Who Am I...?

by Connor the Brony


My Name Is Twilight Sparkle

Twilight Sparkle was reading a book, no surprise there. This particular day, she decided to read one of her old favorites, The Elements of Harmony: A Reference Guide. She loved the concise nature of the book. Just straight, undeniable facts with as few frills as possible.

The book had originally been filled with holes, both figurative and literal, due to the book’s age. There were relatively few known facts about the Elements, but the pony historian who had written the book included as many as she could possibly find at the time. Twilight had personally enjoyed filling in some of these holes and adding new content herself.

She cleared her throat, put on her best narrator’s voice, and began to read aloud from the beginning: “There are five Elements of Harmony, but only four are known: Kindness, Generosity, Honesty, and Loyalty. The fifth is a complete mystery. It is said, the last known location of the four elements was in the ancient castle of the Royal Pony Sisters. It is located in what is now the Everfree Forest.”

Twilight looked down at the diagram under the text she had just read, showing four spheres resting on an oddly shaped pedestal. The caption underneath it read: When the four are present, a spark will cause the fifth Element to be revealed.

 Under that were some of Twilight’s personal scribblings: The fifth Element is the Element of Magic; or, perhaps more accurately, the Magic of Friendship. The five Elements are currently possessed by five mares from the town of Ponyville: The Elements of Kindness and Loyalty by the pegasi Fluttershy and Rainbow Dash respectively, The Elements of Generosity and Magic by the unicorns Rarity and Twilight Sparkle respectively, and The Element of Honesty by the earth pony Applejack.

Twilight’s reading was interrupted by a knock at the door.

“I’ll get it!” yelled Spike as he ran to open the door. “Oh, hi Nurse Redheart. Is there anything we can help you with?”

“Hello Spike. I have a bit of a medical dilemma on my hooves right now, and I think Miss Sparkle might be able to help resolve it,” Nurse Redheart responded.

Twilight walked over to them from her reading desk. “What seems to be the problem, nurse?”

“Ah, there you are Twilight. A mare has just recovered from a mentally impaired state and we’re trying to figure out what caused her condition to suddenly improve,” Redheart stated mater-of-factly.

“That sounds... interesting, to say the least. How can I help?” asked Twilight as she peeked out the door to see if she could catch a glimpse of the patient in question.

“Well, I know you have all those scientific instruments in your basement, and I was hoping that one of them might be able to help us,” the nurse responded.

“Sure, it'll be no problem. Come on in,” said Twilight as she opened the door wider.

“Thank you so much! I’ll be right back, let me go get the patient and her father.” A moment later, Nurse Redheart returned, bringing with her a pink mare and an older stallion who must have been her father.

“Hello, my name is Twi-” Twilight's introduction was cut short by a tackle-hug from the pink pony.

“Hi Twilight, I haven’t seen you in forever. Well, only about a day or so, but it feels like forever when you’re away from your friends!” Pinkie exclaimed, still holding on to Twilight.

“Nice to meet you too...” Twilight responded, laughing a bit to herself. After levitating the pink pony off herself, Twilight added, “By the way, what’s your name? You already seem to know mine.”

The pink pony giggled as Twilight set her down. “Oh, silly Twilight. I’m Pinkie Pie! Ya know? You’ve known me since ya moved here.”

 Twilight stared at Pinkie Pie, puzzled. “Um... I don’t think so. I can’t say that I’ve ever met you, or even seen you in Ponyville before.”

Pinkie’s father stepped forward. “Hello, Miss Sparkle. I’m Clyde Pie, Pinkamina’s father. Please forgive my daughter’s rather...” he looked up to see Pinkie running around the library, looking at everything there was to see, “rambunctious demeanor. She’s not usually like this.”

Pinkie called out from over at the reading desk. “Hey, Twilight! Your book’s wrong!”

Twilight noticed that the book Pinkie was looking at was the same one she herself had been reading earlier. “I don’t think so, Pinkie Pie. I checked all the facts several times myself. What do you see that’s wrong?”

“Well, isn’t it obvious? You have all your numbers wrong! There are six Elements of Harmony, not five. Kindness, Laughter, Generosity, Honesty, Loyalty, and Magic. I would have expected you of all ponies to know, Twilight. You are the Element of Magic after all.”

“I’m sorry, Pinkie Pie, but that's just not correct. As you said, I am one of the Elements, and I think I would know more about them than some random pony off the street.”

“What are you talking about, ‘random pony off the street?’ I’m an Element too, duh! I might not know as much as you Twilight, but I think I would at least have the number correct.”

“You’re an Element?” Twilight asked, a skeptical tone clear in her voice. “Which one? I know all the others personally.”

“I’m the Element of Laughter, you silly filly! It’s my job to make you all smile!”

“Uh-huh, fine. Let’s assume for a minute that you are an Element. What do you have to back up your statement? Where is your proof? Tell me something that will leave no doubt in my mind that you are this mythical sixth Element.”

“Well, what do you want to know?”

“Let's see, how about how my friends and I rediscovered the Elements of Harmony?” Nopony knows that but us five and the Princesses, Twilight thought to herself as she prepared to accept sweet victory.

“Oh, that’s an easy one! First we came to the library and I found a book. Actually, I think it was this one right here,” Pinkie said, pointing at the Reference Guide. “Then we went to the Everfree Forest, then we all fell off a cliff and Applejack reassured you, then we ran into a manticore and Fluttershy tamed it, then we ran into a bunch of scary trees and I sang a song and we laughed our fear away, then Rarity gave that sea serpent her tail, then Rainbow didn’t join the Shadow Bolts. Now we were at the castle and we found the Elements, but that big meanie Nightmare Moon stole them, then we all fought her and won and saved Princess Luna!” Pinkie paused for a moment to take a breath and look at her friend. “Twilight, are you okay?”

Twilight sat on the floor staring up at the pink pony with a mix of annoyance and wonder. “No, no, no! This doesn’t make any sense. How do you know that? You’re not supposed to know that!” Twilight took a second to breathe and calm herself down. Best not to get mad at somepony I hardly know, she thought.

Before Pinkie had a chance to respond, Twilight continued. “Of course, of course. That story has to be common knowledge now, right? But here’s one thing I know nopony but my friends and I know, because we’ve never told anyone, not even the Princesses. How did we find the Elements of Harmony the second time, earlier this year?” Now Twilight knew she had won; nopony but the Elements themselves knew exactly what had transpired in the maze.

Pinkie sighed. “I really don’t know what you’re trying to get at, Twilight, but if you insist. So, we went to Canterlot Tower and the Elements were missing, then you guessed they were hidden in the maze, so we went to the maze and got separated, then Discord discorded us all! Applejack got tricked into lying by a bunch of apples, some balloons made it so I hated laughing, Rarity got greedy when she found a giant rock named Tom, Fluttershy was mean to everypony for no reason, and Rainbow Dash abandoned the rest of us 'to go save Cloudsdale.' Discord said we lost the game and he messed with everything in Equestria. It was really awful… Except for the chocolate rain, that was the best thing ever! Then you figured out we were supposed to go back to Ponyville and when we got there you found the Elements in that book. We tried the Elements but they didn’t work because we weren’t ourselves. The rest happened really fast. You got discorded and then brought back by your letters to the Princess, then you brought us all back my making us remember our friendship, then we defeated Discord, and then we had a party!”

Twilight stood up and started to speak, her facial expressions going through a range of emotions from surprise to mild contempt. Twilight let out an exasperated sigh and turned away from the pink pony. She was fed up with her wrong yet unflappably self-consistent alternate timeline. All she was doing was taking true events that had happened to Twilight and her friends and inserting herself into them like some sort of unimaginative fiction writer. Twilight now turned to Nurse Redheart and Clyde, who had been sitting on the sidelines of their argument. “So, what did you come here for originally again?”

Nurse Redheart blinked a few times before answering. “We were wondering if we could use your brain scanner.”

Clyde, Pinkie, Nurse Redheart, and Twilight walked down the stairs to the library’s basement. As they descended, all of Twilight’s scientific instruments came into view. Various test tubes, electric coils, pipes, and books lined the walls. This was as close of a look as any into the workings of Twilight’s mind; a precise scientific tool, honed by her years spent as Celestia’s pupil.

Hopefully one of these machines can figure that pony out. I just don’t know what to make of her, Twilight thought to herself before turning to address Pinkie.

“Pinkie, come here please.” Twilight looked around, determining which one of her machines to use. She decided on the one at the center of the room, a strange contraption connected to a large helmet by multicolored wires. “I’ll get you hooked up to the machine while Nurse Redheart explains the procedure to you and your father.”

There was a pause. “Um, Twilight? I think you better explain this to them. I’m not entirely sure of what is going on,” the nurse said.

“Alright then,” said Twilight. She magically lowered the helmet onto Pinkie’s head and clamped her forelegs into the metal restraints. “This machine is a magioencephalogram, or MEG for short. The lines it draws indicate different types of magical activity occurring in the brain. Once the lines are recorded, we can go over them by hoof and classify them into different bands based on their frequency and other characteristics. This will also show us any anomalies that could indicate what is wrong with your daughter, Mr. Pie. We’ll just turn it on and wait for it to gather sufficient data for analysis. It shouldn’t take much longer than an hour… probably,” Twilight explained as she opened the valve on the side. Immediately, the machine began emitting steam and recording data. Only then did Twilight turn around to see the confused expression on Clyde’s face.

“Excuse me, Miss Twilight, but do you think you could explain that in a laypony’s terms?” Clyde asked.

“Oh, sorry. All that means is that this machine should be able to help us figure out what’s wrong with your daughter by giving us information about how her brain works.”

Twilight gave some last instructions to Pinkie before trotting over to wait with Clyde and Nurse Redheart. “Pinkie, I want you to let your mind wander. We’re trying to figure out how your brain works, and there’s no better way to do that than to just let it do its thing. Just daydream about whatever comes to mind.”

Clyde, Nurse Redheart, and Twilight sat in relative silence as the testing wore on. Every once in a while Clyde or the nurse would ask Twilight a question to which she would often give a highly technical and incomprehensible answer. Pinkie looked around the room at all the different scientific instruments. She glanced over at her father; he looked worried.

Every minute was an hour to Clyde, the test just went on and on. He couldn’t tell any differences between the lines the machine was making now and the ones it made at the start of the test. Come on Clyde, get a hold of yourself. These ponies obviously know what they are doing, Clyde thought. But this is taking forever, what else could they possibly learn from letting the machine run longer? Clyde put on his best polite smile before asking Twilight a question. “Miss Sparkle, is there any way we could possibly hurry this test along? It doesn’t seem to be doing much more than wasting paper at this point.”

“There's nothing we can really do but wait for the test to finish.”

“What do you mean there’s nothing you can do?” Clyde responded calmly.


“What do you mean there’s nothing you can do!?” Clyde practically screamed at the nurse.

The nurse backed away and lowered her head slightly. “I’m sorry Mr. Pie...” she started to respond before Clyde raised his hoof, indicating for her to stop.

“No. Don’t tell me you’re sorry. Just, just... get out, please. I want to be left alone.”

“Of course, Mr. Pie.” The nurse left quickly, not wanting to be the recipient of any more shouting.

Clyde sighed and slumped down against the wall. He looked up at the bed from his position on the floor. There lay little Pinkamina, resting peacefully. She didn’t care about the turmoil going on in Clyde’s mind. If the doctors were right, she wouldn’t care about anything ever again.

Clyde had finally been ordered by his wife to bring Pinkamina to the hospital after she started talking to herself. He had filled the doctors in on what had happened. She came down with a fever that wouldn’t let up, she stopped eating, she stopped responding to anything. All she would do was look up at the sky and mumble to herself about friends and rainbows.

Clyde stood up and walked over to Pinkamina. She really did look peaceful. Her chest rose and fell slowly. A faint smile was on her lips. His mind began to wander. He imagined her waking up and staring at him with those big blue eyes and then asking, “Papa, where are we?” Then he would respond saying that they were going home and everything was going to be alright.

He reached out a hoof and gently nudged his daughter awake, hoping that his fantasy would come true. She opened her eyes and stared at him, but there was something missing. Her eyes were dull; there was no spark of life behind them. Slowly, they wandered away from his and looked toward the window.

Clyde felt something deep down. He felt the heartrending pain of loss; there was no getting his daughter back. His mind began to wander once again, this time to places of sadness rather than comfort. He would never see her truly smile again. He would never hear her laugh. It was doubtful that she would ever speak to him again for the rest of his days. Not all the modern medicine and magic in Equestria could bring his daughter back to him. Clyde’s legs gave out. He collapsed to the ground and wept. His daughter was as good as dead.


“Pinkie Pie? Hello, Pinkamina Diane Pie. Can you hear me?” Nurse Redheart was standing in front of Pinkie, waving a hoof in front of her face.

Twilight was shouting ecstatically from not far away, “This is unprecedented! An earth pony with latent magical potentiality this well-pronounced. I would trade my horn to see what’s going on inside of her head right now.”

“Too late, Miss Sparkle. She’s back,” Nurse Redheart informed Twilight of their patient’s condition.

Twilight ran over to Nurse Redheart and Pinkie, nearly bucking the nurse out of the way in the process. “Pinkie, can you tell me what just happened?”

Pinkie blinked several times and looked around the room. Finally, she responded, “What do you mean? You and my dad were talking, and then you just started shouting.”

“And can you recall anything in between?” Twilight asked.

“I... There was a hospital bed, and yelling, and somepony crying. I don’t know, it’s all fuzzy. Can I go lie down for a sec?”

“Sure, why don’t we all head upstairs?” Twilight said as she released Pinkie from the machine. Twilight grinning from ear to ear.

“What are you so smiley about, Twilight?” Pinkie asked as she started upstairs.

“I don’t know Pinkie Pie,” Twilight said as she levitated the bin containing the results of Pinkie’s test, “you’re just a very interesting pony.”