"Well this is a disaster." I groaned as we arrived at the Atlanta airport at 7, waiting in line to be screened.
The crowd was normal for a typical Monday evening, as it would be a little less than 30 mins before it was our turn, but as we got in line I realized something...
In order to avoid suspicion about us turning into ponies, my mom had ransacked my closet for various articles of clothing to hide the o' so obvious changes. I was wearing mom's red bucket hat, akin in likeliness of 'Paddington the bear' haha, yoga pants, and a thick coat so no one could see the stripes all over me.
Jacob also sported my heavy snow jacket, that is three sizes too small for him but was the best we could do, to hide his scales, along with gloves and a pair of sunglasses.
Ariana was lucky and only had to wear my rain jacket, since the hood was big enough to hide the horn and ears, as she skipped merrily down the line with us.
It was currently about 59° outside, typical for an October evening in Georgia, and was raining. Luckily, this drew suspicion away from the funny pair of people wearing thick coats as we moved up the line.
I guess I should explain why I know so much about the Atlanta area.
You see, my mom's sister lives not too far away from here. Her job is basically selling various medical equipment to hospitals and dentists offices akin to how a telemarketer tries to get you to buy Avon products, etc.
Typically once a month I, or my mom, would drive down here to hang out for the weekend and go sightseeing. So I knew the layout of Atlanta fairly well.
Also, the Atlanta airport is one of the biggest airports in the country, and was a favorite of mine to use when we flew down to Orlando in the summer.
Needless to say, this wasn't my first rodeo.
With that I realized one tiny flaw in getting screened.
You see, most airports do a 'pat down'; a non invasive check to see whether or not your harboring anything illegal on you, but here in Atlanta pat downs had been replaced with a machine that did the screening for them.
This machine would spin around you and do a scan which you shows your outline to the security officers while also highlighting anything metal, making the machine go off. To my horror, this also meant it would probably detect my horn and tail and immediately alert them to it.
I glanced around as we moved up some more and watched as people filed in behind as the chatter continued around us.
I was sweating bullets by now. I could technically refuse to be scanned by the machine, but that would mean I'd have to be patted down, and that would mean they'd feel my tail.
Either way I was screwed, as the line moved on at a pace faster than I would've liked it to be.
"ID?" The lady said, as I blinked out of my daydream for a moment and fumbled around in my purse before pulling out my drivers license.
She scanned it along with my ticket before I crammed them back in and started pulling off my shoes...
My toes were becoming oddly squished ever since the drive over here... They already refused to go down from the tip toe position, but I wasn't as concerned with that since I'd been walking on my toes for my whole life. (Yeah, yeah I know I'm odd. But for whatever reason the habit stuck.) Anyways, I slung my shoes into the bin as I took off my watch and emptied my pockets before walking down the line and putting my purse in a separate bin.
The others were not far behind me, but as I watched the number of people in front of me decrease from ten to just three in front, I felt myself gasping for breath.
"Next please!" The lady shouted as I took a deep breath and walked into the machine.
Time seemed to drag as the machine clicked and whirred about before doing its spin as I stepped out.
I looked behind me to see the lady examining something closer on the screen as she crinkled her brow in confusion and whispered something to the TSA agent.
Oh Celestia I'm dead. I shivered as the TSA man started walking towards me with a look of confusion written across his face.
Please pass by me... I squeaked, but no such luck as the others came out and the lady who was doing the scans showed the same baffled face.
"I need officer Mike to the front please, officer Mike thank you." She said as she put down her pager as the TSA agent made it to us.
"Excuse me kids, but I'm afraid we need to ask you a few questions if you would follow me." He said as he looked at my mom who had before been putting on a brave face, but now looked scared and lost.
The TSA man tilted his head, "Are you the guardian? You need to come as well." He said as we began out long track to the back of the air port...
All I could think was, Crap...
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"Open these doors right bucking now!" I screamed as I banged on the only exit out of this hell hole.
Once the TSA had gotten wind of us trying to sneak on board when everyone affected was supposed to be staying away from public areas, they did the only thing they knew to do until back up arrived...
Throw all four of us in the kid's lounge room.
"Buck it!" I cursed as I kicked the doorframe for good measure before sitting down in a chair defeated.
"Calm down Emily. Yelling will only make it worse." Mom assured as I watched Jacob scratch a spot on his chin that he had been messing with for the past fifteen minutes.
During that time my feet had felt like pin cushions, as my balance was threw off and I ended up wobbling off and on since they put us in here. It was only making my anger worse, as I wanted out of here and to Chicago ASAP. I didn't want to have to explain myself to security, and even if banging on the doors made things worse, it was better than just sitting here doing nothing when we could be headed to somewhere that had answers...
Jacob appeared to be growing scales around his ears, soon to be just ear holes as the cartilage was dissolving already, as he kept scratching only for mom to give up on scolding him for such behavior.
Ariana was busy being entertained by the TV playing some kind of pixie fairy show that I could care less for, like really care less for, and she had took off her glasses since her eyes were expanding in size.
To be honest, it was an hour till our flight took off, we were being quarantined, my balance was off, and I was hungry. All this added up to me being pretty angry as I just grumbled and took off my hat to scratch my pony ears.
Still trying to get used to these thing by the way. The hair is so sensitive something always seems to be tickling it. And did I mention the noise amplification? Yeah, it didn't help I couldn't block out that blasted kids show anyways...
Thinking about this made me realize something, "Hey Jacob? What exactly was your dragons name?" I asked curiously.
Jacob stopped itching for a moment as he looked at me, "Huh? Oh! His name was Scorch. Red dragon with purple eyes and highlights. Vicious fire dragon adult male with a talent in dragon martial arts. Heh, easy enough for him to take on much tougher foes without them even knowing." He smirked. Argh! Again with the fangs!!
"Hm.. Do you think you can breathe fire yet?" I asked as I pointed to the door.
Jacob shrugged and did a small puff of air, which just resorted in me smelling his bad breath, ew! And then sighed once we both realized fire wasn't going to help us get out of here.
We sat in silence for a bit, save for the TV, as my ears kept twitching and I ended up resorting to folding them down on my head.
That TV! Faust! It would be the end of me...
"So what did you learn about how to make the color purple today?" The chubby pink fairy asked the cheeky chipmunk. The chipmunk thought for a bit, scratching above his ear as he hummed in concentration, "Hmm... Well I know that you have to have blue paint and a whole bunch of peanuts!" The chipmunk raised his arms up for emphasis. The pink fairy laughed as s-
"Faust! For the ever loving sake of Celestia will you Shut. Up!" I screamed as I felt a familiar sensation run through me and then there was a crash!
"Gah!" Jacob shouted as I blinked and realized the TV was now smoking on the ground with blue flames..
"Whut." I dead panned as I looked up to my horn where the feeling was coming from and caught a glimpse of a faint blue spark before it winked out of existence.
"E-Emily?" Mom asked in shock as I just stared at the now broken TV, and then back to my horn, and then back to the TV.
Ariana was watching me too with wide eyes as the gears turned as I reached for the familiar sensation again..
A blue aura engulfed a magazine nearby as I concentrated hard and moved it into my hands. The aura disappears as soon as the magazine launched in my lap and I grinned.
"I've got magic." I tittered, as a slew of ideas began running through my brain.
"Magic?" Mom repeated still blinking.
The titter turned into a chuckle and then to a small laugh before I was roaring on the couch. Everyone respectively backed away from me as I grinned manically.
"I have magic!!!" I shouted crazy as the next thing anyone knew there was a boom followed by a war cry as the door to the kid's area was blown apart.
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Princess Cadenza was frantically tapping her hoof on the crystal library's desk as she flipped through pages and pages of books held in her magical grasp. Each one was labeled either 'magical disturbances', 'creatures of Equis', 'magical artifacts throughout time and space', or 'apocalyptic prophecies'; the latter group briefly skimmed but not taken seriously. As Cadance used her magic to weed through every book she held at blinding speeds, another jolt of magic went through her horn as she halted all activity when it shot a bolt out her horn.
She ground her teeth as the flare subsided and she tenderly rubbed her horn, before catching all 128 books that had fell out of her telekinetic grip.
"Another magic burst..." She huffed as she resumed her reading. They had been occurring more rapidly now. At first there had been only the one that she had assumed to be an odd occurrence that happened once every century, later on it was one in the morning and one in the evening for half a week, now it was four a day. She did not know what caused these flares to occur, since no other unicorn, pegasi, or earth pony could sense them, but one thing for sure was they were increasing in frequency and she did not know when they would halt or if they ever would. She shivered as she set down another book she had finished flipping through. What if it never stopped? Was she doomed to bear the intense magical backlash of whatever this was for all eternity? The thought made her hasten her research. The flares may have been increasing in frequency, but not strength, which was good. Cadance had experienced enough of them already to deal with the backlash, it was only when they caught her off guard like this one had did they sting.
She sighed as she finished the 'magical artifacts' section and began to skim more thoroughly through the 'apocalyptic prophecies' when she stopped and started to laugh. "What am I doing?" She chuckled as she set down the books and levitated her notebook over to her. "These books aren't going to tell me anything. I need a living source." She smirked, as she sent off a letter to her Aunt Celestia and packed up her things.
She waved to the librarian, Amethyst, sweet deary really, and headed back to the castle. She had some packing to do...