10. Truth
Cheated Dreams
Chapter 10
Truth
Twilight flung the door of the library open, her shoulders sagging as she walked into her home. Spike came out from the kitchen, the smell of cooking food following him as Twilight closed the door behind her.
“Where were you? I thought you were just going to get the necklace. It's been hours!” Spike asked as Twilight trudged wearily into the main room of the library, sitting heavily on an arm chair and blowing out a long, slow breath.
“It's a long story,” she muttered, “what are you cooking?”
“Asparagus casserole, but you are not changing the subject; where were you?” He pressed, ignoring her obvious desire to rest in silence.
“Fixing things. Or at least I hope so; there's no telling what's going to happen next,” Twilight said, idly poking at the silver lightning bolt resting against her chest.
Spike came out and stood in front of Twilight with a slightly fearful expression on his face, “Okay, I'm worried now; what did you do?”
Twilight sighed heavily, sinking further into the chair. “If you lie for the right reasons, is lying still wrong?” She asked, posing her question to the very air around her as she stared mindlessly up at the ceiling. “We'll find out soon. But it's nothing you should be worried about, just make sure dinner doesn't burn. If I'm lucky we'll have company.”
Spike was about to protest, but decided against it and nodded slowly. If there was anything really wrong she'd tell him about it. With that comfort in mind, he made his way back to the kitchen, returning to his cooking.
Twilight kept her gaze focused on the necklace hanging against her chest. “I hope I'm right,” she murmured quietly.
As though on cue a sharp knock rang at her door, once again drawing Spike out of the kitchen. Twilight stood, waving for her assistant to go back to his cooking. “It's alright Spike; I'll get it,” she said, walking over to the door. “She's earlier than I thought she would be,” she added under her breath.
“Rainbow Dash,” she greeted calmly, stepping aside and letting the cyan pegasus into her house. Spike let out a gasp of understanding before scurrying back into the kitchen and taking out an extra plate before setting it on the table.
“I had a couple visitors a little while ago,” Rainbow said, walking into the main room and sitting back on her haunches in front of Twilight.
The unicorn nodded, sitting a little distance away from Rainbow. “Oh? Who was it?” She asked, faking curiosity. Rainbow knew Twilight didn't really need to be told, but she played along.
“The girls, a couple other ponies around town, and even Scootaloo was there.”
Twilight's eyes widened in false surprise. “And what did they want?”
Rainbow, not wanting to play Twilight's little game, sighed and shook her head. "You can drop the act, Twi; the others told me."
Twilight sighed, nodding her head in acceptance. “How much did they tell you?” She asked, not meeting Rainbow's eyes as she scuffed a hoof along the floor.
“First they apologized for mistrusting me, which confused me. I finally got AJ to tell me about how you went around to all of them and explained how you placed the enchantment on the necklace without me knowing. Which, by the way, she's pretty mad about,” Rainbow explained, trying to catch Twilight's gaze. Unfortunately, the unicorn refused to look away from the floor.
“Yeah... she wasn't too happy when I told her either. I thought she was going to buck me in the face before she ran off looking for you to apologize...” Twilight trailed off, rubbing one of her forelegs against the other.
“Twi... look at me,” Rainbow prompted, bringing her hoof too Twilight's chin and slowly raising her head. She was met with minimal resistance as her eyes finally met Twilight's, before the unicorn's violet eyes quickly darted away from her.
“You didn't place that enchantment, did you?” Rainbow asked quietly. Twilight snapped her eyes around to face her, surprised Rainbow would ask such a question without further proof. Still, she asked, and Twilight could see the hope burning behind her eyes.
“N-no... I didn't...” she said hesitantly, dropping her gaze back to the floor as she waited to be chewed out by the pegasus again for lying. When it didn't come, she looked back up to see Rainbow staring at her, her face unreadable.
Finally, she broke the silence, shaking her head slowly and saying, “I've been a crummy friend, haven't I?”
Before Twilight could properly form a response, she was wrapped in a tight embrace by the pegasus, cyan wings joining hooves and wrapping around the unicorn's body. She felt Rainbow rest her chin on her shoulder before gently whispering, “I'm sorry,” and promptly breaking down into quiet crying.
Twilight stood still in shock for a moment, before quickly reacting and adding her own two hooves to the embrace of legs and feathers. “I'm so sorry,” Rainbow repeated, shifting her head and burying her crying eyes into Twilight neck, replacing the pillow she'd used the previous night with the lavender unicorn. Twilight didn't mind one bit as she gently ran a foreleg down Rainbow's back.
“You must hate me,” Rainbow sniffled, not even daring to loosen her grip for fear Twilight would kick her out. Against all her fears, however, Twilight tightened the embrace instead f resisting.
“I don't hate you. I don't even blame you,” she assured quietly.
Rainbow drew back in surprise, looking up at Twilight questioningly for a moment, before chuckling quietly through her tears and once again resting her head on Twilight's shoulder. “Only you could forgive me after what I did, Twi. I did the exact same thing to you everypony else was doing to me. I was just too angry and stubborn to see it.”
Not knowing what else to do, Twilight stilled her hoof on Rainbow's back and said, “It's okay, Dashie; I understand.”
Rainbow felt her cheeks grow a deep crimson when Twilight called her 'Dashie'. Normally only Pinkie called her that, and it annoyed her to no end; it sounded way too girly for her liking. But hearing it now, coming from Twilight, it sounded... felt... comforting. With the mare’s hooves wrapped around her she didn't mind one bit. Still though, she had to ask.
“Dashie?” She murmured into Twilight' fur, closing her eyes and breathing deeply as her tears finally stopped fully.
Twilight felt her own cheeks grow a few shades redder as she realized what she'd said. “S-sorry, it just kinda... came out,” she explained sheepishly.
“It's okay; I kinda like it when you say it,” Rainbow admitted quietly.
They sat in silence for a few moments before Rainbow felt something brush against her that was not Twilight's own coat. Looking over curiously, she spotted a very familiar necklace. “Uh... Twi? Why are you wearing my necklace?”
“Oh, remember when I said Celestia sent me a way to prove my innocence?” Twilight asked excitedly, “I need this to find out who actually placed the enchantment”
“Oh that's great and all, but I have three plates and an asparagus casserole I cannot eat by myself,” Spike called from the kitchen doorway, watching as Twilight and Rainbow quickly separated themselves with an amused smirk before disappearing back into the kitchen.
Twilight was the first to fight down her blush, asking, “How about it; want some dinner?” With a pleasant smile, turning back to the still blushing Rainbow Dash.
“Uh, y-yeah, sure,” she agreed somewhat nervously, still struggling against the heat in her face, turning to follow Twilight into the kitchen before stopping suddenly. “Hey Twi?” She called, making the unicorn stop as well.
“Yes?” She asked curiously turning back to face the mare behind her. She found herself once again wrapped in a hug, though this time it was much shorter and gentler.
“Thank you.”
-_-_-_-
“So let me get this straight; this spell will let you find out who touched the necklace with their magic, but not really, because you'll only know their aura-thingy?” Rainbow asked, staring uncomprehendingly at a sheet of paper containing various notes on said spell.
Twilight nodded, reading another page from the stack Celestia had sent her. “Pretty much.”
“But... won't the spell just detect it's own aura?”
Twilight smiled brightly, looking up from the papers. “Apparently it detects and neutralizes the aura of the unicorn that's casting the spell. I wish I'd known that before jumping into the fountain,” she added under her breath.
“What was that?” Rainbow asked, looking up from the notes she'd never be able to understand as they were levitated away from her and back into the stack.
“Nothing. Now then, I think I understand the theory, so let's see if this works,” Twilight said, walking over to the table that held the very necklace that was the only way to prove Rainbow's innocence. She lit her horn, letting her magic gather and focusing it down to the right form for the spell she needed to cast. A bright purple glow sprung to life around her horn, flowing and weaving through the air and connecting in a solid-looking stream to the necklace. A ball of magic began forming around the small silver amulet, raising it off the desk and slowly bringing it up into the air as the glow grew even brighter.
With a final flash of light the spell was over, and there were two balls of magic floating in the air above the table, the necklace falling back down with a quiet tinkling noise. Each of the balls were encased in a near-translucent ball of purple energy, but even through the slight tint their colour could be clearly seen; one was a light grey, the other was a deep, reddish-brown.
“Uh... Twi? There are two different... things...” Rainbow pointed out, watching as Twilight opened her eyes and observed the spheres for herself.
“Huh... oh! Hold on, just lemme...” she trialed off as another look of concentration came over her face. The purple glow around the grey aura intensified slightly for a few seconds, before Twilight let out small hum of approval and the entire ball faded out of sight.
“Where did it go?” Rainbow asked curiously, looking around the room for any signs of the greyish magic.
“I let it dissipate; it was Magic Flight's aura from when he scanned for an enchantment. I'd recognize his aura anywhere, since we used to practice scanning auras on him back in school,” Twilight explained, bringing the remaining ball of magic for inspection. “This one, however, I don't recognize. We find its owner, and I'd be willing to bet we’d have found the pony who enchanted it.”
“That's awesome! So how do we do that?” Rainbow asked excitedly, circling the magical ball and examining it from all angles.
Twilight sighed, “That's just it; I don't know. We have the aura, but that's it. For all I know this could be from a unicorn all the way in Germane.”
Rainbow visibly wilted a little, but she quickly brushed it off. “Who cares who placed it? It's no one we know, so let's go to the Wonderbolts and prove it to them! They'll have to give me my spot back!”
“It's not that simple, Dash,” Twilight explained sadly, “All this does is prove I'm not the one who placed it. For all they know you could have gotten a different unicorn to place that enchantment for you. We need to find this unicorn; it's the only way.”
“But you just said we didn't have a way to find them!” Rainbow complained, sitting irritably back on her haunches and watching as Twilight shook her head sadly.
“Exactly; we don’t. But at least it's a start. We can narrow it down to motive, though; they'll probably be either close friends or family with a pegasus who was involved in the Wonderbolts competition. Either that or they're just a regular enchanter for hire, though there are quite a few of those...” Twilight trailed off, before glancing back over the the floating orb. “Oh, hold on, if I keep it like this too long it's going to dissipate,” she said. Once again her brightened, as did the magic surrounding the sphere. The purple magic containing the reddish-brown aura slowly grew thicker, forming into a more defined shape. With a final flash of light, it congealed into a solid orb of magic-infused glass.
“What did you do?”
“Something a bit more permanent. Now I don't have to hold it in my magic constantly and it won't dissipate unless I release it. It'll last as long as we need to find the unicorn it belongs to.” Twilight explained, setting the glass orb gently on the table next to the necklace it had come from.
“Great! So what are we waiting for? Let's go find that unicorn!” Rainbow cheered, flying over to the front door of the library.
“And how, exactly, do you intend to do that?” Twilight asked, catching Rainbow's tail in her magic before the excited pegasus could get out the door.
“Uh, I dunno, you seem to be able to scan ponies for their auras, so let's just start scanning!” Rainbow said impatiently, struggling against the magic holding her back. When it was clear Twilight wasn't letting her go she landed gently on the floor.
“Rainbow,” Twilight sighed, “do you have any idea how long that would take?”
The pegasus shrugged, “You scanned that aura pretty fast; I don't see what the big deal is.”
“That was pure aura; scanning it while still inside a pony is an entirely different level of spell. And even if I could scan them all that quickly, do you know how many unicorns live in Ponyville alone? It'd take me days to go through all of them here, never mind the couple thousand living in Canterlot. Then there's all of them in the other surrounding cities. It'd take me lifetimes to scan them all. Even if we narrow it down to those with either ties to Wonderbolt trainees or hired enchanters, there are still more than I can scan, not to mention it could have been done by a black-market enchanter, or somepony who doesn't actually sell their enchanting and was approached by whoever took the necklace to have it enchanted.”
Rainbow thought for a moment, before asking, “Wait, black market enchantment?”
Twilight nodded, “Yeah, there are a few unicorns talented with enchanting that sell their services to those who wish for illegal enchantments.”
“There are illegal enchantments?” Rainbow asked curiously, momentarily forgetting about her previous issue as Twilight sighed.
“Well there's always the more generic charms like poison touch, or the higher level version which causes near-instant death when a pony touches the enchanted item. We can't exactly let ponies go around preforming those can we?”
“No, I suppose not,” Rainbow agreed thoughtful, “But still! We could always get lucky and find the right unicorn!”
“Except that's technically a violation of their rights if we do so without their consent or a court order, and I doubt highly the pony who placed this would willingly give in to an aura scan,” Twilight explain, somewhat annoyed at Rainbow's thoughtless approach.
“What if we got a court order?” Rainbow asked, trying to think of some way her argument could remain valid.
“Unless this is an actual legal case, I don't think we could get a court order, even with this evidence.”
“Well then what if you got Celestia to give you one? Surely she has that kind of power?”
Twilight rolled her eyes at the notion, “Right. How do you think it would look if the Princess of Equestria gave her student the ability to invade the privacy of any unicorn she wanted just to get her friend back into a team she had previously been kicked out of based on solid evidence?”
Rainbow opened her mouth to respond, before realizing exactly what that would mean for Celestia. “Huh... I guess you're right. So how are we going to do this?”
Twilight sighed, saying, “That's just it; I don't know yet. I just... I'll have to think of something. For the mean time, at least Ponyville isn’t as upset with you. It should have gotten around now that I was the one who placed the enchantment without you knowing, so you shouldn't have any more problems.”
“But you will,” Rainbow warned quietly.
“I know,” Twilight said, smiling, “But for this, I'd rather take the blame than force it on you, since it really wasn't your fault at all.”
“But it wasn't your fault either!” Rainbow protested. “How do you think I'll feel now, knowing that they all blame you because I couldn't handle them blaming me and took it out on you?”
“It's alright Rainbow, really; I can take it. And it's only until we find the unicorn who did this. After that life can go back to normal. Well, except you'll be a Wonderbolt, of course,” Twilight assured confidently.
Rainbow shook her head in disbelief, before stopping and staring at the necklace on the desk. “Is the enchantment still on there?”
“Hmm?” Twilight asked, following Rainbow's gaze to the table. “Oh. Yes, it is; it's how I got the aura. Why?”
“Could you take it off?” Rainbow asked.
Twilight, unsure what Rainbow was getting at, simply complied, her horn lighting once again along with the necklace as she stripped the enchantment from the small metal bolt. “It's gone now. But why?”
Instead of answering, Rainbow reached over and picked up the lightning bolt, looking at it for a second before lifting it up and dropping it around her neck. “I can't be mad at the necklace, and since you're not the one who put the enchantment on it, I don't have a reason not to wear it now that the enchantment's gone.”
“Besides,” Rainbow added, “It reminds me of you, and what you've done for me.”
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Oh hells yeah! Time to find the asshole who hurt these two! Another chapter that has exceeded my expectations.
Didn't the Wonderbolts establish that neither of them were aware of any other unicorn handling the necklace, and thus proving it wasn't Twilight also implies neither were aware or intentionally cheating?
Also wondering if the rain boom spontaneously enchanted it somehow.
4000789
You can't exactly prove what someone does and does not know. Twi and Dash claimed that no other unicorn had the necklace, so when they found the enchantment, based on their own statement, it was assumed that Twilight had placed it. However, it's always possible they lied, so it's still not enough evidence that neither of them purposely had it enchanted.
4000884
Didn't their guilt being "proved" hinge on no one but them having a chance to have placed the enchantment? There is no longer any evidence for them being at fault over a competitor who wants them disqualified.
So when will the enchantment get back on there and then have Twilight testRainbow's aura this discovering she enchanted it because of her stunts and the specialness of the metal. That's the only logical conclusion which I will either feel good for figuring out in chapter 5 or you'll throw in some twist that'll make me wrong.
4002188
You're the second person to think Rainbow enchanted it herself...
I'm not going to give any spoilers, but what I can say is that I don't think you'll end up depressed about anything, least of all the ending.
4001171
Rainbow's guilt hinged on the fact that the necklace was enchanted. Not the fact that Twilight enchanted it. Like I said; she still could have gotten somepony else to enchant it and simply lies about Twi being the only unicorn to have had it.
This was a nice chapter.
I think you covered your ass nicely with all the explanations.
You know. I am surprised Twilight has not chewed the fuck out of AJ,, Pinkie, Fluttershy and, if Dash had seen here, Rarity so easily being willing to turn their backs on their friends... just like they did at the Royal Wedding along with Rainbow Dash to her and it was found at that they were WRONG! Instead of telling them that she placed the Enchantment, she should have told them to gets their heads out of their flanks because she was going to prove to them that neither her or Dash had known about the enchantment just like she proved at the Wedding she was right the entire time.
Seriously, fuck what the rest of what Ponyville thinks, but I would at least assume Twilight would set the others straight.
AJ thinks she's so great at telling when Somepony is LYING when she was talking to Dash? She sure as hell couldn't tell Twilight was lying when she told her she had placed the enchantment. And don't get me started on the others.
4018006
The fact remains that none of them were outright mean or cruel to Dash. The only reason she got so upset was because she knew she was innocent. All they did was assume the newspaper was correct, and we've seen how much influence the newspaper has in Ponyville, even when it's just a school newspaper. As for why Twilight wouldn't just tell them the actual truth, well she doesn't exactly have proof, while the newspaper, on the other hand, has cited plenty of proof that seems undeniable at first glance. It was also how she managed to convince Dash of her innocence. Had she not done this, and simply told the truth, then they wouldn't have ran to apologize to Dash, but instead would have waited and seen if she could prove it. If Dash had then heard what Twilight had said to them, it only would have made her angrier, because in her eyes it would be seen as Twilight trying to uphold the lie and protect herself.
This way, the town has forgiven and apologized to Dash, and Dash knows Twilight's innocent. It's about the best outcome that she could have gotten.
Milkshakes seem to be the romantic dessert of choice amongst Twidashers (and Scootabellers, which seem to go hand in hand), but I'm starting to think that asparagus casserole is the Twidasher's dinner of choice. And I think I'm okay with that.