Twilight and Pinkie get involved in a devious scheme that takes them across dimensions.
You may have read something like this before in a real book. But this is completely different. Why? Because Pinkie Pie is involved. When Twilight discovers a mysterious stallion alter time and space, even something Celestia would struggle with, she and Pinkie are sucked into a void of pure randomness. There's a place with wall portals, a place with electric mice, and there's a place where everything's pink and girly. Even Twilight can't wrap her head around most of this. Will Twilight be able to find the stallion's motives, or will they remain shrouded in darkness? I don't know. I'm just the narrator.
The trip to Canterlot was like any other. The wind rushed against the train, while the extravagant city grew closer into view. Twilight wasn't sure what Celestia was calling her for. Perhaps the changelings were attacking again. Maybe she was going to reward her or crown her princess.
All these things circled around Twilight's head for a while. Well, except for being crowned a princess. Twilight knew there'd never be any chance of her suddenly gaining wings and becoming a princess. It just went against everything that Twilight would do. Finally, the train arrived at Canterlot's train station. The streets were packed with ponies, but they all seemed to clear out of her way.
Finally, she was at the palace walls. The guard count was normal, but Shining Armor wasn't there to greet her. "He's probably just off with Cadence," she kept reassuring herself silently.
When the ponies reached Celestia's throne room, the same benevelont alicorn was there to greet them. She smiled richly at them and told them to make themselves at home.
"But you haven't explained why you've called us here," Twilight quickly noted.
Celestia dismissed it early on and told them she'd tell them in dear time. Twilight was confused by this cryptic explanation, but who was she to question the ruler over all of Equestria? Probably not much, considering Celestia would just send her to the moon and say you got eaten by a dragon. At least, that's what she thought.
The guest rooms where magnificent, but only offered so much. Twilight was feeling somewhat sick, so she marched down the hall to find a sink or something. The castle seemed desolate, despite the activity that would normally go on in Canterlot.
After a few minutes of exploring the hallways, she saw something from the corner of her eye dash through the corridors. She forgot about what was happening before and started thinking about the dashing figure. Why is he in a hurry? the wondered.
Deciding to find out, she started chasing him, snaking from hall to hall in a strange fashion. Finally, the stallion was once again in view before taking a jagged left. Twilight's hooves screeched against the carpet as she came to a stop. The only thing occuping the left turn was a strange painting of the sunrise. That's when Twilight realized she was lost in a part of the castle that was unfamiliar to her.
When she placed her hoof up to the painting, it rippled somehow. Although she was initially shocked, she found the painting was completely intangible.
"What's going on?" she asked herself. She couldn't find any anwsers, though.
When the initial surprise faded, she treacherously stuck her head into the passage. The first thing she noticed was that the room had space behind the doorway, something physically impossible to create without magic. The second thing she noticed was that it wasn't a room.
Instead, Twilight was poking her head out of some sort of portal into the Everfree Forest. She cautiously climbed out of the portal, only for it to shut completely the second her entire body was in the forest.
"Great. Now I'm stuck here alone. Somehow." It still made zero sense to Twilight. What happened next made even less sense.
"Hiya, Twi!" greeted a familiar, energetic voice.
"Pinkie!? What in Celestia are you doing here!?"
"I saw you climbing into that sun thing and knew I just HAD to join you!" Pinkie was bouncing up and down, her frizzy tail flopping around like always.
"But, how do you get through the portal!? It closed the second I stepped out of it! Even if it didn't cut you in half, how would I not notice you coming through!?"
"I don't know," Pinkie replied with a huge grin across her face. Twilight wasn't willing to rant any further. She silently punished herself for trying to get logic out of Pinkie Pie.
"Well, how are we going to get back now?" Silence swept both ponies, leaving only the melancholies of the forest to bounce back and forth.
"Wait, I've got it!" Twilight yipped enthusiastically. "We'll just go back to Ponyville and write Celestia. She'll probably know what's going on with these painting portals!" With that, Pinkie simply nodded and started trotting down the path to Ponyville.
The next few minutes were rather silent. Nothing broke through from the rugged ferns or towering oaks in the forest. Just the buzzing and chirps of many strange creatures escaped through the thick weeds.
"Ponyville should be another five minutes ahead, so we just need to keep--" Twilight's face suddenly pounded against an invisible wall, completely cutting off what she was about to say.
"Ooh! I didn't know you could pantomime, Twilight!" Pinkie laughed, not realizing the damage was real.
"Ow! What was that? That hurt!" Twilight groaned, clearly sore over the most unexpected thing that had ever happened to her.
Making sure to keep her hoof in front of her, Twilight poked around to find what was sitting in their way. Finally, her hoof came to rest on a solid wall that was perfectly invisible. It felt like metal upon touch.
"Metal!?" she exclaimed. Who would put an invisible metal wall in the middle of a forest!? And more importantly, how!?"
As Twilight spoke, Pinkie noticed something in the bushes and said, "Hey, what's that shiny purple thing?"
Sure enough, a swirling, purple vortex was randomly floating along the edge of the path. Without warning, Pinkie leaped in carrying a pack of party balloons. Twilight approached it, sighed, and followed her friend in. Afterall, today had already been so strange for her. What else could possibly happen?
"Everything was black. Twilight couldn't see her own hoof, even if she pressed it against her face. Only the occasional strike of purple lightning broke the impenetrable darkness."
"Who turned off the sun?"
"Pinkie, you ruined my third-pony narrative!"
"Third-pony what-a-tive?"
The two ponies kept shouting at each other, each having no clue which direction the other one was in. Finally, a bright, purple flash ended the realm of darkness and brought them somewhere else. Both of their senses were temporarily impaired, although Twilight could clearly feel the grass underneath her hooves. When her senses returned, she saw an expansive grass field with a huge castle looming in the distance.
By the time both ponies were perfectly healed, someone approached them from the back.
"Who the hay are you?" Pinkie quizzically asked. In front of her was a tall, blonde young man wearing a green tunic and carrying a sword sheath with on his belt.
"Hyeh!" the boy yelled.
"Pardon me?" Twilight wasn't sure if he was injured or if he just talked like that.
"Hyeh!" he repeated.
"Uh, sir, we appear to be lost in some sort of alternate universe, so if you'd just kindly--" Twilight was interrupted when she saw the long, slender sword two inches from her face.
"Hyeh!" the boy yelled again, this time sending out a tiny, blue ball with wings.
"This looks like a rather weak equestrian demon. Its stubby hooves make it useless for combat or escape. I'd say it'd be easy to kill."
"Kill!?" Twilight immediately protested. This wasn't part of what she'd expected to happen. Without second thoughts, she dashed off in the other direction. Pinkie followed her when the sword pointed towards her.
Twilight and Pinkie were faster than the boy expected. He grabbed a small ocarina and began playing a simple melody. Within seconds, a horse of his own had galloped next to him, already equipped with a saddle. The boy hopped on and ordered his horse to follow the ponies.
When Twilight heard another pony's hooves clopping on the ground, she looked back and saw that the green-dressed boy was quickly gaining on them. Without warning, however, another portal appeared right in front of Twilight and consumed her and and Pinkie. It closed less than a second before the boy's sword jabbed the thin air where the ponies where before.
Back in the pitch dark tunnel, Twilight was relieved to have avoided that sword. Once again, a bright flash brought them to their next destination, temporarily blinding them again. This time, the first thing Twilight felt her hooves make contact with was a cold, metal floor.
Twilight looked around the room she was in. The walls were crowded with vines, and the place utterly reeked of emptiness. A single plaque hanged on one wall.
Welcome to the Aperture Science Enrichment Center. Everyone is guaranteed to die have a great time while they experience what it's like to be a scientist!
Twilight grew nervous at the words on the plaque. It reminded her of those places that claimed to be family-friendly but actually had something evil behind them. That's when Twilight noticed the talking sphere behind her.
"Space, I wanna go to space, space is fun, will you take me to space? SPAAAAAAAAACE!!!"
"This thing is funny!" Pinkie Pie giggled while listening to the robotic voice's rambling.
Twilight looked around for another portal, since this room had no doors. Finally, she saw a blue portal around her elevation on the wall. Upon jumping in, she found herself at the other side of the room.
"What? How'd that happen?" she questioned. When Pinkie Pie's attention diverted to Twilight, she kept flipping back and forth to the Twilight in either portal.
"Neat! I want to do that!" Pinkie Pie exclaimed, bouncing up and down and jittering all the way. When Twilight finally exited the orange thing she had somehow went into, Pinkie began running through the blue portal repeatedly.
"This is fun! Awesome! Cool! Pinkie-licious!" As Pinkie kept teleporting, she entered a different pose each time she came out of the orange portal.
The combination of the robot's habit of yelling space and Pinkie's joyous laughter made it impossible for Twilight to concentrate. It was like trying to explain indoor voices at a sports rally.
"Enough already! I'm here trying to figure out how we got into this mess, and more importantly how we'll get OUT of it, and you two won't stop making noise!"
Both Pinkie and the sphere stopped moving and stared at Twilight. Great. Now their staring was driving Twilight's mind blank.
Finally, after several minutes of sitting there and coping with the unusual silence, Twilight heard Pinkie scream and point and shout at something.
"Twilight! I see the purple thing! But it's shrinking!"
Without any warning at all, Twilight tackled into the hole. She didn't care about anything besides getting out of that maddening room.
"That was fun, Twi! Where do you think we'll go next?" Pinkie asked.
The familiar flash occured and led Twilight and Pinkie into some new world. It had become nothing new now. The same impaired senses fixed themselves in the same amount of time. The only thing that changed was where they ended up. And this new place was probably the most nightmarish of all.
"New friends!" shouted a strange-looking pony.
"Yay! Let's dance!" yelled another one.
Twilight looked around to see that the houses were pink, the sky was pink, and there wasn't a single stallion in the entire mass of ponies.
Without warning, an entirely pink pony, resembling Pinkie Pie, began singing some off-key "friendship" song. To Twilight, it was more like a broken accordion.
"Who in Celestia are you?" Twilight asked, hoping to find some answers.
"I'm Pinkie Pie!" the one who sang said.
"What!? It's just as I feared! Twilight, we need to get out now!" Without any warning, Pinkie Pie (the one who traveled dimensions) fled out of the town.
Twilight followed as the foreign ponies trotted closer to her, staring into her soul with those terrible eyes.
"Pinkie, wait up!" With that, they were both escaping from this horrible land. It would be too girly even for a stereotype.
The portal was nowhere to be seen, though. Instead, all that Twilight saw down the path was the stallion from the castle. Realizing what she needed to do, she started passing Pinkie and charging towards the stallion.
Instead of capturing him and finding out about what was going on about all this, the pony simply jumped out of the way, where another gateway opened. With the stomp of a hoof, the dirt path suddenly flipped into an icey walkway, forcing Twilight and Pinkie into the portal.
As they zoomed through the dark tunnel, Twilight kept beating herself over at how close they were. Within a few seconds, both ponies were deposited into a new world.
Twilight noticed how basic this world looked. Very few colors were present and she could only move in four directions.
"Hey! You look like a strong trainer!" a strange man said upon seeing Twilight.
"Huh? What?"
"Let's have a battle!"
The entire world flashed as Twilight was locked into a small arena by some mysterious force.
Hiker Jim wants to battle!
The floating text was confusing enough, but then Pinkie jumped forward and threw a red-and-white ball out onto the field. From the little ball jumped some sort of yellow mouse. The strange man, which reminded Twilight of something called a human, tossed a ball, too. A four-armed something emerged from this one, although it was clearly to large to actually fit in it.
Pikachu used Thunderbolt! the strange text showed.
The four-armed thingamajig's life bar went down, followed by it retaliating.
Machamp used Karate Chop!
The "Machamp" lunged towards the "Pikachu" with one arm ready to chop when a sudden earthquake caused it to trip onto its face. The simple layout of the world began to fade as the ground dissolved, revealing a dark, swirling void underneath.
"What the hay!?" The ground underneath Twilight's hooves threatened to dissapear and let her fall into the storm appearing from below.
When her face turned to the right, she very faintly saw the mysterious stallion again, leaping over rocks that a normal pony could not jump over. Fighting against the strange void, Twilight and Pinkie started to give chase after him. As they neared him, more rifts in the ground started to appear, forcing the two to keep aware.
Knowing this was her chance, Twilight began building up magic in her horn. If this spell were to connect with the stallion, he'd be immobilized, but still able to speak. She increased her speed and fired the spell, which took the form of a laser beam. The attack directly hit him, bringing him to a halt. Well, it should have, at least.
He just kept galloping, completely unaffected by one of Twilight's most powerful spells. It made so little sense Twilight herself couldn't say anything. She just stood there, her jaw hanging to the floor.
"Twilight, RUN!" Pinkie yelled worredly. Pinkie was waving her legs and jumping when Twilight finally realized the 3-yard-thick border of deteriorating ground preventing her from going anywhere.
Continually backing up into nothing, Twilight's hooves failed to cling onto the remaining ground, and she slipped into the dark abyss below.
"TWIIIILIii..." was all she heard as the darkness engulfed her. There was no way of knowing where she was going now. It was highly possible she'd just keep falling down the pit until she starved to death.
Twilight's body was face-down in a meadow. It felt as though something otherworldy had led her to this spot.
"Wake up..." some disembodied voice called.
Twilight groaned as she lifted her body from the grass. Her eyes needed to adjust now that the color had returned to the world. And when she saw what stood in front of her, she couldn't help but stare in awe, for in front of her stood Princess Luna.
"Princess, what are you doing here?" Twilight asked before realizing another important question.
"HOW are you here!?"
"The answer's simple, Twilight. I--" a portal opened up and two dark-grey hooves dragged the princess in. The portal closed when Luna was out and the stallion emerged from another portal.
He stood blankly at Twilight. It was as if he were saying something, although she couldn't quite understand it. The grassy field began to melt as the stallion glanced out into the white emptiness beyond them. The world returned to them in what seemed like brushstrokes against a canvas.
This new world greatly clashed with the previous one. The sky was blood-red and a huge factory lay off into the distance, chugging pillars of smoke into the sky.
"What does this mean? Is this something parallel to Equestria?" Twilight fired off question after question, but she stopped after about the 20th one when she realized he wouldn't be answering them.
A siren blared from the factory, making a grating, yet intriguing sound. The sound resembled the screech of numerous things piled into one. And then next thing Twilight saw solved some questions and opened up even more.