Twilight's Phobia

by Homage

The Disaster

Twilight's Phobia, by Homage

Chapter 3: The Disaster

Twilight's eyes rapidly shifted left and right as she sunk down on the ground amidst dozens of cheering ponies, curling into a ball.

“Surely I heard him wrong,” the unicorn thought frantically out loud. “What are you thinking, Twilight? He wouldn't release s-s-s-s-...snakes into the c-c-c-crowd...”

Fluttershy noticed that her friend had begun talking to herself, the way she always did when extremely upset. Fluttershy recalled the last time the lavender pony acted like this, and the pegasus had blamed herself for failing to stop the disaster that Twilight's freakout had caused. Seeing the warning signs of an imminent meltdown, and pushed by her desire to avoid a catastrophe, Fluttershy took action. Unfortunately, she decided to do it... well... Fluttershy-style.

“Twi... Twilight?” said the pink-maned pegasus, carefully poking at her friend with a hoof. “Is everything all right?”

Twilight was still sitting on the cobblestone street. Her nervously shifting pupils had contracted to a pinpoint, and her mane was a mess. She failed to react in any way to Fluttershy's question. Suddenly, she jumped to her hooves, a maniacal grin spread across her lavender face. The sudden movement completely frizzled her carefully groomed mane.

“I'm great, just great, Fluttershy,” replied the crazed unicorn. “I just misheard what Forked Tongue said, that's all! There's no way he would do something so dangerous! I mean, there are foals in this crowd!”

Twilight Sparkle had failed to see the small brown and black striped python crawling around behind her. Fluttershy had known that this event included releasing snakes into the crowd. She hadn't said anything because she was too afraid to speak up. Now, she realized there was only one way she could avoid a total disaster.

“...in fact, there's not even a chance that this Forked Tongue could have even brought any snakes to Ponyville. Famous animal tamer or not, nopony could tame something so evil, so mean, so...” the lavender unicorn rambled.

“Um, sure, Twilight,” Fluttershy gently said to her crazed friend. “Even though he wouldn't bring something so bad, maybe we should... um... leave anyway?” the yellow pegasus suggested hopefully, a small, forced smile spreading across her face. The grin was accompanied by a faint “squee.”

“But Fluttershy,” Twilight exclaimed in a voice that was much too high for the unicorn, “that would be... crazy!”

“I want you to have fun with the animals! I have nothing to be afraid of!” the lavender pony continued. “There aren't... any... snakes!”

With most of the crowd now starting to spread out, Fluttershy noticed the brown and black movement directly behind Twilight. She had precious few seconds left. “Um... but... Twi-Twi-Twi-... Twilight,” the pink-maned pegasus stuttered nervously. “Let's... just... g-g-g-go back. I think A-Angel needs m-m-me...”

The frizzled lavender pony let out the most maniacal laugh heard in Equestria since Discord's return. “Oh relax, girl!” she cackled to her friend, jumping up and down. “He'll be fine with Spike! Fine fine fine! Stop thinking so negatively!! This is so much fun! Wahahaha...”

Fluttershy watched helplessly in horror as the small, brown snake crept within an inch of her friend's left rear hoof. The yellow pegasus opened her mouth, emitting a small squeal, being unable to form any words.

The python flicked its tongue out, and decided to change direction at the last minute. It headed off, toward Sweetie Belle, Apple Bloom, and Scootaloo. Each of them had their faces painted with reptile scales of various colors. The three fillies cheered, “Cutie Mark Crusaders Reptile Wranglers! Yay!” and lunged for the snake. An unimpressed Big Macintosh rolled his eyes as the snake slithered right out of their hooves and disappeared into the crowd.

Fluttershy exhaled, immensely relieved that the calamity had been averted. However, her relief was premature.

A yellow pegasus mare with a cyan mane had a green and black spotted snake wrapped around one hoof. She flew through the air, doing flips and impressing the crowd. Then, to everypony's shock, she flicked her hoof, sending the snake flailing through the air. The snake writhed around for a moment, then proceeded to flatten out its body and glide gracefully through the air. It turned a few times on its slow trip toward the ground, eventually coming to a stop right on Twilight's plot.

No finite number of decibels could have matched the volume of the scream that followed. Everypony in the town square stared at the terrified lavender unicorn as she jumped thirty feet into the air. It was just pure bad luck that Pinkie Pie happened to drift overhead, attached to her giant balloon. Twilight's head smacked right into it. The unicorn's horn punctured the balloon with a loud pop. The ensuing “pssst” of escaping helium sent both ponies whizzing all over the sky, screaming.

Forked Tongue was still on the stage, apparently oblivious to the drama in the sky. “Filliessss and gentlecoltssss, I give you... the flying ssssnake!”

The green stallion was shocked that nopony had applauded. Usually the Festival was extremely popular, and the flying snake had always been a crowd pleaser. These ponies didn't look impressed. In fact, he realized, they weren't even looking at him. Forked Tongue followed the gaze of every single pony in the crowd, just in time to see the the screaming lavender and pink mares hurtling toward him.

“Aw sssscales,” the stallion muttered.

Comments

[Tinker301]

Yay crazy twilight! Who dosn't love Crazy Twilight? Great story!

[BenRG]

Yeah, by all means, let's put probably the third strongest living magic user in Equestria after the princesses in a crowded square with something she's phobicaly afraid of. Nothing good can come of this.