//------------------------------// // Becoming Normal // Story: Normalcy Is Overrated // by Starlight Fan //------------------------------// Starlight was in the library, currently studying a certain spell that caught her interest. It was a spell that lets a bubble form around your body, and then you could walk inside the bubble and could shield yourself from magic blasts. It sounded very interesting and could potentially be useful should another Storm King or Cozy Glow incident take place so she decided to try it out. Spike was supervising her progress to make sure she didn’t do something wrong. Starlight figured she could need someone to keep her in check should the spell go wrong and Twilight was busy in her bedroom getting the lesson plan for the school ready. “Are you sure this is a good idea?” Spike asked curiously. “Well I DO wanna do something helpful for Equestria, and this spell does seem cool so it seems like a good idea.” Starlight reassured the dragon. “Okay… I guess it makes sense.” Spike says before taking the book from Starlight and reading it out, “It says here you just need to make a bubble with your magic, close your eyes, and concentrate really hard on it as it inflates. Sounds simple enough.” “Okay then. Let’s do this!” Starlight smiled as she began lighting up her horn, closing her eyes, and creating a bubble, letting it inflate around her body, as soon as heard a boing noise, she let herself relax her horn and opened her eyes. “Alright Starlight! You did it!” Spike smiled enthusiastically, “Good job.” “Thanks Spike, that was kinda draining not gonna lie, but I’m glad I pulled it off.” Starlight sighed in relief before she wiped her forehead with her hoof before bumping it against the bubble, causing it to slide against the bubble wall. It began rolling which caused Starlight to start scrambling and scream, “Gah! Hey, hey, what’s going on here?” She began rolling against the walls which caused her to bounce against them at a very quick pace. Spike then used his wings to start flying and grew a concerned frown. “Starlight! What’s going on?” Spike asked in concern. “I don’t know.” Starlight cried out as she kept rolling uncontrollably and soon she went outside the library and began rolling down the castle halls. “Hold on Starlight! I’ll save you!” Spike said in determination before flying after his friend. Starlight continued to roll and bounce across the halls, heading towards Twilight’s room much to Spike’s horror as he flew faster to catch her. Twilight was currently writing on her notes for her lecture and lesson plan for the School Of Friendship and wiped her forehead, it was a bit taxing, but worth it. She then looked to the left side of the study table, and looked at her clay sculpture of the old tree library she used to live in in nostalgia. Spike made it for her to remind her that her old home was still there with her. “Man, making these friendship lessons are stressful but it’s still worth it.” Twilight said fondly. Soon Starlight in the bubble came barreling through the door, “Look out Twiliiight!” Twilight immediately flew away from the bubble’s range but it ended up bouncing on the front of the bed and hit the table, causing all of Twilight’s notes to scatter and her figurine of the tree library to fall and break. Thankfully, Twilight was able to cancel out the spell Starlight cast, leaving her lying on the ground, a bit dazed. Twilight soon noticed her figurine was broken and gasped in shock and sadness, “Oh no! No no no no no!” She looked around and saw her notes scattered around the room and began to get angry, it was going to take forever to reorganize them and now the one reminder of her old home was now destroyed. Starlight recovered from her dazed state and looked on in shock to see what she had caused. She knew how important that figurine was to Twilight and she just destroyed it. “Twilight, I am so sorry, I was just trying to study a new spell that I felt would be impressive and helpful to learn…” Starlight began explaining and apologizing but Twilight just glared at Starlight before yelling, “Of course it was a stupid spell! Why did you feel the need to test that spell out?!” Spike soon arrived to hear the commotion that was going on and gasped at the broken figurine, he immediately knew what was going on. “Twilight please don’t be mad! Starlight and I took as many precautions as we could, plus the spell didn’t seem that bad.” Spike told the alicorn. “Well clearly it wasn’t enough considering all THIS happened!” Twilight groaned as she gestured to the mess around the room. “Ugh, I swear Starlight you can be so reckless and annoying, sometimes I just wish you were normal!” Starlight’s eyes watered a bit, “Oh… I understand Twilight. Do you think I could help clean up this…” “No!” Twilight said angrily, “I’ll do it myself! You’ve done enough!” “Understandable.” Starlight sighed before she used her horn and with that, she teleported away from the room. Spike soon turned to sigh at Twilight, “Did you have to say that to Starlight? She didn’t cause that much of a mess, and you basically just told her you wanted her to change her entire personality… that doesn’t involve her being evil at all.” “I know.” Twilight sighed sadly, “I didn’t mean it, I was just tired from writing out the lesson, and my prized possession just got destroyed. That figurine of the old library really meant a lot to me, especially since you made it, and I just snapped. I messed up didn’t I?” “Twilight. The tension will blow over. You can just talk to her tomorrow.” Spike said comfortingly as he patted Twilight's back, “I’ll put in a good word for you so she’ll rest easy, you just focus on getting ready for bed and fixing the lesson plan.” “Yeah, I guess that’s probably what I should do. Thanks Spike.” Twilight smiled softly. “Anytime Twilight.” Spike said as he embraced Twilight who hugged back. Starlight sighed as she laid on her bed aimlessly, Twilight had a point about her. She’s always been too reckless at times, especially with magic. Maybe Twilight had a point, maybe she did need to act more normal. Soon her door quietly opened and Spike frowned awkwardly as he walked in, “Uh hey. Are you doing alright?” “Well, I’m a bit upset by what Twilight said but I can’t act like it wasn’t understandable.” Starlight spoke monotone. “Yeah, that does make sense. Look Starlight, Twilight was just upset by what happened. She didn’t mean to be that hurtful.” Spike told the unicorn reassuringly. “It’s fine Spike. I’m not mad at her.” Starlight said to reassure the dragon, “I’m just gonna turn in for now. Thanks for trying to help me though.” “Okay. Good night.” Spike said happily, before leaving the room. Starlight sighed as she thought about her next course of action. ‘Twilight has a point, I need to become more normal and I need to do it immediately.’ Starlight thought to herself before she smiled and immediately teleported to the library and soon looked through the books by levitating herself near them and found a book spine titled Etiquette. “Perfect.” Starlight smiled to herself before levitating herself and the book to the ground and began flipping through the pages and found a spell called Normalcia and started reading through it, “For this spell to work, the one using it must be completely willing to have this spell casted on them.” “Huh, they made sure to make it morally safe to use. Well this IS a book about Etiquette after all.” Starlight said with an impressed smile before chuckling. She then sighed and became serious and began to question herself, “Do I really wanna do this though? This will end up changing my personality.” She then thought back to Twilight’s words: “Ugh, I swear Starlight you can be so reckless and annoying, sometimes I just wish you were normal!” “This is for the best.” Starlight sighed before lighting up her horn as magic began coursing through her veins, and giving her a tingly feeling, “Goodbye old Starlight.” She sighed sadly before smiling in acceptance as the spell began to take action. Twilight yawned happily as she made it to the kitchen table. It was a tiring night yesterday for her but she was glad she was able to have a good night’s sleep. She then spotted Spike at the kitchen table, twiddling his claws nervously. “Oh good morning Spike. What’s going on? I thought you’d be making something by now.” Twilight said with a raised eyebrow. “Yeah but Starlight kinda took over herself.” Spike admitted sheepishly. “She’s still feeling bad about the figurine huh?” Twilight asked sadly. “Well sort of…” Spike turned to Starlight who was levitating waffles to the table, and now wearing glasses and her manestyle was back to the way it used to be when she was running her old town. “Starlight?” Twilight asked, a bit weirded out. “Ah Twilight Sparkle, Princess Of Friendship, Headmare and Founder Of The School Of Friendship. Good morning.” Starlight greeted formally as she sat next to Spike. “Starlight? Are you feeling okay? You’ve never greeted me like that before.” Twilight raised an eyebrow. “Never better. I have taken your advice and now I am completely normal.” Starlight smiled as she used a neutral tone. “What? But how?” Twilight asked in shock. “Yeah, you can’t just suddenly change your personality in one day. Even when you turned to the good side, you still had to work on your friendship and moral compass.” Spike added. “Well I cast a spell on myself known as Normalcia, the purpose of it is for the WILLING participant to change their personality into becoming normal.” Starlight explained, “It’s perfectly harmless and now I am the new and improved Starlight.” “Wait no.” Starlight put a hoof up in thought, “Starlight was the name of a reckless unicorn who uses magic constantly. From now on my name is Glim Glam.” “So… your Glim Glam Glimmer.” Spike raised an eyebrow, “Doesn’t really roll off the tongue like Starlight Glimmer does.” “Well, at least it’s a fitting name for me.” Starlight shrugged. “Starlight, Look. I’m sorry about what I said last night, but you don’t need to change your entire personality to please me.” Twilight told the unicorn as she sat next to her. “It’s Glim Glam now Princess. Now please, let’s not waste this breakfast I made for us.” Starlight willfully ignored the alicorn’s argument and used her magic to put a pancake on each of their plates. Spike immediately began using his claws and began chomping on his pancake, while Twilight used her magic to levitate the pancake and eat it. Starlight turned to the two as they ate their pancakes and rolled her eyes, “I’m sorry but you’re seriously eating with your hands and your magic. That is very uncivilized.” “But… this is how we always eat these. Don’t you do it too?” Spike asked genuinely curious. “Not anymore.” Starlight smirked as she used the butter knife and the fork to start cutting up her pancake into four and then cut them into smaller pieces. “Perfectly balanced. As it should be.” Starlight smiled before taking her fork and eating the pancake piece by piece. “I mean… It's okay to do this in like a public area, but you don’t have to do it with just the two of us here. It really doesn’t matter as long as there isn’t butter or syrup on it.” Twilight told her friend. “Don’t be ridiculous.” Starlight scoffed in disgust, “If I am to be normal I must act completely civilized.” Spike soon finished his entire pancake and sighed, “I’m gonna go.” He then began to walk off sadly as Twilight looked sadly at her two friends, something was seriously wrong with Starlight.