Twilight Shine couldn't believe what her eyes were seeing. It was THE mirror, that she had heard oh so much about as a child. And she was about to step through it.
She looked at the slowly vibrating book on top of it. Once, it had been the connection between her mother and her friends on the other side. However, several years ago, something happened to the book on the other side and the magic connection had been weakened to the point that the only thing it now was good for was to keep the portal open for two weeks every thirty moons, instead of three days.
"Are you ready, Twiny? You don’t have to do this, you know..." Enamorada, a dark pink alicorn with yellow and dark pink mane asked. Though she didn’t show it, she was very nervous. No matter how many times her mother repeated that it was safe, Enamorada would never agree on letting her cousin enter the mirror.
Twilight Shine rolled her eyes at her cousin.
"Yes, I’m ready Enamorada. If mom could do this on regular basis, I can do this once," Twilight Shine answered.
She was awre of her cousin’s worries, but nothing would stop her from going on this journey. When she returns, she'd be considered a grown up, and she'd get to share the secrets her mother collected over the years. Not to mention that aunt Luna had promised her that she’d teach her the secret sleepwalking spell. Only certain ponies, so far Luna exclusively, could use the spell, but Luna thought there were big chances of Twilight mastering it one day.
And so, Twilight Shine trotted up the few steps to the mirror. But before she stepped through it, she hesitated, repeating everything her mother had told her.
'It will be weird, but you'll get used to it. Don't eat the stuff they call meat,or you'll spend most of your trip in a hospital. Try to find an authority figure when you arrive. And most of all, make friends! They can help you arrange the details concerning your staying in their world.'
As Twilight Shine stepped through the portal, the world seemed to fall away. As she looked around frantically, Twilight was blinded by flashing lights of bright, white-hot intensity. She suddenly became aware of her body twisting and changing. It was like being pulled from every direction at once, and caused her such pain, she swore it was bone-deep.
What's going on?! she thought, becoming more and more apprehensive with each passing second. She finally lost it, and with one final scream, which came out as but a feeble squeak, Twilight Shine clenched her eyes shut. Curled into a ball, she prayed to Celestia for the nightmare to pass, sobbing.
When the flashing lights finally stopped blinding her and and her body stopped spinning, she found herself lying on the ground, curled into a ball with her legs pressed against her chest. Everything looked unfamiliar, yet familiar at the same time. She was laying on her back in lush, green grass. Sitting up, she immediately recognised the big horse sculpture.The statue was her ticket home, the portal to Equestria.
"Come on Jackie, stop being so slow!"
Upon hearing somepony talk, she turned her head and saw two fillies, or girls as her mother had told her that they were called here. One filly had a weird pink skin tone and a short, blue mane that made her look more like a colt. The other one had a orange skin tone and yellow mane hanging in two long tresses.
When Twilight looked around, she discovered that, in fact, the whole area was filled with boys and girls, all of which had their own skin tone and mane color, varying from purple to green to blue to white.
Slowly making an attempt to stand up, she took a look at her own clothes. She was wearing a white blouse and a pink skirt with her cutie mark on it: a collection of seven purple stars.
After failing the first two times, Twilight finally managed to stand up on her two thin, unstable back legs and even managing to walk a few steps before stopping, realizing she didn't know where to go. Most of the other fillies and colts were heading for the massive building up front, and Twilight decided to do so too after quickly sorting through her alternatives.
Letting herself get swooped up in the big mass of students heading inside the building, she was almost run over by the orange and pink fillies form earlier, this time accompanied by four other fillies, a white one with a messy yellow mane, a light blue one with a red and purple mane, a yellow one with a pink mane and a dark yellow, almost orange one with a yellow and orange mane.
"Hey! What do you think you're doing?" Twilight shouted, catching the attention of the last girl, the one with the orange and yellow hair.
The girl turned around when she heard Twilight calling, helping her up and dragging her aside so they wouldn’t be in the way of other students. She was dressed in red and black checkered dress with a leather skirt and she had a black bow in her hair that she constantly had to push back up.
Seeing her repeat this motion over and over again made Twilight feel less threatened by her. She just didn’t seem as so much of a ‘bad girl’ as she first thought when she stood there in front of her, pushing that bow back up over and over again.
"Oh, I'm so sorry. You’ve got to look up when there is so many students." The yellow haired girl paused for a minute, pushing the black bow back up again, before continuing. "You know, I haven't seen you before. Are you new?"
Twilight gave her a nervous smile.
"Oh, um, yes. My name is Twilight Shine."
The other girl took her hand a shaked it.
"Nice to meet you Twilight Shine, my name is Sunset Eclipse." The girls suddenly furrowed her brow, seemingly pondering something. "Hey, you don’t happen to know someone named Twilight Sparkle? She’s a friend of my mom, and you kind of remind me of her. I’ve never met her in person, but my mom have showed me photos.”
Twilight resisted a sudden urge to scream and run for her life. She knew that it was possible that any of her mother’s friends would have children her age attending Canterlot High...but she hadn’t thought the first thing she’d do was running into one of them. She face-hoofed. Or face-palmed. What ever it was called in this universe.
“Um, are you alright? Was it something I said?” Sunset Eclipse asked nervously.
“It's okay. It's just that...This Twilight Sparkle you mentioned...She's my mother.”
Now it was Sunset’s turn to resist screaming and running for her life.
“R-really? That’s great! I can’t wait to see what the girls will say about it! They’ll be over the moon! Especially Surprise. But first we need to get you signed up as a student.”
Sunset grabbed Twilight’s hand, taking her with her into the school, ignoring Twilight’s protests. When she finally let go, Twilight had lost all sense of direction and it quickly dawned on her that she had no other choices than relaying on Sunset. In front of them was a massive oak door with a golden sign saying “Principal Luna’s Office.” Sunset opened the door and pushed Twilight inside.
Once across the threshold, Twilight Shine had to stifle a laugh. She had known Luna since she could barely walk, and had been in her chambers many times before. This room was nearly identical to them, and it reminded her of Luna's eccentric nature.
It seemed to be a room made of shadow. Sparse sunlight entered from behind the curtains, and the desk in the room's center had a single dim lamp upon it. As they advanced toward the desk, Twilight Shine began to discern the features of the woman behind it. What seemed to be a 50-something woman with night-eternal youthfulness, skin the color of a clear night sky, long hair that was a sharp indigo, and glinting teal eyes, dipped her head to them as they approached.
"I've been expecting you, Miss Shine. Welcome."
“Principal Luna” Sunset declared. “I met this girl outside school, as you informed me i would yesterday. She claims to be the daughter of Twilight Sparkle.”
Principal Luna smiled, looking at Twilight with amusement.
“And what, if may ask, evidence do you have to support your claim, Miss Shine?” Luna’s voice carried the authority of one who would not tolerate any opposition. Her smile had disappeared and she looked at Twilight, demanding.
Twilight’s mind raced. She hadn’t expected anyone to ask her to prove that her mother was...well, her mother. But then she suddenly remembered something. She had packed them. From her backpack, which was what her saddlebags had been turned into, she picked up several crudely sewn together dolls and tossed at Prince-principal Lunas desk.
“Intresting. truly interesting.” Principal Luna mused, examining the six crudely sewn dolls depicting teenage girls, all of them unique, yet still carrying the same basic features.
If it hadn’t been so dark in the room, then maybe, just maybe, Twilight would have noticed the photo of seven girls, six of them obviously being high school graduates, but she didn’t.
The princess tossed the dolls back to Twilight, who stuffed them into her backpack
"I believe you. Welcome to Canterlot High, Miss Shine. Miss Eclipse will guide you around the school and make sure that you get where you need to be. Now go to your
classroom."
Sunset didn't waste any time in doing what the principal told her. Twilight was still trying to sputter a response when Sunset closed the heavy door behind them.
Once outside, she took a firm grip around Twilight's arms and looked her in the eyes.
"I'm sorry for doing that to you. Principal Luna is much more formal than Principal Celestia ever was. She expects almost military discipline from her students, and you better give her what she wants. I never doubted your origins. I grew up hearing stories about your kind coming here through the horse statue. I just think it’s amazing I actually get to..you know...meet anyone like you." Looking into Sunset's eyes, Twilight knew that she meant it. She was honest.
But at the same time, something scared her. Sunset didn't seem to know about her mother’s past. About her mother’s life as a unicorn in Equestria...
Twilight was just trying to come up with a proper response, when someone else spoke up.
"Oh my goodness! there you are, 'Clipse! I've been looking for you everywhere." A girl Twilight's age with a weird light blue skin tone and a dark pink and blue hair that was formed into perfect, natural princess curls came running down the hallway. The girl wore expensive jewellery and was dressed in a royal dark blue dress. Twilight immediately disliked her, she seemed like one of those snobbish girls who'd pick on other students for not having designer jeans.
However, Sunset did not seem to share that opinion as she let go of Twilight and faced the girl, a big smile on her face.
"Hi, Sparkler. Sorry for disappearing, but I got the greatest news. Where are the rest of the girls?" Sunset looked behind the girl.
The girl waved her hand in front of Sunset to get her to focus on.
"We decided to skip PE and take an early lunch. The others are waiting at Surprise's mother’s. what’s the news? You sounded really excited.”
Sunset shook her head, looking at Sparkler.
“It can wait. So, Pinkie’s huh? Seems good. She’s probably the only one who doesn’t complain if her daughter skips a class or two. I remember it annoying the teachers a great deal last term ” Sunset said, glancing over at Twilight and waving her hand in her direction. “Oh, we’ll be one extra. The news kind of concerns the girl Principal Luna gave me responsibility for, Twilight Shine.”
Sparkler’s eyes grew big as plates, hearing Twilight’s name. Several times, she looked like she was going to say something, but simply closed her mouth again. There was no words big enough to describe what she just realized, so she finally settled with ignoring the last part of what Sunset said.
“Oh yeah. I remember them repeating over and over again how she was ‘crazy’ and ‘shouldn’t be allowed to raise a child if so her life depended on it’! Now, come on, let’s get going!”
Sunset nodded and looked over her shoulder at Twilight, motioning for her to follow.
"Sure. You're coming Twilight?"
Twilight nodded, hurrying to catch up with them.