Twilight was hurrying back to her castle, trying to work out what kind of message she wanted to have Starlight send to her friends. They needed a way to remain hidden for starters.
Once she reached her castle, it became obvious how any planning was going to fail before it even started.
And all it took was opening her front doors.
Twilight nearly jumped out of her skin as several cannons fired off at once. It was only a small portion of the surprise she got because she saw that the interior of her castle had devolved into pure chaos.
Books had sprouted legs and were crawling up the walls, party decorations were everywhere, rainbows and posters of Rainbow Dash were all over the place, a volcano was in the middle of the room spewing fruit punch over everything, bunnies in fashionable outfits were walking around and conversing like Canterlot nobles, and as if to harm Twilights patience even further, the girls were squabbling like crazy ponies.
Pinkie and Rainbow were trying to see who could overpower the other in converting the room to their style while Fluttershy was trying to get Rarity to understand that what she did to the bunnies was wrong and she should restore them to being ordinary bunnies. Applejack was simply trying to help Starlight out as she was being dangled by her tail by a ceiling lamp with a mouth and tentacles.
Looking at the mess Twilight felt irritation building in her body. She then let out a frustrated scream which thankfully caught all the attention of all the mares and all the chaos paused. As they stood watching the panting draconequus, Twilight finally found her voice.
“What is going on here? Why are you all already here and why is Starlight dangling from the ceiling!?” As if on cue Starlight landed on the ground next to Twilight with a solid thud.
“Oof!” Starlight grunted in pain. “I’m ok!” Starlight called out when nopony asked.
Pinkie was about to begin a long-winded explanation spoken so fast it was nearly one word, but thankfully Applejack beat her to the punch.
“We’ve been trying to get a handle on our powers but it seems Ah’m the only one willin to try.” Applejack directed an annoyed glare at a laughing Pinkie who had begun shooting stuffed animals out of a floating cannon at Rainbow, who was retaliating with colorful clouds.
“Focus!” Twilight snapped making the two former ponies pause their little play fight. “That still doesn’t answer my other question.”
“Pinkie teleported us here. She thought it would be fun to gather up and throw a party,” Applejack said plainly.
“A party?...” The girls didn’t notice Twilight’s silent seething.
“YEPPORONI! I wanted to use these powers to make a fun party nopony will ever forget! And thanks to this book by Discord, we can!” Pinkie squealed, holding up the otherwise ordinary-looking book.
“There are instructions on how to be a draconequus?” Twilight asked incredulously.
“Yeah, you kinda ran off before we could show you,” Rainbow said with a shrug.
“So Twilight, wanna help make the most splenderifficous awesomest most wonderfullest party EVER!?” Pinkie cheered.
Twilight just growled.
“Huh?” Pinkie said, noticing the violent aura Twilight was giving off.
“You okay there, Twilight?” Rainbow Dash said
“First off, you barge into my house, then you render it practically unlivable with all this chaos, and now you want to throw a party? Do you have any idea how much stress I'm under right now!?” Twilight snarled as she closed in on a scared Pinkie.
“U-uh, not too stressed to par-”
“I DON’T WANT A PARTY!” Twilight bellowed
“Twilight! Compose yoursel-” Rarity attempted before Twilight turned her reddened face towards her.
“SHUT IT! I’M UNDER ENOUGH STRESS RIGHT NOW GIVEN THAT DISCORD FORCED US INTO THIS STUPID BET IN THE FIRST PLACE! AND I’M TRYING TO CURB THESE TURBULENT EMOTIONS CAUSED BY THIS FORM BUT YOU ALL ARE NOT HELPING!” Twilight screamed at her friends causing all but one to wither at her tone.
“HEY! Don’t take your bad mood out on us!” Rainbow said, stomping up to Twilight.
Fluttershy obviously saw the upcoming fight and quickly moved to end the argument “H-hold on! The book clearly states that inexperienced draconeqquses have problems managing their stress levels! We need to calm her!”
“I KNOW THAT! BUT ALL THIS MESS AND TALK OF PARTIES, WHICH STILL ISN’T HAPPENING, IS DRIVING ME CRAZY!” Twilight said only descending further and further into anger. Even in the throes of her wrathful mood, however, Twilight remembered Discord’s advice about how she can calm herself.
“Pinkie! Ice cream! NOW!” Twilight turned to Pinkie.
“But I thought you sai-” Pinkie said.
“I SAID NOW!” Twilight shouted and Pinkie winced before snapping her finger and summoning a chocolate sundae with bananas and peanuts.
“HEY! WE’RE HAVING A CONVERSATION HERE!” Rainbow Dash yelled as Twilight began to take several spoonfuls and eat them. Visibly beginning to simmer down, she took several deep breaths.
“Ok… I’m better now…” Twilight said, giving a relaxed sigh.
“I SAID WE WERE TALKING TWILI-” Rainbow Dash’s words were cut off by Twilight plonking a spoonful of ice cream into Rainbow Dash’s mouth.
“What? Hey! Not cool!” Rainbow said, swallowing the ice cream forced into her mouth. Before she could resume berating Twilight, she felt an odd calming effect wash over her.
“Whoa… Hey, I suddenly feel... better? Pinkie, what was in that ice cream?” Rainbow said, trying to make sense of the weird emotional shift.
“It’s just a regular banana nut fudge ripple coconut ice cream supreme.” Pinkie shrugged.
“Discord told me ice cream has a calming effect on draconeqquses.” Twilight sighed before turning to the others. “I’m so sorry, girls. I lost myself back there. I didn’t mean most of those things I said.”
“It’s fine.” Applejack waved it off, though she couldn’t help but speculate on Twilight’s claim that ice cream would fix their bad moods.
“So we just eat ice cream and we stop feeling angry?” Fluttershy asked, while Pinkie Pie practically burst with joy at the thought that she actually has to eat tons of ice cream and not just because she wanted to.
“You're partially correct. Eating ice cream causes an emotional shift from anger to happiness. This could give us insight in how some foods affect us in different ways,” Twilight said before walking up to Fluttershy. “I’d like to read that book if you're done with it,” Twilight politely asked.
“Umm, actually I’m not done,” Fluttershy hesitantly said, expecting another freakout from Twilight.
Thankfully, Twilight just waved it off. “Alright, just loan it to me when you're done.”
“Ok,” Fluttershy said with relief.
“Wow, ah have a feeling when this is all over we’re going to have a much better understanding of how Discord works,” Applejack said
“I’m counting on that, Spike! Take a letter ple-” Twilight said before remembering Spike was with Discord. “Oh yeah….” Twilight facepalmed
“I can take over for him until he gets back,” Starlight offered, trotting up to Twilight.
“That sounds great. Thanks, Starlight,” Twilight said with a smile
“Alright, we know we have the information we need in this book. Do you girls think we can control ourselves for a whole week?” Rarity hesitantly asked.
“Oh come on! What’s the worst that can happen?” Rainbow Dash laughed only to get a cold stare from everyone.
“Never say that!” Rarity warned, expecting something to happen.
“We need to fully review that book before we do anything else, otherwise we’re looking at an Equestria-wide problem. I don’t know why our actions only affected Ponyville, but I’m not looking to test our luck,” Twilight said seriously.
“Agreed,” Rarity said before turning to Fluttershy. “Does that book have anything on returning to my normal appearance? I do have to get back to work on my boutique before tomorrow.”
“Hmmm… It says here ‘to transfigure yourself, simply imagine what you want yourself to look like and hold that image in your mind as you activate your magic.’ At least that’s what it says,” Fluttershy responded
“Very well then,” Rarity said, shutting her eyes in concentration. After a moment, a flash overtook the area and when they looked they saw Rarity as a pony again… missing her back half.
“Snk, forget something there Rarity?” Rainbow chuckled
“What do you mean?” Rarity said in confusion.
“Sugarcube, how do I put this? You’re half the mare you were,” Applejack said, hoping she would understand.
“What?” Rarity said in surprise before looking behind her and seeing nothing there. “AAAAAHH! WHERE’S THE REST OF MY BODY?!” Rarity ran about the room in a panic while Rainbow was rolling on the ground in silent hysteria at the sight of a two-legged pony running around.
“That looks like fun!” Pinkie cheered and promptly did the same to herself and ran around the room with Rarity.
“Girls! Can we focus!” Twilight snapped
“No, don’t stop! This is too much!” Rainbow said laughing her head off. It rolled on the ground for a second before Rainbow noticed and put it back on. Twilight, who was unamused, looked to the voice in her head only to sigh when the voice was laughing at the situation as well.
“I need help here!” Twilight murmured angrily.
“Sorry, I can’t help it! This is gold!” The voice laughed
“What. Do. I. Do?” Twilight said impatiently
“Just do as Fluttershy said and focus on them,” the voice casually replied.
“Alright,” Twilight said as she focused on Rarity and Pinkie. With a snap of her fingers and a moment to take a small amount of pride in how good she’s getting at snapping her fingers, the two looked like normal ponies again.
The term ‘look’ being exaggerated, as she could still feel the chaos magic radiating off of them.
“Aw, why’d you mess up the fun?” Pinkie said with a pout
“Sorry girls, but we need to get down to business. We’ll cycle the book between ourselves and read it cover to cover and try to get a handle on our new powers. Remember, we just need to last a week and we can finally get a break from Discord’s constant interruptions,” Twilight said firmly
Rainbow Dash nodded, remembering all the crazy things that had happened so far. “I can agree with that. We need to get things under control or we’ll end up messing up the town again. And I refuse to go to another sleepover at Discord’s house again after last time,”
“Alright, hold still girls. I think I’m getting the hang of this.” Twilight focused and snapped her fingers again, returning everypony in the room back to their original appearances.
“Yay, I’m a pony again!” Pinkie said, prancing about before pausing, wondering if she still had her powers.
Fluttershy stretched out her body before looking herself over and smiling at her familiar form being returned to her.
“Nice! Rainbow Dash is back in action!” Rainbow Dash said taking to the air again,
“Boy is it good to be me again.” Applejack said with a smile looking her familiar earth pony body over. She felt a tingle in her nose and before she could warn everypony, she let loose a sneeze, causing a ripple of magic to pass over the room.
Everypony tensed, knowing something could happen.
“Good going, AJ. Now what's going to happen?” Rainbow Dash said, glancing about nervously.
“Ah didn’t mean to! It was one of those sneezes that just came out of nowhere!” Applejack said, getting defensive.
When nothing happened, the girls one by one began to relax a little bit.
“M-maybe it was a fluke?” Fluttershy hoped
“I don’t trust this…” Rainbow Dash said, keeping high up in the air.
“Perhaps it was something subtle? Keep an eye out for anything differen-OW!” Twilight yelped as her face met the ceiling.
“AAAH!” was the collective response from everyone else as a massive appletree suddenly sprouted out of the ground beneath the seven mares and the tree wound up slamming them into the ceiling.
“Is everypony okay?” Twilight said, managing to wiggle out from the branches.
“Fluffershy’s flank ish in my facsh!” A muffled voice said amidst the branches.
“I’m being squished against the ceiling but apart from that I’m alright.” Starlight's strained voice spoke from above Twilight.
“OH! Who just kicked me!?” Rarity’s outraged voice said from somewhere.
“Don’t worry girls! I got this!” Pinkie's voice chimed out and suddenly the tree vanished, making the six mares fall out of the air and onto the ground.
“Thanks, Pinkie.” Twilight squeezed out from under the pile of ponies.
“What’d you do with the tree?” Applejack said curiously
“See for yourselves!” Pinkie exclaimed pointing to a wooden table with various apple confections on it. “Call me Pinkamena Recycling Diane Pie!” Pinkie said before conjuring some drums and giving a rimshot.
“She’s getting good at her powers,” Twilight noted
“Guess there’s less chance of the town becomin’ a circus again then.” Applejack said
“Actually Pinkie mastering her powers has me more concerned than relieved…” Twilight said
“Why?” Rarity asked
“She could already do things nopony could understand when she was a pony. Now she’s a draconeqqus! Who knows what she’ll do now that she can bend reality!” Twilight said panicking, visions of a party-apocalypse destroying the world flashing in her mind.
A heavy silence descended on everypony as the implications hit them.
“Perhaps we could call Discord and ask him to exclude her?” Rarity asked
“No, if we do that it’ll look like we’re quitting!” Rainbow Dash said looking angered at the thought of Discord gloating over his victory.
“Not to mention it wouldn’t be nice to do that to Pinkie. She really seems to be enjoying herself,” Fluttershy added.
“Alright! Let’s… just be careful around her.” Twilight conceded
---Later---
Twilight’s friends left the castle as subtly as they could. Having reviewed the book and taken some time to practice their new powers, the mares were now ready to tackle the upcoming week.
In the window of her castle, Twilight watched them all wander off, and couldn’t help but let her eye wander off to the town and all the rolling hills and peaceful landscape. When she looked at this sight she always couldn’t help but admire the beauty of the overlook she had to herself.
Right now it felt different…
It all seemed too boring, too static… too… un-chaotic… Twilight tried to shake the strange feelings but they didn’t go away. A part of her wanted to make the town a bit more interesting, more chaotic.
“These must be the urges Discord told us about,” Twilight said taking a deep breath and sitting down on a meditation rug “I will prove that chaos magic can be tamed, no matter what urges try to twist me!” Twilight said resolutely.
“Why fight it? Being chaotic is fun!” The voice in Twilight's head said.
“Because I’m trying to prove that chaos magic can be mastered. If I allow it to run amok then that will just prove Discord was right and then he’ll never let me live it down.” Twilight responded trying to regain her focus.
“He may have been onto something, because you're so much more powerful like this!” the voice protested
“The answer is no!” Twilight barked before going back into her deep concentration. The voice distanced itself from Twilight by going into her subconscious, and if it had a face it would be smirking.
“You think you can resist Twilight, but there’s a beautiful chaos in your heart… and soon, everypony shall see it.” The voice gave a laugh as she went dormant in Twilight's mind, one last set of words echoing out before silence descended.
“After all… chaos is magic.”