The lights above me flickered as my hooves clacked onward into the empty lecture hall, reminding me of how early in the morning it had been. Setting by bags down next to the podium off in the corner of the room, I pulled out a small series of textbooks that I had packed the night before, laying them on top. I walked over to the blackboard and picked up the chalk with magic. Writing down my name in big letters for anypony to see, I went back to the corner and pulled one of the textbooks to read as I waited for time to pass.

It wasn’t long until I heard the passing conversations of students go from the entrance to their seats, and it was even sooner when the school’s first bell rang. Setting my book down once more, I stood up, presenting myself to the class.

“Hello, fillies and gentlecolts,” I greeted in my formal tone. “My name is Twilight Sparkle. I will be your substitute while your teacher is away for these upcoming five weeks.”

Now taking a true look into the crowd of students as I began, the majority of them had been awestricken by my appearance alone. With the raising of a hoof within the small crowd, one of them spoke up. “Are those wings real?”, she said with a squeal. “Are you really Princess Twilight Sparkle?”

“Last time I checked.” Raising my wings and giving a show of my cutie mark, the children continued to squeal in absolute delight, shifting between conversations as the excitement lasted.

“Are you going to teach us any princess-y magic?”, one of them proposed. I guess it wasn’t long until one of those questions popped up.

“Not by my knowledge,” I said, continuing it with a final ‘no’. The excitement within the crowd had died a little as I gave the news, with some giving pouts, but that alone didn’t distract me as I moved on. Bringing in a textbook with telekinesis, I continued.

“Now, off with today’s lesson.”


It wasn’t long until an hour passed. The school bell rang once more, indicating the end of the period. Students had already gotten up with their bags and began shuffling out as I was cut mid-sentence during my lecture. Most of the peers had made their way out into the halls, except for a single student who had still been sitting in her seat, her head down onto her desk. Had she been napping throughout my entire lecture? Hopefully not, since that material had been pretty important.

Trotting up to the student’s desk, her pink hair had covered most of the white fur on her face, her soft, yet audible breathing had indicated that she had been, in fact, sleeping. Shaking her with a hoof, she woke with a drowsy look on her face, giving out a confused ‘huh’ as she glanced around.

“Class is over,” I deadpanned. “Were you sleeping during the entire—”

Shooting up from her seat, she ran off from her desk off into the direction of the halls. “Sorry!” she shouted in haste.

Well, I suppose I was expecting something like this while substitute teaching. Guess each class is going to have at least one slacking pupil.

---

Finishing with the classes after, I walked off to the teacher’s lounge. It’s the first time I’ve ever been in here, since the last time I had made my own appearance at this school was when I, myself, was a student. Grabbing the lunch I had previously put in the fridge, I began to wonder. What was it with that previous student?

In all of the periods after the first, none of them contained anypony with any kind of slacker attitude, at least, that's what I observed. Was it that she was just the one bad apple, I suppose? The thought that someone would enlist into Celestia’s School for Gifted Unicorns and then not even try is something that wasn’t quite possible for my understanding. There could be some kind of ulterior motive to this, or maybe I’m just simply blowing proportions with my imagination.

Repressing the thought, I guess there wasn’t much that I could do if she really was slacking off.

Enjoying the hayburger I had packed, I passed the time thinking of the next lecture being given tomorrow. Unsure whether or not to stay on the current subject and re-evaluate it a little, or move on to the next topic, I opened my school-issued textbook and concluded with the ladder. The class had already lost an entire week due to the school attempting to find a proper substitute teacher, so it was probably for the best that I moved on with a pace.

The doors opened suddenly, with a tall and dark alicorn figure walking through. Setting down my lunch for now, I smiled and greeted.

“Why, hello there, Princess Luna.” Quite unexpecting, to say the least, for her appearance at Celestia’s school, but I suppose she may have arrived to simply ask how my first day here had been.

“Twilight Sparkle,” she greeted with a smile of her own, very much in her regal voice. “It has been moons since we have last spoken to each other. How have you been?”

“Just fine,” I replied as she sat down to the left side of my table.

Pulling out a manila folder that she had kept from view, Luna opened it and laid its contents on the table in front of me.

“Now, I understand that today is only your first day, but have you noticed this student in your first-period classroom?” Luna pointed with a hoof at the picture of the filly in question, her face becoming more recognizable as I stared at her pink and white colors.

“Uh, yeah,” I affirmed. “Actually, she was sleeping through the entire class. I had to wake her up once everypony else had already left.”

Giving a nod and a look back at the papers, Luna continued. “It has come to the attention of my sister that she hasn’t been doing well in her studies, so she sent me to ask for this favor.”

“Her name is Stardust if you didn’t know that already. So far, she has shown exemplary in tests of magic performance, and has absolutely no trouble in replicating some of the more advanced spells from above even her own level.”

“Then what’s the problem?” I interrupted. If she was this well at practicing magic, how is it that she’s having a hard time?

“Well, from what it seems, she’s having difficulty with mostly written and equation portions, dealing on just about every subject.” Pushing over the paper in her grasp, it went over the current status that Stardust has been in according to her studies. So far, it really wasn’t looking good in the slightest. She had received perfect A’s across the board in magical practice, but in just about any other subject, she was either flunking or barely managing to pass.

“If this attitude of hers continues, I’m afraid that she won’t be able to graduate from the school by the end of the year.”

“So, what is it exactly that you want me to do?” I asked. There were only five weeks left in the school year, and I was going to be here throughout, due to the departure of the previous teacher. “Are you asking me to tutor her?”

“Actually, that’s exactly what I’m asking from you. I’m fairly certain that my sister will be quite pleased to see that you’ve saved one of her potential pupils.” Luna gave a smile as she shuffled the contents back into the folder, giving it a close and hoofing it over.

She stood up and with her goodbye, Luna left the room. Checking over the folders that I had been provided with once more, I could only hope for the best from this student.

---

Another lecturing day had passed, and it wasn’t long until the lecture hall had cleared of students, except for the same pink and white pupil who still sat with her head down in her seat. Giving a knock on its wooden surface, she shot up, this time with exceptionally more speed than the last.

“Stardust, we need to talk.”

Letting out a questioning ‘huh’, she glanced around, only to find that the class had been, once again, long abandoned. “About what?” she said, her attention coming back to me.

“You’ve been sleeping during my lectures, that’s what.” My serious voice had made its appearance as I stiffened up. “Do you know what your grade is currently in this class?”

“Uh, not so well, I’m guessing.” Rubbing the back of her mane with a hoof, she broke eye contact as I continued to stare at her. If anything, she reminded me of the fillies back in Ponyville, averting her eyes like that after knowingly being confronted of something she had done wrong. I could possibly see some kind of future for this student.

Releasing some of the tension that had built up within me, I began to give a nonchalant tone within my voice.

“Look,” I began. “I know that whatever you’re doing in your spare time may be important to you, but that doesn’t mean that you should completely shrug off your school work in order to make due for it.”

By now, she had been looking directly down as if she was being punished for doing something bad.

“Don’t you want to graduate?” I continued as she stared at the ground.

Mumbling under her breath, she gave a sigh and went on. “Yeah, it’s just that it’s a little tough, you know?”

“Tough as in you don’t understand it?” I questioned.

“Yeah, after the first couple of months here, I gave up with the whole ‘writing’ stuff and depended mostly on my magic.”

“And you didn’t ask for help?”

A very noticeable pause hung in the air after being asked, only for a soft “no” to sound afterward.

Well, here was her problem. Not only didn’t she understand the material, but she didn’t even try to compensate for her misunderstandings. I’m pretty sure I would easily be able to iron out a few of her problems, given the time. “Well, how about I tutor you, then?”

Her eyes widened by the proposal, once again making eye contact with me. “You’d do that?”

“Absolutely,” I responded. “Now, the current plan that I have for us is to study after school. Are you available?”

Standing up and taking her bags with her, she began walking slowly. “Uh, yeah. It’ll be here, in this classroom, right?”

Responding with an affirmative hum, she began picking up her pace.

“Alright! I’ll be there!”



Stardust comes in later after school and I greet her. Taking her seat in the front row, I approached her with a paper that I had created earlier.

“Take all the time you need.” Walking back to the podium, I levitated my book up once more to continue reading.

As I continued with my reading, the room had been exceptionally quiet. It wasn’t until I got to the next page that I noticed that the room had been a little bit too quiet. Looking past my book, I peered over to Stardust. Her continued glare at the paper and circular rubbing motion to her head clearly indicated that she was having a bit of trouble. Had she been staring at the paper this whole time?

Standing up, I trotted over once more back to Stardust. Her focus completely unbroken, I gave a lean to see that she hadn’t made any kind of progress. “Need help?”

Launching back in her seat in what I assumed was shock, she nodded. Glancing at the paper, the first problem was of the first scientific law of magic, with no input being given by Stardust. Was she really this far behind? I’m surprised that she’s made it this far if she didn’t know something as basic as this.

Reading the first question off from the paper, I looked at Stardust with anticipation as she beat her head.

“Just give me a summary of it,” I stated.

Murmuring to herself, she began. “Something... uh, about how magic manipulates the environment?”

“Almost, but not quite.” Levitating over the textbook that I had my attention on, I opened it to the page in relevance. “The First Law of Magic dictates that no magic is a manifestation of itself, that it is simply the manipulation of the environment around its user.”

Giving her another look, I continued. “Now, what does that mean?”

“That,” she gave a short pause. “Magic can’t be created by nothing, it has to use the energy from the environment in order to gain power?”

“Exactly correct,” I responded. Her smile had still shown, despite obtaining help from me. “Now, the book doesn’t exactly state this, but if you’re an alicorn, you don’t necessarily generate magic from the environment, as there is already a large pool of magic from within.”

“Does that mean that you’re able to do a whole lot of powerful magic?”

“Precisely, but that doesn’t always seem as good as it sounds.”

“Why not?”

“When alicorns are all out of magic from their energy pool, they start collecting it from the environment, which can lead to disastrous effects in the future. Take for example the Everfree Forest.”

Shutting the book, I peered over once more to the second question on the paper. Reading it aloud, I waited with anticipation once more for Stardust to give an answer.

---

The days rolled past as Stardust and I practiced every day after school. She was a bright pupil, honestly. It was only a shame that she hadn’t made herself learn all of this before in her own time.

For the past couple of days, she came in with full attention, not missing a single lecture for a moment of sleep. Although for some days, it was clear that she had been somewhat worn out, but I don’t think that bothered her attitude a whole lot for learning.

Confronting her after class, I just had to ask. “Stardust, are you doing alright?”

“Yeah,” she responds. “Why?”

“It’s just that you look a little bit tired, are you getting enough sleep?”

“Uh, yeah.” Her attention being caught off guard by a yawn, she continued. “Don’t worry about it, I just got caught up in studying. Four weeks left, after all, plus some upcoming tests.”

I suppose that the final exams would cause a great deal of stress to some of the students. When I was attending here, no one that I knew of had to go out of their way to lose sleep on the final, but I guess with her problem being as bad as it was, I could understand.

“I’ll see you after school again, yeah?” She looked back as she walked off into the direction of the halls, her sights still on me.

“Uh, yeah,” I rang. “After school.”

---

Dropping off my bags onto the floor as I arrived home, I quietly carried the stack of test papers that I had not quite finished grading yet. There were only a couple more to go through, so I looked forward to reading a book or two once I finished. Spike hadn’t made the trip with me to Canterlot, as he’s busy keeping calm back at the castle home, so I had hope that no interruptions would come as I was preoccupied.

Settling down, I dumped the ungraded papers onto the desk and began. Most of the students that I’ve graded so far have only made it into the C or B range, with exceptionally few being as high as an A. It had been the same content that I had been learning when I was in Celestia’s school, so it wasn’t all that complex. At least, it wasn’t for me.

Giving another B and making way for the next paper, I had noticed Stardust’s name on top. Beginning my review, I could only hope that the tutoring had gone correctly. Looking from problem to problem, it had surprised me that she only missed one question, and that was most likely due to it being a careless mistake. Writing the big letter ‘A’ on top of her test, I stacked it with the others.

That had probably been the highest grade achieved in the class, surprisingly. I hope that she’ll be able to persist this way through the entire rest of the school year.

---

Another two tests later, Stardust, for the duration of these three weeks, has been on the top of her class throughout. With an intensive amount of lecturing before each test, I guess it was only expected, though, as it was either this or failing, forcing her to redo the entire year again.

And it wasn’t only in my subject that she is showing to perform exceedingly well in. In her failing classes, she’s raised those grades somewhat beyond acceptable. Plus, she’s even got in a couple of extra points onto the topics already being passed.

Waiting in my lecture hall, I read a book to pass the time for Stardust’s arrival. With my upcoming final test in Magic Theory, as well as a few other tests she has within some of her other classes, a lot of time would probably pass until we had finished. There was most certainly a lot of material that we had to go over, and some even twice. I’m not sure exactly how long it would take, but I hoped that we could possibly put a close to it by the beginning of nightfall.

The clock ticked as time passed, me flipping in between pages as I continued with my reading. Looking up from my book, I had noticed that thirty minutes have passed since the end of school. Odd. Shouldn’t Stardust be here by now? Any other time she came to my class for tutoring, she was present within five minutes after the final bell.

Walking over and taking a look outside into the hallways, the school had seemed pretty inactive, with exception of a few students here and there still talking among themselves. With a final glance around, I spot an approaching and once again familiar tall and dark figure. It’s been three weeks since I’ve last seen Princess Luna, so I can only assume she’s dropped by to check on my progress.

“Hello, Princess,” I greeted as she smiled. “Checking up on things so far?”

“Yes, quite. Have you been able to make a breakthrough with Stardust as of yet?”

“Yep,” I proclaimed. “I do have to say, though. She really is a bright pupil, all she needed was a little shove out from her regular environment.”

Murmuring a hum of acknowledgment, Luna continues. “Are you not doing your tutoring today? I would’ve like to see the progress made first hooved.”

“No, I still have tutoring today,” I corrected her.

“Odd, because I saw Stardust going off with a group I assumed was her friends. Did she know about it?”

Well, that explains it. I guess she didn’t think tutoring would be necessary, with how high her grades have been. Oh, I hope she studies when she gets home.

“Actually, she’s supposed to. I’m pretty sure she just forgot today and will make up for it when she gets home,” I lied. We’ve been doing tutoring every day after school, there is absolutely no way she could’ve possibly forgotten.

“Alright, then.” Turning herself, she began walking. “Well, I’m off. See you later, Twilight.”

Saying my goodbyes, I walked back into the lecture hall and grabbed my stuff. With my upcoming test being tomorrow, I could only hope for her best.

---

Passing tests papers around, I announced that they had the entire class period in order to finish. One by one, the students began writing, the sound of pencils scribbled away as I went back to my corner podium to continue reading.

It wasn’t long until the first student had turned in their paper, them being followed by a small series of others. Glancing around from one student to another, I had noticed that a few number of them had stopped writing, most likely in attempt to understand the question being asked. Stopping at Stardust, she also had the same problem as the others. As before, I could only hope for the best.

One the students finally turned in all of their papers, the bell rang, most of them shuffling out in groups as usual. Stardust, who had been surrounded by her own group of friends, was among them. Calling out to her, she turned as I approached.

“Something the matter?” I questioned, trying to get to the root of this.

“With what?” she replied.

“You didn’t arrive for tutoring yesterday, remember?”

“Oh, yeah,” she gave, scratching the back of her mane with a hoof as she averted her eyes. “I was busy.”

Raising a single eyebrow and giving her a look of suspicion, it wasn’t long until I heard a somewhat hushed murmur between the group of friends behind Stardust. “Did you hear that, she’s getting tutored,” one of them giggled. Were they really Stardust’s friends?

“Anyways, I gotta go. See you after school?” Striding off back into her group, they walked out into the hallways, leaving me being left alone once more in the empty classroom.



With the anticipated arrival of Stardust, she sat down, waiting for me to begin the after-school tutoring. Getting up myself, I walked over and placed Stardust’s test grade on her desk, immediately giving her a show of shock and regret. “You didn’t study, did you?” I firmly asked.

The grade itself had been below the class average but was still passing. Although, for Stardust’s situation, a grade as low as this only spelled doom for her in numerous ways.

“I did some number crunching, and the only way you can graduate now is if you hit above the combined ninety-five percentile on your final examination.”

With a gaping mouth, I could already see the shock settling in as she processed it.

“A ninety-five?” she murmured to herself.

Eliciting a hum of affirmation, I continued. “It’s entirely possible, don’t get me wrong. I got a perfect score myself when I was attending.”

From the looks of it, however, she was still settling into the fact that she had sunk this deep with only one test.

“I’ve already arranged a plan that we can work out together if you’re still wanting to succeed.” Putting on my own smile, Stardust shot back up from her short depression.

“Please, Twilight. I’m willing to do anything at this point!”

“Calm down, Stardust.” Her franticness alone would be enough to set her off shy a point from that ninety-five percentile. “I’m thinking that you will be able to pass, only if we do a three-day study session during the weekend.”

“Like, I come over to your house and we study there?”

“Not quite what I’m thinking. My plan is that you sleep over and we go from morning to night.”

“Well, alright.” She thought about it for a minute, most likely to weigh her options. “I’m not sure though if my parents are willing for me to do something like this.”

“Oh, don’t worry about that. I’ve already contacted them. They readily accepted once they heard who it was from.”
Walking back and grabbing my bag, I looked once more to Stardust. “You ready?”

“We’re going right now?” she asked.

“The earlier we get started, the more sleep we’ll get. Now come on.”

Standing up and grabbing her own bag, Stardust followed as I walked out into the hallway.



The walk had been a short one from the school to my Canterlot residence. Still living in the tower that I had once lived in as a student of Princess Celestia, it alone was enough to give a short round of awe through Stardust as we approached. The inside was pretty big, I’d have to admit. Certainly larger than that of a normal household in Canterlot.

“How many books do you have?” she questioned upon entering the second-floor library, the number of books stacking as high as she could see.

“Somewhere around three thousand to four thousand,” I replied. It’s been quite a while since the last time I reorganized the bookshelves in here, so I wasn’t sure of the exact amount. “This is only one-fourth of my collection, though. The rest of my books are in Ponyville.”

“Have you read all of these?”

“No, not quite. There are still a few that I haven’t looked at yet, but I’ll get to them eventually.”

With Stardust still gazing around in admiration, I had sat down my bags of into the corner of the room. Grabbing her attention, she did the same and waited for instruction from me.

“Alright,” I began. “Now with the final examination coming up, do you know what type of material is going to be on it?”

“I’ve heard some things from the others, but not much.”

“Well, the final examination is split into two portions. First, there is a written test, which will range between all of the subjects you are currently taking right now, as well as a few others on subjects from previous years. Secondly, there is an examination test, where you are given a random assignment on magic, and you are to find yourself the right spells to use in order to achieve the given task.”

Really, I shouldn’t have been telling her information on how the final examination was going to turn out since I’m pretty sure I could possibly get fired for doing something like this. Though, in the security of my home, I decided to take chance.

“What assignment were you given?” she interrupted.

“I was given the task to hatch a dragon egg.”

“Really?” she buzzed in excitement. “A real dragon egg?”

“Yep. And don’t get me wrong, they make it a lot harder than it looks. I had only succeeded by a freak accident.”

“Do you think they’ll give me a dragon egg too?” Her eyes were filled with excitement already as I imagined somepony like her with a baby dragon.

“Actually, I’m hoping that they don’t give you something as hard as that,” I sincerely responded, hoping not to crush her dreams.

“Why is that?”

“Well, we’re wanting you to pass, remember? The examination portion is overall worth twenty percent of the final examination itself,” I stated. “Also, most grown unicorns aren’t even capable of doing a feat such as that.”

Her face went into a state of dread by the sound of that, her dreams, being what I imagine, crushed by the reminder, as unavoidable as it was.

Moving onto the next topic, I pulled out one of the notebooks from my collection and placed it in Stardust’s telekinetic grip. “This is the notebook that I wrote in when I was attending Celestia’s School for Gifted Unicorns. I wrote everything that I had noticed in detail, so I’m pretty sure that if you get stuck while doing some kind of problem during the tutoring, we can turn to one of those pages in order to get another explanation of it.

Opening the notebook to a random page, Stardust looked on to the many calculations and drawings that I had made within the numerous pages. “I can’t read your writing,” she deadpanned, trying to squint for a better view.

Only a little slightly embarrassed, I turned her attention back to me and we continued.



The day had passed significantly faster than what I had expected, although we did get through a large number of topics within the time span. With demonstrations to show the properties of different types of magic, it had gone significantly faster than what we would have been able to do at school. With magic being restricted there, due to the cause of it providing a high amount of obstruction during class, magic at my house had become commonplace between the two of us, sometimes with me doing a spell three or four times over in order for Stardust to perfect it herself.

After many hours of studying, however, the two of us had gotten quite hungry. I hadn’t packed anything in the fridge, despite being the one arranging the plan of home studying, so during our short break, I peered over to Stardust for her opinion on what she wanted.

---

While I didn’t initially agree to going out for doughnuts and ice cream for dinner, Stardust was, to say the least, determined in her efforts. Opening the doors to Donut Joe’s, we took a seat next to the window and looked at the menu, doughnut appetizers, doughnut entrees, and doughnut desserts being seen from the entire two pages.

With Donut Joe himself coming around, he greeted me by name and took our orders. Walking back behind the counter, Stardust stroke up a conversation.

“So, Twilight, what is it exactly that you do in Ponyville?”

Propping my attention back up, I focused once again on the filly in front of me. “I’m the Princess of Friendship,” I responded.

“So, you go around fixing friendships?” she proposed.

“Not only that, but I also help strengthening friendships, and even sometimes help fix larger scale problems across Equestria.”

With a look of dread coming off of Stardust, I began to worry. Was something the matter?

“Why, do you need some friendship advice of your own?” I voiced up, waiting until I see a nod come from Stardust.

“Well, it’s about the group I hang around with sometimes after school,” Stardust began after the doughnuts and drinks had arrived at the table.

“It was the end of the last school year when I met them, and I’ve been hanging around them ever since. I hadn’t even noticed that my grades had been taking an effect until earlier this year once school started again. Every day they’re doing some kind of cool thing, they’ve even showed me a lot on what life around here had to offer, outside from the average Canterlot suburbs.”

“So, you’re afraid that if you leave them, that you won’t be able to live a life like that anymore?”

Laying her head on the table, she continued to pout as she went on. “No, not exactly. I think that if I leave them, I’m pretty sure that my life won’t be as fun anymore. None of the other fillies around here are anywhere near like them, and the students here in Celestia’s School for Gifted Unicorns are focused mostly on studying.”

“But still, you recognize that they’re putting a strain on your work?”

“Well, yeah,” she confirmed. “But it’s hard to determine which to go for.”

“Stardust, I know exactly what kind of position you would be in if you were to leave out your friends to focus on your studies,” I said in a very compassionate tone. “What you have to focus on, mostly, is moderation between the two. You can’t focus entirely on one while completely putting off the other, and that is true with most things in life. What you need to do is clearly define which days you’re available and which days you aren’t.”

“Yeah, I guess,” she agreed.

“If I were you, I would focus my weekdays on studying, and spend the entirety of the last two days with my friends.”

Putting my view on the pastries that had been laid in front of us, I grabbed one and looked at Stardust. “Well, go on,” I said. “You wanted doughnuts and ice cream.”

Leaving Stardust alone for a while, I noticed that she had still been thinking about it in her head. Probably rerunning possible scenarios with her and her friends. I was the same as her when I was her age, except with thinking about my friends, I was instead thinking of my studies.

“Hey, Stardust,” I chant, grabbing the attention of the filly across from me. “Want to see a neat trick?”

Grabbing my ice cream cone in a telekinetic grip, I levitated it and emitted a short flash. Once the light from it had dissipated, I lowered it back into Stardust’s direct view and released it onto the table. The once ice cream had now formed into a light marble, completely solid throughout.

A small and curious look had grown from Stardust, immediately questioning how I had done something as this. “How did you turn it into marble?” she asked.

“Well, don’t you remember the First Law of Magic?” I asked. She rubbed her head as she tried to remember, but even I had trouble remembering it from word to word.

“The First Law of Magic dictates that no magic is a manifestation of itself,” I recanted. “That it is simply the manipulation of the environment around its user.”

Slowly, the pieces began to form within her brain, clearly shown throughout on her face. “But, what did you manipulate it from?”

Giving off a sly smile, I pointed upward with a hoof. A portion of the ceiling had shifted from its original white marble look into a drooping plop of ice cream, barely managing to hang on to the ceiling. With a drop of ice cream falling as Stardust looked up, it landed on the tip of her muzzle as she jolted back in shock.

Even though trying to hold it back, a small giggle came from me as I had watched the drop spread. In the middle of it, though, Stardust dotted the tip of her hoof with ice cream from her muzzle, giving a small boop onto my own as I failed to pay attention. Now with me frantically giggling, she went back to her seat and began to giggle herself.

---

Conversations had started to die once the first bell rang, indicating the start of the first period. Setting my book down and levitating a stack of papers, I announced to the classroom that we would start with the first portion of the final examinations. Calling by name, I gave the appropriate papers to each student and went back to the podium.

Three hours had passed in the extended classroom, and I had gone through two other books during the wait. Peering up to the students every so often to ensure that none of them were cheating, despite everyone being given a different arrangement of subjects within their packet, I noticed that, once again, a few number had been stuck on some of the questions provided. I had absolutely no idea what was in their packets, as they were provided by the school board, so I could only hope for the best for each and every one of them.

Eventually, the final student had finished. Setting the stack down on the floor beside the podium, I reached for a separate, yet much smaller stack of papers and presented them to the class. Conversations had already erupted, but I pacified them as I began talking to gain the attention of the pupils.

“Now, for the examination portion of your final exam,” I began, “each one of you will be given a different task that you will have to figure out how to complete. You all will be given a three-hour time frame to determine the fastest, safest, and overall most optimized way to encountering the situation.”

With a hoof raising among the small crowd, one of them rang out. “Can we talk with each other?”

“Yes,” I replied. “Everyone can talk among each other for the best possible outcome, but just remember, they don’t have your assignment.”

Before I could even finish, the crowd of students started rearranging themselves to form groups with their friends. Starting to pass out the papers by name, it wasn’t long until I arrived at Stardust’s name. I had become curious as to what she was going to get, so I peered over and—

Dragon egg.

It had been a short while until I fully registered that my mind was in complete shock. Out of all the sample examinations that could’ve been given, Stardust had to be the one student in the entire school to be given the task to hatch a dragon egg?

Deciding to get rid of it before I lost my posture, I deposited the paper into Stardust’s possession, giving her a look of determination as she looked back with surprise. Passing the rest of the papers around, I picked up the stack of packets on the floor and walked into the hallway.

Once each classroom had finished with it’s written portion of the final examination, the packets were to be delivered to the principal’s office for delivery to the school board. Knocking on the door, I let myself in, settling the stack next to several other stacks that had accumulated on the floor.

“Princess Twilight Sparkle,” Principal Cinch greeted. “It’s once again nice to see one of my prized pupils.”

Averting my attention from the stack, I greeted my former principal.

“I suppose everything is going nicely?” she asked, readjusting her purple glasses.

“Nothing of the unusual,” I responded. “However, do you know of the student who was given the task of the dragon egg this year?”

“Excuse me, I haven’t yet looked at the assignment roster for this year. Mrs. Hawthorn, the teacher you filled in for, hasn’t been responding to any of my letters.”

“Oh,” I responded. “Is she in trouble?”

“None that I know of. Although, knowing her personality, I’m pretty sure she’s just a little bit inconvenienced at the moment.”

“Well, it’ll be good to hear from her soon.” Making way for the door, I opened it and looked back. “Nice seeing you, Principal Cinch.”

“Nice seeing you too.”



The front courtyard of the school had filled with students and parents, all waiting for their turn to come up in the examination. As it was the same for me, I had my parents watch as I was doing my final examination. With the crowd of at least two hundred families stockpiling on the courtyard of the school entrance, it had easily become quite loud, so, as always, the names of the upcoming students were announced by megaphone.

My job was to bring the students in my homeroom class from the courtyard to inside my lecture hall once their number had come up, where examiners waited for the arrival of the pupil. Walking with a pace down the halls, I met up with my favorite sunbutt teacher.

“Princess Celestia!” I exclaimed, already noticing my own glee from seeing her once again.

“Twilight,” she greeted. “I didn’t expect your appearance here.”

That line stroked me a bit funny. “You didn’t expect me here?” I asked, giving a puzzled look to Celestia.

“No,” she stated.

“Haven’t you heard anything from Luna about me?” Most certainly she had to talk about me at least once.

“None that I recall.”

Okay, that’s a bit odd.

“The only thing Luna talks about with this school is of one of her potential pupils,” the Princess continued. “Do you know a little filly by the name of Stardust?”

“Actually, I’ve been tutoring her for the past five weeks,” I reply.

“Oh, really now?” Knowing Celestia, that was most likely be a topic of interest, and when she made that tone, it was certain that she would be investigating further into the subject later on.

“Stardust, if you hadn’t already known, is a potential pupil that Luna has been looking at for quite some time now. Luna has already talked plenty about her, saying how she’s capable of fully dream walking from one host to another. I believe she’s even become captivated in her personality as well.”

Princess Luna, being a teacher? That could work out, I’d imagine, but it would be a little interesting to see how that plays out.

“Anyways, Princes, I’m off to get Stardust right now for her examination. Do you wish to come?”

“I’ll catch up to you later, Twilight. First I have to drop by the principal’s office for a short moment.” With that, Princess Celestia started off down the hall.

“Be seeing you, Princess!” I said, seeing her off.



Once Stardust and her family had made their way to the lecture hall doors, I revealed the inside, only for four slightly impatient examiners and a dragon egg to be waiting on the other side. The dragon egg itself had been laid inside a cart of hay, different in color than the purple egg that Spike had been hatched from.

Getting into position, Stardust looked at her parents, and then at me. Giving off a motion to smile with my hoof, Stardust’s grin had shown momentarily, until the third examiner spoke up. “You may start now, Ms. Dust. Please do remember that this is timed.”

Taking a look from left to right of the egg, it wasn’t a long time until Stardust had fired off her horn. From the looks of it, she had been trying to use brute force to open the egg, the same mistake I did during my examination.

Figuring out that force alone wasn’t going to be enough to work, Stardust averted her methods to different types of magic. Some spells giving off immense light from it’s casting, some even unknown to my knowledge. Where exactly did she learn to do this many spells, and how was it that she was performing them perfectly in execution at that age?

The examiners had been busy scribbling away on their clipboards, paying attention to every detail that had occurred between Stardust and the egg. Her parents had been watching anxiously for the egg to start shattering at any moment. Stardust, herself, had started to show fatigue from all of the spellcasting that she had been doing.

Giving off a spectacular light show with her horn, the spell she had counted on charging now had flared with its long cast time. The glow around her horn had started to slowly build in size. How much magic was she intending to use on this one spell? With the spell still building in size, the words no one had expected to hear were uttered.

“That’s time.”

Plopping onto the floor in complete exhaustion, Stardust laid there, covering her face. Her parents walked over to her and consoled her, taking a moment until they began talking among themselves. Watching upon their conversation, someone else had started to speak from behind me.

“Did you teach her those array of spells, Twilight?”

Turning around, the tall figure of Princess Celestia had stood there, positioned next to Princess Luna.

“Those were as much as a shock to me, Princess Celestia.” I honestly haven’t even seen a quarter of those spells being done before.

“Maybe she’s a lot more interesting than I thought of prior,” Princess Luna had stated, her eyes focused on the filly still in the middle of the lecture hall.



With the closure of the day, plenty of families had made their exit from the school. I had my bags strapped and ready for departure. Walking out through the front door of Celestia’s School for Gifted Unicorns for the last time this year, the color of a pink mane and white fur caught my attention from the corner of my eye.

“Stardust?” I called out, her head turning to see me. “Why didn’t you go home with your parents?”

Averting her head back to the ground, Stardust continued, clearly still bummed out by her whole performance. “I wanted to stay so I can talk to some of my friends, so they went home ahead of me after meeting some other parents.”

Sitting next to her on the school stairs, I wrapped my hoof around her and pulled her into an embrace. “You still don’t know if the results of the final examination, Stardust. There’s no way to know if you passed or not.”

“But I ran out of time!” she exclaimed. Yeah, it was true that she did run out of time.

Deciding to finally lay all of my knowledge down to Stardust, I began. “The main purpose of the final examination isn’t to see if students are able to do a certain task, Stardust. It’s about finding their magical abilities, what they’re strong in and what they’re weak in, and how each student can be assessed as an individual. Some of the spells you performed even baffled Princess Celestia!”

“Does that mean I passed?” Stardust sniffled.

“Once we get the results, we’ll know for sure.”

A moment of silence had passed between the two of us, with Stardust quietly sniffling between intervals. Looking at her directly, she had most definitely seen better days.

“If you want,” I began, “I can find you another teacher. I already know a specific someone who could possibly fit the bill.”

“Who’s that?”

“She’s had her eye on you for quite a while, would you like to meet Princess Luna?”

Locking her gaze into mine in shock, she gave a short pause, attempting to reorganize her brain before replying. “You can do that?” she asked. “You can get Princess Luna to be my teacher?”

“Certainly,” I responded. Looking up into the sky, I saw the blue figure approaching towards us. Stardust had looked as well and had been completely awestricken by the appearance of Princess Luna’s landing.

Standing up, I walked over to the Princess and greeted her, with her greeting me back.

“What brings you back here?” I ask, her appearance even being somewhat of a shock for me.

“Well, I wanted to talk to Stardust myself once this was all over, except I hadn’t found her until now.” Glancing over to Stardust, she had continued. “I suppose you found her first?”

Motioning Stardust over, she trotted down the stairs and stood in front of Princess Luna, her mouth still gaped from awe.

“Ms. Dust,” Luna starts. “How would you like to be my student?”

It hadn’t taken long for her brain to connect the pieces this time, as she started hopping from one leg to the other in complete glee. Eliciting plenty of loud noises of what I assumed was happiness, she finished with a wide grin and sparkling eyes as she looked at the princess.

“Now, how about the three of us go for some doughnuts and ice cream?”