//------------------------------// // 7: Oops // Story: Pony Pony Pony: The Thirty Minute Stories Collection // by -Jules //------------------------------// “How could Twilight Sparkle be so stupid?” Spike asked incredulously. The five mares with him stood frozen in horror. Spike sighed and tried to see the scope of the devastation. Sweet Apple Acres stretched to the horizon all around them, but there were no apples to be seen. Instead, there were millions and millions of spiders. And flying around erratically was the purple princess, desperately firing bolts of magic down into the orchard to try and undo what she’d done. Spike saw Rarity staring at a nearby tree and watched curiously as several small spiders approached one the size of his head. Rarity fainted and he grimaced when it darted forward and devoured them. What was she thinking? How do you even mess up a spell this bad? his thoughts were interrupted when Twilight landed in a heap next to him. Spike stared expectantly at her as she stood up. “Are they still stuck?” she asked, looking at their friends. “Rarity fainted, but other than that none of them have moved a muscle since the spiders showed up,” he replied as casually as he could. He watched as Twilight looked left and right at the hopeless amount of spiders she had unleashed on the orchard. “So… What exactly happened Twi? I’ve seen you create some abominations before, like that sentient bird orange, or unleash hordes of tiny creatures to devour the town, but filling Sweet Apple Acres with spiders? This is a step up. You ever consider becoming a supervillain?” “Spike this is serious.” “I started serious, that first question was serious.” Twilight started trotting in place, about to panic. “Umm… I– I think a spider was in my mane, it threw off my focus, so instead of thinking about butterflies for the spell I was–” “–thinking about, and releasing, spiders. Wow. So what do we do?” “Ideally?” She thought for a moment, weighing options. “Burn the entire orchard and neighboring farm down.” “No, that’s just not happening Twi!” Applejack shouted, finally snapping out of her trance at the threat of burning down her home. “Why not?” Spike asked, “The barn gets rebuilt, like, twice a month. In a good month.” Applejack glared at him. “The barn yeah, but we can’t go and rebuild the trees. Unless ya can make the trees fireproof, it’s not happening.” Twilight stopped to think again. “No, too risky.” Spike giggled at her. “Creating millions of bugs is fine, but fireproofing trees is too risky?” “I might make the spiders fireproof.” Spike stifled an even bigger laugh. Applejack looked nervously at the spiders that were quickly covering the trees in webbing. “So uh.. What’s option B?” “Abandon the farm, and Ponyville. Start new versions a few miles down the train tracks and pretend the old one doesn’t exist.” “That’s not happening either Twi.” “Maybe a tornado? Pull them all off the trees and move them out of here.” “No way!” Rainbow Dash shouted as she jolted back into movement. “What if it broke up? or just scattered them? Besides, what if they start ballooning? Who knows where they would all end up?” Twilight sat down and thought long and hard. “I could try and use magic to make them want to leave.” “You mean like you tried with the bats?” Spike asked. “You remember what happened when you tried that? Do you really want to risk turning someone here into a spiderpony? That would somehow be even worse than what we have now.” Applejack stomped her hoof. “That’s it! The north orchards, the part the bats run so we don’t go there anymore. Can ya send them there?” Twilight pondered the question and watched one of the larger spiders chasing a smaller one. “I can try to teleport them all there, but I’ve never teleported this many things at once, I don’t know if it would work. I don’t even know how that would work.” “Just act like you’re teleporting one  giant spider that weighs as much as the millions you put here,” Spike offered cheerfully. “Spike!” Twilight shouted, intending to reprimand him. “That– that might actually work,” she trailed off. “Well then what are you waiting for!?” Dash demanded, “Pinkie’s still not moving and I’m not even sure if Fluttershy is breathing.” Twilight nodded and screwed her eyes shut. Her horn began glowing, and soon so did all of the spiders. Spike watched in wonder as her horn’s glow became more and more intense before there was a blinding flash and a deafening crack. The remaining ponies began to move again and Applejack ran to Rarity. Spike turned to Twilight. “Did it work? Are they all up in the north orchards?” “I think so Spike.” Spitfire was flying above the main boulevard in cloudsdale, heading out to lunch at a pizza joint when it happened. She didn’t know it at the time, but that day would go down in history as one of the most bizarre things to ever happen in the city. Everything began to glow purple and she slowed to a midair halt, looking down at the confused mass of pegasi trying to figure out where the glow was coming from. That looks like Unicorn magic, she thought, but there aren’t any Unicorns in Cloudsdale that’s just– her thoughts were cut short by the deafening crack that normally accompanied a powerful teleportation spell. She rubbed her eyes and looked down at the no longer glowing streets below her. At first it just looked like the clouds had gotten bigger, and then she saw them. She started to scream, and so did the ponies on the streets and in the buildings. In fact, almost everypony in Cloudsdale started to scream, and most of them wouldn’t stop until the problem was finally solved by the royal guard several hours later.