Prank
by Kean
"So, who wants to go first?"
Celestia's question was met with silence from the empty throne room. Perhaps "empty" was the wrong word, as a few maids roamed the room, polishing the floors and washing down the windows, while her usual guards stood at theirs posts at the entrance and on either side of the raised dais on which she sat.
But, they were not as they should have been: their bodies shimmered and wavered, as if they were non-corporeal; ghosts. However, three very real, very corporeal alicorns sat in front of the dais.
On the left sat a soaked and disgruntled Nightmare Moon, her ethereal mane waterlogged and hanging down the side of her face, covering one eye. Next to her sat Luna, stock still and stoic, except for the slight upward curve of her lips that betrayed her mirth. And finally, there was Twilight, currently succeeding in avoiding Celestia's gaze with her own, but utterly failing to hide the glances she kept taking of Nightmare.
"Twilight?" Celestia kept her voice even, as always, but still Twilight startled, her wings twitching nervously.
"Y-yes, princess?"
Celestia sighed inwardly at the use of her title. She won't look at me, won't call me by name... The culprit was obvious enough, but it would be wrong to not at least hear her out. But first...
"Would I be right to assume that you at least know how we ended up here?"
Twilight fidgeted and stared at the floor as she shuffled her forehooves. "Yes, Princess."
"And would I be correct in assuming that you don't know how to get us back? At least, not at the moment?"
"Yes, Princess," Twilight answered as if condemning herself to death.
Celestia sighed once again. Some things would never change. "Do you know how you brought us here? Would you be able to bring something from our... side to this one?"
Twilight blinked before rubbing her chin with a hoof. “It depends on what It is. I’d also need to know what it looks like and where it is. Not just a description, I would actually have to know it or be able to see it.”
“That shouldn’t be a problem.” Celestia smiled. “I just need something from my chambers: The small cabinet by my bed. The one behind the nightstand. The one locked with enchantments that I caught a certain over-curious filly trying to dispel one night.”
Twilight ducked her head and nodded. “Yeah, I know the one. I’ll need a second.”
A full minute passed before the aura around Twilight’s horn faded. It was strange, Celestia thought, because, from what she remembered from being transported here, it had been instant. One moment she had been ready to greet the guards outside the dining hall before breakfast, the next; they had been translucent and unresponsive.
“Your wards are stopping me from teleporting it here, but it should be on this plane now.” Twilight’s reserved voice brought her from her musing. She nodded and, with a flash, the cabinet appeared beside her.
“Thank you, Twilight,” She said. Seeing, and choosing to ignore, Luna raise an eyebrow, she dispelled the enchantments surrounding the cabinet and levitated out a single glass tumbler and a bottle of amber liquid, a stylized Griffin, reared up on its hind legs and spitting fire painted on the side of it. “A gift, from a Griffin ambassador some two hundred years ago,” Celestia chuckled, filling the glass half way. “I’m thinking this will be worth opening it for. Since none of you volunteered to speak, however, I think Twilight should start.”
With a grimace, Twilight looked to Luna and Nightmare. Luna continued to stare ahead, stoic and unresponsive. Nightmare shrugged and nodded.
Sighing, Twilight began, “As you know, ever since my last trip through the mirror, I have been studying the possibility of other alternate dimensions.” Celestia nodded for her to continue. “I haven’t gotten anywhere on that, but I did find out that there are different… not dimensions, but planes, I guess. Alternate planes that mirror our world, but are different.
“Using myself as an anchor point to bring them back, I sent crystals enchanted to record their surroundings through. Sometimes the difference was minor. Maybe light reflects off of surfaces slightly differently, resulting in colors being off. Or it could be a minute or so ahead or behind the time here. Or, at the other end of the extremes, I found one where everything was on fire. “Twilight shrugged. “The only constants were that, unless I sent it there, nothing could be affected by what was on the other side, and that they were always uninhabited.”
“And with you being here, you have no anchor which to pull us back to,” Celestia proffered, refilling her glass for the third time.
“Right.”
“And, exactly, did we get here?”
Nightmare cleared her throat. “I was assisting Twilight at the time, helping her record the data the crystals brought back.”
“And distracting me every chance you got,” Twilight muttered with a grin.
Nightmare grinned right back at her. “What can I say? The way you get when you’re researching something new is just far too… alluring.”
Luna, finally showing that she hadn’t become a statue, rolled eyes. Before she could say anything, Celestia cut in. “So Nightmare distracted you and you miscast the spell?” Celestia grinned, refilling the glass once again. “And here I thought I did well in teaching you proper focus, Twilight.”
“Wait- no- I- That’s not what happened!” Twilight sputtered. “Well, not exactly…” She sighed and composed herself. “I figured out that I could set parameters – “
”Parameters?” What are you getting at, Twilight?
“– for planes I could send the crystals to. Before casting the spell, I can specify what I want the plane to be like: Change the gravity, how magic works, the temperature, the speed at which time passes, relative to our plane, and so on. I could even make a portal to one exactly like our world.” For the first time, Twilight met Celestia’s eyes, her expression serious. “If I ever needed a private place to talk to someone about something important, without worrying about interruptions.”
Oh…
She looked away again, grinning, blushing, glancing at Nightmare. “Or other things, but you get the point.
“As for how I miscast the spell, well, I had actually wanted to get some work done, so I sent Nightmare to get some more crystals and, well, Luna, would you like to explain?”
Luna huffed. “It was meant to be a practical joke. A bucket of water placed above the door, set to dump its contents when the door opened. Twilight has been quite boring lately, having her nose buried in dusty old tomes for days on end. I sought to shock some life back into her.”
“Only, from where I see the carpet is wet, it was not Twilight the water landed on?” Celestia proffered, suppressing a laugh and hiding her smile behind the glass.
“No,” Nightmare growled.
“I heard her shout and, when I looked up, the way her mane and tail were laying, the way the morning sun shone off her wet fur…” Twilight cleared her head with a shake, but it did nothing to remove her still deepening blush. “I had prepared to send another crystal through, here, and, distracted as I was, I wasn’t thinking and accidentally added another parameter: Alicorn.”
“And so it pulled all of us through instead of just you and Nightmare.” Twilight nodded. Celestia took another drink, noting that the bottle was only a fourth empty. She turned back to the group, lips tight, holding in her laughter.
Nightmare took advantage of the silence. “Had I known it was so easy to hold your attention, I’d have kept my mane wet more often. I may have to make it permanently so.”
Celestia could have sworn she heard her student’s mind grind to a halt. Twilight sat stock still, her eyes distant, and wings twitching. A short chortle escaped, signaling the breaking of her dam. Luna waving her hoof in front of Twilight’s face only to receive no response solidified it.
“Oh dear, I think I broke her,” Nightmare laughed and levitated Twilight on to her back before turning to leave. “I will have to turn her on again.”
“I‘m still not entirely acquainted with modern terms, but I believe the phrase would be “Turn her off and on again.”” Luna said, eyebrow cocked.
“Yes, that too,” Nightmare called back over her shoulder as she exited the throne room.
Celestia watched the two leave with a smile before turning to Luna. “Luna?”
“Yes, sister?”
“Would you accompany me to my chambers? I believe it will be some time before Twilight figures this out and I would like to speak with about something.” Celestia offered her sister a genuine smile. A smile that shifted to a grin as she raised the bottle. Shaking it gently, she said, “I wouldn’t mind having someone to drink with, either.”
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Panting, Twilight smiled, feeling Nightmare wrap her hooves around her chest and pull her close, her back against her chest. She shuddered as Nightmare nipped gently at her ear. “Is this where you tell me that you really should get to work on finding us a way back?”
Twilight chuckled and rolled over to face Nightmare. “I know how to get us back.” She grinned at the confusion evident on Nightmare’s face. “We were never stuck here. C’mon, you know better than to think I wouldn’t be as careful as possible when dealing with something like this.”
“Then why are we here?”
“Well, I wasn’t lying when I said it was for ‘other things’. Like what we just used it for.” She kissed Nightmare gently on the chin. “It was supposed to be for Hearts and Hooves day, but when I saw the chance – had an excuse to bring both Luna and Celestia, I decided to take it.”
Nightmare placed a kiss on her forehead. “Again, why are we here. Not that I am complaining, but you could have just as easily brought the two of them here.”
Twilight laid her head on Nightmare’s chest. “When I was younger, Celestia used to tell me stories about a mare. A mare who was kind and caring, strong and brave, intelligent and silly. A mare who was just as beautiful as she could be fearsome. She said that she balanced her. I had the feeling that she idealized the mare; loved her. But when I asked Celestia what happened to her, all she would say was that she ‘drove her away’.”
Twilight sighed as Nightmare began to run a hoof through her mane. “Last year, we spent Hearts and Hooves day together. Not together together, but neither of us had someone to be with, so we kept each other company. I had all but forgotten about the mare she used to tell me about, but she started talking about her again, about how she wasn’t able to – and still couldn’t – find a way to tell her how she felt, it sort of just clicked in my head.”
“Luna?” Twilight nodded. “So in the span of a few moments, using Luna’s failed prank, you came up with this plan to have them alone together for an undefined amount of time?” Nightmare chuckled. “Remind me to hire you to plan my next uprising.”
Twilight lightly hit Nightmare’s chest. “No, I’ve had the idea for a while now, I just took a gamble.”
“Oh? What about the Flaming Griffin whiskey?”
She shrugged. “Lucky break?”
“And do you believe Celestia knows that you gave her this chance?”
Twilight nodded. “I think so. But I’m more worried about how Luna will react. Do you think she-“ She was interrupted by a long, pleasured moan echoing throughout the castle. Twilight ducked her head against Nightmare’s chest, shaking from holding in her laughter. “O-okay, new param-parameter: Limited auditory distance.”
The sound faded as a bubble surrounded them, Nightmare’s horn glowing faintly.
After regaining control of herself, Twilight pressed her lips to Nightmare’s before rolling her onto her back. Lying atop her, she grinned down at the dark mare. “As I said, this was originally meant for our Hearts and Hooves day.” She leaned down to whisper in Nightmare’s ear. “But if you’d like to… test anything out…”
Twilight smiled as Nightmare’s breathing increased in speed. “Anything?”
“Mmm-hmm.” She gently kissed Nightmare’s cheek. “There are toys in the dresser on your left. Ropes, whips, blindfolds, gags, and more in the one on your right.” She pressed her lips against Nightmare’s again, gently parting them with her tongue. She shifted her hind leg and pulled away grinning at the sound and feel of her breath catching.
“And spells?” Nightmare asked, panting softly.
“As long as you teach them to me afterwards.”
Nightmare wrapped Twilight in wings and hooves, pulling the smaller mare into a deep kiss.