• Member Since 20th Nov, 2013
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Foals Errand


Guess whose back?!

E

Over a thousand years ago Starswirl the Bearded wrote his last spell, an incantation that by his own admission was "broken and unfinished". Centuries later Twilight Sparkle derived from it the spell that allowed her to ascend and become an alicorn. But while she was able to reverse the effects of the spell on her friends, they weren't the only ones affected.

Co-written with River Road and Edited by The Weakest Link

Chapters (4)
Comments ( 125 )

“Three sugars, one cream, just like you like it, Teach.”

Might I humbly suggest 'just the way you like it'?

“Um Twilight… you remember that one query we had before casting the spell?I think we just

And a missing space.

Starlight stared in shock as she sat down hard, bringing a hoof to her head and began to laugh

And wrong tense.

Definitely reading more of this.

me think spell was made so that those two will learn what it like to be the other, to stop them form fighting or for something like nightmare moon from happening.......

7840669
I could see them attempting to prevent that, but how does it being this way do that?

7840697 walk a mile in the other shoes, or in this case role,

7840707 each others, luna and tia, best way to learn how the other is feeling is to switch roles,

this is all guess what though

7840725
Um, none of the quotes suggesting a different wording are from when Celestia and Luna were there, the first one is the only one to do that, and is from the second paragraph.

EDIT, you are not talking about my quotes, sorry.:twilightblush:

Yknow, I originally thought this was going to be a spoof of the Leroverse/Xenoverse version of Magical Mystery Cure. That story is getting freakishly long with no end in sight. I thought the description said that Twilight cast the spell again a thousand years after SHE cast it the first time.

Oh. Okay. I see what happened here... This certainly is a most vexing conundrum. I like it.

Celestia nodded, unclasping her own cloak with her mouth, revealing the silver crescent moon cutie mark on her light pink fur. “We seem to have…” She shuddered. “I lost control of the sun.”

Shouldn't Celestia think she's suddenly unable to control the moon with the skill and precision she's built up over the years?

Oh, Twilight. Why in God's name did you listen to Starlight of all ponies concerning whether or not to cast a spell?! :ajbemused:

I am simultaneously amused and wanting to headdesk at their actions. More, please? :D

Alright Mr/Ms/Mrs Errand, you have my attention. Please, continue :ajsmug:

“Nothing quite that simple i’m afraid my faithful stu— Twilight. Go on Luna, show her.”

Missing capital. Otherwise, this seems like a fun idea and I'm interested to see where it goes from here.

I don't have anything to really say yet besides "thats p good more pls," but the title alone makes me wonder how many baby boomers started screeching at the mention of "millennial."

Luna originally being the sun princess but having all that power and love suddenly stripped away would definitely make her transformation into Nightmare Moon more believable. Unless the spell just somehow switched their cutie marks instead of returning them to their rightful owners. I'd love to see how Luna deals with being the sun princess and how Celestia deals with having to learn to dreamwalk and help fight nightmares, since Luna said she had no power in dreams. It would be magic totally unfamiliar to both of them. Luna, used to raising the smaller moon and having less to deal with at night suddenly being forced to hold day court, and Celestia, who doesn't have power over and can't comprehend dream magic....

So, before their first attempt at Starswirl's spell, Luna originally controlled the sun and Celestia originally controlled the moon?

Interesting idea. I feel like I've seen it used somewhere before, too.

I think that one was just a one-shot, though.

So Star Swirl's original use of the spell switched Luna and Celestia's destinies around, I take it?

More more more more more more. Please?

I was actually hoping the AU tag was going to be that Celestia and Luna had swapped cutie-marks thousands of years ago without realizing it only to be shocked when the counter spell fixes it, then think that Celestia having a sun mark and Luna having a moon mark is wrong. And Rarity pointing out how much better the swapped marks match their color schemes.
... Unless that's what's going on, I'm a little tired.

P.S.

It’s around two in the afternoon

Has anyone else ever noticed that fanfic writers never write out exact times? Like, it's always, always like this; around this, about that.
It's one of those 'once you see it' things.
"How long was I out?"
"Around a week."
How long ago did he leave?"
About four hours ago."
"What time did you fall asleep?"
"Around nine."
It's very odd.

7841631 I'm fairly certain it was a major plot point in Rainbow Divided, a story in the Xenophilia verse. It was right around when the story when down the drain.

7841921
Ah! I do believe that was it. Thank you.

Heh, while I have too much appreciation for that story to agree completely with you, I'll confess that's around the point where I kind of took a break from it.

7841921 Don't remind me. Shit, I was so big on Xenophilia and that was a kick to the dick for me. It still hurts my soul.
I hope this doesn't get out of hand, but in all honesty Xenophilia was never that good. Rainbow Divided just pulled the wool off my eyes, if that's the right term? Point is, these days I can't even reread it due to how much it hurts me on a physical level. I get bruises on my liver when I try to read it, and that's before I feel the need to drink myself into a coma. My body's trying to make me stop it faster it seems, thank d-g. I really hope it's obvious but I'm joking in that last sentence, don't want you worrying.

7841951
7841949
7841921
That story was never anything more than Gary Stu wish fulfillment. It was never good and just a prime example of why the fandom is so mocked by those not in it.
You can enjoy such things as a guilty pleasure, but the overwhelmingly positive reception it had pretty much screams how obsessed bronies are with the idea of having a pony harem.
The only, only thing I liked about the story was Dash's self-consciousness at the very start about how she isn't beautiful by pony standards. It's always written as all members of the Mane6 being superhot and desirable, capable of having any pony they want, so it's a nice twist to see the opposite.
If someone knows of a story where it's like this that isn't HiE, I'd like to hear about it.

7842025 You know, on one hand you're right, but you really need to calm down. Xenophilia isn't some sort of Illuminati front that oppresses the brownies or whatever the hell you're trying to say.
Are you okay? Are you being ironic or are you legitimately trying way too hard to be contrarian and edgy?

It's always written as all members of the Mane6 being superhot and desirable, capable of having any pony they want, so it's a nice twist to see the opposite.

Even though you're kind of flipping out, this WAS a creative idea! Even though it's a lie because Rainbow Dash is a semen demon and if the fic happens to be canon, I'll kill myself pony standards can EAT SHIT.

7841951 Honestly, while he was pretty gary stu, and got moreso as the verse and that story in particular went on, the biggest appeal to me wasn't the hole 'harem' thing but the fact that it treated the MLP world as an actual distinct world with genuinely different and alien culture as opposed to being just "America 2". As annoying as the sueness and silliness got in that verse is I still find it infinitely more annoying when other stories have things like 1950s american sexism or gender roles when they living in a fucking quasi-theocratic matriarchy with an immortal demigoddess in rule for a millenia. It started a small shift in a part of the fandom of asking "what would their society actually grow to be like instead of just being a reflection of earth"... And then later in the expanded universe idiots that didn't get that point started adding in all the "A-Mare-ica" and other reflection nations into canon ruining that uniqueness as well.

Interesting, though not necessarily profound or great, ideas that ultimately didn't live up to their potential.

7842025 Eh, most stories are wish fulfillment in one way or another. The only question is how overt and how well written is it. It started pretty overt, but backed it up with at least the tease of world building and treating Equestria as its own nation and Ponies as their own species completely separate and alien to humanity as opposed to just being an "America 2" reflection that a lot of stories just roll with.

The story had a few interesting ideas to start with and if it just used Humanface whatshisname(... LERO! that's it) as a vehicle to explore that universe and its culture it probably would have been an objectively better story, but alas what starts as clop with an interesting premise usually doesn't shake its roots. It started out masturbatory (Quite literally at first) so it verring even harder into self insert sue isn't suprising to me, or even something to get worked up about. I'm just a touch disappointed that it never went anywhere really interesting with the whole alien society thing.

7841869
Probably because if you were to have a character start giving specific times, people would wonder how said character knew this and start making fun of the fact that they have a magical, convenient stopwatch.
"How long was I out?"
"Nine hours and twenty-six minutes."
"...Crap! This convinient plot device makes me late for the next plot point!"

7842189
Okay, let's see if I can explain this better.
What I meant by specific times was more like, lets say somebody asks you a time related question, like, "How long ago did something happen?" and the exact answer is two hours and five minutes, the answer you will give will be, "Two hours ago." Not, "Around two hours ago." No one feels the need to clarify that they are not being exact like people in these stories always do.
See, usually when people in real conversations give a time, it's an estimate, but that fact is implied. You don't say stuff like, "I was on vacation for about a month," just because is was actually thirty-five days, you just say, "I was on vacation for a month." or, "It's a two and half hour movie," instead of, "It's around two and a half hours," because it's actually two-thirty-six.
People aren't this... wary of giving precise, incorrect times, and so don't see the need to cover their bases by adding an arbitrary about/around to every mention of time ever spoken.
The quote from the last comment? Nine times out of ten, "It's two in the afternoon" would have been said instead.
Get what I mean?

7842044
Just really hate that story. And what is a semen demon exactly, and is that your head canon for Dash? That small bit is confusing.

7842151 I too was not down with the harem thing. Hell, I even wanted to drop the story because of it, but I was younger and retarded. I kept going until "it" happened, as already discussed.

It started a small shift in a part of the fandom of asking "what would their society actually grow to be like instead of just being a reflection of earth"... And then later in the expanded universe idiots that didn't get that point started adding in all the "A-Mare-ica" and other reflection nations into canon ruining that uniqueness as well.

You know, this really summarizes the fandom quite well to an extent. We get better, we're doing well, and then some dumbshits ruin it all for everyone. And we keep trying.
We have long since crossed from endurance to insanity. I dunno I had a better way to say this in my head.
7842260

And what is a semen demon exactly, and is that your head canon for Dash?

It means I want to fuck her.
EDIT: For the record, I usually say "around two in the afternoon" or "about a week" in real life, due to my cripplingly low self-esteem due to doubting myself 24/7 and overall fear of failure.

Don't give me that look.

Tracking.

7840916 I believe they're both used at some point in the song.

Alright, you have my interest. Tracking.

Two critical comments though:
I know they need a reason to try and reverse engineer (or whatever they're going to try) the spell in order to create a counterspell, but using the cutie mark crusaders as reason for this is a bit far out. If Twilight stores powerful spells where even they can get their hooves on them (and cast them!), she has no business having anything like it in her castle. Or any spell scroll, for that matter.

Researching a failsafe to minimize the risk of analysing the spell in depth would actually be totally sufficient and a very sound reason all on itself. I guess that's the real reason Twilight wants to do it, but the CMC thing irked me.

we’re in Defcon One research

That... sounds a bit weird and in the wrong universe.

Anyway... I like the premise of the counterspell having restored the princesses' original destinies. Reminds me of your story (in my favourites folder) where they swapped bodies and got stuck. you seem to like that theme. :twilightsmile:

7842260

I don't have any idea what your conversation is about, but I'd like to point out that for me, clarifying that figures are estimations comes naturally. I inherently hate telling half truths and that's reflected in my language, almost to the point of being a tick.
That's probably odd of me, but I do regularly observe others using such clarifications, typically when they're uncertain of the information they're conveying.

Wait wait. Comments tell me Celestia and Luna had switched up marks all this time? ... Then what about their names? Luna = Moon. Celestia = Sun. I mean, these are the thematic references in their very names. Having the Moon Horse in control of the sun as her original destiny makes no fucking sense. :derpyderp1:

7843443
It'll be touched on in the next chapter. But let's just say destiny decided to make fools of their parents.

:trixieshiftright:Veeeerry interesting well written concept. You have my attention. Though you might want to clean out the comments section when you get the chance.

When the spell was first worked, the "Mane Six" didn't realize their cutie marks had changed, so they accepted their new roles as though they'd always been that way--despite having no skills to carry those new roles.

So, Celestia and Luna should have done likewise, with them accepting that Luna had always had control of the sun and Celestia the moon (and possibly the stars in all of their celestial glory?). They might be confused about why they were suddenly making mistakes, though.

7843840
Rarity states after the spell is undone. "Oh What a terrible dream I had, or maybe i'm still having it." But that was after only a day or a few days. The Princesses were changed for over one thousand years so it's not like coming out of a dream for them.

7842795
A good point, but this is the CMC and a spell with unlimited potential for cutie-mark-related hijinks we're talking about. They would get their hooves on it somehow even if Celestia herself locked it away in her Royal Vault of Dangerous Artifacts. :scootangel:

7844333 Okay, you may have a point there. :trixieshiftright:

Definitely a good start :rainbowlaugh:
Oh, I'm so looking forward to reading more of this story!

Eh?

I require more horse words to contemplate this conundrum.

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