The Everfree Forest is a place every Ponyvillian knows not to enter. Well, unless they are visiting Zecora. Even then, all anypony needs to do is follow the path she cleared to get to her hut.
However, there are other ponies living in the Everfree, who also own a small hut. There is no visible path to their house, so nopony knows how to get to their home. Not even their best (and only) neighbor/friend/mentor Zecora.
“Well, hurry up,” stipulates the mare with an orange-red coat and a green volumetric flask in a purple {9/2} star polygon as a cutie mark.
“Wait a bit I need to finish this,” pleads the busy colt with a light-yellow coat and a cutie mark of a burning blue gem behind a green pencil with a blue eraser. The colt is mixing potentially explosive chemicals together, the purpose not even this narrator knows.
“You didn’t say please,” retorts the mare in a singsong voice, “didn’t Tia show you proper manners?”
“Don’t start about Tia, you know how much I don’t like her. She’s lucky we are in here now because if I spent any more time there, I would have done something.”
“Yeah, Yeah, I know. Just hurry up.”
The mare walks to a corner to wait. Why is he taking so long? she asks mentally. Uggh! Whatever! Let him concentrate; the sooner he finishes, the sooner we can get to Zecora’s. She tries to find something interesting to do but ends up messing with her mane of black and brown highlights.
“Aaaand done,” concludes the colt with green and blue highlights in his mane after a minute or three. He packs up his vials, beakers and test tubes into a small briefcase, a briefcase seemingly unsafe to harbor such dangerous chemicals.
“Hey! I know what I’m doing,” exclaims the colt to nopony in particular.
“Who are you talking to,” the sister inquires.
“Oh…nopony. C’mon lets get to Zecora’s hut.”
“Should we teleport or walk?”
“What if Zecora is entertaining guests?” the male asks with wide eyes. “We might frighten them.”
“Since when are you so conscientious of other’s Sol?”
“See…Um…I…Let’s just go,” the brother stammers. Then he murmurs, “You win this round Bitty, you win this round.”
Nopony can miss a giant tree in the middle of town, so nopony can miss the Golden Oaks Library in Ponyville. The tree is a hollowed-out living space, but somehow still quite alive. There has to be some magic going on here. Inside, a purple unicorn speaks with her adopted son/slave dragon.
“Actually, Spike, why don't you take the day off?” asks Twilight after receiving a dozen books from Celestia to read.
“Really?” prompts Spike.
“Why not?” Twilight answers his question with a question. “These books are gonna keep me busy for a while.”
The Everfree is always dark, even when the sun is out, but Bitter Sweet and Solar Nuul know their way to Zecora's hut after being there so long (soon after Twilight defeated Trixie for the second time, if you need the information for some reason).
I don’t do this often but since the two don’t seem to want to talk during this walk, I see nothing wrong with looking at what is in their minds, being an omniscient narrator allows me pleasure so you are very welcome dear readers.
Bitter Sweet: hmm I wonder what Zecora is going to teach us today? Ooh I hope it’ll be more elemental magic.
Solar Nuul: I bet I could make Zecora stop rhyming today. I know I can.
Just as I thought, they think for the short-term not the future. Shame, somepony with their power should use their heads more. But as I am new to this narration game, I’ll give these ponies a chance.
After some time walking, they arrive near Zecora’s tree hut. The hollowed out tree style seems to be popular; except unlike the Library, this tree is quite obviously dead.
“Ah. Just the ponies I wanted to see; Come on in and have some tea.”
They walk in, immediately noticing the welcoming masks from her native land. They chuckle, quite simultaneously, as they remember the song Pinkie Pie made about Zecora. Although they have not heard the song directly from Pinkie herself, they still know the lyrics. And they love laughing at Pinkie Pie’s shenanigans, even though they have not met her.
The song makes Zecora seem evil, but they know Zecora is harmless from their multiple encounters with her and Celestia’s words about her: Zecora is a zebra, wise beyond her years. Ponies seek her out for cures, and to help allay their fears.
“Are you two feeling okay, it seems your minds have gone astray,” questioningly rhymes Zecora.
“We’re fine,” the twins respond.
“We’re just looking at your masks and remembering some stuff,” adds Bitter Sweet.
“Only good things I would hope, I don’t need you two to start to mope. Now drink your tea and lets get started, it'll be best if we soon departed.”
“Where are we going today,” Bitter Sweet asks.
“We aren’t going to the Everfree pool again are we? I had enough water magic,” Solar Nuul complains.
Bitter Sweet gasped and exclaims, “Elemental magic’s the best!”
Zecora stops them before they get into one of their epic fights over tripe, “Now, Now. No need to fight. Today’s lesson will be on flight.”
Bitter Sweet sits down and sips her tea, pleased with the lesson for today; being a Pegasus, she’s a great flier. Sol, an earth pony, gives Zecora a nice, loud harrumph and a grumpy face.
“I already know levitation and teleportation spells, so I don’t need flight. Not for hard to reach places nor transportation. Why do I need to learn how to fly?” questioningly whines Solar Nuul.
“Celestia sent you both to learn all you could, so you will try to learn and make some good,” explains Zecora.
“Make good?” both non-zebras ask, “We aren’t doing good.”
“Ah. Soon you will,” Zecora started but stopped to take a sip of her tea, which had been neglected trying to explain things to these ponies. “But first one must gain skill. Now stop fussing and take my suggestions, drink your tea and stop asking questions.”
“Celestia never made me learn how to fly,” murmurs Solar Nuul while drinking his tea.
“Touch nose with tongue,” Spike reads aloud so the reader doesn’t get bored of my narrating voice. He extends his tongue and places it on his dragon nose.
“Done!” he exclaims as he checks off the action on his list. “Play bongos on my belly.”
“Done!” Spike says after making beautiful music on his gut. “Smell my dirty feet.”
“Done!” He says yet again. Not sure how he enjoyed that but now he finished his list of stuff to do. “Huh, that didn’t take as long as I thought it would.”
Spike decides to walk around town when he spots a big purple balloon, which we all know from the opening theme of the show. Maybe Twilight rents out her balloon when she doesn’t need it. Or maybe it doesn’t even belong to her! Eh, whatever, it is not important.
“A hot air balloon ride,” he exclaims as he runs to the balloon. He, being a baby dragon, decides to bump into the post that the balloon was tied against, untying it with his big head and letting it fly away.
Spike gives chase and finds himself jumping on crates and houses to reach the balloon’s flailing rope. He, being a clumsy baby, misses and lands in Big Mac’s apple cart.
With the cart, he approaches the now low flying balloon at remarkable speed. He is about to catch it when he notices that the cart is heading straight for Granny Smith.
Spike grabs the wheels of the cart with his flame resistant dragon hands to stop the collision, but his hands still seem to catch fire.
Luckily, the cart suddenly decides to stop. It digs itself into the dirt but the forward momentum, not impeded by the digging process, flings the baby dragon forward as one might expect momentum to do.
Learning how to fly is fun so Spike, now slowly approaching the dangling rope of the balloon, reaches out for it. After catching it, he lands the balloon in the middle of the Forbid…I mean, the Everfree Forest.
Three equines stand in a clearing near the edge of the Everfree.
“Hey! Was that Twilight’s hot air balloon,” asks Bitter Sweet.
“First of all,” Solar Nuul lectured, “you have never seen Twilight’s balloon. Second, she is Celestia’s star pupil; everypony is always saying how she is more powerful than anypony. She could find her way out the problem if it was her balloon.”
“No more stalling, bickering foals,” Zecora interrupted yet another forming argument between the two. She knew that Sol got into intense arguments about Twilight easily. “Now, take to the sky and show me some rolls,”
“I can't fly remember,” Sol states, a knowing smile growing on his face.
“You cannot fool me, I know you well,” Zecora said a smile also growing on her face, “Just use your hooves and cast the spell.”
“It was worth a try,” he grumbles under his breath.
He stomps his hooves on the ground and a crack appears in the grass near where he stomped. The crack shines bright yellow bordering on white and soon the crack expands to make a circle around Sol (well not a perfect circle but cracks around him). Once the crack finished its revolution around Sol, the yellowhite light blinds Zecora and Bitter Sweet (or it would have if they didn’t knowingly close their eyes first). I for one didn’t know it was going to be so blinding so I had to blink a couple of time to refocus.
Nothing seems to have changed. Well except for the obvious Sol has wings now thing. Hmm, I guess he is a Pegasus too now.
Wait, Bitty seems to have changed too. Her mane, previously Brown with Black highlights is now Gray with Purple highlights. And her coat is now more orange than red (with a bit of yellow mixed in).
“Good job Sol, nice wings, but why so dramatic? Just clapping your hooves would be more pragmatic,” Zecora rhymes.
“Also I closed my eyes during your show,” Bitty adds. “Can you change my colors back again? Thanks.”
“Bitty you need to learn how not to blink,” Sol says, “or sneeze, or close your eyes in general. You know chaos ponies can't without something chaotic happening. You are lucky that it chose to just change your colors again. Next time you could hurt somepony.”
“Well, it’s your fault,” counters Bitter Sweet. “You wanted to put on a light show and hurt my eyes.”
“If you would just put on shades like me, things like that wouldn’t happen,” rebutted Solar Nuul and to add points to his side he re-arranged his green shades.
“We all know the only reason you wear shades is so that ponies can't see your eyes.”
“The only reason you keep your wings on is because you are compensating for your lack of powerful magic.”
“I do too have powerful magic, you’re just jealous of my elemental skills.”
“Nopony will ever need you to burn something up.”
“Yeah you think so! How’s ‘bout we settle this right here.”
“This is where I shall stop you both,” Zecora interrupts. She doesn’t even know why she let this one go so long. “How bout we settle this with a little oath.”
“What’chu talking bout,” Sol asks warily.
“You two are a brother and sister, but act as if you are a blister.”
“Well, you see,” both start to explain but are quickly interrupted by Zecora again.
“No more speaking that is what we’ll do; only open your mouth if you have something nice to spew.”
“Okay neat and knowing Zecora,” both Pegasi say.
“Okay both of you have wings now, get up there and don’t break your vow.”
“Wait!” Bitter Sweet exclaims. “Sol needs to change my colors back.”
“Okay give me a sec,” Sol responds as he looks up remembering the shade of red that his sister’s coat was and her previous mane color. Once he finished thinking, he plops on the ground, raises his two forehooves, and knocks them together instantly changing Bitty’s colors back.
“Thanks Sol,” lovingly remarks Bitty. “I wuv you.”
“T’was nothing milady,” says Sol with a dramatic bow. This received a giggle from Bitty.
“You are done with fun and games, we should return to today’s aims,” interjects Zecora before this too spirals out of control.
With that, Bitter Sweet and Solar Nuul took to the air. Well, mostly Bitter Sweet since she is the more experienced flier of the two. Soon after leaving the ground, he gives a flap in the wrong speed and direction and flies straight into the trees of the Everfree at amazing speed.
Even after criticizing his sister for closing her eyes, he could not help but close his eyes. Well, mostly because he’s now unconscious.
“Huh. That was a close one,” Spike says to himself. “I-If I didn’t know better, I would swear that I was on the middle of the dark and scary Everfree Forest.”
Suddenly a twig cracks in the shrubbery darkness of the Everfree.
“What was that?” A scared Spike asks. “C'mon, Spike. Just because this forest is full of wild dangerous animals, doesn't mean that you're gonna see one.”
But Fate had a different idea up her sleeve. There were stink lines visible in the air. Spike sniffs the air and to his dismay, he smells the stink of Timberwolf breath. One would think that this would be fine (since this is the dragon that liked to smell his own feet) but these are dangerous Timberwolves; he didn’t want to stay and enjoy the smell.
Spike running and the wolves giving chase, they suddenly arrive at a large rock formation, trapping Spike to be food for these wood-based beasts. The beasts slowly approach the defenseless Spike but a runaway pebble seems to be attacking the alpha wolf. To the right, we see Applejack saving a defenseless fire-breathing dragon.
“Come 'n' get me, ya big goons!” she tells the Timberwolves. Then adds to Spike “Run!”
She bucks another rock towards the wolves again to give Spike a chance to run, and the wolves now chase her.
She grabs a tree branch while running and she quickly lets it go knocking a couple of Timberwolves into a pile of twigs and leaves. Killing innocent creatures with what they are made of is a new low; then again, they are chasing her.
She throws a rock or three up in the air and bucks them in quick succession towards the wolves, breaking one’s face and another’s legs. One more wolf to go.
She simply jumps through a hole in a tree and the wolf, being larger than a little pony, is shattered.
Applejack wipes a sweat off her brow as she does after a long’s day work.
“Wow, Applejack! That was amazing!” Spike exclaims. “I mean, you rocketed those boulders at them like they were... rockets! Pow, pow, pow pow pow! You saved my life!”
“Aw, don't mention it, Spike. C'mon, we should be headin' on back, now.”
While the two leave; however, a magical yellowish-green light recombines the pieces of the Timberwolves.