//------------------------------// // 1 - The Headliners // Story: The Opening Act // by thedarkprep //------------------------------// The Opening Act Chapter One The Headliners It’s not every day that someone has a close encounter with magic. Some go their entire lives looking for that spectacle, that enchantment that blurs the line between reality and disbelief. Very few ever find it. Luckily for the students at Canterlot High School and, more specifically, the visiting students from the Crystal Prep Academy, they had Trixie Lulamoon. An announcement rang out over the school intercoms calling for students to make their way to the front courtyard. CPA and CHS students alike began filing out of the school building in disorganized groups, but Trixie remained flush against the wall, scanning the unaware passersby for her desired quarry. Not long after that she spotted them, three CPA stragglers had broken off from the larger group—easy pickings. Trixie took one more moment to analyze their stride before separating from the wall and taking an alternate route at an unassuming pace. As soon as she rounded the corner, however, a surge of adrenaline hastened her along way back through the labyrinth of hallways. Once she reached her desired intersection, she stopped and waited. And yet, while she was now at rest, her heartbeat only quicked further, her senses sharpening.  Thirty-nine, Thirty-eight, Thirty-seven, she counted down, her mind’s eye focused on the pace she had seen and estimating their trajectory. Of course, there was always room for error, and so she listened. As her countdown hit seventeen, she heard footsteps against the tile floors. As her countdown hit eight, the footsteps were close enough to strike. Concealed by her cloak were pouches of smoke powder and flash powder, from both of which she scooped a handful. Closing her eyes she discharged the powder around the corner. Then, guided entirely by sound, she jumped into what she knew to be an empty spot and made her grand entrance. “Behold trespassers, for you stand in the presence of the Great and Powerful Trixie!” she bellowed with a flourish of her cloak, which began to disperse the smoke. “While most in this place would shun you based on your school of choice, Trixie stands above such petty rivalries and has chosen you three to witness acts beyond comprehension. Consider yourselves favored amongst the few.” As the last of the smoke faded, she was finally able to get a good look at her targets. Two of the three, a boy and a girl, were still recovering from the effects of the flash powder, blinking hazily. The girl was also in the midst of a coughing fit, despite the fact that the smoke bomb was contained to Trixie’s side of the hallway, causing Trixie to struggle not to roll her eyes. Instead, she focused her attention on the third member of the group. While he wore the same uniform as the other guy in the group, his jacket was unbuttoned, exposing his tie and his belt with a triple-star buckle. His sleeves were rolled up to the elbow giving him a very relaxed attitude, matched perfectly by his spiky jet-black hair.  “Trespassers, huh?” he said, eyes behind black sunglasses which perfectly complimented his unamused frown. Of course that’s the part he focuses on. “Figure of speech, really,” Trixie continued. “In any case, the Great and Powerful Trixie suggests you three prepare yourselves. The feats you are about to behold are not to be witnessed lightly!” The boy still looked unimpressed, turning to look from Trixie to the pair behind him. Trixie looked as well to see the other student helping the girl steady herself and her breathing. She noted how close they were, his hand on her side, and made note of it in her mind as the student with sunglasses turned his attention back to her. “I think we’re good actually,” he said. “You’ve done plenty and, in case you didn’t hear, the final event is gonna start outside soon. I think it’s best if we go and act like this didn’t happen.” Trixie didn’t flinch or react for a second, accustomed as she was to the sound of shutting doors. Instead she took note of the student in front of her. The glasses, the belt buckle, the spiked hair, none of which could be in compliance with the dress code of a place as fru-fru and stuck up as Crystal Academy. He was different from the other students and, on top of that, he was surprisingly familiar. Yes, all he’s really missing is headphones. She then focused on the way he had looked at his classmates. There had been something there as well. She’d already gathered something but that look was the missing piece. She knocked on the door again. “Oh come now,” Trixie practically purred. “You can’t honestly tell Trixie you’re that concerned about the games. The silliness of school rivalries notwithstanding, she is sure you’re bound to win as you always do, whether you three go out there or not. As for your friends there, you don’t need to look so worried. They’re not hurt in any way. In fact, this might help them along. A bit of a scare, a chance for the young man to help his lady, and a magic show afterwards? Sounds like the perfect opportunity for a developing romance, wouldn’t you agree?” The effect was immediate. The student in front of her looked at her confused while, behind him, both sets of eyes snapped to her—squinting and suspicious. They looked to each other, unaware of who exactly, what exactly, had given this stranger her information. The confusion would hold long enough for her purposes. “As for you,” she continued. “Trixie is asking for a chance to show her skills and talents to a new audience. Despite what you might think, the Great and Powerful Trixie is no mere amateur, and the show you stand to witness is surely a better use of your time than watching students blindly search for flags outside. Trixie merely asks for a bit of your time, like an audition of sorts. Surely as a fellow performer, you can understand. Or is the field of music so privileged you’ve never had to fight for a willing ear?” His spine straightened. “Do you know me?” Trixie smiled. “Oftentimes it is within a magician’s power to know things she should have no way of knowing,” Trixie explained. “Not only is this within Trixie’s scope but, within her repertoire, it is one of Trixie’s lesser abilities. Would you like to see what else she can muster?” The boy with the sunglasses looked to his friends again and something unspoken passed between the three—unspoken but not unreadable. In their blinking, in their questioning glances, in their hesitation, Trixie could read their unmistakable curiosity. Got them. “Alright, Great and Powerful Trixie,” the student with sunglasses finally said, with more emphasis than was probably necessary. “Show us what you’ve got.” “With pleasure.” With practiced grace, Trixie shot out her left arm, tussling her hair in the process, and performed a complicated finger roll. With all eyes on her outstretched hand, her other hand found its way into the cards she always carried in her pocket for impromptu performances, discretely palming them. With the cards safely concealed, she brought her left arm in again, bringing it to the middle. Her hands connected and, in time with the clapping sound, the cards flushed outwards into a fan, seemingly out of thin air. In all, the maneuver took about a second and a half from start to finish. Her heart was racing. Her breathing was steady. Her eyes studied the faces of her audience: a soft smile, a gaping mouth, the removal of sunglasses. And I’ve done nothing yet. She fought the grin. Look confident. Not giddy. With the cards outstretched she asked each of them to draw a card and to show them to each other. Then to put them back into the deck. “Now, this is a trick that Trixie is sure you’ve seen before,” Trixie began, as she shuffled the deck. “It’s quite simple. You pick cards. You put them in. Trixie shuffles. She pulls them out. No one knows how. Applause.” From the deck she drew three cards and revealed them to be the three cards the students had picked. She put them back into the deck and began to shuffle it again. “The problem is that this trick has been done. There’s no challenge to it. No nuance. The Great and Powerful Trixie wanted to change it a bit. So here’s what she was thinking. What if she could get you all to draw the cards instead? Infuse you all with magic for long enough that you, without any training, could pull the right card? Wouldn’t that be something?” It always was a strange experience for Trixie, being both so focused in the moment and simultaneously outside of it. She swelled at the nodding along of her audience. She savored the crisp snap of the cards as she finished shuffling. She drank in the excitement as the three audience-members-turned-volunteers stepped closer to draw their cards. She couldn’t hold back a smile. “Now, what I need you to do is to stand in a line and wait your turn, maintain eye contact with me to form a connection, and draw blindly from where you think the card is. As long as our connection remains strong, you’ll make the right choice. Then put the card up to your chest and don’t look at it.” The three nodded and the first up was the girl who eagerly followed the instructions. As for the trick itself, it was easy enough to do. As the girl got ready to draw, Trixie used her trained peripheral vision and rehearsed dexterity to manipulate the card she needed to the proper spot. The girl maintained her eye contact and was none the wiser. The other two were behind her in line and could not see the act happening. The same actions were repeated by the next two participants. Trixie then pretended to examine the back of the deck and gave a dramatic sigh. “Oh no, Trixie should have seen this coming,” she said, earning confused looks. “What’s wrong?” “Nothing’s wrong, per se,” she continued. “You see, the trick got a little messed up is all. The Great and Powerful Trixie wasn’t specific enough. As it turns out, she gave you all a little too much power and not enough direction, which ended with different results. What you’ve got there are your cards, but not the ones you drew before.” “What does that even mean?” the girl asked, as the other two looked questioningly at each other. Trixie took that moment to draw three cards seemingly at random from the deck, revealing them, once again, to be the cards the students had drawn before. “All you were told was to draw your cards,” Trixie explained. “Your cards. Not the ones you drew before, but your cards. Trixie should have seen it coming. Quite impressive, really, that you were able to tap into her powers so far and complete this feat. It might make more sense if you flip them over.” They did. They gasped. The boy with the sunglasses had drawn the King of Clubs. The other two students had drawn the King and the Queen of Hearts respectively. The significance was not lost on any of them and, as they looked at her confident smile, there was no doubt in any of their minds that Trixie had known for a fact what cards they had drawn before they’d revealed them. “Now, if I could have those back, I can continue.” They nodded, enthralled and invested in the rest of the performance. Or at least they would have been. However, as Trixie got the last card back and began to shuffle, the skies outside the window went black. Storm clouds appeared out of nowhere. A terrible rumbling shook the building.  “What’s going on Neon?” the girl asked. “I’m not sure,” said the student with sunglasses. But Trixie felt like she did know. Something about this felt familiar. “There’s a bright light coming from outside.” Sure enough, a beacon could be seen through the windows, shining into the sky just outside the front entrance to the school. The three Crystal Academy students ran towards it but Trixie hesitated, memories beginning to surge forward—memories she struggled to comprehend. Canterlot High School had experienced magical incidents. That much was common knowledge amongst the students. And yet, in some ways, it wasn’t. The fight against Sunset Shimmer’s demon form and the reveal of the Sirens as creatures from another dimension had all been mired by brainwashing and hypnosis. The feelings, the sights, the experiences of those magical outbursts were less memories and more dreams in how tangible they were. It was often easy to forget they were real. Not now though, Trixie thought. Not when the sky is dark as the night Sunset became a demon. Not when the ground is shaking and rumbling like a siren’s roar. This is definitely connected. Which means, right outside that door, there is magic. Trixie ran the short distance to the awning, pushing through the glass door, unprepared for what would greet her there. In the middle of the courtyard was a pillar of light, a version of Twilight floating in its depths. All around her she could see portals to a different dimension. Jungles, cities, civilizations made of clouds and crystals, as real as her school building and just as within reach. She could hear the screams all around her of the panic. But more than anything, she could feel the thrum of the magic emanating from the pillar of light and reverberating within her bones.  The cards, which were still grasped in her shaking hand, cascaded onto the floor. She crumpled weakly beside them.  So this is what magic is, she thought, humbled and embarrassed by the forgery she had dressed herself up with for so many years. She looked up at Sunset as she struggled against that other Twilight, a conduite of arcane power draped in an ethereal white dress and held aloft with radiant wings. Trixie’s cloak felt childish and stifling. Before her she saw the other girls, the ones that had stopped Sunset, had helped stop the Sirens, and even now in the face of such energy were undaunted and unafraid. They were still continuing to help. Meanwhile, Trixie struggled to take a breath, much less a step. Her eyes began to water. What must they think of me? I really thought I was at their level? That I could compete with Rainbow? Entertain Pinkie? Outshine Rarity? Memories from the Battle of the Bands rushed past her consciousness. What gave me the right? With each magical burst, the portals kept growing larger making it harder for those already at the edge to avoid falling in. Crystal Prep Academy and Canterlot High School students alike were now joined in the effort of making sure no one fell into the abyss. Trixie knew she needed to help. But… Why can’t I move? Impossible images flashing through the portals as sobbing was heard from somewhere in the courtyard. Move. The rumbling coursing through the earth and into her very bones while students were held between dimensions by the strength of their peers. Move. The swirling storm overhead which seemed to react to the magic in the atmosphere, violet hued lightning bolts brightening an impossibly dark afternoon sky. MOVE! Another lurch in reality, another flash of light, and everything suddenly stopped. Amidst the light, Sunset began to descend holding a defeated looking Twilight in her arms. The portals began to close and Trixie could actually feel the magic draining from the air, as if a pressure was being drained from the atmosphere—a static electricity going numb and fading into nothingness. Without the thrum of magic pulsing through her, Trixie was able to breathe again, to feel again. And yet, without that resonance, she felt empty, each breath hollow and shallow. She didn’t dare speak, for fear that her voice would be much too quiet compared to what she’d heard. Instead the void was filled by the chorus of the surrounding students. One by one, the students from Crystal Prep Academy and Canterlot High School were filled by that sense of peace that Trixie found so deeply lacking at the moment. Those who had taken shelter in the building reemerged unto the courtyard, stepping past her and atop her scattered cards as they did so. They returned to their classmates' side, to help them off the floor, to hug and cheer and cherish in the euphoria that came with survival of a cataclysmic event. For them, the world could now go back to normal. But Trixie wasn't really sure things would ever be normal again. Not this time. The laughter seemed muted somehow, the colors less vibrant, the sunlight more dim. Trixie had stared into something staggering and had been partially deafened, blinded, and subdued as a result. A soft breeze blew by her, fluttering her cloak behind her. It itched against her neck. After that, she thought she heard some more cheering. She remembered some muted conversation about something or other involving Twilight and the Principal of her school. At some point there was some announcement that The Friendship Games were declared a tie and the Crystal Prep students boarded the buses to go home. But Trixie Lulamoon was only marginally aware of these events. The only thing she knew for certain was that long after everyone else had gone home, she was still there by herself, numb and shaken, collecting tearstained cards from the entrance floor.