“Twilight it’s time to get up! Hey Twilight, look if you don’t get up… are you even listening to me! You didn’t give me life to be quiet you know!” Twilight stirred in her bed as a high pitched squeaky version of her own voice yelled in her ears slowly waking her up. “Come on already Twilight, it’s another great day and guess who turned fourteen today?”
“Not now Smart… five more minutes.” Twilight rolled over and pulled her covers over her head. Twilight would never forget why she turned her beloved Smarty Pants doll into a very pixie like creature, much less that it held that form because it was enchanted with several different spells. The most interesting enchantment was the one that made it solar powered.
“Ugh, I’ll just go get Barb then, nothing gets us up in the morning like our daughter!” Smart E. Pants was once Twilights childhood toy, until Twilight took her imagination of the toy being alive and literally brought it to life through her studies on enchantment. She loved her toy even more after it turned into a cute little five inch tiny grey pony form with pixie wings, not to mention it had a default average length well brushed raven mane and tail.
Despite her appearance, Smart was not a truly intelligent doll morphed into a pixie pony. It was a living copy of memory in a memory storage device and could possibly learn things, but for all intents and purposes it was like the piece of Twilights mind that created the Smart E. Pants imaginary friend from when she was little.
This meant a part of her consciousness was constantly wandering around keeping her childhood alive and if the doll were destroyed Twilight would know about it. She’d get a sudden headache and memory of being a tiny little annoying fairy pony with her exact memories that played out her fantasies of being Twilight Sparkles toy. Knowing you’ve been your own play thing was quite disturbing in the least. When you grew up not having friends and are a single mother with a daughter you cherished, well Twilight needed somewhere to vent and no place was better than Smart or more to the point at a small part herself.
Speaking of a small part of herself that Twilight practiced magic on, she played with her Smart’s hair a lot and couldn’t help but toy with the hair as one day it might be brown and the next indigo. All kinds of styles were used on the pixie figure from long hair to short and even once an afro which Twilight didn’t like but Smart certainly did. Smart being part of Twilight relished in all of the attention and liked being Smart E. Pants.
There were downsides to Smarts existence, but there were plenty of upsides to make up for it. Twilight created Smart to act as a reminder to important stuff she may forget or to keep her on schedule. The bigger reason she created Smart after the first year of Celestia’s school for gifted unicorns, it was to have a part of her that could always have time for her daughter. For some reason Twilight found it less creepy that she was her daughter’s mother and plaything, then being her own plaything. As long as the doll wasn’t destroyed it would continue to live on… well past the time Twilight would inevitably die as even given Barbs twists due to Twilights magic, she would eventually out live Twilight and Smart would be her constant companion when and if things got to that point. Smart could even cast a few spells, but she couldn’t directly use any of them on Twilight because she was immune to being affected by them.
Twilight figured that if she were ever to gain an evil side she would force it to become a negative version of Smart without the ability to vocalize or cause trouble. Many had already asked her where her friend Smart came from and Twilight was smart enough not to give away an answer. Enchanting was a dangerous school of magic, one could easily kill themselves by accident if they didn’t take things slow and it was a school of magic that favored the patient. Enchanting never had any great offensive capability and unicorns in the armies of the ancient past never got into it because it was difficult to learn and reaching mastery would take forever. What they entirely ignored was the great supportive capabilities and it fell largely out of practice.
Over the last six years Twilight had learn a lot of magic, however the potency of said magic was random for whatever she placed it into.
Twilight was pretty good at enchantment as Smart would probably say she’s a work of art made from an insane unicorns mind, Twilight was self deprecating at times for her inability to make friends in Canterlot.
When it came to Medical Magic, Twilight had some talent as she had plenty of power for healing cuts, scrapes and minor wounds. Her magic cosmetology book helped her learn those medical spells quite easily and she learned how to remove near permanent scars with her magic easily enough. Her problem was she hit a form of mental wall in this area of magic and could go no further.
Magical Plants and Alchemy could easily coincide with each other, even if they were slightly different fields. Magical Plants was recognition of plants and their properties, if you took alchemy you could possibly have a good combination for mixing up stuff like shampoo. Twilight was embarrassed that that was exactly the first successful concoction she ever created, it made her mane slightly silkier when used and had no detrimental side effects while leaving her smelling like grapes. Alchemy wasn’t all about plants; it had metals and other elements as well and was something Twilight enjoyed.
Her study of Magical Animals really helped her raise her daughter; Twilight would have never known that Barb was a magic dragon and it would explain why she was able to affect her daughters hatching with magic. Magic dragons were apparently dragons that were special because they were hatched by powerful magical forces and any type of dragon egg could be hatched into a magic dragon instead of what they would have originally hatched into should they have hatched normally. The school for gifted unicorns specifically used eggs that were magically protected to be extra difficult to hatch; no other pony has done so for a good one hundred and thirty two years.
Other then all that Twilight was gifted with a talent for raw magic. She could levitate tons of weight, she could light up an entire forest and she was a walking powerhouse capable of understanding what a spell was doing and what it would do as long as she studied it with her eyes carefully. She was even beginning to get teleporting down, as far as things went the most general forms of unicorn magic was her area of expertise even if a lot of it was convoluted silly stuff like transforming an apple into an orange. Twilight thought it was easier to turn her doll into a pixie pony.
There were three ways to go through the Celestia’s academy for gifted unicorns, take classes, self study or mentorship program. Twilight was stiffly into the self study portion and was doing well for herself as she enjoyed the freedom while the other unicorns in self study goofed off a lot. Twilight did take some classes on the side and was even asked by a teacher or two if she would like a mentorship but she had to politely turn them down. She enjoyed her freedom and wouldn’t have time for her daughter if she took a mentorship program.
Along the way through school, Twilight had tried to make friends. She really was trying, but nothing she could do would be good enough for the other unicorns.
She had an acquaintance in a pony named Trixie, a pony that was arrogant and had a special talent for telling stories and making illusions to go along with them. Trixie didn’t get along with Twilight for a variety of reasons but at least they were amiable towards each other. Trixie didn’t outright dislike Twilight.
Sunset Shimmer on the other hoof was Celestia’s personal student, a thing she had the tendency to rub in the faces of other ponies including Twilights quite a few times. She thought herself above other ponies, whereas Trixie was just brash and self confident. Twilight knew how Sunset was being trained by Celestia and thought that Sunset truly needed Celestia to teach her or else she might eventually hurt herself alongside many others one day. For some reason Sunset hated Twilights guts and Twilight never quite understood why.
Those two ponies were sticking points in Twilights memory, but many other ponies that she tried to befriend didn’t acknowledge her in a positive light. Twilight wouldn’t know it, but it was mostly out of jealousy for her talent in the more general forms of magic. Quite a few of them noticed Twilights staring from one time or another at them or mostly at their manes because she thought they were pretty. Twilight never knew or understood why she loved the idea of playing with manes, tails and fur, all she knew is that her magazine subscriptions wouldn’t appear odd for an average teenage mare.
Twilights last six years in a nutshell, trying to make friends and it was not for the lack of trying. She believed at least Trixie was a good pony, once you could get by her boastful nature. Something of which Twilight had yet to do, but she thought she might have been close one time while trying to compliment Trixie’s mane. So she was completely and utterly lonely at her school, but hay at least she wasn’t being bullied.
Twilight made sure that her daughter was generally happy and liked to learn, something Twilight didn’t force feed her under the magical surge that hatched Barb. Barb formed her own mind and ideas and was her own magic dragon pony hybrid.
Twilight was happy for the life she led so far, but sad that she didn’t have any friends. At least she wasn’t a very high strung shut in of a pony; she tried hard to be approachable and outgoing.
“Mom, time to wake up… grandpa and grandma want you downstairs for breakfast after you take a bath, I’m not leaving till you get your lazy magical butt out of bed.” Barb liked to nap in too, but thought it was strange for her mom to sleep in considering she was a hard working pony of many different branches of magic. Barb never called Twilights parents grandpa or grandma to their faces, but she always thought of them as such.
“Not now Barb… mommy is still tired from mixing so many chemicals last night. Something still missing from the formula…” Twilight drifted off back to sleep, while petting Barb’s head with an outstretched hoof.
Barb smiled at being petted and her little wings fluttered at her mother’s touch only for her to realize her mom went back to sleep which annoyed her as soon as the hoof went limp. Today was her mommy’s birthday and she wanted to give her mom her present!
Barb reached up with her tiny claws and struggled to pull herself on top of the bed and when she finally managed it, she crawled on top of her mother and started poking. Eventually she managed to poke her mom enough times to get her to roll out of bed and onto her hooves.
“Fine, fine… I’m up already!” Twilight giggled as her daughter jumped upon her back.
“To the bathroom mom, I don’t want to miss breakfast!” Barb pointed in the general direction for Twilight to go get bathed.
After a quick bit of bathing and mane care, Twilight and Barb ate breakfast. After that Twilight’s parents asked her to meet them in the living room since they all had presents for her birthday, even Barb got her a birthday gift with part of her allowance that didn’t go into gems that she snacked on once in a while.
Twilight looked at the gift that Barb got for her and it was a strange one, she had not heard of an enchanted comic book before and it was something for her to examine later. She hugged her daughter and thanked her parents for her wonderful gifts. Later on she made a note to send a thank you back to her big brother, who was Uncle Shining to Barb, as his gift came later in the day.
They would have a wonderful cake after dinner that night and the next day would bring a bit of trauma for Twilight and Barb.