//------------------------------//
// The Letter 
// Story: The Epic Journey 
// by JerryTheHouseGhost 
//------------------------------//

	Twilight Sparkle awoke to the usual fire alarm noise. Wait, that's not very usual. Twilight jumped out of her bed and ran into the kitchen. What she found was also not usual: Spike was cooking some weird-looking green stuff in the oven, and it was flying out at him due to the extreme heat. It smelled rather familiar, but Twilight couldn't quite remember what it was.

"Spike? What is that?"

"Oh, good morning Twilight! I didn't expect you up for another thirty minutes or so. I was just fixing you some breakfast when this stuff started flying out of the oven. Can you believe that!?!?"

Twilight just stared at the little purple dragon with a glare.

"You weren't woken up by that alarm, were you?"

Twilight responded very sarcastically, "No, I woke up because of the silence."

"Yeah, uh, sorry about that."

"How did it even go off?" Twilight asked. She looked around the kitchen and spotted a box on the counter. The box had a picture of some tasty-looking pancakes on it. That was what she smelled. Pancakes. There definitely weren't any pancakes in sight. The box also had a warning label on it that read: "Do not put this pancake mix into an oven. It will turn green and violently explode out of said oven, resulting in a very hot mess and causing fire alarms to go crazy and other weird stuff like that."

"I guess I missed that," said Spike as the green ooze was sliding down his body.

"Just clean this up. I'll make myself some oatmeal."

Just as Twilight finished the oatmeal, there was a knock at the door. She wondered who it might be. Twilight made her way to the door. The purple pony opened it and was surprised to see that it was none other than: Nopony. Twilight looked around, confused, then remembered that the door that had just been opened was the closet door, and walked over to the front door and proceeded to opened it. She was surprised to see that it was none other than: Nopony. There was, however, an envelope resting right in front of her. The purple unicorn picked it up with her magic and walked back inside, closing the door behind her. She was very suspicious of the envelope; it had no return address, which made her very hesitant to open it herself. Thoughts of all of the possibilities of the contents the envelope held went through her head. It could be a regular letter, it could be a birthday card, it could also be the electricity bill. Twilight was about to open the envelope until the thought of another possibility shot into her head: what if it is a trap! "Spiiiiiike! Come open this letter for me; it might be a trap, so I don't want to open it myself!"

"Coming!" Twilight heard Spike yell back. It wasn't unusual for her to have Spike open letters. Whenever she thought the letter might be rigged, Spike was always given the task of opening it. She heard the pitter-patter of Spike running towards her. The noise of Spike running went on for several seconds. He finally appeared in the doorway.

"It took you long enough, Spike! I almost decided to open it myself, but then I remembered that I don't want to die." Spike took the envelope into his hands. He looked at it carefully, held it up to the light, and then sniffed it. He took one of his claws and carefully cut open the envelope. There were no traps to be seen. "Oh look, silly me! There were no traps! Maybe I shouldn't be so paranoid anymore... Or maybe that's what they want me to do! Oh, never-mind." Twilight took the letter out of the envelope and opened it up. She began to read it aloud.

"Dear my Dearest Twilight Sparkle,
If you are reading this, that means that you received my letter. Congratulations. It also means that I am in need of your assistance. If you would so kindly come see me, I will explain to you why I need you and what I require you to do. I expect you no later than... Uh.... Nevermind, just get here as soon as you can. There isn't really a time limit on what I need you to do. But don't take too long, it would be rather rude to make me have to wait for a very long time. Just so you don't forget where I reside, I have attached a map that shows my location. Follow the directions that I have put on the map, and you will eventually find me.
Yours truly,"

"Are you kidding me!?!? They said 'Yours truly' but didn't even sign the name!?!? WHO ARE YOU!?!?" Twilight was furious because whoever sent the letter clearly did not know how to properly end it. Twilight remembered that the letter stated that there would be a map attached to it. She looked on the back, in the envelope, and on the floor. Nothing. "Oh come on! First you can't properly end this letter, and then you-" Twilight stopped when she saw it. It was at the very bottom of the page, below the improper ending of the letter.


map.jpeg


Twilight just looked straight ahead after reading that. She looked into the distance, which wasn't very far because there was a wall right in front of her. Spike noticed what was happening. "Is something wrong, Twilight?" Twilight didn't answer for a very long time, and just continued to stare at the wall for a good ten more seconds before any answer. The infuriated pony looked down at the letter.

"Whoever sent this letter will wish they never did this. I will somehow find them, do whatever it is they want me to do, and then I will destroy them with a lecture SO HARD." And with that, Twilight told Spike to stay with the library as she left to go get her friends. Twilight was going to travel as much as she had to find this pony, and definitely wasn't going to do it all alone. She was going to get her friends to go with her on this journey to find the pony who sent the letter. Even if her friends had other things planned, they were going to be taken along anyway.