Wish Upon A Discord

by ShadeJak


What Now?!

Rushing inside her cloud home and closing the door behind her, Rainbow tried to slow down her rapid breathing. This day had gone so drastically downhill thanks to that stupid draconequus, and her own bad judgement! Now she was stuck looking like her friend, in a place where everypony thought said friend was away and no explanation ready should she run into any of the others, or anypony for that matter!

Hovering in front of her, she just realized, was a very confused tortoise with a propeller strapped to him.

“Hey, Tank, good to see you’re still alright!” Rainbow said, then realized she probably didn’t look like his owner anymore and he was now wondering why this pony was in Rainbow’s house. “Tank, it’s me! I know I don’t look like me but it’s me!” she insisted. The tortoise just cocked his head.

“Taaaaaank!” the alicorn whined. “Please believe me! Can you really doubt the most awesome flier in Equestria?” she asked. Tank still appeared rather skeptical.

“Come on, buddy! It’s me, I swear! Remember you freed my wing from that boulder and brought me to the finish line, and that convinced me you were the best pet in the world?” she pleaded, and thankfully this time the tortoise seemed to believe her and hovered towards her, nudging her with his forehead in acceptance and causing Rainbow to throw her hooves around him and hug him tight.

“Thanks, pal!” she said, smiling. Her smile faded, however, when she saw her reflection; that of Twilight Sparkle holding Tank instead of her usual awesome cyan-coated, rainbow-maned self. Gently letting go of Tank, she walked closer and stood herself up, pressing her hooves against the mirror and leaning in close inspecting every detail.

“This is so messed up! I really am Twilight! Down to, like every detail!” she said, looking at her flank and sure enough there was Twilight’s star pattern cutie mark instead of her own.

“Oh no… he changed everything!” she shouted, and suddenly her horn glowed a bright magenta and several objects in her room began floating about. Yelping, Rainbow tried to think. “Okay, there has to be some logical, reasonable explanation for this! This is Twilight’s… my unicorn magic, the stress must have been causing some kind of subconscious output that was not much different then bursts of power unicorn foals got due to its instinctive power and lack of control—WHAT IN TARTARUS AM I SAYING?!

Rainbow froze in place, she was thinking like Twilight! She looked back down at the star pattern on her flank, and memories of the incident where everypony’s cutie marks got swapped around came to mind. If she now had Twi’s cutie mark, it meant her special talent might be changing with it, and with that, some of who she was! Did that mean the longer she stayed this way… the more she was going to become Twilight?

“Tank!” Rainbow shouted, rushing over and grabbing her tortoise pet, causing him to duck his head into his shell. “I gotta get outta this body! It’s important! If I don’t I’ll turn into a total egghead! Who knows what could happen! I might start liking academic books and doing math problems and stuff! How uncool is THAT?! I mean sure Twi’s one of the best friends I could ask for and hang with but she can be such a nerd sometimes! I don’t wanna be that! And if she sees this she might like that I’ve become another her and she can compare the pages of notes she takes on her studies and I’ll enjoy them because I’ve turned into Twilight and I’ll probably have like twice as many notes full of mathmatics and stuff and AAAAARRRGGH!!!” The tortoise just blinked at the alicorn with a sympathetic look as she finished her bizarre rant in his face.

Looking around at all the floating objects, Rainbow stood on her bed and closed her eyes, trying to focus. “Come on, come back down!” she said, but they just slowly started hovering in a circle around her. “Please?” she asked, but they didn’t seem responsive to her request. “Wait, the library! Twi’s gotta have books on this stuff!” she said, perking up, but then slumped her head down again. “But that’d require leaving here and being seen! Forget it, I’ll just have to stay here and try to figure this out mysel—“

A soft knock came at the door, interrupting her.

“Um… Rainbow Dash? It’s Fluttershy,” a soft voice said on the other side of the door. “I just… wanted to know how you’ve been, if that’s okay, I mean,” the pegasus said. “I-I’m not trying to impose or anything. Just, Discord said he saw you just leaving in a huff last he saw you and I wanted to see if you were okay.”

Rainbow snorted angrily, it'd be so like Discord to compound her situation by sending Fluttershy up here. How was she going to get out of this? Fluttershy couldn’t see her this way! Quickly, Rainbow let out a few coughs.

“H-hey, Flutter…shy,” she said in a weak tone and trying to lower her voice a little in hopes of sounding a little more like herself. “Sorry… I came down with... Feather Flu and decided to head home!”

“Oh my!” Fluttershy answered from the other side. “You poor, poor thing! How about I stay with you and help you get better, I got a great new soup recipe for Feather Flu and—“

“NO!” Rainbow shouted, forgetting to change her pitch and sounding like Twilight again. “I-I mean… no, I just need some rest is all!” she said, attempting to disguise her new voice again.

“Are… are you sure?” Fluttershy asked, worry in her tone.

“Yeah, I’ll be fine, I’m… coolest pony around, measly Feather Flu won’t keep Rainbow Dash down long!” Rainbow answered with a nervous laugh. “Seeya later!”

“Okay, I guess so,” Fluttershy answered softly, and after a few seconds Rainbow heard the pegasus fly away. She felt bad blowing off Fluttershy like that, but she couldn’t have this embarrassing secret be exposed to all of Ponyville!

Once she was sure Fluttershy had left, Rainbow collapsed on her bed, her wings spread apart reaching each corner as she sighed. “I’m never gonna be able to keep hiding this, how am I supposed to find a way out of this?” Looking over at the mirror again, she frowned at Twilight’s reflection, which mimicked her expression. “Why’d I have to go and get all jealous? Is this what I get for it? Is it so wrong to get a little bummed that everypony I know is doing better then I am?” she protested, letting out a growl of anger and suddenly her horn charged up, firing a blast of magic through her roof and tearing a hole through it. Rainbow stared agape at her handiwork and shook her head.

“Great, now my house is even more destroyed. I can’t get the repair ponies down here with out seeing them first, can’t do it like thisbecauseTwi’ssupposedtobeinbuckingCANTERLOT!” she ranted, her last words becoming faster and faster and she noticed her horn glowing again. “Oh no! No! No! Stop!” She pleaded, and soon her house had another skylight. “Great, can't stay here! Now where do I go?” she muttered.

An idea came to her. The library of course! She thought. Twilight’s home was closed till her return which meant she wouldn’t have to deal with Spike or Owlowiscious and there were sure to be books to help her figure out how to control this magic better but she’d have to risk being seen by Ponyville’s residents even if she flew at top speed. There had to be some other way…

Teleportation?

She barely had control of her magic as is; the fact that things were still randomly levitating off the floor was proof of that! But then again, Twi always made it look easy, and she was now Twilight, how hard could it be?

Her mind made up, Rainbow beckoned Tank over and held him in her hooves. Closing her eyes, Rainbow tried to focus as hard as she could on the library. Books, shelves, more books…

POP!

Rainbow opened her eyes and found herself floating six feet off of her floor upside-down before gravity chose to take action and bring her back down. Trying to turn over, Rainbow felt a horrible wave of dizziness and nausea overcome her and before she could stop herself, she’d managed to cover a sizable part of the floor with partially-digested food and stomach bile while Tank spun about in the air in a dazed stupor. “Okay… not doing that again…” she muttered, glad Discord couldn’t see her make a complete fool of herself right now.

Slowly standing up, she caught Tank in her hooves and turned him to face her. “Looks like we’re gonna have to fly. Hang on tight, little buddy!”

Tucking the tortoise under one foreleg, Rainbow flew to the door, pushing it open and looking around cautiously. Nopony in sight. She thought with a smile. Awesome.

Immediately, she flew as fast as she could, pleased to see her speed and skill at flying had stuck with her. Zipping through Ponyville during its late afternoon hours, Rainbow weaved around buildings to avoid detection. The library was just up ahead and nopony had seen her. So far so good! Flying with all her speed, she came to a screeching halt right in front of the door and tried to open it.

Locked! Figures, Twi is away after all. She needed to get this door open and fast! Suddenly, she saw a pink shape in the corner of her eye.

Oh no! Pinkie Pie’s coming this way! She immediately ducked around the large tree, looking cautiously to the side and sighing with relief as the pink earth pony bounced blissfully along in a different direction, thankfully having not noticed her.

Waiting for a moment, Rainbow looked up at one of the windows. “Maybe if I…” she muttered softly. No way she’d be able to break through, Twi had gotten reinforced glass after all the times Rainbow had accidentally smashed through them and the then-unicorn had gotten sick of having to replace them. “Come on, this one time don’t screw up!” she pleaded softly, focusing and she could see a latch move inside the window and it slowly opened. Letting out a small squeal of glee, Rainbow flew straight up at the window and into the library, hurriedly closing the window behind her.

Setting Tank down, Rainbow slumped against the wall, surprised at how exhausted she felt. “What’s wrong with me? I don’t usually tire out this fast!” she wondered. Then it occurred to her… she was Twilight now, Twilight was an egghead, not an athlete, so her strength and endurance even as an alicorn probably wasn’t up to her own. Another thing this stupid wish had messed up for her.

“Alright, buddy, we’re in the library now. Let’s see if I can find some books to get this under control before I—“ Before Rainbow could finish talking a swarm of books engulfed in a magenta aura flew from their shelves and pummeled her into the wall, burying her. Tank had fortunately flew out of the way in time and made his way up towards Twilight’s bedroom, figuring it’d be much safer there.

Digging her way out, the alicorn looked over the many titles and sighed. “Well, guess I better get started, hope this isn’t too boring!”

~

Hours later, Rainbow had gone through a number of trial and error moments with attempting to use her new magic properly, and mostly the error part occurred. In the period of time she’d practiced, the alicorn had managed to nearly blow up the fireplace with a fire-starting spell, caused a shelf to fall over, and while she’d managed to make things stop floating everywhere it’d ended in the books she’d unintentionally brought to her strewn about the floor. She didn’t even want to imagine how distraught the real Twilight was going to be when she got back and saw the place, but fortunately reading the books hadn’t been too dull… maybe a little too interesting, actually. She’d never been this fascinated by this kind of stuff, and it worried her that it was more of Twilight’s mentality seeping through. If this kept up…

Rainbow shook her head frantically to get the images she’d had earlier out of her mind and toppled over, wanting to just curl up and cry despite how uncool she always thought that was.

“This wasn’t what I expected being an alicorn was gonna lead to! It’s so much work! I was never meant for any of this!” she protested, but then her eyes widened as realization came over her. Of course, it all made sense now! The lesson she was meant to learn! Sitting up with confidence again, the alicorn grinned. “I get it now! All this time I was jealous of Twilight’s being all lucky with her new status and stuff that I never realized all that baggage that came with it! It was all just dropped on her, it chose her, she didn’t ask for it either! I have a chance, I worked for what I want and it’ll pay off!” she said proudly.

“Bra-vo! Bra-vo!” Discord’s voice said as one of the books flipped several pages to an image of the chimeric entity and he rose out from it, applauding. “Such an insightful speech right there, I have to admit! Rainbow Dash, you really have learned quite a lesson, and on your first day as Twilight no less!” he said with a smile.

“Really? Awesome!” Rainbow said, jumping up with a giddy cheer.

“…Too bad it’s the wrong lesson!” Discord replied with a sing-song tone and a wide smile. The instant Rainbow’s expression fell, Discord burst into a fit of hysterical laughter, rolling about on the floor for several seconds.

Letting out a furious snort, Rainbow slammed her lavender hoof on the floor. “That’s NOT funny, Discord! I learned a lesson, now change me back!” she demanded.

“Not for all of Celestia’s jewelry, Twilight!” The god of chaos said, wiping tears out of his eyes from his earlier laughing fit. “Why should I end this so early when you’re still behind on learning my lesson and there's still so much fun to be had from it?”

“And what’s so ‘fun’ about this to you?” the alicorn asked.

“What hasn’t been?” Discord asked. “Your freak-outs about becoming a nerrrrrrrrd like Twilight…” he said, putting on a pair of gigantic thick-framed glasses that were taped together in the middle and made his eyes look enormous. “Your disastrous attempt at teleporting…” He vanished and reappeared above her flailing his limbs and landing atop her, laughing. “And your attempts to hide this! No doubt the lesson will come to you in good time!” he said with a smile, vanishing again and reappearing before the now extremely embarrassed alicorn. “Now if you’ll excuse me, I’m feeling a bit… weary…” he said with an exaggerated yawn. “…Better luck tomorrow, Princess” he added with another obnoxious laugh as he snapped his claw and disappeared in a flash of light.

Growling with fury, Rainbow trotted angrily in place for a second, then looked around at the books on the floor. “Fine, if he won’t cure me I will! Come on, transfiguration spells! Gotta be in here somewhere!” She snapped, and sure enough, a book on the subject popped open. Reading frantically, Rainbow quickly found her hopes destroyed.

“Due to the brief, temporary nature of transfiguration, there is normally no cure intended for it. There are some cases, however, which the transfiguration may be permanent, were it cast by beings of tremendous, godlike power. This, however, is considered a forbidden art and thus the Royalty will not use it for any reason, though they are best sought after should such a curse befall a pony…” Rainbow let out a sigh of disbelief and noticed, in crayon was the message HA-HA! underneath, with two eyes and a smiling mouth with a single fang drawn next to it.

“Great! Just bucking great!” she said, slamming the book shut and kicking it away. “Looks like I’ll have to play his game after all…”

A loud rumble in her stomach caused the alicorn to wince, realizing she hadn’t eaten since lunch and most of that ended up on the floor of her house earlier. Hopefully Twilight had left plenty of food she could ‘borrow’ during her stay; Rainbow hoped as she trotted into the kitchen and began looking through the cabinets.

On a normal day, Rainbow was not a bad cook and could prepare plenty of meals for herself, but with her inexperience with Twilight’s power she didn’t want to risk trashing another part of her friend’s home so she settled for anything she could just open and eat from the box. Finding a bag of oat chips, bread rolls, and apples, Rainbow’s appetite quickly got the better of her and she soon found herself with a full stomach and Twilight’s pantry much emptier. In the corner, she spied a few bottles of hard cider and smirked.

“Heh, way to go Twi…” she muttered, but decided against them for now. Who knew what kind of damage a tipsy alicorn with very little magic control could cause?

Returning to the den, Rainbow looked over the fiction section and spotted Daring Do and the Manticore Mantle, the newest of the series and one she’d not read yet. At least this was something she could enjoy without being embarrassed about that could hopefully help her cool down till she fell asleep, Rainbow focused on the book with her magic, only to get slapped in the face by the flying book, sending her on her back. Rubbing her muzzle and glaring at the offending book, she grabbed it with her hooves and flew upstairs with it, finding Tank already asleep on Twilight’s bed.

Climbing onto the bed, Rainbow looked outside, many of the windows were dark now, and all but a few ponies were still out… including Pinkie Pie, who was still bouncing around randomly chatting to some of them before bouncing away towards where Sugarcube Corner was. “Heh, typical Pinkie Pie…” she said with a smirk, groaning as she realized she wouldn’t be able to hang with her friends till this was over. Not till she was herself again.

Yawning and wrapping herself in the bedcovers, the alicorn shifted a little. It wasn’t as comfortable as her cloud bed, but it’d have to do. Opening her book and beginning to read, Rainbow was fast asleep before she’d finished the first chapter…

~

Sunlight poured through the windows and right into Rainbow’s face, causing her to stir. Her eyes opening she found herself halfway off the bed and soon her back half joined her on the floor. Looking around, then at herself, the alicorn rolled her eyes.

“Awww, it wasn’t a dream?!” she protested, getting herself up and looking at herself in Twilight’s mirror. Sure enough, Twilight’s reflection stared back, her mane and tail messy like they’d gotten when she went through that nervous breakdown over a late friendship report.

Heading downstairs in defeat, Rainbow realized she’d eaten most of Twilight’s snack foods and would need to get more… which meant going out in public. There had to be some way to avoid detection, she thought to herself. Maybe if she wore some kind of disguise and didn’t stay out long she could seem like some mysterious visitor or something. Nudging open the closet, Rainbow spotted a hooded cloak and tugged it down with her teeth, sliding it on after. “Guess this’ll have to do.” she muttered as she nudged the lock on the door with her hoof to get it open. It was still way early if Twilight’s clock was right; not many ponies would be out right now so if she just moved fast she could avoid suspicion and—

“SURPRISE!!!!!”

The instant the door came open Rainbow was greeted by a loud cheer from what had to be the entire town, Pinkie Pie standing in front with a huge grin on her face.

“Welcome back, Twilight!” Pinkie said gleefully, leaping forward and giving the alicorn a big hug before jumping back in front of the crowd. “I spotted you yesterday, hiding behind the tree, but I didn’t say anything because I figured you were coming back early to surprise us and didn’t want me to know right away, but then I thought Wait! What if I surprise Twilight back with a big welcome home party with everypony in town so you know how they’re all happy to see good ol’ Twilight Sparkle back home? So then that’s what I did, I spent the night telling everypony and having them get ready so we got here like reeeeeeally super-early figuring you’d want to go out and get some breakfast or something so here we all are and we’re glad to all have you back!”

“I…. I…” the alicorn stammered, everything spinning and fading to black as she promptly fainted in response.