Canterlot High School at night is usually quiet and peaceful. No students, no teachers. However, tonight was different. The Fall Formal was taking place, with music and festivities celebrating the new school year. Just minutes earlier, the school was alive with folks enjoying the party in the auditorium, and the bass of the music still played loud enough to be faintly heard even by the main building entrance, not that anyone near there was paying any mind.
The facade of the front entrance lay in ruins, ripped up by magic from a terrifying being. The students crowded there were still shaking their heads as they came to, slowly recovering from having been under the influence of the corrupted magical crown. Near the Wondercolt statue was the elected Fall Formal princess, Twilight Sparkle, somehow sporting wings, along with her five friends, all sprawled on the ground. As they slowly picked themselves up from the ground they took notice of each other and the gaping crater now between them and the school, with smoke coming up from the bottom.
Everyone was quiet, slowly shuffling closer to the edge of the hole. As the smoke faded away, it was clear someone was down there. While the smoke coming up obscured any details, at least it was clear they were moving and alive.
Twilight stood up from the ground and glanced at her friends. They all looked fine, just a little shaken up by the magical connection used to defeat the transformed Sunset Shimmer. Twilight flared her wings instinctively with wariness as she approached the edge of the crater in front of her, and saw that their opponent lived, and didn't seem to have more appendages than a regular human. Twilight took a deep breath.
"You will never rule in Equestria! Tonight you've shown them who you really are, you've-"
"Twilight, look!" With a gasp, Rarity interrupted, suddenly grabbing Twilight’s hand tightly, her knuckles going even whiter than usual. Twilight turned to her friend in confusion, then looked back down, squinting her eyes a bit.
"Thi-this isn't Canterlot... Where am I? ... Princess Celestia?!" Sunset rambled, seemingly out of sorts, which was no surprise after the amount of magic that hit her.
Actually, Twilight realized as she looked more closely at Sunset’s terrified face, her silhouette looked off. If she didn't know better, she would say Sunset Shimmer looked smaller than before. Twilight suddenly understood, she must be looking at a human foal, much tinier than even Apple Bloom, that was in the process of breaking down in tears.
"Eep! Wh-what are you?! St-stay back!" As Sunset took in the odd looking monsters circling her from the edge of the hole she found herself in, the small pony-turned-human scooted backwards, tumbling over herself from her lack of coordination. With nowhere to really escape to, Sunset Shimmer ended up in curled up and hugged her knees, hiding her face from the world. Sunset seemed to finally realize her body was not currently pony shaped and this sudden distraction thankfully stopped her panic for the moment, as she raised one of her hands.
Twilight took the moment of inattention to carefully slide down the slope of the hole to get closer. As she did, she kept all her attention on the filly in front of her. She would need to clarify what humans called their young at a later date.
"Wha-what happened to me? Somepony help me!" Sunset closed her eyes and began to softly cry, before looking up at Twilight, who was standing over her. "Who-who are you?"
Twilight's thoughts were racing in her head. The jacket Sunset had on now reached her knees, and she looked like a child playing dress up with their parents' clothes. She was tiny, and terrified, and clearly had no idea what was going on. Well, she knew how to deal with fillies and colts thanks to her time as the Ponyville librarian, so she put on her gentlest smile.
"We're your friends, Sunset Shimmer. Don't worry, we'll be taking you home to Canterlot and Princess Celestia in a little bit, we just need to clear up some things here. Can you tell me the last thing you remember?" The moment Twilight dropped Princess Celestia's name, Sunset seemed to relax, taking a deep calming breath, though she still looked scared and uncertain.
"I-I was practicing my conjuration spells. I know the Princess said she didn't want me to do so without supervision, but I-I was so close to getting it right last time! But, then I think it ... blew up in my face, maybe? Is-is she mad?! I'm sorry, I'm sorry I'M SORRY!" The little girl shouted the last part, clearly beginning to fall into a panic attack. Twilight found it oddly nostalgic to see another young filly freaking out about disappointing her mentor, and she crouched down and pulled her into a gentle hug.
"Shhh shhh, come here. Let's get you out of this hole. I promise you'll be seeing the princess in a little bit. I just need to wrap a couple quick things here, and we'll be on our way." Twilight patted her on the back, letting her calm down.
"Promise?" Sunset squeaked out with a sniffle as she tried to control her hiccups and tears.
"I promise, Sunset. She's waiting for you, so take my hand." Twilight stood up from her hug, "Now up we go".
Applejack gave her a hand getting them over the top of the hole and back on solid ground. As Twilight patted her flank from the dust and grime from sliding down the side of the hole, the rest of her friends were staring at the child hiding behind her. Funnily enough, Sunset wasn't using her hands to grip her back at all, as a normal human would. Instead she had her hands folded up, with light fists, more in line with someone getting ready to do the chicken dance, while awkwardly pressing herself into Twilight's side as a barrier to hide behind. It was an ungainly pose, which called to her lack of experience with her current body and human mannerisms.
"Darling, what's going on? Is that really Sunset Shimmer?" Rarity asked, seemingly entranced by the child now hiding behind Twilight's legs. Rarity could just make out one brilliant eye peeking from behind Twilight.
"Yes, it seems so. Well, this changes our plans drastically. Girls, I'm sorry but I probably won't be able to enjoy the rest of the party, not with this little one here. Might be best if we head out sooner rather than later." Twilight looked at Rarity. "Actually, Rarity, would you mind looking after her for a moment while I speak with the rest of the girls and the principals?" she said while trying to subtly nod at Sunset, trying to communicate her desire to keep the girl in the dark for now.
"Of course, it would be my pleasure! Come here, dear. Why don't we sit on these steps for a bit while we wait, and maybe you could tell me a bit about yourself, hmm?" Rarity crouched down a bit so she was at eye level with the transformed Sunset.
Sunset looked up at Twilight, who just smiled and gently pushed her towards her friend. As Rarity gently took Sunset by the shoulder, Twilight and the rest of the girls began walking around the crater, where they were met halfway by principal Celestia.
"I believe this belongs to you." Principal Celestia gave a smile to Twilight while passing her the crown. She quickly became serious however, having seen Sunset’s latest transformation, "Can you tell me what happened?"
"Certainly, but let's go over there first? I'll try my best to explain everything, but I'm not sure about why Sunset looks-" Twilight began, before being interrupted.
"Like a 5 year old child?" Celestia said, an odd smirk on her face, a combination of slight disbelief and humor at the situation she knew was all too serious.
"Yeah that..." Twilight replied while scratching the back of her head.
Celestia put on her well practiced, benevolent smile, used for years to calm down students, and replied, "Well, tell me what you can and we can go from there."
Sunset was scared. She was surrounded by some type of weird beings that walked on two legs, like minotaurs or diamond dogs, and quite a few were glaring at her quite fiercely. She held onto Rarity's hand and tried scooting even closer to her, all while she looked at the ground, hoping they would stop staring at her. She really hoped that this Twilight was telling the truth when she said she knew how to fix her and get her back to the princess. Otherwise, Sunset had no idea what to do.
It had just been almost two years since she became the luckiest filly in the whole world, when Celestia chose her to be her student, and she moved out of the orphanage. She had wanted to surprise her mentor by demonstrating all the spells she had learned, wrapping it up by conjuring flames in the shape of Celestia's and her own cutie mark. It would have been a beautiful display of magical power and control for a filly her age, but she felt she could get it done in time. Too bad she wasn't able to practice it too much around her mentor without ruining the surprise. Well there was a surprise alright, apparently she somehow not only blew everything up, she also teleported AND became a monster! What a mess.
"So, Sunset, how old are you?" Rarity asked, trying to distract the girl a bit.
Sunset knew what she was doing, but appreciated that they were trying to put her at ease. She'd always had a knack for reading people, specially grown ups. "Well, I turned seven a couple months ago!"
"Oh really? My goodness, you don't look a day over five my dear," Rarity stated, looking a little bit shocked, having assumed the memory reversion would be in line with the physical.
"Are you calling me a baby?!" Sunset snapped, looking like a spitting kitten.
It actually made Rarity almost chuckle, easily reading that she felt comfortable enough to show some of the fire in her personality that she was known for. It meant she wasn't terrified, or at least distracted.
"Not at all, not at all, I guess pony and human ages don't translate that well," Rarity replied easily, making sure her voice kept its light hearted drawl.
"Hu-mane? Is that what you all are?" Sunset asked, cocking her head at an exaggerated angle, looking like a puppy perking its ears up.
"Well yes dear, though I suppose Twilight is like you, a pony masquerading as a humAN as she... well, as she... hmm... eh, wrapped up her mission," Rarity said delicately, trying to skirt over the details of why precisely Twilight was here for in the first place, to recover her stolen crown. That wasn't a topic she wanted to bring up with the amnesiatic Sunset at all if she could avoid it.
"Oh, right... The princess probably sent her to rescue me, that's how she knew my name. Oh no, she's going to be soo mad..." Sunset whimpered to herself.
Rarity laughed at that. This child beside her jumped from thought to thought like a hyperactive puppy. She looked five, but the girl reminded her of Sweetie Belle after another misadventure with her little friends.
"Oh don't worry! She's going to be too busy feeling relief that you're safe to be mad. You gave everyone a bit of a scare, but it'll all end well, I promise." Rarity comforted Sunset as the filly-turned-child looked down
"I guess... Hey what do you call these?" Sunset raised one if her arms and wiggled it around, her hand flapping about.
"Oh, your hands? You see these are fingers, this one is special, and we call it a thumb. This part is the palm, and it all connects to your arm via the wrist," Rarity explained while pointing to each part on her own hand.
"Ok, I think I get it. So you guys walk on two legs, like chickens and birds, and use these 'hands' on your forelegs to grab and move things, right?" Sunset asked, her eyes shining as she began to think about it more,
"I'm guessing it’s 'cause you don't have any innate magic?" Sunset asked, showing that even as a mental seven year old she was bright.
"Uh... sure dear, that sounds about right," Rarity chuckled.
"... Then when we looked down, Sunset was the age you see her now." Twilight finished catching up Principal Celestia and Vice Principal Luna.
"That's a lot to take in. What will happen now?" Luna asked, looking back and forth between Twilight and her sister. Celestia, on the other hand, continued to look straight at Twilight.
Twilight looked at the educators in front of her, "Well, I have no idea when or even if Sunset will go back to normal... To be honest, the problem is that we used magic from my Element of Harmony, which is extremely powerful, yet the catalyst was friendship magic in an alternate reality where the rules of magic may be different, so with all the variables... to be honest we were very lucky this is all that happened." Twilight took a deep breath. "Look, the truth is... Sunset was a runaway apprentice, and became a runaway fugitive from my world after stealing my crown. Compounding that, if she truly has no memories of this place, and has reverted in age, then she would be an Equestrian runaway minor. Even if she is lying, or regains her memories, it would be negligent for me to leave a citizen of Equestria here. She will need to come back through the portal with me when I leave tonight."
Luna and Celestia shared a worried look. Luna stepped forward to whisper, making sure no one nearby could hear. "You know that means we will have a missing teen here, don't you? What would we tell the authorities? The damage to the school will be hard enough to deal with, but the disappearance of a female student from a school sanctioned event?!" Luna exclaimed, barely keeping her voice down.
Celestia sighed and replied to her sister. "Luna, I think Twilight has the only reasonable idea. Let's be honest, we would be missing a teen in either event, or do you really think anyone would take that child to be a junior in high school? No, at this time I suppose we focus on what is best, which is to get these two home, and we will see what comes our way tomorrow."
Celestia reached out and placed her hands on Twilight's shoulders. "Twilight, thank you for letting us know, it would have been tragic if we didn't know her fate. I truly wish and hope you will be able to take care of my student... well, I guess she's my former student, since she will not be going to this school anymore. What I mean is, she wasn't the easiest child to come to this school, but she really was brilliant with a lot of potential. With her memories wiped, in a way she's gone now, but in another this is the ultimate gift. If she has to grow up again, please help her reach it and find some measure of happiness?"
Twilight looked Principal Celestia in the eyes. It truly amazed her how much this parallel world's inhabitants could mirror their counterparts from home.
"I promise she will receive utmost care, and if she truly does not recall her life, we will treat her with all the affection a child needs. Now, I do need to hurry a bit if I'm to make it back to our world before the gateway closes," Twilight stated solemnly to the principal gently gripping her shoulders, feeling the importance of her words. The principal squeezed her shoulders, nodded once, then stepped back, before turning around and heading towards the other students, to help those she could. Vice Principal Luna followed her a moment later.
Twilight turned around and walked over to her friends, gathered at the base of the statue marking the portal. It was time to say goodbye, and to bring back Equestria's wayward student to their shared mentor.