“Moondancer, do you have the lantern?” Twilight Sparkle’s voice was cool, calm, and collected. She sat on a plush, overstuffed cushion and her cast was now covered in a collection of colourful ribbons.
“Sure do,” Moondancer replied, holding up the lantern as she came into the room.
“Wonderful.” Twilight snatched the lantern out of Moondancer’s magic and then focused all of her attention upon Sumac. “How are you feeling, Sumac? Has the effect worn off? Do you have your magic back? Do you notice any other side effects?”
Sumac took a moment to focus upon himself. He felt a tickle of magic in his horn, which he lit up. He had magic again, and that was good. Cautious, he wiggled his legs and didn’t go flying across the room. Super strength seemed to be gone. After a few more test-wiggles, he looked up at Twilight.
“Everything seems to be fine,” Sumac reported. As he spoke, he heard a sigh of relief from Trixie and Lemon Hearts. Great. Now there was two of them. Already, his brain was laying the foundation for thinking about Lemon Hearts as his mother.
“Time for a bit of unscheduled science. Spike, be ready to take notes!” Twilight began to examine the lantern with an eager, if somewhat haphazard grin upon her face. “Also, I need some tea. Celestial Glory please, honey, a sliver of crystallised ginger, and a bit of heavy cream.”
With a noticeable wobble, Lemon Hearts took off to prepare her boss’ tea.
“So, Twilight, what did you have in mind?” Moondancer asked.
Holding up the lantern, Twilight pointed it at Moondancer. “Hold still and don’t move. I think I am about to try the pegasus setting!” Twilight stuck out her tongue and tweaked the shutter latch with her magic.
Before Moondancer could protest, the lantern flashed and Moondancer let out a spooked gasp as wings appeared upon her sides. In a bit of a tizzy, Moondancer began flapping her wings and she ran around in a narrow circle as she panicked.
“Twilight! This isn’t anything at all like a wing spell! This feels totally different! I don’t have magic! The feeling of the air on my wings is really weird!” Moondancer came to a halt and then stared at Twilight. After a few seconds, Moondancer’s face darkened and her glasses steamed up a bit.
“Moondancer, what is wrong?” Twilight asked.
“I can’t say,” Moondancer replied, “it’s embarrassing.”
“Say it anyway… for science.” Twilight gave her underling a reassuring smile.
“Your wings are very pretty and I find them attractive and I can’t figure out why!” Moondancer blurted out. As she spoke, her own flapping wings snapped out and went rigid. “Oh my stars! What is happening to me! My wings won’t move! Is this what pegasus ponies have to go through every single day? You just see a pretty pair of wings and this happens? This is unbearable! No wonder Rainbow Dash acts so brain dead!”
Sniggering, Spike wrote down every word that Moondancer had said—for science.
“Oooh… check out my wingspan… it’s kinda impressive!” Fascinated by her own wings, Moondancer let out a wolf-whistle and shuffled around on her hooves. “For some reason, I want to find a body of water, start bathing, and then call attention to myself so everypony can watch me. Twilight, there is something wrong with me!”
“How illuminating…” Twilight snorted and then let out a giggle. “The lantern”—she giggled a bit more and had to fight to keep her composure—“did the same thing to you that it did to Sumac. A physical change that exaggerates the features of the selected tribe. This is very fascinating. The wing spell, if it is anything like Sumac’s earth pony transformation, is worthless for flying because it will wear off in about ten minutes.”
“Then what is the point?” Trixie asked.
Still giggling, Twilight replied, “That’s obvious. The lantern wishes to illuminate others on what it is like to be a certain tribe of pony. Sumac experienced superiour grade earth pony strength and Moondancer has found out what it is like to be Rainbow Dash.”
“But why?” Trixie’s head tilted off to one side and she gave Twilight her best quizzical expression.
Twilight gave a shrug. “Perspective?”
Sumac, who had a sore head, got the joke that Twilight was making and he groaned. He had perspective alright. If he had even a fraction of the strength that Pebble had… well, he didn’t know how she did it. How did she not destroy everything she touched? How was she able to hug him and not kill him? Or other ponies for that matter? And how did she sneeze without leaving behind a ruined house or an unthinkable body count? As he thought about these things, more questioned formed… like…
How did earth ponies poot?
The stomach muscle contractions and the following expulsion of air would cause hurricane force winds if it wasn’t controlled. Sumac, even with his overactive imagination, had trouble trying to make sense of his new world view. Pebble had to live a very, very stressful life, holding everything back the way she did.
Sumac vowed to be a better friend and be more supportive of Pebble before she exploded. One day, she would just burst from holding everything back. She would detonate like one of Trixie’s rockets and all that would be left would probably be her hooves and maybe some scraps from her dress. And then, he would be sad and alone.
“Twilight, a part of me hates you just a little tiny bit for having larger wings than I do. I can’t figure why though, but I can feel the resentment… it’s illogical and stupid!” Moondancer looked a little distressed as she folded her wings against her sides, now having relaxed enough to do so. “Also, I am distressingly concerned with being pretty, fast, and nimble.”
Spike appeared to be having trouble writing and with each snort of laughter, smoke curled out of his nose. If he snorted too hard, or worse, coughed, he might set his notes on fire. Moondancer wasn’t making it easy for him and neither was Twilight. The struggle was real and never ending.
Holding aloft a mug so large that it was comical, Lemon Hearts returned. The steaming mug she held overhead smelled of ginger and Celestial Glory tea. Lemon Hearts’ front legs seemed sorted out, but her back legs were somewhat out of synch with her front ones, causing her to walk in a somewhat diagonal manner as she approached Twilight.
“Some tea for you, Boss.” Somehow, Lemon Hearts didn’t spill a drop as she passed the enormous mug along to Twilight. “You know, Boss… there is a warning on the Celestial Glory tea tin that ponies with an excitable nature shouldn’t drink it—”
“What are you insinuating, Lemon?” Twilight’s eyebrow arched and her nostrils flared.
“Oh, nothing, Boss, nothing at all… just never mind. I think it’s my concussion talking.” Smiling, Lemon Hearts backed away, her back legs still moving out of synch with her front legs. “Silly Lemon, she got her head bonked and now she say crazy things… crazy.”
Unable to help himself, Spike burst out laughing, coughed out a gout of flame, and set his notes on fire. They burnt to a crisp in an instant and then were gone, sent off to Princess Celestia. Every word that had been said, every observation, every one of his own snide observations, including his snide remark about Prince Gosling and the pegasus pony’s inner struggle to be pretty, fast, and nimble.
“Uh oh,” Spike grumbled as he realised that he was stewed.
Far away, in Canterlot, Princess Celestia, who was getting ready for her wedding, was quite surprised by the unexpected delivery. She caught it before it hit the floor, held it up, read it, and then began to snicker as her eyes glanced over Spike’s looping scrawl. Unable to hold it back, the big white mare began to chuckle.
Looking up from a pile of paperwork, Gosling asked, “What’s so funny?”
Smirking, Celestia replied, “Here, why don’t you read it and find out, Prince Peacock?”
Moondancer, now wingless, seemed to be recovering from her ordeal. Lemon Hearts had been sent to fetch another cup of tea, which Moondancer now sipped as she collected her thoughts on her newfound perspective. The bespectacled mare was now quiet, calm, and maybe just a little out of sorts.
Spike, looking fretful, sat in the corner, re-writing what he could remember of his notes. Spike’s excellent memory allowed him to recall most of it, but he left out his own comical asides. Curled up beside Spike was Boomer, who had slipped into a full belly coma and was now unresponsive.
For the most part, Sumac was okay. He had split open the back of his head a little bit, it wasn’t bad. There was now a scab in his mane and he knew that Trixie would attempt to scrub it out later. He wasn’t looking forward to that, not at all. Quiet and now rather calm himself, he watched as Twilight studied the lantern while sipping her tea.
The sudden change of view, going from being a unicorn to experiencing life as an earth pony, had left Sumac a little shaken. He had no doubt that Moondancer was experiencing something similar. It was one thing to have wings, but it was something else entirely to become something else, something foreign and weird. Even though he was very young, Sumac now had an understanding that would change his life.
The lantern had illuminated him, as Twilight might say, and he wondered what it might be like to be an alicorn. He now had a way to find out, but he didn’t think he was ready for the experience, as he was still too shook up from being an earth pony. The lantern had certainly shed some light upon the subject and this was a lesson that Sumac would not soon forget. In fact, Sumac began to think that this was a lesson that everypony in Twilight’s school needed to learn.
Thinking about weddings, marriage, and love, Sumac asked, “Twilight, have you ever been in love?”
Twilight did not respond right away. She sat there, holding her enormous mug of tea in her telekinesis, and she stared at Sumac through half-closed eyes as one ear twitched. She sighed, causing both ears to flop a bit, and then after more of a delay, she replied, “Yes, Sumac, I have been in love.”
“They don’t seem to be around.” Sumac hoped that his observation would not cause Twilight to become upset. For some reason, he thought about Pebble, then he thought about Lemon Hearts and Trixie. His reflections made him feel somber. Feeling worried, he added, “I don’t mean to be a pain in the neck, if I am…”
There was a long sigh that slipped from Twilight, and her lips made a flatulent sound. “Sumac, not all love works out. Sometimes, fate… destiny… whatever you want to call it, it throws you the love of your life in the form of a school sweetheart and everything just sort of falls into place. Your best friend becomes the love of your life and everything is perfect.”
“What happened?” Sumac asked, all too aware that he was dealing with a dangerous, maybe even painful subject.
“Sumac, sometimes… sometimes love has nothing to do with destiny.” Twilight took a sip of tea, shuddered, and then her ears drooped, as did the corners of her mouth. “Sometimes, love is just a feeling. Infatuation. A very painful crush. You feel something for somepony, but they do not return your feelings.”
“I’m sorry, Twilight, I didn’t mean to make you hurt.” Sumac hoped that his apology would smooth things over. It was the foalish hopes of every colt and filly that had made an adult hurt somehow, and then had felt guilty about it.
“Oh, I’ve gotten better about it. I’ve even learned to be happy for this pony that I loved. I grew up. I matured. I got past being selfish and because I loved them, I wanted what was best for them. I wanted them to be happy. So I let go.” Twilight let heave another sigh and nopony else in the room said anything.
“I bet that was rough,” Sumac said in a low voice, now wishing that he hadn’t brought it up.
“It was,” Twilight admitted. “This pony that I held a great deal of affection for, they married somepony else. I was bitter for a time, angry even, but now my heart has healed. I loved this pony so much that I was willing to allow my love to cool into a very warm friendship, just so I could continue to be with them. I see it as one of my most important friendship lessons. To be honest, now that I think about it, the whole experience has made me a better pony, a better princess, and a better friend.”
Turning his head, Sumac looked over at Trixie and Lemon Hearts. He hoped that whatever happened between the two of them, that they would somehow remain friends, no matter what. A part of him rather liked the idea of calling Lemon Hearts ‘Mom’ quite a bit—even though he would never admit to it. But if her and Trixie were to drift apart, it would be painful. Too painful.
Perhaps, this was the reason why Applejack had said what she said, he wondered.
“What about you, Sumac? Do you think you are in love?” Twilight gave Sumac a gentle smile and there was no hint of teasing in her voice.
“I have no idea,” Sumac replied without a moment of hesitation. “All I know is… Pebble is my best friend and I am a better pony for having met her. I would do just about anything for her. I keep thinking about how both of us fell… and I can’t help but feel that we didn’t have enough time together. It makes every moment together now much more important.”
As Sumac spoke, he heard both Lemon and Trixie sniffling, which made him feel self-conscious. The back of his neck was alive with prickles and he felt his ears twitching as his cheeks grew warm.
“Like you, Twilight, I think the experience has left me a better pony…”