What A Long Strange Trip

by milesprower06


Ending 2: Sunrise

It had been so long since Sunset had gone between worlds that she wondered if she remembered what it felt like. It usually felt like air was rushing past her as her form changed from human, to ethereal, to equine. If she recalled the transition was somewhat psychedelic, but right now it felt somewhat... Muted. The intensity of this journey that only took a few moments was considerably dulled from what she remembered it being. Her last trip had been more than a year and a half ago, twice in quick succession as she looked for the solution to a storm that had threatened their school's Spring Break cruise trip, and the second one was hours later when she brought her entire class through to save on rescue expenses... To say nothing of the ship itself, which had been insured, thankfully.

Ever so slowly, she saw the point of light that served as the point of contact for the other side, and shielded her eyes as it rapidly got closer. She shut her eyes as the blinding light enveloped her, and her heart jumped when the next thing she heard was the sound of glass shattering. Feeling gravity take over her body once again, she lowered herself to all fours, and opened her eyes, to complete darkness.

She concentrated, and began casting an illumination spell from the tip of her horn, lighting up her immediate surroundings in a bright blue hue, and her heart dropped when she saw the floor surrounding her.

Shards of reflective glass were scattered all around her, and she looked behind her to see the magical mirror completely shattered, as if it had exploded outwards as she passed through. Her belongings were there on the floor next to her, and Ray, now a much larger bright yellow and black-spotted draco lizard was standing on her back.

"I guess that was a one-way trip, but what's going on here? Why is everything so dark?" She asked herself, looking around.

In fact, the darkness wasn't the only thing contributing to the overall eeriness; it was also the fact that the now-shattered mirror was the only thing in this room, which looked like it was the basement of Twilight's castle in Ponyville. She was sure she would have the mirror moved to Canterlot when she went up there to take Celestia's place.

She stacked her saddlebags, guitar case, and suitcase, now a chest, in a neat pile next to the mirror, and carefully sidestepped all the shattered mirror pieces, then ascended the stairs up to the main floor.

Her worry and concern only climbed higher when she stepped out into the main hall, and saw the same dark, downright abandoned hallways.

"Twilight?" She called out, her only answer being her voice echoing off the walls. She immediately turned towards the front doors, where the smallest amount of light was entering into the hall, and it looked like the right door had been damaged. She walked to the doors, and she nearly stumbled out onto the front stairs as her breath was taken away at what she saw before her.

Ponyville was nowhere to be seen. The stairs were covered in thick roots, and the castle itself was surrounded by thick forestation.

"Wh...Wh-what?!" Sunset exclaimed, her eyes widening in shock.

This got the attention of two nearby armored pegasi who were sitting next to a campfire a short distance away from the bottom of the stairs.

"Gah!" Screamed the mint green stallion, clearly startled by the sudden appearance of somepony coming out of the castle.

"Hey! How did you get in there? That's an off-limits historical site!" The other pegasus sternly announced as she got to her hooves. She was sky blue, and had an identical helmet and chest piece.

"What's going on here? Where's Princess Twilight? Where's Ponyville?!" Sunset asked incredulously, her horn beginning to spark in anxiety, and this put the two guards visibly on edge.

"Did you bring the shield?" Zoom asked her partner.

"We, uh, we only had the one..." Thunder answered.

Zoom rolled her eyes, and turned back to the unicorn.

"I'm Sergeant Zoom Zephyrwing of the Zephyr Heights Royal Guard, and you're trespassing on protected historical property. You're going to need to come with us to answer some ques—"

Sunset wasn't having any of it, and took the magic sparking on the tip of her horn, and squeezed.

Zoom and Thunder took an instinctual step back as there was a flash of light where the unicorn was standing. She was there one moment, and gone the next, a small plume of smoke where she had been standing. Zoom's ears twitched when she heard galloping distantly behind them. She turned and saw the unicorn heading away towards the road.

"Hey! Stop!" She shouted as she gave chase with Thunder.

Sunset reached the dirt path, where there was a sufficient enough clearing in the canopy that she could see the city built into the mountain top.

"Canterlot..."

She saw the two guards behind her giving chase, and fired up her horn again. She had to keep them on the back hooves until she got some answers to her surroundings.

"She's headed up the mountain! Call Starscout, see if they're back yet, maybe she knows something about this!" Zoom shouted back to her partner.

To keep his speed up, Thunder hopped up into the air and went into a coasting hover as he dug out his phone from his saddle bag, dialing the number for Sunny Starscout. As far as he was aware, Princesses Pipp and Zephyrina had gone abroad with her, and may have been unreachable.

Indeed, the phone rang five times, then went to voicemail.

"Miss Starscout! Something came out of the castle!" Thunder said frantically once the recording had started. "A unicorn. We asked why she was trespassing in the castle, and she took off. She's headed up towards Zephyr Heights! She's transporting all over the place, we're having trouble keeping track of her, please tell me you're getting this!"

With the voicemail done, Thunder decided to take advantage of the signal he was getting down here on the road, and texted Queen Haven and her captain of the guard.

'Come on, we can keep up with her if we head straight up!" Zoom told him, taking to the sky.

He sent one last text, then pocketed his phone, joining his partner higher in the air, going straight up the face of the mountain, as the unicorn barely stayed ahead of them winking all over as she rapidly ascended the ascending road. As they came to the south gates of Zephyr Heights, the unicorn ceased teleporting, and instead started weaving her way through the crowds. Now that they were in range of other guards, Zoom gave a long blow of her whistle.

"Follow that unicorn!" She commanded, pointing to the amber pony galloping her way towards the castle.

Sunset's initial plan was to hide among Canterlot's other unicorns while she made her way to the castle, but the main hitch in that plan was that the crowds in the streets were almost entirely made up of pegasi. That, and the city streets and buildings looked a lot different. A lot more, well, modern, when compared to how it looked when she was here last. Had something happened when she had gone through the portal? She had a feeling something about her return journey felt off.

The castle was in nearly the same place as it had been this whole time, but again, more modernized, like it would probably look like back through the mirror. She saw the doors of the elevator close, and the unit begin to move up through the glass tube towards the castle. She lit up her horn again, concentrated, and then vanished into thin air again.

Zoom skidded to a halt, looking around frantically.

"Look, up there!" Thunder pointed a hoof skyward. There stood the unicorn, standing on top of the elevator as it rose to the approach to the castle. Now, Zoom got her phone out, knowing she'd be impossible to catch by the time the elevator came back down.

"The unicorn is on the elevator, intercept at the front. I repeat, she's on top of the elevator heading up to the castle."

Sunset saw the top coming up, and momentarily turned to look out at the cityscape, as well as the forest below the mountains. That was so much bigger than what she remembered, and that kind of growth was absolutely not possible in the entire time she had been gone.

She felt the elevator come to a halt, and she lit her horn up one more time, winking all the way over to the large double doors, and pushed them open.

She was promptly met with a dozen spears that were instantly brought to bear, inches from her coat and face.

"Not another step!" An authoritative voice shouted, behind the large group of guards that had instantly surrounded her. She looked behind her, and saw six more guards behind her.

She tried lighting up her horn again, but it just fizzled, as her magical reserves now needed time to recharge from all the miles she had traveled in just a matter of minutes. She felt Ray skittering around on her back nervously, and she didn't want to accidentally misfire a spell that would leave him behind.

"Captain, the Queen and throne room are secure!" Another guard announced as she came around the corner.

"Take her to the dungeon. We'll get to the bottom of this."

As she was escorted by six armed guards down to the basement, she took note that every single one of the guards that she had seen was a pegasus. Something had happened, and perhaps going along with this was the best way to find out what.

The 'dungeon' they had spoken of, was anything but. It was more like a salon with bars in front of it. She was ushered in, and the bars slid down into place with the push of a button.

Sunset let out a sigh, and looked at her surroundings, and the first thing to catch her eye was a fruit bowl.

"Well, you hungry little guy? Or, not so little anymore, eh?" She asked Ray, letting him crawl onto her hoof and over to the fruit bowl, where she set him down and let him inspect the offerings. After sniffing past several, he began to bite into a strawberry. Grabbing a banana for herself, she unpeeled it and started into it. She was barely halfway done when she heard hoofsteps coming down the hallway.

She was an older mare with a pale pink coat, dark purple wings. The crown atop her head was all Sunset needed to see to figure that this was the 'queen' that had been secured in the throne room.

"And just what is the meaning of this? I am Queen Haven, and I want to know how you got into that castle, and why you ran from my guards watching over it, as well as why you felt it was necessary to barge into this castle unbidden?"

Sunset took a deep breath, and approached the bars.

"I don't care what you have to do, Queen Haven, but I won't talk to anypony other than Princess Celestia, Princess Twilight, or somepony who can tell me what happened to them."

With that, she turned away from this 'Queen', and walked back to the fruit bowl, where Ray was continuing into a second strawberry.

"I'll see what I can do," was all Queen Haven said before turning back down the hallway. She came to her Captain of the Guard, who had escorted her down here.

"She stays here until we can get a hold of Sunny Starscout or my daughters. They were supposed to be back today, let me know the minute they get back in touch."


It was clear that Canterlot was, for whatever reason, a pegasus city now. She had no idea what had happened, but she knew that Twilight and her friends dealt with much more magic than she and her friends had on a much more regular basis, so it could have been anything. There had to be an explanation for this, and to be fair, her accommodations could be much less comfortable. The fruit was good, the chair was good enough to take a short nap in, and the view was stunning, which is what she was doing right now.

It had been several hours, and she had been brought a couple slices of hot pineapple pizza for lunch, and all shee could think of while she ate the delicious food was how Rainbow would have called her out for the sacrilege of having such a thing on her pizza.

"Excuse me, miss?" Queen Haven announced her presence once again. "This is the mare I've been saying could help you." The Queen motioned to an apricot earth pony with magenta and purple mane and tail, as the earth mare took a step towards the bars, as two other pegasi looked on.

"I was quite clear; I wanted to talk to Princess Twilight or Princess Celestia," Sunset said after taking a breath, walking towards the bars towards her visitors. Her expression softened considerably when she saw the six-pointed star on the earth pony's wooden pendant around her neck. "But I'll make an exception for that."

The earth pony glanced down at her pendant when Sunset pointed at it. "So where are Princesses Twilight and Celestia? Why is Canterlot full of pegasi? Why does the city look so different?" The unicorn asked. Her tone could be construed as accusatory.

The earth pony took a deep breath, and looked the unicorn directly in the eyes.

"Alright... There's no easy way to say this, so I'll just be as direct as I can. To the few of us who know those names... They're ancient history. They're long gone, and I'm afraid I can't tell you how much time has passed, because I honestly don't know."

Sunset's eyes widened as she drew in a shaky breath. Of all the possibilities she had considered, this was the one she didn't want to hear; that she had inexplicably jumped forward in time. But, so far forward that they were ancient history?

"They said you came out of the castle," the pony continued. "Did... Did you come out of the mirror we found in there? The portal?"

"How could you possibly know about that?" Sunset asked, amazed. So this mare knew what she was talking about.

The earth pony dug into her saddlebags, and pulled out a book. She flipped almost halfway through the pages before coming to what she was looking for, then turned it towards Sunset, showing her a picture of Twilight's castle in pristine condition.

"My name is Sunny Starscout. My father and I have devoted our lives to learning as much as we can about Ancient Equestria, and about Princess Twilight and her friends."

Sunset's breaths started to become shorter as she took a single step back before collapsing into a sitting position. The earth pony saw her eyes tear up, and she motioned for one of the pegasi to hit the door release. The white pegasus got a nod of permission from the queen, and tapped the release, and the bars slid into their retracted states. The earth mare slowly and calmly stepped into the cell as Sunset began to softly weep.

Twilight, Celestia, her mom, dad, her brother... All gone...

"Sunny. That's my name. Sunny Starscout. What's yours?" The earth mare asked her as calmly as she could.

Sunset took a deep breath, made no move to get up, but wiped her eyes, looking into Sunny's emerald green eyes.

"Sunset. Sunset Shimmer."

Sunny smiled softly at her, and offered her a hoof.

"Sunset Shimmer, I have a feeling there is so much we can learn from each other."