Onset of Darkness
“Ooh...”
Rarity massaged her aching head, feeling her curly mane as she slowly felt energized by an aromatic whiff. “Why...why does my head hurt so much?”
Then, a hoof on her foreleg.
A purple hoof.
“It’s just a side-effect of the spell, Rarity,” Sparkle said in a calming voice. “It’ll wear off in five minutes.”
Rarity gritted her teeth, wincing at the pain in her horn.
As Sparkle moved in closer, levitating an ice pack then placed it on her head, making sure Rarity’s horn would not tear it open.
With a bag of cold, Rarity felt much more relaxed like she was letting some steam off. “Ahh! Much better….”
Then, her eyes finally adjusted to the bright light.
She found herself in a crystally room like the ones she had seen before, feeling the soft fluff of her bed and pillow. Around her were some of her friends: Cotton was busy inflating balloon letters that would make up the message, “Get well soon!’; Starlight and Sunset stood by the door, whispering something to each other with pensive frowns; Sci-Twi was nervously biting her hoof at the one and only table present; of course, there was the bedside princess herself.
Rarity glanced out the window to her left, seeing darkness outside. “Is it nighttime already?”
“Yes,” was Sparkle’s simple reply. “You’ve been out for quite a while. Almost nine hours, in fact.”
“Nine hours?!” Rarity screamed, lifting herself and immediately sitting up, forelegs crossed and shivering, head whirling about as the blanket flew to the air only for Sparkle to catch it with her magic.
Everyone looked at the pony fashionista. Even Sci-Twi stopped chewing on her hoof out of respect.
“What did I miss?!” Rarity shouted, hooves on her head.
“Aside from becoming a zombie that wanted to produce clothes at all costs?” Cotton said fast and innocent.
The used-to-be-zombie gasped. “I-Is that what h-happened to me?”
“That’s what’s not supposed to happen,” Starlight said, trotting up to the mare with Sunset by her side. “However, since you haven’t, well, grown up with magic, the backfire must’ve been a lot stronger than usual.”
Sparkle nodded. “Usually, Facere Habitu would just knock you out if you cast it wrong, but I didn’t expect the spell to turn you like...that!”
Rarity sat still on her bed, thinking over the missing nine hours. Then: “So, what did I miss? Did you save our world while I was out?”
Starlight chuckled nervously, finding it difficult to keep a straight face. “About that….”
“It’s gotten worse,” Sunset cut in.
Rarity gasped again, this time with more volume and more exaggeration in her features. “Don’t tell me that—“
“Both our principals became ponies,” Sunset said. “Because of that, our astronomy lessons are now outdated.”
“What do you mean, they’re outdated?” Rarity said, sounding irritated. “Of course, I know we have eight planets now instead of nine!”
Starlight raised a brow. “What happened to the ninth planet? Did it blow up?”
“No, not that,” Sunset said, waving a hoof at her. “Had to do with reusing some old textbooks.”
Starlight backed away. “Oh.”
Sunset sighed and turned back to Rarity. “What I mean is: there’s something new with our sun and moon.”
Cotton snickered and snorted, now holding all the balloons with strings wrapped around one hoof. “Sunset talking about the sun! Hah!”
“Come on, Pin—I mean, Cotton!” Sparkle yelled. “Aren’t you worried about Principal Celestia dropping the sun on accident?!”
“Dropping the sun?” Rarity repeated, her eyes slowly growing wide at what that implied.
“Now you get it, Rarity?” Sunset asked with a tilted head.
Rarity was silent.
What came next was a deafening scream that rocked the room and poked all Pinkie’s balloons away, Sci-Twi jumping scared at each pop!
Then, she quieted down, leaving Sci-Twi shuddering under the table.
Sparkle removed her pair of emergency earmuffs. “That’s what you missed, Rarity.”
“B-But if you said both principals,” Rarity continued in a nigh blubbering accent, “that means Vice Principal Luna controls the moon now!
“And the stars, the meteors, the comets,” Sunset listed with her hoof despite the lack of fingers to visually enumerate them. “Basically, she’s become the Princess of the Night in our world.”
Rarity froze, rock still.
Starlight glowed her horn and made some pairs of earmuffs appear for everyone to wear. “Three, two, one—“
The double doors opened to bring Rarity and company into the dining room.
The rest of her friends sat as they looked up from their dinner of corns, flowers, and apple fritters emitting a savory, mouthwatering smell. On the walls were green stained glass windows depicting stylized trees; the big one at the back displayed a rolling green field.
Rainbow tried to suppress a chuckle at the tired mare. “Hey, Rarity! Were you the one screaming?”
Rare rolled her eyes. “It was probably her first time experiencing a true magical mishap. Believe me, darling, I have done much worse before you came along.”
“Ooh!” Pinkie balanced a carrot on her head. “Like how you wanted to burn Ponyville down because you dyed your mane wrong?”
AJ’s ears folded. “That don’t sound too good.”
In an attempt to save face, Rare rolled a tongue in her cheek. “As you can see, I have not burned down Ponyville in my moment of weakness. You could thank my restraint for averting disaster!”
Fluttershy gulped. “Oh, but if you did burn this town—think of all those poor, poor animals without a good place to call home!”
Sitting beside the sensitive pegasus, Flutters stroked her mane, comforting her.
Applejack smacked a knife on to the golden table, making everyone look at her. “Girls, shouldn’t we be, ya’ know, helpin’ out Rarity?”
It was too late, though, since Rarity was accommodated to one of the empty cushioned seats, visibly shaken.
Dragon looked at the rest of her entourage. “So, Sparkle, you told her the news, didn’t you?”|
The princess nodded, letting the others take their seats, too.
Now, fifteen were seated at the slightly overcrowded table, her Highness content with being the odd one out with no chair.
She let out a long sigh. Then, raising her head: “We all know that your world is in danger, facing a crisis it has never seen before. If we do not fix this in time, nothing will ever be the same. Your friends, families, and everyone else will be changed, both physically and more. Magic will become an undeniable fact of life and society as you know it will splinter and crumble to give way to one just like ours!”
She paused, making everyone silent with the truth heavy on their shoulders.
“That said—and I have given serious thought to what I am about to say,” and Sparkle inhaled, exhaled “—all of you are free to hang out in Ponyville tonight.”
Everyone flinched, especially Sunset. “They’re free to what?!”
Sparkle trotted to her and Starlight. “I’ll be taking these two and Spike—no, uh—Dragon with me to the library to iron out this inter-dimensional issue. I know you want to help and—“
“Of course, we wanna help!” Dash shouted, leaping out of her chair and hovering right in front of the princess. “That’s our world falling apart!”
“Dash?” Applejack asked, a little scared. “This ain’t the best time to—“
“Oh, and you think you’re safe and cool ‘cause nothing bad’s happening in your world!” continued Dash, crossing her forelegs in defiance.
“Rainbow Dash,” Sparkle said, voice somewhat softer. “I already said I gave serious thought—“
“Then you should give it more serious thought!” Dash cried out, snout inching closer to the princess’s face. “Yeah, I know I’m not as magical as a unicorn or an alicorn, but if sweeping the floor is gonna help, then I’ll do it for everyone I love back there!” and pointed at the doors. “I’m not gonna let anyone stand in my way of helping you, whether you like it or not!
Starlight stepped in. “Uh, Dash? Maybe you’re being a bit too loyal that you’re not seeing this—“
Rainbow glared at her. “That’s not how you—“
“’Too loyal’?” Dash repeated, eyes aimed at her as they twitched. “Did you just call me...too loyal?”
Starlight took a step back. “Oh, no.”
Knock! Knock!
Sparkle stood at the door, alone in the middle of a darkened hallway. She heard nothing but distant voices from across the castle.“Rainbow Dash? I know you’re there.”
“Leave me alone,” came the gruff reply from inside.
Sparkle frowned. “Come on, Dash. I know what you did out there wasn’t the best, but—“
“All thanks to you, Miss ‘Too Loyal’.”
Sparkle sighed.
Then heard wingbeats.
“No, you don’t!”
Sparkle pushed the door open and saw Dash in the rather generic bedroom, holding a key with her mouth.
Dash floated to the floor, spat the key out to the bed, and wore a face worthy of a hotshot. “What’s up, princess?”
Sparkle gulped, looking around to find anything to rest her vision on, but it all kept returning to the show-off standing right in front of her between the lights, the crystals, and the pictures.
“That was so dumb, Twilight,” Dash began, “and that’s coming from a pony who’s supposed to be a know-it-all.”
“Hey!” Sparkle pointed a hoof at her. “I admit, that probably wasn’t the best thing to say when you were in such a bad mood!”
“Took you that long to realize that, eh?” Dash then flapped her wings to hover a bit. “Oh, and is there such a thing as being, ahem, too loyal for the, ahem, Element of, ahem, Loyalty?”
Sparkle sighed, her head hung low. “Starlight shouldn’t have worded it that way, but she was right.”
Dash raised a hoof and opened her wings, and then simmered down, deciding to flick her mane at her. “That settles it. You just don’t care much about our world after all!”
Sparkle pawed a hoof on the floor, exuding anxiety. “I do care about your world as much as you do! D-Don’t you remember when I vowed to protect your world even if it meant being cut off from my friends and my home for thirty moons?”
“Well, times change!” Dash yelled. “Maybe you’re not willing to do that now!”
Sparkle gasped, clutched her chest. “Rainbow Dash! How could you?!”
“Because I’m right!” She crossed her forelegs again in mid-air. “What makes you think that we can just trot around in Ponyville while everyone back home’s turning into ponies against their wills?!”
Sparkle raised a hoof and flared her wings out. “Could you please just listen?!”
And Dash was floored by the shout.
She landed on the ground, staring at her hard. “I’m listening.”
“Thank you!”
“But, could you please hurry up?” Dash asked, tapping her hoof in impatience.
The princess sighed. Then: “The reason why I said what I said was because I thought you wouldn’t be able to contribute much—wait!” She extended a hoof at Dash who was about to tune out. “I said that because most of it involves unicorn magic. If you were in our room, you’d pretty much be bored and break our concentration.”
Dash kept hovering. “I wonder why you would leave out Rarity and Twi, then, but proceed.”
Sparkle’s ears folded. “Well, after what just happened, I gave it some second, third, seventh thoughts, and I think—“
“Yeah, you’re gonna let us in ‘cause you feel bad,” Dash said, flicking her tail.
“I feel bad because I changed my mind!” Sparkle replied louder.. “Now, I think it’s right to let you in because...oh, the times when my friends did help me like when Pinkie found the reference guide under E—”
Dash rolled her eyes and gave her a nudge on the shoulder. “Fine. I gave it some second thoughts, too, and we’re more likely to not save the world if we keep arguing like this.”
Sparkle let out a sigh of relief and hugged her. “Whoo! Glad that one worked out super quick!”
Dash let out a small smile. “Yeah. Me, too.”
“Now, come with me to the library!” Sparkle said, pulling Dash’s leg as she flew out of the bedroom with her. “I already got everypony up-to-date on what needs to be done!”
Dash rolled her eyes again, also relieved that the fight was over.
As she predicted, Dash was sweeping the library. Her wings gave her the ability to also sweep the walls and the ceiling.
“OK, I take it back,” Dash said half-jokingly. “I don’t see why cleaning the library’s getting us closer to fixing the portal.”
Rainbow, who was sweeping the ceiling with her own broom, rolled her eyes. “OCD? I mean, we have two Twilight Sparkles in the same room.”
“Yeah. That could be a problem.”
Then, Rainbow caught a glimpse of the princess which made her glare at her other self. “Let’s not forget that I have to be stuck with clean-up duty, too, thanks to you.”
Dash threw the broom up and caught it. “Hey, I made up with Sparkle so we’re fine now, right?”
It was Rainbow’s turn to cross her forelegs as both of them hovered near the ceiling. “Yeah, but that’s not gonna go down so soon. If it weren’t for Starlight, all of us would’ve ended up in the ER ‘cause of you.”
Dash scratched her head with her broom, looking down with shame. “Heh-heh.”
On the ground, those two Twilights were at it along with Starlight and Sunset, poring over various magic-focused books, scrolls, and tomes on one table all accumulating that familiar musty scent of old and dust. Not far away were the two Rarities who were also reading up on magic, reading so intensely that it had become study. The Fluttershies and the Applejacks sat farther away, closer to the doors as informal guards willing to chat freely about what was going on. This left the Pinkie Pies out of the room altogether though bouncing could be heard from time to time.
Sci-Twi became overwhelmed with what was racing through her head. Symbols, illustrations, diagrams; paragraphs, anecdotes, problems, and theories; dates, names, and spells of various kinds—all these filled her head with strange terms like derivation points, nullifier, nodes, aura, Fiducia Compelus, poison joke, Clover the Clever, Staff of Sacanas—
Dragon burped out a letter, and Sparkle levitated it to her sight without looking. “’Moon Dancer’s come up empty. She’ll try again after an hour’s rest.’” With a grumble, she threw the scroll back at him who then threw it at a nearby garbage bin.
Sunset groaned, slamming a book on the table. “What about this one? ‘Portals that span at least two different dimensions require—‘”
“’—a connection already established in order to be easily constructed and mass-produced,’” continued Sparkle, “’since, without this connection, building a portal on one side would be tantamount to shooting an arrow in the multiversal dark.’ Ugh!” She smacked her head on the table and rubbed her strained eyes. “We’re not going anywhere this slow!” A pause as the three unicorns at the table read on. “Why don’t we use portals more often? That way, we’d be have more material on the topic!”
Sci-Twi gulped, briefly glancing at Fluttershy. “What about we call in that chaos creature?”
Flutters’s ears perked up. “You mean Discord?”
Sparkle shook her head. “Not an option.”
Fluttershy raised her hoof. “But, he can just snap everything back to normal. Why can’t he just snap the portal back on?”
“Yes, he can,” Sparkle replied, “but there’s a catch: it involves magic, and since turning it back on will need lots of it, that magic will seep through to their world.”
Sci-Twi raised a brow. “So how come keeping the portal connected wasn’t causing magic to go haywire?”
“The principle of maintenance,” Sparkle said like she was reciting it out of a book. “Takes lots of magic to connect and disconnect, doesn’t take much to keep it on. Sort of like a plugging something to a socket only it takes a tremendous amount of energy to plug it in in the first place.”
Twi rubbed her chin. “What about he fixes the portal, goes through it and snaps everything back to normal before the portal’s magic alters things further, then goes back?”
“Still requires magic,” Sparkle replied.
“Then, what about making Discord use the least amount of magic?”
“Nuh-uh,” was Starlight’s answer. “Even the minimal amount necessary to turn the portal back on would still bring out enough magical residue to spread and multiply like wildfire, possibly speeding up the change.”
“So, Discord’s out,” Sunset concluded and then groaned.
“What about you call in Star Swirl?” Twi asked further suggested. “Isn’t he that guy who’s supposed to be dead but he’s here after a thousand years?”
“He’s in the middle of a very long journey,” Sparkle said. “He won’t be coming back for some time.”
“Then call him to teleport here!” Twi yelled, flailing her forehooves and about to sweep the table clean of books.
‘Twi,” Sunset started, “there are no phones here.”
Twi smacked herself on the hoof at that realization.
“And, no,” Sparkle said, “Spike the Dragon cannot send letters to just about anypony.”
To add to that, Dragon sealed his lips with an imaginary zipper, making the statement clear to Twi.
“What about we send a letter to Princess Celestia to tell Star Swirl to come here?” she then suggested, growing frantic. “Surely, she knows how to get to him!”
Sparkle shook her head again. “Last time I checked, he was in Sire’s Hollow.”
“Did you just say Sire’s Hollow?” Starlight asked. Then, without waiting for a reply: “When was this?”
“Just before sunset.”
Sunset perked her ears up. “What?”
Starlight giggled. “Now there’s something worthy of a joke!” Then, ears folded back and relinquishing her mischief, “But, Sire’s Hollow? My Dad would be all over him! Star Swirl’s not just old, he’s an antique!”
A tap from Sunset as she pointed a hoof towards the table. “I think stopping a worldwide magical fiasco is more important than calling Star Swirl old.”
Starlight bulged her cheeks. “Yup! Gotta trot to it!”
Then, the princess and her unicorn friends went back to studying and checking, each of them taking down notes with their quills and their papers. For Twi she scrawled horribly, her glowing quill bending rather clumsy as her hoofwriting turned out barely legible. In spite of the challenge, she could still read what she had written.
Which was not much. Just a basic outline on what magic was and how portals operated.
Twi groaned as she levitated another book entitled Warp Zones: Why They are a Huge Failure as a Hypothesis. Despite the not-so-promising nature of the name, she opened the book and—
“Twilight.”
She sat up. “Sparkle? Did you call me?”
The princess shook her head. “No. I didn’t say anything.”
Twi turned to Sunset and Starlight. “You?”
Both shook their heads, holding their own books with their hooves.
Twi turned to the two Spikes by the small table. “Did you call me?”
They turned to each other, then shook their heads at her. “Not a thing,” added Spike.
“Did anypony call me?!” Twi shouted at the top of her lungs.
Everyone looked at her.
“No”, was Rainbow’s reply from above, making the unicorn tilt her head up. “Heard nothing at all!”
Twi turned back to her book. “What if I’m hearing my name? What if I’m going crazy?!”
Starlight was about to say something snarky but was stopped by Sunset’s glare.
Twi moaned, lifting her glasses and then putting it back on again. “Alright, take it easy, Twilight, take it easy.” She levitated the book before her, about to open it. “Everything’s gonna be fine, everything’s gonna be—“
“Twilight.”
“Who’s there?!”
Fell off her chair with a thud!
Silence as Sparkle and Sunset glowed her back up, put her glasses back on.
Everyone stopped, looking at her with worry.
“What’s wrong?” Sparkle asked, voice tinged with concern with a hoof to her shoulder. “Is something bothering you?”
Twi was close to hyperventilating, what with her incessant wheezing. “I h-heard someone calling my name, but I don’t know who!”
“You’re sure it’s not sleep deprivation or anything like that?” Sunset asked.
“Maybe?!” Twi shouted, the wind flipping a bookmark away from its page.
“Oh.”
Sparkle levitated a wet rag and cleaned her other self’s glasses with them. “It’s probably your imagination. If it’s not, we have a way of knowing and we’ll help you.”
Twi sighed then pulled her in for a short hug. “Y-Yeah. Th-Thanks.”
With the hug done, they returned to work. Twi focused hard on the Warp Zone book to the point that she deliberately ignored what she thought was a long and floating strand of pink hair glowing white blue as a sign of getting tired.
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She who pops a Pie's balloons MUST PAY!
Yeah, sorry folks, but unless you have the number of a really good realmwright, those changes are gonna be permanent. The livestock's sapient, the magical field's ignited, and the cosmology just got done ditching gravity as it's motive force. By this point I'd just hammer a world gate through and get on with damage control.
Can someone smack Dash up the head a bit more here? I don't think everyone apologizing to her means she's going to learn her lesson on this one. Blindly charging into things and insulting the people trying to help you without listening to them is not going to make things go any faster.
I don't believe it is Midnight calling her. Otherwise, she would recognize the voice immediately. Unless that Warp book is something abnormal. I rather hope it is latter, making it more interesting.
Welp. They're boned. Seriously, I don't see any way to resolve this that doesn't end in two planets full of ponies.
Well, not one that involves the assorted main characters in any capacity beyond research. The people still on Earth may yet surprise me.
9107798
Indeed. Especially since the magical requirements of reopening the portal seem unavoidable. Though at least they still have the connection between worlds thanks to the journal.
Could you include Fluffle Puff in your fic plz?
9107870
Of course, Dash never learns her lessons. Ever.
Something they probably should have mentioned is using Discord is a terrible idea BECAUSE IT'S DISCORD. Any solution he offers will only make everything worse somehow. Even if he doesn't mean it too.
9107987
Maybe a deus ex machina will save everything at the last minute if the author decides they've written themselves into a corner?
Looks like Earth will become a second Equus regardless of what will happen. Also insulting people who are trying to help you won’t help at all, but will worsen the problem- wow, I sounded smart just now.
9108029
I'm afraid I can't do that. While some of the stuff in this story is made up on the fly, I don't see how I could add such a character into the story without sounding very contrived.
9108104
Ha-ha!
To be serious, though, I'm no stranger to using deus ex machinas, so:
Maybe, maybe not.
I still have absolutely no idea how this will end.
Voices, huh?
Midnight...
9399006
Do you hear the voices too?