//------------------------------//
// Acts of Harmony 
// Story: Cursed Destinies and Faux Marks 
// by MaskedPony 
//------------------------------//

Two hours had past since the five members of Twilight’s circle of friends had been requested to come to the palace for an emergency meeting with Twilight regarding Stardust. Over the course of the time gap, Stardust had returned to her normal self as the curse effects have halted until the next time. When she saw the ponies Twilight had called come in, like every pony in Equestria, she was surprised to meet the other five of the six who had saved Equestria multiple times from the many dangers it had encountered over the last few years.

After quick, if shy on Stardust’s part, introductions had been made, Twilight asked the mare to leave the room for a bit and wait in the lobby. Although Spike could be in there with them, he decided to be with Stardust to make sure she was alright and if she needed anything.

With the mane six were all in the room, Twilight sat in her chair, using her magic to close to the door to ensure privacy and looked to her friends, beginning to gather her thoughts. This was going to be hard to explain.  However, it was worth a try. "Girls, we have a serious problem.”

"What, did the latest Daring Do book get cancelled?" Rainbow asked in horror, only to get a glare from her friends. "What?! It happened before."


Starlight, who was next to Twilight in a custom chair Maud had built for her out of gems, looked around at the group, after giving her own quick glare to the Pegasus. "Now is not the time to joke around, Rainbow. We found out something about the new mare in town.” She sighed. “Something that explains why she doesn’t interact with too many ponies in town or anything."


Hearing about the new mare, everypony looked at one another. When they’d first heard a new mare was moving to Ponyville from Pinkie Pie, she’d told them how she was going to plan a Welcome to Ponyville party for her, however, that Twilight had recommended she not do so.

They had all wondered why Twilight had asked such a thing, as it had left Pinkie upset at the idea of not throwing a party.

"So is she a party pooper? A Party ruiner? A..." Pinkie rambled only to get a magically contructed hoof in the mouth from Starlight.

Twilight took a deep breath, before looking firmly at the party pony. "Pinkie, she is cursed.”

Dead silence filled the room after those words were heard. The expressions on the other five mares’ faces were complete shock and disbelief, as if Twilight was pulling a fast card, or pulling a prank on Rainbow. Fluttershy looked at the door worriedly, knowing Stardust was on the other side.

"Say what now?" Applejack asked with a raised eyebrow.

" From what Twilight and I can gather, Stardust is cursed with a long forgotten mark known as a Faux Mark. Unlike the marks I gave you all two years ago, the Faux Marks we are talking about are very serious, and far more dangerous than the Equality Mark I came up with."

Twilight nodded. "From what we have learned, a Faux Mark functions as a curse. Faux Marks may look like a cutie mark, but it behaves as a curse.”

“But... didn’t you say WAY back when we were all so wrong about Zecora that curses aren’t real?” Pinkie asked, looking confused.

Twilight nodded in agreement. “That’s true, I thought they didn’t exist, however, the curse of a Faux Mark still functions on a basis of magic. The mark has its own abilities, that in this case are thankfully non-harmful. Stardust has a faux mark and hers makes her inflate into a round balloon pony, for about an hour or so."

Learning the information, every pony gasped, while Rarity fainted. This was the very first time they ever, in their whole entire lives that they heard about such a thing. To them it was like if it was in a movie played in the Cinemas in Ponyville, but far worse.

"Wellm what are ya waiting for, can’t ya reverse it or somethin'?" Applejack asked very annoyed.

Right when she asked that, frowns appeared on Twilight and Starlight’s face. It was hard to decipher their expressions at first, but after a few moments, the five mares all covered their mouths, realizing what they meant. From Cutie Pox, to Horse Hives, even Poison joke, all of them had a reverse method to cure them, but hearing something that can't be reversed, was even more shocking.

"Darling....you don't mean, Faux Marks can’t be reversed?" Rarity asked horrified.


Recalling what they read in the book about similar curses, they couldn't help but nod. Since they found out about the Faux Marks, they had trying their hardest to find out what the reverse spell for a Faux Mark could be. When they skimmed through every book for the second time in the library to the point the books were forming a Book fort, nothing, not even the modern books had the information about a way to undo the Faux Mark. Though, one couldn’t completely blame them for not finding anything yet. As it was, they’d only gone through the books in Twilight’s library. Whether or not a book containing a reverse spell existed was unclear. If they checked the Canterlot Archives, however, who knows?

With the truth about Stardust now revealed and Twilight and Starlight had explained how it had happened, the other mares felt bad for Stardust. An innocent mare, who had her innocence destroyed by a mere Faux Mark curse as a filly, on her own birthday. Now it made sense that she was Anti-social, because she doesn't want to risk others ostracising her for something she can’t control.

"Um, so, why does this relate to us? I-if you don't mind me asking," Fluttershy murmured meekly as she hid behind her mane.

Twilight looked at Starlight and nodded. It was time to see if they’d go along with the plan. "Well, we have an idea. We told Stardust, but we want your input," Starlight responded.

"We are going to help Stardust not be bothered if her curse activates in public,” Twilight explained. “Basically, this involves all of us. We are going to help her not be afraid of her curse. Here’s the plan, we are going to make a cover up, saying the reason why Stardust inflates is due to it being part of her special talent. That way, when she inflates in public, it won't give out that she is cursed."

"This brings us into the plan...."


_____


Stardust was waiting patiently and quietly as she sat on the bench that was placed in the lobby to the Throne room, with Spike next to her. Since she inflated, both Twilight and Starlight were the only ones who were so kind to her and, like her sister, believed her. Surprisingly enough, Spike also believed her, but was asked to not inform Princess Celestia, or Princess Luna about this, until they have a game plan.

Looking at Stardust, who was awfully quiet since she returned to normal and was requested to wait, Spike began to wonder what Stardust’s dream talent was before the whole curse mess occurred. After all, a lot of ponies have dreams of what their talents are and what they might be.

With the dead silence killing him, he looked at Stardust. "Um, Stardust, can I ask you something?"

His question breaking the silence actually startled Stardust, who had to take a second to compose herself. "Oh um, sure. What is it?"

With the Faux Mark and the whole ordeal of the inflating effect, Spike knew that she had a dream before it was destroyed to smithereens. "What was your dream talent? I mean, like...you know, what your were good at that was going to make you who you are?" Spike asked nervously only getting a chuckle from Stardust.

"You're the first to ask that. Nopony else ever asked that since...well..." Stardust replied as she looked at her mark. "My dream was to be an amazing travelling entertaining magician, like Troupe Glamour. As a filly, I loved their shows, loved them so much they were my idols, which made me want to be a great magician." Stardust’s face shone with awe, but it was short lasted, as her expression saddened. "On my birthday I was going to pull a magic show for my friends and sister... that was until Aunt Charm did this to me."

Feeling bad for Stardust, Spike gave her a friendly hug, which surprised her. Before she met Twilight, Starlight, and Spike, everyone and any pony around her who knows about Cutie marks always lectured her that the cutie mark she has will forever be hers, and it can never change. Even seeing that there is a chance the former bearers of the Elements of Harmony, and the pupil of friendship will help her gave her hope.

After some time past, Starlight came out from the throne room, and waved a hoove, indicating that Stardust can come in. Getting up and proceeding in, she saw the other six mares sitting at their chairs, looking at her with sadness and such. It was easy to tell for Stardust that Twilight told them about what happened, and why she inflates, and even takes multiple breaks a day at her store, even if she hadn’t known prior it was what the Princess of Friendship was going to do.

Silence hung through the air and Stardust was curious why no pony has spoken yet. However, after a fair amount of time, Fluttershy got off her chair and flew over to her. Surprisingly, like Spike did, Fluttershy pulled Stardust into a hug for comfort.

Despite the things she heard about Fluttershy, she originally feared the element of kindness as much as she had anypony else. She’d feared that, even the pony known by Equestria of being the kindest pony, ever willing to help ponies feel better no matter what, her curse would be enough reason to be shunned.

“It’s okay,” the kind mare murmured. “We’re all here.”

Tears formed in Startdust’s eyes. She returned the hug. "I...I was afraid..."

Hearing the sorrow in Stardust’s voice proved to them that Stardust knew she had trouble speaking up, since it was hard to tell the difference between a Faux Mark and Cutie Mark. Whenever a cutie mark is earned and on one’s flank, ponies, no matter who, always see it as one’s special talent.

On the other side of the table, Applejack was calm, but hiding the fact she was furious at the pony responsible for giving Stardust such a curse. For one, Stardust was a filly when the curse had happened, and doing such a horrendous thing to a pony at such a young age, especially on their birthday without reason or motive, was cold and heartless.

After a while of Fluttershy giving Stardust a friendly hug to help her feel ease and stay calm, Fluttershy pulled away and returned to her seat. Twilight, who’d just finished writing a Royal Order scroll, gave the scroll to Pinkie. Stardust began to hope it was good news.

"So..., what’s gonna happen?" Stardust asked a little nervously.

The seven mares all looked at one another, and nodded. To Stardust’s point a view, it looked like they all came to an agreement on something. She began to hope it was what Twilight had planned.

"Stardust, since this is very serious, and we do thank you for telling me and Starlight about this, we have discussed this and decided, since you inflate every three or four hours and remain like a Balloon Pony for one or two hours due to your Curse Mark, we will be helping you feel more comfortable and not worry about your curse activating," Twilight explained.

"Um, isn't that....a little weird?" Stardust asked with a raised eyebrow.

Twilight shook her head. "No. The reason being, when me or one of my friends are with you, we will use a cover up. Think of it as a white lie."

 "What she means is, when you start to inflate in public and if ponies start to notice, we’ll be saying that it is part of your talent and who you are,” Rarity clarified. “It’s due to the fact we don't want to cause a panic by saying its a curse."

"However...' Starlight butted in, "if you feel uncomfortable and uneasy about inflating in public, and are bothered by the attention at any point, Twilight will allow you to come to the palace anytime until you return to normal."

Putting the pieces together, Stardust was filled with surprise and shock that, of everything that transpired today, these seven ponies actually wanted to help her. She couldn't believe it, the heroes of Equestria, and the former student of friendship, were actually going to help her. It touched Stardust so much that tears began to form in her eyes.

However, before she could, Pinkie came bouncing towards her and hugged her happily.

Twilight smiled, seeing that hope was shimmering in Stardust’s eyes. However, Applejack caught her attention and gave her a single, as if she was forgetting to mention the Royal Order she gave to Pinkie. Blushing slightly, she looked back at Stardust. She knew this was the right thing to do, just so Stardust’s shop didn't get shut down. "I forgot to add something Stardust, there is another part to this."

"Th-theres more?" Stardust asked wiping a tear of joy from her eye as Twilight nod.

"As a princess of Equestria, I have the ability to pass down any ruling that I see fit, as long as it doesn’t go against any main laws already in place. Those I would need to run through court. Anyway, since we are aware you run the Party & Balloon Shop, we know that your frequent breaks are indeed due to the fact you inflate."

"Where are you getting at?" Stardust asked.

Pinkie showed her the scroll. "As one of the Princesses of Equestria, I have assigned Pinkie Pie to help operate your Shop. That scroll I gave Pinkie is a Royal Order. This means that with this, Pinkie has proof she will be working at your store under my ruling."

Looking at Pinkie, Stardust knew that Pinkie could actually be a big help. Since Pinkie was a well known Party pony and known in Ponyville for making ponies smile, happy, share laughs with others, and her usual random parties, it was probably for the best that Pinkie helped out.

Bringing the meeting to a conclusion, other seven mares headed out of the room, inviting Stardust to hang out with them, who was happy enough to accept their offer. While they all went to hang out, Pinkie Pie, however, had to run to Sugarcube Corner to inform Mrs Cake that she won't be working with the cakes as reguarlaly due to her new obligations to Stardust.

From a day turned to a bad start, to surprisingly a good start, Stardust couldn’t be happier about it. However, tomorrow would be the daythat Pinkie would host her long overdue Welcome to Ponyvile Party, which would be held at Twilight’s Palace.