//------------------------------// // The Arrival Of Night // Story: Days in the Mind of One that is Great and Powerful // by The REAL Mister Pkmn //------------------------------// Trixie and co. soon found where Twilight and friends had gotten to, thanks to help from Maestro. After introducing the new anthros to the rest of the group, Pinkie (she’d anthrofied? That was new) spoke up, pointing to the spherical hourglass-shaped item that Trixie had pinned to her blouse. So what’s that thing you’ve got there, Trixie?” Trixie grinned. “This is the Illusion Dynamo, an artifact that the Analysts helped Trixie find. I believe they wanted Trixie to have it as a sign of trust.” Twilight seemed a bit confused. “The Illusion Dynamo? What exactly is it, anyway?” Maestro explained. “The Illusion Dynamo is one of the eight enchanted items of Mage Meadowbrook. It can give illusions a more ‘solid feel’ so to speak. This is why it is most suited to Trixie.” Ashley then spoke. “So have you been given an artifact by the Analysts?” Maestro shook his head. “No. But then again, I doubt I’ll need one- after all, my built in spell efficiency is more than enough.” Micaela (Rainbow) crossed her arms. “Wait a minute. If you have it built in, why’d you nearly pass out after all of those enchantments?” Maestro chuckled. “I’d never needed to use all of my magic, so I keep most of it sealed away using enchantments grafted into my very being. If I knew beforehand what the result would’ve been you would’ve seen me tap into my sealed magic, if only slightly.” Trixie then spoke to Twilight. “So did you already find whatever artifact was here?” Twilight nodded. “It’s the mana reserve that Maestro speculated about. I’m already feeling back at 100%!” Trixie then spoke. “Look, about what happened…” Twilight shook her head. “I’ve already forgiven you, Trixie.” She then put her hand out. “I just hope we can be friends now.” Trixie accepted the handshake, and grinned. “We’re in this mess together, so Trixie supposes it couldn’t hurt to be friends, at least for now.” The group then headed back towards the school, where they saw a peculiar sight- Chessmaster pushing his glowing red hand onto the vice principal. He then released his grip and turned to the group. He smiled evilly, the Alicorn Amulet gleaming around his neck. “Well, what do we have here? The incomplete Mane six and some stragglers, as well as-” He paused when he looked at Maestro, Servo, and Janice. His grin then returned. “What a wonderful surprise! The whole family’s been anthrofied! Glorious! Now, come to my side, and together we can get everything we rightfully deserve!” Servo huffed. “Maestro wasn’t kidding. You’re hopelessly deluded.” Chessmaster blinked. “So he’s already colored your opinions, has he?” He then glared at Maestro. “Well, now let’s see what you think of what I’m capable of!” He then guides the group’s gaze to a black swirling cloud that is where the vice principal once was. He smiled. “Beautiful, isn’t it? I can now anthrofy others at will, even forcing them into bodies not meant for them!” He then let out a guffaw. Janice started to cry. “That’s horrible! Forcing somebody to become something that they aren’t is just wrong!” Chessmaster huffed. “Whatever, just try and stop me now!” As he started to teleport away, Maestro leapt forward, and grabbed onto something. Chessmaster pushed Maestro off of him, flinging him into Trixie. Chessmaster then chuckled. “Sayonara!” He then vanished. Maestro got up, furious. “Again! He escaped again!” He started to mutter something. Trixie then shouted. “The black cloud is parting!” Sure enough, the black cloud was dissipating, and the figure that emerged floored them all. She then shouted her iconic phrase from the show. “The Night shall last forever!” They were face-to-face with Nightmare Moon. Twilight gulped. “How are we supposed to beat her? We don’t even have all of the main cast anthrofied!” Maestro put whatever he’d managed to pull off of Chessmaster’s person into a pocket, and huffed. “I didn’t want to have to do this, but desperate times…” He then walked up to Harry and Pinkie His horn started to glow, but that wasn’t all. The spiral of his horn shone a brilliant white, as if powering the spell further. His right hand then shared the same glow as his horn, and he traced two familiar symbols- the enchantments that he’d given Trixie and Applejack- albeit with a slight tweak to the unicorn one. Harry spoke first. “Maestro dear, what are you going to do to us?” Maestro sighed. “Speed up Harry’s Anthrofication and give both of you an enchantment. I didn’t think that I’d have to use this spell, but desperate action is required if we are to properly beat Nightmare Moon.” He then pushed the modified enchantments towards their proper hosts. The instant they connected, Harry began to change. Harry grew white fur and a horn, and his body became more feminine as his feet became hooves. His ears also morphed to pony ones, moving to the top of his head. The final touch was his hair becoming purple as well as a tail of the same color growing. Maestro nodded. “Alright. Now we can beat her!” Twilight then summoned the box with the Elements, and levitated one to each of her five friends, giving them the ones of their respective characters. She then put the tiara of the Element of Magic on her own head. But before they attacked, Twilight saw Maestro, Servo, and Janice light their horns. “Why are you doing that?” Maestro then spoke. “We don’t know if the Elements will remove the forced anthrofication entirely. If it doesn’t, we want to be ready to remove it. With a theoretical spell, but it's something, right?” Twilight nodded, and then she and her friends grabbed hands, and levitated into the air. The six colors of the elements then shot off towards Nightmare Moon, swirling around her. She screamed out, as she was enveloped in the light. As the light died down, the group noticed that the former anthro had been returned to a normal human. Passed out sure, but normal nonetheless. Twilight sighed as they touched down. “We won!” Maestro cleared his throat. “It’s not over yet. Remember, we still have to beat Chessmaster and his employer.” Micaela then spoke. “How long do you think that’ll take?” Maestro sighed. “I don’t know. But, I believe that we’re dealing with Starlight Glimmer. Of this, I’m pretty certain.” Rarity scrunched her brow. “Last night you said that you had two suspects. How can you have changed your mind this quickly?” Maestro huffed. “The more I thought about it, the less it made sense for it to be Chrysalis. After all, at the current state of the show, she wants revenge on Starlight more than anyone. So, the more logical option is that the Equestria we’re dealing with is not in sync with the Season 5 finale as well as Season 6 and 7. Why this is, I cannot say.” He grunted in pain, and brought a hand to his head. Flora (Fluttershy) spoke up. “Oh my! Are you alright?” Maestro nodded. “Yeah. Just a migraine, nothing too huge to worry about.” He wandered into the school using his extra key. “Just need to take a bit of medication. Be right back.” He disappeared into the building, not noticing that Trixie had followed him. Trixie then saw him go into a random room, and shut the door. She went up to it, and cast a spell that let her hear what was going on inside. She was startled as she heard him speak. “Why? Why is this happening? Why did I have that strange vision involving the Maestro Spectrum from Equestria? Is it some kind of delayed side-effect of my anthrofication, or am I going insane? Not to mention all of these… feelings... They seem to belong to him, the original, but now they’re making things needlessly complicated! I mean, it’s not so bad around certain anthros, seeing as those feelings are platonic, but around a certain anthro…” he sighed. “Why! I just…” He took a deep breath. “Calm down. Maybe Discord might know what’s happening. I’ll go see him about this.” Trixie then left the school once she heard him coming near the door. She knew something about him that nobody else did! Just the thought made her feel… special. She decided to keep it to herself, if only for now.