Rearranged

by Touch the Sky

It Ends Here (Option 1)

I stood totally still. My mind struggled to comprehend the words the creature which had once been Rarity had spoken. I stared dazedly at the white lips which had spoken the words, those lips which had once belonged to Rarity. The spirit of the beautiful unicorn... it couldn't be gone, just like that. Why hadn't Rarity fought? She was never one to give in so easily...
And Pinkie, still laughing at me with those out-of-place wings and butterflies on her flank. She'd given in too? My own starry cutie mark was still emblazoned over Rarity's flank; I cast a quick glance at the balloons which adorned my own flank and had a sudden urge to tear them off.

Rarity's cold blue gaze met mine, challenging my defeated spirit to flame again. But I backed down. What else could I do? She was an all-powerful alicorn endowed with dark powers; I was a mere unicorn. The Elements would not work with only four bearers. I dropped my gaze to the dusty ground beneath my hooves.
Rarity saw me give in, and gave a delighted crow of triumph; but Rainbow, Applejack and Fluttershy immediately sped to my side. Rainbow growled deep in her throat, her cyan wings poised for flight; Applejack crouched, ready to pounce forward on her strong farm-pony legs; and Fluttershy narrowed her green eyes in a parody of 'The Stare'.

I looked up at them, and my gaze slowly swept over each of them. Rainbow Dash, so unerringly loyal; Applejack, always bold and true; and Fluttershy, willing to face her own fears to defend her friends. I looked at them, and knew that I just couldn't let them be hurt because of something which was all my fault anyway. So without any hint of what I was about to do, I threw myself forward into a charge at Rarity.

Time seemed to slow down. I heard Rainbow cry out in alarm, heard Applejack yell my name; but all I knew was the steady pounding of my hooves on the earth and the twisted sneer on Rarity's face. In a fluid motion, I bunched my muscles and sprung. I heard Rainbow's wings in motion behind me, and the clamour of running hooves, but still I was fixated by Rarity's ice blue gaze. As my hooves were about to smash into her head, Rarity's horn darkened once more, and then everything went black.

I woke, lying on a dry, dusty surface. I pulled myself upright, and glanced around me. A few feet away, Rarity stood, her back to me. There was nopony else in sight; just a grey, rocky landscape stretching out as far as the eye could see. I looked up; the stars glittered, but there was something else; a huge, faintly glowing green and blue orb, with patterns of white swirling over its surface. My mouth felt dry; it was- well, nopony had ever bothered to name our planet, since as far as we knew it was the only planet there was. But anyway, it was our planet. Which meant I must be..."

"Beautiful, is it not?" came the snide remark from behind me. When I turned around, Rarity had moved closer. "I had many years to look upon the planet in my thousand years of exile, Twilight Sparkle." Rarity's eyes glittered with untold memories; ones she had never experienced. I had to remind myself, though it was painful, that Rarity was gone.

"Now, I am giving you the chance to experience it as I did. For the rest of your measly existence, you will remain here, on the moon. Maybe, in centuries yet to come, I will return and find your dusty bones. Farewell, Twilight Sparkle. I doubt I'll be seeing you later." With a last hateful glance, Rarity vanished.

I sat for hours, just staring at the planet. Far below, beneath the ever- shifting clouds, my friends were suffering, perhaps even dying, while I sat up here. But I could find no way to get back to them; my teleportation spell wouldn't get me anywhere near that far.
So eventually, I got up and began to walk. I walked for undeterminable hours, but the landscape stayed the same. Grey, dusty hills; I looked back and saw my hoofprints stretching out into the distance. I kept walking.

But then, an indistinguishable amount of time later, I found more hoofprints. And they weren't mine. There were two sets of tracks, side by side; and I knew I'd have noticed if I had walked alongside my own tracks. As well as that, I'd been walking in the same direction the whole time, and these tracks cut across my path almost perpendicularly. So I followed the tracks.

I had no idea if I was following two ponies or one bizarre eight-legged pony monster, but by then I didn't care; I just wanted company. Hunger and thirst were starting to nag at me; I knew I wouldn't last long without nourishment. Maybe, just maybe, the thing I was following had food. Otherwise, how else could it be here?

After a considerable amount of time- it could have been a week, it could have been just an hour- I caught a glimpse of something pink disappearing over the next hill. Despite the hunger gnawing at my belly and the thirst rasping in my throat, I began to gallop towards it.

I hurtled over the top of the hill- and tripped. I fell head over tail, rolling down the other side of the hill. I heard an indignant cry as I barrelled into somepony, then somepony else cried, "Whee! This is fun!"
At the foot of the hill, we slowed to a stop and fell apart. I stood up, feeling rather dizzy, and spat out some grey moondust.
Then I heard a very familiar scream of horror, and then another familiar voice chirping, "That was so much fun! Let's go again!"

It couldn't be, my mind told me. You're just imagining it's them, because you really want it to be them... But I looked up, and to my delight my mind was wrong.
Rarity, a unicorn again, was looking rather faint; her mane, coat and tail had become matted with grey dust, but beneath the dust her mane was definitely purple. Pinkie, also with grey dust all over her, was bouncing up and down; the dust fell off in clumps, revealing pink fur.

I cried in pure delight, and hugged them both. Pinkie eagerly joined in with the hug, but Rarity struggled free, and looked at me critically before recognition sparkled in her eyes and she echoed my cry of glee and hugged me.
Even as I looked at them both, however, I knew something was wrong. It too a few moments for me to identify it; neither of them had cutie marks. Pinkie looked put out upon spying her own balloon cutie mark on my flank, but Rarity didn't seem at all perturbed.

I said, "But you two...I thought you were gone. The darkness told me you were..."
Rarity shook her head, and as she did her mane sprung back into its perfect purple curls. I was so taken aback by that that I almost didn't hear what she said next.
"You should never believe a villain, Twilight. You can't expect evil to be honest; after all, that's an Element of Harmony. You can't be a villain while employing a virtue of your enemies. We were forced out of our bodies, and suddenly we were here."

"But why didn't you fight?" I cried. "The others all did- even Fluttershy fought her way out."
Rarity sighed. "I was so unsure, Twilight... I hadn't realised who I was really supposed to be when the darkness took me. The others, they all know... of course I tried, but my heart wasn't in it. Of course, it is now. I want to get back to my boutique, my sister, Spikey-Wikey. But we've walked for hours, and there doesn't seem to be a way out of this predicament."

I had to smile at the reference to Spike; maybe there was hope for him after all. But then something else occurred to me. "But Pinkie, you were so nasty... you wanted to keep your wings so much- how are you back to normal now?"
Pinkie looked miserable. "The first thing I remember is feeling really happy... I think I was dancing and entertaining a load of animals... but then..." Pinkie's hair deflated and her eyes grew sad. "This darkness, this awful sadness, forced my way into my head. After that, I couldn't do anything... I remember flying in, snatching the butterfly Element... and then saying lots of nasty things... and doing lots of nasty things. I hurt ponies. Bad." Pinkie breathed in shakily. "Then I was being forced down, and it all went dark- then suddenly, I was here."

"That's rather like what happened to me." concurred Rarity. "But now, we really need to consider how we are to get back and help our friends. I daresay that wicked thing is still gallivanting about in my body," -she shuddered- "and causing our friends a lot of grief and pain. We have to help them."
I nodded. "But I really don't know how we'll ever get back; it's too far to teleport."
"Pinkie?" asked Rarity. "Fancy trying a bit of that fourth-wall-breaking thing you do?"

"Sorry." Pinkie said downheartedly. "It just doesn't work... I suppose it's because I don't... have... my cutie mark..." Pinkie's gaze swivelled over to me.
"Oh, no." I said. "There's no way I can break the fourth wall. I'd probably break all the walls and bring the weight of the universe down on our heads."
Pinkie shook her head at me. "Oh, no, Twilight. It doesn't work like that. The breaking of a wall depends on your passing through a synthetic time warp using the super-bimflimanatrix drive of a beebleflux-capacitating zossifier, which creates a sub-paradoxial, dimensionalistic alternicon-shift, which opens up a hyper-googliphonic portal into a sub-omnivating ultra-zinticular bio-nanzonoflanamarzipan."

Rarity looked at me as if I'd be able to translate; my jaw just dropped. "Yeah, I'm not trying that."
"Awww, but it's so easy!" protested Pinkie, but before she could say anything else there was a flash and Rainbow Dash appeared beside us.

"You guys! There isn't much time! Come on, we're going back!" Rainbow stretched her hooves out to us imploringly. We didn't move.
"Uh, Rainbow, would you care to tell us how we're going to get back?"
"Duh, I'll fly back." Rainbow rolled her eyes. "Now come on!"
"Rainbow, there's no way you can fly through space."

"Okay, fine, I'll explain it to you." Rainbow sat down with a huff. "Luna and Celestia put a talent-enhancing spell on me so I can fly faster and further. Then when Nightmare-Pinkie and Rarity were distracted, Luna teleported me here. She said all three of you would be here. Now let's go!"

"But we can't breathe in space. And the pressure will just crush us." I argued.
"Celestia said you'd say that, and she told me to tell you to use a spell."
"Um..." I struggled to remember the spell. "Okay, got it. I hope this works, Rainbow..."
"It will. Now grab on, and hold tight!"

Somehow we all survived the flight which followed. My shield spell kept up all the way back home, though it flickered a little as we broke through the atmosphere. As we broke through the atmosphere, a Rainboom promptly exploded behind us. Yes, we we travelling that fast. Rainbow hadn't even broken a sweat. We kept shooting down, a thick, glittering rainbow following us along. I realised how much it must show up against the sky, and cried out to Rainbow. Rainbow just gritted her teeth and growled, "I can't help it!"

Rarity was screaming in terror, her long purple mane flowing out behind us, while Pinkie's hooves reached up into the sky as we plunged towards the ground. But then, I looked down and saw rainbow colours were flowing over Rainbow's body, just about to close over her nose. I screamed too, as with a deafening boom two Rainbooms rippled across the sky. A double Rainboom! Such a thing had never even been spoken of, not even by Rainbow, but the ground was rushing up to meet us at infernal speed. I felt Rainbow start to pull up, but surely we were just about to crash; I screamed in harmony with Rarity as the treetops brushed past us-

But then we were soaring skyward again. Pinkie was still gleefully giggling with the exhilaration of it all, while Rarity had her eyes tight shut.
We soared towards Ponyville, slowing all the time, until Rainbow landed softly on the edge of the Everfree- and then promptly collapsed with exhaustion. I patted her head and then looked towards Ponyville.
Rainbow pulled herself up, swaying slightly. "I can nap later. We've got to save Equestria!"

We trotted back into town to delighted cries from all sides. Ponies were chained or caged everywhere; up on the steps of Town Hall, Applejack and Fluttershy cheered. But Nightmare Rarity came stalking over to meet us, and they all fell silent.
"Hello, Twilight Sparkle," sneered N. Rarity; her eyes, though, betrayed her alarm. "Come crawling back then?"
I looked defiantly up into the ice blue eyes. "Oh, were you not expecting me?" Well, when the dust clears-"

"Yoink!" Pinkie had skipped over to her nightmare counterpart and snatched the Element of Kindness from her, dancing away as Nightmare Pinkie swiped at her.
"Pinkie, you ruined my entrance line!" I complained; but Pinkie was bounding over to a tethered Fluttershy; she took the Element of Honesty from the yellow pegasus and gave it to Applejack, who handed Pinkie the Element of Loyalty in return. Fluttershy fitted Kindness around her neck, and Applejack did the same with Honesty. Carefully, Pinkie eased the Element of Generosity off Rainbow's neck and swapped in Loyalty; Rainbow grinned.

By now I had worked out what was going on. As Pinkie clipped the Element of Generosity around the real Rarity's neck, I pulled off the Element of Laughter and and handed it to Pinkie, who clasped it on around her own neck.
Nightmare Rarity had realised what was happening too, though, and she threw back her head and laughed, the Element of Magic glittering on her head. "And what are you going to do, my little ponies? You still need this, and I'm certainly not going to give it up-"

Pinkie jumped up and swiped the crown off the alicorn's head. Nightmare Rarity cried out in a wail of anger and fear as Pinkie set the tiara on my head.
Applejack strained against her chain; eventually, it snapped. Applejack broke Fluttershy's chain and the two of them fell into position around me. Rarity, Rainbow and PInkie were already in line.

"No." said Nightmare Rarity, as we began to rise into the air. "No. Not again."
We rose higher, and I closed my eyes. I felt the powers of Honesty, Kindness, Laughter, Generosity and Loyalty flow into me, and then I added my own power; Magic. Feeling the power build to maximum, I opened my eyes- and two ribbons of colour helixed up above us; one red, orange and yellow, the other green, blue and purple. Then the ribbons collided into a full rainbow and zoomed down towards Nightmare Rarity.

"NOOOO!" the wicked alicorn screeched; but the rainbow was swirling around her now; she reared up and vanished from sight. Slowly we floated down to the ground, and the rainbow ceased to flow. It died away to reveal... Nightmare Rarity, blinking in confusion. Then she laughed.
"Hahaha! It didn't work! And now, my victory is assured!"
"Don't think so!" chirped Pinkie. She was standing in front of her counterpart, and with a cheery wave at us, she stepped inside Nightmare Pinkie, literally stepping forwards and disappearing into her counterpart's body.

Nightmare Pinkie's pupils contracted into tiny points and she glazed over. Just minutes later,as we all stared in consternation, a spiral of black smoke hissed from her mouth and Nightmare Rarity took it in without a thought. Pink colour rippled over Pinkie's body until she was coloured as her normal self; though she still had wings and a butterfly cutie mark. She waved at us. "Hi, girls!"

We just stared at her. Nightmare Rarity snapped us back to reality. "Ha! I didn't need her anyway! Not when I have this lovely alicorn body."
"Actually, darling, I don't think you'll have that body much longer." This was Rarity, stepping forwards determinedly. Nightmare Rarity sneered.
"Oh, hello, Rarity. I've been waiting to meet you, and ask who put all those infernal thoughts about fashion in your head."

Rarity stopped. "I beg your pardon, dear?"
"Well, when I flicked through your thoughts, it was all about dresses, and hats, and trends. Such prissy things as fashion; who cares for them? So I decided to ask who put them-"
Rarity's hoof struck her counterpart's face with a echoing crack. Nightmare Rarity stepped back, spitting out a tooth.
Rarity, looking at the pearly white object on the ground, seemed to realise that she'd just knocked out one of her own teeth and swayed. But then she looked up at the alicorn, fury in her eyes.

"It. Is. ON." she snarled, and threw herself at the alicorn. But instead of another blow- which was what the alicorn was expecting- Rarity just vanished inside her counterpart's body like Pinkie had.
The fight for supremacy within the alicorn's head was over remarkably quickly. Though we couldn't see it, I could picture a furious Rarity beating the stuffing out of the darkness. For a moment, the darkness screamed, "NOOO-" before it was cut off. a thick cloud of smoke swirled out of Rarity's mouth, but before it could fly away, Luna, who had been watching quietly, leaped forwards and trapped it in a huge jam jar. I sniggered at the ease of the capture.

Rarity's mane and tail turned purple once more, and she looked up. "That's what you get for insulting fashion."

Over the next week, everything was put right. We all re-earned our cutie marks.. but yet, something was still wrong. Rarity was still an alicorn, though she now had her diamond cutie mark once more, and I was still a unicorn. Rainbow had helpfully offered to throw me off a cliff to see if my wings grew back, and Discord had tried transplanting Rarity's wings onto me, but for some reason he couldn't remove them.

Celestia and Luna applied their brains to the problem, and then they summoned us to Canterlot, telling us they had a solution.
We walked into the throne room, and Celestia waffled on about research into the problem. Then we were led into another room, where Luna solemnly told us what was going on.

"We are dying, 'Tia and I. We live for many millennia, but we are not immortal. Now our time is coming to an end. And so, we have decided that we must find heirs. That is why we crowned Twilight. But becoming an alicorn cannot be reversed without the use of a very destructive spell," -with these words, Luna fixed me with a stern glare,and I blushed. "So there is no sensible, non-dangerous way to reverse Rarity's condition. Therefore, after careful consideration, we have decided to crown all six of you princesses."

All six of our mouths fell open in shock.
"'Tia and I will perform the spell upon you one by one. Then we shall announce our retirement and hand Equestria over to your rule."
"But... what about Cadence?" I asked.
"She will continue to rule over the Crystal Empire."

"And who's going to raise the sun and moon?" asked Rarity.
"Twilight will take over the sun. Rarity will take the moon. It isn't to exclude the rest of you; it's simply because they are the most experienced with magic. Now, come this way, and we shall transform you."

I went first. I grimaced as large purple wings pushed out of my back and my legs grew longer; but when it was over I felt powerful and strong, and happy that now my friends would join me in my new position as princess.
I stood in the throne room with Rarity, waiting for our friends to appear. Rainbow, now sporting a long cyan horn and looking taler, was giggling ecstatically at her new, more powerful wings. She prodded at her horn, and wondered aloud whether it would cause drag as she flew.

Applejack was next to appear, wincing. After all, she had had to grow wings and a horn, so she was likely more pained than us. But she trotted over to Rainbow, who was beating her new wings and nodding approvingly at their power. Applejack began to replicate Rainbow's wing movements with some awkwardness.
"No, Applejack, you put the force in the downstroke..." corrected Rainbow. Applejack's wings swung down hard, lifting her a foot up and smacking Rainbow in the face at the same time; Rarity hid her grin behind an elegant hoof, and I did my best to copy the smooth action without success.

Pinkie came bounding out, looking none the worse for the ordeal of becoming an alicorn. Her large pink wings fluttered as she jumped, and I was alarmed to see sparks of sea-blue magic sparkling out of the end of her long pink horn. Rarity got there first, tackling the deliriously happy Pinkie to the ground before she could cause any damage.
Fluttershy crept out last, looking rather scared of her new horn and larger wings. She stood next to me, her ear flicking nervously, as Celestia and Luna entered the room.

A few hours later, Rarity was shoving a protesting Rainbow into a coronation dress and tiara. The rest of us looked on, using our large wings to hide our huge grins. An ornate silver tiara glittered on each of our heads. Each tiara was adorned with the same symbol as those on the Element of Harmony each pony possessed. Finished with Rainbow, Rarity straightened her own tiara and ran a critical eye over each of us. After some minor adjustments, we took our cue and stepped forwards together onto the royal balcony, and the sun glanced off our crowns as our subjects stamped their hooves and cried out in appreciation.

It was an event I'd look back on for many centuries after. As I stood with my six friends on a high cliff, the six of us who were alicorns smiled in unison before Rainbow threw herself off the edge, followed by the rest of us. We spiralled upwards together, and simultaneously tipped into a vertical dive. Spike stood below, watching us.
Just as they had all those years ago, multiple Rainbooms blazed across the sky. The six princesses of Equestria, and Elements of Harmony, had many centuries to live yet, and life had never been brighter for us.

THE END

Author's Note:

Double Rainboooooom!!!!
References, I mean.

Yes! So it's finally over. Thanks to everyone who has followed this story to its conclusion. I hope you all enjoyed the ride!

I know there's a lot of argument over the whole mane six-alicorn thing, but I personally think it's a good ending for this story.

-Touch the Sky

Comments

[Nolongerposting]

Well i liked this ending. Now Im going to the next chapter to read the second ending. Once Im done ill tell you which i like more.

[DarkStarWolf53]

This is my favorite ending though i read both.