You are me...and I am you...
Hearing those words caused Star Twinkle to abruptly wake up from his sleep. This happened a lot recently. Strange words and pictures, dreams that didn't make sense to him, him waking up in the middle of the night because of it. It was a total mess.
"Might as well get up now, huh?" Star Twinkle mumbled as he began to sit up on his bed. "Morning, Comet," he said greeting his pet Goldfish.
Comet didn't move in response.
While not getting out of his bed, Star Twinkle stretched his legs a little. Of course, he was not too thrilled of getting up so early and was usually grumpy because of it. He decided to open the window next to him and inhaled some of the fresh air from outside. He looked over the streets of Ponyville. There was nopony in sight. Made sense to Star Twinkle since nopony in their right minds would get up this early in the morning. Except, that didn't seem to be the case completely.
"Huh?" Star Twinkle said confused, once he saw Twilight, Applejack, Rainbow Dash, Rarity, Fluttershy and Pinkie Pie gathering in the middle of the street, talking to each other. "What are they all doing there this early?" He wondered.
Before he knew it, he was walking straight towards them. He didn't even remember getting ready for leaving the house or neither did he seem to be aware of it. But that didn't matter. Right now, he was just wondering what his friends were up to.
As soon as he was close enough, Star Twinkle greeted the group. "Hey, girls, what are you all doing here this early?" He asked. But there was no response. In fact, it didn't even look like as if they heard him since they continued talking to each other. "Girls?" Star Twinkle said, trying to grab their attention once again but there was still no response. Their mouths were moving and it seemed like as if they were talking and laughing at each other but Star Twinkle couldn't hear them. "Oh no!" Star Twinkle said as he had some kind of idea what was going on. "Did I walk into Poison Joke and got deaf again!?" He figured although he can't remember setting hoof into the Everfree forest recently.
But after thinking about it, even if he would have gone deaf, then there was no reason for the girls to not hear him. That wouldn't make any sense. They were probably pulling a prank at him which made him laugh it off for a moment. "Okay, girls, you got me, good one," he said but again, no response from them. Star Twinkle walked up to the girls and grabbed Fluttershy's shoulder who happened to stand the closest to him. "Hey, Fluttershy what-" but Star Twinkle stopped once his hoof practically went through Fluttershy's body.
Needless to say, Star Twinkle jumped back in shock after this. He stood there with an open mouth and with widened eyes until the girls turned around and walked away from him, causing him to jump once more in response. The girls walked away without ever noticing him in the first place. Star Twinkle reached out his hoof. "Wait!" He said while he tried to walk up to them. But there was one problem. He couldn't move. It was like his hooves were glued to the ground, making it unable for him to move. "What is going on here!?" He exclaimed in his frustration.
Soon the girls were too far away to hear Star Twinkle anymore. Then something even weirder happened to them. After Star Twinkle focused his eyes on the girls after they got almost out of his sight, he could swear that they turned into six different ponies for a brief moment. However, once he got a slight view on who those ponies were, an immediate pain went through Star Twinkle's head, causing him to drop down to his knees and grabbing his head. "Why does my head hurt so much all of the sudden!?" He said as he dropped his head down on the ground unable to ignore this stinging pain. "Argh! Why does my head hurt so much!?" Star Twinkle complained as he crawled on the ground in the middle of the street of Ponyville.
Despite being in all this pain, Star Twinkle could clearly hear a voice. It was a little distorted and he couldn't make out who it belonged to if it even was the voice of someone he knows but he was able to hear what it was saying. It just confused him where it was coming from because, after thinking about it, the six girls were the only ponies that he saw all day so far, making it even more confusing.
"Star Twinkle!" The voice screamed.
Star Twinkle, however, was in so much pain that he couldn't even open his eyes to look for the one who was calling his name. Fortunately, the pain went away after a while and Star Twinkle could catch his breath for a moment. Once he opened his eyes, however, there was something else that caused him to panic.
"What in the..." he could only say after he realized that he was no longer in Ponyville. Instead, he was in the Castle of the Two Sisters. In the room where the girls found the Elements of Harmony to be exact. He didn't even begin to question what was going on since it happened so fast and without him even realizing how he got there in the first place. Still, he tried to confirm some things that caught his attention.
In front of him was some strange pedestal with a bunch of stone orbs on it. Something looked really familiar about this. Star Twinkle had some kind of a guess that he didn't believe was true but as soon as he looked out of one of the windows, his guess proved to be right. It was dark outside and up in the sky he could see the moon, and inside of the moon was...
"The Mare in the Moon..." Star Twinkle said quietly before he looked over to the pedestal with the stone orbs. "Those are the Elements of Harmony..."
The first time, he saw the Elements of Harmony was when Twilight and the others already activated their powers. Of course, his friends told him that before he came to their help, they were turned to stone after Princess Celestia used them to banish her sister to the moon. It was not until Twilight discovered that she and her friends were the spirits of the Elements that made them return back to their original form.
With all those information, Star Twinkle could only come to one conclusion. "Is this...the past?" He wondered, expecting someone to answer his question.
Suddenly, a light began to come from the Elements of Harmony, causing Star Twinkle to back away in shock. He didn't do anything so naturally, he was confused why all of the sudden something like this happened. Soon, five of the six orbs turned into gems. The bigger one in the middle had a six-pointed star-shaped one coming out of it which looked exactly like the one that was in Twilight's crown. The others, however, didn't look like the Cutie Marks of his friends. They almost looked like regular gems. "That's how they used to look like..." Star Twinkle figured, judging from what he knew how they looked like from Twilight. "So this is the past...?" He said as he saw the elements slowly flying past him to the middle of the room.
Following the Elements of Harmony with his eyes, Star Twinkle almost didn't notice that they were flying towards a group of ponies who stood in the middle of the room. "Huh?" He simply said once he recognized the six ponies in front of him.
Twilight, Applejack, Rainbow Dash, Rarity, Fluttershy and Pinkie Pie. They all stood there waiting for the Elements to reach them. Each of the gems flew to one of the mares, circling around them. "Girls?" Star Twinkle said, still being confused about literally everything that happened in this last minutes. He walked towards them in order to get some answers. "Hey, do you girls know what is going on here?" He asked confused, slowly walking up to the six mares.
Strangely enough, they all had their eyes closed and didn't react to Star Twinkle's question just like before. This slowly began to irritate him. "Talk to me!" He then said in a mix of anger and frustration.
Then, almost on cue, Twilight opened her eyes. They were glowing, much to Star Twinkle's surprise who stopped walking towards the girls as soon as he saw that. The Elements began to quickly circle around the girls, levitating them over the ground and engulfing them in a bright light. Star Twinkle had no idea what this all meant and stepped back. If he didn't know it any better, then he would guess that they were activating the Elements of Harmony. Star Twinkle looked behind him, above him, to his left, and to his right in order to find out against who they were using them on.
But soon, he was convinced who this attack was directed at, making him back away even further until his back was against the stone pedestal. Moments later, the light that engulfed the girls, shot out a rainbow which came diving down directly towards Star Twinkle. "Noooo!" He screamed in fear before the rainbow hit the ground. The rainbow circled around him and he could feel how it was draining his energy or even hurting him. Eventually, he couldn't stand it anymore so he dropped down to his knees, covering his head as if he was ducking for safety.
"What is happening here!?
Is this the past or not!?
Why are they using the Elements against me!?"
All those questions repeatedly circled around in Star Twinkle's head while all this was happening. The mere thought of his friends attacking him was scaring him too much. He just wanted this to be some kind of bad dream. He wanted to go home. He wanted to forget this.
Then...it became quiet.
Star Twinkle still kept his eyes closed, he didn't know what would happen if he opened them again. He didn't want to know. But soon, he got curious. It was warm. He felt warm as if he was kneeling in front of a campfire or a chimney. Warmth like this couldn't possibly bad, is what he was telling himself. So he decided to open his eyes again. But immediately, he regretted doing that. He was no longer in the Castle of the Two Sister. He was back in Ponyville again. And after seeing what was happening, he realized why he was feeling so warm.
There was fire...
Ponyville was on fire...
The building was burning, Ponies were running away in a panic to escape the flames or trying to put them out. Star Twinkle was paralyzed by all this. Why was he in Ponyville again? Why was the town on fire? All these things happening this quickly caused him to simply stand there in shock, helplessly.
After looking around a little more, he just realized two ponies laying in front of him, unconscious. For some weird reason, he could only barely see them, as if they were blurred out, even though they were right in front of him. His head began to hurt again, making him grab his forehead and closing his eyes due to the pain. It didn't last longer than a few seconds though, much to his liking. He opened his eyes again. Something was different. Some kind of red magic aura began flowing to him.
There was another surprise once he touched his forehead. There was a horn, and magic was flowing into it. As if it was absorbing something. And this something laid in front of him. He absorbed something from the unconscious pony in front of him. While still not being able to see who it was or what kind of pony or even the color of its coat was, one thing was for certain...this Pony was in pain. And he was the one inflicting it on it.
Star Twinkle could only widen his eyes after this realization and wanted to move away from the poor Pony but just like before, he couldn't move. He felt helpless and weak. "Wha...what am I doing? Why...am I doing this?" He said in a trembling and helpless voice, wishing whatever he was doing right now would just stop.
Then suddenly, the voice from before returned.
"Star Twinkle!" It said, causing Star Twinkle to snap out a little. The voice came from behind him so he turned around and saw somepony running towards him. But as soon as he was in sight, the pain in Star Twinkle's head returned like a flash shooting through his brain, causing him to drop down on his knees once more.
"Argh! Stop it! I got enough of all this!" Star Twinkle exclaimed in his pain.
Then suddenly, everything was black. Star Twinkle could see nothing. He couldn't say anything. He couldn't move, he couldn't think. But he could still hear something. That something was some familiar words.
"You are me...and I am you..."
Immediately after, in the middle of this black nothingness, two red eyes opened up, staring right at Star Twinkle. This sudden thing caused Star Twinkle to sit up from his bed. He breathed heavily and looked all around himself to see where he was now. He was relieved to find out that he was in his bed this time. It was all a dream. A horrible dream. It was still a little dark outside. The day was probably about to begin soon. Star Twinkle quickly remembered something in his dream and took a look outside. He looked at the moon. "No Mare in the Moon..." he said once he found out that he was not dreaming anymore.
He laid down on his bed again, feeling exhausted about all this. "It's okay..." he said to himself. "It was just a dream...nothing more..." he said in order to calm himself down. "I am Star Twinkle. Chosen by an unknown Elements of Harmony. I can transform into a Unicorn and a Pegasus, to mention only a few things. That's just the way it is. I'm done thinking about all those weird things happening to me. I'll just have to accept all this while I continue my life...right?"
While saying all this stuff to himself, Star Twinkle grew more and more confused. There will be more things happening to him that he won't be able to figure out right away. He simply can't return to his normal boring life anymore. He now had friends that would support him in any situation. He was chosen by an Unknown Element of Harmony. He could grow wings and a horn. He couldn't explain those things and always looked for an answer but it would never come so he was going crazy about it for nothing. Eventually, this got very tiresome for him so why should he continue thinking about all this? This is what kept him going. The question was now...if that was actually the right thing to do...
Meanwhile, somewhere in Equestria...
"You are me...and I am you..."
After hearing those words, Summershine opened up his eyes. He was sleeping in the grass, right next to a boulder in the middle of a huge grass-field. He got up on his hooves and yawned in the process. "I'm hearing those words again..." he said before he looked up to the sky, watching the stars. His expression was anything but cheerful, in fact, he had a really bad feeling. He put his gray hood over his head and was on his way again. There was no time for him to waste. "I thought that I had more time left...but judging from all those dreams...He will return soon..." he said in a serious tone before he focused his eyes straight forward again. "I have to take of everything before that or else...I have to deal with him...again,"
Summershine continued his travel with a really bad feeling in his mind. Things were about to get difficult very soon. And his only wish was to take care of everything before that. Or else...Equestria would be in danger once again...