“Why, that- that-“
Rarity was unsure what to do. What to say. She was confused, scared, and angry. Sweetie Belle was too young to do simple levitation spells, no less transforming a full grown mare into a filly! Those spells were only for high-level unicorns!
Rarity looked herself over, again looking at her reflection in the water. Wonderful.
She looked around the dark room, where was the light coming from? The sun had long since set. “I’m a filly again,” she said, looking at her tiny hooves. “Why, of all the worst things that could happen, this is the worst POSSIBLE THING!” Rarity wailed.
“Oh, Sweetie Belle, when I get my hooves on you I’ll – I’ll…”
Rarity paused. She could think of ways to strangle her sister later, right now she needed to get out of this mess. She begun forward, and immediately fell on her face in the mud under the water. Such tiny legs! She yelped, jumping upwards. She frantically tried to wipe the mud off her face with her hooves. “Mud! On my face!” she yelped, finally she scooped up water in her hooves and splashed it onto her face – anything to get the filth off!
It worked somewhat, but her face still felt dirty. With a growl, she set forward. She crossed the room, eying the holes that the light was coming through. Where was it coming from?
A mystery for another time, perhaps. She put a hoof on the door, how did this thing open? Magic? She focused the energy in her horn. She closed her eyes – clenching her teeth she channeled the magic through her horn.
It… wasn’t working. Her horn produced a few blue sparks, but that was it.
“GAH! Sweetie Belle, when I…” she bit her lip, trying to cool off. “Relax now, Rarity. A lady never loses her temper.” She pressed both hooves on the door and pushed upwards with all her might. She felt it lifting – yes! Once it was high enough, she quickly ran under it. It just barely missed her tail as she ran underneath. She found herself in a hallway made of… log? It was almost as if she was in the inside of a hollowed out tree. Not that she was too surprised, the library was inside of a tree after all, but this was different. It curved at the end, she could see. She trotted forward on her embarrassingly tiny legs, the ground was smooth and clean. At least a nice change from the dirt of the Everfree. She glared at her tiny little hooves. So pudgy, and little. In this body, she couldn’t be much older than the Cutie-Mark-Crusaders. “Oh, I’ll have to move back in with my parents!” she fretted, “No more spa days with Fluttershy, nopony will take me seriously anymore!”
She felt the tears welling up, and forced them back. She couldn’t cry, at least not yet. She needed to find Sweetie Belle and the other two and get this cursed removed. There was also the fact that she didn’t know how to get back home from here. She rounded the corner, How is that even possible? She thought, Isn’t this a tree? Trees can’t curve…
Well, unless there was magical influence involved, she figured but still, she'd never seen anything like it. She immediately noticed that this room was much like the room she had been transformed in. Grassy, dirty, mossy. Only the door was now on a ledge on the other side. She took a deep breath, backed away, and then took a running leap. She made it!
Well, almost.
Her hooves hit the edge, but her tiny body slid off. She shrieked as she begun to slide off. It wasn’t that far a fall, but how would she find her way back up?
Finally, she pulled herself up. She lay on her back, breathing heavily. She could have made that jump no problem if she were a grown mare. And if she had fallen she would have just been able to jump climb back up. She groaned and got to her hooves for what felt like the zillionth time that day. How had the three fillies made it? Rarity tried to use her magic to open the door, remembered she didn’t have any right now, growled in frustration, and used her hooves. This one was significantly smaller than the other and much easier to lift. She went through. Looked around. And almost fainted.
Across from the ledge she stood on were several pillars. Tall pillars. No, the tops were even with the ledge she stood on, but that’s not what bothered her. It was the fact that they stretched down, down, down into…. Well, nothing!
Nothing at all.
Just pure, blackness.
Rarity moaned, she could see another ledge and an opening on the other side of the room.
She was going to have to jump across. “Why me!” she wailed.
Yet, there was another thought that disturbed her. What about Sweetie, Apple Bloom and Scootaloo. Had they made it? Rarity swallowed, what if they had fallen?
No. She refused to even think about it. She was going to find them! With new found energy, she took a running leap.
Luckily, she landed on her hooves on the first pillar. Ugh, it was muddy! Uh oh, that couldn’t be good. If she tried to jump for the next one and slipped…. She looked up. Darkness above, too. How she could even see was a mystery to her, to her knowledge there wasn’t a source of light.
Luckily for her she managed to leap across all the pillars without incident. She did slip a few times, but other than a few seconds of panic she was fine. Finally she made it to the other side. She sighed in relief. That was… a trying experience. She wiped the mud off herself to the best of her current ability, and proceeded through the… entrance? Exit?
She didn’t know yet. She stepped through.
Was she looking at… a painting? She put a hoof against it. It wasn’t solid. She was actually looking at this.
She wasn’t sure exactly what to do. Was it safe to go through?
In front of her was a hallway with a neon green carpet and stone walls. Nothing out of the ordinary, right? Well, except for the fact that the whole thing actually twisted. The entire room curled halfway through, not just the floor, but the whole thing. The carpet, the walls. The door was actually on the corner of the ceiling.
She stared in disbelief for a while, before regaining her composure. She pressed forward. She half expected to have to leap up and got through, but no; as she walked along the carpet she could feel herself twisting along with it. It was the strangest feeling…
When she reached the end she was dizzy. She stood there for a moment, her ears perked when she heard a heavy creaking noise behind her. She turned around just in time to see two heavy doors pull shut behind her. She jumped, startled. She didn’t even notice a door when she went through. She took a deep breathe; she could worry about it later. She still needed to figure out where the hay she was and where the Cutie-Mark-Crusaders were. Oh, and get her older self back.
She looked around, she appeared to be in a…. she wasn’t sure. She’d never seen anything like it; there were waterwheels spinning through a stream, and gears spinning on the walls. The ground she stood on was made of wood. From the looks of this place, it hadn’t had a good scrubbing in quite a while. And those gears needed to be oiled! She could see a wooden ramp ahead of her, she quickly trotted over to it. Wherever she was, it had to be near civilization!
She turned and walked upward. In front of her was a spinning pole, and beyond that were two doors. She hoped to Celestia it wasn’t another strange forested place. She bit her lip and trotted up to the door. She reached out with a pudgy foreleg about to open it, when a familiar, deep voice from behind said; “Element of generosity, you are undoubtedly the one and only Rarity?”
Rarity whirled around, and came face to face with Zecora.
“Zecora!” the filly-turned-fashionista turned beet red, shrinking back. But then again, it wasn’t as embarrassing as it would have been if say, Rainbow Dash or Spike had seen her.
“Zecora, my how lovely to see you! Hehe…” she turned away.
Zecora arched an eyebrow; “Rarity, if my eyes do not betray me you take the form of a filly?”
“Yeeees!” Rarity let out a heartbreaking wail. “I don’t know how she did it- It was Sweetie Belle! She used- she used MAGIC! It was not normal, and and-!”
Zecora seemed calm. “Calm yourself, little pony. Speak calm, and tell me.”
And so Rarity did, explaining about being knocked out in the forest, to the stealing of her instrument and then the cave, the transformation and how she got to be here. Zecora listened intently. When Rarity was finished she frowned.
“Sweetie stole a precious item from me; upon her face a mask did you see?”
“Yes,” Rarity said; “It was the ugliest thing I’ve ever-“ she quickly caught herself. “N-never mind! Yes, they said it was stolen…”
Zecora looked worried. “Why would they steal again? Did the Cutie-Pox incident not put that to an end?”
Rarity grimaced, “Apparently not.”
Zecora looked urgent, “Rarity, we must make haste, for if not this land will be made waste.”
“What?” Rarity stared, “Zecora, what’s wrong with Sweetie Belle? Why would she do this to me?”
Zecora shook her head. “Sweetie was not in control, we must hurry before the mask’s full powers take toll. Rarity, you must retrieve back my mask. Surely you are up to the task?”
Rarity was bewildered. “You mean… she’s possessed? By that dreadful mask?”
Zecora simply nodded.
“Why," she gasped; "of all the worst things that could happen, this is the worst POSSIBLE THING!”
Rarity collapsed dramatically.
“Rarity, you must hurry and not let anything get in the way. We only have until the third day.”
Rarity arched an eyebrow, “I only have three days? Why? Why only three?”
Zecora looked as though she was going to answer, but said nothing.
Rarity sighed, “No matter. I can get that awful mask off my little sister. Piece of cake. You’ll be able to turn me back into my old self, right?”
Zecora nodded; “Get my mask back and your instrument as well, and I’ll get you back to your old self faster than you can tell.”
Rarity smiled, “Thank you! Now, I take it Sweetie Belle’s through here?” pointing at the door, “Excellent. I’ll have your mask back in no time!”
And without another word, she trotted towards the door, pushed it open and went through.
She was… well, surprised with what she found.
She stood outside a massive tower. The doors were brightly painted with blue red, and white. Not as elegant as Rarity would have liked, but it the colors were pretty. She was outside, the ground was dirt, but there were bricks in the ground here and there that formed patterns. She could hear the sound of construction, and ponies walking around. When had the sun come up? Last she checked, it was early evening. Strange.
Rarity took a deep breathe, it was time to find Sweetie Belle.