The sun shined throughout Equestria, symbolizing a new day thanks to the glorious Princess Celestia. In the little town of Ponyville, a purple unicorn was stirring from her sleep. She slowly sat up in her bed, giving a rather big yawn and stretching out her hooves to her sides. She sat her hooves in front of her and smiled.
"Mmm... Good morning, Spike," she cheerfully mumbled, "Ready to start the daily chores? I have the greatest idea about how to re-organize the library! We're finally going to have a section for all those books on the history of the production of cotton!" Things stayed silent for a couple of minutes, before Twilight realized she wasn't going to be getting a response. She glanced over towards Spike's bed to find the little assistant missing.
Twilight quickly got out of her bed and headed towards the door, deciding to her ignore her unkempt and messy mane. "Twilight, you're overreacting! Spike is probably just downstairs having an early breakfast!" She happily bounded down the stairs and headed towards the kitchen, only to find... nothing. "S-spike?" she called out in a worried voice. "Spike, are you okay? Where are you?" She was stopped short of her desperate pleads for an answer when she heard a loud crashing noise in the bathroom. She gasped loudly, and ran as fast as she could to the bathroom. "Spike, is that you? Are you oka- SPIKE?!" Twilight stopped in her tracks at the thing she was staring at.
"Twi... Twilight!" he cried, rubbing his face in disbelief. What she was looking at surely resembled her beloved assistant, except it was vastly different at the same time. Spike was... larger, so to speak. He looked like he did back during the incidence when he let greed get the best of him, but he was less... gangly. His voice was also much deeper than the cute, squeaky voice she was used to. Twilight took a step back and shook her head.
"You haven't been hoarding stuff again, have you?" she asked in calm voice, with a hint of anger and confusion lingering in the air. Spike just shook his head at the question, which completely confused Twilight in every fashionable reason. She had little knowledge on dragons, and this didn't make sense worth the slightest. "I... don't understand. Yesterday I was practicing the aging spell, but I made sure not to get near you while I was doing it! Did you do anything suspicious last night?" she gave him a questionable yet intimidating stare.
"I... I don't know! I came home after finishing the chores you had assigned me, but that's about it. I swept the library and ate this really cool gem I found lying on one of the shelves before I went to bed..." he sobbed. "I don't want to be like this... What if I kidnap Rarity again?" Twilight sighed, rubbing a hoof to her forehead.
"Well, I don't see how any of that could've... Wait, you ate a gem you found on the shelf?" Spike nodded. "That's gotta be it, then! I tried using the spell several times, even on a gem. It didn't seem to work, though, so I had left the gem lying on the shelf. If only I had remembered you eat gems..." she murmured. Her face suddenly went from one of disdain to one of pleasure. "But, this is amazing at the same time! That means I can preform the aging spell on certain things, it just takes a while to make an effect! It must have started to take effect while you were digesting, which is how you ended up like this in the first place!"
Spike let out an audible groan of annoyance. "Yeah, yeah... But how do you change me back? This just feels wrong... I've got all these weird, disturbing thoughts in my head that I didn't have as a baby dragon." Twilight tapped a hoof to her chin as she circled around the dragon.
"I suppose aging has changed your thought process a bit to match a teenage dragon. Funny, seeing as this was never mentioned in the book written by Starswirl The Bearded. Then again, he never did test it on anything but plants, for the most part. Who knows what kind of reaction a pony could get from it? Or from that matter, a dragon?" she concluded her sentence by stopping in front of Spike and looking at him. "Unfortunately, I don't think I have the power to reverse this at the time. I could send a letter to the Princess and ask for her input on this, as well as going to Zecora to talk about it. For now, though, you're stuck in this form."
"Great. I'm going through puberty twice. I can't wait for the third time!" Spike said in a sarcastic voice. He crossed his arms over his chest in a disapproving manner. "Sometimes, I really regret this whole assistant thing. Maybe if I had stayed with the Princess in Canterlot I wouldn't be going around destroying towns and stealing things."
Twilight shook her head. "But Spike, you wouldn't have made all the amazing friends you have right now! You probably would've been stuck helping Celestia with her daily chores, and nopony besides her and Luna really know what that's like... Or, you could be turned into a guard! What would you think of that? Then again... you could get to know Shining Armor and Cadence better, seeing as you aren't really acquainted with them. I guess that would be a good thing when you think about it... But we'd miss you! ...I wonder if Celestia and my brother miss you? Oh... now I feel bad! Maybe you should've stayed in Canterlot...!"
"TWILIGHT!" Spike shouted, interrupting Twilight's thought process. "I think I get it... I don't need you to stand there for two hours thinking about the good and the bad out of me coming to Ponyville... or me staying in Canterlot. I'm here right now, and that's all that really concerns me... well, next to this whole "I'm as old as you now" thing." He sighed, looking around the library, knowing he would probably have to help Twilight with it all day. It filled him with disgust and a hint of sadness. Twilight, as if reading his mind, thought of something to fix it.
"Hmm... Why don't you go run a few errands for me outside instead of helping me with the library? I don't think keeping you cooped up inside all day is going to make you any happier than you already are. Most ponies will know that this is probably my fault, anyway, considering you aren't acting nearly as strange as you were the first time this happened." she trotted towards the door, and opened it. When Spike walked over to where she was, she used her magenta-colored magic to levitate a list over to him and smiled. "Have fun!"
"...I can try," he grumbled, slamming the door shut behind him. Twilight turned her attention back to the library and smiled.
"All right, let's get shelving!" she said excitedly.