The Bonds of Friendship

by TalesFromEquestria

The White Maze

Despite her anger, Twilight still decided to visit Princess Celestia, not wanting to let her anger ruin the rare occasion of practising with the Princess.

That would be easier said than done though. For what seemed to be about 20 minutes for her to get ready and out the door was about 2 hours for Spike and dealing with her not-so-cheerful attitude.

Everything Twilight thought she said, she didn't. In its place was rude, snide things that she would never of dream of saying to anyone. All morning everything she said was a confabulation of nice. But of course reality isn't so kind all the time.

"Good Morning Twilight. Time to get up, you have your lesson from the Princess today," the young shook her body gently to wake her up, it was rare that Twilight slept in.

"Thanks Spike," and the purple haired girl started to stretch a little as she rose from her bed in her pajamas. But the 'Thanks Spike' part was a confabulation, what she actually said "Screw off Spike."

With a confused look on his face, Spike asked "Hey, uh Twilight, are you feeling okay?"

"That's none of your business, go away."

On her way there though seemed to be were it got worse. When she thought she helped someone with some friendly advice, she actually only worsened their problems. Like when someone asked for directions to Doughnut Joe's, she gave them directions to the garbage dump. Or when someone asked if she knew the time, she said it’s time for them to get a watch, and not as a joke either.

Things didn't cool down, no they only seemed to fuel her anger even more. By the time she reached the Castle, her anger was just a ticking time bomb, ready to go off any second and anyone.

This definitely made the training harder, and be cut short.

"I'm here Princess, lets get this lesson over with," Twilight was definitely not herself, Celestia saw this clear as day. Anyone could see that Twilight was acting like her life was going to hell.

"Twilight Sparkle, my faithful student, what seems to be bothering you today?"

"Nothing! yesh why does everyone think somethings wrong with me. Nothing's wrong!" The purple haired girls confabulation was still going on, and she thought she said something nicer, more polite, but reality isn't so kind to some people.

"Twilight relax, but there is something wrong, you sound very angry. We should reschedule this another day.You won’t be able to practice Alicorn level magic without being in an elevated mood, magic does come from your emotions, the purer the stronger. In your mood any spell you try will definitely fail."

"I can and watch!" Twilight started to gather mass amount of magical energy, and as quickly as she can gather the energy, it disappears for a few seconds, then comes back as a sphere surrounding the college student.

"Twilight Sparkle, if you continue to gather magical energy you won’t just fail the spell, but kill yourself as well. Stop now!"

The words of concern never reached Twilight, who was still trying to cast the spell. And as such, a huge mass of magical energy was starting to surround her, causing bolts of magic to erupt from the sphere like mass.

Celestia had one choice, and that was to seal Twilight's magic till her anger calmed down. It was a drastic decision, because the spell sends energy back at the caster, and if Twilight was to try any form of Alicorn level spells while she was still unstable, it would wound Celestia badly. This though was something the Princess was willing to do for the sake of her number one, and Faithful student.

Celestia's hands started to create a white aura, as she started to prepare the sealing spell. With every second she charged the spell, the more Twilight's magic became unstable. With every step closer she took, Twilight's magic seemed to tear apart reality around them. The fear of what may happen to Twilight and most of the castle was showing on the master of alicorn magic's face.

"This is for your own good Twilight," Celestia said as she arrived to the magical sphere that had encased the Element of Magic's body.Taking in a deep breath, and preparing for the pain that is sure to come, Celestia placed her right hand on the sphere, causing a jolt of shock throughout her whole body. The magic that was being produced was stronger than any Alicorn level spell can, and would of killed the Princess if she never have mastered holding her body's natural mana source.

The magic sphere was fighting Celestia's spell with full force, and with more force it used, the more reality seemed to fall apart. Celestia's clothes started to get cut from the magical aura. She soon felt a bolt of energy jolt her left wing, causing her to stop in pain. The stop gave Celestia time to think about what might be happening to Twilight, if what was happening to her was painful, then what was happening to the purple haired girl was worse.

Around the element of Magic the sphere had seemed to become rifts in the continuum around her. The closer Celestia got, the more she could see. Any theory of this entity was soon removed from the Princess mind, because once she was able to pierce the sphere, they had seemed to move into a reality other than any she had heard of, and not to far away was Twilight, still trying to cast Bring Light.

To say it was Twilight was a bit of a stretch, because most of her was ethereal, and each second that passed more of her became so. Her ethereal body parts seemed to flicker, disappearing and reappearing, as if something was still holding it to Equestria.

Celestia was able to walk more freely here, as if all of the danger was on the outside. With the added freedom of movement, Celestia made haste to her student, and got to her in a matter of a few steps. Not only was reality distorted on the outside, it was distorted here as well, because when she took one last step to get close enough for the spell to work, she appeared ten paces behind her.

Worried with how much time Twilight had left before complete aetherization, Celestia spread out her wings, hoping that that would save them some trouble. But letting them stretch was a bad idea, not only was her left wing in extreme amount of pain, but it wouldn't even stretch out enough to fly, meaning she was grounded. With her hope dwindling, Celestia turned and took a step forward, it worked, but the next one she took brought her 5 paces closer. The next took her four paces to the left.

The space around Twilight was a labyrinth, and the wrong step could take Celestia anywhere, and failure to reach the center was the end for the Element of Magic. Without flight this was going to take a long amount of time, and Celestia would love to try and figure out this strange places origin and how to get through its puzzle, but that was not something she could do, for every second that passed Twilight seemed to grow more and more ethereal.

Taking a step slowly in front of her, she advanced one pace forward. Taking a second step foreword she still moved one pace, but this time to the right. Celestia steadied herself a bit, and took a step left, and ended up two paces forward. Another to the left, and ended up three paces to the left, back on track, only three more paces and she can seal Twilight's magic and save the two of them.

Slowly moving forward, she took two more steps, just one more step. This time it worked in her favor, when she took one step forward, she ended up right in front of Twilight. Her timing was getting close, for all of Twilight's limbs, and the lower half of her abdomen was ethereal.

What was happening to Twilight was something no one could survive. With one look in her eyes, anyone could see the process of REM going on. But not just any REM, this REM was different. With every second her body was turning ethereal more and more knowledge that no one could understand past through the young girl’s mind.

Celestia reached out her right hand, and attempted to touch her with the sealing spell. But like with touching fire hot enough to burn white, Celestia was going to be in immense pain.

Her right hand made contact with Twilight's forehead, and as the magic started to seal, excruciating amounts of pain shot through Celestia’s body. This was the same pain Twilight was going through at the time, and was causing her body to become ethereal, this was the pain of vast knowledge, the pain of the Aether Realm forcing its essence of knowledge and dragging its victim's body and life energy to the unknown.

As Twilight's body started to reverse the etherization, Celestia flinched. The pain was gone from both of them, and the white void was slowly disappear. Well to say the pain was completely gone was a stretch, Twilight was twitching in her sleep, and Celestia was breathing heavily.

Moving to her intercom, Celestia called for medical help before sitting down in exhaustion. She understood what was happening. A being much more powerful than she was is awakening, and in its wake, the destruction of harmony.