Chapter 4: The Cruelest Joke
Rarity dug through the rather gargantuan pile of swag, picking up the most exquisite gems and jewelry. She had to admit, for an awful brute that stole little Spike’s future home, the dragon who had been here before possessed a fair amount of good taste.
It was quite the shame that such a trait wasn’t ingrained in their species.
“Hey this looks kind of cool.”
The unicorn flinched at the loud sound, and looked back to her current companion that blocked her exit to the cave. Despite the hour they’d been digging, she still hadn’t gotten used to Rainbow Dash being…
Celestia who am I kidding? I can’t get used to Rainbow Dash when she’s a pegasus either, the unicorn told herself. If anything, she was worse when they were closer on the species chart. The mare was just so bucking abrasive! She had absolutely no tact, and her mane! It was so unfair that the mane with the most potential Rarity had ever seen in a pony belong to that…that pseudo-stallion!
The only good point Rarity could even think of to counter all her flaws was the pegasus’s dazzling flying abilities, but even those were put to waste thanks to the fact Rainbow only seemed to care about doing fast stunts instead of using her one of a kind contrail to create works of art in the air. If it wasn’t for her Wonderbolts obsession, Rarity wouldn’t have been surprised if Rainbow could have already been a famous aerial acrobat with a special act designed around her unique personality instead of the conformity that was the Wonderbolts.
It wasn’t as if she disliked Rainbow Dash…that much. Rainbow had many good qualities like her bravery after all. Rarity had even tried to get the mare to come with her to the spa like Fluttershy did these days, only Rainbow always refused her generosity quite harshly no matter how many times Rarity made the offer to help Rainbow get her mane done properly and a hooficure.
“Inside voice please darling, I want to be able to hear when I get back home,” Rarity told her before looking over to the statue Rainbow had picked from the pile of golden bits. “And that statue is atrocious.”
The dragon rolled her eyes and her wings ruffled; drawing Rarity’s attention to the oddity of Rainbow Dash still having pegasus wings (if gigantic ones) instead of the leathery wings of a dragon. She guessed it was why Rainbow had been chosen over Applejack as a companion, since the transformed pony also possessed the pegasus-level sight and hearing needed to properly commune with smaller creatures. “More like awesome,” she replied, using a voice that was probably less than a whisper for her at the moment.
“It’s a minotaur,” Rarity stressed as she frowned at the waste of gold.
Rainbow Dash sighed and rolled her eyes before lowering her head until the two of them could almost look eye to eye. “I so don’t get you.”
Rarity rolled her eyes. “That makes two of us.”
“I mean look at you,” the dragon said as she reared up on her hind legs (or were those her only legs?) and motioned to Rarity with open claws. “I’ve been to lunch with Twilight and heard you guys talk. You’re from Manehatten but you want to be one of those snooty Canterlot unicorns, you even talk like one! And you want to make everypony just like you!”
The unicorn was quick with her retort. “You’re one to talk Ms Wonderbolt Wannabe! Not to mention that ego of yours and how to drag everypony you can into fawning over your aerial acrobatics, and how you’ve corrupted Twilight with those pranks of yours!”
Rainbow Dash descended to get in Rarity’s face and slammed one of her claws into the ground with it all bunched up like a fist.
“Hey she practically begged to come along with Pinkie and me!”
A part of Rarity was aware that the gigantic and angry creature in front of her was a friendly acquaintance who styled herself a hero and would never actually use physical violence on another pony. But, a much larger part of Rarity’s mind just saw a very big and angry dragon looking ready to breathe fire. With that in front of her, the unicorn's instincts took over. She shrieked in terror, then turned around to try and find someplace to hide.
However, since there was nothing but a large pile of bits and assorted treasures in front of her, the unicorn’s panicked mind told her the stuff in front of her was just bits, and a little magic could move it aside. Unfortunately, when she did so, the very unstable mountain of bits and other assorted treasures became completely unbalanced and slid forward in a vast wave of riches that probably weighed several tons.
Rarity could only look up at her impending death with wide eyes. The Element of Generosity killed by an avalanche of wealth…Celestia how I hate irony.
Then came the darkness, and the crashing clinking of a million, billion bits.
Death was not what Rarity had expected, not by what her mother had told her. It was dark and suffocating, hot, and she felt a huge amount of pressure on her, crushing the unicorn even more than she already was.
For a moment, she thought that had actually survived the collapse, only to have to die by asphyxiation; the thought was not a pleasant one. Then came the motion, an uncomfortable wrenching that felt as if her whole being was being jerked backward before she was flipped upside down onto her back. That particular unpleasantness was followed by…light?
And the concerned eyes of a blue…dragon?
“Rarity! Rarity, are you okay?”
The unicorn looked up at her savior, almost unbelieving at what she came to see as her sight cleared. “R-Rainbow Dash?”
“I’m sorry! I just stomped my stupid claw into the ground and got all mad and did think and…and…oh Celestia I’m so sorry!”
The light ringing in her ears didn’t help the unicorn come to her senses any faster, but when she did, Rarity found that she was currently laying on her side, in the palm of her savior’s claw. Aside from the mess that her hair had turned into, she was none the worse for wear.
If anything, Rainbow appeared to have taken it even worse than Rarity had herself. She fell back and slumped against the wall, panting heavily while a tell tale heart thump that spoke of just how panicked the rainbow dragon could be heard by the unicorn more than every two seconds.
The two of them sat in the cave for some time after that. Thanks to the avalanche, Rarity had no intentions of going anywhere near that treasure again, and it seemed the dragon wasn’t going to be letting the unicorn out of her grip anyway. All in all, it suited Rarity just fine.
So they just sat there, slowly calming down from their respective waves of panic.
“…you’re better than them, you know?” Rainbow said after what had probably been several minutes.
Rarity blinked in confusion, then looked up at the dragon. “W-What?”
Apparently put off by the attention, Rainbow coughed and looked away to avoid meeting Rarity’s eyes. “The Canterlot ponies, I mean,” she explained before pausing for a moment while Rarity readjusted herself. “I…went to watch the Wonderbolts in Canterlot a few times, and every time I went, they always…looked down on me. You never did stuff like that. You always tried dressing everypony up in your stup…your clothes, but it was because you always wanted to pick ponies up and make them better.
“Those jerks just look down on everypony. That’s why I don’t get why you want to be like them when you’re…better. Sorry, this talking stuff is…”
“I think I understand,” Rarity said as she held out a hoof to paw at the palm of Rainbow’s claw. She hoped the pseudo-dragon understood her meaning, physical interaction with such a different species was hard, and Rarity had no idea how to adjust thanks to the change in respective sizes. “And well…to be honest, I act like them because they are like that.”
“Wait…so…you want to be a plothole?” Rainbow asked, confusion evident on her face despite the species change.
Rarity frowned at the odd accusation. “What? No!” she replied before translating what Rainbow Dash's confusion probably meant. The whole situation left her sighing. “But they’re…well you’ve seen it for yourself, ponies from Canterlot aren’t very inclusive. The truth is, I don’t like anypony who looks down on another either, but well… They wouldn’t even bother to look at me unless I…oh how would you put it?” She paused for a moment to think. “Unless I suck up to them, and one says imitation is the greatest form of flattery. Over the years, the accent just…stuck.”
“So wait…you’re making it look like you’re kissing up to them, while making them all look like idiots cause they’re just hearing your accent, and not what you’re really saying?” Rainbow Dash asked.
In case the smirk on Rarity’s face wasn’t telling enough, she nodded to the dragon. To which Rainbow Dash gave her obvious approval.
“HAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA Oh mare, that’s like the best practical joke ever!”
Then, when Rarity cringed at the volume, the dragon turned sheepish and cleared her throat. “Sorry.”
“Quite alright, it’s nice to be praised for my intelligence,” she said with a smile as her opinion of the pegasus-turned-dragon rose a few notches.
Since it would be a shame if the conversation ended there, Rarity decided to switch topics, one that her companion was a bit more familiar with. “So you go to the Wonderbolts Derby? I thought you were just interested in their air shows.”
Rainbow Dash shrugged, an action that didn’t carry over well to her claw that Rarity sat in. “Well, the races aren’t as cool, but considering my speed’s the best thing my flying has going for it, that’s probably where I’m going to end up when I do make it into the Wonderbolts.”
“In that case,” Rarity said with a smile, “I shall do my best to make it to every one of your showings. I know you’d absolutely hate it if the only ponies cheering for you were Canterlot snobs.”
The dragon rolled her eyes at the offer. “Oh come on Rarity, I know you don’t like me all that much. No need to go overboard just cause I saved your flank and all. I know I’m…not easy for a pony like you to get along with.”
The despondent tone in her friend’s voice brought a sad smile to Rarity’s lips. “I’ll admit that you’re a bit…rough Rainbow Dash. But after using my magic for several years, I’ve discovered that’s where you find the best of diamonds.”
A sound reached Rarity’s ears, and upon focusing on it, she could hear the clip clopping of multiple hooves. “Raaaaainbow, Raaaaarity!” Twilight called out, “we’re back, and we brought Fluttershy. Um…you girls haven’t killed each other yet, have you?”
The while unicorn let out a loud humph at the suggestion. “You make it sound as if Rainbow Dash and I have some sort of animosity between us darling! We were just having the most wonderful conversation about the Wonderbolts,” she said while looking through the space between Rainbow’s claws. “I was just about to get her to accompany me to the spa tomorrow when you so rudely barged in.”
“Huh?” Twilight cried out.
“Uh…what?”
Rarity whirled around to face the dragon. “Oh but you must! They have the most excellent masseuse. I bet she could help relieve those muscles of yours after a hard workout, and everypony enjoys a therapeutic soak.”
Apparently, Twilight didn’t think much of the offer. “Rarity, there’s no way Rainbow-”
“Hmm. You know, that sounds pretty cool,” Rainbow said, earning a gobsmacked expression from Twilight.
“But you, and she…you never…HUH?” Twilight exclaimed in a worried voice.
Behind her, Fluttershy just gaped up at the reclining reptile.
Chapter 4: The Cruelest Joke
Spike didn’t know if it was the sound, the light, or the smell that awoke him before the dawn.
No, scratch that, it was the smell, it was definitely the smell.
The odor that assaulted Spike’s nose smelled like a dead possum, wrapped in dead fish, covered in rotten cheese that had been urinated on by a minotaur who had drank too much cola.
Spike gagged, retched, tried to vomit, and did a bunch of other things that added up to the same action before his stomach reminded him that dragon digestive systems didn’t actually allow for that kind of thing. Oh mare, what died, became a zombie, took a nap in a septic tank, and then got out to die all over again?
He got out of bed to look around and noticed something odd, the light from Luna’s moon wasn’t the only thing illuminating the library. There was a soft purple light coming from the bottom floor, originating from the door to Twilight’s laboratory; the open door to Twilight’s lab.
For a moment Spike thought it best to just go back to sleep. This was hardly the first time that he’d awaken in the middle of the night for some water, a snack, or because of a bad dream spooked him awake to find Twilight doing some project. In fact, every one of the times Spike had risen early within the library, Twilight had been whittling away at some project or another.
But this time, things were different. This time, there was that bucking smell.
Well, it could mean anything, Spike told himself. Twilight had an alchemy set down in her lab. She could have been brewing a potion that…smelled like every bad thing Spike had ever sniffed left out in the sun to ripen.
“Right, and I’m an overgrown iguana,” the dragon told himself before getting out of bed and jumping down to the floor while a stab of pain ran through his heart. Ugh, why did I have to make a species joke?
Despite the fact that it had been days ago, Spike still felt the sting of disappointment when he thought of his mother’s words on the way down the mountain.
“A pony?” Twilight asked as she looked over to Spike with a smile and a giggle. “Why would you want me to turn you into a pony?”
“Oh come on it’s uh…curiosity. Yeah! I mean, I’ve lived around ponies all my life, so…it’s only natural to see what its like to be one, you know?”
For a moment, Twilight looked thoughtful, then much to his delight, she nodded. “Yeah, I guess I can understand that,” she said before breaking his heart. “But the spell I know only let’s a pony take on another creature’s physical traits, it doesn’t actually turn us into that creature. That’s why I still had my horn, Dash still had her wings, and neither of us could breathe fire. Besides, there isn’t another dragon around to change you back, and we wouldn’t want that, right?”
Despite the memory of his mother’s cheery smile, Spike could practically feel her ripping out the dragon’s heart. Right cause, finally being able to walk around town without getting a million stares, being able to finally have Rarity notice me, having other ponies think I‘m your son instead of a pet…who’d want something like that? Spike asked himself.
But now wasn’t the time to be such a mope. Twilight could have been hurt…or gagging at least. He needed to save her!
So Spike rushed down into the lab to find his mother…standing there perfectly oblivious to the toxic fumes or Spike’s presence as she stood over her alchemical workbench with a pair of tongs being held by her magic, holding something that looked like a giant black root. “Mom?” he asked as low as he could, as not to disturb her.
The lab had gone through a decorative change since Spike had last been inside it. There were two new chalkboards. The first had small photographs of Twilight’s friends stuck to the front, while lines with equations written above and below them crisscrossed the board every which way until each ended in a boxed in word. The second board was at least slightly understandable, even if the words written on it made no sense.
Parasprites. Preemptive extermination = Infinite variables. Wards = Solution. (check)
Zecora. Make Introduction = Solution
Hydra. Preemptive Extermination = Solution. (check)
Nightmare. Preemptive Extermination = Not Feasible. Dream Wards = Solution (check)
Diamond Dogs. Preemptive Extermination = Solution
Rainboom. Reinact = Too dangerous/blurry. Preempt competition = Too damaging. Failure = Unacceptable. Induce event = Solution.
3G. Mirror Pool = ? Fake Illness = ? Best Night Ever = Unacceptable For them? Possible Outcome.
The unicorn didn’t even turn around as she shushed him while positioning the black vine-root thing into one of her newer inventions that was just a metallic disc attached to another metallic disc held up the first by a few small rods on the side. After Twilight placed the vine/root.. within the area between the two, the discs began to hum and Twilight withdrew her tongs, leaving the vine/root just floating there.
With her job done, the unicorn turned to look down at the dragon. “Did I wake you up Spike?”
“Ugh, what is that smell?” he asked while holding his nose. As bad as the stink had been upstairs, what was in the basement was ten times worse. “And where’d you get that thing?”
Twilight let out a nervous laugh. “ It’s me,” she said, earning a disgusted look from Spike. “Sorry, I needed to collect some reagents from the Everfree and it’s dangerous at night, so I coated myself in Zecora’s animal repellent to keep all the monsters away.”
Upon hearing it was Twilight who was the source of his nausea, Spike took a few steps back to avoid any physical contact with the unicorn that tried to hug him at least three times a day. “Bleh! Twilight that’s just…ugh!” He had thought the zebra living in the Everfree was a little kooky with the way she talked when Twilight had dragged Spike out to meet her the week after they moved to Ponyville, but now she her oddness had reached new heights since she was telling ponies to smear some foul-smelling gunk all over their coat.
“Okay, okay I’ll take a bath…geeze,” the unicorn mumbled before she picked up a small vial of liquid from her lab and headed towards the exit.
As she started to come forward, Spike ran around the table in the middle of Twilight’s lab to keep as far away from her as possible. Unfortunately, that meant by the time Twilight was heading towards the door, Spike was standing in her trail where the smell of her monster repellent still lingered.
In order to keep from gagging, since it seemed claws were not good for holding a dragon’s nose shut, Spike looked around the lab for a cloth, towel, nose plugs…anything that would allow him to avoid breathing in the toxic fumes. However, Twilight tended to conjure and dispel her cleaning rags these days whenever an accident occurred, so there were no handy pieces of cloth to cover himself with.
So, Spike needed to get more creative. He looked around a bit more, and quickly found his salvation. In the few seconds it had been out of sight, the black vine that Twilight had brought home had sprouted a blue flower in full bloom.
Although Twilight had constantly drilled the rules of her new lab into Spike after they moved to Ponyville as well as made him take a test consisting of multiple choice, true/false, and essay questions over those rules and the reasons for their existence, the need to breathe overrode them all and Spike snatched the flower from the vine to inhale its sweet scent and drown out smell of Twilight.
“Spike, you coming?” his mother called from beyond the exit.
“Ye-ye-ACHOO!” The dragon sneezed, burning the flower in his claws to ash a second later. He rubbed a claw beneath his nose and looked back up as Twilight called to him again.
“What was that?”
“Nothing!” Spike assured her as the ashes of the flower dissipated into the air. “I just sneezed. Oh! Nothing’s on fire! Just let me get up the stairs.” Thankfully, what remained of the scent in his nose was enough to counteract whatever toxin Twilight was wearing, and Spike managed to walk by her before she shut the door on the lab and begin the process of reactivating her wards.
As he was already awake at… Spike looked over to the clock and blinked. “It’s two in the morning?”
“I’ve still got a good four hours for sleep,” Twilight said as she held up her sleeping potion. “Thanks to this, its all I need to function at one-hundred-percent.”
The dragon raised an eyebrow. “She wasn’t making much sense with all those rhymes, but…I’m pretty sure Zecora said using that stuff too long was dangerous.” Something about dreaming…or, not dreaming? Ugh, why couldn’t she have just talked normal?
Twilight’s face went from its normal cheer into a droopy sadness, and Spike quickly found himself regretting bringing it up. “It’s fine Spike,” she assured him in a tone that matched her face. “Certainly better than the alternative. Remember?”
The question brought up a memory that Spike had done his best to forget. The day Twilight had given out the gala tickets and gone to bed, she had awaken Spike not fifteen minutes later tossing and turning in bed, sobbing into her pillow, and even screaming for her friends at several points.
Just thinking about that night made Spike shiver. Two nights of that and Twilight took them into the Everfree to look for some herbs that would give her a good night’s sleep. While looking around, they had stumbled across a strange hut with an even stranger pony living within. That night and the next, Spike had slept all the way through just fine.
“Well, come on, you’ll probably need me to scrub your back,” Spike told her before he started towards the bathroom.
Then, he stopped and looked back to his mother. “Just uh…can you turn off my nose like you turned off Rainbow’s mouth that one time?” he asked. The smell of the flower was already starting to be overpowered by the gunk Twilight had coated herself in.
Twilight giggled. “Sure thing Spike. Sure thing.”
It was a few hours before lunch as Sparkler made her way through the grassy streets of Ponyville with her bags that contained the three books she checked out from the library. The weight of the things dragged her down unevenly and caused the unicorn to shift to the left every few steps. It was a pain, but not as much as some of the odd looks she was getting from a few of the townspeople.
Of course, once she moved back in with her mother and made to correct her identity, Sparkler knew she’d have to face some fallout. It helped that Twilight Sparkle had personally wrote a letter to the head of their government to help clear the mess up; grumbling the whole time of course. So she wasn’t facing any penalties for forging government documents or anything thank Celestia.
All in all, Sparkler knew she owed Twilight Sparkle big time, and that was only with the beginnings of her debt to the unicorn arch-mage. The textbooks in her bags were another. Twilight had pointed out a self-study program for unicorns in her situation, ones that went into the workforce for a few years after the basics had been covered and their talents discovered. If Sparkler hit the books and studied enough to pass the entrance exams, she could get into that program and hopefully gain enough education to find a respectable job that matched her talent and provided a decent wage.
Sparkler had no intentions of becoming like her mother, stuck in two and a half dead-end jobs, barely making it by.
The thought of her mother made the unicorn frown. In all honesty, Sparkler didn’t know where she stood when it came to Ditzy. On one hoof, the pegasus was a loving mare…who abandoned her to the system instead of fighting to keep the unicorn, but she also realized her mistake and was working extra hard to make up for it with Dinky…a little too late for it to matter for Sparkler’s foalhood. The four differing opinions made the unicorn feel like she was standing on one of those floor games that told you where to put your hooves, and she ended up with one leg planted on all four corners of the mat. Trying to keep all four hooves on their respective positions was hard, but Sparkler knew she couldn’t just cling to Ditzy’s past mistakes when she was willing to make amends, or simply forgive her mother because she was pitiable.
It was a problem Sparkler just didn’t have an answer for.
So, she had come to the library to go over things and ask Twilight to help her with some of the harder concepts in her study material. Plus, Spike was always nice company. The little dragon was one of the few creature’s in Ponyville who could put up with her snarky attitude. On top of which, he pretty smart when it came to books thanks to years of hanging out with Twilight Sparkle. So Sparkler actually found him pretty easy to hold a conversation with.
The door opened a moment before Sparkler could reach out with her magic, and she saw Twilight standing on the other side of the door. At the same time, her nose detected an odd…funk. “Oh um, hello Ms Sparkle,” she said with more respect than she gave to most other ponies she knew.
The slightly taller lavender unicorn smiled. “You can call me Twilight, Sparkler. Is there something you needed?”
“Uh…” the pink unicorn’s nose twitched. She looked up to Twilight as something to aspire to, but hero worship only went so far. “Okay, what’s with that smell?”
Twilight let out a disgruntled growl. “I know I smell weird,” she said. “I couldn’t get all the stink out even with a hour of scrubbing last night and I need to go see Rarity to ask her if she knows a way to get this stuff out of my coat.”
“Oh…um…” Sparkler repressed the ‘it was nice knowing you comment’ that she wanted to say. Nopony going into Rarity’s boutique smelling like that would ever be walking out alive.
Instead, she opted for a safer topic. “So you’ll be out for…most of the day?” she asked with more disappointment in her tone than she would have liked. “I was hoping to see if you could help me with a few things.”
Twilight gave the other unicorn one of her trademark apologetic looks. “Sorry, but not this morning,” she said. “And Spike’s sleeping in, but you’ve been in the library enough to know your way around in case you need any more books.”
“Well…it’s better than nothing I suppose,” she mumbled before nodding her head. “Thanks…Twilight.”
“Happy to help Sparkler. Just umm…let Spike sleep in a bit more. I might have kept him up a bit too late last night trying to scrub this stuff out of my coat,” the unicorn said before she walked outside and headed in the direction of Rarity’s boutique.
“Thanks for adjusting your time table everypony, I know how difficult it is to rearrange your plans on the spur of the moment.”
“Think nothing of it dear,” Rarity told Twilight as she sunk deeper into the therapeutic tub and let out a sigh of contentment.
For her part, Fluttershy just nodded at the unicorn who was in her own separate bathing tub. The things Aloe had poured into Twilight’s water wouldn’t have mixed well with the therapeutic salts that were inside the larger basin she and Rarity were sharing. “Well it is a bit early for a visit to the spa, but I guess that just means we’ll have lunch afterwards instead of before.”
“Are you kidding? If you ask me, we’re late. I needed this since I woke up this morning,” Rainbow told them as one of the spa ponies worked on her muscles to make them relax.
The statement had all the mares in the room look over to the pegasus laying on the massage table that had been brought into the large bathing room thanks to Rarity’s influence. As a several time repeat customer who had started bringing in friends, Rarity was given a bit of special considerations when it came to such things.
Twilight stood up in her tub a little straighter. “How could your muscles be sore after-Rainbow! Did you do another stint of exercises after I left yesterday?”
The blue pegasus let out an annoyed groan. “Yeah, I always have a workout before I go to bed. It helps me sleep.”
“You need to stick to the training schedule I made for you!” Twilight told her heatedly. “Breaking it will cause undue stress on your muscles and cause much more harm than good!”
Fluttershy held in her opinion of the situation as she looked between Rainbow Dash and Twilight Sparkle. Although she certainly liked the mare for all the help she gave Fluttershy with her animals and introducing her to the Love Lace series of books since romance novels were a secret passion of hers, Twilight could certainly be a bit bossy sometimes; especially when it came to clashing with stubborn mares like Rainbow Dash.
As she expected, Rainbow shot back a retort rather than admit she might need help. “Look you may have some book smarts about flying Twilight, but I’m the one with the wings. I know what I’m doing. If you really want me to do a Rainboom then just give me the how-to book already.”
The unicorn gave the pegasus a pensive frown and was silent for several seconds before she replied. “Rainbow, I know you have tons of experience, and you’re an amazing flier. But it takes more than just muscle to perform that move, but what it does do to the body is create an immense strain…at least that’s what I got from what I read anyway. I just want to make sure your body can take it.”
“Are you calling me a wimp?” Rainbow demanded suddenly.
“What?” Twilight exclaimed, her eyes quickly going wide. “No! This isn’t… Rainbow, you’re the most athletic pegasus I know, and I grew up in the palace next to the royal guard!”
Seeing that this argument was about to go sour, the other pegasus in the room moved over to the edge of the bath where her friend’s massage bed had been placed. “She’s just trying to help you Rainbow.”
Rainbow Dash let out a sigh at Fluttershy’s words. “Yeah I know but…” The pegasus turned her attention back to Twilight. “Look, I really do appreciate the help Twilight. I mean, you’re making all the egghead stuff in those training manuals actually make sense and all… but, it’s kind of weird for a unicorn to be telling a pegasus how to fly.”
“Why’s that?” Twilight asked, tilting her head in confusion.
In response to the question, Rainbow Dash unfolded her wings. “Umm hello? Wings,” she said before pointing a hoof at Twilight. “No wings.”
A rather creepy grin appeared on Twilight’s face as she looked over to Rainbow Dash. “So what you’re saying is… If I were to suddenly gain wings, you’ll do whatever I tell you to?”
“Twilight-darling, that’s the same look you had on your face when you had Applejack and I play your Truth or Dare game during our slumber party,” Rarity said as she gave the other unicorn a nervous look out of the corner of her eye.
Rainbow Dash just laughed. “Okay Twilight, if you suddenly turn into a princess I’ll do whatever you-uh, Twilight?”
Fluttershy looked away from Dash and over to Twilight to see her face had become sullenly and dull with drooping eyes. A second later, the look was gone and replaced with a smile as she looked back to her friends. “I’ll hold you to that Dash.”
As the silence dragged on for a few seconds, Rarity cleared her throat and got everypony’s attention. She apparently wasn’t got to let their visitation end on such a sour note. “So in other news, it appears my parents have decided they’re moving to Ponyville.”
“Really Rarity?” Twilight asked, her excitement evident. “Oh I can’t wait to meet them and Sweetie Belle! I can start teaching her to use her horn if you want. I asked Cheerilee if she wanted me to give the foals any lessons in magic, but I apparently need to get a certification before I’m allowed to teach magic in a classroom setting.” Then, Twilight tapped her hoof to her chin and dropped her voice so low even Fluttershy could barely hear her. “Which is weird because the last time I showed fillies how to do magic they never mentioned…” she paused and looked to her back, “oh yeah.”
For her part, Rarity looked a little…odd. She was giving Twilight a measuring look. It was the same one Fluttershy had seen on her face a few times when the unicorn couldn’t quite figure out what one of her clients should wear. “That’s…very generous of you darling.”
Twilight’s raised an eyebrow at Rarity’s reaction. “Is something wrong?”
“Well it’s just that I don’t remember ever talking about Swee-”
“Ms Sparkle! Ms Sparkle!”
All the mares in the room looked to the double doors as they slammed open to admit a pink unicorn that Fluttershy only half recognized as a pony she’d seen around town, but not really gotten to know. However, Twilight seemed to recognize the unicorn on sight. “Sparkler, what is it?”
“Ditzy didn’t derp up the weather office again, did she?” Rainbow added.
The unicorn named Sparkler shot Rainbow Dash a death glare, then looked over to the purple unicorn with panic in her eyes. “It’s Spike, he’s-”
Twilight was out of her bath and dripping water on the floor in front of the pink unicorn not two seconds later. “Spike! What happened? Is he okay?”
“I’m not sure how to tell you this-”
“Oh no! My little Spiky-whiky’s been hurt?” Rarity shrieked.
Sparkler blinked, then looked over to Rarity with a frown. “Your Spiky-whiky? Seriously?” she asked before raising an eyebrow.
“Sparkler!” Twilight shouted as she spun the mare to face her, “what happened to my son?”
With Twilight glaring at her with a mix of panic and anger, the pink unicorn wilted and gulped. “Well uh, you see…when he finally woke up an hour ago…umm, it’s probably better if I just show you.”
The trip from the spa hadn’t taken five minutes, and even that had been longer than it
should after Twilight made Rainbow Dash stay in her table with a telekinetic field so the masseuse could continue working on her. So, it was only Twilight, Fluttershy, and Rarity that accompanied Sparkler back to the Golden Oaks Library at a fast pace the purple unicorn set.
Despite already being winded, Sparkler was just glad Twilight hadn’t popped back with her magic to check things out. She wanted a chance to explain things before Twilight managed to build up a temper and started addressing questions to the only other creature in the library at the time of the incident.
The moment they got to the library, Twilight reached out to open the door with her hooves, and grunted when she found it locked. When she turned to look at Sparkler, the pink unicorn cleared her throat and looked away before a frown could form. Twilight Sparkle was not a unicorn you got confrontational with.
“I uh, thought it was better if nopony came in to bother him,” she mumbled before raising her voice towards the door. “Hey Spike it’s me, I brought Ms Sparkle and some of her friends.”
“M-Mom?”
“Spike open the door,” the unicorn instructed him, apparently calmed down from the fact her son was still able to talk.
For a few moments, the handle just jiggled, but the door refused to open. “Um…I can’t get a grip on the knob,” Spike’s voice replied.
Sparkler sighed and covered her face with her hoof. “We both know you’ve got no grip, just use your teeth Spike.”
Beside Sparkler, Twilight tilted her head in confusion. “Teeth?”
In response to the question, the knob turned and there was a click as the door automatically unlocked before it slowly opened with a creek that Sparkler could only call ominous, despite the bright and sunny day it was.
Instead of the dragon greeting them, a purple pony that was a shade brighter than Twilight with green hair that looked somewhat scruffy stood in the doorway. Despite the age difference, he came up eye to eye with Twilight, which meant he would probably top her by at least half a head taller when he finished growing.
Twilight looked at the new pony for a second before her head became slightly askew in confusion. “Spike?”
“Umm…h-hey Mom…surprise?”
Since Sparkler had seen him get up an hour ago and the related freak-out, tangle in sheets, and trip down the stars that involved very little walking on Spike’s part, she was more than prepared for the sight. The others however, were not.
Fluttershy simply forgot to keep flapping her wings, and fell to the ground right on her plot. It took her ten whole seconds to finally form words. “Oh…my.”
Rarity seemed to take it the best. “Spike?” she exclaimed while asking a question at the same time. A second later, she was zipping around to look at the male pony from every which way there was, checking every part of his body she could in public.
“It…you…pony…tail…ugh-that mane! Darling, you simply must…sorry, getting a bit off topic here,” she mumbled before shaking herself out of it and going back to her panicked assessment of the new young stallion. “You…HOW?”
For her part, Twilight simply blinked once…twice…thrice… Then, she cleared her throat, and took in a deep breath, raised her head to it’s maximum height, conjured a clipboard with paper on it somewhere along with a red pen to check a trio of things off before nodding to herself. Then, and only then, once she was fully prepared…Twilight Sparkle screamed loud enough to break half the windows in Ponyville.
“This is bad, this is bad, this is very, very veryvery bad!” Twilight cried as Rarity watched her pace around the room at a trot while the rest of her friends and currently equine son stood by.
For his part, Spike simply sighed as if he’d seen this a million times before, which he probably had. “I’ll make some tea for when she starts to calm down.” The dragon-turned-pony then turned around slowly, and started to walk to the kitchen on wobbly legs. It was obvious to the white unicorn that he was having trouble adjusting to the change in species of simple walking was causing him so much trouble.
But with him gone, Rarity was able to focus on helping her…not so together friend. She cleared her throat to get Twilight’s attention. “Twilight-dear, it doesn’t seem to be that bad,” the unicorn told her before she looked over to the departing pony.
It was a little off-putting to see Spike so tall. Of course, Twilight had explained Spike’s age to Rarity during one of their weekly luncheons when all of the Elements got together instead of just a handful here and there. While Spike was five or six years younger than the girls in pony-years, when it came to how dragons aged, he’d still be considered a hatchling for quite some time.
Her ruminations were ended a second later when Twilight teleported right in front of the unicorn with a rather manic look in her eye and Rarity was starting to wonder if it had been a good idea to draw Twilight’s attention. Spike said she had…episodes, but I never imagined they’d be like this.
“Not that bad? NOT THAT BAD?” Twilight shouted before she reached out and grabbed Rarity by the shoulders. “You don’t understand! Something like this has never happened before NOT. EVER. BEFORE. NOW!”
The next thing she knew, Rarity was on her side from being let go in mid-shake and Twilight was back to trotting around the room like a madmare. “What am I supposed to do? What am I supposed to do? I didn’t plan for this! GAAAAAAH! WHY DIDN’T I PLAN FOR SOMETHING LIKE THIS?”
“Ummm, Twilight?”
Despite Fluttershy’s soft voice, Twilight stopped in mid-step and looked over to the shy pegasus. “Yes?”
With the attention on her, Fluttershy seemed to wilt a little, but she was still able to speak. “Well, I don’t think it’s that bad,” she told the unicorn. “I mean, Spike seems to be more or less okay.”
The sound of a dish breaking made the pegasus let out an ‘eep’ and Spike’s voice called out from the kitchen. “Sorry, my fault.”
Sparkler let out a groan before she walked towards the kitchen. “I’ll go check on him. Apparently he hasn’t figured out how to hold things with his hooves yet.”
Hmm strange, even foals can do that, Rarity told herself. Turning her attention back to Twilight, Rarity set her mind to the task at hand: calming the magically gifted unicorn down so she could put that brilliant brain of hers to work on fixing Spike. “Yes dear, since Spike seems to be more or less okay at the moment, I think we should concentrate on fixing the problem rather than panicking about it.”
Despite the sound advice, Twilight looked at the two ponies as if they were completely insane. Then, with a completely straight face, she explained something as if it should be obvious to the two of them. “But I’ve still got five minutes of panicking to do.”
“Be that as it may Dear, I…wait, what?” Rarity asked, Twilight’s words only registering at the last few moments.
A clipboard materialized next to Twilight. “See, it’s all according to my schedule,” she said before the item floated over for Rarity to read.
Unplanned Crisis Plan & Schedule Framework (version 3.65a)
STEP 1: Scream (refer to step by step screaming instructions for maximum effect)
STEP 2: PANIC (allow at least fifteen minutes to achieve proper adrenaline rush)
STEP 3: Examine Problem
STEP 4: Draw Up Maximum Catastrophic Outcome Assessment
STEP 5: Panic Over COA (do only if Equestria will be destroyed as predicted by COA if not, skip to step 6)
STEP 6: Find Solution (see solution finding checklist/plan (attached))
Rarity blinked as her brain tried to process what she’s just read. Apparently Fluttershy got over the confusion quicker, or she really didn’t notice how much crazier the fact Twilight had something like this on hand, as she was the first to react.
“Twilight, you have a…schedule for acting this way?” the pegasus asked.
The unicorn nodded, her serious expression making Rarity really wonder about her friend’s sanity. “Yes, it’s much more efficient than simply running around screaming my head off and hyperventilating at random like I used to do,” she told them with a smile. “Would you like me to make you a copy Fluttershy? It’s much better than those panic attacks you use.”
“Oh no,” Fluttershy replied. “But, thank you for offering.”
Twilight smiled and nodded. “Well, I wouldn’t be much of a friend if I didn’t offer to help,” she said before her expression turned a bit more frightened. “Now, could one of you girls fetch me a paper bag? I need to start hyperventilating.”
The bright light being shined in his eye make Spike turn his head away, which got a frown from his mom before she used her magic to turn his head back and continued her examination that had begun half an hour ago with Twilight poking, prodding, snipping, snapping, clipping, and…doing other things to Spike that made him feel just about as violated as anypony could be.
On top of that, Twilight had gone through his bed and the bathroom with some kind of spell which apparently found something since she wiped the floor and put the rag she used into a sample container as well as his bed sheets.
Then there were the questions Twilight had asked him, which Spike answered to the best of his ability despite some of them being completely foolish. He hadn’t wished on a shooting star, drank a purple potion made from the juice of the poly plant, or gone into the Everfree Forest on his own within the past twenty-four hours.
Thankfully, one of the ponies who had been there this morning wasn’t around to see Twilight go over his new body with a fine-tooth comb. Unfortunately, that pony had been Sparkler. Rarity and Fluttershy had stuck around out of concern.
“Okay Spike, I think I’ve got everything I need,” she told him before writing something down on her notepad and levitating the box filled with his DNA behind her as she headed towards the lab’s door.
Twilight started to undo the wards surrounding her lab’s entrance, Rarity walked up and asked a question that Spike was hoping she wouldn’t bring up. “Twilight, not to second guess you or anything, but…why not simply use that spell of yours to turn Spike back into a dragon?”
As usual when she was working with the entrance to her door, Twilight didn’t bother to look back as she talked. “Because, mixing magic without knowing what I’m mixing might ending up doing more harm than good.”
“That makes sense, I guess,” Rarity replied. “I’d hate to see my little Spiky get hurt.”
The mention of his old nickname made Spike frown. “Hey! I’m just about as tall as you are now Rarity! Well…not counting the horn that is.”
“Yes, what is it with that?” she asked. “From the way you talked before, I would have put him more in step with my little sister than a teenage pony.”
A small ding sounded from the door, announcing that Twilight had removed the last ward, and she turned to face Rarity. Her face was wrinkled in worry. “That’s what scares me about all this Rarity.”
As the door swung open, Spike started to stand up trying his hardest to keep his weight distributed properly between his legs. It was a lot harder than Twilight made it look. Still, if he was going to get married to Rarity, he needed to learn how to walk like a pony. Unfortunately, he was unable to break his record of ten steps without falling flat on his face. I am never waxing this floor again, no matter how little there is to do around the library.
“Um, Fluttershy, could you look after Spike while I go through some particulates I found on his body?” Twilight asked as Spike struggled to pick himself up. “Rarity, I could use a little help down in the lab, if you don’t mind.”
“I can take care of Spike for now,” Fluttershy assured the others, making Spike’s pride take another hit and causing him to lose his balance before he could get himself fully erect.
After Rarity gave the stallion a look that reeked of pity, she turned to Twilight and nodded.
“Okay Rarity, just…give me a second to make sure everything’s safe,” Twilight said to the other unicorn. “I wouldn’t want you changing species on us too.”
Before the two could depart, Spike looked up at the white unicorn, then over to his mother. He couldn’t just stand around and let this chance pass him by! “Twilight, wait! I’m your assistant I can-ugh, stupid hooves, I’m supposed to be the one helping you!”
The declaration had Twilight turning around and giving the teenage stallion an apologetic look. “Spike I love you, and you are an amazing assistant,” she told him. “But, you can barely stand up and walk around, much less hold things. I can’t let you anywhere near the lab or you might crash into something and…well, I don’t even want to think what that might bring.” With that, she went through the box again.
“But-”
Twilight looked up from the box of samples, probably checking to make sure she had enough little pieces of Spike to do whatever with. “Come on Rarity,” Twilight told the other unicorn, leading her out of Spike’s sight.
For the second time since coming to Ponyville, Rarity found herself both in awe of Twilight Sparkle, and more than a little afraid of her.
She tried not to be, Twilight Sparkle was one of the warmest, kindest, most caring individuals that Rarity had met in her life. When she had been wrapped in the unicorn’s magic, Twilight had given Rarity and the others a glimpse into herself through the magic she used in order to keep some of the ponies in the crowd from panicking; Rarity included. It had reminded her of the time she had gone to the Equestrian Fair as a filly and run into a rather loud minotaur with a domineering attitude. The monster had been several times larger and stronger than a full grown pony, and Rarity had found herself petrified at the sight of such a creature. While she hadn’t come to any harm, the minotaur's loud voice and brash nature had left a lasting impression that she still found herself recalling to this day.
Twilight was like a unicorn version of that creature when it came to measuring magic against that of another pony. But that was raw power, what she saw after entering Twilight’s lab was something else.
Like all unicorns, Rarity’s magic was very dependent on the mark that adorned her flank. If it existed outside her sphere of finding beauty, or crafting beauty from gems and cloth, then what she could do was quite limited. Still, Rarity had found ways to stretch the limits of her talent such as a few enchantments on clothes help get her clients noticed or increasing the shine on a coat; and she could even stretch it further by putting a bit of magic in gems to power spells that weren’t limited to fashion. She prided herself on being one of if not the most resourceful and possibly strongest unicorn in Ponyville.
After looking at Twilight’s lab, Rarity was seeing that she was like a child standing next to a giant in terms of both power and ability.
Three seconds after studying the spell formula on the walls, Rarity could tell she would never understand what the thing was meant for other than it was so complex it needed to be recorded on a 3D model. She knew spells like that were beyond complex in the extreme since enchanting a gem required something a little similar; in the way that basic addition was related to advanced calculus.
“One second, let me clear some room,” Twilight said before her horn lit up and the chalkboards that were stationed at various points around the lab shrunk to a tenth of their normal size, then Twilight floated them to a far corner. “Don’t touch anything, or even channel magic.”
Rarity frowned at the odd command that practically made her useless. “Very well darling, but…I don’t see how much help I’m going to be in finding out what’s wrong with Spike if I can’t use my horn.”
Once again, Twilight’s horn lit up, and a pair of couches appeared near the base of the stairs via conjuration magic. After Rarity had taken her seat, Twilight nodded and the door to the upstairs shut hard. “Oh, I already know what’s wrong with Spike,” she said before setting the box of things down and turning to Rarity. “I need you to talk him into taking the antidote.”
Twilight’s words sent Rarity into a whirl of confusion. “But…it…you…how…” She took a deep breath, and calmed herself. “What do you mean, you know what’s wrong with Spike? Why did you bother running all those tests on him if you already knew?”
“Most of the samples I took from Spike either evaporated within a minute, or have turned back into their dragon equivalent now that they’re outside the transformation field,” Twilight explained before she held up a small plastic dish that had a pair of Spike’s purple scales inside. “Added to this are some particulates I found in Spike’s nose, his bed, and the bathroom floor last night that are giving off a chaotic magic aura. That means Spike has been exposed to a magical plant known as Poison Joke. It’s a flower that only grows in the Everfree Forest.”
The news sent a shiver of fear through Rarity’s spine. While she and the others had managed to venture into that forest and survive, that had only been because the girls had gone together. As powerful as she was, Rarity dreaded to think what could happen to Twilight in there. “The Everfree…Darling, please don’t tell me you’ve been going in that horrid place alone!”
“At least once a week since I came to Ponyville, several reagents that grow there can’t be found anywhere else in Equestria,” Twilight told her. “Plus, The Castle of the Two Sisters has a library from before the time of Nightmare Moon, and its got the biggest ley line convergence point in all of Equestria right underneath it.”
“That just makes it all the more dangerous!” Rarity exclaimed. “And you’ve been going in there by yourself?” The purple unicorn’s reckless abandon made Rainbow Dash’s look tame in comparison!
“I’m not stupid Rarity, I went with a guide,” Twilight assured her. “Zecora has been living there for-”
“ZECORA!” Rarity shrieked upon hearing the news that Twilight was involved with that…dreadfully mysterious creature. If she wasn’t already halfway laying down, Rarity was pretty sure she’d have fainted! “Are out of your mind darling? Zecora is the absolute worst thing in that dreadful place!”
A frown crossed Twilight’s face, and her lips scrunched up in the way the unicorn always did when her temper was getting the best of her. “Hey! Zecora is one of the nicest ponies…well, zebras I know. Okay, one of the only zebras I know, but she’s still plenty nice! And for your information, she’s a little upset that every time she comes to town, everypony in Ponyville hides behind locked doors!”
“But-”
“Have you ever talked to her?” Twilight demanded, her anger making Rarity flinch.
A little put off by Twilight’s actions, the unicorn looked away from her accusing friend. “Well…no.”
Twilight was silent for a moment, and when Rarity looked back at the other unicorn to see what was going on, she saw the pony in one of her contemplative moods for a second before Twilight spoke again. “Remember when we first met?”
“Well-”
“You came off as a complete fashion-obsessed unicorn who only seemed to care about looks,” Twilight told her. “What ponies wore, what you looked like, all that stuff. If somepony would have asked me who the most self-obsessed pony out of all of us was the night after we helped Luna, I would have looked right past Rainbow Dash and pointed to you. After all, that shallowness seemed to be what your entire life revolved around: looks.”
The accusation made Rarity’s eye twitch. She could see that Twilight was building to something, but the long way she was going about it was making the white unicorn’s temper start to boil. “And your point, Twilight?”
Twilight sighed and shook her head. “But you're nothing like that,” she continued. “You’re responsible, caring, insightful, intelligent, generous; and I’m talking about true generosity, giving something of yourself to others rather than just what you could afford. You’re all those things and more Rarity, and a pony I am honored just to know. Not to mention call my friend.”
With the assessment of her character over, Rarity felt a flutter in her heart at the appraisal. She had to look away from the mare to hide the tears in her eyes that were threatening to form. She knew Twilight could be a little rough around the edges sometimes, but the harshly honest unicorn saying such things was quite the compliment. Probably the nicest she had ever received. “You’re too kind Twilight.”
“And I never would have gotten to know what a wonderful pony you are had I just gone by what I saw and heard from others,” she said. “So, the next time she comes to town, you might try giving Zecora a chance, okay?”
Sighing in defeat, Rarity nodded. “I suppose you have a…wait…what do you mean listened to what others said about me. What others?”
Twilight cleared her throat. “Oh, never mind about that. Now uh…about Spike.”
“Twilight,” Rarity growled at her concerns being dismissed.
The purple unicorn rolled her eyes and let out a groan. “Pfft, fine. Carrot Top doesn’t like you.”
“Carrot Top doesn’t like anypony,” Rarity countered in a dry tone.
“See, so it’s no big deal, now can we please focus on my son?” Twilight begged.
Rarity sighed and shook her head. “Can you stop talking about him like that?” she asked. “Seeing him as a…how old is Spike again?”
“Fourteen.”
“Yes, well seeing him like this and connecting him back to the baby dragon we know and love is a little…disconcerting,” Rarity said before she shivered a little. A child of the age that Spike appeared to be having a crush was something that Rarity could easily blow off as cute and just one of those little things in life that would never amount to anything more than flattery on the part of the dragon.
However, a young teenage colt of the age Spike was apparently at, those kinds of crushes were far more damaging in the end for ponies. After all, a child would never fully act on such emotions, and what little they did could be written off as cute and mostly ignored. A teenager needed to be shot down before they got any real lewd ideas.
“So, you can see why I need you to talk to Spike about this, or at least back me up when I tell him we’ve got to cure him,” Twilight said.
Rarity couldn’t help but cock her head. She was pretty sure she knew what the other unicorn was going to say, but didn’t want to let it mull in her head for too long. “Why me?”
“Oh come on Rarity!” Twilight exclaimed. “I know my son, I know how he feels about you, and so do you! He’ll fight me hoof and tail if I try to just drag him into the bath to soak him in the transformation’s cure!”
Can’t argue that point, she thought. “But I don’t see the need to crush his hopes so firmly just to make your job a little easier.”
The attempt to protect Spike’s feelings only seemed to enrage Twilight. “Make a little-do you really think that’s what this is about?” she demanded as she sat up on her couch. “Rarity, I know it may be painful for him, but it’s better than giving Spike false hope that will motivate him to run off into the Everfree so he can hunt for more of that bucking weed! I will not let him be put in danger like that!”
With Twilight’s tirade done with, and Rarity sitting up a bit straighter on her couch because of it, she took a moment to consider Twilight’s statement. The thought of Spike going off alone in that ghastly place sent a shiver down her spine. “Do you really think Spike would do something like that over a silly crush?”
“He’s young enough to think he’s pretty much invincible,” Twilight told her. “I doubt he’ll even be thinking about the dangers when he heads to the Everfree. But I do know he’ll eventually build up the courage do it. So I need to get rid of his motivation.”
Rarity raised an eyebrow at Twilight’s logic. “Are you sure that’s the only reason he would try to stay a pony?”
“…yeah, what other reason would there be for him?” Twilight asked after a moment of contemplation.
So she really is clueless then, Rarity thought to herself. It was just another thing on her long list of things that made Twilight Sparkle so confusing: she was always so insightful but missed some of the most obvious things, she seemed to know what the other Bearers wanted before they did themselves, but was unable to wrap her head around the reasons disagreements between the girls, she was a magical genius and neat freak but had table manners on par with Rainbow Dash. “Well Twilight, you’ve already seen how Ponyville isn’t the best place for…Love and Tolerance of others.”
The look Twilight gave Rarity told her the purple unicorn had completely missed the subtext about Zecora. “Rarity what’re you talking about? Ponyville is the very definition of accepting. All three tribes are living here in equal numbers. Do you know how rare that is? Why do you think all the Bearers gathered here? We were drawn by the harmony of this place.”
Rarity raised an eyebrow at what she could only call a guesstimate. “Darling, that’s a little…no, never mind it’s not important.
“Look, I’ll agree that it is nice to see so many different ponies living like this after coming from Manehattan. They might as well of put walls inside the city considering how everypony was so…segregated, but that’s ponies. Look at Zecora, she’s lived in this area longer than you, and still hasn’t made any inroads. Now the ponies of this town have a dragon living among them and well…most don’t know what to think.”
Once again, the unsaid seemed to be lost on Twilight as she just cocked her head. “What’re you talking about? I’ve never noticed anypony snubbing Spike.”
Since it seemed there was no other way, Rarity decided to abandon beating around the bush and get to the heart of the matter. “You’re also a unicorn that can pretty much crush anypony in Ponyville like a bug, not to mention have a direct line to the princess, and let’s not forget the display you put on when Trixie came to town,” Rarity told her. “Nopony’s stupid enough to openly show their…well, I wouldn’t call it something as strong as dislike, but it’s there all the same.”
The news seemed to be a bit of a shock to Twilight. If it wasn’t for the fact that she was already sitting down, Rarity was certain she could have just fallen over right there and there. It took her a full minute to respond, and even then, it seemed to be a bit of her occasional nonsense. “I always wondered why he never had friends his own age. I always chalked it up to size and maturity but…oh Harmony, how could I have been so blind? No wonder he became too dependent on me.”
“Well if it helps, Spike…he hides it very well,” Rarity tried to comfort her. “I think he doesn’t want you to worry.”
Rarity’s words did little to soothe the lavender unicorn. “I’m his mother! I’m supposed to worry about him!” Twilight shouted.
“Yet we’ve seen you don’t do worry very well,” Rarity told her.
She needed to switch topics, they weren’t here to talk about Twilight’s abilities as a caretaker after all. “Perhaps…maybe it would be better if we simply let things continue as they are. You said this plant is a joke right? It hardly seems harmful. Perhaps this was a blessing in-”
“No.”
The seriousness of the tone that Twilight replied to Rarity with stopped her cold. “We need to change Spike back.”
Twilight-”
“I did more than poke him a few times when I examined Spike, Rarity,” she told the unicorn. “Do you want to guess what I found? His draconic abilities are completely out of whack. I don’t even want to know what’s going to happen the next time Princess Celestia sends me a letter. Then there’s Spike’s other problem. The changes are only cosmetic. He may look like one of us, but Spike is lacking even the smallest spark of pony magic. Do you have any idea what that means? How crippling it is?
“He’ll never be able to use his hooves like us, he’ll never be able to use Geomancy or Arbormancy like an earth pony. He’ll never get a cutie mark! He’ll spend the rest of his comparatively short life being little more than the butt of jokes between feeling like a waste of space! Or he’ll live as long as a normal dragon and suffer the same fate for even longer! And that’s even if he can live off the normal food for a pony! If he still needs to eat gems to survive…I…I don’t even want to think what that will do to his intestinal tract.”
Rarity gaped at Twilight’s assessment of the situation. She wanted to try and discount her worries but…the unicorn’s logic seemed pretty sound. “And from the name, I thought what it did was supposed to have a funny effect,” the white unicorn mumbled. “But that hardly seems…no, it’s not funny at all. It’s as if Spike has been given a tiny taste of normalcy, only to have it taken away from him.”
“And in the sick mind of the creature who came up with this stuff Rarity, that’s the joke.”
As Twilight started to get off her sofa, Rarity reached out to stop the other unicorn. “Twilight please wait, there has to be another way for us to convince him to change back.”
“If you have any ideas, I’m listening.”
When the door to Twilight’s lab opened up, Spike found himself dreading whatever his mom had thought up while down there. The reason for this was the time she spent doing whatever she had been doing. Twilight wasn’t one to let things like hunger, sleep, personal hygiene, or even other ponies stop her experiments when she really needed to focus on something.
So the fact that she was coming out of her lab so early could only mean one thing: Twilight had already found a way to undo whatever magic had been cast on Spike. The thought terrified him.
“M-Mom?” Spike asked, his voice trembling.
“Good news Spikey-whikey,” Rarity sung as she followed Twilight out with a bottle of some blue liquid floating behind her. “We found a way to change you back into your cute little scaly self.”
Twilight nodded, just as happy before she turned around and started restoring her wards. “We just need to draw you a bath, mix in this potion, and everything will be right as rain Spike. Just let me fix things here and-”
“No.”
Since Twilight was apparently too busy locking her door behind its fifty some magical seals, it was Rarity that replied to him. “Pardon?”
“I said no,” Spike told them, a little more confidently, “I don’t want to go back to being a dragon!”
“It’s who you are Spike,” Twilight said without looking back. For some reason he couldn‘t quite put his clawless appendage on, Spike thought those words sounded cold and cruel.
For a moment he looked back at Fluttershy for support, but only found the pegasus looking around in confusion. A moment ago they had been talking about how ponies were supposed to pick things up with their hooves, which turned out to be pretty useless for him since it was just ‘touch and take’, while she helped clean up the several shattered pieces of saucers and cups on the ground.
Since it seemed he wasn’t going to get any support from her, Spike turned back to face his mother, who as done reactivating her wards. “Why are you doing this? I want to stay a pony! What’s so wrong with me staying like this?”
“Because it’s not what you are Spike,” Twilight explained, having the gall to wear a sympathetic expression.
In response, Spike stomped his hoof onto the ground. “Yeah, well I’ve seen what I am! Remember that dragon? I DON’T WANT TO BE LIKE THAT!”
Twilight shook her head before giving him a reassuring smile. “Spike, a very wise dragon once wrote, it’s not what you are that determines who you are,” she said. “I know you’ll grow up to be a noble dragon, one I can be proud to call my son.”
“You won’t be calling me anything at all!” Spike yelled at her. “YOU’LL BE DEAD! By the time I’m as big as that dragon we saw in that cave, your bones won’t even be around anymore!
“I don’t want to turn back, I just want to stay a pony!”
This time, it seemed Twilight had nothing to say. She was silent for a minute…two…and then ten. Finally, she walked up to look at him within Spike’s personal space. Spike gulped as his mother studied him up and down for a moment, obviously thinking about something. Twilight circled him, taking time to look at his blank flank and green tail, then came back to face him from the front.
“Okay,” Twilight told him, making Spike’s spirits sour, “but you have to pass a test first.”
The condition didn’t affect his mood. Spike practically ran in place with excitement at the prospect of staying the way he was. He could finally be with Rarity! For that he could run around the town faster than Rainbow Dash could fly, tame more animals than Fluttershy, buck more apples than Applejack, he could do anything!
A small chinking sound grabbed the former dragon’s attention, and he saw that Twilight had moved a cup of tea that Sparkler had made earlier over in front of him. Spike looked at it for a moment, then back to his mom. “Thanks, but I’m not-”
“Pick it up,” Twilight told him evenly.
Spike blinked in confusion, then reached forward with his mouth.
“Pick it up with one hoof, if you can do that, then you can stay a pony.”
The cruel words made Spike freeze. “T-Twilight, that…” Anger rose in the dragon-turned pony’s throat, “That’s not fair!” he shouted. She had seen how he couldn’t hold anything in his hooves like the others. She knew he couldn’t do something like that.
“Even the youngest of foals can create a magic grip in their hooves,” Twilight told him in a stern voice. “If you want to stay a pony, then go on and do what even the youngest of us can, and pick up the cup.”
Spike reached forward and touched the delicate porcelain with his hoof. Lift up, he told the cup in his mind before trying to follow through with the motion with his foreleg. His hoof came up, but the cup stayed down.
Not to be deterred, Spike tried again, and again…and again. On his twelfth try, he looked up to Twilight with a scowl. “How the hay am I supposed to do this?” he demanded before his voice rose to a shout. “How does it work? WHAT’S THE TRICK?”
The two ponies in the room aside from his mother looked away from Spike, refusing to meet his eyes.
“How do you burp fire?” Twilight asked him with that same damnable cold expression. “How do you accidentally do what other dragons do? How do you walk, or breathe? How do you make your heart beat? It just happens Spike. Now pick up the cup.”
The unicorn’s cool expression simply added fuel to the fire burning in Spike’s gut. He swept his hoof to the side, and knocked the cup to the floor, shattering it. “YOU KNOW I CAN’T!”
“Then it looks like I’ll be turning you back into a dragon,” Twilight told him softly. “I’m sorry Spike.”
Once again, Spike was overcome with terror. He didn’t want to be a dragon! Being a dragon meant being different in a town of creatures that were more or less the same. It meant almost never being able to eat what tasted good. It meant having to stay the same while all the ponies around him grew old and died!
“No!” the purple earth pony shouted before he looked around the room for a lifeline, and found one in the marshmallow unicorn. “Rarity, don’t let her do this to me!”
For her part, Rarity slowly backed away from him until she ran into the nearest bookshelf. “Spike…Twilight only wants what’s best for you.”
“But this is what’s best for me, for all of us!” he cried. “Look at me! I’m…you and me…we can finally be together.”
“Spike,” Rarity managed to say before Spike cut her off.
“I love you Rarity!” Spike exclaimed while he looked into her beautiful face. “I’ve loved you since the first moment I saw you! You’re the most beautiful, talented, and amazing unicorn I’ve ever seen! And now that I’m a pony I can-”
Rarity said nothing to stop him from talking, she didn’t need to. The look of pain and unease on her face was all it took. When he backed away from her, she finally spoke. “Spiky-whiky…”
“No,” he whined.
“I know what you think you’re feeling is love,” she continued.
“No!” the former dragon replied with a shake of his head.
“But it’s just a crush.”
“STOP IT!” he shouted as he looked Rarity up and down. Everything he knew about the unicorn told him that what he was hearing was wrong. It was like she had stabbed Spike in the chest with her horn, then ripped out his impaled heart before throwing it in the nearby trashcan because he wouldn’t be needing it anymore. There was no way that Rarity would do something like this to him!
Yeah, there’s no way she would do this, Spike told himself before looking over to Twilight Sparkle, his so-called mother. Seeing her standing there, it all suddenly clicked into place. Twilight had cast some kind of spell. That was the only possible reason Rarity was rejecting him like this. “What did you do to her?” Spike shouted.
The question forced Twilight back a step. “W-What?”
“You took Rarity down into that basement, and now she doesn’t love me anymore!” Spike yelled.
Twilight simply rolled her eyes at the accusation, the tension evaporating as quickly as it had appeared. “Now you’re just being ridiculous Spike. Even if I did have a spell for making one pony fall out of love with another, we both know how bad I am when it comes to mind altering magic. It blows up in my face every time.”
However, Spike wasn’t fooled by her act. “No! I know you Twilight! This is all some stupid plan of yours to make me turn back into a dragon because you’re stupid craziness and how you always want to keep everything the same!”
“Spike that is ridiculous!” she told him with a frown before she approached him again. “You are my son and I love-”
“NO!” Spike roared as he tried to swipe a claw that had become a hoof at the purple unicorn and nearly ended up falling flat on his face. “Stop saying that! You’re not my mom! Celestia raised me a lot more than you ever did! You’re not my sister or ANYTHING! YOU’RE JUST SOME STUPID NEUROTIC UNICORN AND…AND I HATE YOU!”
Twilight recoiled as if struck, and Spike could only feel a twinge of satisfaction as the unicorn’s legs gave out from under her and she fell to the ground with a look of something between shock and pain written all over her face. “W-What?”
“I HATE YOU,” Spike shouted again for Twilight trying to always running his life.
Twilight flinched, curling in on herself.
“I HATE YOU!” Spike shouted once again for making him move to Ponyville and leaving all the ponies who knew him in Canterlot.
The little purple pony cowered under Spike’s gaze even further.
“YOU’RE JUST A SELFISH UNICORN WHO ONLY CARES ABOUT HERSELF AND I HATE YOU!” he shouted one last time before looking around the room in a panic.
Spotting the door, he made a dash for the exit and managed to knock open the way to the outside world without falling down. Before he started sprinting away, Spike heard what he knew to be the beginnings of one of Twilight’s panic attacks, and all he could do was be glad that she was getting what was coming to her.
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Oh, no. Spike come back!
Yay, Spike has just had his first-ever teenage rebellious streak.
And, the more things she changes, the way things seem to get more...interesting for Twilight Sparkle...
Ouch -- I think the only way is to tell Spike the truth -- the whole truth -- something she probably should have done EARLIER.
4125632 ...have you even been reading the story?
Here, let me explain it to you: physically, she's the same Twilight Sparkle; mentally, however, she's an older (possibly hundreds, if not thousands of years old) Alicorn from a seemingly screwed-up future, and she managed to swap her mind with that of her past self.
Make any sense now? Because that's about as simple as I can put it.
Dammit, Spike. Way to screw up the space-time continuum!
Please tell me this is a typo. Please tell me Twilight has NOT fallen that far.
The hydra is justifiable. At the end of the day, it's just a monster.
The Diamond Dogs are different. They speak. They wear clothes. They use tools. They are thinking, feeling beings and Twilight bucking well knows this. Please tell me she is NOT thinking about killing them for something they (technically) haven't even done yet.
4125632
4125826
You're talking as if Twilight leveled up a few times and got +5 to her willpower. It doesn't work like that.
Twilight was a very lonely pony before she came to Ponyville and met her friends. They showed her what friendship is, and she grew very close to them. They became the foundation of her life, and the rock that those three and a half seasons of character development are based on. Given her dislike of Celestia, it's quite possible that they are the only ponies she cares about, and through either long years together or long years after their deaths, she has a rather idealistic view of them and their friendships.
Then she comes back in time and discovers that reality is not as nice as she thought. She thought her friendship with the mane six (and Spike) was immutable, and she came back to relive those days and make them better, but she's realized by now that there's a very real possibility that her actions could actually destroy all those years of frienship that she remembers.
And now it's happened.
This is not Twilight being paranoid; this is a rejection the likes of Shining Armor and Celestia in the season 2 finale. No amount of "growth" and "experience" prepares you for that kind of hurt.
4125826
Well I’ve already addressed this in regards to her psychological reactions the first time you commented on it in like the 1st or 2nd chapter so I wont go into that sliver of psychobabble again when it comes to Twilight’s psyche.
As for being a master manipulator, she’s not despite her ideas to the contrary. In truth, there really is no such thing as a master manipulator because it’s impossible to predict the reactions of more than three people in regards to any event, and Twilight would have to do this for an entire town with the possibilities growing at an endless rate per each decision every pony made to infinity. She can do one or two minor things like getting Sparkler to talk with her in private to try and get her and Derpy back together (which she was failing at until Spike said something) because its one pony and one action. Or just trying to get everyone to like Rainbow more by revealing the Rainboom earlier than before.
Plus its Twilight, when her big plans just fall apart, or stuff happens that blindsides her like Spike getting joked, she freaks out. If she didn’t it wouldn’t be Twilight.
As for the things she learned during the show, right now she’s pretty much doing the exact opposite of everything she’s learned in MLP. She’s not trusting her friends to work things out, lying to them by simply being there, and sneaking around doing stuff no one else has a clue about for some big master plan she has cooking behind everyone’s backs.
And when it comes to X amount of years in the future, Twilight’s already let it slip what she’s been up to very early on for several years. She basically sat alone in a library/lab/TARDIS/(whatever fits your head cannon) for so long that she started talking to herself just to hear the sound of her own voice. What little people skills she developed would have long since disappeared in her isolation.
4126044
Silly reader, Twilight would never kill anypony
Oh wait, they're dogs.
Look away Fluttershy
just look away.
Twilight is so bad at time. It'd be hilarious if it weren't so tragic. It's like the cardinal rule of time travellers trying not to mess up history, go with the flow. You can't stop the butterfly effect, and the more you try the more you risk it blowing up on you. Acting timey just at the right moment will net you success, instead of trying to jury rig consistency the whole time. When your attempts at manipulating the timeline go awry you just have to... go with it. Otherwise your aberrant behavior will skew the timeline far more than if you reacted naturally and it went on its own. It's like a balance beam. When you start falling one way, if you jerk yourself the other way, you're now falling faster the other way. Better to do a controlled fall off the beam and get back on it, than oscillate more and more violently, and crack your head on it when you finally slip.
She's such a bad mother too. I know she cares and loves him, but she's way too high strung and obsessed with organization. She's pretty forgetful too at bad times. Not good at reading people... pony or dragon. Some mares really should just send the kid to the orphanage, where they'll have a better chance than the one they had at home. Or in Spike's case let him be your assistant not your child. And get him some playmates his er, maturity level. There's no better way to integrate into a fearful society than to make friends with their kids, especially if you're going to be around when those kids are all grown up and running the town.
Haha! Called it. I'm only a little perturbed that there isn't much Applejack so far in the story.
Well, nice start of the chapter and kind of a grim ending, but still awesome!
Or she could have told him that his life is in danger.
Another thing she could do is explain that the ONLY reason Spike is attracted to Rarity is because of her manecut. Remember when Apple Bloom re-did Twilight's mane to have it look like Rarity's and Spike instantly fell for his adoptive mother?
My headcanon for that is that Spike's particular dragon species has the females with a head-spine setup that is similar to Rarity's manecut.
Why couldn't Twilight just tell Spike the downsides (no cutie mark, no magic, etc) like she told Rarity?
4127968
Because that makes too much sense!
But in all seriousness, she was building to that (or might have been nopony really knows without a look into her head, which we don't have) but when explaining things to kids it's usually better for them to figure out half of it on their own. But then Spike started yelling and went off the track Twilight had planned out.
Plus, there's also the fact she babbys Spike. How often did your parents ask for permission to do something when you were about 5-7?
Good. I always preferred the brother/sister angle. Twilight and Spike's interactions just feel more sibling-ish than maternal. When was the last time you had to talk your mother down from the grips of mania?
Still, this was feelsy to the extreme. Great job.
4127112
Applejack is a boring pony
4128047
Ouch, that was a low blow, Spike
4127112
The same reason Pinkie's had about 5 seconds of screen time in the story so far
The story follows the show in a semi-episodic format that deals with the problems that arise in relation to the characters they effect. The only reason RD and Fluttershy were even in this chapter was because it made sense for them to be at the spa, but Rainbow got left behind and FL was little more than background decoration because the problem that arose was between Spike Rarity and Twilight.
Don't worry, AJ will have her supreme dumb-ass moment where she needs to learn to grow eventually like everypony else.
4128191
Exactly.
Oh and if anyone is wondering about what happened to the dragon horde
and 
jacked at the begining of the chapter, there's a side story coming out about that.
4128386
That was seriously good.
4126044
Minority Report -- pre-crimes division.
Or "A Stitch in Time" the Outer Limits episode from 1996.
Sooo~, Celestia got the flower after Spike burned it, right? That'd be hilarious to see,
especially when she comes seeking answers as to why she received it in the first place.
fc00.deviantart.net/fs71/f/2012/048/4/9/pinkie_pie_oopsie__shiny__by_loopuleasa-d4q05u6.png
Going to be painful waiting a month from here...
Why isn't this liked more? This is wonderful. Can't wait for the next bit. Thank you!
Great story. I look forward to reading more.
Will we get more hint's on what happen to Twilight in the future, and why she came back as the story goes on?
Why does Twilight hate Celestia so much now?
Will Trixie appear in the story again?
Has Twilight lost her son?
Will anyone start to get suspicious of Twilight?
Looking forward to reading more and finding out?
Season over updates when? :)
4431077
It's being worked on, Spike doing his thing is taking time to write and I'm having to re-plan a few plot points to account for the finale.
Plus there's the side story I'm writing about just what they did with a dragon's horde.
I anticipate the story ending with Twilight going back again to have more events happen more similarly to the original timeline, having realised that her changes are causing more damage than they fix. Either that or preventing her original incursion so that she can't stuff it up again, but that causes a paradox.
Interesting that everything is happening so differently, and yet its all remaining just the same at the same time. ((Fluttershy is the only one that's not developing, unfortunately...)) While I can certainly understand Spike's plight, it is a cruel truth that Twilight has a point at the end of the day. Poor thing. I eagerly await the next chapter, this is the best story that I'm following right now, and the best story period I've seen in a long time.
This is ponys. It made me cly tow times.
4445675
I'm wondering if at this point the Elements will end up in others hands because she's practically cracking the friendship.
Seriously, if someone acted like her currently I'm pretty sure most would abandon her considering she's trying to dictate their lives down with force and brutality. She's practically tyrannical, either do it MY WAY or I will lift you up with magic and MAKE you do it MY WAY, heck as mentioned everyone in ponyville is in terror of her, not to mention the ways she deals with others like Trixie.
4445675 EXCEPT... that is if you are using a singular timeline! We can safely assume, if we use the String Theory, that going back in time to change an event would only create a separate timeline for this incursion to exist, thus preserving the original. If you are curious about the String Theory, the basics of it are that if you make a choice, there is a separate timeline where you made a different one. This continues on into infinity, even going as far as to create completely different futures and stepping into Multiverse Theory turf. You could also say that the Butterfly Effect is a prime example of what I am talking about(not the movie, but the scientific phenomenon). The further back in time that you go, the more risk that you have of making a bigger change of the 'present' or future.
*Flash of light* Fuck... My special talent is scientific theorems... or bullshitting... quite similar...
P.S. But seriously, String theory is the logical answer to avoid a true, universe shattering paradox. Only the thread of time that is directly affected is destroyed, but this universe would stay as she wouldn't be affecting it anymore.(Fuck... I hate affect/effect)
Racist.
Well, Twilight handled that horribly. Start of Darkness indeed.
Th cliffhangers are real
I'm torn here--on one hand, fuck Spike because fuck Spike. But on the other, I feel bad for the little guy in this story.
4449136
Ah, no. String theory is about the physical makeup of all matter, and makes no claims as to the validity of a splitting timeline multiverse.
What you've said is a real theory (used in the colloquial sense), but it is not string theory.
4449542
There's only been one timeline
And she hasn't taken over anything yet, it's the equivalent of shooting someone for a crime they didn't commit, and even then Twilight knew most of that was the Alicorn Amulet and made up with her, to attack her now is the equivalent of punching someone after a truce.
4449696 You apparently didn't read the second part of the thing. I bullshit my way through things and make them sound true. So yes, I look like a fool, yes you pointed out the lie, but in the end, I could make it at least sound feasible if I really wanted to. And personally, where the hell are all the strings?
Having just found this, story is awesome. So Twilight is from a future where she (probably) outlived her friends, something awful happened - and she became exceedingly disillusioned with Celestia - and eventually enlisted the aid of Dr Whooves in order to come back in time to try to prevent catastrophe.
Except along the way, she's remembered some lessons, and entirely forgotten others. This is bucking awesome.
Also : The poor dragon from Dragonshy. She just bullied the heck out of him and stole all his possessions
4449876
Your "but seriously" suggests you actually believed what you were saying about string theory was at least partially true.
4449969 You are talking to someone who is constantly arguing with himself and the voices in his head who simply want to rip things and people asunder. I believe many things, doesn't make them true.
4450003
...Which is why I made sure you knew that what you said wasn't true.
4449558
Wait, you feel bad for a character in another person's fic?
Who are you and what did you do to the parasprite?