“I’m affected by Dark Magic? I don’t feel bad or sickly aside from my recent injuries which I will need to see to if I want to remove my suit.” Fluttershy had finally decided to bring the subject up. She watched as Stanley the little troll of Central Park bumbled about his home getting things together in a rather spectacular manner. With a crash she cringed as the poor troll had somehow managed to injure himself again and yet managed to at the same time get his tea started. There were also two types of cookies baking in the nearby oven.
“Stanley is a really nice guy compared to all the other trolls I’ve seen and he’s a little clumsy, but if he says your afflicted then you must be. I haven’t exactly figured out how to detect magic yet.” Foxglove’s ears sagged as she twirled the tip of her wing around on the table as she sat on it. “Stanley tells me all magically talented creatures are capable of it in their own unique way.”
“Well have you tried using your echo-location to read if there is magic coming off of other beings or things?” Fluttershy wasn’t an expert on magic, but she did get involved in a lot things where magic happened. Personally she herself could do some magic with a cloud, that was about the maximum scope of her magical abilities that came naturally. The magical echo-sight thing that lets her see the things she can hear outside of her normal sight range was something that she thought Foxglove could do.
“No screeching in my house Foxglove, also no bringing brooms to life with magic as I can’t stress that one enough with you young lady. You can go outside if you want to give her suggestion a try.” Stanley the troll came over and sat down at the table with them looking at Fluttershy; he chuckled and smiled a lot because he was in general a jovial little guy. “I can feel magic, mostly through nature and you’re rife with natural magical energy. There’s a small bit of darkness, but it seems more rather benign than harmful. Might I even say playful? Not all dark magic is immediately evil or bad, but even small smatterings of it can be pretty nasty. That magic is twisting your form so that look like you do.”
“What kind of magic can you do Fluttershy?” Now Foxglove seemed a lot livelier as her ears perked up, she was interested in what Fluttershy could do as all magical creatures could do something naturally with their magic. It was like her personal ability of magically offsetting a lot of weight that a normal bat wouldn’t have been capable of lifting into the air.
“Is it alright if I ask for glass with a little bit of water in it for a demonstration? Not too much, just enough to that I can pour out onto the table. Don’t worry about the water; it will not be on the table for long. The trick really helps with cleaning up spills from carpets.” With a flick of his tail the troll sent a glass with a little bit of water hovering to the table where it settled in front of Fluttershy. She could have used her own water, but she was saving it for when she really needed it. “Thank you Stanley.”
Fluttershy lifted the cup and upended the water onto the table away from Foxglove who looked on intrigued. Fluttershy tapped a hoof into the puddle of water and it formed a cloud surprising Foxglove, the little bat gave off a delighted squeak in seeing magic other than what Stanley did on a usual basis.
“My, that is interesting. A force of nature unto yourself, can you make it rain? Obviously not in here you know, but how about out there?” It wasn’t often Stanley got to witness other forms of nature magic and here was a natural at it.
“I can even condense it back into water while squeezing out the impurities.” Moving the cloud over to the window she pushed it outside slightly and gave it a tap, it drizzled over the flowers outside the window who cheered in response. “Pegasus ponies have the ability to create and manipulate the weather; we don’t normally look like this. There are also earth ponies that are one with nature and are good at growing food and unicorns that have the ability to learn all kinds of magic; usually they specialize in doing one thing or another. Oh and I’m from another planet, the planet of Equus.”
“That’s not hard to believe, a close friend of mine has met with some aliens before and his friends confirmed it. I kind of thought you were odd for a pegasus and I’m not just talking about the strange twisted bat features you have.” Seeing a look of confusion she was receiving from the pony Foxglove held up her wings in a placating manner. Her head went to odd places when she started thinking of a rather hunky chipmunk, such as Fluttershy being vastly different from native magic horses. “I mean the pegasi and unicorns that come to Central Park every now and then look too much alike at times. They are all white fur, grey manes and their horns all come in the same general golden in color. They are also a lot bigger and have longer faces.”
“What other magical creatures exist on this world? All the ponies where I’m from come in all colors of the rainbow, my friend Rainbow Dash has being colorful as her most defining feature.” Before Fluttershy could continue get into a deep discussion about planetary similarities she winced slightly when she shifted. Stanley got a firm look on his face and stood up to walk around the table.
“I’m so sorry for being such a terrible host, let’s go outside and take care of your injuries and that little bit of dark magic right now. Foxglove, please be a dear and mind the tea and cookies while I deal with this will you? Remember to wait until they cool a little, I know you like cricket cookies but don’t hurt yourself like last time!” The bat nodded and turned to the stove to watch the tea and she could spare a little magic to retrieve the cookies from Stanley’s oven, while Stanley personally led Fluttershy out into his grove to help her with all her problems. “I like seeing all my friends healthy and able, I won’t sit here and watch you be in pain any longer. My magic isn’t good for hurting anyone, but it’s good at healing, growing and giving life to everything around me. Can you please remove that rather nice suit of yours? I must admit that I would like to figure out how to make one of my own eventually, but that’s for another time. I just don’t want it to interfere with my magic; I’ll even fix it for you after I’m done helping you out as it looks a little torn and it’s sad that it can’t fix itself.”
Fluttershy shyly nodded and was slightly confused that her suit even had emotions. She focused a bit and the Rhizome slowly retreated into backpack form which she quickly shucked and set off to the side. Her shoulder barely scabbing was bleeding freshly and her hind legs were slightly swollen.
“Oh this is going to take a lot, but for someone as nice as you… I would go to any length to help! Now hold still, this may tickle and I promise I’ll absolve you of every little woe your body is going through… yeah, I better put my thumb into this one.” With a flick of his right wrist Stanley’s thumb started glowing a vibrant green while slowly increasing in strength as he started focusing his magic to a fine point. He wasn’t the most powerful troll in the world physically, but magically he was the champion of a grand and powerful magic. The very gift of ‘life’ itself only meant for those pure of heart.
Fluttershy closed her eyes cringing as Stanley approached her and then she felt him gently rub her nose with his thumb and his fingers cupped her chin. That’s when she black out feeling an incredible power flow through her taking away the toxins, taken away all the pain and she even felt the many cracks in her mind slowly seal up. There was this odd feeling of vertigo for a few seconds which was followed by complete and total euphoria.
-
Roller sat at the top of the stairs watching as the troll performed his magic; he didn’t interfere because he didn’t see anything wrong with the magic in question and Shush had already wandered off and started frolicking and pouncing on the moving magical flowers that weren’t so easily harmed by her playful nature. When the troll caressed Fluttershy’s face there was a blindingly bright flash and it took a few minutes for his sight to come back, he could see that the troll looked rather tired but he still kept a broad smile on his face.
Unfortunately that smile turned into a concerned frown as there was an unexpected side effect to the magic that the troll hadn’t originally intended on.
Roller revved questioningly as he moved forward, the Troll startled a bit before he noted that Roller and Shush meant him no harm. He looked at the unintended side effect of the troll’s magic and nudged at it and jumped back at the reaction he had caused.
-
“Never seen quite an amazing magical creature like him before… oh look, she’s waking up… how do we break the news to her Foxglove? Do you think she’ll be upset with me? I don’t even know how it happened and I don’t know how she’ll react to it!” Stanley sounded rather panicked about something.
“Calm down Stanley, I’m sure she’ll take it well. Honestly I don’t think she’ll be angry. A little surprised maybe, but not angry.” Foxglove sounded neutral and slightly intrigued by whatever was going on. “I actually think it’s cute.”
A friendly revving noise was heard and it sounded like Roller was here, he sounded overly happy about something.
Fluttershy slowly opened her eyes when she heard a whistling noise, she felt like a million bits at the moment and everything was just heavenly. She also felt ticklish and giggled slightly, Stanley’s magic made her feel rather heady. It was as if all was right with the world, despite the fact that she wasn’t quite home yet. She had a blanket over her and she slowly sat up only to get a wheel to the chest, she chuckled slightly and hugged Roller to her chest and leaned her face down to nuzzled the friendly wheel monster.
The pony immediately stopped nuzzling the wheel when she noticed something blocking her vision. She blinked once and then twice, then several more times just to make sure it was real. She reached up with a hoof and gave a gentle tug; her smile couldn’t have gotten any wider after that. Her mane had been restored to its full glory; oh it felt so nice to be able to hide her face behind her mane again.
Stretching out her wings Fluttershy wanted to cheer loudly as possible, both her wings were back to being feathered and shifting to look at her rear end she could see three normal butterflies on it. She couldn’t feel any fangs in her mouth, and her ears were not unnaturally large anymore. She was finally completely back to normal, she didn’t feel any of that pain toxin in her body and her wounds were gone. She ignored everything else in the room and she flew straight for Stanley to give him a great big hug.
“I’m cured, you have no idea how long I’ve been stuck looking like that! Thank you so much Stanley… um what’s wrong?” Despite his halfway impish smile at her good cheer, he didn’t look as happy as Fluttershy was at the moment. She tilted her head so that her mane fell into her face and relished in the feel of her soft locks once more shifting across her face. It was not just a safety blanket just for her, it could do the same for others as well and it eased the tension in the room a bit as she shied away from the friendly troll slightly.
“Well gee, how do I explain this? I don’t know how it happened, but there might be a few positive side effects from what I did and I’m not sure how to say this. I think it best that I show you one of the end results of my having healed you.” Stanley hoped she took this well, he was still piecing together how it was possible. He was still factoring in how much magic he used and compared how much of Fluttershy’s own magic might have muddled things a bit. Shaking his head he went off to the side and came back with something. “Hold out your hooves and be careful.”
Fluttershy held up both her hooves and a bundle was carefully place into them and she held the bundle looking a bit confused. After unraveling it a bit she got a rather big shock, it had fluffy pink fur that was exactly the same color as her mane and its red mane was at the same length Fluttershy had her hair before Stanley fixed things. It didn’t take long for Fluttershy to register that she was holding a sleeping little filly.
“How…” It was hard to put into words what she was seeing but Fluttershy was pretty sure that was the main question to ask. She carefully unraveled the rest of the filly, her tail looked as luxuriant as Fluttershy’s did and it was only her red mane that looked chopped short as if by a knife. A moment later she finally noticed a defining feature of the little filly, she had large bat wings. Covering the shivering filly back up with the blanket brought Fluttershy’s attention to the two cute little fangs poking out of her upper lips.
“My magic did exactly as I said it would. I healed you, but I also created a child. Don’t honestly know how it happened though unless… well the dark magic was rather clingy.” Taking up a thinking pose Stanley watched as Foxglove flew around pouring tea for four, Roller had declined a cup for himself and Shush was thirsty. Shush could act rather ladylike in sipping her tea, despite the fact that she was constantly wandering away from the table and climbing up the walls and was in general distracting to poor Stanley who had a moment of insight. “I think I know what happened, all that clingy dark magic that twisted your form was rather hard to separate from you and it must have clung to the blood coming out of you when my healing magic went into you. Must have pushed the dark magic into the blood that my magic wasn’t going to heal, my magic caused the dark magic use itself up to create a new body somehow using my ability to bring things to life. Since it was your blood… can I say this was a happy accident at least? It took a lot out of me and I really do like children.”
Hanging in the air were the unsaid words that this little bat filly was Fluttershy’s magical child, at least the pony didn’t have to go through childbirth to have one of her very own. The little filly’s nose wrinkled and she yawned before opening her bright purple eyes; she stared up cutely at Fluttershy before she started screeching softly. Apparently she had gained Fluttershy’s disposition for not making loud noises and was softly crying out for food.
“Oh my, she’s hungry. Can I bother you for some fruit Stanley or something else to feed her with?” When she got home Fluttershy just might buy out Applejack’s orchard if this little vampire fruit pony was as apple happy as she had been.
“Oh sure I have fruit, anything in particular though or something that you don’t think she can eat?” Seeing two shakes of the sudden mothers head, Stanley went off and gathered a bowl fruit. He set it on the table and watched Fluttershy pick out a banana.
Holding the banana to the little filly’s mouth she opened wide and sunk both her tiny fangs into it and began suckling on it greedily.
“Now now not too fast, you were just born recently and I don’t want you to get a tummy ache.” The suckling slowed at Fluttershy’s hearing voice; the banana started rapidly turning brown and withered to almost nothing before it was pulled away. The little vampire fruit pony gave a soft screech that it was still hungry. “Oh you’re fur is so soft, just like your voice.”
This time Fluttershy held up an apple and nervously placed it in the path of those two fangs again, the filly didn’t treat the apple any differently than the banana. At least the apple lust that had gripped her previously wasn’t going to be a problem in this filly’s future… provided nothing else went wrong with the filly that was just born out of magic.
Fluttershy dropped the now shriveled husk of the apple and noted that the little filly giggled happily, after a moment the filly screeched again for more food and then she started feeding her grapes one at a time. After draining the juice from the grape the filly would swallow the remains with a smile on little her face.
“She is a hungry little thing isn’t she, so what are you going to call her?” Foxglove got the little filly to coo at her as she flew a circle in the air above her and performed several swoops. After one swoop she had a cricket cookie in her claws. She landed on the table and started nibbling away at it, before carefully lifting her cup of tea to take a sip.
“I think I’ll call her Soft Echo.” Fluttershy put the next fruit up to Soft’s lips and the filly became incredibly exuberant the second the bite landed. Soft had really liked the kiwi fruit which was a little odd. She started patting the little fluffy filly on the back; her fur was as silky as Fluttershy’s mane. “Is that okay my little Soft?”
The little filly gave off a gentle burp and snuggled into Fluttershy’s caressing hooves. Flicking an ear Fluttershy could hear Bonnie outside at the bridge and she turned her head and saw a magical outline of Bonnie and several other being. She still had the echo sight and enhanced hearing? Well Stanley did say there might be some side effects. She picked up a cup of tea while holding Soft in her other leg and took a sip, it tasted like it had honey in it. Life seemed more vibrant to her and things were looking up.
-
The dispatched WEE people that had attacked Shego and Tubbimura during their fight had been picked up by Global Justice. GJ was led to believe Kim took care of them with Ron and that they were after her personally, all the while everyone else had hidden out of sight. Kim hadn’t offered up Shego on a silver platter for a number of good reasons. Aside from that, Bonnie had acquired the interest of no less than three groups of heroes who were all there for their own personal reason.
“So let me get this straight, you are a woman who was hit by a magical alien comet which explains your powers of throwing plasma balls like one of my brothers. You two are the guardians of New York’s magical side, a half human hybrid and his dog. You two at least remember the problems you had with my youngest brother Stitch back in Hawaii… honestly don’t know how you could have possibly mistaken him for a messed up leprechaun. You three are world traveling average everyday people and mole rat who do ridiculously over the top heroic things all the time, not to mention the mole rat looks an awful lot like my brother Launch minus the spines and you have also seen my family in Hawaii. You four are the ‘Xiaolin Dragon Warriors’ along with their pet dragon who are fated to fight against dark forces that wish to harm the world, which explains the reason why you can toss all those elemental blasts around like candy. Am I missing anything aside from the fact that I’m an alien and Cobra is a top secret agent of the biggest alien cover-up operation across this whole freaking planet?” Bonnie actually gave them all a moment to let it sink in that this was by far the most bizarre convergence she has likely ever seen. “I swear this has got to be the oddest collection of people I’ve ever seen on this planet in one location.”
“I’m not a pet dragon, I’m an iguana!” After a moment the little soot spewing dragon known as Dojo slapped his face once he realized what he said and Bonnie smirked at his stupidity. “Right I’m not a pet or an iguana... though I didn’t know dragons took to hiding amongst humans. It’s probably why Chase Young can’t find them at all; he’s actually quite a danger to the magical world side of things. We’ll need to talk to you all about that Jake, it’s rather important that dragons don’t attract his attention as he might try to commit genocide for that evil soup of his.”
“Right, everyone who has wallets I’m sorry for stealing them from you, also here’s that computer chip thing I took from you minutes ago before we arrived at this bridge where Roller’s tracks come to a stop.” Bonnie turned to the people and started handing out wallets, Shego looked particularly stunned that someone managed to steal something from her without her noticing as she was the best thief born to this planet. Then again Shego was barely standing and had been recently patched up; her shoulder was still a mess. They were at the bridge and saw the small line that was obviously Roller’s path through the grass and a bit of dirt led to the underside of the bridge and then nothing. It was curious spot, so Bonnie was going to wait here for something to come up. “I’m still a galactic class thief after all; I have to keep myself sharp you know. Now where is my little trouble magnet?”