//------------------------------//
// Chapter One 
// Story: Primitive Keeper 
// by MariusAngelicaSue 
//------------------------------//

	"Is everything ready, Spike?"
"I think so, Twilight, but are you sure this is a good idea?"
Twilight looked at the baby dragon. "Don't worry Spike, this is all safe. It won't hurt at all."
Spike looked at her incredulously, but sighed and continued fiddling with buttons on the machine. Twilight sat in a stool, a metal helmet with multiple lights sticking out was placed on her head. There were many cords plugged to it, and they stretched all the way to many machines that were filling the room, which also had multiple lights blinking. One of the machines showed off a large, inactive screen.  At the moment, Spike had just about prepared everything for Twilight's brain scan, and he was only messing with some cords at this point.  
"Remind me why you've got all this science stuff on you?" He asked behind one of the machines. 
Twilight rolled her eyes. "I told you already Spike, I'm going to scan my brain to detect any anomalies."
"Anoma-what?"
"Well, Spike, recently there's been something...odd, with my brain, and I'm scanning it to find out more."
"Huh? What kind of odd?"
"Well..." Twilight scratched her leg in discomfort. "I've been hearing a voice."
"What!" Spike looked over the machine, shock in his eyes. "You've gone crazy?"
"No, of course not!" Twilight replied, waving her hooves around. "I'm not going crazy. It's possible I may be having some auditory hallucinations, so I'm scanning my brain to find out if I've got some sort of damage to cause it, such as a mental illness or some sort of physical damage. Understand?"
"Uh...."
Twilight gave a small sigh. She had to remember that she had to simplify things with him. "Hearing voices doesn't make you crazy, and I'm looking at my brain to see if there's anything wrong."
"Oh, alright then." Spike still looked unsure, but he turned back down to resume whatever he was doing. "But why didn't you tell me this before you started telling me to hook up all of this weird stuff to you?"
"I want to try scanning my brain when I'm hearing the voice, so when I started hearing it this morning, I needed to get hooked up fast." Twilight rubbed her chin with her hoof. "Setting up all of this did take longer than expected, though, so the voice quieted down." She shrugged. "I suppose we'll have to just wait for it to come back. 
"O-kay then." Spike got up and looked at her. "When did you start hearing it?"
Twilight smiled. "I heard it after it woke me up, at about 2:37 AM. I've been trying to study it since then, but I needed some assistance with this machinery, and you haven't woken up until now."
"I suppose that explains why you look so under slept. You know, you should take a bit more care of yourself. Anyways, what else is there about the voice?"
Twilight looked off to the side, trying to remember more. "I know that it seems to appear in episodes, and that it's a foal's voice."
"How come?"
"I'm not sure, which is why I want to scan my brain. Are you done preparing everything?"
"Yep!"
"Alright, then, I want you to stay quiet, while we wait for the voice to come back."
"Aw, what? We just have to stand around and wait?"
"Yes, Spike, I need to make sure that I'll be able to hear the voice when it comes, so right now we need to be quiet."
Twilight closed her eyes, and sat still in her stool, while Spike gave a small sigh and crossed his arms, but he stayed silent as well. The two sat there, eerily quiet, listening to the rumbling of the machines. It wasn't until a couple minutes later Twilight's eyes snapped wide open.
Hee, hee!
"I hear it! Quick, Spike, activate the scanner!"
Spike's spines shot up from the urgency in Twilight's voice, and he hopped up to the machine, grabbed a long lever in his claws, and pulled down with all his might. All at once the machines began to whir and shake with energy, the lights on the helmet lighting up and blinking. Spike called out to Twilight. "Is the voice still there?" He had to shout over all of the noise the machines were making. Instinct made Twilight perk her ears up to try and hear it.
Boom! Zap! Hee, hee hee!!
"Yep! It's still going!" Twilight responded. She grinned, as she imagined the results of the scans. She wondered what she would discover. Would it be some sort of strange form of magic? Or would it really be just an auditory hallucination? Either, way, Twilight was eager to find out.
The screen on one of the machines blinked on, and Spike turned towards it to see a picture begin uploading, bit by bit. More sparks flew from the cords as more and more of the picture was showing an image of Twilight's brain, when suddenly...
CRASH!!
A multi-colored blur smashed through the ceiling and landed in the center of the room, sending crystal shards everywhere. Twilight looked up from her hooves to see the room in an absolute mess, with a large hole stretching from the ceiling to the wall. The machines were destroyed, the screen cracked and broken. The helmet she was wearing was dented, and several of the lights on it were in pieces. She tossed it off her head.
Whup!
There, lying in the center of a small crater in the middle of the room, was Rainbow Dash. She groaned and got up, and looked around. Twilight gave a small glare. "Rainbow Dash! You can't keep crashing in my home!"
Rainbow looked at her with confusion and surprise. "You have to be careful! Somepony could get hurt by all this!"
"Uh, Twilight..." Rainbow tried to interrupt, but Twilight continued with an angry sigh.
"And look at all this stuff you just destroyed!" She stamped her hoof. "We were in the middle of something very important, you know!"
"Twilight!" Rainbow shouted, grabbing her, and snapping the unicorn from her rant. Twilight blinked, and breathed. "Right, sorry." Twilight looked around the room. "Where's Spike?"
Rainbow turned as she watched Twilight gallop to the other side of the room, digging through the crystal. "Spike?" she called. A groan emerged from a pile of crystal, and Twilight looked to see Spike rising from it, a little disoriented, but otherwise fine. "Are you alright?"she asked. Spike simply nodded, holding his head. 	 
Twilight turned back to look at Rainbow Dash, an eyebrow raised in anger. "Rainbow, I thought you were out of this little habit. This can't keep happening, especially with such a large crystal castle." Twilight emphasized as she pointed outside, through the large hole in the wall. There, a large crystal chunk had fallen off the castle thanks to Rainbow's crash landing, though thankfully there weren't any houses very close by. Other ponies were already sticking their heads out of the doors to figure out what the commotion was. 
Rainbow Dash anxiously trotted in place. "Look, I-I know, Twilight. But I swear that it wasn't my fault for the crash!"
Twilight raised an eyebrow. "Really?"
"Yeah! I was just flying by, doing some cool stunts, when all of a sudden my wings wouldn't move, and I just fell!" Rainbow said, indignant. 
Twilight rubbed her chin. "Is that true?" Rainbow nodded. Twilight looked up through the hole in the ceiling. Opening her wings, she flew through, looking around. 
"I don't see anything around that could make you crash, Rainbow." She called down as she searched for something, like a change in heat, a bit of wind, anything that could explain Rainbow's story. Poison joke? No, Rainbow's wings look fine. Was there a sudden change in weather? Twilight looked at her surroundings, but no other pegasi were nearby. She racked her brain, trying to come up with some sort of reason. She was so caught up she barely heard Rainbow shouting something from below.
"You think that it might be Discord?"
Twilight's eyes widened, then facehoofed for not thinking  Of course! Who else could do something like control Rainbow's wings! "Alright then Rainbow, let's talk to Discord!" Twilight turned her head to where Fluttershy's cottage was in the distance. And with that, the princess began to fly there.
That is, until she realized that Rainbow Dash wasn't following her. Twilight looked back at the castle, and flew back to the hole. "Aren't you coming?" she called. 
Rainbow scratched the back of her head. "I don't really want to admit it, but my wings are still pretty stiff. I don't think I can fly with 'em."
Twilight tilted her head to the side, shrugged, and descended to walk through the castle with Rainbow. 


==============


Fluttershy's cottage wasn't too far off as the pair trotted through Ponyville. The town was pretty busy as usual, and a few ponies waved. "So, what are we gonna do when we finally talk to Discord?" Rainbow Dash asked, waving back to one of the ponies. 
"Well, we're going to make sure he doesn't do it again. That kind of act is dangerous." Twilight spoke, her gaze set on the cottage. "Once that's solved, I'll be getting back to my study-"
There was a scream. 
Twilight and Rainbow froze. The two looked at the cottage, and began galloping towards where they had heard Fluttershy's shriek.