//------------------------------// // 78 // Story: Twilights Mane Passion // by Darkonshadows //------------------------------// “How are you feeling Tress?” Twilight was immediately interested in her friend’s state of mind as she walked into the kitchen. “Morose, ugh last night was hard on me. Thanks for helping me calm down Twilight.” Tress rolled her head and a few cricks could be heard snapping as she stretched out her hooves. “Yeah, about that… my spell only had about a fourth the normal effect on you. It was actually like my spell was mostly just a placebo.” The super powered mare just stared at her and Twilight didn’t have the heart to finish saying what was on her mind, but she would anyway. Friends don’t keep friends in the dark when they truly needed to know something. “My spell was supposed to loosen the tension of your hair, what actually happened was that I loosened up your emotions. The only reason why the spell had any effect at all is that you believed it would and therefore it did.” “Loosened my emotions how exactly?” Tress seemed to take the news very well; even Barb and Zecora were taking an interest in this conversation. Looking at Zecora her hair was restyled to how it was before. “Well you’re hair has a mental connection to you that seems to be the cause of your psychosomatic problem last night.” Twilight knew she would always be drawn back to mentally recounting these things, because she’d likely never forget how she got her first friend. “Frankly you were panicking badly last night and you’re hair was reacting to the panic in quite an equally spectacular manner.” “So of this fact we should always be wary, our friend in full Mane-iac form has a partially mood controlled mane that makes things hairy.” Zecora was kind of amused by this; she could only begin to guess the problems Tress had surrounding her abilities. Twilight would know more about it then she would. “Twilight was targeting your hair to loosen your tension, instead it hit your emotions as she did just mention.” “Well that’s nothing new to you Tress; it’s just going to take you a while to get used to fully being Mane-iac again. Am I right?” Barb could be pretty insightful when she wanted to be. “Have you ever tried riding a bicycle, after having broken all your legs on it before? Even if I can transform I might be currently averse to doing so.” Tress looked to Barb, Twilight and Zecora with a stern gaze. “Especially in a small room like this, with three friends I wouldn’t be able to handle the guilt of hurting.” “It’s okay Tress; you’re doing pretty well in the control department so far. At least I hope you’re as equally forgiving of me for manipulating your emotions by accident.” Twilight really didn’t like the sound of anything that could be closely related to mind control. If you controlled another pony’s emotions it didn’t necessarily control that pony entirely. Forcing a pony to feel angry? They could have that tranquil fury directed at you unknowingly. Forcing them to feel calm would end in the same way; it depends on how the pony determines the use of said forced emotion. “That’s the very reason I went off on Cadence for and here I am doing the same thing.” “No you’re not, that magic lasted all of a split second. It had no real staying power and it did what it set out to do. I completely forgive you for stopping me from killing anything and just in general getting horribly violent with everything around me.” After a moment of Tress mentioning that, the two ponies, zebra and dragon sitting at the table just started laughing a bit. After hearing a grumbling sound, Tress acquired a sheepish blush on her face. “So… I guess it’s my turn to make breakfast then? I’m thinking egg drop soup today or as it should be known egg flower soup.” Ten minutes later, a vegetable broth was made with whisked eggs and some rice for extra texture. Tress had made some really good soup that they all enjoyed equally, even if it required a bit of watering down for her friends because the flavor was a bit strong. Tress liked the heavy flavor personally, it had quite a zing to it with a little soy sauce mixed in. “This is another reason I want you to forgive me Tress, without you around I’d only have Barb to rely on to cook everything.” It wasn’t that Twilight hated her daughters cooking; it’s just that she doesn’t innovate half as well as Tress does. Not to mention Tress adds a definite bit of variety to the mix with some foreign cooking every now and then. “Ah, this recipe on my own I may have to try, maybe some eggs from Fluttershy I could buy?” It was definitely a thought; Zecora never tried making her own foreign delights for her friends and this soup recipe looked pretty easy to make. “You know that sounds like a great idea Zecora, we should have a foreign food festival where we can all try new things!” Everyone slowly turned towards Pinkie and glared at her suddenly appearing amongst them still wearing her frog costume. To be honest Pinkie still didn’t know how to remove it. “What? Is now not a good time? Hold on, let me check the script, I’ll be back in a minute to see what I missed.” “How does she keep getting into the house when every available entrance is blocked off? I even made sure she couldn’t even get in through the toilets. I swear she’s an earth pony with unicorn abilities aside from her Pinkie Sense super power, she has got to be teleporting when we’re not looking.” This just rankled Twilight, even if she was the one sitting here assuming there was at least one abnormal pony in all of Ponyville that would ever bother with the front door. Zecora didn’t count as she didn’t technically have a true residence in Ponyville. “Getting into your home should be especially hard without permission; it is clearly improbable with the enchantments you put on as an addition.” Zecora knew a thing or two about enchantments and that there were more ways to perform magic then with just a horn on your noggin. “Pinkie Pie is a companion of yours, causing you headaches is something of which she obviously never bores.” “Pinkie, that’s right!” Pinkie hopped in while striking a silly pose in her frog suit. Tress lifted a hoof and slugged Pinkie across the head and in a puff of smoke her Nightmare Night costume disappeared. “Wahoo freedom from the frog oppression suit! Thank you Tress and the word thingy that told me exactly what to say to annoy you hard enough to get hoofed so hard to the point that I…” Pinkie fell to the floor out cold after her eyes rolled up into her head and Tress had a somewhat sickening satisfied smile on her face. They may have been friends, but Pinkie was getting so annoying that even Zecora was asking Tress to cold cock Pinkie with her eyes. The zebra nodded solemnly at the out cold crazy pony on the floor. “Is it always the violent option with you Tress?” Deadpanned Twilight, she looked down at the knocked out Pinkie and wondered what they should do with her. Eh, they’d take her back to Sugar Cube Corner later, the Cakes could actually use some private time without a Pinkie Pie interruption. “Well duh, I’m not exactly the brains behind the Trouble Takers even if I can match you in intellect at times.” Thinking about it Tress figured she was pretty much even with Twilight mentally in most scenarios. “In any case, are you saying you wanted her to continue for another minute? You hate raising your voice and Pinkie wasn’t obviously going to stop until you got to that really shrill pitched yell. It’s usually the third one you do when you get really mad in the most adorable manner. All of that may or may not involve a face hoof in the interim and I was saving you the pain of having to slap yourself.” “Okay, so you have a good point there Tress. Pinkie is annoying and I was in fact on the way to another face hoof. I will not deny that the method used to quiet her was effective and at least it didn’t seem to leave a bruise.” Twilight decided to compromise so they could move on with their lives. Pinkie was an earth pony, so Twilight thought she should be able to take a punch just like any earth pony would. “Can we go for a walk this day; I wish to celebrate the time before winter comes this way.” It made Zecora happy that they could go for a walk to see the leaves after they’ve finished eating the rather delectable soup. Walking through the woods, things were peaceful as they passed by the spot Tress had trashed. The mare in question looked away from the damage feeling exceptionally shy about the minor devastation she caused. They just took to walking the trail around Ponyville; they breathed the fresh air and felt the grass beneath their hooves as they wandered. “Those Cakes certainly know how to make a food buffet and it tasted great. Funnily enough I thought Pinkie would ruin them getting together again like she always does.” Chrysalis looked to have a distended belly which was a first for her and she was idly talking to her giant monarch butterfly. The butterfly stopped for a moment to flutter a small circle around Twilight’s head before continuing after her owner. “Yeah, I don’t have any business with them today my pet. It’s always fun to see friends enjoying nature as well, when said nature is not mauling me that is.” “Well that never bodes well, you do know what they say about a butterfly that flaps its wings right?” Now that Twilight thought of it, things always happened around Fluttershy to conspire against her every time she tries to fly. The butterflies for a cutie mark were not very subtle in the slightest, especially for a pony that attracted chaos and was a friend like Twilight. “So, countdown from ten and something weird happens because the butterfly took great interest in you on a moment’s notice?” Tress wouldn’t be surprised if something did happen. “Trouble is not always so spry, not that you two don’t seek it like it constantly falls from the sky.” There wasn’t always going to be trouble around just because those two thought there would be and Zecora knew that they weren’t that unlucky. “I guess, I’m going to need some training to get my Mane-iac form back under control.” Tress turned to Twilight with an interesting sparkle appearing in her eyes. “How do you suggest we do that?” “Well we’d have to test the limits of your abilities as they are, then we continue to test them away from every pony in different environments and levels of danger.” In fact, now that it was brought up, Twilight could feel her head filling with idea’s to help Tress out with training and where this training would take place. She was going to be using a lot of barrier spells for it. “I know you can glide and manipulate your hair to grasp, harden and soften. You could even grow out your fur from your hooves and not just you’re mane and tail. You said you could feel all the hair on your body so it makes sense that you’re fur can also grow and retract like the rest of your hair does.” “If you two need some assistance in that, I would be willing to assist both of you at the drop of a hat.” Even if she didn’t do much at all, Zecora could still be a very good advisor to help train Tress in her rather unique abilities. Palatable ran up to Tress and hopped onto her back mewling sweetly. He wanted to aid Tress as well, he had felt horrible that his owner had got into some trouble last night and that he wasn’t there to protect her from it. “So aside from preparing for the return of Nightmare Moon, we’ve got to train your powers even if they are just at minimal capacity for a full transformation.” Twilight did a few mental calculations by waving her hoof in the air. “Also we’d have to keep doing jobs that pay well or else Barb will have to cut back on her snacks and that will undoubtedly make her cranky. If we cut back on her gem snacks we’d have to cut back on things we like too.” “I can live with that, I can train on the job easily enough.” There was a slight ear flick that meant Tress was less then alright if it cut into her personal exquisite shampoo that she stocks up on. If Nightmare Moon so much as upsets Twilight, dark, moody and mooned was going down and hard. All they had to do was survive until Nightmare Moon actually appeared and that was going to be hard enough as it was. “So why do ponies think the Ever Free Forest is unnatural Zecora?” Barb was curious as a lot of Ponyville’s ponies seemed to say that forest was unnatural in the occurrences that went on there and she had finally decided to ask. “The Ever Free is not as unnatural as you modern ponies would think; the fact that ponies are the ones doing unnatural things to their surroundings is what may cause you to blink.” When it came to the Ever Free Forest, Zecora knew better about it. Ponies were always manipulating nature when in the past they never did so as much. It only seemed so unnatural now since they’ve been altering nature to their whims for so long. Wild magic was the only reason why it stayed the way it does free of forced conformation.