Twilight did not wake up the next morning. In order to wake up, she would have first needed to fall asleep, a feat she found utterly impossible. The ballet instructor's voice had a peculiar quality to it. Even if she could not make out the words, Twilight could still somehow hear the tone of her voice resonating throughout the crystal of the castle. It carried far and wide, audible at a barely perceptible level in every nook and cranny. It was inescapable, from the lowest cellar to the highest tower, the incessant sound haunted her. So she spent the night where she always did when she had a headache: the library.
Even there, the noise haunted her, but it was at least bearable between the soothing covers of her books. She spent the night studying anything that could be relevant, anything at all. Her limited selection of books on draconic magic, a slim few volumes on unexpected teleportations, and the entire shelf of mythology. Though the rational part of her brain hurt at admit it, Pinkie Pie's 'Hearth Warming Pixie' was rapidly becoming the most plausible explanation to her situation. True, Nightmare Moon had also been considered a myth, but her legend was primarily passed on word-of-mouth, with little to no records or writings about it. The Hearths Warming Pixie on the other hoof, was easily indexed and researched across multiple sources. She could trace the legend's date and reason it was introduced to Equestria, how it had been changed and modified during and since then. She could produce pages upon pages of artist's depictions of the Pixie, sorted with specific variances based on region and age. With a bit of digging, she even found the supposed origin of the myth; an ancient minotaur hero who supposedly slew a dragon, formed it's hide into armor, then retired as a local guard to deal out punishments to the misbehaving youth of his village. The Pixie couldn't hold a candle to Nightmare Moon.
Still, the thought worried her. No one had believed her about Nightmare Moon, could she now be the one on the wrong side of history?
Still, she researched every option available. She even initially began to suspect it all of being one of Discord's elaborate pranks, before she remembered a conversation she had had with Fluttershy several days before when she had come to see the birds. Apparently, despite being strongly on the road to redemption, Discord still had a strongly adverse reaction to the holidays. To quote Fluttershy's paraphrasing "all the systematic cheer and ritualistic goodwill played havoc with his sinuses", and he was spending the holidays safely in his pocket chaos dimension.
Though she did not sleep, Twilight did eventually fall into a trance-like stupor, where she sat staring at a single page for over two hours, re-reading the opening paragraph. This was how Spike found her the next morning, staring at the page like Pinkie Pie at drying paint.
"Uh, Twilight?" He shook her shoulder. "Twilight are you awake?"
"I... ugh... what?" She shook herself out of the stupor.
"You spent the whole night in the library. Again." He chided.
She rubbed her eyes blearily. "Sorry Spike, I just couldn't get to sleep, so I spent the night researching."
"Find anything?" he asked.
"Not really... I don't know enough about dragon magic to really analyze if it's even being used here, previously recorded events of spontaneous teleportation are wildly different from what we've seen here, and most of these legends are either ridiculous or contradictory! It just doesn't make any sense!"
"Speaking of not making any sense..." Spike began.
"Oh no."
"Oh yes. We've got more guests."
In addition to the music, Twilight and Spike could hear arguing emanating coming from ballroom as well. The scene they opened the doors to was worse than yesterday. The number of ponies seemed to have tripled, and the chaos was greater than before. Two sets seemed to be dancing still, while another was bouncing about aimlessly. For some reason, they seemed to have springs attached to their hooves, and were moaning helplessly.
'You! You there! Unicorn by the door! Please help us!" A middle-aged earth pony with a greying mane called out. "These springs seem to be enchanted to keep bouncing, and neither of those bickering unicorns over there will help! Please!"
Instantly moved by his plight, Twilight halted him and his bouncing compatriots in midair. Removing the springs (which continued to bounce about on their own in a corner) she set the ponies back down, the one who had spoken closest to her. Meanwhile, Spike headed off to see what the dancers were arguing so loudly about.
"Thank you so much! I don't know how much longer we could have stood that torment!" He thanked her profusely, nearly in tears. After a moment he regained his composure and checked over his similarly fated companions. "Is everypony alright? Alright, everypony other than Pencil Pusher once he finishes spoiling his breakfast in the corner? Good? Okay then." He turned back to Twilight. "Well then, I suppose proper introductions are in order. My name is Legal Notary, Vice-Mayor of Trottingham. These assorted ponies with me are some of my assistants and various other office staff. "
"Let me guess," Twilight interrupted, "You all either went to sleep or collectively passed out in your office, and awoke here mysteriously? With no other clue regarding your arrival?"
"That's- That's exactly right!" He exclaimed, "But how could you possibly know that."
She sighed. "You're not the first ponies this has happened to. The same thing happened to the Royal Canterlot Ballet yesterday, and a herd of cows from Whinnyapolis the day before."
As she spoke, Spike retook his place by her side. "Also the Manehattan Ballet Corp." He added. "They just arrived today as well. Same story as everypony else, they all passed out during a rehearsal and woke up here. No one from the Canterlot troupe saw them arrive however. Apparently everyone in this room passed out simultaneously as well. Also, seems the head instructors from each school are old rivals or something. They've been yelling at each other about proper interpretations and a bunch of stuff from their pasts for a while now."
Twilight nodded in thanks before turning back to Notary. "As you see, this is an ongoing problem we're dealing with. We're working on solving the issue and restoring everypony to their homes as quickly as possible. Unfortunately, we're currently snowed in as well, though we are in communication with ponies on the outside."
He nodded in gratitude. "Many thanks, Princess. We will try to be hospitable guests during our time here, and cause you as little trouble as possible."
Twilight smiled. "Thank you. Now if you'll excuse me, my assistant and I will see about getting something to eat for everypony."
Twilight turned away quickly and began walking down the hallway. Spike hurried to catch up. As soon as they turned a corner, her regal posture and demeanor fell away as she slumped down. "More ponies!?" she muttered in disbelief. "It's just impossible!"
"Well, dragon magic does get through the barrier." Spike reminded.
Twilight shook her head quickly. "No Spike, I made sure to run a magical scan on them while I was removing their springs. There's not a trace of dragon magic on them anywhere. As far as I could tell, they all were pure earth pony bureaucrats. Nothing strange or out of place at all."
"Well..." Spike hesitated, "It still could be Pinkie's Pixie. You said the legends varied right?"
"No!" She half-shouted, "I resolutely refuse to believe the cause is this Pixie! Even now the facts and data are starting to contradict that theory, what with the lack of dragon magic; a clear and repeated trait in nearly all the legends!"
Spike sighed as he walked ahead towards the kitchens. "Fine, believe what you want, but this Pixie is sounding more and more plausible to me. Could you at least help me with the breakfast please? We're going to need some powerful growth spells or else our one hay-bacon tree just isn't going to last feeding this many mouths!"