Twilight and Ruff walked into the atrium at the School of Friendship.
“Wow, this place is huge!”
Twilight gave Ruff a weak smile. “Welcome to the School of Friendship, Ruff. This is the atrium, the main area where students can mingle in-between classes or when classes have stopped for the day. It’s…” Twilight paused and stretched her wings. “It’s meant for a place of rest, mostly. I’ll let Starlight show you this in your main tour. We just need to find her, that's all.”
She turned to her left and beckoned Ruff with her wing. “Come on, Ruff. I’ll show you her office.”
Ruff smiled and stood right beside her, beaming. “Yes, Princess Twilight!”
Twilight felt her heart do a somersault at that. A diamond dog that is this enthusiastic about learning friendship? It warmed her heart. Not that diamond dogs were bad company; no, no, no, she knew better to not assume now. This was just… new. And if she could find Starlight, maybe this whole mistake could be corrected and everything would turn back to normal.
So, she walked down the hall of offices and beelined straight for Starlight’s room. It was the largest one in the school, with enough room to put a state-of-the-art typewriter in. It was imported from Canterlot for this year’s semester, and she was curious if it really did speed up production of documentation. After all, it was fairly large, and very pony friendly even for Earth ponies.
She put that thought in her back pocket of her mind as she walked into the roo—
Twilight stood ramrod. Her eyes blinked. Her mouth felt dry. Her brain misfired. Her nerves were on end. A chilling rush of adrenaline raced down her spine.
Starlight’s office was a mess. Papers were cluttered; a cup of coffee without the cup (just the plate) was sitting on a filing cabinet that was bow-echoed at the top; the bulletin board behind Starilight’s desk was tilted at a seventy-three point two hundred and thirty-nine degree angle, a number so odd that not even Twilight wished it upon anypony; and most of all, in the center of her friend’s desk was a copy of Ruff’s enrollment papers, with his name circled in red. Nothing on the forms were filled out. Just a circle in red. And an unidentified species listing glaring at her, menacingly.
She walked into the office further, inspecting the damages. The cup of coffee? The contents were unsalvageable, staining the floor with its remains, while the porcelain cup had shattered, its shards displaced near Starlight’s crude wooden chair. On top of it all, accompanying the remains of the good morning treat, a few pages and an empty inkwell were on the floor too, finding purchase with nothing but the carpet singularity, a shade of indigo that distracted Twilight immensely, not because of irritation, but because it reminded her of something.
Starlight was gone.
Where was she? Were there any clues in Starlight’s office? Twilight felt her wings attempt to unfurl as she stood there, eyes scanning over Starlight’s desk. She sifted through the contents of the paperwork with her forehooves, rearing up on her hindlegs. It was fairly standard for every enrollment: standard information of the student, where the student would fill out their personal information before providing some form of payment. For Ruff, they chose a monthly payment plan paid by a mutual benefactor, which turned out to be Ruff’s ‘guardians’. These guardians were actually friends of Ruff, almost as if they were littermates rather than parents. Parents, from what Twilight gleaned, weren’t always around for Diamond Dogs. Only their littermates were a constant, a definite cultural shift that made Twilight wonder how Starlight would have to accommodate him and—
She sighed. Focus. She needed to find out what happened here. She used her magic to levitate the forms, stacking them neatly on the desk. She flipped through a few before stumbling upon something that stood out: a sticky note attached to the whole copy. It was glaring at her with a schedule of events that were listed to four numbered steps. They read as follows:
1. 𝒞𝓁𝑒𝒶𝓃 𝓊𝓅 𝓂𝓎 𝑜𝒻𝒻𝒾𝒸𝑒 𝓈𝓅𝒶𝒸𝑒.
2. 𝒞𝑜𝓂𝓅𝓁𝑒𝓉𝑒 𝑒𝓃𝓇𝑜𝓁𝓁𝓂𝑒𝓃𝓉 𝓌𝒾𝓉𝒽 𝑅𝓊𝒻𝒻.
3. 𝒢𝒾𝓋𝑒 𝓉𝑜𝓊𝓇 𝓉𝑜 𝑅𝓊𝒻𝒻.
4. 𝒜𝓈𝓀 𝒜𝓅𝓅𝓁𝑒𝒿𝒶𝒸𝓀 𝒶𝒷𝑜𝓊𝓉 𝒽𝑒𝓇 𝓁𝑒𝓈𝓈𝑜𝓃 𝓅𝓁𝒶𝓃𝓈.
She really wanted to crumble up that stupid note attached to this, but part of Twilight was… happy. Happy that she at least had her day somewhat scheduled. Well, not that the schedule mattered anymore, it was already muddled on step one, and shredded to bits by step two.
Twilight gritted her teeth before letting out a slight groan. The only thing that helped was that Applejack, of all ponies, was in today. She needed to go find her, and fast. Maybe she’d have some answers to the problems at hoof.
Turning, Twilight walked out of the office. Ruff, who she had almost forgotten about, was standing there, looking at her with a solemn expression, his eyes tracking her but they were not looking all too thrilled to see Starlight not in the room.
“Princess?”
“Yes, Ruff?”
“Is… is Miss Starlight Glimmer missing?”
Twilight didn’t know how to answer that question without giving off a sense of disparity. So, she opted to just be honest.
“I don’t know, Ruff. I don’t know.” Twilight walked by Ruff, only to stop and turn to address him. “Follow me. We’re going to find somepony who I believe may know where Headmare Starlight is.”
Ruff nodded curtly, twiddling with his paws as he followed her. The two exited the hall and into the atrium, hoping to find the pony that caused all of this as soon as they could.
Starlight was having a massive panic attack.
She was overlooking Ponyville, staring from above on the Bridge of Unification. She felt her gaze falter, shaking as she narrowed her gaze on the School of Friendship. It was a blur from where she saw it. The clouds shrouded it like a mask of fog that disoriented her view. Her forehooves shook as she realized the magnitude of her decision.
Focus, Starlight. Focus. Breathe.
She filled her lungs with that joyous O2 before shivering, and exhaling the feelings that she could only imagine to see as a mask that concealed her anxiety. She kept her forehooves on the ledge of the bridge, settling there while her hind legs anchored her. Then, she let her forehooves find purchase with the bridge again. She turned and noticed that some ponies were looking at her, but they did not choose to stare for long, choosing to look elsewhere or return to their previous conversations.
She looked insane to them, didn’t she?
Her mind flickered between each. She needed to ask somepony, but none of them seemed to be knowledgeable—if their glares were anything to go with. It would be best to start fresh.
And she did. She had done so. Several ponies passed, and some she asked:
“Have you seen a diamond dog up here?”
“Have you come across a diamond dog traversing the Clouds of Dale today?”
“Diamond dog. About yee high. Looks like he means business—I-I mean, he looks like he could own a business, if he studied enough! Have you seen him?”
All these different ways of asking. All these different ponies. All these different measurements for yee high—
She frowned.
Did ponies up here in Cloudsdale have terrible memory or something? Or were her measurements off?
Starlight sighed. She wasn’t going to find him by just standing here on the bridge. She should try to walk around Cloudsdale. Maybe that’d help her get closer to finding him instead of pacing this stupid bridge!
Steeling herself, Starlight puffed out her chest, took a deep breath, and turned around to—
“Hey, are you Starlight?”
“Yes, I am,” Starlight began, this time prepping herself to not teleport this creature to another random location of her mind’s choosing. Thankfully, upon seeing it wasn’t something that was going to attack her like one of those cheesy slashers, she realized it was just a mare. A yellow furred mare. With a teal mane. Starlight smiled at her, or at least attempted to, her lip was twitching out of control. “And you are?”
“Oh, sorry. Name’s Raindrops. I’m actually from Ponyville but I stopped by Cloudsdale today since Rainbow Dash told me to go to this All Things Weather convention to help the weather team out. Not that she’s really in charge of it anymore, but getting advice from her wouldn’t hurt, would it?”
The name sounded familiar… Had she ran into this pony in Ponyville before? “No, it wouldn’t—well, unless you were asking her about flying advice, then it may hurt.” She giggled-snorted before clearing her throat. “So, why did she tell you to go to a weather convention?”
“Ponyville hasn’t been getting enough cloud coverage lately, and it’s probably due to us not meeting regulations from the factory,” Raindrops droned, before letting out a burst of giggles. “Regulations? Pfft… we’ve winged it down there for so long, I’m surprised she actually recommended me to go to one of these things!” She let out one final laugh before calming herself down. “Hah, good to see you, Starlight! I heard from some ponies you were asking them about something that was on the bridge recently—”
“Wait, you know about that?” Starlight asked, her voice raising slightly as she squeaked in excitement.
Raindrops took a step back and cleared her throat. “Kinda. Ponies were shouting about some light suddenly appearing on the bridge and it apparently sounded like ‘somepony created a wormhole and it was going to suck them into it!’. Pegasi and their imaginations can go places not even wings were meant to take them. Me, on the other hoof, knew two things: one, that it was most likely magic dissipating and it wasn’t going to eat them, and two, that the thing on the bridge was most likely something they haven’t seen before.”
Starlight’s eyes widened. “Was that thing a diamond dog by chance?”
Raindrops raised a brow before tapping her chin. “I think it was. Either that or it was one of Discord’s ‘Create A Species’ attempts. Heard rumors that he’s been doing those and—why are you looking at me like that?”
Starlight felt her heart race, and her legs suddenly turned into stone as she kept her gaze glued on Raindrops. “Are you sure it wasn’t something else?”
Raindrops rolled her eyes. “”Pretty certain it was a diamond dog. Most of the ponies were too terrified to go check, but living in Ponyville made me realize that I couldn’t be afraid, because I’ve already seen pretty much every single scary thing in existence!” She giggled before continuing, “Thankfully, I checked. I actually was able to catch a glimpse before it and a certain somepony you might know blinked out of existence.”
“And… and who was that?”
“Princess Twilight Sparkle. She had teleported the diamond dog and herself somewhere. Probably back to Ponyville and—Starlight, are you okay?”
Starlight blinked. She blinked hard. Harder than any pony else before. When she opened her eyes again, she was seeing stars of all colors flickering and dancing around Raindrops’ head and to make things worse, her heart was hammering in her ears. It was like she couldn’t feel, only hear the racket that pulsed through her brain, making her face numb.
Was she about to pass out?
She took one more look at Raindrops.
“Do… Do you mind if I pass out here?”
“Uh… yes. I don’t think I or anyone else would be a fan of that.”
Starlight blinked. “That’s too bad.”
The two stared at each other.
…
…
…
And then Starlight saw her world go upside down.