4:30PM - Afternoon tea with Bubble Berry
Two months ago, Twilight had gone through a slightly self-conscious phase – for her, which was saying something – and her magical mishaps had provided her with a new spell that let her know when ponies were watching her.
That had been a very unpleasant day. She was a princess! Of course ponies were watching her!
Once she had managed to turn it off, she had sworn up and down that she would never use it again unless it was for a serious ‘Fate of Equestria’ mission. She knew using it day-to-day was an incredibly bad idea, as it would only serve to make her that much more paranoid.
And yet it was one of those ideas that kept resurfacing – and right now it was on her mind because she was sure ponies were staring at her. Every time she looked around, though, they were just going about their business as usual, barely giving her a second glance.
So she hurried, moving on to her next, and thankfully final, appointment for the day. But even though she was walking through the streets as naked as she usually was (and she checked, repeatedly, every time she felt something brush against her side… someday she’d get used to those wings…) she felt like her every step was weighed down by those ornamental golden horseshoes a hundred times over, constantly having to fight to keep from dragging her hooves.
It wasn’t even Elusive’s actions, really, or any of the others.
It was her own.
After that heartfelt speech that had practically left her in tears, she’d basically done exactly the opposite of what Elusive had explained she – or Dusk, but whatever – was known for. She’d run out, given him the cold shoulder…
Elusive had apologised to her with grace when she had fled back inside even more flustered than she had left, and refused to hear her own apologies in exchange – acting much as if her little tantrum had never happened, and so smoothly and sincerely that she simply couldn’t find an opening to so much as apologise further.
She groaned. After everything she’d been imagining Dusk doing to her friends, she was probably being a far worse friend than anything he’d manage. Today was an absolute write-off, everything was going completely wrong…
Maybe I should just look into some memory-altering spells once I get back home and wipe the whole day from my memory…
No, that’s no good. If I do that then everypony else will remember me as a stallion for a day and I won’t have a clue what’s going on. If I’m going to wipe my memory I’m going to have to wipe everyone else’s, too…
She gave that a long moment of consideration.
…And that would be wrong.
She shook her head and trudged on ahead.
Maybe just a little…
…No, seriously, still so very wrong.
If this keeps up I’m going to have to find a personal memory-wipe spell to wipe out the memory of thinking so hard about mass memory-wipe spells so I don’t accidentally cast one and end up with a super-awkward friendship report about everypony panicking because we’ve lost a year and nopony can remember why I have wings.
And why do I suddenly have this horrible feeling that this has already happened once?
Argh! Magical memory manipulation cannot solve all of my problems. I need a distraction!
Twilight stopped and evaluated her surroundings. Everypony was still ignoring her, thankfully, which gave her free rein to look over the streets, desperately searching for something that would not involve her invasively rewriting sections of an entire town’s brains.
Study!
Yes. Study. Priority five. Not terrorising populace, not hurting friends, just learn what I can about the differences while I’m here.
It was still rather fascinating seeing the way that the differences carried over from gender to gender. Manes seemed to be mostly in the same fashion in both universes – shorter for the stallions, longer on the mares – although it was usually easy to see equivalents, the general patterns and styles remaining the same at the alternative length.
It wasn’t always the case, though. Applejack’s had been practically unchanged, and she could spot a few others that saw little difference. The ice-blue mohawk on unusually dark grey made Thunderlane’s counterpart instantly noticeable across the street, and differed only in its width. And… she sighed at the thought… Lyra’s cut had not been particularly long anyway, and what little she had seen of her stallion side here, through the red haze, had been almost identical.
Tails, on the other hand, were surprisingly the opposite – the fashions appeared to be switched, with longer tails on the stallions. Thinking back across her friends as stallions, most of them had had tails almost identical, with the exception of Rainbow Blitz and his jagged spectrum.
Regardless, even if she couldn’t put a name to each face, she could recognise just about every one of them… the flower brothers shutting up shop for the day… a stallion and mare with very similar hourglass cutie marks, but rather stunningly altered in colour schemes…
She blinked as she watched a familiar-looking plum-coloured stallion stagger out of a house and lean against the wall while he fumbled the door closed. Something clicked in her mind as she saw him against the door frame – the scene was hardly an unusual one for anyone who knew Berry Punch, but…
The feeling of something being off that had plagued her all day surfaced harder than ever.
The stallion moved off and started dragging his way through the town, doing a brief double-take as his eyes fell on Twilight staring at him, before bowing slightly and moving on past with a confused mutter.
Twilight looked around the square suddenly and then trotted up to a nearby house, standing up straight beside it and lighting her horn briefly, leaving a slight glowing mark in the air at her horn’s tip.
Stepping back but leaving the light where it was, she looked at the mark against the house and gave an excited grin.
The door is bigger!
She knew how tall she was compared to most Ponyville architecture – when she had her ascension-fueled growth spurt she was terrified that she would be bumping her newly extended horn on everything – and the door she stood beside was clearly higher than she remembered. It was only an inch or so, and her eye for detail made it clear that everything about the house – indeed, in the town – seemed proportionally the same, but it seemed that everything was built just a little bit bigger than the Ponyville she was used to.
That’s what’s been driving me nuts all day? How… anticlimactic. It was one of those subtle little things that really didn’t matter, but part of her found it fascinating. If the average height of ponies is taller because most of them are stallions, I suppose it makes sense. The difference isn’t even as much as between mares and stallions… so I didn’t see it before because everypony’s been the wrong height anyway.
She laughed triumphantly, moving down the street with renewed purpose. I finally figured something out! And I’m not even talking to myself out loud anymore! Ahh… if only there was anyone in town who would actually care about this…
It doesn’t matter! One more tick for the differences list. But the general architecture is still the same! What else can we check? Her ears twitched. Sounds! General marketplace chatter is deeper, that’s to be expected. I wonder if that has any effect? Maybe large magical predators have a slightly different hearing range to be optimised for such? …Wow, that’s morbid.
She grimaced and her ears twitched again. That sound is the same too! …Wait, what is that?
A buzzing combined with the rattling of wheels on cobblestone, growing louder…
Oh no.
She winced as the screech of the scooter-propelled cart’s wheels echoed over the market, and the whole contraption and its contents came to an admittedly rather impressive halt, sideways, less than her own body length in front of her.
And then there were Crusaders everywhere.
Observation assured her there were still only three of them – one yellow, one white, and one orange – but somehow she could have sworn there were at least twice that many at any one time as they ran around her and occasionally over her, bombarding her with observations, questions, and arguments without end.
“See, Silver, ’Buck! Told you Rainbow Blitz said Dusk was a filly today!”
“We know that, Scooteroll, we got told at school too!”
“Yeah, but Rainbow told us first, Applebuck!”
“How did you do it?
“Wow, you look really different!”
“That’s so cool!”
“Why did you do it?”
“Your wings are smaller!”
“Your face is smaller!”
“Does it feel really different?”
“Your mane’s all flat and straight!”
“Have ponies been treating you different?”
“Oh hey, it’s—”
“YEEP!”
The tirade of commentary was interrupted as Scootal— -eroll, apparently – led his investigation of her changes a little close to home, and in a quick whip of magic, Twilight had all three of them levitated in front of her with a familiar expression of fraying patience.
Three curious and cheerful smiles hovered before her.
Elusive’s little brother Silver – Silver Bell, she assumed – had much the same changes as his sibling. The mane was much shorter yet still immaculately curled, the tail still just as long; the muzzle a little longer.
Applebuck was the most different-looking of the three, and that could mainly be attributed to his discarding Apple Bloom’s red bow for a baseball cap, slung backwards. He was noticeably larger, both than the other two colts or Apple Bloom, and with the large Apple-stallion build already beginning to show.
And finally Scooteroll was… virtually unchanged. Seen from the front or top, she’d probably never have been able to tell the difference between the two… except, she noticed, that his tail was actually slightly kinked at points – not nearly to the same degree as Rainbow Blitz’s had been, but it was pretty obvious where the young pegasus had taken the style choice from.
Either that, or that’s just something that happens to speedy pegasi on this side? Maybe I should try to find a Wonderbolts poster or something…
Sighing, she stopped looking over her latest interrogators and tried to remember their questions.
“Yes. I am smaller. It doesn’t feel any different, but ponies have been treating me different. And I did it by accident.”
She closed her eyes and opened her mouth, ready to explain what was actually going on, but was quickly overwritten by, “Can you turn us into fillies too?”
Her mouth snapped shut.
She stared at the three of them, trying to process which one had actually asked the question, and as her brain caught up realised that all three of them had asked it together.
“…Really?” was all she could manage.
“Well yeah!” Scooteroll nodded enthusiastically.
“We wanna try!”
“We’ll be..
“The CUTIE MARK CRU—”
“NO!” Twilight cut them off in horror. “No! Why would you want that?”
The three of them looked at each other, then at her, with expressions of confused confidence as to why this was even a question. “Well… we figure maybe we can get our cutie marks…”
A flurry of horrifying images flashed before Twilight’s eyes, leaving her shuddering.
“Okay, first and foremost, I can tell you with absolute certainty that you are no more likely to get your cutie marks as fillies than you are as colts.”
“Awww, but practic’ly all the fillies in our class have their marks already!” Applebuck whined.
“Most of the colts do too,” Scooteroll groused.
“I bet there’s all sorts of things we could do as fillies that we couldn’t do as colts!” Silver crowed.
Every sane and sensible remaining part of Twilight tried to take control of her mouth and prevent the next question from escaping. It was almost like watching on in horror from outside her body, detached from the situation, as her mouth moved against her will. “Like… what?”
“I dunno! We won’t know until we try it!”
“We could model?” Silver suggested.
“Nah, that’s boring. Fillies are smaller, right? I bet if I was a bit smaller, I could fly better!” Scooteroll buzzed into the air briefly, grinning.
“Yeah, but your wings’d be smaller too, Scoot.” Applebuck shook his head.
“Oh…” He landed heavily, looking over his wings with an unsure expression.
“You could probably go faster on your scooter, though! Less drag!”
“But we’d definitely have to be fillies too, otherwise she’d be struggling to pull a heavier weight in the wagon.”
Twilight relaxed slightly as the colts started arguing about weight and power. Part of her was admittedly rather impressed at the grip the three of them had on the science behind aerodynamics. Another, more cynical part of her noted it as something that should have a very close eye kept on it, but that part of her had been getting enough of a workout today.
“Oh! And preening!”
…And yet it was still quite capable of a few flare-ups yet.
“Preening?” The other two looked at Scooteroll curiously.
“Yeah! Well, sometimes when I’m hanging out with Rainbow Blitz after he’s been doing stunts, he looks at some of the mares flying around and says something like ‘Wouldn’t mind preening that.’” He did a rather impressive imitation of his idol, which Twilight was in no state to appreciate. “So maybe if I was a filly, he might want to help me preen too!” His little wings fluffed out eagerly, also doing nothing for her peace of mind.
Applebuck cut in before Twilight could develop a solid rebuttal. “I don’t think that sounds quite right…”
“What would you know, not like you have wings to preen!”
“Not like ya know the first thing ’bout preening the wings you got!” The two colts were soon head-to-head, shoving and growling, only to have Silver jump up on the platform created by their struggle.
“Oh! Elusive says a mare who dresses well and acts right can twist a stallion around her hoof no problem!”
“Really?” Scooteroll jumped towards Twilight with shining eyes, leaving Applebuck to overbalance and collapse. “Is there some kinda secret filly combat style? That sounds awesome! Just twist Diamond Crown or Silver Ladle around…” He made a strange series of vaguely martial-arts-like motions and cries, clearly imagining some sort of strange battle.
“Yeah, but he said ‘dresses right’, Scoot. You wanna dress up?” Applebuck taunted, getting back up.
“Oh.” Scooteroll deflated, then stared up at Twilight with shining, huge, hopeful eyes. “Can you teach me it anyway, Dusk?”
“There’s… really no such thing…”
“Awww… I guess maybe they haven’t taught you either, since you’re not usually a mare…”
“Err, actually…”
“Grampy is always tellin’ Applejack he needs to bring home a filly to make more apples.” Applebuck put in thoughtfully. “I dunno what fillies can do different or what’s wrong with Red Gala but maybe we just need more fillies? I could help! Dunno why, but big bro always turns all red and changes the subject.” The youngest apple glanced at her friends to see if they had any idea, then up at Twilight. “Yeah! Just like that!”
“We could get colts to cover us!”
Twilight felt the world drop out from under her.
“Elusive always says a gentlecolt should always cover a filly’s bill when they’re eating out or shopping!” Silver nodded confidently.
“Are you alright, Dusk?” Applebuck stared at her in concern, as she slowly felt the world recover around her and regained her legs.
Fortunately for Twilight, the pause in determining if she was okay gave her a few precious moments to collect herself and consider her next words. “G— er, boys…” she managed to get out. “Look – even if I could, and even if I hadn’t already promised at least two ponies that I would never do so – would you really want a cutie mark in something that you could only do while you were a filly?”
The three of them pondered this for a long few moments.
“I don’t think I’d care, as long as I could wave it under Diamond’s muzzle,” Applebuck stated.
Twilight twitched and ground her teeth gently. Finally, she opened her eyes and gave a bright and entirely sane and stable grin. “Alright, colts! Here’s the deal – I’ll take you to Sugarcube corner and buy you whatever you want, so long as you promise to never, ever talk about this again.”
Three colts blinked up at her, then looked to each other, apparently conferring through some sort of crusader-based telepathy – …Because this situation wasn’t horrifying enough… – before looking up to her again with giant, thankful eyes, and nodding cheerfully.
Sighing, she headed off once again in the direction of her last friend’s workplace, three excitable colts in tow.
~-~-~-~
The moment Twilight stepped through the door of Sugarcube corner, she was going to get a party cannon to the face.
She knew that it was said, amongst ponies of not-particularly-great learning, that some very old ponies could develop nearly precognitive powers.
Well, not in those exact words, considering the education levels at play – but the thought was there. These ponies could sense events coming – wild storms, earthquakes, magical calamities, the Zap Apples – in the twitch or ache of an old hoof or feather, or the taste of magic on the wind.
Ponies of greater learning, such as Twilight, understood that those ponies were not so much precognitive, but had accrued a great deal of simple association and experience – though the changes they felt may not have been consciously noted, they subconsciously remembered those feelings, and perhaps others they didn’t even recognise, being felt before previous major events, and thus could predict their occurrences.
Once, Twilight had considered that maybe this sort of thing was a possible relation to Pinkie’s predictions… but she had discarded the idea simply because it implied that there was some sort of magical field Pinkie could interact with, that at the very least could sense things falling before they had even been knocked off their shelves – and that was basically the same problem, just on a larger scale.
The other problem was that Pinkie was only about the same age as she was, and such associations were supposed to take a lifetime of experience.
However, she found herself pausing at the entrance to Sugarcube Corner, and having flashbacks to making those very conclusions, because as she came to the door, she knew she would be hit with a sudden blast of confetti and sound. There was nothing she could say to prove it – she supposed she could feel Pinkie’s, or rather Bubble’s, magical presence inside, but she somehow knew without a doubt that the party cannon would go off.
Part of her briefly considered trying a different entrance to the store, or even teleporting inside; the same voice that warned her in the first place seemed to almost laugh at the idea that that would in any way prevent her inevitable and immediate cannoning.
Of course, the three colts behind her had no such compunction now that that they had reached their dessert-destined destination, and ran past her in a rush before she could stop them, bursting open the door and…
…running into a perfectly ordinary day at Sugarcube corner, with no partillery in sight?
She stared, the door held open to let her gaze into the bakery. She had been so sure, somehow, that something would happen, but… Just one more thing that’s gone wrong today… She sighed, stepping forward. Maybe I really am going cra—
BOOM!
A blast of noise, sugar-saturated air, streamers and confetti struck her full-on from above, making her jump straight up in shock.
Of course, with pegasus magic now part of her arsenal, such a jump could take her much higher than it once would. And with pegasus instincts still in development, this only made her panic further, grabbing onto the closest thing to hoof to prevent herself falling.
It took a few long seconds for her heart rate to calm (for what felt like the hundredth time today) as she clung to the soft… fuzzy… sugar-smelling form of…
“Hey there, Twilight!”
She blinked, opening her eyes and turning her head in line with her limbs, and finding herself cradled in the forelegs of an exceptionally pink stallion, bright blue eyes sparkling inches from her own.
A hoof slipped between their muzzles as the stallion brought it to his widely grinning lips, shushing her for a moment before pointing across the room. Following the hoof, she spotted a banner hung high on the wall across the room, above some of the omnipresent decorations of the bakery, out of sight of most of the shop:
‘Welcome-ish to Ponyville, Twilight Sparkle!’
“Welcome… ish?” She turned back to the earth pony, who shrugged.
“Well, you’re from Ponyville, but a different Ponyville! So…”
“I… guess…”
“So it’s sort of a party-ish!”
She tensed. “I… really don’t think I’m up for a party right now…”
“I know! That’s why it’s a party-ish! It’s sort of like a party, only nobody is really sure if it’s a party!”
“…Isn’t that like… any time when you’re around and not actively throwing a party?”
“Now you’re getting it!” Bubble grinned, and with a hop the two of them were back on the ground floor of the bakery, Twilight back on her hooves. She took a long moment to get her bearings, then blinked, looking up above the door.
“…Pinkie… err, Bubble Berry… what were you standing on up there?”
“My party cannon!” He grinned, petting the monstrosity by his side that she was absolutely certain had not been there a moment ago.
She stared at him, then at the cannon, then up at the entirely blank wall above the door again. “…But… what was the cannon attached to?”
“I was holding it up, silly!” Berry rolled his eyes at the apparent obviousness of the answer.
Twilight’s eyes flicked back and forth between her friend and the door a few times, her eye twitching dangerously, before taking a long breath and smiling weakly.
“You know, Bubble… I think that’s exactly the sort of normality I need from you today. Let’s just get a table.”
~-~-~-~
Once a table had been claimed, it was the work of a moment to hand over her order and a rather larger sum than she would normally consider spending to a rather sympathetic looking Carrot… Cup… Missus Cake – it was actually slightly confusing, since the two of them appeared almost entirely identical to the Mister and Missus Cake she knew, with switched colours and cutie marks – who gave an extra-understanding wince when she advised of the open tab for the Crusaders, as they immediately started squabbling over how to spend their windfall.
Twilight walked away before she could come to properly regret that decision, and settled in at the table.
A few moments later she noticed a curl of pink mane fall in front of her vision, and looked up to find Bubble carefully balanced on the back of her seat on all four hooves, looking down at her.
The two of them remained in that position for a long, precariously balanced few seconds.
“Hello, Bubble Berry.”
“Hi Twilight!”
“Why are you up there?”
“Because that’s the kind of normality you need today!”
“Of… course. But you can sit down now.”
“Okie dokie!” In a pegasus-worthy act of acrobatics, the pink-on-pink stallion launched himself over her, flipped and twisted in midair, and landed in the seat opposite her with barely a sound, muzzle in that expectant grin that suited Pinkie so well.
Now that the adrenaline had faded, she had a chance to properly examine the last of her friends. The first thing she noticed was that he was certainly larger – easily the second tallest of the group after Applejack, and with a rather heavy build – clearly strong and well-muscled, though not nearly as well-defined as the more athletic of the group.
Indeed, somehow despite the overwhelming pinkness and giggling, Bubble was distinctly masculine, which surprised her a little after seeing some of the others. His mane was only a little longer than Elusive’s had been – although given the mess of curls, it may have been significantly longer if straightened – though his tail was, once again, every bit as long, poofy and impressive as Pinkie’s.
Her observations, however, were cut short as she realised that Bubble was actually posing, changing every few seconds to a slightly different ridiculous pose.
When she raised an eyebrow, Bubble giggled, somehow still not coming across as feminine even with that. “This is fun! Now it’s your turn.”
“I’m not posing for you, Bubble Berry.”
“Awwww. Well then. I suppose we’d better get down to business then.” That omnipresent grin just got wider. Twilight knew that grin on her friend, and the different face didn’t change it at all.
Bubble Berry was planning a party.
She sighed. “Business?”
The grin grew wider yet. “Yep! Because you come from a whole other Ponyville, right?”
“…Do I want to know if there’s a Pinkie Sense for that? Or… Berry Sense, or whatever you call it?”
“Probably not!”
“…I’ll give you that. And yes, yes I do come from a whole other Ponyville.”
“So there’s a whole other Ponyville full of ponies?”
“…Yes…?”
“And a whole other me?”
“Yes…”
“Okay. Twilight. This is important.” Berry leaned in over the table, his expression somehow simultaneously deadly serious and grinning wildly. “If there’s one other Ponyville… does that mean there’s probably lots of other Ponyvilles too?”
Twilight blinked, considering. “…I don’t see why not. If there’s a Ponyville where everyone’s the other gender, there might well be one where you might be a pegasus or unicorn… or maybe not even a pony!”
“But in every Ponyville, there’s a Bubble Berry?” He was practically vibrating.
“Or equivalent… well… probably not every one, but I’d say it’s pretty statistically likely…”
“Eeeeeeeeeeeee!” He squealed, forelegs bursting into the air with a blast of streamers and confetti. “We need to get ALL the Ponyvilles together! And all the Bubbles! And then hold the biggest party EVER!”
Twilight had a sudden mental image of a gathering of countless Pinkie Pies and Bubble Berries from all tribes and walks of life, gathering together under the direction of an enormous alicorn Princess Pinkie, planning an apocalyptic party to end all parties.
“That… while strangely horrifying, is not going to be possible. My spell only works to swap me with Dusk. I could probably make it swap you with Pinkie Pie, maybe… but I think it’s still just one Pinkie, er, or Bubble at a time. And one Ponyville.”
“Awwww…” Bubble slumped on the table.
“Didn’t we learn our lesson about too many Bubbles?”
“Yeah…” He rolled his eyes, then suddenly perked up. “But that’s not the only party idea I had! We could have competitions which are all battle-of-the-sexes! And they wouldn’t be so lopsided!” He giggled. “And then you could have ponies switch sides as a penalty! Which stallion would you like to be replaced with a mare and join your team?” He gestured wildly, pretending to referee the game.
Twilight chuckled, relaxing slightly as she pictured it. “What sort of competition would it be?”
“Ummm… Guessing everypony’s name!”
“That’d… actually work, maybe.” She nodded. “I don’t think I’ll be up for that much casting for a while yet, though…”
“Well, keep it in mind! It’d be a party never seen before on Equestria! And it’d be even better because it’s two parties at once! And there’s two of me to run it! Eeee, I can’t wait!”
Twilight couldn’t help but smile along at her friend’s enthusiasm, despite her own reservations on the idea. The thought that she was relying on Bubble Berry of all ponies to give her a vaguely sane and relaxing end to her day was very worrying, but somehow this kind of madness made her feel entirely at home…
~-~-~-~
The pudding before her was heavy chocolate cake, shaped much like a volcano with molten chocolate oozing out around the edges and with a deep red raspberry core. It looked small compared to many of Sugarcube Corner’s treats, especially for its price, but it was not to be underestimated, for it was unconscionably dense and rich, and absolutely divine.
Twilight felt she deserved the comfort after her day, barely giving a thought to any silly stereotype she might be perpetuating, and was trying to make it last with very little success, relishing every decadent mouthful.
Bubble Berry, while not officially working, was a bundle of energy that not even the novelty of a gender-switched friend could monopolise, and was frequently bouncing around the store to serve, greet, and socialise with the late afternoon rush. This suited Twilight fine, giving her a bit of comparative quiet to let herself wind down, pony-watch, and think.
The Crusaders were gathered together on a table across the way, surrounding an enormous monstrosity of a sundae, filled with what looked like three different flavours of ice-cream, at least two different sauces, and just about every extra that could fit in the cup. The thing was probably large enough to satisfy five adult ponies (or one Pinkie Pie equivalent) but the colts looked like they had little intention of giving up before anything more than a chocolate smear remained.
She’d probably be hearing from their brothers about the consequences of that tomorrow. Or sisters. Something like that.
Watching them for a while, something tickled at the back of her mind, and she found herself thinking back to the observations she’d been making on the way here about the differences between genders. Her eyes fell on Applebuck in particular, as he chewed his way through a thick wafer before reaching for a scoop of chocolate ice-cream, quickly finding himself at odds with Scooteroll, who seemed intent on the same point.
But even as they started playfully arguing again (and Silver smoothly levitated their target out and into his own mouth) her mind was going back to conversations she had heard about the Apple family’s history. The lack of the intervening generation between Granny Smith and Applejack and siblings was a topic she had been hesitant to bring up to the Apples themselves, but she had eventually gotten the story out of Rarity.
Applejack’s father had died in a tragic accident when she was still barely young enough to remember, while her mother had still been pregnant with Apple Bloom; and she didn’t last long after, just long enough to bring the youngest Apple into Equestria. Macintosh had taken over the farm and raising of his siblings with support from Granny and the extended family, but…
…It must have happened differently here. Or perhaps the two of them had switched roles. But…
Well, there went her comfortable, happy mood.
“Twiiiiiiiiiii…” And naturally Berry picked it up within seconds, from the other side of the room, and was suddenly beside her again. “You’re not smiling anymore.”
“I… just realised something.” Twilight blinked. “And I don’t know what it means.”
“Isn’t that good? You like learning what things mean!” he encouraged.
“…This place is… impossible,” she stated dramatically. Some chill went down her spine, and she glanced around suddenly, as if that very declaration might actually clue in the world that it shouldn’t exist, and it would suddenly fix that oversight.
Bubble Berry looked around, following her gaze. After a long moment, he stage whispered, “What are we looking for?”
“Nothing, Berry.”
“Well… I don’t think Sugarcube Corner is impossible. But I might not be the best pony to ask. Why is it impossible? Does it have stairs that look like they’re going up but they just go in circles? Or forks with more sides at the top than at the bottom?” He picked up Twilight’s cutlery to examine it closer, though he seemed quickly distracted by the chocolate fudge covering it.
“No! I mean… the idea of a place where everyone is switched mare and stallion, but… but everything else is the same!” she hissed to him. “There have to have been situations where being a different gender has changed how an event has occurred! I mean, apart from anything else, it’d mean that every couple in the history of Equestria has only had one foal at a time! If one stallion had foals with two mares in my ponyville, how could that happen here?”
Bubble grinned at his friend. “Well, maybe she would be a very lucky mare he—”
“Bubble! This is serious! I’m talking about two whole universes that are supposed to be exactly the same, except for gender, but that’s impossible!”
“Wellll~ I think YOU are thinking too much.” Berry bopped Twilight on the horn. “You’re thinking too hard about it.”
“What? How can I be thinking too hard?”
“Welll… okay, it’s like decorating a cake, see?”
Twilight’s flat stare could have been used to level a building. “What.”
“Look, it’s simple!” Bubble dashed away from the exasperated mare, only to return a moment later with a rather lavish-looking cake decorated beautifully with chocolate cream.
“Let’s say you’ve got a pony who asks for a chocolate cake. So you get a sweet, creamy birthday cake, all chocolatey and delicious! Mmmm… chocolate…” He smiled, beginning to drool slightly as he looked over the cake in his hooves.
A pointed clearing of the throat echoed from behind the counter, along with a glare from the local Mister Cake, and Berry snapped out of it suddenly, shaking his head out.
“Anyway! So then the birthday pony comes in, and looks at the cake, and says it looks really good, but he doesn’t want chocolate anymore, he wants strawberry. What are we supposed to do? I can’t just turn the chocolate cream into strawberry cream – I tried!”
“…What…?”
“Well, maybe you can, clever-magic-pants. But it’s way easier! We just make another cake!” Berry rushed off again, and appeared with another cake seconds later, in the same style, only this one had pink icing.
Twilight’s head spun as she tried to make sense of this baked-goods metaphor. “…Are you trying to tell me that I… created this whole universe?” That was terrifying on multiple levels – and she really wished that the fact that everypony seemed attracted to her being something of her own creation wasn’t as high up that list as it seemed to be.
“Well, how do you know Dusk Shine didn’t create your Ponyville?” Berry grinned conspiratorially.
Amazingly enough, this did not significantly curtail Twilight’s rising levels of panic.
But then the stallion bopped her on the muzzle before she could work herself into a proper meltdown, shaking his head emphatically. “No, no, no! I mean… we’ve got a whole lot of cakes! Even apart from the Mister and Missus and the twins! We can get another cake that’s pretty much the same, only strawberry instead of chocolate! Buuuuuuut…”
A hoof hooked around Twilight’s neck, dragging her closer, somehow ensuring she stopped with her muzzle only an inch from the edge of the cakes.
“The cakes aren’t exactly the same! One might be just a liiiiiittle bit thicker, or thinner! Or the cream’s not exactly the same. The decorations are a little different!” She found herself glancing between the two cakes, noting the swirls of cream were slightly different in size, and quickly finding herself compelled to even them out…
But Berry flicked both cakes away before she could light her horn. “But they’re still mostly the same cake, right? You can look for changes and find them if you reaaaaaaaally try. If you cut them open, maybe you’ll find more differences!”
“I… still don’t see where you’re going with this, Berry.” Twilight’s head was spinning.
“Well, we’ve always got a whole lot of cakes ready! So instead of trying to change the one we have, we just find the one that looks the closest to what we’ve got, with the right changes!”
Twilight stared at her friend, then looked down at the two cakes, thoughtfully.
“So… you think since there’s probably a whole lot of other Ponyvilles out there… I just found the one that looked closest? The further out I go, or the deeper I look, the more differences might pile up… but it’s enough that everypony close to me is…”
“And then once you sell the strawberry cake, everypony’s happy, and nobody wants the chocolate cake anymore, which means I get to eat it!”
“Wait, what is that supposed to—”
Like a huge, sea-bound predator, Berry loomed from the edge of the table, his mouth gaping impossibly wide as he bore down on the chocolate cake…
Which was miraculously whipped away along with its gender-swit— err, icing-switched double. Mister Cake, balancing both pastries on his back, gave a long-suffering look and a roll of his eyes to Twilight, and wandered away out the back as Berry tried to disengage his teeth from the table, much to the amusement of a few of the other patrons.
Twilight chuckled again at the randomness of the pink pony, as he finally pulled away and tried to put his face back to the right shape, or at least a shape that let him pout effectively at his employers behind the counter.
“Never change, Bubble Berry. Please.”
~-~-~-~
“Everything today has just been highly…”
“Highly?”
“Confusing.” Twilight decided on.
With her existential crisis of the hour finished, along with the delicious volcano pudding, Twilight relaxed a little, and started discussing her day with Bubble Berry.
At first she had been reluctant to impart her experiences, for reasons ranging from not wanting to seem too upset with the others (Pinkie’s reactions to problems between her friends were rarely subtle) or to suddenly clue in to Bubble that perhaps he should start acting that way too.
However, secrets could not be held long from the pink menace, and a combination of friendly banter and wobbly-eyed pouting soon had her explaining her day, pony by pony.
Rainbow Blitz had him bursting out in laughter. Twilight was put off somewhat as Berry giggled his way back to comprehensibility, but he waved her down while he caught his breath.
“No, no, I’m just imagining Blitzy sitting in his cloud house all offended. ‘No mare ever turned down the Blitz! Who does she think she is?’” The ridiculous over-exaggeration of their friend caught her by surprise, making her laugh along in spite of herself. “And he’s probably puffing himself up and shoving all his junk into the closet so when you finally decide to come over, he’ll be ready for you.” He winked with an abundance of suggestiveness.
“Bubble! Rainbow’s not like that!” She still couldn’t keep herself from laughing, though.
“Yeah? Wanna go check it out?”
“No!”
“Probably a good idea. If we both went, he’d get all sorts of ideas…”
Twilight rolled her eyes and changed the subject, moving on to Applejack. Bubble was a little less joyful over that story, and even before Bubble could say a word, she could see the accusing look in his eyes.
“Yes, I’m going to apologise to Applejack tomorrow. Everypony else already told me off.”
“You didn’t say you could do the Royal Canterlot super-shouty thing!” He poked her in the chest. “Do you know how useful that could be? I’m gonna make you do all my invitations for my next party. In one go. From the library. Oh, and yeah, you better say sorry to AJ too.”
Twilight rolled her eyes. “And then after that, I went to see Butterscotch… only I met Eris on the way…”
While the story of the Draconequus had the stallion in stitches once again, with Twilight laughing along, the other two ponies had him sober up a bit and brought Twilight down too. She wasn’t nearly the wreck she had been earlier, but the reminder of the long day she’d had was just… exhausting.
“It’s just been… I don’t know. This day feels like it’s been dragging on for a whole year. Everything is just…”
“Is just?” Bubble leaned forward, that expectant grin on his face…
“It’s just… highly… highly…” She fished for the word, while Bubble grinned wider. “I don’t know… unpropitious!”
Bubble’s smile snapped back to shock and disappointment. Twilight blinked, confused.
“What’s wrong?”
“Oh… I just thought you were going to say the thing.”
“What thing?”
“Somepony else’s thing. It doesn’t matter.” Bubble waved her off, with a slightly hurt look. “Must be one of those other Ponyvilles I was thinking of.”
“Oh… okay.” It was just Bubble being Bubble, apparently. “Well. That’s my day. How has your day been?”
Bubble brightened up instantly. “Oh, well my day hasn’t been sub-optimal at all! I mean, we’ve had a lot of ponies come in today talking about you, that’s for sure, but that’s hardly anything new…”
Though his word choice confused her slightly, that was hardly anything new, and she’d soon forgotten it in the endless stream of consciousness that was Bubble Berry, finding herself slowly relaxing once again…
~-~-~-~
Nothing good could last forever, of course, though this time it thankfully petered out gently rather than come crashing down. The crusaders, having somehow finished their colossal dessert and having the energy of their sugar rush countered by the awkwardness of their distended bellies, speed-waddled over and thanked her in chorus, before buzzing out the door in their usual rush.
Definitely going to hear about that… She sighed.
But the day was quickly coming to an end, and the Corner was rapidly emptying out, and Twilight actually felt relaxed. Perhaps it was the decadent dessert, or the delicious milkshake she’d since ordered and was slowly savouring, but mostly it was just the company of Bubble Berry, who despite everything was simply almost identical to dealing with Pinkie Pie.
Finally, as the light faded outside, she finished off the last of the milkshake with an echoing slurp.
“Thank you, Mister and Missus Cake.” She smiled. “And thank you, Bubble Berry. This has been just what I needed today.”
Bubble giggled. “You’re welcome! You know I’m always good to throw a party-ish for you!”
She laughed right back. “Whether I know about it or not! I probably won’t be seeing you soon, but say hi to Dusk for me!”
The bell jangled quietly as she walked away into the cool evening air. It was good to see that at least one of her friends could be relied upon for normalcy – although the fact that that was Pinkie’s double… well, if she hadn’t already met Discord’s double here, she’d think that he – or she – would have had something to do with it.
Just as she was beginning to walk home, the bell rang behind her once again and the unmistakable sound of Berry’s bouncing towards her rang out.
“Twilight! Twilight! You forgot your change!” Berry’s voice rang out, slightly muffled by something in his mouth.
Oh! She blinked, turning back. She’d given them a fair bit for both the Crusader’s and her own rather impressive feasts, but perhaps…
“Thank you, Berry!” She smiled as he bounced up, the small bag held between his grinning teeth.
“You’re welcome!” He grinned, bounded up to her, and pressed his lips to hers.
Twilight froze.
The warm, slightly moist, pink-fuzzed skin pressed up against her own, grasping and manipulating with all the long-earned skill of an adult earth pony. Her own muzzle tingled wherever he touched her, a wash of hot, sugar-laden breath tickling across her whole face.
His bright blue eyes were as close as they had ever been, his ears and curls perking up as his long muzzle pushed into hers, tongue and jaw twisting and somehow sending simultaneous waves of chills and electricity from horn to hoof.
It seemed to last for hours, that heat and pressure working their way across her mouth… until all of a sudden it was done, and he pulled away, leaving her with the little bag of bits hanging from her own lips, and a strangely cool sensation wherever his mouth suddenly wasn’t.
He leaned forward one more time, booped her snout with his own, and then bounced away. “Seeya tomorrow, Twi-Twi!” he called, and the bell above the door jangled one last time.
The only movement or sound from Twilight from the moment he had first touched her, to several minutes later, was the bag falling from her nerveless mouth to the ground with a quiet clink.
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Soon as in already!!!
also yeah I thought the door thing was really exciting
5617067 Nooooo. .. I thought I was doing so well. D= Still, one paragraph in 7k words is not so bad, right?
......not bad.
It seems like this is the month of unexpected updates in my faves library.
I am surprised Twilight didn't figure out that whole "for this gender swapped word to work some details MUST be different" thing on her own, but she is having a stressful day so maybe she missed it because of that? But certain events would have to happen to different ponies due to the gender change, like Carrot Cake getting pregnant instead of Cup Cake but the foals born still being Pumpkin and Pound, not completely different foals.
5617136 Gotta love that. "What story is this that has updated...? OH! THIS one! I'd forgotten this existed!"
More to come soon!
5617166 She did! It just took her most of a day. :P A straight gender-switched universe becomes increasingly unlikely when you start thinking about it, but she didn't properly think about it because she was too busy being freaked out by being hit on by everypony she met.
5617171 Well then... Glad you enjoyed it.
PINKIE CANNOT BE CENSORED.
A total disregard for personal space.
Well, at least someone is exactly the same....
Thank you for picking on the "sub-optimal" thing. That drives me nuts in the other story. Twi doesn't talk like a robot.
AND THEN THEY KISSED!
5617190
"Well Twi-Twi DID tell me to never change, sooooo~!"
5617198 I had to reference my sister fic SOMEHOW. Does it still count as breaking the fourth wall when you're just breaking into other versions of the same thing, rather than out into the real world?
5617199 "They" is such a strong word. Kind of implies two participants, and Twilight would likely argue that she wasn't really involved there.
Or she will, once her brain resets.
Let's give her a few moments.
Next chapter can not come soon enough. Adding to favorites.
vignette4.wikia.nocookie.net/trollpasta/images/a/a9/I-see-what-you-did-there.jpg
This feels like a fourth-wall breaking reference that I didn't get. Can anybody tell me what Bubble was expecting?
5617233 I like to know that too.
Leonzilla
5617219
... clever boy-girl....
5617231 Within a week - which compared to this fic's usual release schedule, is practically instantaneous =D
5617233 5617236 It's a reference to The Dawn of Dusk Shine, which was written as a kinda-sorta "What's happening to Dusk in Mare!Ponyville?" - it's grown into its own fic since then with a quite different theme and storyline, but I had to reference it at least once :) Apologies to anyone who was confused.
Well Bubble Berry did better than Pinkie did.
5617233
5617236
The sister fic, "The Dawn of Dusk Shine", is known for Dusk Shine repeatedly saying that events have been "highly suboptimal".
Bubble Berry WINS! K.O.!
Oh dear. He said 'see you tomorrow', and Twilight thinks she's getting out of there. Oooops.
HL3 CONFIRMED
Have I ever mentioned how awesome this story is? Because it's awesome. This awesome! (shows)
Yeah, that awesome.
Also, Twi finally thinks things are kinda sorta normal-ish... and then the end of the chapter happened. Great way to thoroughly break someone.
Basically Twi.exe stopped working
5617280 I found Pinkie's scene in DoDS heartwarming and adorable, but yeah... not the greatest success rate.
5617387 I was wondering if anyone would pick up on that.
(It was actually totally unintentional, I didn't pick up that I'd written it until I was re-reading the next day... But I decided it's probably best to leave it in ;) )
5617462 While this story is in fact irrefutable proof of HL3, you can't just SAY it, you need to go on a long and convoluted apparently senseless set of logical jumps showing how this chapter proves HL3.
5617509 Squeeeee ^.^ Thank you! I have determined that the most important change seen in this universe is not actually that everypony is the other gender; rather it is its ability to repeatedly lower Twilight's guard and raise her hopes, only to dash them harder and harder each time.
(It's not over yet...)
Goddamnit, Berry....
It is awesome to see another chapter, and I must get to work writing Sunrise more...because there must be Celestia trolling ASAP.
It was highly optimal to see a well-done Bubble Berry, and I can see where you went.
That was crazy. I mean, I thought Berry would have made it. He was perfect. Then he kissed her. As soon as that happened I heard Twilight's reality crash like a window. Great chapter. i love this story.
5617258 what? I don't remember reading anything about a sister fic in the authors notes.
Must read now
Leonzilla
:D
Wow, Bubble Berry is one confident dude. Love the ending.
Well obviously it can't be Valve Soon, you made it past the second chapter.
Yay one of my favorite gender bender fics updating.
Bubble is clever. Nice one
I hope there will be more
5617548
Indeed. Something like this...
Valves are used to turn on or off water pipes.
Water is a liquid you can drink.
Milk is also a liquid you can drink.
Milk is an ingredient in most cakes.
There are six cakes mentioned in this chapter.
Divide the two 'food' cakes from that gives us three.
Also Cakes are sometimes round.
To find the circumference of something round you use pi.
The first number in Pi is three.
But wait... I'm just getting started!
Pi is pronounce the same as pie.
Pie is also a desert like cake.
This chapter is about the male counterpart of Pinkie Pie
That's three different things pronounced as pie.
Also the author says there's only two chapters left.
That means there will be a total of nine chapters in this story.
Nine is three times three, or three plus three plus three.
Finally the story was posted on the twelfth.
Twelve is a one plus a two.
One plus two is three.
All these threes can only mean one things...
Left 4 dead 3 confirmed!
And poor Twilight, just when she thought she'd gotten through a normal (at least as normal as anything can be when Pinkie's involved) visit with one of her friends' male counterpart.
I hope it doesn't take her too long to reboot.
Huzzah! One of my favorite fics updated, and it's finally going to finish up. Such a bittersweet time. I'm looking forward to seeing how this rollercoaster ends.
I absolutely loved the partillary and Berry's circular logic surrounding it.
5617089
Well... I hate to be the one to burst that bubble, but
Even with editors it's hard to achieve a 100% success rate on little things like this. They're so easy to let slip when your brain knows what you were supposed to have there.
I am not criticizing your editing skills, because this story had fairly few mistakes. I just want to mention a little editing trick that was considered good enough for my school paper to have it be mandatory when editing a story (and I should know, I was on the journalism team).
Read the story backwards, sentence by sentence. This breaks the flow of the story and forces you to evaluate each sentence individually. This allows you to catch mistakes that you would otherwise miss.
Used throughout my school system as an editing tool.
5617258 Wait, that was the reference? I thought it was going to be a Spock reference.
5617552 5617864 He was doing so well... *insert dramatic 'mission failed' music here*
5617835 Yepyep! Hope you get an extra reader or two out of it :)
5617870 Like this one! :P I updated the fic a bit to put in a direct link to the other story.
5617923 =D
5617934 5618034 5618040 Glad you enjoyed, and thanks for commenting! Your words fuel my ego-based superweapon, the world shall soon be mine!
5618014 They're mainly fine with chapters, it's just getting to the third book in the series you gotta watch for...
5618089 Next chapter due to release this weekend :)
5618114 To be honest even I'm not exactly certain of Bubble's motives there. And Twilight doesn't dare ask, because seeing how things have gone so far, chances are it'll make everything worse. She's not entirely certain how, but it will.
5618143 Good sir or sir substitute... I bow before your HL3 logic prowess. You have won a cookie, and also the internet. But not HL3.
Yet.
5618291 I am certain I have no idea what you are talking about and am appalled that you would post such a thing when anyone can CLEARLY see that no such error exists.
On a completely unrelated note, I need to go and put these editing tools away, which I had out for the sole purpose of adding a link to the fic before.
On another completely unrelated note, I'd like to see my editors in my office immediately.
(Thank you >_> Glad you enjoyed the fic!)
5618331 That... sounds like an awesome idea. I've heard of flipping a picture mirror-image when you're drawing it, but it sounds even more effective as a writing tool. Thanks!
5618636 It was an effective enough editing trick that every English teacher from Middle School on up repeated the tip. It worked for them, it works for me, and it can work for others. If you want a tip on getting out of writers block, I have one of those to. My writers block trick works for some people. It might not work for you, so I will not waste your comment space on it unless you want me to.
But what a way to go.
5618736 Don't worry, the real Pinkie, with the help of some of her alternates, stopped it, so all of existence didn't end.
Also I have absolutely no trouble believing Pinkie randomly kisses guys she thinks are cute on the mouth, and Twilight just hasn't noticed so Berry is acting exactly like his counterpart.
5618713 By all means, deliver, or if it's too long for the comments section feel free to PM :)
5618829 5618736 I was wondering if anyone would catch that reference! =D There's one more reference to another fic in the chapter, although admittedly it's a lot more vague...
5618941 *laughs* Quite frankly this is very much the opposite of my real life experience. I am borderline asexual when it comes to real life - I usually can't even consider someone in that way unless they've already shown an interest in me and have a particularly interesting personality. I'm not going to claim that that's a healthy social outlook, but it's how I am.
No, the story's just starting off with a cliche trope then trying to escalate with each chapter. Part of me would make the excuse that it is at least in part that ponies are hardwired to find Alicorns attractive, and the shock of having one that's the opposite gender to every other example ever is breaking down everyone's inhibitions with shock; but realistically it's just a comedy piece and everypony's acting a little bit OOC.
Thank you for your concern and thoughtful feedback, however! I appreciate it :)
5619042 Find a place where you feel that you will not be observed, then start acting out the scene. Take the role of the POV character for the scene, and pretend to be interacting with the other characters. Speak out loud. Talk to your imaginary cast. Maybe even move about like you are on a stage, or pace in a circle. Increase your heart rate a bit, get more oxygenated blood to your brain. Do not worry about redoing the same scene multiple times, as you are just trying to get a feel for what interactions should be made. It helps me.
5617198 I had a teacher who said suboptimal all the time. It's not robot speech.
5617233 Dusk Shine's favorite word. It doesn't actually break the fourth wall. While it references another fic, it's another fic in the same continuity. Any of the main six could have made a reference to "suboptimal".
Awesome. This is actually the first time I have seen the fact that ponies carry everything in their mouth used this way. I mean, really, what happens when one pony gives another pony something they carry in their mouth? Does it happen anywhere in the show? It could! I mean, the most was when Applebloom carried Granny Smiths teeth.
Also, the narration during the kiss: Whooo heee! That sounded like Twilight LIKED it! Which is totally Okay with me, because I like it when Twilight loves Pinkie but doesn't realize. I love it when Rarity likes Twi and Twi likes Pinkie! Especially when it continues with Pinkie likes Applejack likes Rainbow Dash likes Fluttershy likes Rarity!
And the fact that the door thing isn't as exiting gives us an interesting look into Twi's mind!
5619343 It is when you use it to mean "bad" in every possible context, refuse to use contractions, and always speak as if you're doing formal writing.
5619343
Usually in the show when one pony is passing something to another they either use their hooves to pass it from one to another, place it on a stand for the other pony to pick up, or some of the more energetic ones have tossed things with their mouths.
Though directly passing from mouth to mouth would seem to be something that, while we never see in the show because it resembles kissing which is an inherently intimate act and therefore not apt to show up in a children's show, yet in a hypothetical Equestria would probably be relatively common and not have the same intimate connotations since it would be an efficient way to transfer items between each other.
I thought you were different Berry!!
Oh Well, Colts be colts... (Is that how it's said? I heard the expression somewhere...)
Next is meeting her 'sister' and brother-in-law.
5619079 Hmmm, yep, I can see that working. Might try it for future fics. Thanks for the advice!
5619301 Welcome to the fic, glad you're enjoying it! :) And I'm certain Rainbow Dash would never be so crass as to blatantly hit on Dusk like that... right?
5619343 Well, for a given value of continuity. The two fics do share a concept but I can state that the Dusk shown there is not the same as the one Twilight's replacing - the two fics split some time ago :) The rest of the mane six stallions would be as confused by Pinkie as Dusk is.
I think someone's been reading Unexpected Confessions. XD Who needs a love polygon when you can have a love conga line~?
5619471 The problem here is finding a balance and keeping it funny in this situation - I mean, if it's a particularly common thing then Twilight really shouldn't be shocked, it's just a fact of life; if it's particularly rare then it can't be justified as anything other than a direct act of affection. For the sake of this fic, I'm thinking it's something that isn't done so much between strangers if it can be helped, but between family, those very close to each other (or ponies with zero concept of personal space) it might be more common. Most common among Earth Ponies - pegasi have additional limbs to worth with so it'd be a bit rarer; when unicorns are involved, it's entirely unnecessary so it becomes a more openly intimate matter.
How did Twilight not understand initially that in an infinite multiverse the improbable becomes guaranteed.
It's like having numbers 1 through 10^100^100^100... and her horn picked number 10^100^87. I guess book smarts isn't everything!
Somepony write this. Like, right now. I would make it myself, but I really, really want to read it.
5619536
As a fan of Xenophilia, you're well aware that I delve way too deep into the ideas of a realistic Equestria, so this is just how my brain works.
The way I envision it, passing an item from mouth to mouth would be something common for most Earth ponies, and the majority of Pegasi (keep in mind most pegasi tend to be on-the-wing a lot so they wouldn't use their wings for tasks like this unless they were on the ground) since that would be an efficient way for them to exchange items without putting the item on the ground or some other surface and without having to use their hooves (which lets be honest would not be a very clean way to do things for Earth ponies). Unicorns would probably be much more likely to instinctively use their telekinetic fields to pass items and so might not have the same view of passing things from mouth-to-mouth if they have grown up surrounded by mostly other Unicorns as Twilight likely did growing up in Canterlot and Celestia's school. That combined with the nature of many of Twilight's encounters so far that day would certainly mean she would give the act a far more romantic connotation than she may have on any other day.
So, in my opinion, it works out fine that Berry probably didn't have any conscious ulterior motives when giving Twilight her change, but Twilight's mind would instantly jump there.