Allies Assembling
Don't panic. That was the mantra Ditzy was silently repeating as she found herself alone in the infinite star-speckled void of space with the Mare in the Moon. Don't panic. She filled her mind with the phrase, plastering it across her psyche in big, friendly letters. It was preferable to thinking about the ebon alicorn who was looking at her bemusedly.
"I should think that my presence must surprise you," said Nightmare Moon. "I know for a fact that the converse is true." She gave a brief start, then a soft laugh. "Oh! Listen to me, I sound like a zebra."
This stopped Ditzy's recitation cold. The Queen of Everlasting Night making casual conversation? Laughing at herself? Here on going was heck the what? The pegasus swallowed nervously and eked out, "A-as you say, Your Caliginous Majesty."
This was met with a larger smile. "Ooh, 'Your Caliginous Majesty'. I rather like that one. I'll have to remember it." The Mistress of Eternal Darkness sat, putting her eye-to-eye with her guest. "Oh, do relax, my little pony. I'm not going to bite."
If one was generous, one could describe Ditzy's response to this as sitting down. Those more concerned with accuracy would say that her knees gave out. "F-forgive my impudence, o Requiem of Sanity, but you seem less..." The mailpony wracked her vocabulary for a diplomatic way to end the sentence.
Nightmare Moon did it for her. "Enraged? Vengeful? Insane than a drunken draconequus? Stop me at any time, dear, I could go on for days."
"How about 'intimidating'?"
"Charitable, but still accurate." The Emperess of the Void gave another smile. "Well, for one, spend a thousand years on a truly desolate wasteland with only yourself for company, and we'll see how sane you are upon your return.
"For another, ponies these days no longer equate sunset with bedtime. My nights are genuinely appreciated now. I even have cults! Do you have any idea how much fun it is to have a cult dedicated to you? It's like having the most adorable fan club filled with ponies who will do anything if they think it will make you happy!"
"Huh." Ditzy could offer nothing more coherent, her brain still stuck on Nightmare Moon saying the word "adorable" without a hint of sarcasm or irony.
"Oh sure, eternal night would be nice, but it doesn't really feel necessary anymore, you know? My work isn't ignored anymore, it's adored! Really, banishing the sun would be gilding the lily at this point."
A question nagged at the pegasus's mind. "If I may ask, well... why are you still here?"
This brought out an indulgent smirk that Celestia would recognize as a Number 61, "Student laboring under an understandable misapprehension. "Tell me, young..."
"Ditzy Doo, milady."
"Tell me, young Ditzy, what is the nature of Nightmare Moon?"
The planeswalker mulled this over. She had only seen the Tyrant of the Furthest Reaches briefly during the Summer Sun Celebration, and her mana sight had mostly shown an amorphous blob of night sky. Now, all she could see was an alicorn of deepest black garbed in regalia of silver and steel, with only her mane matching Ditzy's memory. Finally, the blonde admitted, "I don't know."
"Not surprising." The slit-pupilled princess said this neutrally, an observation rather than an indictment. "The most learnéd sages of Canterlot have formulated countless hypotheses that try to answer that question. 'The Nightmare is a parasite of the soul.' 'The Nightmare was planted into Luna's mind by Discord.' 'The Nightmare is Luna, and she plots a coup against her sister still.'" The alicorn noticed the unease this last one brought to Ditzy, gave what she hoped was a reassuring smile, and added, "They're all wrong, especially the last."
They grey mare relaxed. A little. "So what are you?"
Nightmare Moon shrugged, a feat made much easier with her impressive wingspan. "It is not a question to which I have given much thought. If I had to guess, I would call myself the new moon to Luna's full. The same thing, only darker."
"I thought you said the 'you are her' theory was wrong."
"Oh, make no mistake, as far as I can tell, I am she and she is me and we are us. But neither of us wants to overthrow Celestia. Not anymore."
Ditzy was now so deep in thought that she had largely forgotten where and with whom she was. "So what did the Elements of Harmony do, exactly?"
The Black Regent's gaze wandered to some distant point in the endless expanse. "They gave me something that I would have never accepted through another medium, the only things that could quench my rage and restore my sanity."
"What?"
The smile on the Nightmare's muzzle was uncannily like Celestia's. Maternal, wise, and unquestionably sincere. "Love and tolerance."
The pegasus could think of only one response to something so profound. "Huh."
"It may not seem like much, but friendship really is magic, and a most potent one at that. The Elements are the ultimate expression of that magic." Nightmare Moon looked up at some sign only she could see. "It appears that this little tête-à-tête is drawing to a close."
Ditzy had a hunch that learning how the alicorn knew that would take more time than she had left. Thus, she simply rose and bowed. "Thank you for a most enlightening audience, Your Highness."
The dark noble still wore that smile so uncannily like her sister's. "Thank you, Ditzy Doo, for bringing some variety to my existence." She faded into the aphotic background, and one by one the stars began to wink out.
As they did, shadowy surfaces came into view beneath Ditzy, and the stars that hadn't vanished grouped together in the east. They resolved themselves into the Sun in a display not unlike the biggest flashbulb in the universe, and the pegasus recognized the gently rolling hills to the north of Ponyville.
She also recognized that Dinky, Trixie, and Luna were all staring at her. "What?"
"You collapsed once we materialized," explained the showmare.
"You've been unresponsive for nearly a minute," added the night princess.
Dinky seemed far less concerned now that the pegasus had come to. "Mommy was just thinking."
The mailmare couldn't help but smile. She ruffled her daughter's mane and said, "That's right. Mommy was finishing up her master plan to save Ponyville from the monsters."
The young unicorn reared back in excited delight. "Coolest mommy of all time!" She raced towards the town, crying, "Monsters beware! Here comes my Mommy!"
Ditzy's maternal mirth was interrupted by a pair of skeptical stares. "You were braindead on your hooves," Luna stated. "I was about to resort to electroshock. What really happened?"
The pegasus squirmed. Somehow, she didn't think the knowledge that Nightmare Moon still lurked somewhere in the younger princess would go over well. "I promise to tell you when we have the time, but right now, I need to keep an eye on my daughter." She took wing before Luna could ask more authoritatively.
Trixie swallowed the lump that had grown as she became increasingly alone with her regal tutor. "We should probably follow, Your Highness."
"Go," the princess answered absently. "We shall arrive in Our own time."
The lump came back with a vengeance. The blue unicorn gave a low bow. "As You will." She then ran for the town like her tail was on fire. Luna rarely employed the royal "we" anymore. When she did, there tended to be rather spectacular meteor showers the following night.
"Red Lobster to Book Fort. Come in, Book Fort."
The response crackled over her crustacean headset. "This is Book Fort. Reading you loud and clear, Red Lobster."
"I'm beginning the final sweep. Confirm feed reception."
"All angles confirmed." In the base, Twilight hesitated for a moment. "Be careful, Rarity."
The pilot couldn't help but give a coquettish grin at this. "Codenames while I'm in the cockpit, dear. Initiating final sensor sweep."
The Fabulosity was, like its pilot, lightly armed but highly sensitive to even the tiniest detail. Just beneath the jet's streamlined fusilage lay countess sensors capable of extracting virtually any conceivable information. Also like its pilot, the plane was capable of breathtaking grace and poise, slipping over enemy territory wholly unnoticed nine times out of ten.
A sudden lurch made it clear that this was not one of them. "Red Lobster! I've lost starboard thaumeters four and five! They're showing nothing but polka dots!"
The ivory unicorn felt her blood chill. "Tachyon weapons..." Tachyons, the elementary particles of ugliness, were one of the Fabulosity's greatest weaknesses. If Rarity didn't get out of range soon, her beloved scout plane would be reduced to unspeakably hideous scrap. Oh, she would just die!
After a moment, she realized that she probably would die, what with the crash and all.
In any case, despite the twin threats of death and plaid, none of the Rarity's fear showed in her voice or her piloting. "Evasive manuevers," she said as calmly as she would an order at a café. "Disengaging from sweep."
She bobed and weaved, countering the brutish bursts of acid green and Day-Glo pink with elegant swoops and dives. Even as the skies grew choked with the smoke of vaporized polyester, the Fabulosity was a threaded needle weaving its way to safety.
"Nearly there," the pilot muttered to herself. As if summoned by this temptation of Fate, a naugahyde shell struck the plane directly. The aircraft was nearly torn in half, shards of the rock candy fuselage raining on the battlefield like sugared diamonds. Every screen and readout in the cockpit went blank, Twilight's frantic cries cut out, and gravity expressed its displeasure with Rarity's current altitude.
Despite all of this, the unicorn was smiling. Oh, it was by no means a pleased or satisfied smile. It was the manic rictus of a pony with nothing left to lose, ready to strike the match that would ignite a blaze of glory. "Passcode marshmallow omega one-one-two-three-five."
"Cataclysm contingency engaged. Goodbye."
She closed her eyes. "Goodbye, Fabulosity." A feeling of inner peace welled in her breast. By setting the magical reactor of the plane to overload, her final act would bring fifty kilotons of style to these ungrateful brutes.
I should probably intervene now.
"What?" Rarity looked around, mystified. That voice had been far more masculine than the prerecorded lines her dear little jet was programmed to produce.
Well, if I waited any longer, I can't imagine that it would be pleasant for either of us.
"Who's there?" Idly, the unicorn noted that gravity had had a change of heart, stopping her in midcrash.
"Hi, Sis!"
"Sweetie Belle?" Impossibly enough, her little sister was on top of her head.
"Wow, this is a really cool dream! I'm gonna have to tell Scootaloo about this!"
"But you're supposed to be... to be..." Somewhere in the fashionista's mind, a baton was passed from subconscious to conscious. "This is a dream." Everything but Sweetie became progressively grayer and duller.
Yes. And now its time to wake up.
Years in the past
Ditzy squirmed, neither ready nor willing to wake up quite yet. Then she paused as her drowsy mind tried to determine what wasn't quite right.
Well, for one, it was definitely colder than normal. Maybe there was a rogue cold front? It was still early in spring, after all. No, wait, she couldn't feel her comforter. And her bed felt far firmer than normal, totally unlike any cloud she'd ever felt. And there was some weird itch in her ear. Everything just felt off, but why?
"Ah, good, you're waking up."
Who was that? Why couldn't Ditzy open her mouth and ask who that was? Why couldn't she open her eyes either? Oh Celestia, why couldn't she move at all?
"Please, remain calm. You've just gone through a highly traumatic experience, and it would be best to ease you back into consciousness."
The pegasus fought to control herself. Listen to the voice. It is a calm, confident voice. The voice knows what it's doing. Steady, even breaths. Don't think about what the voice is talking about.
"Good. Now, I'm going to—"
Don't think about anything traumatic that might have happened recently. Don't think about how you got home and Dad's boss showed up. Don't think about Dad's hat, singed with lightning. Don't think about how it may be the biggest piece of him they could find. Don't think about how you'll never, ever see him again.
"Oh, come on. You were doing so well."
Don't think about it. Don't think about it. Don't think about it don't think about it dontthinkaboutitdontthinkaboutitdo—
Ditzy squirmed, neither ready nor willing to wake up quite yet. Then she paused as her drowsy mind tried to determine the origin of an odd feeling of deja vu.
"Good, you're awake. Now, let's try this again."
Again? What was this strange pony talking about? Wait, why couldn't she—
"Before you panic, know that I'm keeping you still so that I can ease you into wakefulness. This is going to come as a big shock to you, and I think you'd like to have something left of your sanity after we're through."
Okay. She could deal with this. This pony was keeping her still and she couldn't feel any restraints, so he had to be using magic. That meant he was a unicorn, and that plus the uncloudiness of whatever it was she was resting on meant she was on the ground. What he was saying certainly wasn't reassuring her, but it made sense. She'd lived in Cloudsdale all her life. The culture shock was probably best taken slowly.
"You seem to be taking this well. Good. I'll free up eye control for you."
Ditzy's eyes opened, and she had to blink furiously a few times to adjust to the sudden burst of sunlight. Wow, she must have been out for a while. In any case, this was the surface, huh? Not much to look at, really. A big ol' puddle (a lake, she corrected herself,) surrounded by bare rock. And beyond that...
There was no beyond that. The pegasus reflexively checked her internal altimeter, unreliable though it was. Still, she was able to determine that she was very definitely not at sea level. A mountain, then? Did mountains have lakes?
"You're beginning to panic again. Please calm down. We are presently airborne. This is what is called a sky reservoir. Think of it as a very high density cloud."
Oh sure, never mind that this cloud happened to have an outer shell of stone. Wait, did that unicorn just read her mind? Well, no surprise, really. If she was somewhere where they could make rocks fly, the unicorns must be something else.
"You flatter me. Magically speaking, I'm nothing special. My ability to follow your surface thoughts comes from the same means by which I'm keeping you from moving. Speaking of which, do you feel up to standing?"
YES PLEASE! Ditzy was rather surprised at the urgency of the thought. She hadn't realized how much this complete motionless was getting to her until now. She was a pegasus. She was made for wide, open skies. This restraint was just plain wrong.
"Done. Go ahead."
She did, stretching out the various kinks and cramps that had come from Celestia-knew-how long spent without moving.
"All right. Before you next act, allow me to assure you that I mean you absolutely no harm."
Ditzy had assumed as much. Now she found herself wondering.
"Now then, turn around please."
Feeling increasingly ill at ease, she did so. What had been behind her was not a unicorn, as she'd thought. Instead, it a creature out of filly tales. The antagonist of everything from The Three Little Geese to Little Red Gliding Hood. Her costume of choice last Nightmare Night.
It was a human.
Ditzy quickly discovered that she was still unable to scream, producing a light hiss like an imitation of crowd noise.
The human sighed. "Wonderful. Look, I have no intention of doing any of the things you're imagining. Especially not stabbing you and drinking the blood. Honestly, do I look like a vampire to you?"
The adolescent pony had to admit, the ape-thing certainly didn't seem to very threatening beyond being a human. It seemed almost... sad, somehow. A sort of sadness it didn't even notice. Her heart went out to the creature.
At least, it did until she noticed its right arm. Then Ditzy learned that the beast had paralyzed her wings again at some point.
"What, this old thing?" The human looked at the assembly of twisted metal as though it had just noticed it. "It's all the rage where I come from."
That's nice, the pony thought at the abomination before her. Could you let me use my tongue, please?
"Oh, of course. My apologies."
"No problem," she said reflexively. "Well, yes, yes there is. You're not going to enslave me, eat me, or do anything else out of the stories, right?"
"Nothing of the sort."
"Okay, fine. So what will you do with me?"
"Give you a better welcome to the Multiverse than what I got."
"The what-now?"
"The Multiverse." The human gestured, and a golf ball-sized blob of metal rose out of the water. Ditzy wondered how long she had been out if her captor had time to prepare visual aids. "Suppose that this sphere is your world of Equestria." A series of similarly sized balls joined the ersatz-Equestria. An open sphere the size of a pony's head made from twisted wire came last, and the balls found their way inside. "While the model isn't to scale, it is a passable representation of your home universe, what we call a plane."
"Home universe?"
"I know, it's quite a bit to take in." If he really did sympathize, his expression didn't show it. It had barely shifted from mild disinterest the entire time Ditzy had been looking at him. "But yes, this is your plane, known to the wider Multiverse as Ungula. It is but one of an infinite array of worlds spread throughout the Multiverse. I am what is known as a planeswalker, able to move between them. So too are you."
"What." It wasn't a question, just a flat statement of incredulity. So much that Ditzy lay down lest her spinning head make her fall off the lip of the reservoir.
"I found you between planes. You had just exited Ungula rather violently."
The pony thought for a time on how to respond. Finally, she settled on a rather basic question. "So where are we now?"
"A plane known as Ravnica. Nice place, if you like cities. If not, well, you're rather out of luck."
Ditzy nodded, understanding little. "Okay. Now what?"
"Now? Well, now that I've saved your life, I rather think that you owe me a favor, and I know exactly how you can do so."
Dinky charged forward, fueled by the energy of youth and limitless confidence in her mother. After all, she was a pegasus who could use magic! And she knew how to make super-awesome chocolate chip pumpkin muffins! Beating up a few lousy monsters would be foal's play for her.
"Dinky! Stop!"
The filly skidded to halt, looking up to see her mother swooping down to her. She was confused for a moment, then shook her head at her own foalishness. "Sorry, Mommy. I went and ran off before you could tell me my part of the plan." Dinky gave an eager grin. "So, what'll I be doing? Do I get a sword? A magic sword? Does the sword make puppies? Can—"
"We're not getting a puppy, Dinky."
"Aw..."
"And your part of the plan is to stay safe and as far away as possible from the fighting."
"Awwwwww..."
Ditzy's will fought with her heart. They found a compromise, and the pegasus swept her daughter into a tremendous hug. "I need to know you're going to be okay, Muffin, or I'll be so busy worrying about you that I won't be able to stop the monsters."
The young unicorn processed this for a moment before sighing in resignation. "Okay, I guess..." Her expression returned to the bright, hopeful smile. "But can you at least bring home a monster part?"
That prompted a smile to contrast with Ditzy's imminent tears. "I'll see what I can do, Muffin. Now please, promise me you'll go straight to Auntie Carrot's and stay there."
"Yes, Mommy."
"And if the monsters show up there, run."
"Okay, Mommy."
Reluctantly, Ditzy took to the air again. "I'll see you soon!"
Dinky waved goodbye. "Good luck!"
Sniffing still, the grey mare made her way to the outskirts of the town proper. She couldn't see any obvious signs of the elementals, but the entire town seemed wrapped in a multicolored haze. There was some serious magic going on in there.
"So, what's this I heard about a plan?"
Ditzy sighed. "Hello, Trixie."
The unicorn walked to her side. "I ask only because I assume you went over it while I was still expunging your hideous little cantrip from my memory."
"You don't plan on letting that go any time soon, do you?"
The showmare essayed a shrug. "I hold grudges. I'm working on it. So, plan?"
"The plan is telling my filly that I have a plan so she'll trust me to take care of things and keep herself out of harm's way. After that, I'll play it by ear."
"So we have no plan whatsoever."
"Eeyup."
Trixie looked at the pegasus. Assuming that one eye pointing at her meant that she could be seen, she made an incredulous face. "Why are you the leader of this little farce, again?"
"Because I was the only one in the entire universe who knew it was coming and knows what it is."
"Do you know how to fix it?"
"Working on that part." With that, Ditzy closed her eyes.
The showmare was about to deliver another verbal barb when her horn began to tingle. "What are you doing?"
"Working on that part." The pegasus expanded her senses, examining how the metaphysical landscape of Ponyville had changed since the advent of the elementals. When she stumbled upon one such shift, she barely stifled a laugh. "Wow, really? Really?"
"What is it?"
"You wouldn't understand," Ditzy said idly, confirming her observation.
"Oh," sniffed Trixie, "something about jet streams or pressure differentials or some such."
"No, magic."
"What!" Ditzy blinked. One moment, she'd been looking at the town's overfed leylines. The next, her view was full of indignant blue mare. "You dare imply that the Great and Powerful Trixie , student of Her Royal Highness the Princess Luna, would not comprehend the mysteries of the arcane?"
The grey pony gave the same patient smile she used for Dinky's tantrums. "Have you ever heard of Tolaria?"
Trixie deflated with an almost audible whoosh of hot air. "Toe-what-ia?"
"Ask Dinky to tell you the story of the silly old pony who blew up time. It's one of her favorites." Ditzy closed her eyes again, beginning to establish a mana bond to an especially swollen nexus of energy. "For now, all you need to know is that there was once an academy there, not unlike Celestia's, and it was a potent source of magical power for those who possessed many magical items."
"So?"
"So, the Carousel Boutique has become something similar, and I have quite a few enchanted curios in my attic." The blonde mare opened her eyes. They were solid ovals of blue luminance. "Next stage of the plan: Reconnaissance."
Trixie opened her mouth to comment on the sudden existence of a plan, but she found herself speechless as Ditzy's spellcraft proceeded. The blue light expanded out of the pegasus's eye sockets like a soap film from a bubble wand. Two by two, spheres seperated themselves from the billowing energy. Once half a dozen orbs of light had formed, their creator's eyes went back to normal, and she smiled with the unique sense of fulfillment that comes from a spell well cast.
The unicorn finally found her voice. "What are these things?"
"These," answered Ditzy, "are probes." As she spoke, a golden film of energy settled into place on a circular patch of each probe, giving them the appearance of floating eyes. She continued, "I'd send them out whenever I travelled somewhere new to get a sense of the place. Lay of the land, local customs, that sort of thing."
"I... see." Trixie had never seen a spell like this before. Hesitantly, she poked the nearest magic eye with a hoof. It was firm, yet yielding, like the stress toy Her Nocturnal Majesty had given her. "So, what will you do with them now?"
"Find each elemental. See what is, what it's doing, and what obvious weaknesses it might have." With a thought, Ditzy brought the milieu into formation in front of her. Each one, the blue mare noted, was more or less looking in the direction of its mistress, but its gaze was slowly drifting in a seemingly random direction. "You know your assigned targets," said the planeswalker. "Seek them out." The spheres sped off towards town, two of them splitting off to head for different parts of the outskirts.
Trixie sat down. She tried to disguise her awe with nonchalance. "So, I suppose we wait for them to report back, then?"
The grey mare nodded, still looking at Ponyville. "It won't take long. I've got a passive mental link to them. If I focus, I can see what they see, and they can tell me when I should focus." Suddenly, her ears perked up. "Like now!"
An awkward silence followed this exclamation. Well, awkward for Trixie, at least. Eventually, she uttered, "So, could you—"
Ditzy, who had until now been utterly motionless, gave a gasp and a wince. "Ouch. Bad way to go."
"What happened?"
"Wha? Oh! Trixie!" The pegasus grinned sheepishly. "Sorry, guess I got lost in my own head there."
The showmare rolled her eyes. She wanted answers, not apologies! "What happened?"
"Well, I sent each probe to the home of one of the Bearers of the Elements. The one that went to Twilight Sparkle told me to follow its feed."
"Twilight Sparkle!" Trixie sprang to her hooves at the name. "What has she done? What manner of menace has she unleashed? How can we thwart her fell minion?"
Ditzy considered several reactions before settling on "concerned". "That's just the thing. I didn't see a magic elemental. I didn't even see Twilight. Once the probe got close enough to the library, it was torn apart."
The blue mare was aghast. "What could do that?"
"High ambient magic. My probes are basically clumps of energy kept stable by being much more magical than their surroundings. In a strong enough magic field, they basically dissolve." She noted the terror this brought to her audience. "O-of course, that only happens to something made of pure energy! We'd be fine."
Trixie relaxed. A little. "Ah. Well. So, I suppose my archrival and her new pet will have to remain a mystery for the time being."
Tactfully, the blonde chose to correct only one of the misapprehensions in that sentence. "Actually, that kind of intensity means that the magic elemental hasn't formed itself yet."
This prompted a look of delight from the unicorn. "Even better! We can stop her before she even gets started!"
"We still have five others to worry about." Ditzy paused for a moment to check the probes. "I've found two of them. Do you see the pink building that kind of looks like a wedding cake?"
Trixie scanned the horizon for a moment, then grimaced. "Much as I wish I couldn't. Yecch."
"A rather docile-seeming entity is in there. See if you can subdue it."
Ever the performer, the silver-maned mare held her head up high. "Not to worry. I shall make it rue the day it met the Great and Pow—"
"Good. If I end up needing help, I should be easy to find." With that, Ditzy took to the air.
Trixie watched her fly off, then carefully swept the immediate area for any witnesses. Satisfied, she allowed herself a pout and whispered "Meanie" before heading off to her objective.
Scootaloo was not having an awesome morning. The toaster had reduced her breakfast to charcoal, Dad had mentioned having to go shopping for school supplies, and Mom had said something about signing her up for, ugh, ballet classes. The orange-coated filly didn't care how much strength and agility dancing needed, the tutus were a dealbreaker. But that just led to her mother getting weepy-eyed about her tomcolt of a daughter and moaning about something involving cats and parades and carpets. It all went over the foal's head, but Dad seemed to find it hilarious.
Hopefully, things would improve now that Scootaloo was away from the drama queen. All she had to do was get the other Crusaders for some end-of-summer cutie mark attempts, assuming she didn't first run into—
"Get away from me, you little—!"
"Rainbow Dash!" The filly gazed up in adoration, seeing her hero performing incredible feats of aerial agility. It was like Dash was performing just for her!
It took a moment for the other presence to register, given Scootaloo's fangasmic tunnel vision. It seemed to be following the Best Young Flier turn for turn, loop for loop. Indeed, rather than reveling in her own athletic prowess, Dash seemed to be performing acrobatics as evasive maneuvers. But that didn't make any sense. Why would the living embodiment of awesome be running from a cloud? Indeed, what kind of cloud could even move on its own, much less keep up with the Rainbow Dash? Not even the Everfree Forest could—
Scootaloo's brain cut off this train of thought to devote all of its cognitive power to basking in the glory of a Buccaneer Blaze. Once the organ rebooted, it alerted its owner that her idol was coming to a landing right in front of her. The fanfilly immediately took hold of the opportunity. "Hi, Rainbow Dash!"
The cyan pegasus, exhausted from her attempts to shake the living thundercloud, offered a weary smile. "Hey," she managed between pants.
The winged Crusader took a deep breath, ready to bombard Dash with admiration. However, before she could begin, her expression shifted to one of fright and confusion. "What is that thing?"
Dash bit back a groan and looked behind her. Sure enough, there was the freaky rainbow cloud. She fought the increasingly appealing temptation to collapse. All that effort and nothing to show for it. "I don't know," she grumbled, "but it won't leave me alone."
Scootaloo looked at the strange being with new eyes. Followed somepony everywhere. Copied that pony's appearance. That pony didn't know who, how, or why. The foal's eyes narrowed. "Oh, hay no."
"Watch that mouth, Scoots," chastised the other pegasus. "You never know when a parent might be in earshot." Dash smirked internally. Who said she was a bad influence?
Still, her hard-won life lesson went unheeded. "Dash," said the filly, "I think I can help you with your problem."
The rainbow-maned mare raised an eyebrow. "I appreciate the offer, but I don't think you're gonna get a cutie mark for dealing with annoying weather."
Once again, Scootaloo wasn't listening. Instead, she was staring into the twin gouts of rainbow flame that served as the elemental's eyes. The loyalty elemental, an inchoate mass of emotional and magical energy loosely bound to a nebulous form, had nothing as sophisticated as a language. What Scootaloo was attempting, though, went beyond language. More accurately, it went beneath language, into a peculiar stretch of the misty depths of the unconscious.
It was known to a select few, and dismissed by many as a myth, or at best a collective hallucination. The few scholars who knew the truth called it the fanmind, an empathic connection born of enthusiasm and desire for a common subject. The fanmind was what turned a horde of screaming adolescents into a pack of ruthless predators bent on overwhelming their common prey. Now, it was serving as the means of communication between Rainbow Dash's two most obsessed devotees.
Scootaloo brought herself into a classic charging pose: Head down, legs tensed, wings flared. She is mine.
The elemental spread its arms wide, their constituent clouds bulging. Arcs of multicolored lightning danced around it, leaving a familiar afterimage in the filly's vision. I am hers.
The pony considered this for a moment. She assumed a proud and erect posture, appearing to imitate a royal guard. One eyebrow slowly rose. We could...
Twin fireballs burst from the apparition's eye sockets. Agreed.
"Um..." Ironically, Dash felt sorely out of her element. She could tell that something was going on. Indeed, some hint of understanding itched at the base of her brain. Still, she had no real grasp on what was happening.
When the thing that had been following her all morning kowtowed before Scootaloo of all ponies, it only served as a confirmation. Ditto said filly jumping onto its shoulders, her mane poofing into a purple parody of Pinkie Pie's in the process.
Everything became clear after the cloud straightened up. Mostly because it's hard to misinterpret somepony pointing at you and shouting "Get her!"
Spike greeted the day with a tremendous jaw-cracking yawn. Then he paused for a moment, because there had been far more crack to the yawn than he had anticipated. Furthermore, hadn't he been molting? He certainly hadn't been able to open his mouth last time, trapped as it had been under the dead scales.
He also hadn't been able to open his eyes, but he did now. A quick self-assessment showed a marked difference from the last molt. That had been similar to a shedding snake, the hatchling trapped within the pale shell of his old scales until he squirmed out through the mouth. Now it looked more like he'd try to put on clothes he'd long outgrown, the old layer torn apart at joints and shifts in physiognomy.
Spike moved to the vanity to get a better view. Those shifts proved to be major indeed. His muzzle protruded a bit more, his tail was slightly but noticably longer, his proportions were more mature and less infantile. He'd definitely gained at least an inch or two in height, and though the crests along his cheeks and the top of his head hadn't grown in fully, they seemed sharper, less rotund. The young dragon gave his reflection a roguish grin. "Lookin' good there, Spike. Lookin' good."
Of course, being the mature fellow that he was, it goes without saying that Spike did not giggle in delight at this development. He also didn't jump up and down in glee, nor did he make various poses in the mirror. Nope. Didn't do any of that.
Once the maturing young cesium dragon was done with very definitely not indulging his vanity, he noticed something else in the mirror: A large lump in his boss/big sister/surrogate mother's bed. Spike felt a surge of both affection and dread. "I hope she took care of herself while I was out of commission," he whispered. "I should go talk to the other girls, make sure of it."
His mission decided, he strode purposefully out of the library. The hatchling then had to stop, since a ring of ponies had surrounded Books and Branches. At first, Spike tried to slip through the circle, but the ponies were shoulder-to-shoulder, and he wasn't quite as tiny as he still thought he was.
After insinuation came diplomacy. "Excuse me," he said to the nearest member of the barricade, a blue-coated unicorn stallion, "could I get through?" The unicorn gave no indication that he had heard anything. Indeed, save for the slight rise and fall of his chest and the occasional blink, he gave no indication that he was alive. He just stood in place, directing a glazed stare at the tree.
Still, Spike had been raised by Twilight Sparkle, and if nothing else, that upbringing had instilled in him two values: Persistence and faith in the problem solving power of experimentation. Thus, the dragon repeated this one-sided exchange with several more ponies before giving a frustrated sigh. "I've had better conversations with Owloysius."
"Who?"
"Oh, don't you start—" Spike cut himself off. Twilight's number-two assistant was on vacation. That meant somepony had actually reacted to him. A quick scan of the crowd revealed one pony who seemed a bit less catatonic than the rest. Even better, it was one he recognized from her frequent patronage of the library. "Lyra!"
The mint-green mare slowly tore her gaze from the building. "Spike. Hi." "Less catatonic" was clearly a relative term here. Her eyes were unfocused, and the dopey smile was certainly nothing like her deadly serious expression during her "private research".
Still, the dragon didn't need much. "Hey, do you think you could move for a sec? I've been asleep for a few days and I'd like to catch up with Rarity. And the others. ...And Rarity."
"Move?" Her blank expression made it clear that even the thought of leaving the spot was inconceivable.
Fortunately, while Twilight had raised Spike, he was in many ways her compliment. Nowhere was that more obvious than in socialization. He made it a point of remembering the library's more frequent customers, since it was fairly obvious that nopony else was going to. Thus, he knew one tactic guaranteed to work on Lyra. "Wouldn't you like to tell Bonbon about how great this place is?"
"Bonbon?" The unicorn blinked, then gasped. "Bonbon! You're right! She'll love this! I gotta go get her!" She awkwardly backed up, pressed as she was against her neighbors. Presciently, Spike followed close in front of her. Once both had extruded themselves, the ring of ponies immediately moved closer to the tree until its constituents were again flank-to-flank.
The hatchling looked back as he resumed his walk to the Carousel Boutique, then gave a shrug. Ponies. Go figure.
Never did it occur to him to wonder why everypony entranced by the library was a unicorn.
Marion Mare had been mayor of Ponyville for nearly twenty years, running on a platform of experience, minimal government interference, and nopony else wanting the job. It was widely agreed that she had met the challenge of maintaining peace and order on the edge of the Everfree Forest as best as anypony could. Oh sure, there was the occasional minor disaster, and the less said about Winter Wrap-Up the better, but the day-to-day operation of the town went more smoothly than most had dared to hope. Really, if the worst thing that could be said of a town within walking distance of the infamous wood was an annual logistical snafu, then the pony in charge clearly knew what she was doing.
In few instances was this more clear than when she walked onto her front porch, beheld Pinkie Pie atop the lovechild of a hydra and a balloon animal, and simply turned around, walked back inside, and locked her door.
"Huh," mused Pinkie after this episode, "I wonder what that was about."
The laughter elemental cackled at this, but offered nothing constructive.
"Pinkie!"
The party pony perked up upon hearing her name, but the call had no obvious source. Worse, it had echoed to the point where there wasn't even an obvious direction in which to look. Fortunately, the recourse was obvious. "Helloooooooo~," she called, flawlessly enunciating the tilde.
"Over here!"
This time the cry was much clearer. Pinkie turned to her left and spotted a rapidly approaching pegasus. She grinned and waved, recognizing the voice. "Hi, Ditzy!"
The other mare didn't respond until she got close enough to answer at a more socially acceptable volume. "Pinkie, I—"
"So, didja have fun in Canterlot? It's a shame you couldn't be here, you'd have been so proud of how Twilight handled the mail! Though I guess if you were here, she wouldn't have needed to handle it, but still! She was all, 'Dash, I need your best fliers.' and Dashie was all 'No, I need my best fliers!' and Twilight said 'Princess Celestia is counting on me to deliver the mail!' and Dashie said 'The plants are all counting on me to deliver rain!' and Twi—" The poofy-maned pony was abruptly cut off by the sudden disappearance of her mouth. She inquisitively ran a hoof over her face. Yup, smooth, unbroken skin.
"I'm sorry to interrupt," began Ditzy, white glow fading from her eyes, "but I need you to listen for a second. This thing you're riding is weakening the foundations of reality simply by existing. You need to—"
The elemental's yellow head interjected with a painful looking headbutt, sending the pegasus rocketing towards the ground. She barely managed to pull up enough to turn it into a furrow-chewing slide along the thoroughfare.
Pinkie was clearly displeased by this, judging by her expression and the volume of the indistinct sounds coming from her sealed jaw. The jumping up and down on the entity's head was probably also a tip-off, at least until she bounced off of it like a trampoline. Surprised by the bigger bounce, she couldn't react before landing on the couch-like upper jaw of the blue head. The earth pony sat up just in time to see the crimson balloon she'd dubbed "trollface" give the harshest, cruelest laugh she'd ever heard, directly and quite obviously at her.
That tore it. This thing had hurt her friend, clearly didn't care about anypony's feelings, and hadn't even applauded after her musical number! Such thoughtless cruelty would not be tolerated.
Glowering, Pinkie performed a breathtaking series of bounces off of the three inflated heads, coming to a stop at Ditzy's side. She felt an odd itching sensation as her lips reseperated. "You okay, Ditzy?"
"'M fine," came the rather dazed response. "M' face took mosta th' impact."
"Good. Now, what is it that I have to do to this thing?"
"Gotta d'stroy it. Sorry, no other—"
It was a good thing that Ditzy's head was still somewhat wedged in the earth. The grin that grew on Pinkie's face was not something that should be seen by the sane. "Don't worry. I got this."
The pegasus pulled herself up into a sitting position and turned to ask how. She got out a "Huh?" before everything exploded.
To mana sight, the world suddenly became a photonegative. The laughter elemental's bulbous faces were reshaped into three different flavors of horror and suffering, inexplicably wreathed in acid-green flames. The road had been transmuted into a cracked, glowing sheet of igneous rock, seething and steaming with volcanic potential.
Worst was Pinkie Pie. Her colors hadn't been inverted, simply deepened, going from cotton candy to blood. Her mane hung limp and matted with the vital fluid. From her eyes and mouth oozed a black ichor. Her tongue lolled out of her mouth, a vivid slab of raw scarlet meat against its tarlike backdrop. All the while, a single word echoed through Ditzy's mind. "ZALGO."
A second later, the town had returned to normal, save for two exceptions. First, the laughter elemental was clearly dead, its heads popped and its body dissolving into flakes of ash. Second, there was a pony hovering above Pinkie, apparently through the use of a propellor beanie.
"Who are you?" Ditzy asked of the newcomer.
"Exigencies coordinate simultaneous cheese cannons! Details at pi."
Understandably, this didn't answer her question. The pegasus turned to Pinkie for something more coherent (and what a sorry state of affairs that implied...) "What just happened?"
"Noodles squamously frondled—"
"Not you."
The earth pony smiled. "Oh, it's real simple. See, when Avatar of Discord enters the battlefield, I have to sack it unless I discard two cards. I went with Anger to give her haste and Fiery Temper so I could cast it via madness. So now, the Laughter Elemental's dead and we've got a five-three flier to take on the others!"
Ditzy took a moment to parse this as best she could. Then another. By the third, she decided to just latch onto one of the few things she'd understood. "From what I've heard, an avatar of discord is a shadow cast by the demon Rakdos the Defiler."
"Psh. Well yeah, on Ravnica." Pinkie replied, tonally insinuating that this was only slightly less obvious than water being wet. "Here, they end up looking like her." She grinned as she looked up at the peculiar purple pony. "I call her Screwball."
Screwball gave the pegasus a midair bow. "Would you like a chocolate milk of glass?"
This was all just too much for Ditzy. "Who are you!?"
Pinkie's expression turned solemn. "On Ravnica, I am the nameless patron totem of Rauck-Chauv, the Gruul festival of spontaneous vandalism. On Segovia, I am Apocalypse-Given-Flesh, accidental flattener of civilizations. On Kamigawa, I am Piki-Piki, kami of akki poetry and octopus hats. Oona, queen-mother of the faeries of Lorwyn, remembers me as the pony who tried to eat her. Nicol Bolas, elder dragon planeswalker, acknowledges me as the one being who has withstood his touch with sanity unchanged. Emrakul, The Aeons Torn, She of the Six Thousand Tentacles of Annihilation, considers me her therapist." A smile returned to her face, but this was not a sugar-fueled manic grin. It was the confident smirk of a being who had been almost everywhere and had tried virtually everything. Twice, in some cases. She concluded, "I am Pinkie Pie. I am a planeswalker. And I am on your side."
As is usually the best course of action with Pinkie, Ditzy decided to shelve her questions and just go with it. "You know, I think we can actually do this."
"Yeeee-haw!"
Both ponies turned to behold a behemoth, legs the shape and size of century oaks, head an apple the size of a house. A tiny smudge of orange was just visible atop its crown.
"Maybe," amended the pegasus.
Pinkie, the Festive 3BR
Planeswalker — Pinkie
+1 - Pinkie, the Festive deals 1 damage to target player. You gain 1 life.
-3 - Untap and gain control of target creature. That creature gains haste and "At the beginning of the end step, sacrifice this creature."
-6 - Each player reveals the top card of his or her library, puts that card into his or her hand, and loses life equal to that card's converted mana cost. You may repeat this process as many times as you choose.
4
Stats
Page generated in 0.08 seconds
Total duration
1,016 users online
27,665 hits today, 2,561,572 yesterday
FIMFiction
My Little Pony: Friendship is Magic Fanfiction
Designed and coded by knighty & Xaquseg - © 2011-2024
Follow & Support Us
Support us
SubStar
Chat!
Discord
Follow us
Twitter
MLP: Friendship is Magic® - © 2024 Hasbro Inc.®
Fimfiction is in no way affiliated with or endorsed by Hasbro Inc.®
So, what have we learned today?
1. Nightmare Moon is actually pretty decent when not suffering from extreme isolation.
2. Fangirl/boyism is capable of uniting beings from different planes of reality.
3. You portray a great Spike.
4. Pinkie Pie is still the best pony. Ever. Of all time.
And 5. Turns out I'm capable of laughing for five minutes straight. Did not know I could do that.
No wonder she told the CMC that crazy story about the rock farm; Ditzy is about the only pony around who could understand how she really got her cutie mark.
Quick question: I know that whatever is happening at Twi's place is going to be bad
but exactly how big a mess will Ditzy, Pinkie Pie and Tezzeret have to clean up and how many unicorns will be traumatized for life?
Pinkie is Emrakul's therapist? And survived an encounter with the Elder Dragon Nicol Bolas mentally unscathed? Dear god.
I mean, I always suspected that she was a planeswalker, but HELL. My mind = BLOWN.
Alright.
This fic is impossibly awesome.
You MUST continue this!
I'm not surprised in the least that Pinkie is a planewalker. Pinkie's rather long list of other planar accomplishments on the other hand was kinda surprising.
Just as I start to wonder how this story can get any better, you throw another hillarious curveball that leaves me eager to read more.
27782 The sensor spell is an original creation. Sort of. It would have been the card of the chapter, but Pinkie kind of overshadowed it. Here it is in card form:
Ditzy's Probe 1U
Creature — Eye Illusion
Flying
Players play with their hands revealed.
"First one to make a joke about my wandering eye swallows his teeth."
—Ditzy Doo
1/2
27800 That would be telling.
However, I will tell you that the truth to Pinkie's youth will be revealed next chapter.
Judging by the description of the Planeswalker that rescued Ditzy, would I be wrong to assume he's Garruk pre-Inistrad?
Ack, never mind, It's Tezzeret.
I am not a clever Pony.
"Nicol Bolas, elder dragon planeswalker, acknowledges me as the one being who has withstood his touch with sanity unchanged"
LIES!! My touch did have an effect on her sanity... [url=http://gatherer.wizards.com/Pages/Search/Default.aspx?text=+[madness]]It made her even more dangerous
She didn't get affected by Nicol Bolas. Wow.
This is so addictive. I want to go to sleep but I can't!
Pinkie Pie.
This last scene, and the song are simply beautiful
"So, what'll I be doing? Do I get a sword? A magic sword? Does the sword make puppies? Can—"
Here ya go!
gatherer.wizards.com/Handlers/Image.ashx?multiverseid=212640&type=card
Finally reading this. *looks at time* Mother of God... 42% read in an hour and 20 minutes. about 115-135 pages. And I got all the references, I think. *goes back to reading.*
I want a Pinkie Pie, the Festive.
Bolas touched her and she shrugged it off? I guess it won't work on those already mad.
5877323
Remember, her exact words were "sanity unchanged." You can't discard your hand if you already don't have any cards in it.
2506108
That's fine its only been about 1.5 hours for me and I know almost nothing about the Planeswalker mythos.
And we are all together?
Pinkie as a 'Walker, eh? As much as I know I should put seperation between this story and your others, Foamy, this makes too much sense for most of your interpretations of Pinkie.
Oh. Spoilers. Did I ruin too much for you, reader?
Lol! Pinkie's ulti is like Grumpy Bob exploded his frowniness so much that it inverted into the most painful smiles. Gotta love it when your opponent finds out they have like three Worldspine Wurms clumped together, eh?
Super Happy Wurm Time
*wiggles a giant "wurm" around*
At the time of my reading of this, "Fiery Temper" has been reprinted in standard... I would ask if you were a wizard but that would be obvious so instead I'll say
Hmmm, interesting interpitation of Nightmare Moon. I was not expecting her to be seen or to have such a calm demeanor about life and everything. Of course it makes sense, seeing as that now she would see how much fun ponies have a night now. I also love how Ditzy has been acing very motherly and knowledgebale throughout the whole thing, giving out help wherever she can.
Kind of wish we had seen the fight betweeen the two monsters though, would've been awesome to see.
So, did you plan of having the Elements of Harmony be the Body of Faust this far back, and so, by inference, it's her mother's love that brought her back to sanity?
You didn't specify "Run away"
too
it