A Mile in Their Horseshoes

by Kumei

(Re)Introductions

Chapter III: (Re)Introductions

Twilight awoke, again, to the cruel sun streaming through her windows. She sighed and rolled out of her bed.

Wait.

She took a look around at her room. It was her room. She smiled and thought to herself, “Gee, maybe that was just a dream!”

Her smile grew as she started hearing her friends’ voices down below. Oh, how good it was, hearing Fluttershy’s drawling voice, and Rainbow Dash’s bubbly ramblings, and her voice mixed between the two.

Wait.

Twilight took a quick look at herself and grumbled loudly. Finally, she opened the door, fumbling a little with the handle in her teeth, and walked out until she could look at everypony.

There they were, all five of them looking back at her. Spike walked out from underneath, carrying a tray of pastries, and after he set the platter down he turned and joined their stares.

“Erm, well, howdy-“ Twilight began. After a harsh glare from Fluttershy, she sighed and began again. “Hi, girls. I guess we already know that we’re not us anymore, don’t we.”

Rainbow piped up at this, literally bouncing up and down where she sat with a hoof in the air, “Ooh, Ooh! Pick me, pick me! I wanna introduce myself as Pinkie first, just in case somepony else is secretly me unless I announce it first!”

“Sugarcube, Ah don’t think that’s how this works. Yer still you, ye jest ain’t in yer own body. An’ I think Rarity over here would be more’n happy to git it back to ye.” Applejack said out of Fluttershy’s mouth.

Pinkie Pie, or rather Rarity by deduction, nodded sullenly in agreement, apparently afraid even to speak. Her mane, normally as poofy as cotton candy, likely the same consistency, was straight and hung low.

Twilight took another breath, still taken aback by the sudden personality shift. “Rarity, I’m sorry, I know how much pride you took in your mane, I-“

“It’s not that…” Rarity said softly, trailing off.

“Beg pardon, Rar?” Applejack said “Didn’t quite catch that.”

“I…” Rarity took a moment to compose herself. “The Voices… It’s the Voices with no tongue!”

“Ah… Beg pard-“

“OOH! I wondered what became of those since I don’t have my Pinkie Sense anymore and so I guess they’re kinda related or something? Anyway, what she means is that she’s currently in shock by the tremendous Voices of the Elder Things whispering thunderously into her brain every second of every minute of every hour of every-“

“Wait wait wait.” Rainbow Dash said, stuffing a hoof into her own mouth. “Wait. Let’s take a step back from this… thing. That’s not the issue at hoof. At least, not yet, I guess. We’ll worry about that later. Or never, because that sounds totally awesome and I know it’s just gonna be disappointing and boring. Twilight, you know anything that might have caused all this… uh, stuff?”

Twilight sighed and trotted down the stairs. “No, Rainbow, I don’t. I didn’t even know anything was wrong until I realized this morning that I was in AJ’s room.”

“Now wait just a consarned minute! What in the hay is wrong with-“

“Nothing! Augh… except I had to deal with your family. AppleBloom and Granny didn’t think twice, I think, but Big Mac…” Twilight shook her head to get herself back on track. “That’s not the point! The point is that we have to figure this out! What’s the last thing you remember before this morning, girls?”

Oddly enough, it was Fluttershy who stepped forward first, trying to hide behind her purple coif. “Well, you see, Twilight, we’ve already thought about that, and none of us did any special magic or explored any cursed tombs or anything. We just woke up like this,” She motioned gently towards everypony else in the library. “I’m sorry.”

Twilight thought for a moment. “Girls, I think we should probably talk to the Princesses about this. Surely they’d be familiar with what’s happening to us, I mean they’ve probably seen just about everything, right? Spike, can you draft up a letter to send to the Princess about what’s happened?”

The little dragon straightened himself up and flashed a quick salute as he scurried off to find some parchment and a quil. In the mean time, the mixed six shuffled somewhat awkwardly, not especially sure what to do.

Finally, the quiet was interrupted by, surprise, Pinkie. “Oh! We should have a sleepover! You know, just the six of us! We’ll all go back and pack supplies for a few days here while we figure out what happened and then when Twilight zaps us back, barring some hideous mistake, we’ll all just get back to our homes!”

“Um, excuse me, mistake?” Fluttershy asked. Twilight was impressed, she actually had to look closely to tell that she was shaking.

“Sleepovers!” Pinkie shouted again, then abruptly stopped and took a deep breath. “That means we can have a party with all of us right here and it’ll be super duper awesome! C’mon, let’s go pack!”

“Pinkie, that’s… Actually not a bad plan. Girls? You up for it?” Twilight looked four nodding faces and stopped at Dash. “You don’t think we should?”

“Huh? I never said that! It’s just, what does it matter to me? I’m you now, as far as everyponies concerned, I live here. As such, you have my awesomely humble permission.” Rainbow Dash grinned.

“Then it’s settled! Girls, let’s get packing!” Twilight started trotting to the door when her path was suddenly blocked by Applejack.

“Erm, uh, Twilight, Ah think that Ah should pack for ye, erm, don’t you worry none, it ain’t goin’ outta mah way, ‘sides this gives ye some extra time to start yer research into this, right?” The yellow Pegasus said quickly, forcing a smile while biting her bottom lip gently.

Twilight didn’t notice, or else didn’t respond to the suspicious behavior. “Hmm. You’re right, AJ, thank you! Okay. Girls? Let’s all meet back here in two hours, I’m going to start putting together some books that might help.” With that, she turned and began scanning her shelves, muttering a few unintelligible fragments of her sorting codes and patterns.

Applejack sighed, evidently relieved, and motioned for the rest of the girls to head out. Just as the door was closing, Spike heard Rainbow Dash’s voice, so Pinkie, asking Applejack if Twilight knew about “them” yet, as he entered the library proper with the parchment and quill ready.

After a few minutes, he flagged Twilight’s attention to him and he told her what he had written so far. She nodded, “That sounds perfect, Spike, just what I expect from my Number One Assistant! Send it off, and give me a hand with these books?”

The little dragon smiled, nodded, and incinerated the letter in a jet of green flame, whisking it away to Canterlot. “Sure thing, Twi, what would you do without me?”

Author's Note:

Whew, made my self imposed, and rather ludicrously large, deadline by the skin of my teeth! Sorry if the last half seems a bit rushed, I'll probably (not) be going back through, and some of this chapter may be rewritten at a later date. I'll also try not to keep you guys waiting too long for the next chapter!

Comments

[Casual Potato]

i would love it if you could come back to this story. it has a very interesting premise