Step 1: Anticipate her answers
Hey, Eric “Buggie” Reed here.
Oh man, I was going to enjoy this. A lot.
Back in my old human world, I mastered some math and mind tricks that, if done right, can look like you’re reading minds or predicting the future. I already tested them on Starlight Glimmer and Spike to ensure that I remembered all the steps correctly.
Now, it was nearly time for the sweet main event, or mane event: employ those tricks on my favorite adorkable alicorn, Twilight Sparkle, and watch what happens! I will dub the incoming show "Twi-fun".
At this moment, I was lying across a couch in the library of Twilight’s castle; a stack of paper and a red quill lay on my stomach. I was playing with the brim of a white hat that has designs of Twilight's, Starlight's, Pinkie’s, Rarity’s, Fluttershy’s, Applejack’s, and Rainbow’s Cutie Marks -- Twilight’s and Starlight’s were near the top -- that I like wearing. Rarity made it for me, being the big-hearted Element of Generosity. More importantly, Twilight should be coming any second for one of her favorite activities: read books. She’s a great friend, but sometimes she’s more like the Princess of Books than Princess of Friendship.
Approaching hoofsteps from the hallways told me the Twi-fun was about to commence. I rubbed my hands in anticipation when one of the library’s doors cracked open in pink magic. Twilight trotted through the doorway, wearing one of her usual cheerful smiles. Almost felt bad that would change soon.
“Hey, Twi, glad you’re here.”
“You are?” Her smile left and became a worried frown. “Is there something wrong? You don’t lay that way on couches much.”
I sat up to rest my back against the couch’s backrest, laying the paper and quill still on my stomach beside me. Beats me why I was lying that way. “Nothing’s wrong. I just want to show you something.”
“Oh? What is it?” Twilight walked across the library to me. Those big eyes of hers oozed curiosity.
I pointed at myself. “I’m going to predict the future.” Trixie must have rubbed off on me a little because I bragged those words in a boastful voice. Not telling “Ms. Powerful” that, or she’ll pick on me about it.
“Really?” Twilight giggled with her mouth half-covered by a hoof. Part of me expected her to roll her eyes; Rainbow would have fallen on her back laughing if she were the one I told this to. “Don’t tell me Pinkie taught you how to use ‘Pinkie Sense’.”
“Nope, what I’m about to do is nothing like Pinkie Sense.”
After another chuckle, Twilight said, “Well, I was thinking of asking you to join me and read some of our favorite books together, but you can show off your ‘prediction’ first. What are you going to predict?”
I’m not the egghead Twilight is, but I do enjoy the reading sessions the two of us have. If she’d still want to after the Twi-fun is over, we’ll read together later.
I pointed at the papers beside me. “I’m about to write something on these papers, then I’ll ask you some questions. But first, close your eyes, so you won’t see what I’m going to write.”
Twilight closed her eyes; I wrote my prediction and Twilight’s questions on two of my sheets of papers, then flipped the one with my prediction face-down on the couch. The other paper with the questions I laid face-down on my lap.
“Okay, I’m ready.”
She opened her eyes. “I’m ready too, so fire away with the questions.” Along with her confident smile, I had the feeling that Twi was a little excited about this.
Me too. Maybe I should have told the joke-loving Rainbow and Pinkie about this.
“Let’s start off with you picking a number between 1-100.”
“Uh...I’ll pick a low number, so 8.”
“8, huh? Thought you'd pick something higher. Now, multiply 8 by 2.”
“By 2? That’ll give me 16.”
“Multiply 16 by 5. I bet you could solve that in your he--”
“And I did. The answer’s 80,” Twilight interrupted. She rolled her eyes up in thought as I was talking, but I barely had the chance to notice it.
“That was fast, even for you. Now divide 80 by the number you first picked, so 8.”
“80 ÷ 8 is...10.”
“Last step: subtract 7.”
“Now I have 3.” Twilight let out a little cute giggle. “I thought you were going to predict the future, not give me a math test.”
Glad you’re in a good mood. It’s about to end.
“That’s because I already predicted it." I pointed at the paper I had laid face-down beside me. "Take a gander at that paper.” I sank farther back on the couch to get more comfortable.
Twilight’s horn glowed pink and she levitated the paper I told her to read. She pulled it to her face and...oh boy! Her wings spread out at a lightning-fast speed that I’ve rarely seen them move. The paper was covering her face from my point-of-view, yet her eyes grew so huge, I still saw the edges of them.
“WHAT?!” Twilight pulled that paper even closer to her face. “How...how…” She lowered the paper. Her eyes shrunk back to normal, though her pupils were half their normal size. Why didn't I bring popcorn for this? “How did you already know the answer would be 3?!”
“As I said, I predicted the future. You’re supposed to be the smart one between us.”
Twilight stuttered, turning her head left and right, almost looking like she saw ghosts. Or, since this is Equestria, windigos. “B-but this is crazy! How could you--wait.” Twilight’s pupils “regrew” and her eyes formed a slight scowl. “What are you up to?”
I pointed at myself. “Up to? Why you think I'm up to something?”
Twilight set her hoof back on the floor, raised her head with her eyes closed, but kept her hold on the paper with her answer. She was showing her lecturing face, and she’s so prone to giving lectures whenever she gets the chance. “Because not long after I found you in Equestria, you became like a little brother to me, so I KNOW you, Buggie: you’re up to something.” Twilight opened her eyes and pointed at me. “How do I know you didn’t rig those questions?”
“Would I do something like that to you?” I asked innocently.
Twilight lowered her eyelids halfway, staring at me with one of the most deadpan faces ever. With my love of jokes and pranks, what I just asked might have been the dumbest question I’ve ever asked that pony. It had to be hard for her to keep her snarky side in check, verbally.
I let out a deep sigh at my blunder. “Fine, I would do something like that to you, but how? You picked to start off with ‘8’, remember?” I picked up the paper still on my lap to hold it up. ”I even wrote down everything I told you to do before you picked your number, so how could I have ‘rigged’ any of these questions?”
Twilight took (with her magic) the paper I showed her to get a closer look at it, mumbling what it said, and growled when she was finished reading. She levitated it and the paper with her answer back to me. “Fine, but still--"
"How about this, Princess of Skepticism: if you don't believe I can predict what your answers will be, I'll do it again. You game?" I balled up the paper she had given back to me. I wouldn't be needing them again.
"Okay, I'm, uh, game." Twilight's stressed frown relaxed. "Maybe you were just lucky. REALLY lucky, but lucky."
"Ha, keep telling yourself it's just luck. Close your eyes again and I'll write what your future answer will be."
Twilight closed her eyes and I wrote something on two new sheets of paper still beside me. Like before, I flipped one of them face-down on the couch and the other face-down on my lap.
"I'm ready."
She opened her eyes. "Do I still have to pick from 1-100?"
"This time, you can choose any number that's over '0', even a decimal number, so you won't say I'm just being lucky when I nail my prediction again. You can take one of the unused sheets of paper and quill if you will need them."
Twilight picked up the quill and a fresh sheet of paper and brought it to her. "In that case, I'll pick...152."
"Going triple-digits, I see," I commented with a chuckle. "Fine by me, so multiply that by 3."
"By 3? That will equal...456."
"Multiply 456 by 4."
"Uh, give me a second." Twilight wrote on the paper she held. Not even she could calculate that in her head so easily, but I bet she could if she really needed to. "Carry the 2...carry the 2 again...okay, I have 1,824."
"Now multiply that by 6."
She wrote on the paper again while muttering part of the process she took. "That gives me 10,944."
"Next step: divide what you have now by your original number of 152."
After more writing and low muttering, she said, "Now I have 72."
"Add 3."
"That I won't need to write down and the answer's 75. What's next?"
I pointed beside me at the face-down paper with my prediction. "'What's next' is for you to take a look at what I wrote a second ago."
Twilight picked up the paper and levitated it to her. She gasped, but didn't spread out her wings or make her eyes huge from shock this time. Even so, it was still a hilarious sight!
Just in case she thought I rigged things, I picked up the paper on my lap, which had the math questions I told her to do. She took it and stared at it right afterward.
"H-h-how did you know I would finish with 75?!"
I let out a brief laugh. "You already forgot that I predicted the future? Aren't you too young to have this kind of memory trouble?"
"I didn't forget about--" She growled and (with her magic) balled up the two sheets of paper she held and "threw" them in a nearby trash can. "Maybe you were correct again, but it still has to be some kind of trick! I don't know if even Starswirl the Bearded could do something like this!"
She wasn’t trying to do it, but I still felt a bit belittled here, making me shake my head. “You know, Twilight, most big sisters would say that I could do anything I put my mind to. You on the other--”
Twilight scowled and said, “Eric, I didn’t mean it that way and you know it. I’m the last pony to ever try to hurt your confidence.” Her scowl softened. “But this is just illogical, not because I don’t have faith in you!”
“‘Illogical’, huh?” I stretched my arms and yawned. Must have been lying on that couch too long waiting for Twilight to come. “Didn’t you learn some friendship lesson about how ‘some things can’t be explained’ or whatnot? It was back when you tried to learn how Pinkie Sense works, right?”
“I did, but after I learned a lesson about trusting your instincts, I performed more research on Pinkie Sense. After about a month of analysis and...hidden tests, I discovered that Pinkie possesses an unusual type of magic.”
Whoa, time out, time out! Let’s suspend the Twi-fun for a minute. Pinkie has some weird magic? It was my turn to have the widened eyes full of shock.
“Wait, she does?”
Twilight nodded her head. “Yes. It doesn't seem to function like unicorn magic, but I nevertheless concluded that it is the source of Pinkie Sense. Why she has this magic or how it operates without a horn, I've given up on learning.” She pulled her wings in front of her to fidget the edges of them. “Spike knows and Starlight wouldn’t judge me, but could you not tell the others about this little research I did? Even if I was right about Pinkie Sense having an explanation, I don’t want them to think I didn’t learn anything.”
Wow. Whether she learned nothing or not, Twilight Sparkle pulled off the impossible: she figured out Pinkie Pie. PINKIE PIE, the pony that can do impossible stuff seemingly by "feeling" like it! I stood from the couch, got on one knee, and bowed my head.
Somehow, I could feel Twilight looking down at me (literally) when she asked, “What are you doing?”
My head still down, I answered, “Princess Twilight Sparkle, you learned the secrets to Pinkie Pie, something I thought couldn’t be done. I’m giving you the respect you deserve for that feat.”
She giggled and playfully popped me on the top of my head with a hoof, making me look up at her. “Buggie, get up. You know I feel weird when my friends and, in your case, brother bow to me. I’m just a pony like you--” Twilight gasped. A simple little fact about me threw her off. “Uh, t-that is, I’m a human like--wait, no, b-because I’m...uh...”
Twilight’s stuttering and turning her head in random directions as she struggled to find the right words were amusing, but I chose to help her out. “Ha-ha, I know what you meant: you don't want me to think you're better than me. I'm getting up.” I sprang to my feet and sat back on the couch while laughing; Twilight joined me in laughing. After a few more seconds of laughter, we both calmed down.
“But back to your ‘prediction’. I still say there’s more to this, so I am going to learn what you are up to.”
“Good luck. I’ll be here when you blow it.”
With her magic, Twilight plucked some books from the library's bookshelves and sprinted out of the library. Some of those books were about math, so I guess she thought they might aid her.
After she left, I had another good laugh. Messing with her is fun, and it’s not like she doesn’t do the same to me when she’s in playful moods. Three days ago, she really put me through the wringer before she had enough.
At any rate, with how smart Twilight is, she would figure out how my “prediction” worked in no time. I tossed the balled-up paper beside me in the trash can (it had the first series of math questions and the answer of "3") and put the still-unused paper on a dresser beside the couch. Then, I lay across the couch again -- this time I truly meant to -- and waited for Twi to come running back.
And then in round 2 of my Twi-fun, I'll do something much more complicated than math tricks: read her mind.
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The 2 and the 5 that you multiplied the original number with would be 10, same with the 3x4x6=72, the number your victim picks is merely a detractor, add or subtract by a number knowing the result would be icing on they cake by then. Should actually work on any number that is not 0 (Had done it with .00001 and still worked)
Twilight:
GRRRRR! WHY CAN'T I FIGURE THIS *SQUEEEE!* 
OUT! 
It is all a question of multiplication being a commutative binary operator, and eliminating your initial number.
It is just less obvious when done with multiplications than with additions.
10342015
You're the first to say how it's done! I'll have to think of a prize or something...maybe.
10342074
A more technical way to say it. Twilight appoves.
10342274
Thanks, and glad you're liking it so far!
I think I saw a VSauce 2 video covering a maths "illusion" like this, quite recently.
so basically a brony goes to Equestria after session nin ends only to find he's also gone slightly back in time and knows things others think he shouldn't? (for lack of better wording)
Cute. I suspect she'll figure out the math eventually, though only after going down about 12 wrong roads and possibly discovering multiple methods of achieving actual clairvoyance in the process.
10342506
I've seen a few videos from Vsause, but I don't know I've seen that one yet. Hmm.
10342535
None of that with my Eric Reed stories, though if I did, it would probably be part of a much bigger and longer story where that's part of the plot. It a type of story I might do in the future.
10342583
10342664
Found it!
Twilight's so smart, for 5 minutes she forgot algebra existed.
This old trick? My dad used to do it on me a couple decades ago. Seems so silly and obvious now.
10343350
And she's going to feel silly about overlooking how the trick works too.
10343922
That math trick is just a little appetizer for what's next. Unless it was taught to you so you're already aware of it, the mind-reading one is going to be much tougher to figure out how it works.
I've seen this trick before. It lost all its remaining mystery the moment I applied some basic algebra.
10342015
Me, lol.
10344244
Same.
10347779
I haven't seen you comment in a little while. Welcome back!
10342015
So basically, he picks a number that is his end-game's end result, then does math in his head quickly based on what number she picks, then has her perform multiplication, addition, subtraction etc until he gets her down to the number he wants her at? Clever.
10354480
No. While she chooses a number at the start, he also has her divide by that number, meaning the final answer has nothing at all to do with what she picked.