Academy City was a very strange place.
The most obvious part of its peculiarity was its name. While it was true that more than half of the inhabitants were students, the true nature of the city was actually a giant research facility, with the students simply being one avenue of research. What did they teach at Academy City? Well, they unlocked the secrets of the human mind and granted psychic powers. While that may sound fantastic and impossible to those outside the city-state, to those inside it was a well-understood process with sound grounding in science and mathematics.
It was strange, but in this world psychic powers were a reality.
However, there was one girl in the city who did not belong there.
Ponyville was a very strange place.
The most obvious part of its peculiarity was its name. In a world where cities of ponies could be found most anywhere, many had questioned why the community was known as "the town of ponies". If somepony cared enough to research it, the name actually had a simple enough origin. When the Apple family originally moved to the fertile ground near the Everfree Forest, "the town of ponies" was actually a useful descriptor given the next nearest pony community was a week's travel away. Of course, that did not explain why so many had chosen over the years to move next to a monster-filled forest, but life was filled with such mysteries.
It was strange, but ponies were just one of many races in this world.
However, there was one mare in the town who did not belong there.
Index Librorum Prohibitorum was a short, slender girl of fourteen years of age. Her silver hair tailed down into the hood of her white and gold-trim habit. And despite being in the middle of the City of Science, Index was most definitely a magician, the claimer of a power that would cause even the brightest scientists to scratch their heads in confusion.
Index was not in Academy City because she wanted to be. She was there because, as the bastion of Science, it was the last place that a magician might track her down and attack her for the 103,000 magical grimoires she carried around inside her head. With that wealth of magical knowledge inside her, she was an irresistible target to any magician.
Unfortunately, at least two magicians had tracked her down regardless.
Zecora was a zebra alchemist. She lived in the Everfree forest to ensure she always had ingredients for her magical potions ready at hoof. Unlike ponies, zebras had no inherent magic but had more-or-less invented potion-making to fill in that gap in ability.
Zecora was not, strictly speaking, in Ponyville because she wanted to be. Living in a forest denied one most of civilisation's comforts, and there was a limit to what Zecora could build of wood. She had come to Ponyville, as she did every month, in the hopes that somepony would actually barter goods with her. For a town jointly founded by farmers and merchants, Zecora was finding it frustratingly hard just to buy food. Raw grass tasted no better to zebras than it did to ponies.
Unfortunately, nopony dared show their muzzle.
On the other hand, having memorised 103,000 grimoires made Index the undisputed expert on magic worldwide. If anyone could hide from a pair of magicians, it was her. Magic could seem like some unfathomable force to those unfamiliar with it, but the concept itself mostly revolved around symbolism.
For example, there was a certain Celtic myth that if mushrooms were found growing in a circle, it meant that place was an invisible space filled with fae and misfortune; so different that it could be said to be another world. Using that story, along with a handful of store-bought mushrooms, Index could create a circle inside of which counted as 'another world'.
Now, no magic was actually being used. No portals were actually created. But any spell created to 'search the whole world' would be invariably fooled by the circle whose contents were 'in another world'.
Scattering the mushrooms around a park bench, Index wrapped her habit tightly around herself and tried to get some sleep.
On the other hoof, maybe that was just as well. It meant that nopony was around when Zecora tripped over a tree root on the way out of Ponyville. No one was there as the contents of her saddlebags went everywhere. Magic could seem weird and random, even to a unicorn, but could mostly be understood if you knew what each of the parts of the magic was trying to do. Of course, having a half-dozen different intentions in the mix could create some truly bizarre results...
The Poison Joke that Zecora had carefully bottled up wanted to play pranks on people. The Heart's Desire wished only to grant its namesake. Nearly a full dozen different and very potent magical plants were now strewn across the ground, their jars shattered. The cork and glass seals Zecora had locked the magic in with were now broken. The juices from the various cuttings leaked into the soil, forming a circular puddle just outside the border of the Everfree.
Zecora frowned in annoyance and frustration as she saw many hours of collecting spill out onto the ground.
Index slept fitfully inside her self-made 'faerie world'.
Zecora got to her hooves as the puddle of magical ingredients soaked into the dirt.
Index jerked awake as she felt powerful mana collect right underneath her. Her 'spell' was powering up?! Where was it getting mana from? Had she tapped into a ley line or the Fung Shei of the area purely on accident?
Zecora reared back in surprise as the puddle of wasted magic abruptly started glowing bright purple. The ingredients were responding to something? But that was impossible, they shouldn't be reacting to each other like this!
She leapt clear of her Faerie Circle just in time for the bench she had been sleeping on to fall down, the ground seeming to cave in.
She leapt clear of the magical ingredients as the puddle began to rapidly eat into the ground, forming a deep hole.
Heart racing, Index frantically ran. Whatever that had been was undoubtedly a magical phenomenon, and even if it had been an accident, the magicians chasing her were sure to have sensed it too. She needed to run, and run fast.
Heart racing, Zecora galloped away. Mixing magic willy-nilly was always a bad idea, and Zecora didn't want to be anywhere near her impromptu potion just in case it decided to explode, or worse. "I would warn anypony I could see." She told herself. "But nopony will ever come near me. They will avoid this; they have that sense. I must hurry, this trouble could be immense."
As it happened, both Index and Zecora were familiar with the idea of two places that occupied the same space, but unable to affect each other. To Zecora, they were simply called worlds. To Index, they were known as phases.
It would be wrong to say that the two incidents formed a hole in-between the two locations. That would imply that the two destinations were relatable enough that each could call the other a 'world'. It would also, incorrectly, hint that small enough things could squeeze from one to the other.
What had formed might perhaps be better described as a crack.
However, this was not a crack in some wall. This was a crack in the fundamental rules that allowed two completely different stories to be told in the same place.
Being forced through a crack in stone might take some skin off. Being forced through this... would have very different effects.
It hadn't even been a day when that was first discovered...
Saten Ruiko was well known to investigate urban legends to the point of near obsession. To her, the sudden appearance of a deep hole in the park was a mystery that deserved her fullest attention.
She stared down the new hole with wide eyes. Was this a test of some new earth-moving technology? An esper taking out frustrations against the ground? Dropping to her hands and knees to place her head closer to the hole, Saten dropped a rock in and listened carefully.
Rainbow Dash was well known for being lazy when not on the job, but you would have to be crazy to ignore the glowing circle in the ground that marked a hole. Hovering over it, Rainbow let out a whistle when she realised she couldn't see the bottom.
Recognising the thing as clearly magic, Rainbow was perfectly happy to leave this to some unicorn to deal with. At least, she would have if a rock hadn't been ejected from the hole just fast enough to smash into her muzzle. Rainbow's head was knocked back, and a comical -bonk- noise was made as the rock bounced off Rainbow's lower jaw and back down into the hole.
Saten blinked as her rock whistled back past her face, catching it on the way down. Was there someone down there, throwing rocks back up to the people who dropped them? Obviously, this hole was shallower than it looked.
And with that foolish and tenuous logic, Saten lowered her body into the hole, arms grasping the sides, then slid down the sides.
Rainbow rubbed her sore jaw. Nopony clocks Rainbow Dash and gets away with it!
With a flap of her wings, Rainbow dashed down into the hole.
Saten was a carefree young girl. She was a level 0 esper, attending Sakugawa Middle School. She was friends with Uiharu Kazari, Shirai Kuroko, and Misaka Mikoto.
Rainbow was a self-confident, self-made mare. She ran the Ponyville weather team as its star pegasus. She was good friends with her flying camp buddy Fluttershy.
W-what is this? It feels like pieces of me are being torn away!
_____ was a carefree young ____. She was a ________________________________________________. She was friends with ______ _____, ______ ______, and ______ _______.
________ was a self-confident, self-made ____. She ___________________ weather ________________ pegasus. She was good friends with her ____________ buddy ________.
Did I just fall past some____....?
Satin was a carefree young mare. She was an earth pony with a Cutie Mark of a magnifying glass. She was friends with Gatekeeper, Stage Hand, and Railgun.
Rainbow was a self-confident, self-made girl. She was a master of weather magic, using the legend of Pegasus. She was good friends with her magician buddy Fluttershy.
I can see light!
Blinking at the sudden brightness, Rainbow Dash tried to get her bearings, the plastic wings on her back slowly flapping. She ran a hand through her colourfully-dyed hair while she hovered in place. She abruptly dropped to the ground as she realised that she was surrounded by skyscrapers - and that wherever she was, it certainly wasn't Humansville.
Satin -whoosh-ed up the side of the hole, up a good metre in the air, then -smash-ed back down on the ground. Shaking her head to clear her dizzy spell, Satin stood up on all four hooves. Her eyes widened enormously as she took in the rural surroundings.
Two stories, neither yet truly begun... already, both were irreversibly off track.