MLP: Technology is Magic

by Xarmar13

Summer Sun Celebration

Twilight leaned over the side of the chariot that was flying toward Ponyville. Though Starlight and Spike couldn’t see her face it was obvious that she was moping about the letter from Celestia.

“Look on the bright side, Twilight,” Spike assuaged. “Princess Celestia arranged for you to stay in a library. Doesn’t that make you happy?”

Twilight turned around to face her friend and assistant with a growing look of determination on her face, “Yes, yes it does. You know why? Because I’m right! We will check on the preparations as fast as possible, then get to the library so we can do more research on the return of the Princess’s sister.”

“I don’t think we are supposed to stop her return, Twilight, nor do I think Princess Celestia wants her return to be prevented,” Starlight said.

“Why? If she returns then she will exact her revenge on all of Equestria!”

“Have you ever thought about how you would behave if Shining Armor was wrongfully banished from Equestria because ponies were afraid of his ideas toward improving the military?”

Twilight opened her mouth to say something but no sound came out as she gave her friend’s words some consideration. She opened and closed her mouth several times before a sigh came out. “I guess I would be looking for revenge against them too. He’s my brother and he has done nothing wrong.”

Starlight nodded, “Which is why I think that Princess Celestia doesn’t want us to stop her but to make sure her return isn’t followed up by a vengeful alicorn. To that end, I believe she wants us to make friends with the locals since they are likely more virtuous than the ponies of Canterlot.”

“What makes you say that?” Spike asked.

“Because Canterlot is full of snooty ponies who can’t think beyond their own self interests. Mind you, I don’t think of Moondancer and the others that way but they are in the minority over there.”

“True.” Spike nodded sagely. “Though Twilight doesn’t know the first thing about making friends. The reason she’s friends with Moondancer and the others is because you made her hang out with them.”

“Hey!” Twilight cried out, offended. “I can make friends if I want.”

“Which is why I am going to let you take the lead on this so you can figure out how to make friends yourself,” Starlight offered.

The rest of the ride was spent with Twilight overthinking about how to make friends while drawing up a number of plans and making charts and writing up a number of flash cards. Starlight quickly set those on fire before her friend filled the chariot with those, much to Twilight’s annoyance.

Once the chariot landed the trio disembarked while Twilight continued to mope about her incinerated charts and plans.

“Come on Twilight, you don’t need to make a plan to make friends, just talk to somepony,” Spike offered.

“Fine…” Taking the dragon’s advice, Twilight walked up to a pink pony with a curly hot pink mane and tail and greeted her. The pink mare gave a prolonged gasp in response and ran off.

“That was unexpected…” Spike mused. Even Starlight found that behavior strange.

“Let’s just get on with the inspection so we can get to the library,” Twilight grumbled.

Spike pulled out the checklist and unrolled it. “First up, banquet preparations at Sweet Apple Acres.”

While the trio was headed toward the farm, they didn’t realize that they were being watched by a certain blue rabbit. She had received a letter from Celestia yesterday requesting that she look after Twilight, Starlight and Spike and make sure they didn’t come to serious harm in case Luna proved hostile.

The trio soon reached the large apple orchard where they spotted two mares, two stallions and a filly preparing a large variety of apple-based dishes.

One of the mares, the one with a gamboge coat with an olive mane and tail, was driving a tractor giving a hay ride to other ponies. She cut the engine upon spotting the newcomers, and prompting the passengers to disembark, before leaving the tractor to approach them. “Howdy there, ah ain’t seen you three around town. Ya new?”

Twilight stepped forward to greet the mare, “Greetings, my name is Twilight Sparkle and this is Starlight Glimmer and our assistant Spike.” She pointed to each pony and dragon respectively. “We are here to supervise preparations for the Summer Sun Celebrations. I take it that you are in charge of the food?”

“Sure as sugar,” she replied. “Name’s Applejack, nice to meet ya!” She then vigorously shook Twilight’s hoof which left her shaking even after the earth pony let her go. Twilight was reminded that earth ponies were naturally strong. “So, while y’all’re here, why not sample our products.”

“As long as it doesn’t take too long…”

Applejack then called on the rest of her family to join her before she introduced her extended family to them. It became apparent that this event coincided with the Apple family’s reunion.

“Well, I can see that you have the food situation handled so we should be on our way,” Twilight nervously stated. Starlight and Spike looked at the scene with amused expressions.

However, the three of them were startled when they heard a voice from behind them, “Aren’t y’all gonna stay for brunch?” They had no idea that someone had snuck up behind them until they made themselves known. Turning around, they noticed a filly with the same coat color as Applejack’s mane though this filly had a mane of brilliant amaranth and a pink bow in her mane. She had a sad look in her eyes.

“When did you get behind us?” Spike asked.

“Since y’all got here,” the filly replied.

Still, Twilight and Starlight couldn’t resist the charms of the filly and ended up staying for brunch. The three agreed to share the offered samples between them so as not to overeat.

Sophia observed the trio leaving the farm looking like they just had an entire meal though not so much that they became sluggish. She noticed Spike pulling out his checklist and mentioned the weather which was supposed to be monitored by Rainbow Dash.

It disappointed the rabbit that the mare was lacking in diligence to her duties which was a clear sign that the mare lacked discipline. She would need to come down hard on her to mold her into a true soldier. She had much more power within her than most pegasi but such power had led her to be cocky. Of course, Sophia was no stranger to talented and cocky recruits.

The mare in question ended up losing control of her flight from performing one of her stunts and barreled toward a nearby mud puddle that Twilight, Starlight and Spike were near. Starlight reacted quickly and put up a shield while Spike placed himself behind the shield. Twilight was not so lucky and the cyan mare’s impact left the lavender mare caked in mud.

Sophia couldn’t help but facepaw as the rainbow-maned mare made things worse by drenching Twilight in rainwater and used her wings to blow dry her, leaving the lavender mare a frizzy mess. Thankfully Starlight had a refresh spell to get her friend’s fur and mane back in order.

“Thank you Starlight. Now…” Twilight’s grateful expression turned to annoyance when she turned back to Rainbow Dash. “You’re Rainbow Dash, correct?”

“The one and only,” Rainbow cocksurely stated. “Why, you heard of me?”

“I heard that you were supposed to be keeping the sky clear. I’m Twilight Sparkle and the Princess sent me to check on the weather.”

Sophia watched the conversation continue as Rainbow practically admitted to shirking her duties for the sake of practicing her stunt flying because she wanted the Wonderbolts to notice her. It took Twilight baiting the mare into doing her job to see the sky cleared. The bunny was going to enjoy breaking that mare when the time came.

For now she followed the three after Rainbow flew off. Spike listed that the decorations were handled by Pinkie Pie. However, they noticed that the decorations were already in working order though they never found the mare in question so they decided to move on to town hall.

“Next is stage preparations which are being handled by…so cool…” Spike said, right as he spotted a mechanical filly with a light gray shell with a mane of pink and lavender being accompanied by a light gray mare with her violet mane done in a bun. The three noticed the three crystalline gears on her flank.

“I wouldn’t call stage props cool, Spike,” Twilight said. “Though they would bring out the Princess’s best features.”

“Not that, her…” He pointed at Sweetie Belle.

Rarity had just finished installing the lighting for the stage in the town hall while she had Sweetie Belle adjusting the angles of the lights for optimum lighting. A pair of extendable grappling arms from her back were being used for the task. “Another eight degrees to the right and that should do it,” Rarity instructed.

“You got it!” The arms retracted once the task was complete. With everything finished, the sisters prepared to leave town hall before they spotted the trio.

“Is that a mechanical filly?” Twilight asked.

“Sort of, Sweetie is, what has come to my attention, a cyborg filly. While nearly her entire body is mechanical her brain is completely organic which is the brain of my little sister, Sweetie Belle.”

“A mechanical filly with organic parts?! Amazing! Where did you get the idea for such a fascinating invention? How is the brain still functional after being removed from the body? How is–?”

Seeing that this conversation could distract Twilight for a while, Starlight decided to temporarily freeze her friend in a block of magic crystal and take control of the conversation. “Sorry about that, as you saw my friend can get a little too excited when it comes to machines. She has been interested in them for years but Canterlot leaves no opportunity to see mechanical marvels.”

“Understandable, darling,” Rarity nodded. “It’s one reason I moved to Ponyville since the ponies here are much more accepting of mechanical engineers like myself. I’m Rarity, by the way, and this is my sister, Sweetie Belle.” The cyborg filly waved her hoof at them which left the dragon starstruck. Rarity looked at the dragon in concern, “Is something the matter with him?”

“Spike? He likes machines like Twilight does, except for different reasons,” Starlight explained.

“Well yeah, she has a metallic exterior, which is so awesome! I’ve read comics about robot ponies from the future coming to take over Equestria but I always thought it was more propaganda since Equestria in general hates machines. I never thought I would get to meet a robot pony though, let alone a cyborg filly.” Spike continued to gush over Sweetie Belle which made her react as if she were blushing. Thankfully he stopped a few moments before Starlight considered freezing him too.

“Anywho, my name is Starlight Glimmer and this is Spike and my frozen friend is Twilight Sparkle. We were sent here to check on the preparations for the Summer Sun Celebration.”

“Oh, then don’t let me keep you three. Sweetie and I have another engagement to attend so we shall see you later.” Rarity then left as the spell holding Twilight wore off, the latter giving her friend an irritated glare.

After an apology and a promise to teach her that spell later, the three were off again to check on the music which was handled by Fluttershy who lived in a cottage at the edge of the Everfree Forest.

Fluttershy was one of the ponies Sophia had her eye on for the future though she also never expected to see a mare short of an alicorn who could grow their mane and tail out as long as she had. Nevertheless, her skills as a veterinarian were impressive, even though she never studied at a university or went for a proper license due to her social anxiety. However, that didn’t mean she never studied at all since Sophia often snuck textbooks into Fluttershy’s cottage, bought of course.

There was one annoyance of being around the mare though and that had everything to do with her pet rabbit. Angel Bunny was often a fussy one who Fluttershy had often spoiled to where he often behaved like a brat. Even worse was the fact that he often attempted to woo Sophia only to get shot down each time. The critter was quite the persistent one and Sophia was extremely adamant about her rejections.

Fluttershy was also one of the few ponies in Ponyville that Sophia talked to with words but that was because Fluttershy believed that her ability to communicate with animals was the reason. Sophia felt a little guilty about deceiving the poor mare that way but it wasn’t time for her to publicly come out as a talking animal just yet.

Fluttershy was currently tending to a chorus of birds that were supposed to sing for the upcoming festivities. She had to call out one of them for being a little off on the timing just before Twilight made herself known which caused the shy mare to yelp and jump into a 180 to see them before curling up into a ball. Twilight apologized for the intrusion and introduced herself to which Fluttershy responded with an extremely quiet introduction which had to be repeated several times.

Starlight watched the scene unfold and felt sorry for the shy pegasus since her friend wasn’t reading the room. Though she was surprised when the pegasus suddenly came out of her ball and rushed over to lift spike into the air with her forelegs. After that she began asking the baby dragon a bunch of questions about his kind and completely forgot the other two existed.

Twilight carried Spike on her back while Starlight and Fluttershy followed. She led the two mares to the Golden Oaks Library where Celestia arranged for Starlight, Spike and herself to stay in Ponyville. While Twilight tried to get the pegasus to leave, she went inside where it was completely dark due to the lights being off and that the sun had set. It was when she turned the lights on that the purple trio received a scare that made them almost believe that their hearts stopped briefly.

“SURPRISE!!!” yelled a large number of ponies inside the library, followed by confetti, streamers and the sound of kazoos going off at the same time.

Once the three recovered a familiar pink pony came up to them to tell them that this was their “Welcome to Ponyville” party.

At first Twilight wanted to get every pony out of the library so she could learn more about the Elements of Harmony in case she needed to find them to stop Celestia’s sister from enacting her revenge. However, when she saw Starlight and Spike heading into the crowd to enjoy the festivities, she sighed in defeat and joined them, remembering that Starlight’s interpretation of Celestia’s instructions involved making friends and as much as she hated to admit it, her friend had hardly ever steered her wrong.

It was nearly time for Celestia to raise the sun as part of the festivities so the party moved over to town hall where they were supposed to meet the Princess. Everypony was excited to see their ruler in the flesh.

Sophia looked at everything from the rafters of the town hall while cloaked in shadows. Nova and Tosh were in attendance in case things took a very bad turn, especially since Sophia also had a very bad feeling about what was about to happen.

Perched next to Sophia was a crow. The bird was able to see her through her cloak and gave her a knowing look. Sophia gave a nod in return.

The mayor stepped onto the stage to begin the big announcement while everypony else was waiting with bated breath. “Fillies and gentlecolts, as mayor of Ponyville, it is my great pleasure to announce the beginning of the Summer Sun Celebration! In just a few moments, our town will witness the magic of the sunrise! And now, it is my great honor to introduce you to the ruler of our land, the very pony who gives us the sun and the moon each and every day, the good, the wise, the bringer of harmony to all Equestria…”

Fluttershy prepared the chorus.

“Princess Celestia!”

When the curtain opened, nothing appeared, to the shock of every pony in the room.

Sophia was shocked as well but for a different reason. “Prepare for battle, you two!” she telepathically warned Nova and Tosh.

Moments later, a large mare appeared on the stage, except something was very wrong. Sophia heard the description of Luna from Celestia but this mare looked almost nothing like her. She had a raven black coat and bluish silver shoes, peytral and helm, but that wasn’t what the rabbit was paying attention to. Her mane looked like the night sky…if they were in the void where the universe creators called Xel’naga went when they were killed. It was a transparent crimson with scarlet stars. Her wings appeared to end in solid, blood red, razor sharp feathers and her eyes glowed crimson. Spider web cracks of the same color covered much of her body. Her crimson, sharp teeth completed her nightmarish visage.

As she gazed upon this horrifying form, Sophia had one thought racing through her mind: How in the name of the Xel’naga did she contract Void Corruption!?

Author's Note:

Before anyone tries to say I contradicted myself I want to point out that this isn't Nightmare Moon. My intention was to have the main characters face a version of Luna in a form out of a nightmare. For you Starcraft fans it's more like if Luna were a Protoss still connected to the Khala at the start of the End War when Amon took control of it and those connected to it, except in this case there isn't a malevolent intelligence controlling Luna's actions, just a lot of rage and malice with no means to focus it.

What does it mean? Find out next time.

Comments

[Gargon94]

So it begins, it's interesting you went with that for the description of this version of Nightmare Moon. I look forward to seeing how things go from here.

[Black--Soul]

Banshee Luna? Crimson Luna? Nightmare Luna?
Awesome chapter!

[OP Omni God-Emperor Doom]

Damn! Sophia and Nova/Tosh really need to help out Luna with this corruption!? And eventually reveal their "extraterrestrial" nature.

At least Starlight is the most reasonable, and have some common sense, because Twilight is so anti-social and socially awkward from the beginning.