//------------------------------// // Chapter 1 // Story: Why you don't use a CERTAIN thing on April Fool's Day // by CrossRedstone //------------------------------// “Twilight, I have known you for my entire life, minus six months or so. And for all the time I have known you, this is the stupidest thing you have ever done!” “Oh, come on Spike. What could possibly go wrong?” “Now you jinxed it.” ------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------ Sunset looked down at her phone, frowning a little. She put the thing away and readjusted her bag on her shoulders, before heading outside of the school building. Outside walking down the road, she found Rainbow Dash with her guitar case on her back. Quickly the former Equestrian caught up to the athlete. “Dash, wait up!” Rainbow turned her head, finding Sunset Shimmer running towards her, until they were side to side to each other. “Hey Sun. What’s up?” The rainbow haired teenager asked. “Did you get the message from Twi?” Sunset asked. “Yeah. Wonder what’s up? She’s been missing for a week.” “Last I heard from her mom is, she caught something bad. Maybe she’s finally feeling good enough for us to come over and wants us to visit.” “Cool. AJ’s on her way already. Have you seen Fluttershy, Rarity and Pinkie Pie?” “I think they’re at Twilight’s already or at least should. They had the last period off.” As it turned out, Rarity, Fluttershy and Pinkie had met up with Applejack at the place Pinkie Pie worked and were waiting for the other two to arrive. After quickly meeting up, they went to the next best bus station, since Twilight lived way inside the city. After a thirty minute drive, the six finally arrived at the right house. It was actually the first time of them visiting their friend’s home, despite all of them having her address. They were surprised to find her family living in the penthouse. “Man, her parents must have a lot of greens to live up there.” Rainbow commented. “Of course they got the money.” Sunset deadpanned. “Crystal Prep isn’t exactly cheap, you know? I’m surprised they even allowed her to change schools, considering how much money they must have spent.” Their conversation was brought to a halt, when a ringing sound signaled the door being open. Applejack quickly pushed it open and held it for her friends. “I wonder why she’s not answering herself.” Fluttershy whispered. “Maybe she’s got a sore throat.” Pinkie Pie suggested. “Oh, I SO have to throw her a get better soon party!” The pink girl snapped her fingers. “Let us hope she feels well enough for a party.” Rarity said, calling down the elevator already. They had to wait quite a while, considering that it started almost from the top floor. Plus it stopped in between floors. In the end, three people stepped out of the elevator. Rainbow’s complaining had AJ challenge her to a game of rock, paper, scissors. By the time they stepped into the elevators, they were tied. The ride was pretty much uneventful and soon the six girls found themselves in front of Twilight’s penthouse. Surprisingly the door was already opened and so the girls stepped in. “Twilight? Spike? Anyone?” Sunset called, her voice going nowhere. “Twilight!” Rainbow tried once again. Suddenly, out of nowhere, a door down the hallway opened seemingly on its own. “Uh...am ah missin’ something?” Applejack asked, looking towards the door. “Maybe she left a window open.” Sunset said without worry. She was the first to walk through the doorframe, the others following soon. They found themselves in yet another hallway with doors on both sides and at the end as well. “So glad, you could come.” The girls spun around at the voice of their friend. The second they saw her, their eyes might as well have fallen out of their skulls. Sitting on an armchair, at the other end of the hallway was none other than Midnight Sparkle, having one leg put over the other. She was leaning her head against her open palm and a cocky smile on her face. “WHAT?!?!” They all exclaimed. “T-Twilight?!?!” “What happened?!” “Why are you-?!” *”Eeep”* “Twilight” for her part let out a dark chuck, watching her friend’s horrified expressions. “Speechless?” She asked, standing up. “Not much of a throne, but everyone starts small, I guess.” “Twilight?” Sunset spoke slowly. “Why? I mean how…?” “H-hey, I get it. It’s a joke right?” Rainbow stepped up, clearly not convinced of her own words. “Payback for the little stunt we pulled on ya isn’t it? Pretty good costume.” At Rainbow’s words, Twilight could only laugh. “A costume?” She asked, before aiming with her open palm at the door the girls came from. Just like in the friendship games, a beam of magic shot out, only this time it froze the door solid. Twilight repeated the notion a few times, until there was no escape route left. Pinkie Pie touched the ice and shivered. “Brr. This feels a teeny, tiny bit too real to be a hologram.” “A hologram?” Fluttershy ask. “Well, she is pretty smart, so I thought she would have all kind of new generation tech stuff at her home.” “My, I’m flattered.” Twilight stated, now standing in front of the girls. Sunset and the rest gulped. Her mind was racing, looking for a solution of the situation they were in. The how and why didn’t matter at this point, they had to get away and find a way to get their magic to work. “Let’s cut this short, shall we?” Twilight asked. “Either you girls will bow before my rule or else...well, let’s say I can be very creative, when I want to be.” Sunset gritted her teeth, kneeling down. “Hey Sun!” “Just do it, girls!” Sunset barked back. “It’s not like we have a choice here.” “Wise words.” Twilight nodded. The girls gave each other an uncomfortable look, before following Sunset’s examples, keeping their heads low. “Splendid.” Twilight clapped her hands. “Now then we have a lot to do, but first things, first.” Twilight lowered herself, until she was mouth to ear to Sunset. “Happy April Fool’s day.” She whispered. Before anyone could say anything, Twilight pressed the button of her necklace, resulting in the doors and herself to return to normal, except now the girls could see her necklace. It was similar to the one she had during the friendship games. Seeing their totally speechless expressions, Twilight couldn’t help herself, but laugh so hard, she fell onto the ground. ------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------ The girls of course were less than happy with the prank and were looking rather stern at their friend. However instead of looking guilty, she looked just as stern back to them. “Well, you did burn my entire Daring Do collection.” She retorted. “It was an accident!” Rainbow defended. “It was just supposed to look like we burnt ONE book. We would have apologized, but you were missing the entire week. Also, you didn’t answer any of our messages.” “Oh yes. That was, when the princess and I planned this all out.” Pinkie Pie spat out her chocolate milk she just happened to be drinking. It hit Rarity. “Princess Twilight is in this?!?!” She shouted. “Yeah.” Twilight scratched the back of her head. “After she heard what happened, she kinda proposed making a portable Illusion as she called, which then would fool all five senses of everyone in a small radius.”   “Okayyyyyyy?” Sunset started slowly. “Nothing against pranks, but...did you have to recreate this thing?” She pointed at the necklace. Applejack nodded. “Last time your thing in a jig caused lots and lots of trouble. No offense.” Twilight blushed, looking away. “It turned out to be the best way to store the magic in this world. We made some readjustments and build in a lot of safety measurements, so that something like that wouldn’t repeat. Yesterday we did a test run and everything was fine.” “...Darling, I’m not sure whether to say I’m impressed or disturbed.” Rarity said carefully. Fluttershy mumbled something along the lines of “disturbing”. “I think we can even improve of what happened today.” Pinkie stated firmly. “No offense Twilight, it was good for a first try, but this thing there has A LOT of potential!” She snatched the pendant out of Twilight’s hands. “Hey! Wait, Pinkie Pie!” “What? You said it was safe!” “I did, but that doesn’t mean I want to take any-” “Ooops.” Pinkie accidentally tripped over own feet, causing her to crash to the ground. She lost grip on the pendant and the rest of the milk. The latter splattered over the pendant, the liquid entering the sensitive machinery. “-chances.” Twilight finished lamely, before sparks started to come out of the pendant. “Oh oh.” Applejack tentatively backed away, the rest following. Only moments later, purple lightning came out of the pendant, striking everyone in the room. ------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------ Spike literally jumped out of his dog bed, when he heard lightning coming out of the other room. “What did she blow up, now?” The dog wondered aloud, before he stepped into the living room, where he found seven girls, pretty dizzy, partially rubbing their heads or generally having trouble getting of the ground. And that was the normal thing. He face pawed. “I KNEW it was a bad idea.” He mumbled, before heading to the bathroom. He recovered a small mirror out of a low cabinet under the sink. Knowing the girls might need it he carried it to the girls, who still seemed to be a little off. This will be interesting. He thought before Fluttershy screamed at what she saw. It was as if someone had seen Twilight's rampage during the friendship games and decided to redo the image with various other peoples that had been there.