If there was one thing Rainbow Dash loved besides flying, it was pulling pranks. It wasn’t just the laughter that came from the event, but the setup of the event as well. It was how she proved to herself she wasn't just some dumb jock without everypony thinking she was some kind of egghead. If too much shock or damage was done, then a prank would come off as mean spirited or even bullying; and Rainbow Dash abhorred bullies as the most un-awsome creatures in the world.
The fact that she had just found out that Pinkie Pie of all ponies was a master at designing such pranks gave Rainbow Dash another input into the planning and helping take the burden off. Plus, the pink pony’s sheer level of innocence practically guaranteed that all of her initial ideas were much less were much less in need of toning down, unlike Dash’s. It helped her to appreciate Pinkie Pie, who had really been more of an annoyance than a friend with the way she was constantly following Rainbow around after the whole Nightmare Moon thing.
Together, they had managed to get Rarity with a few bit of sneezing powder and do a few other things to some other residents of Ponyville. Then, Twilight’s turn had come. Rainbow Dash had been waiting for some payback for that insta-preening she got from the unicorn after AJ had catapulted the pegasus onto Twilight’s balcony and she needed to go through the library thanks to all the damaged feathers the rough landing gave her. While she appreciated the help and all the time it saved, the social awkwardness that was Twilight Sparkle should have known nopony messes with the feathers of a pegasus without express permission.
So, Dash had planned to set up the ultimate embarrassment prank where only Twilight, Pinkie, and Dash herself would be witness to. However, the two ponies found themselves a little put off by the fact that Twilight had locked herself behind her basement door for the fourth time this week to only leave a sign out to greet them.
DANGER!
Magical Lab
Nopony Allowed In Without Strict Supervision!
THIS MEANS YOU PINKAMENA DIANE PIE!!!!
“Okay,” Dash mumbled as she read the sign on the door. “Now I got to know what’s in there!”
Before she could even reach for the knob, a pink hoof came out to stop her. “Dashie wait!”
A little annoyed at the roadblock, Rainbow Dash looked over to its owner. “Oh come on Pinkie, I’m a pegasus, we’ve all got super vision.” They needed the better than average senses to fly and spot things from miles away after all.
“I dunno Dashie, nopony ever uses my real name unless they’re super serious about something,” Pinkie told her. “We might just want to leave Twilight alone till later.”
Rainbow Dash rolled her eyes. “Pink-wait, your real name is Pinkamena?”
Before Pinkie could answer, there was an audible click, and the door opened to reveal Twilight standing at the other end of the door. What caught Dash’s attention though, was the room behind it.
Although she couldn’t see everything, what she could make out was enough. There was the usual mad scientist chemistry set and a weird floating round-ish block…thingy right above the table the chemistry set rested on, as well as a trio of chalkboards with more numbers and symbols written on them than Dash had thought existed before she laid eyes on them. However, the real scary stuff was written on the walls. It didn’t matter what it was, equations, some letters, a bunch of odd logic circles and other symbols…along with rather good depiction of Dash’s cutie mark minus the cloud; it was the fact that it was writing on the walls!
“Hey girls what’s-” Twilight cut herself off and raised an eyebrow. “Wait, it’s the two of you...together, alone at the front of the library. Ohmygosh, I’ve been pranked!”
The excitement on her face made Rainbow Dash share a look of worry with Pinkie. Their eyes met as if to ask the other ‘did somepony give us away?’.
“Is it disappearing ink?” Twilight asked with glee, causing Dash to hide the gag jar underneath her feathers all that harder. “Whoopie cushions? Covered everything in sneezing powder so when Spike dusts, his fire sends a huge pile of books to bury Princess Celestia? Did you put all the book’s dust covers on upside down again? I don’t mind that, but could you girls mind not swapping them? It’s a pain to have to fix it after somepony does that.”
Pinkie’s eyes widened. “Wow Twilight, that’s a cool idea. Somepony would open a book to read it and be all Gar Bul Error Shmulze cause things are upside down. Hey, you should totally come pranking with us!”
While Rainbow did think the book idea had much merit, Twilight seemed to know a few things about pulling a few fast ones, even if her ideas were pretty old school. Of course, it also helped the mare could teleport and actually make stuff appear out of thin air like no unicorn Rainbow had ever seen before. The stuff the three of them could do together…even a pony as awesome as Rainbow Dash couldn’t imagine it all. “That…actually sounds like a cool idea Pinkie.”
Twilight raised an eyebrow in excited disbelief. “Wait a second, you want me to come with you? The two of you, when you’re pranking other ponies?”
“Uh yeah, you need some fresh air and fun,” Pinkie told her before looking over Twilight’s shoulder at the lab with all the mathematical equations lining the walls. “Even I think this is crazy.”
Rainbow Dash blinked in confusion at Twilight’s reaction. She just stood there for a moment, muttering to herself so softly Dash could only hear a couple of words while straining her ears. “…changes…can I?…Should I?…form better bonds faster…but less time to work…”
“So, is that a no? Or…” Rainbow Dash drawled out.
“No! Oh my gosh! I’m actually going to be pulling pranks with the two of you!” she said while trotting in place. “I always wanted to know what that was like! Just give me two minutes to finish up with this week’s batch of sleep potion, and we can go have some fun!”
Chapter 2: Abracadabra
Spike stood in Twilight’s lab as she continued to jot down her mathematical gibberish on a chalkboard. Nearly bored out of his mind, the dragon looked at the floating dodecahedron and tapped the giant D12 a few times to make it spin. “So uh…what’s this thing do again?”
“It’s a model for a spell that creates an inversely focused harmonic field that can perpetually renew itself by drawing on the magic of harmony in the surrounding area,” Twilight explained without looking away from her work before she went back to mumbling to herself. “Okay so that’s Loyalty, Generosity, Joy, Kindness should be easy enough…ugh, it always comes back to Honesty!”
As soon as Twilight turned away from the board and looked at the clock, she let out a gasp and rushed over to the dragon. “Spike, we’re ten minutes late! Why didn’t you tell me?”
The dragon waved his mother’s face out of his personal space, and shrugged. “Eh, it’s not really that big a deal Twilight. Besides, what you were doing looked important.”
“There is nothing more important than spending time with family Spike,” Twilight scolded him before she picked the dragon up and set him on her back with her magic. “Blood or otherwise. Now, we’ve got two hours, where do you want to go?”
As Spike gave the question a good think, he saw Twilight prepare to activate the dozen or so wards that the room had been surrounded in, most of which were apparently of her own design from what she told him. Although, the Pinkie Pie ward she came up with a few days ago seemed a bit much.
“Still don’t see why you made a whole new spell to keep out one pony,” he mumbled, voicing his doubts.
The shrug Twilight gave made the dragon hold onto the pony tighter, which seemed to put a smile on her face. “Well I’m not even sure that would do it. It’s why I made her give a Pinkie Promise.”
“A what?”
“You know, that silly rhyme you heard her say a few days ago?” Twilight reminded him.
Spike shook his head at the memory. “Still not sure where she got that cupcake, it almost looked like she pulled it out of her…” He paused for a moment when the purple pony gave the dragon a warning frown. “…tail.”
“Yeah, it’s best not to think about it,” the mare said as she looked at the ground and shook her head at the same memory.
With that, the dragon decided to end the conversation and his mind wandered on what they could spend today’s ‘Spike and Twilight Time’ on. In the five weeks they had spent in Ponyville, Twilight had taken the dragon to see the sights, meet the ponies, and eat at all the restaurants.
In all truth, there wasn’t all that much to do in Ponyville. They had run out of new stuff as of last week, and aside from the odd stunt show by Rainbow Dash or weekly party from Pinkie, Spike was starting to dread he’d be spending the rest of his life waiting for a holiday to come around just to liven the place up.
Twilight seemed to pick up on his somber mood. “Something wrong Spike?”
“I dunno, just bored I guess,” he admitted. “There isn’t really all that much to do here in Ponyville.”
A second after the words were out of his mouth, Spike instantly regretted them because Twilight put on her thinking face. As much as he loved the mare, the way her face scrunched up and combined with her frown just made Spike think she looked a little creepy. “I suppose the reduction in assistant responsibilities has caused an excess of free time, or did he always feel this way and I just never noticed before?” she mumbled to herself.
“Twilight?”
“Friends!” she suddenly exclaimed as her head reared up and Spike found himself tumbling off the little purple pony. Before he could recover, she was in his face with a smile plastered on her face. “That’s what you need to do Spike, make some friends!”
The dragon could only blink in confusion as TWILIGHT SPARKLE of all ponies had just said that. Just a few weeks had seen a massive change in her personality, and Spike had yet to see a single self-help book. It was kind of creepy. “But, we have friends,” he said after a moment’s pause.
Twilight pulled herself back up to her full height and nodded slowly before looking back down at the dragon and explaining things to him in a softer tone what what he was used to. “But those are our friends Spike, and as wonderful as they are, they aren’t the only ponies in Ponyville. I’m also trying to make friends with ponies like that teacher Cheerilee who asked us to give a lesson on dragons last week, our mailmare, the Doctor…”
“Dr Who?” Spike asked. Twilight’s argument didn’t seem very sound if she didn’t even know the pony’s name.
“Well he’s still Time Turner right now,” Twilight told him before she looked up into the air a bit and her tone altered to the one she always used when she was thinking out loud. “I’m not sure when he changed really. Would be nice to talk to him about all this timey wimey-ugh!" She shook her head and looked back to Spike."The point is, you should also try and make some friends around town on your own, explore some of your own interests.”
The suggestion made Spike roll his eyes. It was pretty obvious that the unicorn wasn't aware of he dragon's particular predicament since they had moved to Ponyville.
Most of the ponies in town tended to think he was the equivalent of Twilight’s pet, or took the baby dragon comment Twilight made when explaining his origins a little too literal. Spike may have been a baby dragon, but he was still older than the fillies and colts who went to the local schoolhouse. It hadn’t been a problem back when Twilight lived at the castle. All the guards had been around to watch Spike grow up so they knew how old he really was, but now that they were in a new place everypony took one look at the dragon and put him in the same age bracket as Applejack’s younger sister.
As Twilight let him climb onto her back again, Spike found himself wondering what it would be like if he did look his age…or matured at the rate of a pony anyway. Heh, Twilight would probably be the one riding around on my back, he told himself as he pictured himself twice as large as his caretaker, strolling through town as all the little ponies gazed up at him in awe. Rarity would swoon, and then he’d take her into his powerful arms and take her off to...uh…well…do something!
“Coming through!” Spike heard a pony shout before he saw a pair of colts rush by in a hurry. Snips and his friend Snails had been two of the foals Spike had met at the school one day when Twilight introduced him to everypony. Although it seemed the colts and fillies liked it when Spike told them the story of his life, most of them were asleep by the end of the day thanks to a rather dry lecture given by Twilight about dragons in general. Spike had managed to get through it because it was the first time he had ever heard Twilight talk about his species, but they had been the first victims of her teaching methods that only the most caffeinated of ponies could survive.
“Hmm, I wonder what those two are so excited about, want to go check it out Spike?” Twilight asked with that gentle smile she had seemed to develop since coming to Ponyville. For some reason he couldn’t quite figure out, Spike thought it looked a little out of place on the unicorn. It made her seem more…(ugh)…motherly.
Spike thought it over for a few moments. Thanks to his Rarity daydream, he really hadn’t considered what he and Twilight should be doing during their ‘us’ time, and it was still just a little early for lunch. “Might as well,” he said after a few minutes. It beat doing nothing, even if there was going to be a letdown afterwards when it turned out to be just some lame distraction from the smalltown drudgery.
“COME ONE, COME ALL! COME AND WITNESS THE AMAZING MAGIC OF THE GREAT AND POWERFUL TRIXIE!”
Twilight frowned at the announcement, then raised a hoof to tap her chin. “Hmmm…why does that sound familiar?”
“Watch in awe as the Great and Powerful Trixie performs the most spectacular feats of magic ever witnessed by pony eyes!”
Rainbow Dash raised an eyebrow at the display in front of her as the showmare made her declaration with a second showing of fireworks like when she had made her introduction before the teleport. All in all, Rainbow thought that she should have stopped it with the appearing on stage since that was the harder trick. Any good showmare knew to end things on a high note.
The examination of this Trixie’s introduction made the pegasus roll her eyes. A few weeks ago when she and Pinkie had dragged Twilight out of her crazy room and gone pranking, the unicorn had explained the extent of her magic so they could work it into their plans. Teleportation was pretty high level stuff, while things like magical eruptions of light and sound was at the easier end of the spectrum; conjuration fell somewhere in the middle, depending on what the unicorn wanted to create.
Rainbow Dash was just surprised she actually managed to remember some of that stuff. But then again, it was all in the name of harmless pranking; and the pegasus lived for performing tricks, so Rainbow guessed it wasn't that odd. Having Twilight around so increased her options while that Failsafe spell she talked about also let the three of them not have to worry so much about causing damage.
“Ugh, what boasting,” a certain white unicorn said as she stood beside Dash.
“Yeah! No pony has as much magic as Twilight. She-oh! Uh, h-hey Rarity, didn’t quite see you there.”
Rainbow Dash looked over past her fancy friendly acquaintance, and over to the new pair of arrivals. Oh yeah, it’s almost lunch, she told herself when she saw Spike riding on Twilight’s back. The two of them always hung out for an hour or so before they grabbed a bite to eat. Twilight liked to call it ‘being a responsible parent’ even though Dash thought she was a little young to consider herself a mom. Still, it was cool how she was doing her best to look after the little guy.
Plus, it got her out of that freaky lab, which was definitely a good thing.
“Correct me if I’m wrong here girls,” Twilight spoke up. “But isn’t that what a showmare is supposed to do?”
Applejack took that opportunity to chime in with her opinion. “Well she ain’t got to be all high and mighty about it! Just cause she can do a few tricks don’t make her better than the rest of us!”
The declaration brought a look of shock and nervousness to Twilight’s face. “Applejack, this isn’t about what happened on your farm a few weeks ago, is it?” she asked before her whole body seemed to wilt. “Do you…resent me for that?”
“What?” AJ asked with wide eyes before rushing over to assure Twilight everything between them was fine with a hoof on her shoulder. “Course not sugar. I needed to be hogtied after knocking Rainbow around like that.”
Of course, she might have asked for help earlier if I hadn’t shot my mouth off when we were fighting over those Gala tickets, Rainbow reminded herself as she thought back to that day a few weeks ago. After crashing into Twilight‘s tree, the purple unicorn had come running out of her lab to see what was wrong, then dragged Rainbow Dash to Applejack’s farm after Dash explained everything…
“Dagnabbit Twilight! Put me down, ya hear?” Applejack shouted as she floated in midair, surrounded by a purple haze.
“LOOK AT YOURSELF!” The irate unicorn shouted, her eyes on the verge of tears. A second later, a mirror just appeared in a puff of smoke, and Applejack floated over to her reflection. “I understand you have your pride, and pride can be a good thing. Pride in your work, your abilities, your farm, it motivate you to keep everything in tip top shape. But too much pride is foolishness! AND WHEN YOUR PRIDE STARTS MAKING YOU HURT YOURSELF OR OTHER PONIES THROUGH CARELESSNESS, THAT’S WHERE I DRAW THE LINE!”
She pointed a hoof at the pegasus that Twilight had practically dragged to the farm. “Rainbow Dash crashed into my house and ruined over two dozen of her feathers thanks to that catapult stunt! What if she had broken a wing or something?”
Applejack looked at the other mare for a moment, then her gaze flickered to Rainbow Dash. “Yeah well…look…it’s just…I don’t want everypony to think all I want my friends to do is help me on the farm. Ya’ll ain’t a bunch of work horses after all,” she mumbled.
“What?” Rainbow Dash exclaimed. “AJ, Where in the hay did you get a stupid idea…oh, me…right,” Rainbow Dash said as she rubbed the back of her neck and averted her gaze from the farm pony.
“Just let her have her five minutes girls,” Twilight told them as she waved her hoof at them. “It’s not like this stuff is all that memorable anyway.”
“EXCUSE ME?”
The four Elements and one dragon turned their attention back to the showmare at her shout, and Dash found the blue unicorn glaring at the little group.
“Who are you to doubt the magic of the Great and Powerful Trixie? Do you wish to try and challenge the magical ability of the Great and Powerful Trixie?”
The annoyingly repetitive Trixie is more like it, Dash thought.
Twilight just shrugged at the invitation. “No thanks, ponies came here to see you do magic. Not me.”
“HA!” the other unicorn shouted as she reared in victory. “Clearly even an inbred country bumpkin like yourself can see Trixie’s superiority!”
“Y-You can’t talk that way about Twilight!” Spike told her as he pointed one of his claws at the unicorn.
“OKAY THAT’S IT!” Applejack shouted as she got in front of Twilight and the dragon, letting multiple snorts of air through her nose like a bull that had seen too much red, the cowpony glared at the magician. “Ah ain’t gonna just stand here and listen to another heap of this hogwallop!”
Twilight groaned and moved up to whisper into AJ’s ear. “Applejack, remember that pride thing we talked about earlier?”
Instead of becoming cowed, the farmer pony turned her head to face Twilight. “Yeah, and one of the things I take pride in is standing up for my friends when they’re getting bullied!”
Not one to be outdone, and Trixie being identified as one of the banes of her own existence, Rainbow Dash flew up next to the orange pony and shot the unicorn a challenging glare. “Same here!”
“Very well then, the Great and Powerful Trixie challenges all comers. Anything you can do, Trixie can do better!” she said before another set of magical fireworks exploded.
“Twilight, pleeeeeeeeheheheeeeeze just shut her up,” Spike begged.
For the first time since the whole mess began, Rainbow Dash saw Twilight’s calm break as she looked down at the pleading dragon with uncertainty. “Spike, it wouldn’t be fair. I… just let Trixie do her act, and we’ll go get lunch. Anything you want, I promise.”
“Fine, I’ll take the hayseed first,” the unicorn announced.
What followed was almost too painful to watch. Applejack did some of her trick roping using her tail and a lasso. When it came to be Trixie’s turn, she used her horn to make the rope move like a snake on one end to distract AJ while the other grabbed an apple. Then the magiced rope struck AJ’s legs before tying her up and shoving an apple in the earth pony’s mouth. The crowd laughed for a few moments, and then Applejack’s rope glowed with a purple aura before it was undone. Applejack left the stage in a sour mood.
“Once again, The Great and Powerful Trixie prevails,” the unicorn said as she struck her win pose with an extended hoof and a superior smirk while the crowd cheered.
Before Rainbow could dash up and challenge the jerk, the image of Twilight sitting on her haunches and knocking her hooves together stopped her. “Oh that was so amazing how you used basic telekinesis,” she said sarcastically.
A second later, Twilight turned to look at three of the unicorns standing behind her. “Lyra, Colgate, Sparkler,” she said with a frown. “You three could do the same thing, right?”
“Well…yeah,” Lyra admitted before adding, “not that I ever would!”
“True,” Colgate admitted.
Amethyst Star stared at the purple unicorn with an open mouth before she managed to close it a few seconds later. “WHAT? H-How do you know my real name-umph!”
“Um…we’ll talk later,” Twilight promised before removing her hoof from the mouth of the wide-eyed unicorn and turning back to the showmare. “You have proven to have the equivalent magical prowess of a seven-year-old filly. Congratulations.”
The sheer level of burn Twilight dished out with her comment had the showmare grinding her teeth. To add insult to injury, Rainbow Dash flew above the crowd and led them in an “Ooooooooooo!”
Trixie glared at Rainbow Dash for a few seconds, her horn glowed and the zany fireworks launchers began to respond again. “Oh please, a true master of magic does not use a hammer when a flyswatter will do,” she said. “But if you wish for a display of Trixie’s true magic prowess, BEHOLD! The tale of how Trixie vanquished the dreaded URSA MAJOR!”
As several fireworks went off behind her, the showmare started a story about how she had saved some town on the other side of the Everfree Forest from an attack by a celestial creature. But Dash lost all interest in the show when she saw Twilight standing there with her mouth hanging open. The sight made Rainbow Dash drop to the ground and tap the purple unicorn on the shoulder. “Uh Twilight, it isn’t all that impressive.”
“Come on Twilight, it’s just a bunch of inflated stories,” Spike told the mare.
Twilight didn’t even seem to hear them, and it was only thanks to the fact a pegasus’s ears were made to hear sound in harsh winds that she could even pick up a few words Twilight was muttering. “Now I remember you.”
Since it seemed the purple unicorn was out of it with one of her self-discussions, Rainbow took the opportunity to get in Trixie’s face. “So your saying your act stinks so bad it makes even monsters run for shelter.”
“How dare you!” the unicorn shrieked.
“Now if you want a light-show, I’ll give you a light-show,” Rainbow Dash told everypony before she flew off and began her newest routine. A few loops around a windmill for extra speed and three white clouds worth of rain later, and Rainbow was standing at her end of the stage with a transparent rainbow shimmering over her head while the crowd cheered. “They don’t call me Rainbow and Dash for nothing!”
“Oh when I’m done with you, the only thing they’ll be calling you is Rainbow Loser,” Trixie mumbled barely loud enough for Dash to hear before she felt an odd and intrusive tingling sensation on her skin.
A second later, the tingling stopped, and the world had taken on a familiar purple hue. Rainbow didn’t even need to look at Twilight to tell her the unicorn was the cause of it.
“W-What the? That’s a full spectrum defensive shield!” Trixie exclaimed.
“Did you honestly think I was going to let you sucker punch one of my friends again?” Twilight asked between gritted teeth. “That was what you were going to do, right?”
A second later, the shield surrounding Dash disappeared, and the world seemed to lurch before going all white. The next thing Rainbow Dash knew, she was standing behind Twilight and trying to keep her footing. Okay yeah, teleporting is not fun, the pegasus thought, glad she didn’t have any lunch to lose at the moment.
“Humph! Well…Trixie doesn’t have to answer such-”
“You said anything we can do, you can do better,” Twilight interrupted with a frown. “Applejack’s roping skills were purely physical, and she jumped through her own lasso several times without tripping up. You couldn’t even emulate her act properly. But I’d really like to see you try and craft weather that’s better than such a beautiful rainbow.”
Rainbow Dash leaned in closer to whisper into Twilight’s ear. “Go with cool Twi, it sounds better.”
For a moment, Trixie just stood there fuming. She looked over to the rainbow Dash had left on stage, then her horn started to glow. A trashcan appeared and the rainbow was surrounded by the pink color of Trixie’s magic. Her telekinesis spell simply crumpled the object up and threw it away. “Oh please, as if the Great and Powerful Trixie would stoop to using her awesome talents for such a boorish thing as weather work. It would be an insult to all unicorn-kind.”
This time, Rainbow noticed the reactions of the crowd were mixed. All of the pegasi in attendance fell somewhere between angry grumbles and scowls, while a few earth ponies had a snicker or two, and not even half the unicorns supported the showmare.
“So that’s it,” Twilight mumbled to herself before disappearing in a flash of light. She reappeared on stage, causing another disgruntled groan from Trixie. “You know Trixie, I never really understood you…and ponies like you before today.”
Then, strangely enough, she turned to look at her assembled friends with sadness in her eyes. “And I have to say, that misunderstanding caused some heartache to the ponies I cared about more than anything.”
“Any idea what she’s talking about?” Rarity asked.
“Nope,” the apple family pony replied.
“Not a clue,” Rainbow added.
Twilight looked back at the showmare and frowned. “There’s two types of entertainers in this world Trixie, the ones like you, and the ones like AJ and Rainbow.”
The statement made Trixie laugh. “Yes, the talented ones, and the fools. I’ll agree with you there.”
“There’s the kind that build ponies up, and the kind that tear them down,” Twilight corrected as she frowned at the other unicorn. “When fillies and colts see Applejack at a rodeo or doing some feat of heroism, or Rainbow doing her stunts and performing a Sonic Rainboom, they may say how amazing those ponies are, but it also gives them hope that one day they can grow up to be just as incredible. Sure, they brag and go on about their accomplishments, but those are the things that give ponies hope for a better future.”
Rainbow’s eyes widened, and she felt as if somepony had just bucked her in the gut. Escaping the legacy of her Sonic Rainboom was one of the reasons she had followed Fluttershy to Ponyville after dropping out of flight school. Well, that and the shy pegasus had needed somepony to look out for her, it was Fluttershy after all. But the fact that Twilight knew about the Rainboom...she didn’t even bother with the how and went straight to the fact that the unicorn had let out Dash’s dark secret.
If anypony in town found out that she couldn't do the Rainboom anymore, Dash’s reputation would be ruined!
“Then there’s ponies like you,” Twilight continued with a scowl darkening her face. “What really makes me sick about ponies like you Trixie, is that you could take your magic act and spread joy, and make ponies believe they can be amazing as well! But all you seem to do is tear other ponies down in order to build yourself up! You’re like a bucking parasite that feeds off the pain she creates!”
Of course, the showmare didn’t take the comparison very well at all. “You compare The Great and Powerful Trixie to some kind of…ugh, bug? Away! Trixie refuses to waste her time with you!”
Twilight scowled right back at her. “What? No demand that I put my bits where my mouth is? But then, you already know you’re outclassed. I can really teleport instead of having to hide behind smoke bombs, and you’ve seen the level of defensive magic in my book of spells. So how about I let you go first?
“No? Okay, how about I do this.”
The purple mare paused for a moment and closed her eyes, a second later she opened them, and they were glowing with a bright light. Rainbow Dash whistled at the cool special effect. She looked beside her to see Rarity’s mouth hanging open…along with the mouth of every other unicorn in the crowd. As for Trixie, the showmare looked like she wanted to crawl under the stage and hide.
“Sweet Celestia, I knew she had power but…no wonder she’s the student of the princess,” Rarity mumbled.
“Anything you conjure, I’ll make something ten times as complicated and a hundred times bigger.” Twilight’s horn lit up and exuded a flash. A second later, a stage twice as big as the one Trixie brought with her appeared out of thin air, dwarfing the traveling showmare’s and covering it in shadow.
“Shoot off your little fireworks, and I’ll show you something that rivals the sun in its brightness and beauty.” Twilight shot a burst of magic into the sky that exploded in the shape of her cutie mark before a rain of tiny stars gently fell down to the ground below.
“Lift up a few pounds with telekinesis, and I’ll turn this entire town into a floating island.” The glow of Twilight’s magic enveloped the entire crowd, and Rainbow Dash found herself rising into the air along with everypony else.
A part of her said to get out now. Rainbow didn’t like being mare-handled, and what Twilight was doing was worse than any time Applejack had ever dragged her by the tail somewhere she didn’t want to go.
But that feeling was soon drowned out by a strange, soothing sensation that told her everything was going to be okay. It wasn’t the invasive tingle that Trixie’s horn had caused, like a million little ants running over Rainbow’s skin. It was more like being wrapped up in a warm blanket on a cold winter’s day, or being in the forelegs of a mother after a bad day of flight camp. It was warm, and kind, and supportive. It was a promise that she would always be there for her friends.
It was the magic of Twilight Sparkle.
“Told you she could lift ponies with her magic Rarity,” Applejack said to the unicorn.
Apparently, the calming effect hadn’t just been for Rainbow Dash, as Rarity was no longer gobsmacked. “Yes well…Darling, you have no idea how impressive this really is.”
“What’cha talkin' about? I saw you haulin' a ton of apples when Twilight talked you into helpin' out on the farm,” the orange pony replied.
“Moving living creatures and moving plants is entirely different,” she explained. “I can lift tons of cloth and dresses, but the biggest living creature I can move without problems is my cat!”
“I’d blink a few ponies around, but conjuration is the limit of your magic, isn’t it?”
On the stage Twilight approached Trixie, who cowered low on the floor and gulped. “I…I just wanted to perform a magic show.”
“No. You wanted to laugh at a bunch of small town ponies who you thought were beneath you, and ruin a few reputations while boosting your own ego,” Twilight said as she got muzzle to muzzle with the other mare. “So the next time you want to put on your little act, I want you to remember what this feels like. I want you to remember when another pony made you look like a complete fool in front of others. Now get out of my town! And if I EVER hear about you doing something like you did to Applejack again, I’ll step on you like the bug you are!”
“Y-Yes Ms Twilight! Th-thank you oh Benevolent and Merciful Twilight! Allow me to pack up my stage, and I shall be gone within the hour!” Trixie assured the purple unicorn as she began running around the wagon-turned-stage before Twilight made her way off it and went back to normal while the conjured stage disappeared in a puff of smoke.
A second after she landed, the crowd erupted into cheers and Twilight blushed at the attention before looking away. The three other Elements in attendance ran up to her, along with one purple dragon.
“That. Was. Awesome!” Rainbow Dash exclaimed.
“Yes quite…effective Darling,” Rarity commented.
“Wow Twilight, I thought you were going to turn her into a pumpkin or something!”
On the stage, Trixie had apparently heard the last comment and gone stiff.
“Spike!” the unicorn exclaimed. “I’m not a monster!”
“Just monstrously powerful,” Applejack told her with a smile before slapping the unicorn on the back, causing Twilight to stumble forward and nearly fall to the ground.
“You guuuuuuuuys cut it out!” the monstrously powerful unicorn whined before her stomach grumbled for food. “Channeling Magic without my focus really takes it out of me.”
AJ let out another laugh and threw a foreleg around Twilight. “Then let’s head over to Sugarcube Corner and get some grub, my treat.”
“Agreed, a victory feast for the triumphant magician,” Rarity agreed.
“Sounds good to me,” Spike said as he jumped onto Twilight’s back.
With the sides of the unicorn becoming occupied with her friends, Rainbow Dash took the pegasus option and joined the entourage by going into the air. “So uh, Twilight, mind if I ask you something?”
“The Sonic Rainboom?” Twilight asked, although with all the cupcake in her mouth it came out much more garbled and full of crumbs.
Rainbow Dash fidgeted in her seat at Sugarcube Corner at the mention of her greatest triumph that she hadn’t been able to match since she was a filly, something that made every other achievement since then just seem hollow. “Yeah…um, how did you know…”
Thankfully, Twilight waited until she swallowed her food, which Pinkie quickly replaced before the pink pony also took her seat. She apparently hadn’t been at the show because there had been a rush for snacks when Trixie announced her magic act, and ponies wanted something to eat while watching it.
Fluttershy had also joined them since she was in the store as well. The mare had said she had seen the fireworks, and come into the store to hide from all the commotion.
“That it was you?” Twilight asked before a soft smile appeared on her face. “The day I took my entrance exam for The School for Gifted Unicorns, there was a bright flash of light and sound that boosted my magic and allowed me to hatch Spike’s egg. After everything was over, I was curious. So I spent a few days researching what had happened. I learned from weather reports there had been a colorful explosion of magic somewhere between Ponyville and Canterlot that left a rainbow contrail all the way from this town to Manehatten on March the 15th. The same day I got my cutie mark!”
For some reason Rainbow couldn’t understand Applejack spit out the milk she was drinking and swerved her head over to moved it between at the pegasus and the unicorn with wide eyes. “Say what?”
And she wasn’t the only one. Rarity had turned her attention to the prismatic pegasus, and Pinkie was actually struck speechless, frozen in movement halfway to her seat. The only one that didn’t seem to be stunned was Fluttershy, she just nodded and mumbled to herself. “So that’s what caused that loud bang.”
“Then I looked into it and found the only other pegasus to do a Sonic Rainboom was Commander Hurricane back before Equestria was even founded. So, it’s become something of a legend since then.” Twilight continued. “I saw an old painting of her in Canterlot Castle, she was a pegasus with a rainbow mane. When I saw you, then found out we were about the same age a few weeks ago…meaning you would have gotten your cutie mark around the same time for being fast…everything just clicked.”
Twilight let out a tiny giggle and she shook her head. “Of course being a filly, I pushed all of that aside a few days later instead of doing what I should have,” she said before pulling Spike closer to her. “I’m not foolish enough to think without that one moment I wouldn’t have found out what my talent was, but…if your Rainboom hadn’t of come at that precise moment, I would never have been able to hatch Spike’s egg, or pass my test. My knowledge of magic, my son, everything that has made my life worthwhile, I owe to you.”
Rainbow Dash found herself squirming uncomfortably in her seat as Twilight began to tear up. Thankfully, the unicorn bowed her head to the pegasus, breaking their eye contact. “And I’m so sorry it’s taken me so long to thank the little filly who gave me everything important in my life. Thank you Rainbow Dash.”
“Um…that’s…” Rainbow tried to think of something to follow in response to Twilight’s story, but just couldn’t come up with anything cool. “Hey, no problem Twilight.”
It came as no surprise that Pinkie was the one to break the stunned silence. “Whoa heavy,” she said before brightening up. “Hey, anypony want to hear how Dashie’s Rainboom got me my cutie mark? It’s got balloons and parties!”
As the ringing in her ears from Pinkie’s shout died, Rainbow Dash heard Twilight mumbling something to herself.
“Create better bonds faster…check.”