//------------------------------//
// The Great and Powerful Escape 
// Story: Princess Luna and the Guardian of the Faculty Lot 
// by DashEight 
//------------------------------//

"Welcome to detention," Cheerilee intoned with all the energy of an educator at the very end of her rope. She sunk a little deeper into her chair as she addressed the few students seated at her library's tables. "You will use this time productively working on assignments of your choosing. No talking, no texting, no social media. I don't wont to be here any more than you do but if you all sit quietly and do your work we can be out of here before the rain hits. Any questions?"

A pale green arm shot up. "Miss Blush?"

"Um, I don't have any homework and I finished all my projects for the week. What should I do?"

"Hmm," Cheerilee pursed her lips. "You can grab a book from the stacks and read quietly."

Wallflower Blush nodded and stood from her table. As she passed the two other Canterlot High students unlucky enough to be stuck in detention, one scoffed indignantly and nudged the other.

"Nerrrrrrrrrd," she whispered as Wallflower disappeared into the library stacks.

"Miss Lulamoon!" Cheerilee spat, annoyed that they were not yet a minute into detention and her authority was already being defied. "Do you have something you'd like to share with the rest of us!?"

"Trixie does, in fact!" Trixie angrily slammed a fist down on the table. "The Great and Powerful Trixie is a hero of Canterlot High! I helped save the school two days ago! From her, no less!! So why is Trixie being treated like a common criminal!?"

"Trixie, whether you saved the school or not doesn't matter, you were caught with three boxes of smoke bombs in your backpack! Pyrotechnics aren't allowed on Canterlot High property, you know that's school policy! In fact, I don't even think they're allowed in this state! So consider yourself lucky, sit down, and get back to work."

Trixie and Cheerilee angrily glared at each other for a tense moment, the student refusing to yield out of bitter spite at the system which had wronged her. The seconds ticked by until Trixie finally relented, angrily adjusted her pointed hat, and took her seat. She was a magician of principle, but she also had no desire to see time added to her sentence.

Princess Luna, diarch of Equestria and Soverign Ruler of the Night watched the exchange in silence. She’d already found the hard way that her own magic was vastly outmatched by the ruler of this domain. It only made sense that the Vice Principal would bestow some of her power to her followers. Luna abhorred the idea of kowtowing to any foe, much less a school administrator—She was a Princess, for Faustsakes! She’d carved out a place in the world for her little ponies through blood and sweat and steel, showing the world of Equus time and time again the strength and resolve of the pony species. Not even the dragons had dared to wage war against Equestria in over a thousand years! Yet she found herself at an impasse. Until she understood more about the Vice Principal’s command of the elements or the talisman that seemed to be the source of her incredible magic, direct confrontation was out of the question. Luna considered herself a fighter at heart, but she was also a practical diarch. She knew when to walk away from a hopeless fight.

...

Aside from that one time, but that didn’t count! Family squabbles had always clouded her judgement.

Both students eyed Cheerilee like a pair of hawks until the librarian turned back to her desktop monitor and re-inserted her earbuds. With their warden's attention captured by the allure of streaming entertainment, the two immediately turned to each other.

"Okay, we're good. No way she can hear us, those are noise-cancelling." Trixie whispered to the Princess seated next to her. Luna nodded. A classic blunder; she'd caught more than one of the guards at Canterlot Castle fast asleep under a Cone-of-Silence spell. "Can you believe this? Trixie deserves a statue in her honor, not a weekend of detention!"

"Tis hypocrisy of the highest order," Princess Luna agreed. "You are the one who helped Sunset Shimmer recover her friends' memories, correct?"

Trixie smiled smugly and nodded.

"You have my gratitude. I would not wish a lifetime of scorn and indifference upon anypony, least of all my possible adopted niece." Luna continued. "You must be a great wizard indeed."

"Great AND powerful." Trixie replied with a smirk and a tip of her hat. "Trixie Lulamoon, magician extraordinaire at your service!"

"A pleasure to meet you, Trixie. I am Princess Luna, diarch of Equestria and Guardian of the Night." It took all the self-control Luna had to not shout her titles at the heavens. "Do we really need to keep whispering like this?"

"Hmm..." Trixie pondered that for a moment before she looked at Cheerilee and raised her hand. "Miss Cheerilee?"

No response from Cheerilee, who remained engrossed in her show.

"Miss Cheerilee?" She continued. "Does one teach high school because they've given up on their dreams or does one give up on their dreams because they teach high school?"

Still nothing.

"Evidently not," Trixie concluded. "So, you want to get out of here? A Princess must have better things to do than sit around in detention all evening."

"Indeed I do. A quest of grave, nay, monumental importance. But how? The keepers of this school possess magic unmatched by anything I have encountered in my eons as Sovereign Ruler of the Night."

Trixie raised an eyebrow. "Soo... is that like a thing, or what?"

"It is most indeed a thing!" Luna replied hotly. "But our problem remains! I have little knowledge of the magic of this world. I could perhaps unlock the doors to this dungeon, but I cannot defeat our jailers! Believe me, for I have tried."

"No need to worry," Trixie dismissed Luna's concerns with a flourish of her hand, "for you see, the Great and Powerful Trrrixie is a master of the disappearing act! That is, if you think you need a partner on this quest of yours..."

Luna pondered the offer. "I suppose. Adventures tend to be more lighthearted with a friend or two by your side."

"Aha!" Trixie pumped her fist. "Watch out, Rainbooms! Your skills at friendship are no match for those of the Great and Powerful--wait, what did you mean, two?"

Luna gestured behind Trixie towards a very confused Wallflower Blush. Trixie turned, yelped, and leapt into the air.

"WALLFLOWER!" Trixie yelled as Luna caught her. "Stop doing that!"

"Doing what??" Wallflower asked defensively, clutching her library book tightly to her chest.

"Sneaking up on me all the time!"

"I wasn't!" Wallflower said as fiercely as her timid voice allowed. "I was just standing here!"

"For how long!?"

"Several minutes! You just didn't notice!"

"WELL EXCU-USE ME IF YOU DON'T HAVE TRIXIE'S NATURAL CHARISMA!"

Something clicked in Luna's brain as her eyes pinballed back and forth between the two arguing students. "Wallflower Blush? You're the girl that used the Memory Stone?"

"Y-yes, ma'am. I, um, I'm really really really sorry. Really." The girl visibly wilted under Luna's gaze. "I'm not evil, ma'am, I swear! I... I just got tired of everyone forgetting about me. I didn't know what else to do!"

"You are not alone, child." Luna placed a hand below Wallflower's chin, raising her gaze to meet Luna's own. "I am no stranger to such feelings of abandonment and isolation, nor to the allure of dark magic."

"I thought that D. M. A. R. E. class was a load of hooey, but they were right. They were so, so right..." Wallflower brushed a tear from her eye and pulled Luna into a hug. "Thank you, ma'am. I'll never do anything like that again, I promise!"

"It's alright, child." Luna gingerly patted Wallflower's head for a few seconds before the distraught student released her. These displays of comfort and affection were more up her sister's wheelhouse. "We forgive you. And I'm sure that Sunset and the others have as well."

"Thank you so much..." Wallflower whispered. "But what are you even doing here in detention with us instead of your office? Why can't you just leave? and are you really Sunset Shimmer's aunt?? I had no idea she was Principal Celestia's daughter!"

Trixie scoffed. "Why would the Vice Principal put herself in detention!? This is obviously the Luna from the other dimension, Wallflower. It took Trixie but a few seconds and some context to figure that out!"

Luna rolled her eyes at her new friend's haughtiness. "Luna. Princess. Equestrian diarch, Moon shepherd, Sovereign Ruler of the Night. Pleased to meet you." She shook Wallflower's hand. "And I am Sunset's possible adopted aunt. I really ought to clarify that with Celie sometime, she can be maddeningly vague about the most important subjects..."

"Princess?" Wallflower asked, dumbfounded. "Other dimension? I... what... I was gone for two minutes, how much did I miss??"

"A lot, apparently." Trixie snarked. She made a show of inspecting her cuticles to signify how very bored she was with Wallflower. "Do you mind? We were in the middle of plotting an escape!"

"So... you're not..."

"I'm afraid not," Luna shook her head, "but my words were true. I have felt pain similar to yours, and lashed out in a manner that I soon came to regret. Yet I found that those I sought to hurt and destroy forgave me and welcomed me back with open hearts and open hooves, asking nothing in return except that I open myself to them as they had me. I came here on a quest, a quest to find a source of forbidden power and prevent it from harming my subjects or the students of this school."

A light breeze swept through the classroom as the Princess stood, whipping about her hair and her sensible outerwear. Thunder crackled off in the distance. Trixie grumbled about the declining standards for quest companions in this day and age.

"Wallflower Blush," Luna continued, "I stand before you not to demand penance, but offer an opportunity. Soon, Trixie and I shall depart on a journey of unparalleled danger, upon which rests the fate of both of our worlds." She placed a hand on Wallflower's shoulder. "We would be honored if you would join us."

Wallflower gazed in awe at the regal, business-casual-bedecked Princess before her. "Yes... Yes, your Majesty, I will."

"Excellent," Luna replied, pulling her traveler's poncho over her shoulders. "Then we must make haste. We depart at once!"

"So Miss Cheerilee will let us leave with you?" Wallflower asked. She gestured at the front of the classroom where Cheerilee sat behind her desk.

Cheerilee bobbed her head to some inaudible music emanating from her earbuds. She gave no indication she'd noticed any of the conversation, attention still fully focused on her streaming digital entertainment. 

"Leave that to the Great and Powerful Trixie!" Trixie quickly rummaged through her bag, producing a handful of small dark spheres. Before either Luna or Wallflower could say anything, she'd linked arms with both. "Smokebomb!"

*BAMF*

The trio doubled over coughing. Acrid smoke suddenly filled the air around them, stinging their lungs. Luna glanced around as the Trixie-induced smoke cleared. They were now standing in the hallway just outside their prison. Wallflower retched.

"Oh, please." Trixie snorted. "It wasn't that bad. Trixie does it all the time!"

No sooner had Luna and Wallflower realized they had been freed from the clutches of the detention coordinator than they heard muffled thumps from the other side of the library door.

"TRIXIE!" Cheerile screamed as she stumbled around, attempting to clear the choking smoke cloud and find her charges. "You get back here THIS INSTANT, YOU HEAR ME!?"

Trixie turned to Luna. "You said you can unlock doors. Can you also un-unlock them?"

Luna nodded. "Yes," she replied as she closed her eyes in concentration. A pale blue glow surrounded her. Motes of energy danced across her body, coalescing around her right hand. She squeezed the hand into a fist, then opened her palm. Glowing magic pulsed from her hand as she gently took hold of the doorknob.

Then, she squeezed. The knob groaned as pins warped and bent under the Night Princess's crushing magical grip. 

Trixie raised a dubious eyebrow.

"What?" Luna asked. "Spells are difficult in this world, and the door is locked... for a certian loose definition of 'locked.'"

*WHAM WHAM WHAM* "YOU THREE OPEN THIS DOOR RIGHT THIS SECOND!"

"For now, at least. We should make haste." Luna and Trixie started down the hallway. Luna, noticing Wallflower hadn't followed, stopped and turned to address her befuddled friend.

"Buh... whah... you said you were a Princess! Couldn't we just leave? Why did you have to do that!?"

Luna sighed. "I am a Princess, but I'm afraid my title doesn't carry much weight in this world. Full disclosure, I am currently not on the best of terms with your ruler Vice Principal Luna, and may in fact be a wanted felon. Hence why I was incarcerated in this dungeon with you."

"Detention," Trixie corrected.

"Yes, the detention dungeon. We should leave, Wallflower, for they will surely attempt to recapture us."

"Skipping detention is punishable by in-school suspension," Trixie added helpfully. "School policy."

"But... but... I DON'T WANT AN IN-SCHOOL SUSPENSION!!"

"Then we must hurry, for there will surely be others arriving soon." Luna and Trixie took off running once again. Wallflower followed, mostly out of fear. "Once we save this school and also the very fabric of reality across multiple universes, I'm sure they shall be most forgiving of our transgressions. That's the first rule of being a Princess, after all! Easier to ask for forgiveness than permission!" Luna neglected to mention to her cohorts exactly where this pearl of wisdom had landed her in the past as the three dashed down the corridor and out of sight.

More thumps and coughing echoed from inside the library as Cheerilee fanned out the last of the smokescreen and found her way back to her desk. She picked up the phone and dialed out to elsewhere in the building. "Hey, Will? Yep, it's me. Listen, I need a favor. Got a few students trying to play hookey over here. Yeah, Lulamoon again, plus the Memory Stone girl and the one from the other world. No, no need to mention it to Luna yet, just find them before they leave the grounds. Okay, thanks a mil dude!"

Click.