//------------------------------// // Guest Tale: Forbidden Fruit by Ponibius // Story: Tales From the Phoenix Empire // by Chengar Qordath //------------------------------// I love working in a lab. There is nothing like being able to sit down and get some real science done. Sure, books are really nice to learn from, but reading about things like chemical reactions or spell applications isn’t the same as doing them yourself. My old teacher Magetrix once said that her laboratory felt like home. Really, she wasn't far off the mark. Sanitary facilities are usually shared, and there's almost never room for a bed, or a cot, or more than a desk—and if you try to bring them in, ponies give you the strangest looks. And I guess storing food doesn't really work either, since experiments would almost always contaminate it—or vice versa. Or both, as I once learned with the peanut butter incident. Okay, okay, so maybe Magetrix wasn’t quite on the mark; maybe ‘home’ is the wrong term. A laboratory is a laboratory, but for ponies like her and me, and now Sunset too, they’re definitely comfort zones. I entered the lab, saddlebags filled with the objects we would need for today’s experiment. The Empress had been kind enough to set aside one of the labs in the Imperialia Schola Ingeniorum Unicornium. Thankfully, the ruler of Equestria had agreed to us being lab partners to help Sunset move the teleportation project along. If this all panned out, then near-instantaneous travel would be possible between the major cities of Equestria. We were on the cusp of what was potentially being the greatest magitech advance of our generation. The lab had everything we really needed. Some open space, a desk, some chalkboards, and potassium chlorate crystals—the basics. What was really special were the two carefully crafted rings of metal set onto the floor. The magic circles were covered in arcane runes Sunset and I had carved into them, in addition to a hoofful of meticulously selected gems. Sunset turned to look at me, turning away from the huge blackboard we had been using to keep our notes. “Hey. Get everything?” “Mhm.” I placed my saddlebags onto the table and pulled out some apples, rocks, gems, and a Smarty Pants doll. “This should at least give us something to test the teleportation circles on.” Sunset gave the items on the table a quick glance over. “Yeah, all of that should work.” Seemingly satisfied with what I had brought, she turned back to the blackboard. There, she picked up an eraser and proceeded to wipe away part of one of my equations. My ear twitched. “Sooo ... what are you doing there?” I couldn’t shake a slight feeling of annoyance over my lab partner doing work on my precisely measured half of the blackboard. “Hm?” She had put the eraser back down and was halfway through redoing one of my equations when she looked at me and stopped upon seeing my unhappy expression. “Er ... you messed up the math. I was fixing it.” I gave her a glower. “You could have waited until I got back before fixing anything.” Sunset was silent for a long moment, probably deliberating on what she would say next. Not surprising when she knew she was doing something she shouldn’t be. “But it was wrong.” I groaned in frustration. “I thought we already went over this! In the event we need to make minor changes to each other's work and don't want to forget it, we mark it down on one of the smaller chalkboards I bought just for that.” I levitated over one of the small chalkboards and waved it in front of her to emphasize my point. “Remember?” Sunset shuffled in place so slightly. A small enough movement as to be easily mistaken for her shifting in place. “I was going to do that once I was done.” I rubbed at my face, not believing we actually had to have this conversation again. “There isn't much point when you alter the original work!” Her ears flattened against her head. “This is another one of those things I need to apologize for, right?” “I'd appreciate it,” I said stiffly. “How would you like it if I changed some of your work without asking you?” It was so frustrating when Sunset did stuff like this. It reminded me of when she had been little more than a bully to me—always demanding, wanting her way, or being dismissive towards me. I had been working with her to break those habits, but we still had a ways to go. The fact I wasn’t an expert on friendship hadn’t exactly helped either. In a lot of ways, I was still stumbling through ... whatever it was that Sunset and I had—just as much as she was. Sunset’s posture turned rigid, and her tone became more defensive. “Well, there aren't any errors on my side of the board, so...” “Oh reeeallly?” I started looking over her side of the blackboard. The complex equations danced before my eyes. “Mind if I have a look?” She stuck up her nose. “Go ahead.” I carefully went over line after line of Sunset’s work. Determining that she hadn’t changed anything since I had last studied it, I moved on to her newer work. It was there I found a problem. “What about this right here?” I pointed at the equation. “That isn't how Glitter Dust's Frank Fragmentation Law works.” Sunset craned her head up to see where I was pointing. At first she didn’t answer, but a moment later, her shoulders sagged. “Right. That needs fixing.” She sighed and murmured something under her breath as she marked that the section of the board would need to be redone. “Right. And how would you have felt if I had fixed it all on my own?” I asked, not ready to let the whole thing go that easily. I really didn’t like her touching my half of the board without asking first. We had rules for a reason. “Right, right.” Her head drooped towards the floor, causing me to feel a twinge of pity. “Sorry, old habits. Old, bad habits.” I sighed. As unhappy as I was with Sunset, I didn’t want to make this a big deal. “It's okay, just don't do that anymore. Alright?” Sunset nodded. “Got it.” “Good, because I don't like getting into arguments.” Drama was never fun in my experience. I could never understand those ponies who seemed to thrive on it. “I don't like arguing with you either.” She hesitated, a pregnant pause building between us. “It's ... it's a lot nicer having a study buddy than a nemesis.” A cautious smile crept onto my lips. “Yeah, really is. Before, I thought group projects were the worst. Now ... well, at least they're nice with you.” “Ugh, don't get me started on group projects.” You would think she was considering eating bugs from the way she said it. “I’m always stuck with three other ponies dumber than me, and at least one of them is too lazy to do their share and just counting on the others to carry him. I usually wind up having to do all the work myself, just to make sure it actually gets done right. You have no idea how nice it is to finally have somepony who can actually make an equal contribution.” “Oh, I've been there before.’ I shuddered, trying not to think about the reticulating telekinesis project. “Trust me. I’m lucky if the whole group even showed up for the day of the presentation, which was a huge pain when part of your grade depended on everypony putting in an equal share of work. It's way different doing it with somepony that actually cares about how the project turns out.” “Yeah, it really is. I'm glad I'm working with you.” An awkward smile worked its way onto her face. “Sorry if sometimes I'm not so great at being a partner.” I returned the smile, feeling every bit as strained as Sunset looked. “Well, we're working through it, right? Just try talking to me more in the future?” That’s what friends did to prevent problems, right? Talked? That sounded like the right thing to do. “Yeah, I will.” She took a hesitant half-step towards me. “Thanks for understanding.” “Hey, what are friends for?” Her closeness made me feel ... something. Reassured? Yet still somewhat uncomfortable, though not in a bad way. Stupid feelings. They were so much harder to figure out than math. “Yeah ... friends.” Sunset shuffled ever closer and half-lifted her forelegs as though to offer a hug, though she seemed unsure about the idea. “So, um...” I mimicked her motions and after getting over my hesitation, embraced her for a quick hug. Just a friendly one, of course. The pat on her back made sure that it was just friendly. We broke the totally platonic hug, and then stood opposite of each other again. A long, awkward silence descended between us. Thankfully, Sunset finally broke it when she said, “I guess we should get back to work, right?” “Um, yes!” I quickly agreed. “We have science to do. Because science doesn't do itself, right?” “Yeah. Science.” She coughed, clearing her throat. “We should definitely go back to doing science, because science is important. And right now we're just standing around, and standing isn't important at all. Well, it is important sometimes, but not right now. Not like science is.” I nodded. “Science is more important than standing around.” And much less awkward than hugging. “So...” Sunset headed back to the board and her invalid equation. “Right...” I started looking over Sunset’s changes to my own notes, hoping they hadn’t been anything too major. Otherwise, I was going to have to reexamine everything to be on the safe side. It was a couple hours later when I noticed that Cadance had entered the lab. “Cadance?” I hadn’t expected her to show up all of a sudden. She was pretty busy getting ready to go to Northmarch to take up her duties there. Cadance gave the two of us a warm smile. “Hello, girls. How's the research going?” My spirits rose when I saw my old foalsitter. It was always really nice when my future sister-in-law came to visit. “It's going great!” I waved at the teleportation circles. “We were about to try our test our models on some samples.” Cadance gave me a nuzzle that I returned. “Sounds interesting. Mind if I watch?” Sunset shrugged. “I don't mind, as long as you don't get in the way or anything,” she said more tersely than I liked to my old foal-sitter. “I'm sure Cadance knows not to cross the magic circle.” I didn’t try to hide the rebuke in my tone. Sunset’s ears drooped, and she looked away from the two of us. “Right, sorry.” She returned to the chalkboard to do some work. I felt a pang of guilt. Sunset really had been getting better with how she talked to ponies, even if sometimes her old nature of being a ... of not being nice came out now and again. When I called her on it, it tended to make her moody. Once again, friendship isn’t easy. I put a hoof on her shoulder. “It’s okay.” Sunset gave me a cautious smile before looking to Cadance with a less certain one. “Oh, don't worry.” Cadance waved her hoof dismissively. “You'll barely even notice I'm here.” “Thanks, Cadance.” I leaned towards her and lowered my voice. “Though seriously, don't break the magic circle. Bad things would happen.” I pointed to the safety equipment station we had set up. “You should also wear eye protection. Just to be safe.” Sunset and I were already wearing a pair each, of course. There were rules where the lab was concerned. “Of course.” Cadance strapped on a pair of safety goggles. “So what is all this, exactly?” I pointed at the circles. “We’re just about to test Sunset’s long range teleportation artifice. It may not have the range Sunset’s projecting, but it’s only a model right now. If this works like we’ve intended, then we can go to the Empress for funds to create a larger and more powerful version.” “I see.” Cadance smiled. “Though isn’t Sunset’s project supposed to allow ponies to teleport to different cities?” She waved at the models. “Those are only a few steps away.” “Well ... yes,” I said lamely. “But we have to make sure they can work over short distances without issue before we try using them to teleport clear across Canterlot. Considering that teleportation accidents can fuse a pony to a solid object or make ponies arrive at their destination in three different pieces, you really want to make sure it’s done right.” Cadance eyed the circles warily. “I can understand why you’re trying something a little less ambitious right now.” “Right.” I turned to Sunset. “What shall we try teleporting first?” “I was thinking the apples.” Sunset picked up one of the apples and placed it in one of the circles, pausing over it. “Actually, come to think of it, I missed lunch.” She took a bite out of the apple. She looked at me, giving me a guilty smile. “Um, if you don’t mind, Twilight? I know you got these apples for the experiment and all...” “It’s fine.” I waved for her to continue eating. “I had a couple myself on the way here. They're from that gnarly old apple tree in the palace gardens. I asked the Empress if we could use some of its apples for this experiment—she said it was okay and even assured me that I didn't need to fill out any forms in triplicate to do it. So, go ahead—I brought plenty.” “Thanks,” Sunset said, taking another bite out of the apple. Cadance grinned and stepped closer to me. “While Sunset's having her snack, do you think I could borrow you for a second?” “Um, that should be fine.” I wondered what she wanted to talk about. She was set to go to Northmarch soon, so maybe there was something she wanted to cover before going. Either that, or she was just trying to work in some future-sister-in-law bonding time, something I wouldn’t mind. Though I didn’t really want to offend Sunset since this was lab time. “Great.” Cadance wrapped a wing around me and pulled me to the side where we would have a bit more privacy. “So...” She gave me a teasing grin. “I was just wondering how things were going with you and Sunset.” “Oh, good.” I shuffled in place, feeling strangely uncomfortable all of a sudden. “We're getting along really well as study partners. Sunset's come a long way opening up and is even letting me help her with her teleportation project, which is a really big deal to her since she’s been working on this for years.” “That's great. And how are you two getting along in ... other areas?” She winked and nudged my shoulder. I wasn’t quite sure I liked the direction this conversation was going. It sounded like a number of conversations I’d been having with my parents lately. “What do you mean? Like physical locations other than the labs or the Imperial Library?” Cadance gave me a knowing smile. “Twilight, you know what I mean. You two went on a date last weekend.” “That? We were just going to the theater!” My voice sounded abnormally squeaky to my ears. “Together. To relax. As research partners. And friends, even.” I quickly glanced in Sunset’s direction. She had turned away from us, probably to give us a bit more privacy. “There isn't anything weird about that.” Her smile turned coy. “And the dinner date after the show?” My eyes looked over to Sunset, who was still facing away from us. “It was late, and we were hungry.” I really didn’t know why Cadance was making such a big deal about this. Ponies could spend all day cooped up with one another in confined spaces, interacting heavily, and do activities afterwards without it being any kind of big deal. Right? “So why pick a nice, fancy, romantic restaurant instead of just stopping at Burger Praetor?” Was Cadance keeping track of where we were going now? It couldn’t have been that interesting to follow us, but the thought was more than a little bit creepy. “Um, well you see, that is ... it was a spontaneous decision. We didn't want cheap food, and there weren’t very many family style restaurants open at that time of night.” Honestly, I forgot exactly why we had chosen the admittedly romantic restaurant, but I’m sure we had good, non-romantic reasons for doing so. Maybe Sunset just liked that type of food. I mean, I had mentally categorized a lot of the foods she did and did not like so that I knew what to get her when I brought lunch to the lab, and had even made her a few lunches over the last couple of months—but that was just for practical purposes. She teasingly prodded me with a wing. “And what about the fact that you've been staring at her rump instead of making eye contact with me?” That comment caused my head to snap back to Cadance and severed communication between my mind and mouth as I sputtered incoherently for several seconds. “I-I am not!” Cadance put a hoof over her mouth as she giggled. “Oh, Twilight...” “I-It's not like that!” I protested. “Her rear just happens to be facing our direction, and I wanted to make sure she was alright and that our conversation hadn’t extended to the point we were holding the experiment up.” She patted my shoulder and smiled encouragingly. “I would really like to see you two get together properly before I have to leave for Northmarch,” she said in a more serious tone than before. “It'll probably be months before I get the caribou settled enough to be able to visit you, and I’m already regretting everything I’m going to miss.” “We're just research partners!” I insisted. Some guilt built up in my chest. More than a little of me wanted Cadance to be happy, but I couldn’t change reality for her. “It isn't romantic or anything like that. Moon and stars, we were fighting each other a few months ago. For years, she was a complete bi—” I stopped myself, remembering that Sunset wasn’t that far away. Why was it so hard to control what I said when I was flustered like this? “I mean she wasn’t as nice then as she is now.” “A lot can change in that much time. I think you’re a good influence on her.” She shook her head wryly, as though she had just thought of a private joke. “Just think about it, alright?” “Okay, I’ll think about it. But I’m not guaranteeing any more than that.” I could give Cadance that much. She was the Alicorn of Love, so I couldn’t really blame her for trying to find and push romantic interests where she could. I had seen her bring ponies together more than once. Though she was pretty great, she was like everypony else in that she wasn’t perfect; she could be prone to wishful thinking, saying that everypony had a special somepony just for them. I was pretty sure there were at least some ponies who had no interest in romance and had never needed to hook up with other ponies to live complete and fulfilling lives. Cutting her some slack seemed like the right thing to do for my old foalsitter. I knew she had the best intentions for the both of us, even if she was reading a bit too hard between the lines here. “Besides, I don't think Sunset would even be interested in something like that.” The mirth in her tone disappeared. “How will you know, unless you ask her?” That was a logical enough question. “Well, even if I was interested in her like that, I don't really want to risk what we already have.” I looked down and scraped my hoof along the floor. “I don't have many friends, you know. It’s kind of hard to risk something that’s in short supply to start with.” I had dedicated most of my life to my studies, to prove that I was worthy of being the Empress’s student, that I was worthy of my family’s legacy. I wanted to be the best I could be, and that meant I didn’t have time for a luxury like friends. The only friends I had for most of my life were in my family, and I pretty much had to interact with them every now and again. “Ah, that old dilemma.” Cadance sighed in exasperation. “Just promise me you'll think about it? That’s all I ask for. I just want you to be happy. You deserve it.” “For you, I will.” I was pretty sure I had given the topic as much thought as I needed, but there didn’t seem much point in outright crushing Cadance’s hopes. She was hardly in the wrong for wanting something nice for me. “Good.” Cadance wrapped me up in a hug which I returned. We held each other for a few moments before breaking the hug. “So, on with the experiment?” I looked over to Sunset—and not at her rear, thank you very much—and saw that she was done eating. Her hoof was tapping in that way I knew meant she was getting tired of waiting, but also trying very hard to be patient about her impatience. If that makes any sense. “I think Sunset is getting tired of waiting. She's been looking forward to this for a couple weeks now.” Cadance glanced at Sunset and nodded. “Alright, I’ll stand over here and let you two get to work.” “Thanks.” I trotted over to Sunset and gave her an apologetic smile. “Sorry about that.” “It's fine,” Sunset said in a tone that told me that it wasn’t 100% fine, but she didn’t want to make a big deal over it—especially now that the experiment was about to begin. She glanced over at Cadance, then back to me, and her expression softened a bit. I’ve always liked it when she looks at me in that gentle, nice way. “Everything alright?” “Yeah, just some personal stuff she wanted to talk about. It's not that long before she's heading out to Northmarch.” The fact that she was going to Northmarch soon and the promise I just made to her caused me to consider something. “So ... if everything goes fine here, want to do something afterwards?” No harm in just hanging out again, right? “Sure, I'd be up for a victory celebration.” Sunset strapped on her own safety goggles. “What'd you have in mind?” “Err.” I shuffled in place, not feeling all that confident about where I was supposed to go with this conversation. I needed to read some more books on socializing. “Maybe something nice? This is a pretty big day if this works.” Sunset’s mouth turned into a teasing smirk. “How specific.” Something about that smirk became more nervous, and a few more awkward seconds hung between us. “But yeah, something nice sounds ... er, nice. We should do that.” I returned with a smile that felt strained around the edges. “Good. We'll do that when we're done, then.” “Cool.” She cleared her throat. It was probably just a trick of the lights, but the orange around her cheeks had turned into a light shade of red. “So, um, ready to get started?” “Sure am.” Sunset had already placed an apple core into one of the circles. Waste not, want not and all that. She was like me in that she liked to be efficient with the resources we had. The two of us took positions at different circles, with Sunset at the one with the apple core. While the circles would get most of their power from the magical leylines that ran through Canterlot, they still needed to have somepony to activate and control them. We hoped we could make them more automatic in the future, but right now we were working on making the ‘teleportation’ part of the teleportation circles work correctly. “Great. So ... here we go.” Sunset channeled magic into the test circle, and its runes started glowing with her power. She examined the circle, and I detected her feeling it out with her magical senses. “All readings normal so far. How are things on the receiving end?” I powered up my circle and began probing with my own magical senses. “Everything looks good. I think we’re ready to proceed.” Sunset smiled, a sense of triumph in her features. I couldn’t help but smile myself. It felt good that we about to make a big step in her research. I really wanted her to succeed, and helping her get to this point was all the more satisfying. “Alright then, let's do this.” Both of us poured magic into the test circles, activating them in order to teleport the apple core to the other circle. Everything seemed to be going well when I felt a sudden lurch like something was trying to pull my heart out of my chest. The circles exploded in a disorientating flash of light. The next thing I knew I was lying on the floor, blinded by the flash. My ears were ringing something awful, and my brain seemed to be doing its best to pound its way right out of my skull. An intense sense of vertigo kept me on the cool floor. The oddest sensation of the bunch was the taste of apple in my mouth. “Twilight?” somepony asked, sounding tinny and distant. “Twilight, are you alright?” I tried to blink away the spots in my vision. “Cadance?” Some part of my brain realized that it must have been Cadance talking. “W-what happened?” I rasped. My voice sounded off, though that might have been due to the ringing in my ears. “I don't know, Sunset,” Cadance said, sounding like she was on the other side of the room. “There was a bright flash, and you and Twilight both fell down.” “What happened?” asked somepony else. She sounded familiar, but she didn’t sound like Sunset. Had somepony else run in when the experiment ... did whatever it did? “All the readings were normal.” Okay, so maybe it wasn’t somepony new. How else would they know that the experiment’s readings were normal? I wished the pounding in my head would stop so that I could think this through, or that the spots would go away. “I don't know what went wrong.” I rubbed at my head and managed the feat of rolling onto my belly. “All I remember is a flash of light.” “Well, at least you're both okay,” Cadance said. “Let's get you to the infirmary to make sure, though. Let me help you up, Twilight.” “Oookay...” I raised a hoof to let her help me up. And then I waited for her to help me up. And waited. “Thanks, but I thought you were helping Twilight,” said the other pony in the room. There was a moment of silence before Cadance asked, “What?” I rubbed my eyes and blinked them a few more times. My vision finally cleared enough for me to see, and right there standing next to Cadance was ... me? Or somepony who looked exactly like me. “Cadance, who is that?” Cadance head tilted as she looked at me. “What do you mean, Sunset?” The pounding in my head intensified as I tried to puzzle out the scene in front of me. A dozen explanations came to mind for what could have happened, but I had trouble concentrating on any one of them. “I mean why is there a second Twilight standing right next to you? And why are you calling me Sunset?” The other Twilight rubbed at her eyes. She blinked a couple of times and then just stared at me. “Oh you have gotta be bucking kidding me,” she said with disbelief and indignation. Cadance’s head swiveled back and forth between me and the other Twilight. There was a spark of comprehension in her eyes as she turned to my double. “Sunset?” “Yeah?” she said. I could see the wheels turning in Cadance’s head, and her eyes slowly widened. Oh, I did not like the sound of that. Cadance turned to me, concern written on her face as she frowned at me. “Twilight?” “Yes?” A sinking pit formed in my stomach as all the pieces of the puzzle came together. “Oh, oh no...” “I think we have a problem,” Cadance said, speaking what had to be on all our minds. “No, really?” the other pony said with enough snark to sound eerily like me. Going off what all the facts were telling me, I used my magic to create a mirror out of ice. I looked into it and saw what I feared. Standing there in the mirror was Sunset—or rather, Sunset’s body. The answer for what had happened was staring me in the face: I was in Sunset’s body. I dropped the mirror and screamed. It seemed fair to say that switching bodies with Sunset constituted a minor crisis. The situation I now found myself in was a new one. I might have panicked a bit—just a little bit. It’s not like I ran out into the hallways and screamed at the top of my legs about how the body I was in was not my own. That would have caused a really embarrassing scene. Thankfully, we had Cadance there to usher the two of us off to meet with Empress Sunbeam Sparkle. Soon we found ourselves being looked over by the Empress in her personal quarters. We must have caught her at a good time, because we didn’t have to wait half the day for her to get out of a meeting. We promptly explained to her what had happened in the lab. Empress Sunbeam hummed to herself as she finished scanning me with a variety of spells. “Now try and cast a simple spell for me, Twilight.” She had already examined Sunset and had moved onto looking me over. “Okay...” I concentrated, focusing on casting a simple light spell. Something I would normally have been able to cast perfectly in my sleep, but in Sunset’s body it came as a struggle. It just felt wrong, somehow. Magic just flowed differently in the body I now possessed, and when spellcasting requires a certain level of finesse, that’s a problem. My difficulties with the spell caused me to default to the brute force method of making a spell work—I poured more magic into it. It should have been enough to make the spell at least work normally, but something deep sparked within me. It was as though I had touched upon something fundamental to my very being. The light spell worked—too well. A bright flash of light lit up the room, and for the second time that day, I was blinded. I groaned in pain and rubbed at my eyes, and I heard cries of protest from Cadance and Sunset from elsewhere in the room. I blinked the spots out of my eyes; thankfully, supercharging the light spell had been the only thing to go wrong this time. At the rate things were going, I wouldn’t have been particularly surprised to find out the sky was falling or that the Empress was about to give us a pop quiz. Empress Sunbeam continued to look down at me, looking unperturbed by my light spell. I could only guess that her dominion over the sun kept her from being easily blinded by any light source. That was something I would have asked my teacher about, as it would have been really interesting to learn exactly what the Empress’ abilities were and the full extent of them, but as a habit, she wasn’t prone to giving more than hints about exactly what she was capable of. She always cited that she couldn’t afford to let her enemies know exactly how strong she was or what her limits were. That was a letdown for the scientific side of me, but I could understand the logic behind that decision. “It seems that your special talents were another thing that didn’t transfer with your accident.” Empress Sunbeam walked around me, and I felt her eyes briefly fall on Sunset’s cutie mark, still firmly attached to her rear where it belonged. I wasn’t sure if that fact was reassuring or not given our situation. “Did you experience the same problems with using your magic as Sunset, Twilight?” Sunset had her own incident when trying to use telekinesis on a quill. Said quill was now embedded into the stone ceiling above us. It seemed that my special talent had super-charged Sunset’s spell, while Sunset’s special talent for fire and light magic had cause my attempt at light magic to blind all of us. Good thing I hadn’t tried something like lighting a candle. Setting off a fireball in the Empress’s quarters would not have been my best move. I nodded. “Yeah, it just doesn’t feel right. Like I’m trying to use a new tool that I’m not familiar with, or something like that. It’s just off, but I think with time I could grow used to it.” I squirmed in place. “Sunset’s body in general feels off. Like it’s too big in some places, and too small in others.” “Please, tell me more about how terrible my body is,” Sunset grumbled, rolling her eyes. “It's definitely not going to annoy me. I mean, your body is just perfect, right?” My cheeks burned, either from embarrassment or because Sunset was irritating me. Maybe a little bit of both. “I didn’t mean it that way, and you know it. Don’t start putting words in my mouth again.” I snorted and lifted my nose up. “For the record, there's nothing wrong with your body, Sunset. It's just different from mine. Your snout's a little shorter, and your barrel is a bit wider around—” “Did you just call me fat?!” Sunset fixed me with a nasty glower. “Girls!” Cadance stepped between us. “Stop this.” The Empress let out a sigh that she normally reserved whenever she had to mediate between two particularly irksome parties. “I know is a stressful situation, but fighting with each other is just going to slow down finding a solution. So can it.” Our teacher’s disapproval was more than sufficient to cow the both of us into silence. I had read of instances where the Empress had lost her temper with ponies who had made her unhappy. It happened pretty rarely from what I heard, but it was not something I wanted to be the focus of. Not that being the center of her displeasure was exactly fun either. Seemingly satisfied by our continued silence, the Empress addressed us. “Now that we are all acting like civilized ponies, we can decide how best to approach this problem.” “Can you put them back in their proper bodies, Your Majesty?” Cadance asked. Sunset raised a hoof. “I’ll go on record saying that I like that idea.” “I do not blame you for wanting everything to go back to normal.” Empress Sunbeam sat down on a large cushion that oversaw the room. “Though that is easier said than done. Near as I can tell, the switch of your minds was complete, though nothing else seemed to have shifted during your accident. Do either of you know what went wrong with your experiment?” I scratched at the top of my head. “Not really, no. Everything seemed to be going normally until the magic of the circles just went wild. Or at least, that’s what I think happened. The whole experience is a bit blurry.” “I don’t get it.” A frustrated growl rolled out of Sunset’s throat, though it still seemed a weird sensation to see myself standing there and carrying on a conversation. “The experiment should have worked. We checked, double-checked, and then triple-checked the test circles.” She gave me a slightly pointed look. “Somepony wouldn’t even let us think about running the test without the triple-check.” “Hey! Those triple checks probably helped keep something worse from happening,” I sniped back. “Girls,” Empress Sunbeam said in warning tone. “Sorry,” I quickly said. Sunset seemed content to stay quiet and cast her eyes down at the floor. With the two of us sufficiently cowed again, the Empress continued. “Again, I realize that this is a stressful situation for the both of you, but I need you to act like reasonable adults. Especially when I’m not going to be able to fix this right away.” “You’re not?” My confidence crumbled at the news that the Empress wasn’t going to quickly be able to fix this mess. My teacher shook her head. “Not right now, but I am certain we will be able to sort this out and get you two back in your own bodies soon enough. We just need to figure out what exactly went wrong. I don’t want to risk making your conditions worse by acting with undue haste.” Her expression briefly softened, and she put one of her wings over each of us. "The two of you are too important to me to allow such a needless risk." She pursed her lips, and I could see her thinking behind those piercing green eyes of hers. “First, I want to make sure that none of the rules of the universe have shifted on me since last I checked, and after that, look into a couple pet theories of mine.” Cadance pursed her lips, looking like she was thinking the situation over. “How long will that take? I hope they won’t be stuck like this for too long.” “It’s hard to say, but I’m confident it won’t take too long.” The Empress pulled a dusty tome that must have been at least a century old off one of her bookshelves and opened it. “Some of these things take their own time to complete, and I do still have an empire to run.” She raised a hoof to forestall any complaints. “I assure you, your current conditions are stable. No harm has been done to your spirits or minds, and your bodies are healthy. I’ve detected no signs of degradation going on or suggestions that time is of the essence, so we have time to make sure we can do this and do this right. In the meantime, I would advise the two of you check over everything involved in the experiment. Thoroughly. If you two can figure out a way to fix this all on your own, so much the better.” “So ... we’re supposed to go out into the world like this?” I motioned at Sunset’s body. “I mean, we’re in each other’s bodies.” “So?” Empress Sunset shrugged. “This is far from the worst thing I’ve seen happen from a failed experiment since you two should be more than capable of continuing with your everyday lives.” She paused a moment, as though considering her last statement. “And you should both get more practice using your magic. Starting with simple spells, preferably. No sense risking any accidents.” “B-but we’re in each other’s bodies!” I had trouble probably conveying how wrong that was. “What will everypony say? How are we going to explain this? What if we’re trapped like this for months and months?!” “You are both intelligent and capable mares. I have every confidence you will figure this out.” The Empress nodded to Cadance. “I’m sure the aedile can give you some assistance over the next couple of days. It might be best if you all stick together for now. While I am reasonably certain that there isn’t any danger to your health, I would feel better if Cadance could easily watch over the both of you.” “That does make sense.” Sunset frowned as she rubbed at her chin. “It would also let us study together to try and figure out what went wrong with the experiment.” “Might be best to go to my place then,” I offered. The Sparkle Manor had pretty much everything we would need, and would help cut down on the number of incidents where we would have to explain what happened to us. I wasn’t wild about my parents finding out about me being in Sunset’s body but I wasn’t likely going to be able to hide that one for very long anyways. Plus, meeting Sunset’s parents for the first time under these circumstances would probably be even worse. Sunset shrugged. “Sounds good enough to me. My parents aren’t home anyways.” I didn’t like the hint of bitterness with which she said that. She hadn’t really spoken of them much, but I got the sense that the subject of her parents was a sore topic. From the bits and pieces I had gathered, her parents hadn’t been there for her as much as she would have liked. Too busy with work to do things like go to her birthday parties. Cadance smiled at the both of us. “That sounds like a good idea to me.” Sunset looked at me. “Just please tell me we aren’t going to do something stupid like try and pretend to be each other. I’ve gotten to know you a lot better than I used to, but there’s no way I could fool your family for very long.” “Oh no, nothing dumb like that,” I agreed. “We could never pull it off.” Cadance put a hoof on my shoulder. “Best just to be honest. That will make everything go much smoother and easier on everypony in the end. Trust me, keeping secrets, even if you can keep them secret, is hard on you.” “Yes, quite.” Empress Sunbeam gave Cadance a contemplative look. “But you three better get going. We all have our work to do, and the hour is getting late.” I looked at the clock and blinked when I saw just how much time had passed since the experiment. Time flies when you’re mocking the laws of nature. Cadance moved so that she could wrap a wing around my and Sunset’s backs. “Come on, you two. We have an awkward conversation to get through with Twilight’s family.” Oh yes, that was not a conversation I looked forward to. Amethyst’s laughter echoed through the Sparkle Manor after I finished explaining what had happened to me and Sunset. Mercifully, only Mom and my little sister were home today. Dad was off on a meeting in Vanhoover—something about a recent negotiation with the buffalo, if I remembered right—while Shining Armor was off on whatever assignment the Empire had called him to this time. The nature of his job sometimes prevented him from telling us as much as he might like. Not so mercifully, that still left my other family members to explain the situation to. My mom looked between the two of us. “So that’s the depth of it, is it?” “Pretty much,” I said with a sigh. “And you’re sure you’re both okay?” Mom frowned as she looked us over. “Well, as okay as you can be, all things considered. Though I can’t say I’m thrilled by what I’m looking at.” “You and me both, Your Grace,” Sunset grumbled. “But yeah, we’re fine. The Empress herself said so.” I nodded in agreement. “She said that she was going to look into it and told us to do our own research to fix this in the meantime.” Cadance smiled encouragingly. “And I’m here to keep an eye on them, just to be on the safe side.” Amethyst held a hoof up over her mouth. “Oh, I don’t know, I think I like how you two are right now. I-I mean, look at you two!” Losing her self control again, she laughed uproariously at our condition. “There’s so many jokes I could make right now, I’m not sure where to start!” I rolled my eyes. “It’s not that funny, Ammy.” “N-no.” Amethyst clutched at her heaving sides. “It’s h-hilarious!” Sunset glowered at my sister. “Your sister can be a real brat sometimes, Twilight.” “Oh, I know it,” I assured her. “After living with her, I have conclusive proof she represents the largest concentration of brattiness in our municipal district.” “Love you too, sis.” Sidling up next to me, Amethyst whispered conspiratorially. “You know, now that you’re behind Sunset’s counter, you could check out the merchandise before you make a purchase.” “I don’t know what you’re talking about,” I hastily reassured her. About the last thing I needed right now were my little sister’s perverse insinuations. Sunset’s ear flicked. “And you know you’re talking loud enough for me to hear you, right?” Amethyst gave Sunset a mischievous smile. “That’s what makes it funny.” Mom cleared her throat to catch our attention. “Okay, Amethyst, you’ve had your fun. How about you start up dinner while I have a short chat with everypony?” Amethyst puckered out her lips in a well-practiced pout. “But Mooom! This is comedy gold. When else am I going to get an opportunity like this?” “Amethyst...” Mom said in her ‘you better do as I say or else’ tone. I still wasn’t sure if that was just something you picked with experience or if it just came with the package upon becoming a parent. “Fiiine!”  Amethyst let out an exasperated groan. “You got off lucky, Twi. Just so you know.” “Don’t make me buck you to the moon,” I shot right back. It might even technically be possible. Granted, it would take a lot of magical energy, but the way Amethyst was annoying me... “Whatever.” My sister turned to make her way to the kitchen. “Have fun walking a mile in each other’s horseshoes, lovebirds.” “How many times do I have to tell you we’re not dating?!” I yelled after her. Sunset watched Amethyst as if considering how flammable she was. “World’s. Biggest. Brat.” Mom gave Cadance a smile. “Cadance, would you mind helping her while I have a word with these two?” “Sure thing.” Cadance started after Amethyst. “See you all later.” Turning back to the two of us, Mom eyes scanned us with an appraising look. “So then, you two were ‘experimenting’?” “That’s what we said,” I said hesitantly. Something about Mom’s tone set off some warning bells. Mom continued to give us that evaluating stare. “What kind of experimenting were you doing?” “Mom, we just went over this.” I glanced over at Sunset for an affirmation. “We were working on Sunset’s model teleportation circle when this happened.” “Twilight, you can be honest with you mom about what you two were really doing.” Mom must have noted my questioning look as she continued speaking. “Trust me, I know how tempting it can be for two young, high-level unicorns to use their magic to add some excitement to their relationship. I’ve been there myself, but you need to be careful not to have little accidents like this happen in the future. As amusing at it might be, you hardly want the Empress to be repeatedly distracted by this type of thing.” My eyes widened as I understood where my mom was going with this. “I-it isn’t like that! We weren’t—that is ... we’re not...” Words failed me as I tried to think of the proper response for my mom thinking I had done that with Sunset. “It’s nothing like that!” Sunset assured my mom. The lavender of her—my coat had become decidedly red around the cheekbones. Was my blushing always this noticeable? “Girls,” Mom said with a chiding tone. “You’re both intelligent young mares, and we are past the age where I need to shelter you from the facts of life. For one, I’m happy to see that you two are together and trust each other enough to ‘experiment’ with one another. All I’m asking is that you both act responsibly—especially when you use magic.” “Mooom!” I was starting to understand why Amethyst complained about her sometimes. “It was nothing like that! Ask Cadance, she can tell you!” Mom raised a hoof to forestall further protest.  “Okay, okay, I believe you.” She paused, then smiled and chuckled to herself. “Though that does remind me of your father and I ... well, if you two want some advice on some fun but perfectly safe things you can do in the bedroom...” All Sunset and I could do was stare on in bewilderment and embarrassment as Mom went into giving me the advice I had never asked for nor desired. It was at that point I knew how my life was going to end. The mare who had brought me into the world was going to kill me with embarrassment. After a thoroughly humiliating talk with my mom and a dinner where Sunset and I couldn’t meet each other’s gazes, it was time to start winding down for bed. I was just thankful that this awful day was finally ending. It had started out so promising with an experiment we had both looked forward to for a couple of months, only to end disastrously. Still, I had managed to take a shower without bursting into flames, drowning, or running out of shampoo, so at least that had gone right. With a spell, I cleaned off the fogged-up mirror to get a look at myself—or rather, me in Sunset’s body. The shower had felt so good that I had nearly forgotten about the switch earlier, but now it was literally staring me in the face. It was still disturbing to see myself moving Sunset’s body like this, or Sunset walking around with my body. I could only hope we would be able to fix this quickly. This was not something I wanted to get used to. Still, I needed to go through the daily routine. Somehow I doubted Sunset would approve of me no longer bathing for a minor thing like exchanging bodies. Probably doubly so right now, considering it was her body I was responsible for at the moment. I sighed and went about drying myself. The practice with my telekinesis was at least helping me get down using Sunset’s horn and magic. I didn’t feel safe about using any big spells at the moment, but minor conjurations weren’t a big deal anymore. I looked at myself in the mirror as I continued drying myself. It was then that I found my eyes staring at my—Sunset’s—whoever’s rear. I realized that I had probably been doing that for a bit too long to be decent, and I remembered Amethyst’s comment about how I could peruse Sunset’s wares before I made my purchase. That prompted me to fog the mirror right back up to stop the staring. I didn’t think of Sunset like that. Not at all. Nope. Not going to think about how good Sunset’s rear looks, or how appealing the dimensions of her facial features were, or how I liked the colors of her mane. I only noticed such things on a purely analytical basis. Nope, wasn’t going to think about it one bit. “What do you mean?” I glanced at the mirror to see Sunset’s half-brushed mane. I didn’t think it was possible, but Sunset got even worse bedmane than I did. I had been brushing out the knots out of her long locks for at least fifteen minutes. “I’m brushing it like I always do.” “Yeah, that’s the problem.” She grabbed the brush and started going at her body’s red and yellow mane. “You are not going outside with my body with your typical manedo.” I frowned. “What’s wrong with my manedo?” The brushing stopped suddenly. “Um, nothing. It’s ... just not me. Your manedo is, well ... plain.” My frown deepened. “Well, it has to be. If I did my mane like you do yours, it would be a complete mess.” “Oh, that so?” Sunset looked at herself in the mirror and started combing my body’s mane. “It can’t be that hard.” She grinned. “And besides, I’ve been wanting to do something nice with this mane for a while now.” “Good luck with that,” I grumbled. “I have to go to a salon if I want to do anything more complex than my usual look. There are practical reasons why I do the mane the way I do.” “Oh? Why’s that?” Sunset asked while trying to put my mane up into a bun. “Because it’s difficult as all Tartarus to keep all the colors of my mane straight.” A slight smirk creased my lips as I watched Sunset struggle with doing up my mane. As evidence to my point, the stripes of my mane had tangled with one another to create a mess. Sunset didn’t pay as much attention to details as I did, but her scowl spoke of how unhappy she was with the disorganized mop on top of my head. Her head. Gah. “I have to go the salon every other week to trim my mane, and help keep those stripes apart from one another. Otherwise I’d be spending twice as much time as you do in the bathroom.” “I like to look good,” Sunset said defensively. She grunted as she pulled the bun apart and started over. “You seem to like my manestyle enough. You’ve said you liked how it looked in the past.” “I said I found is aesthetically pleasing!” I was perhaps a little too quick in saying that. The stress of the whole situation we were in was perhaps taking its toll by now. Really, could I just have things at least appear normal? Close enough, at least? Sunset snorted. “Yeah, sure. Whatever. But you could stand to pretty yourself up a little too, you know.” That comment caused a number of emotions to flash within me. “What’s that supposed to mean?” “Think you could be bothered to use at least a little makeup?” Sunset went about opening and closing the cabinets of the bathroom, looking inside of each. “It wouldn’t kill you, and it might even...” Her voice trailed off and she blinked a few times. She shook her head and slammed one of the cabinet doors a little harder than necessary. “Whatever. Look however you like. It’s not my business, right?” I felt a stab of something in my chest. “Are you saying there's something wrong with how I look?” “No!  You look fine! Great! It's just ... erm ... that is...” Sunset trailed off into an embarrassed mumble. “Well ... your look is fine too.” I shuffled in place. “I mean your whole body is different than mine. Its legs are a big longer, and the barrel larger—not that’s there’s anything wrong with that! The proportions are different, is all.” “Er, right.” Sunset coughed to clear her throat. “Yours is different too. Your rump is, um, different, and neck slimmer. It’s, um, yeah...” For whatever reasons, that caused my own cheeks to blush. The two of us stared at each other, not saying anything. I hated moments like these. I knew I should say something, but in turn, I prayed Sunset would break the silence. I wasn’t sure with what, but it had to be better than the silence, right? A minute passed by before I finally blurted out, “We need to fix this! I mean our bodies being switched! Well the mane thing needs to be sorted too, but the body swap is our first priority!” “Right!” Sunset nodded enthusiastically. “We just do what we can with our manes, get breakfast, and then work out what went wrong so that we can fix it! I am not living like this a second longer than I have to.” Cadance made a disapproving hum as she watched the two of us prepare the teleportation circle back at the lab. “Are you two really sure about this? I’d hate for you two to get hurt if something should go wrong.” Sunset looked up from reexamining the runes of the circle. The two of us had double-check and then triple-checked all of our work on the project, and thus far we hadn’t discovered the reason for why the experiment had failed. “I told you, I’m not living like this. Twenty-four hours like this has more than convinced me that I don't want to go another day, much less a week or more.” “There must be some factor we just weren’t aware of.” I finished looking over the half-eaten apple before placing it in one of the circles. “We’re pretty sure that if we recreate the experiment exactly how it was done before we can reverse whatever happened before.” “‘Pretty sure’ isn’t the same as ‘certain,’” Cadance cautioned. “I don’t like a big maybe where your safety is concerned.” “It’ll be fine.” Sunset rolled her neck and shoulders, something she normally did when she was about to try something big and complicated. “There are a ton of safeguards built into the circles anyways. The worst that should happen is that nothing happens.” Cadance frowned, looking like she was mulling the issue over. “Shouldn’t we at least ask the Empress before doing this first? No offense to your safeguards, but I’d feel a lot better if she were here in case something went wrong.” I shook my head. “I would really prefer not to bother her. She said she was busy, and besides which, this was our mistake to start with.” Not to mention I agreed with Sunset about not wanting to be like this for a minute longer than I had to. In theory, doing exactly what we had before should create the same results. Only with the two of us being put back in our actual bodies this time. We hoped. Darn it if we didn’t hope. But there wasn’t much else we could do if we wanted to fix this anytime this year. Not without a big, lucky breakthrough on the very nature of teleportation magic and the metaphysical laws of the universe. Admittedly, this exercise was only based on theory and conjecture, but it was the best we had at the moment. And the Empress might not approve of us doing this. As much as I hated to admit it, sometimes it was easier to ask for forgiveness than permission. Hopefully, she would understand after the fact. Sunset braced her stance, and her horn glowed. “You ready on your end, Twilight?” I summoned forth my own magic, carefully preparing it to use the magic circle. “As ready as I’m going to be.” Cadance looked back and forth between us. “Girls, can’t we talk about this a little bit more? There’s no rush. Look, how about we have lunch and make sure this is really what we want to do at this point in time?” I thought about it and looked up to Sunset. “Think we should at least do that before we start? A couple hours aren’t going to make a big difference either way.” Sunset snorted. “No way, I’m not risking us getting cold hooves now and procrastinating. We’ll spend forever going over and over the numbers and coming to the same results. Sometimes you just have to plow ahead and see what happens.” She rolled her head, causing her neck to crack. “Now, you in?” She stared at me with a determined look that helped give me confidence to move forward. “Yeah, I’m in. So shall we?” Sunset grinned confidently. “We shall.” Our course set, the two of us started pouring magic into the magic circles, just like last time. The two of us had spent a couple of hours each practicing with the magic of our borrowed bodies, and even if we weren’t at 100% yet, we were confident enough in our abilities to use the magic circles. The circles glowed with our spell. Sensing nothing wrong, I poured on the magic, and in concert with Sunset. Once again, there was a bright flash of light. After a few disorientating moments, I found myself on the floor. At least that much had happened again, my foggy brain worked out. “Are you two alright?” I heard Cadance say. She stepped over to me and looked me over with concern. “Twilight? Sunset? Are you two back in your bodies?” I blinked a few times, and looked down at my hoof—Sunset’s hoof. I groaned and rubbed at my eyes. “It didn’t work.” That admission had hurt more than a little bit. It seemed just repeating the experiment wasn’t going to cut it. Cadance trotted over to Sunset to examine her. “Sunset, are you okay?” I felt a brief pang of worry shoot through me as I waited for Sunset to respond. Sunset groaned, sounding as miserable as I felt. “Yeah, I’m fine. Relatively speaking. I’m alive, at least.” “You two need anything?” Cadance asked. “Water? Something for the headaches?” I rubbed at my eyes. “Some aspirin sounds really good right about now.” “The same.” Sunset rolled onto her back. “Looks like we’re going back to the drawing board. There must be something we’re overlooking.” “Um, girls?” There was an edge of worry in Cadance’s voice that I didn’t particularly like the sound of. “I think there might be something wrong with your apple.” “Huh?” I turned my eyes to the teleportation circle where the apple now lay. Sunset shifted to get a better look herself. “Is it just me, or is the apple ... growing?” Staring at it, the apple was growing. Not only that, but regenerating. The two of us had eaten the apple down to the core, and now it had managed to replenish about half of its mass. Within a few seconds, I watched it go from the size of a particularly large apple to that of a volleyball. “Sunset,” I said. “We might have a problem.”  “That's weird.” Sunset concentrated and cast an analysis spell. “I've got no idea why it's growing.” She frowned. “Or how to stop it.” I cast my own analysis spell, fighting through the difficulty of using Sunset’s magic. It was definitely giving off a magic aura, but one I wasn’t at all familiar with. I had seen everything from various forms of pony magic, zebra alchemy and shamanistic magic, diamond dog earthshaping, gryphonic words of power, and caribou runestones, but this was different from anything I had experienced in the past. Cadance quirked an eyebrow at the apple. “It's just a big apple, what's the worst that could—” The now pony-sized apple had a horizontal split open to reveal a fanged filled maw. It unleashed a roar that made my ears ring. Leaves ripped out of its stem. The leaves whipped down to the floor and it actually propelled itself at us. Cadance let out a yelp of surprise and, drawing on her pegasus instincts, launched herself into the air to avoid the apple that seemed determined to take a bite out of us. Unfortunately, that left me and Sunset in its path. Each of us thinking the same thing, we both teleported to opposite sides of the lab to get away from it. When I popped back into reality, my vision swam and I had to brace myself to keep from falling over. My control over Sunset’s magic was still poor, and the fact I hadn’t recovered from using the teleportation circle hadn’t helped. Given the way Sunset was shaking her own head, she must have been having the same problems. At least the teleportations had bought us a little bit of time to think. Cadance flapped her wings, staying well out of range of the apple. “Girls, what is that thing?!” She yelped in surprise when one of the apple’s leaves stretched out to ensnare her, only avoiding it with a quick dive and bank to avoid crashing into one of the labs walls. Sunset growled as her horn lit with the magenta of my magic—erratic sparks shooting from it. “Hay if I know,” A pillar of fire leapt from her horn and consumed the apple. I was forced to cover my face as it suddenly felt like I was in an oven. “But it’s trying to kill us, so I’m killing it back!” “Careful there!” I yelled at Sunset. “Pyromancy isn’t safe when you don’t have fine control anymore!” I wasn’t exactly comfortable with Sunset playing around with one of the more temperamental forms of magic when she no longer had the perfect control she normally had over it. Messing around with pyromancy was a good way to burn a building down, especially since I had more raw power than her. Sunset scowled at me through the smoking remains of the apple. “It worked, didn’t it?” The smell of burnt fruit filled the room, and the smoke gradually thinned enough for us to see the charred remains of the apple. That seemed to be end of it—that is until the apple started shifting, growing even larger and regenerating the damage done. “Oh come on!” I protested. “That doesn’t even make sense! There’s no way teleportation magic makes apples grow massive, defy the conservation of mass and energy, grow fangs, gain the ability to move, give it some level of sentience, regeneration, and give it a hunger for equine flesh! This isn’t possible!” “Twilight! Shut up and fight!” Sunset yelled as the apple started scurrying towards her. It had grown to the size of a carriage, and I didn’t want to think what would happen should it collide with my friend. Cadance fired a bolt of energy into it, causing a quarter of the apple to explode and throwing the rest of it against a nearby wall. It let out a wail that was equal parts rage and pain. As I feared, it started regenerating the damage without missing a beat and kept right on growing. “Stop that!” I drew upon more of my magic, feeling the wild energies flow into my horn that only seemed to feed off my anger. “Stop not making sense! You aren't physically possible! Your existence violates at least a dozen laws of magic and physics! Stop it!” I cast my spell and a dozen chains as thick as my leg formed out of the aether. At my will, they wrapped around the apple and the ends slammed into the ground, holding the nonsensical apple in place. “Gotcha!” Sunset pushed enough magic through her horn to cause it to spark, and I felt the temperature of the room heat up—making me reasonably worried that she could accidently fry everypony in the room. I could feel her drawing in the heat energy from a considerable area and concentrating it for her spell. My chains grew red hot as the area immediately around the apple heated up. The heat was great enough that the apple burst into flames, and I flinched back, feeling like I was standing right next to a roaring bonfire. The three of us cautiously watched the physics-defying apple for a few long seconds. For a moment I thought we got it when the apple shifted again, its regeneration starting once again, and I could feel its growth putting a strain on my chains. “Oh come on!” Sunset screamed through panted breaths. Her not being used to my level of magic probably meant she had wasted a lot more magic than she needed to in order to cast that spell. “You’re still not dead after that?!” “This doesn't make any sense!” I scanned the magic of the apple more carefully now that it was held down. What I felt was unlike anything I had ever experienced before. Rather than working based on some sort of structure or logical pattern like every other form of magic, this magic seemed to flow randomly and with no purpose. It just was. “I don’t get it. This magic, it’s—it’s just ... chaos!” Sunset reached out with her own magic and grimaced. “She’s right, this ... I don’t know what to make of it. I can’t even guess how to counter this magic or break it down.” This wasn’t working. I knew it was only a matter of time until the chains were broken, no matter how much magic I poured into them. Sunset’s inherent magic wasn’t as good as my own for maintaining this type of spell.  I couldn’t restrain the apple, and Sunset couldn’t destroy it outright. We needed a new plan if we were going to get out of this one. Of course, making a plan while the giant physics-defying mutant apple was trying to eat my face was going to be a bit difficult. “Cadance, can you keep it occupied while Sunset and I work on a plan?” “On it!” Cadance maneuvered around to face the apple. A stream of pink energy hearts shot from her horn and slammed into the creature, causing large sections of it to get splattered and blasting it against the wall. I ran over to Sunset, careful to keep my distance from the equine-eating apple. “Sunset, we need to come up with a plan, now!” “You think I don’t know that!?” Sunset snapped. A bright blue barrier covered in pink hearts sprang up around the apple, holding it in place. Cadance spared a quick look back at the two of us. “Girls, less bickering and more planning. My Love Shield won’t hold it forever.” Sunset shot my old foalsitter a flat look. “Love Shield? You actually have a spell named Love Shield? Seriously?!” “I was a filly when I came up with the name!” Cadance snapped. “That doesn’t mean you have to keep it!” I yanked on Sunset’s head to make her face me. “Plan now, silly spell names later!” “Okay. A plan.” Sunset flinched when the apple slammed itself up against the shield. “Our talents are still reversed, right?” “That is the source of our problem.” I let out a frustrated huff. “We aren't at the top of our games because of that. We probably would have beaten this thing by now if everything was normal.” “So we need to adapt.” Sunset rubbed her chin. “Your magic won't work the way I want it to, so that probably means I have to make my spells work with it instead.” “Right.” I thought over our options and picked out the one that seemed most viable. “So we switch it up. You try and use the types of magic I’m good at while I focus on lumimancy and pyromancy.” “Sounds like a plan,” Sunset said. “There anything else I need to know about your magic?” I could see that the apple was straining against Cadance’s Love Shield as cracks were already starting to form. That meant we needed to keep this explanation short instead of going into a more elaborate exploration of the topic I would have liked. “There is a lot of it. Just embrace it and go with the flow. It's not like your magic where you have to hold a death grip on it to control it.” I had found it infinitely frustrating how much I had to control every minutia of Sunset’s magic just to make it work the way I wanted it to. I guessed that it was just part of Sunset’s natural gift for pyromancy and how it was vital to keep tight rein over that school of magic. Sunset shook her head. “My magic is about more than just control. It comes from emotion, too. Pyromancy, lumimancy, all of it. Those spells come from your heart, not your head.” That was a significant difference from what I normally did with my magic. Sure, I used emotions for some of my spells, but it wasn’t a lion’s share of most of how I casted. My magic was usually much more analytical in nature. But I was dealing with Sunset’s magic at the moment, which meant I needed to adjust my thinking if I was going to use her talents to maximum effect. “Okay, what emotions do I use for what?” Our fruit-based nemesis managed to punch a pair of holes through the shield and grasped at Cadance. “Quickly, please.” Sunset took a steadying breath, probably to keep herself from getting panicked. “Fire comes from passion, light takes more of a ... internal harmony, I guess is the best way to describe it.” “I think I can manage that.” All I had to do was change how I normally approached spellcasting on a fundamental level. It’s only like learning how to dance on my hindlegs while blindfolded. Easy. “While I have to embrace yours.” Closing her eyes, I could feel Sunset concentrating. “Just kinda gently guide it along instead of forcing it. Huh. I'll give it a shot.” I turned to face our enemy. Cadance was badly straining, and her shield probably wasn’t going to hold for much longer. “So, you ready for round two?” Sunset grinned and squared herself. “Only one way to find out for sure.”  I couldn’t help but find Sunset’s grin to be infectious. “We're only fighting an evil apple that defies the laws of magic and physics. We got this.” “Easily. If it can regenerate, then we just have to kill it faster than it can heal itself.” Sunset reached out and offered a hoof to me. “Together.” I took her hoof and squeezed it. “Yeah, together.” The apple had another growth spurt and strained against the shield until it finally broke from the pressure. It bellowed another ear-ringing roar and charged me and Sunset. Closing my eyes and taking a precious moment to calm myself, I gave Sunset’s hoof another squeeze. The problems of the world seemed to flow away from me. Right there, right then, being with Sunset, I felt an inner peace—a tranquility that I could never remember feeling before. I was part of something bigger, grander and a spark with me ignited. Sunset’s magic suddenly flowed through me, but no longer the wild inferno like it had been before. No, this time I knew how to direct it. In fact, it even seemed drawn to my will. Bars of light formed around me. With a touch of my will, they shot forward and impaled the apple. They blasted right through the apple and bit into the ground, holding the apple in place. Sunset squeezed my hoof, and I felt her relax and let my magic flow through her. She flung a blast of pure magical force that nearly blinded me. It struck the apple, blasted it to pieces. The chunks of apple smeared the walls and floor and they sizzled from the power of the magical attack. The sight sent a thrill through me, and I seized upon those emotions as I built up my next spell. A roar of flames echoed through the room as I sent a wave of fire at the apple shards, igniting every last piece I could see. Some of the apple chunks started to move, but they were halted when they were wrapped up in the magenta aura of my magic. Sunset grinned as she held down the chunks until I could turn my pyromancy on them. Still, the apple chunks continued to regenerate, fighting to survive against our onslaught. What was it going to take to actually kill this thing? Cadance stepped up next to us, her own horn glowing. Her magic fell over me and Sunset, increasing the sense of harmony I had with her. I don’t know what spell we cast together in perfect tandem. It just ... happened. A feeling of perfect euphoria passed through me as we fired a small beam of rainbow light. The rainbow fell upon the apple chunks and they disintegrated on contact. When the spell ended, my breathing was ragged, as though I had just finished running a mile and my horn ached from the effort of using so much magic. Whatever magic that had been. Despite the fatigue, I couldn’t help but smile at Sunset and she returned the gesture. “We got it,” Sunset said through panting breaths. “Yeah, I think we did.” I checked around me, and while some smeared remains of the apple were spread around the room, none of the remnants seemed to be moving. “That was ... wow.” “Yeah. It was.” The two of us stared into ones another’s eyes, soaking in the moment. Then Sunset half-leaned in towards me, and my heart started racing when her lips pursed slightly. I found myself leaning in also, but I stopped short—some imperceptible barrier standing between us that neither of us could seem to make ourselves breech. “Um, so, um, you okay?” I asked. “No apple-related injuries?” “Er, yeah. Fine.” Sunset blushed. “So we're both okay then, right?” “I don't think anypony was hurt,” I said. Cadance seemed to be alright, though she was frowning pretty heavily at us for some reason. Sunset glanced away, the awkwardness of the moment as we remained close to one another building up. “Yes. I mean no, nopony was hurt. You look good.” Her face flushed redder. “I mean, you don't have any injuries.” “Right, y-you do too.” My own cheeks started burning fiercely too. “I mean don't have any injuries, that is. That is what I meant to say.” “Oh come on!” Cadance threw her forelegs out in exasperation. “I am sick and tired of this unresolved sexual tension! You two obviously like each other! Big glowing signs couldn’t make it more obvious! Just acknowledge it already! It’s okay! You like each other! It’s healthy for you two to say it and act on it! Hook up or move on! But don’t pull this holding pattern that’s going nowhere horseapples! You’re both better than that!” My jaw dropped at the sudden, uncharacteristic explosion from old foalsitter. There were only a hoofull of times I could remember ever seeing her flustered. To state the blatantly obvious, love was serious business to the Alicorn of Love. Sunset blinked in shocked silence before turning to me and shrugging. “Yeah. So ... um...” She leaned in, lips pursed again. “Um, so Sunset. Would you like to, um, that is...” I took in a sharp breath. “Oh buck it.” I kissed her. It was an awkward, forced thing fumbled about with due to inexperience and only a concept of how it was to be done right. And it was wonderful. Then I felt something flow through us, and gradually the kiss became more natural and enjoyable. I closed my eyes and reveled in this moment—my first kiss with Sunset Shimmer. My fillyfriend. A blast of pink magic washed over us, and the whole world jerked on me. I nearly fell over and had to steady my stance before I could concentrate on the world around me. I blinked through blurry eyes to see Sunset in front of me, shaking her own head. No wait, Sunset in her own body! A smile creased my face as the realization hit me, and I lifted up my hook to look at it and saw a familiar lavender hoof. “Sunset!” I grasped her in a hug and hopped up and down. “We’re back in our original bodies!” Sunset laughed and jumped with me. “We really are! Thank goodness.” “Yes! Finally!” Cadance whooped in triumph. “You’ve finally acknowledged your feelings for one another!” She paused and then looked around the lab. “Oh, and the mutant apple was destroyed too, and you’re both back in your bodies.” She made a half-hearted swirling with her hoof, “Woohoo.” Sunset flicked her ear. “Nice to know you have your priorities straight, Cadance.” “But why are we back in our bodies now?” I asked. “All we did was kiss. Kissing on its own shouldn’t cause something like that.” “You didn’t just kiss,” Cadance said patiently. “It was true love’s first kiss. You should remember how powerful that can be from all the stories I told you when you were still a little filly.” That was true. Love was a pretty primal and powerful force in the universe, if a bit unwieldy to use. Magi had spent centuries studying it and still only had a foggy idea on a lot of the details. I’d tried to study it myself, but Cadance never had much success with teaching me. Apparently love magic was really hard to logically analyze. Maybe Sunset would have a bit more luck at understanding it. “I guess that is true,” I finally agreed. “I suppose I shouldn’t complain.” Sunset grunted. “Better than where we were starting out, and I wasn’t eaten by a giant fruit. So I’ll take it.” Cadance nodded. “And no more dancing around each other like awkward fillies in school.” “We weren’t that bad, were we?” I asked. Cadance gave me a flat look. “Yes, you were that bad. Embarrassingly so.” Her flat expression became a much warmer smile. “But hey, that’s in the past now, right?” I shuffled in place. “Um, well, that kind of depends on what Sunset thi—” My crisis of confidence was cut off when Sunset kissed me on the lips. A grin worked it’s way onto Cadance’s features. “Yeah, you two are fillyfriends, alright.” In its own way, it was a wonderful moment. I still didn’t think I had the whole kissing thing down, but ... it was still nice. I was really starting to get into it, when of course, Empress Sunbeam Sparkle stepped into the room. That caused the two of us to immediately break the kiss. My cheeks burned as the ruler of the Empire’s eyes scanned the applesauce-covered room before falling on us. Suddenly, I felt like a little filly who had been caught with her hoof in the cookie jar. Empress Sunset flinched when a glob of applesauce dropped from the ceiling onto her muzzle, causing me and Sunset to gasp. Before any of us could form an explanation for what she had walked into, our teacher’s mouth turned up into an amused grin as she wiped it off. “I do hope there is a good story behind all of this.” Sunset cleared her throat. “Well, you see, we decided, after careful study, to recreate our experiment to reverse our mishap yesterday. It didn’t work the way we hoped.” “It also created a carnivorous apple monster with physics-defying growth and regeneration,” I said. Cadance gave the Empress a smile that probably wasn’t as confident as she hoped. “Which we destroyed. Hence the mess. At least Sunset and Twilight are back in their bodies again.” The Empress seemed to take a moment to digest what we had told her. “And I trust you are all well?” We all confirmed we were. “Then I suppose it was all for the best. Though in the future, my students, do wait for me to be here when you decide to do something so dangerous.” Her normally stern features softened. “I would not like to hear news that something unfortunate happened to you.” “Err, right.” I rubbed at my upper leg. We kind of did decide to proceed with trying to fix our condition without her knowledge. At least she didn’t seem to be mad about that. “We’ll keep that in mind, Your Majesty.” The Empress nodded. “See that you do. Though I expect all of you to clean this lab and not leave it to the custodians to deal with. This was a result of your experiment, and you should deal with the consequences.” “Of course, Empress,” Sunset said demurely. All in all, it was a pretty light punishment. Not to mention we had made this mess. “But enough of that.” Empress Sunbeam’s horn glowed and a small stone popped into existence. “One bit of good news is that I discovered the likely cause of your recent mishaps.” I tilted my head in confusion. “A pebble?” “Not just any pebble,” my teacher said. “A fragment of Discord’s statue. Centuries ago, I smashed his statue and spread the remains about Equestria. Unfortunately, the chaos inherent in the fragments caused incidents of chaos magic wherever they were buried. I was forced to dig them up again and take other safeguards to make sure that Discord didn’t threaten anypony ever again.” She frowned at the stone. “I had thought I had gathered all of them, but it seems I had missed one in the palace gardens. One which a certain apple tree had grown over.” “So that’s why our experiment had failed.” Sunset shot the stone a disgusted look. “An outside variable we didn’t know about. Stupid variable...” I had to wonder how she could have forgotten a shard of Discord in her own backyard, but decided it would be best not to question her about that. She had probably broken the statue into enough pieces that losing one or two shards would have been easy. Especially considering how busy she normally was—what with her being the Empress of Equestria. At least, I hoped that was the explanation for how that fragment had been missed. Other explanations were potentially much scarier. The Empress cast another spell, and the pebble disappeared. “In any event, I destroyed the tree and the surrounding vegetation after retrieving the fragment. There shouldn't be any more incidents, so you can run another test without a problem.” Sunset and I shared a look. “I think we'll hold off on that for a bit.” “If you don’t mind, Your Majesty.” Sunset had a mischievous glint in her eye as she smiled at me. “Twilight and I have some ... other experiments we would like to do with one another.” Empress Sunbeam chuckled. “No doubt. Well, considering what you've been through, I have no objections to you taking a few days off.” She and Cadance shared a knowing grin. I offered Sunset a hoof. “So, want to experiment over dinner? Someplace nice perhaps?” Sunset took my hoof. “As long as apples aren't on the menu.”