Prologue

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Twilight did a check over the spell she had decided to do a test with for the twelfth time; Starlight was in position ready to do her part. It was a known fact that due to their complicated nature clairvoyance spells got a bit messy when they interacted with shield spells. The spell Twilight had chosen was an older clairvoyance spell, one that dated back to the time Starswirl the Bearded was said to be in his prime. Starlight was ready and waiting with a newer shielding spell, one of which was only a few years old when Twilight had moved to Ponyville.

The plan was to have Starlight erect the spell then cast the clairvoyance spell. The two mares were almost ready; they just had to confirm no undesired interruptions occurred. In particular, they were waiting for the go-ahead from Spike, who had the all-important job of telling everypony, especially Pinkie Pie, that Twilight and Starlight were to not be interrupted until after noon. The sun had just barely risen, and Spike was putting written notices around town and telling all of Twilight’s friends personally.

Starlight had taken care of that issue the day before, where she told all her friends what she and Twilight would be up to. Trixie, predictably, asked to be kept apprised of the project, mostly because she thought that learning it might make for a decent stage show if the results were good. But that was the main problem; there were dozens upon hundreds of both clairvoyance and shielding spells, Twilight and Starlight were going to be testing them all in sequence. They had decided to have the clairvoyance spells start in the past and move forward while the shielding spells would start in the realm of newer formats and move backward.

Keeping track of the spell and date of the spell was made easier with this method, it meant they could progress the project without having to ask what era both spells were in and instead just ask which era the clairvoyance or shielding spell was. They would keep the shield going and cycle through all the clairvoyance spells from oldest to newest. Afterward, they would go down the line with the shield spells and do the whole thing all over again.

This project was a massive undertaking; it could take days or weeks to complete. But due to the possibility of magic fatigue, the two magic-wielding ponies would take periodic rests.

“Spike is fifteen minutes behind schedule,” huffed Twilight, her ocean blue t-shirt with a violet circle on the chest that contained her mark heaving back and forth with her annoyed breathing, her pants were actually a pair of older pajama bottoms that were just starting to get snug. She missed her days as a unicorn at times like this; she wasn’t pleased about how her bosom had shot up to a pair of FFF-Cups from her pert CC-Cups or the fact that her plot had gotten a bit more girth. “I guess we should start the first of the tests. If nothing else, we’ll get some more concise data on why this practice was said to lack usefulness in the past.”

“I’ve already erected several barriers on all the doors and window that could potentially lead here,” said Starlight, her black tank top holding light purple circle that housed her cutie mark heaving with her breathing. And by the looks of it, her choice of pants was a pair of cargo shorts. “I’m raising the shield now, get ready Twilight.”

“Time to get that data,” said Twilight as she prepared the spell.

The shield was fully formed and the clairvoyance spell was a little over half charged when a pink pony in an eggshell blue jumpsuit that had three balloons, two yellow and one blue, on a pink circle at the chest said, “How’s going Twilight?”

“Gah,” said Twilight causing the energies she had been carefully focusing in her horn to envelop her and Pinkie in a burst of dark pink and lilac purple.

This prompted Starlight to say, “Well, I better round up all the girls to look for those two. It could take a while; I hope it’s nothing too serious,” which was immediately followed by her leaving the room to do just that.

We're Not Where I thought We Were

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When Twilight woke, she felt a bit off, looking about to get her bearings she saw that she was in what looked like one of Canterlot’s many libraries. I guess I must have teleported to Canterlot in my surprise, from inside one of the most powerful magic shields in Equestria. I guess I must have caught Starlight by surprise and overpowered the shield. Or rather Pinkie surprised us both and the end result was me teleporting here, possibly with her. Looking around a bit more as she got her bearings Twilight spotted Pinkie, but she wasn’t dressed as before.

In fact, said Pink mare was in only an indigo apron and violet colored collar with her name on it surrounded by emerald flames, and a bronze band on her left arm that had her mark on it, Twilight couldn't entirely make it out from her distance, but something about Pinkie's mark felt off. She was still unconscious; Twilight wasn’t sure how she felt about that. Looking over herself she found that she was in simple brown pants and a pink shirt under a very tattered looking robe adorned with night sky imagery, not something she was prone to wearing outside of recreation of past events. Feeling her neck, she found she too had a collar of some kind, when Twilight moved her hand away she could no longer feel it, on her left arm she found a bronze armband. Unlike Pinkie’s, which had no visible changes from the distance and angle Twilight was at, Twilight saw the impression of an open brown book with dark blue pages and her familiar mark inside.
Twilight had work to do; she needed to find out about why her mark was different and why she didn’t have and what sort of events had changed from the history she remembered. First thing was; first, she rifled through the card catalog to find the best choice to begin her investigation. The characters were all unfamiliar, but somehow she was able to read them. What surprised, and unnerved, her was none of the titles had Equestria’s name. However, she kept on seeing references to a nation called the “Emerald Flame Dominion” and decided to find a comprehensive account of its history.

After grazing through the card catalog another time she found a book with the title she was looking for. She rushed through the stacks to where the book could be found and floated from its place on the uppermost shelf. As she read she found that the nation of Equestria had once existed, but had been conquered by dragons three thousand years ago, that was a full thousand years before Luna had been turned into Nightmare Moon, and another few centuries after the founding of Equestria. If that was the case, then Nightmare Moon had never happened in this world. As she read on, she found that the dragons had divided Equestria into a dozen or so nation-states, each ruled over by a different dragon.

The book was rather old, showing the Emerald Flame having reign over the area that Ponyville and the Everfree Forest occupied and a few of the surrounding towns that were not all that big as well. Twilight needed a more up to date map, but the chances of her finding one around here wasn’t looking very likely. She headed back to where Pinkie was as she read through the rest of the book, once she finished she was there with a still sleeping Pinkie. She decided to check the back of the title page, if she could determine the copyright date she might be able to determine how old the book was.

“So, this is where you two were,” came a baritone dragonic voice, “I was starting to worry.”

“Oh, sorry, Lord Emerald Flame,” said Twilight, “it seems something knocked Pinkie out after she got here, I’m also a little confused why and how I got here.”

“It’s okay,” said the dragon coming into view, he was much older than Twilight had thought, with a lean and toned body, but something about his purple body and green spines seemed familiar. The white suit and night blue shirt with a purple tie didn’t help matters. He then chuckled, “Twilight, you know I don’t like it when ponies call me that, I would think one of the smartest and most talented unicorns in centuries would remember that.” Twilight locked up; she had been wondering why she hadn’t felt her wings this entire time. “You can just call me Spike when there’s no other dragon around.” At that moment things started to click for Twilight.

“Sorry, I guess my disorientation messed me up a bit more than anticipated,” said Twilight.

“Perfectly understandable,” said Spike, “reviewing your history again, I see.”

“About that,” said Twilight opening the book to the pages with the map to him, “it seems to be a bit out of date, you really should make sure the archives are up to date with everything, especially given your position,” a position that Twilight had no clue regarding.

“You’re right, you’re right,” said Spike, “and we’ve had this discussion a few times before. I am the one who holds command of Dragon Crown now.”

I guess that’s what this world’s version of Canterlot is now, thought Twilight. “Yes,” said Twilight, “and your battle to do so wasn’t easy.”

“The trial to be Dragonlord was far from easy,” said Spike with a sigh, “you would think I would be used to it all in the three centuries since I won my post. Anyway, I was mainly looking for Pinkie. Rarity wants to throw another soiree, and Pinkie is the best at knowing where to get supplies for almost any party.”

“I might need to use an electroshock to wake her,” said Twilight, “but we should probably move her to a place she’ll be a bit more comfortable.”

“I’ll get Pinkie to her shop,” said Spike as he effortlessly picked up the pink mare, in a bridal carry position to boot, “once she’s there I’ll take care of the rest, last time you tried something like that you knocked yourself out for a week. I can’t have my best magic researcher sleeping more than me, now can I?”

“Of course not, sir,” said Twilight reflexively. She started wondering why she would go unconscious from such a simple spell; all the implications weren’t very good. Maybe I should get some fresh air, it will help me get my bearings

****************************************

A few minutes later Pinkie woke up in the kitchen of an unfamiliar building with a well dressed male dragon with purple scales and green spines; her Pinkie senses were feeling a bit off. “Oof, I should really remember to not interrupt Twilight during her experiments by now.”

“Nice to see I’m not the only forgetful one,” said the dragon in a deep baritone voice. “I’m guessing you’re in the same position as Twilight today.”

“Yeah,” said Pinkie, “it’ll probably take me some time to get back into the swing of things.”

“Well, that’s problematic,” said the dragon with a sympathetic voice.

“That might be,” came Rarity’s voice, it was more snobbish and indignant than Pinkie was used to, “but she can still help me with what I need for my party,” Pinkie perked at the mention of a party, “which she is not invited to,” Pinkie deflated a bit at that, “I just need to know where the best napkins for a spring garden party can be acquired.”

Garden Party? Pinkie thought in surprise, Last time I checked we were getting close to the time for Running of the Leaves “Last I checked, the shop called Floral’s Home Design kept a stock of plates and napkins for spring themed parties,” said Pinkie, “but their prices tend to move around a bit for those sort of thing.”

Rarity blinked at the door and left, muttering something about being a bit of an idiot. Pinkie noticed the white unicorn’s dress was a bit less Canterlot elegance a bit more skimpy than her usual fare; she also had a gold ring on her horn and a platinum band on her right leg just above her cutie mark and another one on left arm just under the left shoulder. Said mark looked a bit off, instead of her usual three purple diamonds forming a simple triangle-esque pattern they were four dark indigo diamonds forming a larger diamond configuration, with just enough space to tell you the big one was made of smaller ones. Rarity had been in a black dress that was more something that bordered on lingerie; Pinkie even suspected it was indeed lingerie done up to look like a dress.

Pinkie wanted to know just what was going on; the best ways were her Pinkie Cave and Twilight. Probably the best explanation would be Twilight with info gleaned from the Pinkie Cave. Pinkie couldn’t do her life’s calling without the proper info. That said, she also noticed her cutie mark was a bit off. She still had her three balloons, but they were layered on top of a circular cake that was colored purple with green frosting as trimming.

Unexpected Sight

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When Twilight stepped out to get a better look of things she saw a sight that was almost familiar, one she found similar to when she was younger. She was at the site of what should have been Canterlot’s secondary archive; the main one was much closer to the castle. When looked outside she was treated to a sight most unfamiliar, ponies going about in next to nothing. They all had bands that ranged from tin and copper to something a bit less common for adornment like iron. Twilight and Pinkie were both adorned with bronze, an alloy that was highly prized.

Taking a closer look at things she spotted rings on the horns of the unicorns of similar metals, Twilight instinctively reached up and felt along her horn. She felt what had to be a silver ring, why was her ring a different metal than her band. After taking in the sight she reentered the archive, she was unfamiliar with this alternate Canterlot she figured it best to get a map first to compare things.

************************************

Four hours, Twilight had gone through everything in the archive in four hours and found nothing of use. On the plus side, she had set a new record for going through the second largest archive in the city, or at least one of its many parallels, but on the downside, there wasn’t a single map of the city anywhere to be found. This place needed more updating than she thought, or was this all intentional? Twilight honestly couldn’t tell at the moment.

__________________________________

Pinkie could sense the presence of her Pinkie Cave, despite the fact it should have been in Ponyville. She spent a few hours in the kitchen making confections that she either ate or put on the conveyor belt that led into a trot-in refrigerator. She would have loved to explore the fridge, but she felt she should get things under control and have a chat with Twilight.

After she had spent a few hours baking, storing, and occasionally eating, she went to where she sensed the presence of entrance to the Pinkie Cave. Her Pinkie senses were still a little off; she hadn’t even noticed Rarity’s presence until she heard her voice.

Once she was in the cave she got to work; she noticed the filing was a bit different than she had back in Ponyville. The whole place was broken into two distinctive groups, “Dragons” and “Ponies” and Pinkie was left wondering why, there must be some pieces to the puzzle she wasn’t getting.

She decided to start with the “Dragons” section and went looking for Spike. She finally found him, under the dragons of “House Emerald Flame” and was pleasantly surprised by what she found. Firstly, the image she had was a near perfect match for the dragon she recently spoke to, seems this version of Spike had won the position of Dragonlord was ruling from where Canterlot was supposed to be. His territory was pretty vast, most of the new additions were made as a result of his victories in duels, interestingly enough. This alternate Canterlot was called Dragon Crown, for now. Dragon Crown was the name given to the city that the Dragonlord ruled from, and Spike had won the position over three-hundred years ago.

The accounts also stated he had done quite a few things in relation to other ponies, such as making Rarity one of his highest placed ponies. The accounts of this other Pinkie spoke being collared by him as one of the greatest joys in life. Pinkie didn’t mind waking up naked in an apron, she was prone to doing stranger things in her sleep, but she had never really considered wearing any sort of collar. She put the file back and went looking for mirror, she found a full body mirror right there in the cave, next to table covered with cookies and cupcakes under glass with the words “Emergency Snacks” in big bold bubble letters, and saw that she was indeed wearing a collar with her name on it. She was also a bit more plump in the belly and plot than she remembered, not that she minded it at all.

____________________________________

Thankfully, for Twilight, the layout of Dragon Crown was almost identical to that of Canterlot. That still made things a little unnerving though, especially with drastically different establishments than the ones she remembered. The shop that was supposed to be Pony Joe’s donut shop was a jewelry store that had an approval plaque that had an insignia of four tightly grouped dark indigo diamonds and what should have been her favorite bookstore was a petshop of some kind.

When she got to what should have been Celestia’s School for Gifted Unicorns she found the complex had a nearly identical structure but was labeled as the “Pony Processing and Mental Readjusting Facility” and instead of the six statues that were meant to represent the virtues of knowledge there were statues that showed four dragons and ponies in somewhat suggestive positions, made ever more evident by the fact none of the ponies were in no attire other than a collar that seemed to be a different material than the rest of statue. Among the figures of the ponies, all of whom were mares; there was a unicorn, an earth pony, a pegasus, and what looked like a cast of Celestia.

Twilight had a bad feeling about this but decided to continue on. She got another surprise when she entered, a pony receptionist next to a dragon receptionist, both female, were there to greet visitors. She trotted right up to the reception desk with some apprehension. The dragoness had dark pink scales and ocean blue spines.

“Ah, Ms. Sparkle, it’s been ages since we’ve seen you,” said the dragoness, “for what reason are you here,” her eyes jumped to the band on Twilight’s arm. Twilight took a closer look at the reception pony, they appeared to be mare version of Blueblood in a very revealing bathing suit and a pewter band on their right arm.

“Um, yes,” said Twilight, “I was in one of the archives,” the dragoness rolled her eyes, it was clear this was a common fact about this world’s Twilight, “and it seems to not have any up to date maps, the most recent one I could find was from a thousand years ago. I just need a copy of the most recent maps of the city and country.”

“Is that all? Very well,” said the dragoness, “Azure, if you would be a darling and retrieve the materials Twilight has requested; and let her brother know about her visit, I’m sure he would like to see his little sister.”

Twilight managed to hide her surprise, this is where the alternate version of Shining was. She decided to mine a bit more info, if she could, “Interesting helper you have there, reminds me a bit of a stallion I had some less than pleasant dealings with.”

“Ah yes, I almost forgot Azure Claret was a stallion before a few years ago. He acted rather overly entitled, thought being a stallion made him better than most of the ponies here or something like that, I really didn’t pay attention to his pointless prattles. He was rather high ranked among his prior dragon’s collection, and well-liked by that dragon as well, it made him a bit of an egoist. When I gained access to him I had to do an extensive re-education, nothing stuck until I gave him that gender reassignment potion. Thanks again for that, I know you didn’t ask about it, of course with you that’s pretty common.”

Wait a minute, thought Twilight, that mare used to be Blueblood, and he was an egotistical prick, I guess there is some justice in the multiverse. And I had a hand in turning him into a mare, the only thing I’m concerned about is this ‘re-education’ she spoke of. That said, he probably deserved worse than what he got.

A few minutes later “Azure” returned holding two scrolls, with Shining Armor following close behind. He gave a bow to the dragoness, and big grin when he saw Twilight. The grin was immediately followed by a mild look of disappointment. He was in what looked like a black gladiator’s outfit, complete with straps that went across his naked chest and shorts so short they might as well have gone with a skirt design, Twilight could even see a slight bulge where his junk was.

“Madame Lance, it’s always a pleasure,” said Shining with a bow, he then turned his attention to Twilight as she received her requested documents from the mare known as Azure Claret, “it’s been a while, Twili, how are things?”

“Decided to take a break from research and update the archives as best I can,” said Twilight, she figured that would be an acceptable excuse for moving about the city without raising suspicions, and one of them really did need updating from what she had seen, “I thought I would start with maps and move on from there. Besides, I recently learned of an item duplication spell.”

“Oh, that sounds wonderful,” said the dragoness known as Lance, “be sure to tell Spike about it so that your ring can be adjusted accordingly. We could use something like that to save on production costs.”

“Twili is even more of a great spell prodigy than I thought,” said Shining, “I was worried her talents weren’t being fully utilized for a moment.”

A few minutes later Twilight was out the door, on her way back she spotted a four-story building modeled after a circular cake that had Pinkie’s balloons stamped on it. But the balloons were layered over a cake; she decided to enter and find out what the deal was there.

____________________________

Pinkie heard the doorbell for the shop ring and rushed back up to the main level of the facility; she needed to greet the customers after all. She saw it was Twilight, in a tattered robe of some kind, and instinctively said, “Hi Twilight, what do you think of my new shop?”

Comparing Notes

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Twilight blinked a bit; this was the same Pinkie she had known since she moved to Ponyville. Granted, she was mostly naked, a bit pudgier than usual, and had one of those bands on her arm like all the ponies did, and her mark was a little off but her wording would have been different if she were from this reality. It was time to compare notes.

“Pinkie, what’s the last thing remember before ending up in this shop?”

“Me popping up on you and you screaming ‘Gah’ for some reason.”

“Pinkie, do you even know what Starlight and I were doing?”

“Obviously, some sort of magic experiment. But given the nature of the spells involved it shouldn’t have resulted in us ending up in an alternate universe, maybe something to do with how the spell’s scattered energy reacting to Starlight’s shield spell.”

“A decent hypothesis, but unlikely,” said Twilight with some relief, “I was using an older clairvoyance spell inside a much newer shielding spell cast by Starlight.”

“What if it wasn’t really a clairvoyance spell,” inquired Pinkie, “and just misidentified as one.”

“That’s ridiculous; it was created by Starswirl during his younger da...how could I be such an idiot,” Twilight facepalmed, “we decided to go with spells classified as clairvoyance spells without confirming they were. Newer ones are easier to let it slide on since they already have extensive studies into their nature, but such testing wasn’t common until a few centuries after the Nightmare Moon incident. Even so, if the spell actually allowed for peering into alternate timelines, that wouldn’t explain how a miscast could result in a transdimensional jump. If it could, then there would be warnings about it. I checked the records of all the supposed clairvoyance spells; there weren’t any warnings regarding this sort of scenario.”

“Then I guess we’re stuck here until you can figure out how to undo it.”

“That’s easier said than done, unicorns are all fitted with rings that restrict the spells they can use. And in case you haven’t noticed, I’m not an alicorn at the moment; my magic output isn’t what it was when you surprised me during the experiment.”

“I thought there was something a bit odd about your look, besides the different cutie mark I mean.”

“Yeah, well yours is a bit different too.”

“Oh, I noticed. Also looks like Rarity has a different mark too, and her personality is different as well.”

“She’s probably this universe’s Rarity, I think it’s safe to say all the alternate versions of our friends, and ponies we know will be a bit different. I just ran into an alternate version of Blueblood that got turned into a mare and is submissively doing what a dragoness tells him too; he goes by Azure Claret now.”

“Ooh, that’s pretty different.”

“Yeah and the building that’s supposed to be Celestia’s School for Gifted Unicorns is some sort of pony processing center, I think it has something to do with these collars and bands. What did Rarity’s mark look like?”

“Four dark indigo diamonds forming a larger diamond in a tight formation that you can just barely see the spaces for,” said Pinkie with a recitement from memory.

“I saw that mark on a jewelry store on my way here,” said Twilight with concern, “and Shining is working at the processing center while dressed in a very revealing gladiator outfit, it looked a little snug below his belt.”

“What about Cadance?”

“Haven’t seen any ponies that resemble her yet, same goes for all of our friends.”

“Well, Applejack is probably still in Ponyville, and maybe Rainbow and Flutters are still in Cloudsdale. And maybe Starlight is still in the town she grew up in. Ooh, have you met this world’s Spike yet?”

“Yeah, he’s the one who picked you up and brought you here while I tried investigating things further back at the archive, an archive that is incredibly out of date. Did you find out anything about where we are, besides the name, I already know that thanks to Spike.”

“Yeah,” said Pinkie in her usual demeanor, “it wasn’t always called Dragon Crown, that’s the name a city gets when its the capital of the reigning Dragonlord. Spike won the title a little over three centuries ago and has two siblings, a sister named Lance and a brother named Nail.”

“I met her, she’s at the processing center as a receptionist for some reason.”

“She’s doing that again,” came Spike’s voice, “who did she get to go along with her this time?”

“Oh, um, Spike,” said Twilight in surprise, “how much of that did you hear,” she was worried their cover was already blown, it was important they appear to be this world’s versions of themselves until she could figure out and execute their return home.

“Just that last sentence,” said Spike, “I’m assuming you’re making sure Pinkie’s files are up to date.”

“Among other things,” said Twilight, thankfully Pinkie picked up on the ploy quickly. “I just got back from the processing center with some more up to date maps; you really need to make sure all your facilities, especially informational ones, are up to date.”

“Yeah, sorry, I just didn’t think it would be necessary that much,” said Spike, “you’re the only one who really uses the archives.”

“And what if a visitor to your territory wants to read up on things,” said Twilight, “one with whom you have an alliance, how badly will your lack of up to date records look then. Without the most up to date information, an archive ceases to be relevant before long, what if you personally want information and I can’t help you get it for whatever reason. Besides, the most recent maps in the archive you saw Pinkie and myself in earlier didn’t have any maps newer than a thousand years. Which means, they were easily seven centuries out of date. The bare minimum you should have is up to date maps so you can keep track of where each territory is in our current era,” she rolled open the map of what was of the nation and glanced at it a bit, “and this map is dated two hundred years ago, even it is probably out of date by now. The most an actively utilized map should be is five years, two or three decades if you’re out exploring most of the time.

“Right, right,” said Spike with a grin, “I’ll get right on that, before I do I have a little command for you, Twilight.”

Twilight gulped with apprehension, “And what would that be, sir?”

Spike chuckled with amusement and said, “you are to wear nothing under your robes, that includes undergarments, and are to wear nothing but robes from this point forward, when you are going about in any sort of attire. I forgot how cute you look in those, I’ll see about getting your measurements later so we can get you some better ones than that old thing that looks like it’s going fall apart at any moment.”

Twilight couldn’t understand why but she suddenly had the compulsion to take off all her garments under her robe, every last one of them. And without thinking, and surprisingly with no shame, she carefully took off her robe and set it on the counter next to Pinkie before beginning to remove her shirt and shorts. She was just in the middle of undoing her bra when Rarity waltzed in, wearing a saucy looking sapphire blue dress.

“Oh good,” said Rarity with an egotistical tone, “you’re already removing those horrendous clothes, I much prefer you like that,” Twilight’s bra dropped to floor once it was undone, “and I’m thankful your bosom isn’t anywhere as glorious as mine.” she gave a death glare to Pinkie, “Unlike some other ponies, thankfully most of them don’t have the figure to accent their chest as gloriously as me properly.”

“Yes, Rarity,” said Spike, “about Twilight’s new attire,” Twilight was in the middle of removing her panties, “I’ve decided she’ll only wear robes from now on, make sure they show off her physical properties in a pleasing manner without being garish, and no antagonising her during the measuring and fitting process. In fact, you are to not antagonize her during the entire process of getting new attire.”

Rarity’s collar had its flames flash brightly for a moment after Spike had issued the command, “Of course, my lord,” said Rarity with a hint of disdain, Twilight and Pinkie wondered why that was. Rarity pulled out a much more ornate measuring tape than Twilight and Pinkie were used to seeing, the thing was adorned with actual silver bordering and the letters and numbers were made from genuine onyx.

Twilight was surprised to find her chest had a pair of CCC-Cup breasts. But Rarity had a pair of DD-Cups. Taking a closer look at Pinkie, she was surprised to see the pink mare had a pair of E-Cups instead of her standard DDs. Rarity demanded Pinkie give her a clipboard with paper and a writing utensil, which the pink mare did with some mild confusion on her face, Rarity then worked on the measurements faster than either was used to and stormed out of the complex after taking notes on all Twilight’s measurements. Spike followed shortly after.

Twilight and Pinkie gave each other a look and waited until the dragon and ivory mare were out of earshot before Pinkie said, “She’s a whole lot nastier than I thought in this place.”

“Agreed,” said Twilight as she pulled her robe back on and surprisingly found herself taking her other clothes to a bin in the complex that said ‘Scrap Clothes’ and couldn’t stop no matter much she fought the urge to do so, “did you notice what happened with her collar when Spike gave that command about antagonising me?”

“Yeah, I thought saw a similar flash in your direction when Spike gave you that order about what clothes to wear but I was too focused on him to really check, and the flash only happened for an instant.”

“Which means, these collars allow dragons to make us do any physical act they want, I’m pretty sure it doesn’t extend to the mind because of the evidence I uncovered at the processing center.”

“Oh right, the thing with Blueblood. If it were that easy, then Lance probably wouldn’t have made a big deal out of having to mentally recondition him. Not sure I’m okay with that, but it was probably necessary when he was changed into a mare. Hey, you think that…”

“If you finish that sentence I’m not the only one that’s going to have trouble sleeping tonight, and not in the fun or amusing way.” Twilight started wondering where that remark came from, were pieces of her alternate self coming out in her. At least she hoped that was the case because she wasn’t aware of being that in tune with innuendos, especially sexual ones, before.

She Hoped they could get home quickly. Who knew what their alternates were up to in their bodies, the thought wasn’t a very pleasant one. Pinkie seemed mostly oblivious, then again, that was Pinkie for you.

Wrong Twilight and Pinkie

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Celestia and Luna had serious expressions on their faces when they met with Applejack, Rarity, Fluttershy, Rainbow Dash, and Starlight Glimmer. They were both decked out in full regalia, as usual, with Celestia in an angelic white formal dress and Luna in a midnight blue business dress. Applejack was in her usual farm attire, which meant a red plaid shirt and blue jean shorts; Rainbow was in her formal Wonderbolts attire, with the added bonus of her personal flight goggles on her head; Fluttershy was in a forest green dress, adorned with animal impressions; Rarity was in a formal black dress, with cuts down the side of the legs for greater ease of movement and her mark on the chest and lower back; and Starlight was decked out in khaki hiking shorts and a dark blue tank top.

They were all in an observation room for a room designed for containing magically problematic ponies. Both Twilight and Pinkie seemed to be sleeping in the room that was being observed. “Why the major precautions, your highnesses,” inquired Starlight, “Twilight and Pinkie have never been that kind of dangerous before.”

“My sister and I did a full battery of tests on them when we found them out in the wilds near Canterlot,” said Luna, “even going as far as to see what I could glean from their dreams.”

“What we found was that their magic was a bit off, yet similar, to the ponies we know,” said Celestia. “However the rambling expressions of both have led us to believe that they are merely alternates of the ponies we know and without more accurate information regarding where they are from we cannot begin looking for the ponies we know.”

“To make matters more difficult,” said Luna, “they didn’t entirely switch places with the ponies we know, just their minds have swapped places with their alternates, which explains why their magical signatures are a bit off. Even if we did find the right world the two are in, we wouldn’t recognize them as the ponies we know because their marks will be different. They might be a bit similar but just different enough for us to have no way to positively identify them. What we do know, which isn’t very much, is the alternate Pinkie has a bit more girth to her and the alternate Twilight is still a unicorn.”

“Twilight’s brain would really come in handy now,” said Rainbow, “can’t we just ask this other Twilight to help out?”

“It’s not that easy,” said Luna, “even in their dreams, they ranted about the ‘dragon in charge’ and wouldn’t allow any further explanation than that, we had no idea what they were talking about. I’m afraid we’ll need to give them some time to acclimate to everything here first, which could take days or weeks or even months. In the meantime, I suggest you all wite up lists of a few sample books for the two them to read so they can more easily acclimate to their new situation.”

**********************************

Twilight and Pinkie looked around the room they were in, it seemed to be designed to prevent the occupants from potentially harming themselves. As to why they were both in the room, they suspected it was to make things less problematic. Twilight and Pinkie took another look at each other, for the fifteenth time, and confirmed both their physiology and marks were somewhat different. The book was missing from Twilight’s mark, and she had wings for some reason, and Pinkie wasn’t quite as pudgy with the cake missing from her mark.

They didn’t know how long they had been out but suspected it was at least a few hours. The sound of an exterior door opening was heard and a few minutes later a purple and green baby dragon, that looked like he just got his wings, strolled n from a hidden door they couldn’t keep track of for some reason. He wore visitor’s bracelet with seven tubs of books on wheels stacked three high trailing behind him and stopped to take a look at them before saying in a very childish sound voice, “Do you know who I am?”

“Um, no, should I,” said Twilight in confusion, “you’re much younger than the dragons I’m used to seeing,” this deflated the baby dragon for some reason.

“Actually, we do,” said Pinkie with excitement, “that’s Spike, but he’s so much younger than the one we know.”

“So all that ranting about this not being our universe was real,” said Twilight with surprise, “my ring isn’t calibrated for that sort of spellwork.”

“Didn’t you notice Celestia and Luna didn’t have rings on their horns, and neither do you,” said Spike as he began setting the books up in the far corner of the room from where he entered.

“Honestly,” said Pinkie, “I don’t think we were paying attention to that, we were more confused why they didn’t have collars on.”

Spike stopped unloading the books and facepalmed for a moment before getting back to work unloading the collections of literature while saying, “In all the multiverse, Pinkie is still Pinkie and Twilight is still Twilight. Alright, I brought you a few books to read while you’re here that your alternates’ friends in this world think could help,” he then reached into his surprisingly deep pockets and pulled out some books and files, “and these are materials I thought you might like to take a look at. They’re profiles on the two of you in this universe that I’ve been working on for the past year or so, mostly thanks to this universe’s Pinkie and Twilight, and their personal diaries. I’m pretty sure you should know how to open them, they were written by the yous that existed here. I also brought a copy of the friendship journal they and their best friends wrote a while back.”

With that, the young dragon finished his task and left the two mares to get acquainted with their materials of choice. They both decided to start with the dossiers that had been written on them; they would move on to the books later. Twilight was an expert on research, and they were kind enough to give her and Pinkie several new research materials.

Where to Now?

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“So, Pinkie, did you at least find out where our residences are? Because as much as I love spending time in the archives, I still need a place to eat that won’t potentially damage all the resources.”

“Yupporuni,” said Pinkie, “looks like the other me has her own Pinkie Cave below this place, I took a look at your profile, and it said you’re on 12 Royal Lane.”

Twilight blinked a bit before saying, “In our world that’s the estate next to Blueblood’s, it’s been kept as a vacant lot almost as soon as Blueblood hit puberty. Royal Lane is notorious in Canterlot for being the most expensive real estate any one citizen of non-alicorn status can own. Only the castle has a greater estimated value than any given lot on Royal Lane. Well, I guess with Blueblood no longer a factor the lots next to his are more desirable.”

“Yeah, it looks like things are going to take a little getting used to. Do you do need a map to your new place? And where you keep the spare keys?”

“Seeing as it will likely be a more up to date map than what I’ve found so far, yes, please. What about you?”

“My residence is on one of the upper floors, just like Sugarcube Corner.”

A few minutes later Twilight was out the door, after saying he goodbyes to Pinkie, and headed toward her supposed home. When she arrived at the estate she was floored, the building was a massive white oak tree that had been hollowed out, at its size, it was easily four stories tall. Twilight made a quick search through her pockets; she didn’t want to go looking for the spare key if she didn’t have to. After a few minutes of rummaging through her pockets she produced a brass key in a design that hadn’t been used in Equestria for eighty years that had a wooden keychain with a wooden carving of a book on the end of it, upon the book was a carving modeled after the house that had been painted white.

Twilight used the key to unlock the front door and enter the complex; she was floored once she saw the contents of the complex. The entire tree was filled with row upon row of bookshelves that were tightly packed with a variety of books. Next to the door, she had come through were books that had titles that seemed to follow a travel theme. The themes changed as she moved through the complex. She found a map, done in a style that maps were known for a hundred years ago, of the complex and found that it showed her room on the topmost floor, the kitchen was on the main level with her, and there was a basement with five sub-basements that were all marked as different kinds of labs.

As she made her way to the kitchen she spotted an owl, that looked suspiciously like an owl she kept around as a pet and auxiliary assistant, and a bat with fox-like features, likely a member of the bat family known as a flying fox which were ironically fruit bats and had nothing to do actual foxes. Just beneath their perches, at the base of the items they were perched on, were brass nameplates that read “Owlwicious” beneath the owl, much to her surprise, and “Day Fruit” beneath the bat. She also spotted a third perch that was empty, and a bit more flat and nearly like a nest, that read “Ocean Note” at its base and was wondering what that could mean when an albatross flew through a large open window and landed on the perch and presented her with its leg holding a message.

“Oh, thank you very much,” said Twilight as she took it. Looking around for a treat to give it she found a set of cookie jars across from the perches that were colored night purple, for Owlwicious, morning orange for Day Fruit, and ocean blue for Ocean Note. She reached she carefully opened the treat jar, noticing its lack of being full, and pulled up a biscuit that looked like semi-moist squid and tossed it to the ocean bird, who snatched it in his beak and made a bit of a show eating it.

She kept the message floating in her magic as she closed the snack lid and locked it before wiping her hands on her robe. Aftward she left for what was marked as the study on the map and collapsed in a chair before a desk made from black cherry wood, she could actually smell the presence of the fruit when she got close enough to plop herself in the applewood chair, which also had the lingering scent of the fruit of its name on it, and opened the letter to see what this was all about.

The message only had a seal that indicated it was from Manehattan, if they were back home, and when the message was unsealed and opened there was a single word in the middle reading “NOPE” with nothing else, not even sign of a cutie mark stamped in to take the place of a signature. Twilight groaned with a lack of amusement and used her magic to toss the message in the trash bin with the words “Burn at Earliest Convenience” slapped on it in big, blocky letters.

Twilight was hungry, she remembered seeing the kitchen was in close proximity to the study, and just made a run to it. She would check the kitchen’s inventory then make herself something. After she had something to eat, she would just head to bed and deal with the rest of this tomorrow.

_______________________________________

Pinkie was mostly having a good time, but she still needed to find this world’s version of Gummy. She knew she wouldn’t move anywhere without him; she had even seen a pool in the Pinkie Cave for him. After almost an hour of searching, much longer than usual for her, she found a switch in the back of the kitchen that was behind an oven with an impression of an alligator on it.

What met her was a slowly declining ramp into a dimly lit hallway, she progressed with caution, mostly knowing the kinds of ‘surprises’ her alternate would have set up in a place like this. However, when she was halfway through the hall, which took about ten minutes or so at a slow pace, she smelled a pool and abandoned all pretenses of caution and just bounced happily into the room. There was a massive pool, easily the size of a large pond, as it had over a dozen different baby alligators in it.

Positioned on the lifeguard post was a slightly bigger Gummy, he even had a waterproof name tag that read his name. Pinkie felt a presence up against her leg; she looked down to see another baby alligator that was the size of the Gummy she knew and picked it up; the alligator had its own waterproof name tag that read “Loli” with a female insignia in the upper left corner. Pinkie set the alligator down next to the pool and took another look at Gummy’s name tag, his had a male insignia in the upper left corner. Looking around, Pinkie saw there were ten other baby alligators, all with name tags.

It seemed this world’s version of Pinkie went a little overboard in getting some baby alligators. Pinkie wasn’t sure whether or not she liked this development, there were a lot of things to consider. On one hand, lots of baby alligators to keep track of; on the other hand, really big pool. There were some greater nuances but those were the two big points her brain boiled it down to.

Following Day

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Twilight woke to the sound of a mare screaming in ecstasy, definitely not what she expected the first sound of a new day to be. She had a feeling she would regret this but she went out, in her sky blue bathrobe, onto the balcony to witness the sight of Shining Armor sexually pounding a pegasus that looked suspiciously like Cadance. After a harder look at the mare’s face, she realized that it was this world’s version of Cadance, and said mare had a look on her that said she was enjoying the moment. Just where had Twilight and Pinkie ended up? Twilight also realized the manor from which all the commotion was coming from was Blueblood’s old mansion.

“I’m trying to get some actual sleep,” Twilight yelled at the two, “the least you could all do is keep the dead waking noises until after noon,” she was being sarcastic, but it seemed that what she said was similar to what her alternate would say.

“Sorry about that, sis,” Shining yelled back, “this one is always frisky and kinky in the morning.”

“Aren’t you two married,” Twilight shot back reflexively without thinking, “you would think you would find something a bit more private.”

“Nope,” Cadance responded back, she really did sound like her alternate self, but at the same time not, “I was feeling an exhibitionist kink this morning. As for the married part, maybe we should have ourselves an official wedding, it might make things more fun. After all,” she sensually played with Shining’s chest and groin, much to Twilight’s surprised annoyance, “I have been with you the longest.”

Unlike the other mares she had seen in this world, Cadance’s bust actually looked smaller. Of course, she wasn’t an alicorn either; chances were her cutie mark would be different as well. She had a silver band on her left arm but due to the angle Twilight couldn’t make out any of what her mark in this world was like. Compounding the problem was the fact she couldn’t tell what kind of armband Shining Armor had due to the way the light reflected off the metal when it came into view for her.

Twilight gave a grunt of disgust and headed down to the study, the place had four bathrooms but she wasn’t in the mood for using any of them at the moment, and she really needed to find out what the bands meant.

The moment she arrived in the study she spotted Spike reading a book with a red cover and gold floral patterns but she couldn’t see any lettering to indicate the author or title, he was in a sky blue business suit with an indigo shirt and violet tie, all of which had a green flame pattern on them. “Oh, Spike,” said Twilight in surprise, “I wasn’t expecting you this early in the morning.”

“I know,” said Spike as he approached, “I like to do some unscheduled visits to make sure you’re all in the best health and spirits. I heard your little exchange with your brother, never a dull moment with that one.” He then closed the book and set it down on a side table next to the chair he was in before approaching Twilight, “Yes, robes really do suit you best,” he brought his nose in close and took a deep whiff of her, “and you have bathed yet, nothing out of the ordinary there.” He brought his brought his nose to her neck and took another sniff of her neck, which caused Twilight to feel a sense of sexual excitement for some reason, “I wish I could spend more time ‘playing’ with you, but I have things that require my attention and presence today. But rest assured, we’ll have some more extended fun when I’m not so busy.” With that, he departed.

A few minutes after he left, Twilight let out a sigh of relief and started searching the study for anything on the bands or collars, something on both would be the most welcome. After about a half hour of searching the stacks, Twilight finally found what she was looking for.

___________________________________

Pinkie woke up with her usual vigor, seemed she had also slept in her apron. She quickly tossed it off and into a hamper next to the bed, a basket that was in danger of overflowing despite being filled with a single type of clothing, she would probably have to do something about that later. Pinkie then checked her closet intended for nothing but clothing; there was nothing but aprons in it. Looks like this world’s version of Pinkie either really liked going around in just an apron, which was definitely a possibility, or she was under a similar attire restriction to Twilight.

Looking through the collection, Pinkie found the aprons were actually broken up into four groupings. Work/Casual, Formal (how an apron could be formal with nothing else to accentuate it was only really known to Pinkie), Business Casual (once again, something not a whole lot of folks could pick up on), and erotic. Pinkie grabbed a cornflower blue apron from the Work section and went to the restroom to wash up and to towel off before she tied it on then headed down to open up, she wondered why she didn’t have any employees in this place. The notes she had read by the other Pinkie stated she was still looking into finding the right ponies for the job, she also specifically stated she wanted to keep dragons out of the equation.

Almost as soon as she opened the door a beige colored earth pony in what looked like barely legal bikini got crossed with green lace lingerie with a brass band on her arm rushed in and said, “I’m in a bit of a rush, I really need a job and place to stay or they’ll…” Pinkie’s gaze rested on the mare’s DDD-Cup breasts for a moment; she remembered the Sweetie Drops from home only having D-Cup breasts.

“Calm down there,” said Pinkie, “Sweetie Drops, right?” The mare nodded, “I’m glad you’re answering the call out for help here, I could definitely use it. Please show me your mark,” the mare blinked a bit before reorienting herself so the mark on the band was showing to Pinkie. Unlike the Sweetie Drops she knew back home, this mare had five pieces of candy that were all in green wrappers shaped like a bow with a pink stripe through them. “Your talent is making sweets, correct?”

“Candy, in particular,” said Sweetie Drops, “I’ve been here for a few years now, but for some reason, I was ejected from my old job without warning or a statement why.”

“The business was probably going out or were forced to fire her because of something someone said,” muttered Pinkie, “tell you what, Sweetie, I’ll leave you in the kitchen on your own for a bit and if you can impress me with whatever you make, with as little a mess as possible, I’ll give you the job.” Pinkie would also leave a note for the other Pinkie to tell her about the new hire. “Also, this is party shop, that means we need to have preparations of all kinds for as many different kinds and sorts of parties there are.” Pinkie took a good look Sweetie Drops as the mare made her way into the kitchen, the mare’s pastel blue and pink mane and tail did have a nice aesthetic to them, and her rear wasn’t bad to look at either.

___________________________________

As far as Twilight could tell, the armbands indicated the position and level of importance to the dragon the pony was. Iron and Steel were reserved for ponies in the gladiatorial arenas, iron for the low-rankers and steel for the high-rankers. Bronze was used to indicate a pony in a transition period from lower echelons to higher ones; chances are Spike had unintentionally extended the waiting period for Twilight and Pinkie. Brass, Tin, and Pewter were for lower ranking ponies and Copper was the generally higher ranking ponies. Silver and Gold were reserved for the equivalent of Canterlot’s elite, mostly, with Platinum being reserved the ponies the dragon considered most important of all, the elite among the elite in the dragon’s opinion.

Twilight was surprised it had taken her so long to find the book, half of that time was finding the rankings section of her super library of a home. Of course, the real surprise came when she found that Celestia and Luna did exist in this world and were still alicorns, but due to the immense rarity of alicorns they were reserved for the Dragonlord only, any dragons found in possession of an alicorn were to hand the alicorn over to the Dragonlord immediately. Celestia and Luna were both just a little under two thousand years old, which meant they appeared in what should have Equestria a thousand years after the dragon clans conquered the region and broke into territories.

From what she could tell, Spike was trying to bring as many territories as possible under a single banner, basically turn the whole region into a nation unto itself like what Equestria was. Of course, she couldn’t be sure on account of Spike’s records were thoroughly out of date and he didn’t seem to to be any kind of rush to fix that.

Seriously, What's With this Attire?

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Twilight came into Pinkie’s shop, after washing up and getting dressed in a casual-ish cyan robe with a forest green sash acting as the belt. What she saw when she arrived what she saw was Pinkie scarfing down a veritable mountain of candies of various kinds. To her credit, Pinkie was enjoying herself. Looking over to the kitchen Pinkie spotted a beige mare with a blue and pink mane in a very revealing outfit.

“Pinkie, did you get a new employee?”

“Yupo-rooney,” said Pinkie, “Sweetie Drops makes really great candy!”

“Well, looks some things didn’t change much,” said Twilight as she turned her attention to Sweetie Drops for a moment, “let’s see what else you can do, could make a sweet roll and cinnamon coffee and bring them to me? Oh, and a large chocolate malt for Pinkie, she’s going to need something to wash everything down at some point.” Sweetie Drops gave a curt nod and disappeared into the bowels of the kitchen. Once the mare was out of earshot Twilight said, “I still can’t understand why almost all the ponies have to wear highly revealing, practically erotic at some points, attire. And to make matters worse, I found out my brother and this world’s version of Cadance were my neighbors when they woke me up with their lovemaking.”

“So, Cadance is the alicon of love, nothing weird there,” said Pinkie after she stopped eating all the candies and pushed the plate to the center of the table, “at least she is back where we’re from.”

“Except here, she’s a pegasus,” said Twilight, “and apparently she and my brother are still unmarried in this world.”

“Guess that means there isn’t an alternate version of Flurry Heart bouncing around here somewhere,” replied Pinkie. Besides, I don’t mind the attire around town.”

“I figured you would say that,” said Twilight with an amused shake of her head. She looked around, before saying, “I’m guessing this open space is for hosting parties on site, maybe you should start doing a side business as a restaurant, you definitely have proper facilities for it.”

“The other Pinkie was looking into that,” said Pinkie, “but she’s still waiting on word regarding that. What did you manage to find out?”

“Aside from the fact I now have three different animal assistants,” said Twilight, “it looks like the metal for the bands indicates a pony’s placement in relation to their dragon. Looked liked ‘Azure Claret’ was placed pretty low on the rankings from what I read. Anyway, copper is the metal usually worn by the higher ranking ponies.”

“I noticed a high number of those when I went out for a trot while Sweetie was at work in the kitchen,” said Pinkie.

“Anyway, our bands are special because they indicate we’re in a transition to the higher echelons. Silver and Gold are usually reserved for those. However, the highest possible rank a pony can have is Platinum, that means they are the most important ponies to a dragon. Iron and Steel are special cases; they indicate a pony a being a gladiator, steel indicates a higher position than the standard iron band. I’m pretty sure my brother is a steel band, especially considering he’s in a state of luxury when not out in the arena.”

“I guess Spike really does have a problem getting to things he needs to,” said Pinkie.

“We’ll need to fix that, I hope,” said Twilight as her order was set down in front of her Pinkie, “How much of our conversation did you hear?”

“I heard the part about your speculation on your brother’s band, you really do have trouble keeping up with some things,” said Sweetie Drops, “let me know how I did on this when you’re done, please.”

************************************

A few hours later Twilight was showing Pinkie her home, “So, what do you think? From what I was able to gather the other Twilight designed the whole place.”

“It definitely screams that it was made with a Twilight in mind,” said Pinkie with a big grin as she bounced over to the perches, “and who are all these cuties?”

“The owl is Owlwicious,” said Twilight, “but I’m guessing you already figured that out already; the bat is Day Fruit, which basically tells you what kind of bat he is; and the albatross is Ocean Note, she likes to sing every now and then.”

“She any good?”

“I think so, but I’m not entirely sure. The other Twilight seemed to think so; otherwise she wouldn’t have given her the name.”

“That’s true, so whatcha want to talk about?”

“Why do you think most of the ponies have such revealing attire in this city,” inquired Twilight, “we need to see some of the smaller communities before we can make an informed assessment.”

“This is where the majority of the most prized ponies of Spike’s territory reside,” said Pinkie, “maybe it’s all about showing off what keeps his interest. But we can’t be sure, seeing as we likely are missing some important info.”

“I suppose you’re right,” said Twilight, “but all the attire seems so random at times. I saw Fleur Dis Lee a moment ago, her cutie mark was just one big fleur de lis instead of what we know it to be back home, and it in different colors as well.”

“Yeah, and I saw Octavia on my stroll about earlier, her treble clef was indigo instead of violet. And it looked like her bust was bigger too, is that true with everypony?”

“When I saw Cadance her bust was smaller than...I cannot believe we’re having this conversation, and so casually as well. I have a theory, some of our other selves’ mental traits remained behind to influence us, kind of like a psychological echo.”

“Well, if that’s true,” said Pinkie, “then the same could be said for the other you and me in our bodies.”

Twilight couldn’t believe it; she had failed to consider the other side of her theory until Pinkie had mentioned it. She just hoped whatever they were up to; it would be an easy enough fix. This mostly had to do with Twilight not wanting to think what the other Pinkie and Twilight were doing in their home reality.

The Other Pinkie and Twilight

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Twilight couldn’t believe it, her alternate and Pinkie’s had actually done a lot of world-saving but that wasn’t what she was in awe of. What she was in awe of was the fact that her other self had actually met Starswirl and been part of returning him to the realm, granted he was still in the process of acclimating to the modern era but it was still an incredible accomplishment. Her alternate self had managed to do so many amazing things, while she was still trying to get her universe’s version of Spike to get things up to date and get a personal assistant.

“They’ve done so much in the span of three years,” said Twilight, “more than either of us has done in thrice the time.”

“You think the other me has managed to find some help for the shop,” said Pinkie.

“She’s you; I think she has it covered.”

“Yeah, you’re right,” said Pinkie, “Can you believe Carrot Cake and Cup Cake only have twins right now? Back home they’ve got a few more than that.”

“Yes well,” said Twilight, “Rarity is incredibly nice, definitely nicer than the one we know, and Applejack’s parents are no longer around in addition to her brother still being on the farm and still flirting with a single pony. Things are more than a little different than home, especially given this nation called ‘Equestria’ we’re in is ruled by ponies; in particular, the alicorns.”

“Yeah, and there are way more of them than what we’ve known, back home it’s just Celestia and Luna. And even then, we’ve barely interacted but here we’ve met them a whole bunch and have some amazing relationships with them. Also, you have a niece, who is also an alicorn.”

“I know, and she’s just so cute, makes we wish our universe’s Shining and Cadance would just have a baby already.”

“Yeah, but you know why that’s not likely to happen,” said Pinkie. Both let out annoyed sighs, they really wanted this whole fiasco to be over and done with. Twilight because she had a bunch of nearly pointless organizing to do, and Pinkie because she had a business to run. Granted, from what they had gathered on the other versions of them their jobs were in good hands but they still wanted to be back where they belong.

They still weren’t allowed out of the facility, but at least they could now move about said facility. It was very nice and made very apparent that holding was intended to be short for all the occupants. They hadn’t seen any other occupants but given the size of the structure, it was designed to hold more than a dozen occupants if needed. Twilight was impressed by the whole thing, a facility like this had never been considered back home.

Of course, what was more impressive was the fact she and Pinkie had a much wider variety of clothing to wear, and that Pinkie was in more than an apron during their whole stay. The facility had a puzzle room, a game room filled with a variety of different games, a library, and a mailroom, in addition to a surprisingly well-stocked kitchen. There was also a common area for occupants to socialize. After their initial acclimation period, Pinkie and Twilight were now occupying different rooms but free to move about the facility as they saw fit.

It was all an understandable precaution; they couldn’t just go out into “Equestria” like everything was normal, their other selves had lives that were very different than their own. That said, what their other selves were up to might involve a little culture shock. It had already been one or two, possibly three, days since the incident.

Princess Luna, they were still getting used to that expression, and Starlight Glimmer were working together to generate a spell to search for Twilight and Pinkie’s home universe. But at least they had more than enough distractions to keep them busy and get better acclimated to all this.

Unbeknownst to the two, Princess Celestia and Discord were watching their actions from an observation complex designed for monitoring the complex at a distance. “Well,” said Celestia, “do you think you can find our Twilight and Pinkie, given the information we’ve managed to acquire?”

“Maybe,” said Discord, “I may be the self-proclaimed lord of chaos but even something of this nature requires a bit more to narrow things down.” He magicked up a holographic map that looked like a mass of spirals interacting with each other at almost every angle. “In the vastness of the multiverse,” he snapped his tail and several points lit up on the map, almost too many to count in the instant they flared up, “these forty-nine are our best bet. But seeing as you do not yet have a quick and reliable way to check, and given my approach could just as easily exacerbate the situation; at your current means, it would take just shy of a century to nail down the proper interdimensional coordinates for the use you’re after. And given the temporal dilations that are regular with transit between realities, chances are you could find the right universe and not know it because of your arrival time relative to theirs. Not to mention, just their minds swapped places those of their alternates, chances are residual mental energies on both sides could cause some marginal psychological tweaks.”

“Which means, not only will it be challenging to find our targets but they and our ‘guests’ might end up experiencing some potentially noticeable mental changes. Even if we discount what extended exposure to the alternate realities could do to the psyches of all involved.”

Twilight's New Clothes

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After sending Pinkie off to deal with her issues, Twilight got a delivery of several dozen boxes, which all bore the mark of the Rarity from this world, to her front door, but would soon find out that wasn’t the entirety of the delivery. The pony that dropped everything off at the front door, a dark blue unicorn mare unfamiliar to Twilight in what looked like an overly sexual mockup of a mail uniform just handed her a form to sign. Twilight looked it over before saying, she saw there were supposed to be eighty packages, Rarity’s idea of fashion being forced on her it seemed, but she only saw twenty packages, “Where are the rest?”

“My associate helped me put them out back,” said the mare in a lighter version of the Canterlot accent than she was used to hearing. Twilight felt a little uneasy at that statement.

She thanked the mare for her service and the mare was on her way, Twilight headed out back, thankful she actually had a backyard for once. There weren’t sixty packages, there were over a hundred in her yard, all of which had the Rarity of this world’s mark on them. “Great,” muttered Twilight as she tried to teleport the massive pile into her residence, only to have her magic cut out on her. She tried levitating them all, which was allowed. She suddenly understood that part about having her horn ring ‘calibrated’ and set the packages into a sort of snake configuration and guided them to her most open space in the complex. “Day Fruit,” called Twilight, and the bat fluttered into the same room as her and perched upside down on her horn, “would you be so kind as to place a busy sign on the doors where everyone can see them?”

The bat nodded and fluttered off. Now that Twilight had that out of the way, it was time to look at the one hundred and forty-three boxes; she knew because she counted them as they paraded past her and added the number of the packages she got from the postal mare at the front door to the amount she counted. This was going to take some time.

************************************

Three hours and seventeen minutes, not counting breaks, is how long it took her to go through all the packages and collate all the robes into different piles. There were fifty-six formal robes, which probably showed what the priorities of this world’s Rarity were; nine bathrobes, why anypony needed more than three Twilight would never fully understand; twenty erotic robes, every single one of them made Twilight wonder just what this world’s Rarity was thinking to make more than four; and the rest were casual of varying degrees. Every single one of her robes, aside from the bathrobes, was quite revealing, especially the erotic variety.

Then it got worse; Spike barged into the complex, “Hey Twilight,” he said as he entered the place from the front door. “I got done with all my pressing matters for the day so we can have that long chat you always wanted,” he wandered into the room she was in, which was also the room she had all the robes, “I see Rarity wasted no time in her production of your new attire, looks like she went a little overboard. Although, those saucy numbers might be fun to see you in,” he said as he gestured to the eroticwear.

“That mare needs to work on her priorities,” said Twilight in frustration, “she probably reserves several train cars in advance just so she can have space for all her luggage.”

“To be fair,” said Spike, “when I found out about that I restricted her from traveling with more than ten bags. Twilight just gave him a deadpan stare that said he should probably be cutting that number in half.

“Well, since you’re here,” said Twilight, “there are some matters that need to be discussed. Item one, you need an assistant. Before you argue against it, this is basically mandatory for you at this point; you require an individual to keep you on track and remind you of what needs to be done. I know the Dragonlord has never had an assistant before, seeing as their delegations were kept rather simple before you won the position but you are reigning over a time when dragons are far more urban, and living with ponies to varying extents. At this point you are required to have an assistant, seeing as you keep on putting things off and possibly forgetting about them entirely. I recommend you place a pony, dragon, griffon, or whatever that is highly organized and does not have any current obligations that would distract from their placement. Secondly, you seem to have forgotten about the band upgrades for Pinkie and myself, possibly others. And third, you really need to update your maps, and possibly the archives.”

“Yeesh,” said Spike, “you’re really on point today, and quickly gave statements that render my excuses next to worthless. Do you have anyone in mind?”

“For the time being, no,” said Twilight, “I’ll act as your personal aide in an unofficial capacity until the appropriate individual has been found, chances he could be weeks or months before that happens, it’s not like we’re going to find an appropriately qualified individual within the first week.”

“Point made,” said Spike, “I’m sure you have some ideas of where to start.”

“Honestly, no,” said Twilight, “I was hardly social as a filly, I’m just good at keeping organized because of my affinity for research. That said, Pinkie might have a few ideas, seeing as she keeps surprisingly detailed records or her own.”

“I’ll make it a point to see her tomorrow about that,” said Spike.

“Oh, and my ring needs to be calibrated for the use of a few more spells. In particular, an item duplication spell I learned a short while ago and an item teleportation spell I learned of some years ago. Having that second one would have made things decidedly less awkward when I noticed Cadance and my brother watching me file everything in from their balcony. I would also like to have it calibrated for personal teleportation and teleportation of others, but I think that would probably be in violation of a few rules.”

“Rules I have governance over,” said Spike, “and you’re right, your horn ring does need to be calibrated for more spells, especially given your position as my chief magic researcher.” Twilight had a feeling the day was just going to be even longer than she was dreading.

How Did This Happen?

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Twilight spent some time in the city’s main archive before heading down to the palace; she confirmed even the primary archives were in need of a massive update. She also found evidence of an item duplication spell, that was much cruder than the one Starlight had shown her, and a hard-magic construct spell, that was only in the theoretical stage despite being several centuries old. Spike in this universe really was terrible at keeping things up to date; she missed her Spike terribly.

Twilight arrived at the castle three hours earlier than agreed, which probably was a good thing and wouldn’t matter given Spike’s tendencies in this universe. She decided to wear one of her formal robes, and really hated the magic in her collar barred her from wearing undergarments, and decided to go with an ocean blue one with copper trimming. She had also done some research on her old Canterlot friends, and the end results weren’t anywhere close to what she was hoping.

For one, Minuette was often seen saying something about keeping time, and basically came off as the town crazy for some reason, her mark in this universe was five crisscrossing hourglasses that make a sort of star shape. Moondancer was working in the Processing Center and had her mark in this universe as some sort of brass ring and black mask of some kind. Lemon Hearts was working at the museum and had her mark was a pink diamond on the forehead of a blue cat statue. Twinkleshine was apparently in the service of a theatre and had her mark appearing as a big green star with popcorn inside it. In short, all her Canterlot friends were living drastically different lives, and the only supposedly viable option she had found was the one who had an actual profile go on about how the mare wasn’t right in the head for a paragraph and half.

“Oh good, I caught you,” said Twilight to Spike as she spotted him, “just a reminder, I’ll be with you for the next few days as an impromptu aide until we find someone better suited or qualified so I can get back to my duties as your prime magic researcher.”

“Oh, yeah,” said Spike, “I vaguely remember that conversation,” that wasn’t a good sign. “Did you look into any possible candidates?” The sooner she could recommend them the sooner he could make a show of interviewing them then thank them for their time.

“About that,” said Twilight, “I found a mare in the city that might work, but her work history and psychological analysis give me a few worries,” to Spike that sounded perfect, a pony that provided legitimate excuses for being turned down in her work history and mental breakdown.

“I would like to see her file, and arrange an interview,” said Spike, “Oh, and make the interview discreet.”

“So, set up a bunch of tests and tell her to complete them without informing her why she’s being tested,” said Twilight with surprise, “won’t that be a little...problematic?”

“I’m the Dragonlord,” said Spike, “all applicants need to be suited for less than common occurrences, I’ll be giving the actual interview at the last portion of it all.”

“Of course,” said Twilight in an unsure voice, “I’ll see about working out the particulars of it all with a party I know will probably be well suited for this.”

“That sounds great,” said Spike, “and do your best to make it nonlethal, we don’t want to cause the applicants to get too much harm.”

Twilight almost ground to a halt, just what kind of tests did Spike expect her and Pinkie to be making? She was not very happy about the implications of what Spike had said. She decided to just leave thinking about that for a much later time and went on to inquire about the rest of Spike’s supposed schedule for the day. “Alright,” said Twilight, “I’ll see what we can come up with, do you have any meetings or appearances that need to be taken care of today?”

“I have business to discuss with Shining Armor,” said Spike, “where is your brother today?”

“Last I saw him,” said Twilight, “he was in the manor next to mine; basically he was just at home. I don’t know if he’s still there, seeing as I don’t keep tabs on his affairs or schedules.”

“Then we can start there,” said Spike, “and if everything turns out well today, I might give you a ‘special’ reward. Anything I need to be aware of before we go?”

“I think I’ve covered everything I’m aware needed addressing,” said Twilight, “Let’s get this over with.”

*********************************

I half hour of walking later, with no guards for some reason, they arrived at Shining Armor’s residence in this world and Twilight rang the bell. What met her next surprised her a bit too much, and not the way she would have preferred. Misty Fly answered the door, in an erotic maid outfit. A quick look at her cutie mark showed a sword made of lightning with a shield made of clouds, which was definitely not what her mark was back home.

“Oh, mister Spike,” said Misty in a voice that was half business and half bubbly greeter, “are you here to see Shining Armor?”

“Indeed I am,” said Spike, “is he in?”

“Of course,” said Misty, “but he’s a bit...preoccupied.”

“It’s supposed to be quick,” said Spike, “so I’ll probably only marginally interrupt.” With that, the yellow mare let the two of them in.

“Nice to see, Ms. Twilight,” said Misty as she passed the mare by, “your brother is looking forward to a face to face meeting with you.” The mare closed the door behind them.

“Thank, Misty Fly, right?”

“Icy Mist, actually,” said the mare as she guided Twilight and Spike to Shining Armor, “but I don’t take too much offense, plenty of other folks make that same mistake.”

As they made their way through the manor the sounds of a mare, who was clearly not Cadance, moaning in ecstasy could be heard as they approached a common area in the manor. The sight made Twilight’s eyes go wide, and almost caused her jaw to drop; her brother was rutting Spitfire while Cadance, Jetstream, and Surprise all watched with smiles on their faces.

Aside from Cadance’s silver band, all the mares had steel bands; this was especially noticeable on Spitfire. Her CCC-Cup breasts rocked back and forth to the rhythm of her pounding from Shining Armor. What made it all worse was the fact everyone there was perfectly okay with it all, some were even looking at the act like they expected to be next.

Shining wasn’t joking when he said Cadance was more than a little kinky thought Twilight, but for her to be okay with Shining mating with another mare while she’s in the room, she must be pretty depraved in this world

“Sorry about this,” said shining as he continued to pound Spitfire, “but she’s a bit of an exhibitionist, she just can’t get in the mood without an audience.”

And, apparently, so is Spitfire. Seriously, are all the ponies that are socially high ranking in my world sexually depraved in this one?

“Sorry to interrupt,” said Spike, with an amused smile on his face.

“Not at all,” said Shining as he continued his intercourse with Spitfire, “if anything, you spiced things up a bit. So, what brings the illustrious Dragonlord here today?”

“Grumble issued another challenge,” said Spike, “a four on one match. The winner doesn’t just get bragging rights.”

“What are the stakes,” inquired Twilight, “we’re going to need to know.”

“If his choices win then he can challenge me for the right to be Dragonlord…”

“Again,” whined surprise, “he’s been making that every other win condition for him for the past decade now.”

Spike nodded before continuing, “but if my champion wins I get his champions. I figured my best bet would be the glistening star of the Magi.”

Twilight was confused; she had never heard this term before. “Chances are,” said Shining, “he’ll try to hedge his bets with a mix of different gladiators, an idea who he will be sending out?”

“No,” said Spike, “we both are in agreement that the combatants we send towards the other will not be announced until the match actually starts. So, to keep things interesting you will be showing up to the arena with the Wonderbolts, the rest of the Magi, and the Landshakers.”

“Great, we haven’t seen Mac in ages,” said Jetstream with a little excitement in her voice.

“And it will be his last appearance,” said Spike, Twilight blinked a bit in surprise, she hadn’t realized how things could be so different from home until now, “he got out of the gladiator game three years ago, I'm going to have quite the challenge just getting him to put in this last appearance.”

“A little last hoorah for the crowds,” said Surprise with a smirk, “I think we can all live with that, good luck.”

“Besides,” said Twilight, “you’re not his type. From what I’ve been able to gather on him, he only has that sort of attraction to unicorn mares.”

“Well, that explains a few things,” giggled Jetstream.

“What will we get as compensation for my victory? I can’t do this just for show,” said Shining.

“I really didn’t think that far ahead,” said Spike.

“No surprise there,” huffed Twilight, “seeing as you didn’t bother to tell me or any of your staff of this challenge between dragons.” She fixed Spike with a stern stare, “and I’m supposed to be your aide until a more permanent one is found and properly informed of what is required of them. How about this, you give Shining and Cadance a grand wedding ceremony and we make part of the ceremony the rest of the mares he has here part of an official herd, maybe even throw in actual breeding capacity for all members of the herd for the following month or so." In her study on the collars, Twilight had found collars did indeed not affect mental behaviors and actions of those that wore them but also suspended reproductive capabilities of all those wearing them until explicitly stated otherwise by the dragon that had genuine ownership over said collar wearers. “And as for the other supporting individuals intended to act as a smoke screen, they could get a minor compensation as well.”

“I suppose that’s fair,” said Spike, “I’ll leave it to you to determine what those compensations are, for the time being.”

“I’m not familiar with everyone you have coming in for this event, so I’ll require a list of who they are and their designation, I’ll work out some interviews to see what kind of compensation for their doing this they require.” Twilight also needed the names so she could do some research on all of them to see just what they were like in this world.

“So, when is this match supposed to go down,” inquired Shining.

“Four month’s time, Garble wants to make sure we can provide a suitably effective fighting arena, and I want to make sure there’s nothing potentially problematic about the fighting arena.”

There's No Way Things are Like This

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After the less than family-friendly visit to Shining’s place, and thanks for picking up his slack, Spike took Twilight around to a few other places. Rarity, predictably, was working in her boutique, a boutique that made the Canterlot shop the white mare had back home look like a food cart. The store in question was easily a dozen times larger than Canterlot Carousel on the inside and the outside took up three and a half city blocks in addition to being five stories tall, all done up with an exterior design modeled after a fairytale castle. And to top it off, the name made Twilight want to laugh like a giddy school filly and barf in disgust at the same time, which she thankfully did neither of, but what could expect from a shop called “Regal Scale and Thread”?

Spike only stopped in at Rarity’s to check on the ivory mare’s business practice, citing several complaints of a lack of professionalism. After that, they were back to the castle, where Twilight spent a good four hours of paperwork that Spike clearly should have been doing himself before the violet mare was led through the castle to a location that was marked as restricted.

“And where are we going now,” inquired Twilight.

“I promised you I would be giving you a ‘special’ gift if you performed well,” said Spike.

“I thought you meant over the course of the week; I still have a few more bits of the mess you seem to be in to clean up. I didn’t think it would be on day one!”

“And that was my intent, originally,” said Spike, “but that little bit you came up with for your brother and the rest of our top gladiators made me decide that my original special gift wouldn’t be good enough and you deserve something that’s a bit more extensive.”

“Can we wait on it until a later date,” asked Twilight.

“Maybe, but I think you deserve a taste of it as soon as possible,” said Spike as he stopped for emphasis before a pair of palladium gilded doors with gold and platinum reliefs that were accented with a small assortment of emeralds. The whole piece of art on the door made a piece of art that seemed to show two alicorns, that looked suspiciously like Celestia and Luna, lounging about with no attire.

“Later, said Twilight with more expressed energy, “just showing me the way here was enough, for now. I think it best we head out for your regular inspection of produce and other food items.”

“Oh well,” said Spike, “we’ll visit this venue later,” he brought his mouth right next to her ear as he passed her and whispered, “count on it,” in a seductive tone. Twilight decided to just ignore that; she was very uncomfortable with Spike acting like that around her.

Twilight gave a polite cough before saying, “How about we get on that inspection as soon as possible. In other words, now, after that, it looks like you have a few days free from anything potentially pressing, but something could still pop up unexpectedly.”

“Sounds good,” said Spike, “we just need to make a few stops before heading out of the city.”

************************************

Apparently, “a few stops” meant a little over a dozen. All of them were businesses that primarily dealt with food, it was good to see Spike doing inventory. But for some reason, the last stop was Pinkie’s establishment. It looked like she had a new helper, Sweetie Drops, or was it, Bon Bon? Regardless, Pinkie seemed to be taking a bit more of an interest than she probably should have, no surprise there when you considered what was going on with this world and the places they were occupying. Spike went up to Pinkie and whispered something in her ear before telling Twilight it was time to go.

Twilight really wanted to know what he said to Pinkie but she didn’t have time to ask, they were off again.

**********************************

Almost a half hours later they were coming up on the train station, Spike just said he was heading out for a quality check of produce and the ticket pony, a dark brown earth pony mare with a cherry pink colored mane in an outfit that looked more like a fetish version of a train station worker than an official outfit just nodded and pulled out a pair of metal sheets that were carved to look like tickets and handed them to Spike before saying the train should be arriving in a half hour or so.

After the train arrived the boarded on, all the passengers, dragon and pony, gave them a wide berth. Twilight was feeling uneasy, this was not the Spike she was used to, and all of this was just proving the point even more.

********************************************

After what might have been the tensest train ride of her life, Twilight got off with Spike at what was geographically supposed to be Ponyville. Twilight almost afraid to ask for the name, but she did anyway, “And where are we now, Spike?” Twilight inquired.

“Dragon Reach,” said Spike, “be prepared to see ponies going around in much less than you’re used to, this is one of my breeding towns.” Twilight blinked in surprise, while her research hadn’t told her where any such communities were it had told her what they were. Breeding communities were places where parts of a dragon's territory that were dedicated to mainly breeding ponies. To think, Ponyville’s equivalent had been relegated to something so...shameless. She feared what the alternate versions of her friends here might be like.

Spike led her down the pathways, clearly having been here many times before. The path they were taking led straight to Sweet Apple Acres, or its equivalent in this world. The knowledge that Applejack’s family were still known for high-quality produce did begin to alleviate some of her anxiety; until she saw the orchard's and sign.

As they came up on the farm that Twilight had thought she knew she beheld a massive grove of Apple and Pear trees arranged in a surprisingly efficient and aesthetically pleasing manner. But what really caught Twilight off guard was the sign proudly proclaiming the place “Luscious Apple and Pear Groves” in lettering that made both fruits prominent.

“Um, what’s with the name?” Twilight inquired.

“Oh, a few years ago I presided over the wedding of Bright Mac of the Apple Clan and Pear Butter of the Pear clan. The two families were really competitive, but after I made sure the two were united with those two, things started getting like this. Those two had a few foals; their eldest actually is part of the arena elite, he willingly signed up for it.”

Twilight blinked a bit to get her bearings before saying, “I recall you mentioning Big Macintosh being among the gladiator elite, I just didn’t realize ponies could sign up for it.”

“Common misunderstanding,” said Spike, “very few dragons give ponies the freedom of choice, my siblings and I do, kind of funny when you think about it.”

“Because your parents were controlling to the point of micromanaging everything going on with ponies in their territories?”

“Good guess,” said Spike, “seeing as you probably don’t know anything about them, and yes.”

“But you came to the realization that ponies are more productive when they don’t feel like their choices are meaningless. I know that’s how it is for me, although, I do wish you would stop that habit of invading my personal space without permission.”

Spike gave a chuckle, Twilight was still clueless about his sexual advances on her, before saying, “A good assessment, but I will still continue those advancements because I find your responses and reactions to it all amusing.”

When they arrived at the house, which was a full story more than Twilight knew as the Apple family homestead a light orange mare with a dark orange mane met them at the door, Twilight was unfamiliar with this mare but she seemed to be quite a few years older than Applejack but easily younger than Granny Smith. She was dressed much like Applejack, aside from having her red plaid shirt tied into an impromptu support for her ample bust and the fact her blue jeans looked like short shorts, “Lord Spike,” said the mare in a cheery tone, “it’s been a while, I’ll get Applejack to show you around for inspection.” The mare then turned her attention to Twilight, “and who would you be, dearie?”

“Twilight Sparkle, I’m one of Spike’s magic researchers. I’m playing the part of his aide, for the time being, he’s kind of been putting stuff off a bit too long, it’s best he have someone to keep him organized. I’m looking into getting him a proper aide.”

“Oh good, then you can spend time discussing things with us inside while AJ takes care of showing him around. We have such a big family I’m sure you’ll find at least one or two potential candidates among them.”

“That would be greatly appreciated,” said Twilight with an uneasy smile.

________________________________________

Meanwhile, at Pinkie’s shop, Pinkie had just finished getting sucked off by her fifth customer of the day, a mare that looked suspiciously like Fleur Dis Lee. Apparently, whatever Spike had whispered to her had caused her to lactate, excessively. After Sweetie Drops helped Pinkie bottle a gallon or two, after which Pinkie was still overproducing but just not as seriously, her new helper took to suckling Pinkie’s bosom.

Twenty minutes later she found herself charging a few visitors for the right to feed from her mammaries, they weren’t being bits but they seemed to be similar. The currency looked like scales off a dragon but were called “spines” for some reason. Pinkie wasn’t sure she should be happy or worried at this point, the pleasurable sensations of her breasts being suckled made it hard to focus. Things were getting messy, and she wasn’t sure if it was in a good way or not.

Spike and Twilight at the Farm

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The first thing Twilight noticed when she entered the complex was how different it was from what she remembered, it still had that rustic look to it but the furniture was all different from what she remembered. The rocking chair Granny Smith regularly sat in was missing from the front porch, at the time she figured it was just a minor shift from what she was familiar. Now, seeing what the main room looked like, she could see the changes were a bit more than she had anticipated.

The room had two couches, one of which she was now sitting on, and three different chairs, none of which were a rocking chair. Twilight was confused, but she didn’t want to entirely show it. “I was under the impression you had all current generations in the same residence,” said Twilight as diplomatically as possible.”

“Well, we et least tried,” said the yellow stallion that identified himself as Bright Mac, “tha’ is until the fifth one came down the line.”

“We were starting to run out of room,” said Pear Butter, “so my pa and his ma decided to take up residence in the old Pear homestead, it’s just a short trot through the groves from here, and let us work on building up the family. Daddy’s not even sore about all the foals being Apples, for the time being, but we might start giving a few Pear names.”

Great, thought Twilight, AJ’s parents, I heard from her what they were supposed to be like, but to actually meet alternate versions of them is a little off-putting. The sound of a set of few sets of hooves pounding down the stair was soon heard. Twilight immediately prefaced the arrival of the coming ponies with, “So, who all is living here? I hear a few sets of hooves heading down the stairs.”

Right on cue Applejack, Apple Bloom, and two younger looking foals made their entrance. “Later, Ma, Pa, Ah’m gonna show our dragon benefactor around the groves,” said Applejack as she headed for the door.”

“He always requests her,” said Bright Mac as the orange mare made her way out the door, Twilight hadn’t managed to get a decent look at this version of Applejack’s cutie mark.

“As to answer your question,” said Pear Butter, “Aside from Applejack, who just went out to give Lord Spike his tour, we have Apple Bloom,” said yellow filly with a pink mane was dressed in a green plaid shirt and apple red overalls, and gave a courteous bow when she was introduced, “and the Twins, Spartan Apple and Rome Apple.” The twins giggled, both giving exaggerated bows. One had a bark brown coat with a mane that was apple green with streaks of apple red in it; the other had a coat that was the same shade of bark brown with an apple red with apple green streaks through it. Apple Bloom seemed to be about 12 years old, not much of an age difference from the one Twilight knew, and the twins seemed to be eight or nine years of age.

“Nice to meet you all,” said Twilight, “I heard about some of the obligations Big Macintosh has these days.”

“Can you tell us?” said all three youngsters in perfect unison, looked like they really liked following their big brother’s progress.

“I can’t say much,” said Twilight, “seeing as it pertains to an event a few months out from now, but we’re trying to get him as part of the entry ceremony for an event in the next four months or so.”

“Will Soarin be there?” Inquired Applejack’s mother with a conspiratorial tone, Twilight didn’t want to use the mare’s name again just yet.

“Yep, he’s going to be part of the same group as Macintosh,” said Twilight, why?”

“Oh, nothin’ much,” said Bright Mac, “Jackie just ‘as a bit of crush on Soarin,ez all.”

Twilight had noticed that about Applejack back home but the orange mare always changed the subject when that came up, looks like some things were consistent between realities. “I’m just curious,” said Twilight carefully, “does Spike know?”

“If he doesn’t, he will soon enough,” said Pear Butter, “now, how about we get to work on finding the Dragonlord a capable aide, I think we can come up with a few decent candidates.”

______________________________________________

“...an’ here ya can see tha Jonagold trees have some bigger, an’ possibly juicer, fruits from las’ time ya were here,” said Applejack as she was rounding out the tour, “an’ tha’ should bae jus’ abou’ everathing.”

“Not bad,” Spike as he took a sampling of the fruit and bit into it, he always liked admiring Applejack’s body during his tours. The orange mare had shapely legs, a toned core, defined abs, a well-toned rear that was just shapely enough to be more than a little attractive, a well-toned upper body, and generously sized bust that came out as a charming G-Cup. Today she was dressed in a red plaid shirt tied up under her breasts; he made sure to give her an expressed order that bras were forbidden to her use at all times, and a pair of cut-off jean shorts that were colored green and helped accentuate her legs. “But what I’m really interested is the special project I gave your farm, the one from five years ago, I’m looking forward to an update on the progress. Who knows, if I like what I see then I might do more than give you a ‘special’ thanks.”

Applejack quivered with at the mention of that, his ‘special’ thanks usually involved plowing her up against a tree, hard, and she enjoyed every moment of it. “O’ course, we ‘ave uh special part of tha grove set aside fer it, we needed ta make sure a unicorn wid a ring calibrated fer wards could add in some additional protection, some o’ tha fruit bats started gettin’ antsy when they noticed wut we were workin’ on.”

“Some of the bats tried to eat the seeds?”

“Yup, we managed to keep them from doin’ that, thank tha ancestors. But we also had subterranean varmits, lahke moles, coming aroun’ ta try an’ eat tha seeds befer we even ‘ad them en tha ground. And let me tell ya, once we found a unicorn that had a ring that was calibrated fer tha’ sort o’ thing, they were unwillin’ ta help, even after we dropped yer name and explained why need their services. Happened with three other unicorns as well, we finally found a unicorn that could do it and was willin’ ta work wid us on et. Ah think ‘er name had somethin’ ta do with the night sky, et started wid ‘Star’ but ah don’ entirely know ‘er name since Ah was in such a tizzy et tha time.”

“Where is she now?”

“Ah think she left wid mah brother, she was passin’ through town at aroun’ tha same time ‘e was visitin’ us from his new farm.”

“I know the place,” said Spike as they came up on a wooden fence and gate with silver and brass filigree adorning it, “looks like it wasn’t cheap to set up either.”

“Which is why we billed all tha expenses fer tha project ta ya,” said Applejack with a smirk as she opened the gate for Spike, “we tried jus’ plantin' tha seeds in tha soil ‘roun’ ‘ere, didn’ take.”

“That’s troublesome,” said Spike with an annoyed quirk in his voice, “good thing I also sent you those soil samples as well.”

“Yup, looks lhake once et takes root in tha ‘crystal soil’ all tha way ta sapling abou’ yay big,” Applejack made a gesture of something between one and two feet in size with her hands, “et can bae planted anywhere, but we suspect et won’t work wid the more matured plants as well as tha saplings.”

“It’s a start,” said Spike as they came to a stop before a crystal berry bush. He then looked over to see a crystal apple tree growing crystal Fuji apples a pear tree growing crystal Anjou pears. “I see the soil samples also allowed for new breeds of produced as well.”

“Yup,” said Applejack, “What ya think?”

Spike went over and pulled a sample from each tree and took a few bites of each fruit, he gave an uneasy look before saying, “A good first attempt, but it looks like these fruit trees needed a little more time in the ‘crystal soil’ as for the berries,” he took a few samples and plopped them in his mouth and chewed a bit, “they seem to be within the acceptable margin, I’ll send word to Ember about your accomplishments here. Now, prepare yourself.”

Applejack complied by removing all her attire, in a fluid motion, she was already showing signs of being wet. A moment later Applejack was braced up against the crystal apple tree being sexually dominated by Spike, which meant he was also double penetrating her with his twin penises. He pounded her, in and out, over and over, against the tree. She screamed a primal cry of ecstasy as he continued to pound her against the tree, her gloriously large bosom bouncing to a rhythm and tempo Spike was playing through her body.

_________________________________________

Twilight heard an erotic cry of ecstasy from where she was sitting, the Apples had at least helped her add a few more ponies to the list, only two of which were family to them, and had even given her lunch, a mushroom, broccoli, and carrot soup with apple pie with extra cinnamon for dessert, all washed down with some crisp, clear apple juice. “That’s not a sound you normally hear on a produce farm,” said Twilight with surprise.

“Just Lord Spike givin’ Applejack her ‘special’ thanks,” said Bright Mac dismissively.

“It almost always happens when he visits us,” said Pear Butter, “nothing out of the ordinary.”

For you all, thought Twilight, but for me, this is getting a bit too outside my comfort zone. “Thanks again,” said Twilight, doing her best to hide her discomfort, “I’ll pass along everything you said needs to and we’ll see what happens from there.”

Dragon Reach

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After the mildly awkward time with Applejack’s family, which was driven to extremely awkward when the Orange mare returned with Spike and her bosom free for all to see and none of the ponies seemed to have no care about her breasts being on display for all to see. This Applejack had a rack that was noticeably bigger than the one sported by the Applejack she knew, and Twilight felt a need to scrub her mind clean when she found her mind wandering that way. Shortly after a short exchange between Spike and the Apple family, Spike and Twilight were off on their way to look over the rest of the town. For the most part, Dragon Reach looked nearly identical to Ponyville, if discounted the fact almost all the ponies were going around in skimpy outfits.

They stopped for some food at what looked like Sugurcube Corner with an additional level to it. “Ah yes,” said Spike when Twilight stopped to stare, “this is where I first encountered Pinkie Pie. That was, oh,” he made a show of thinking about it for a few minutes, “six or seven years ago. Of course, you didn’t actually meet her until a few years after she came to Dragon Crown anyway.”

“To be fair,” said Twilight, “I tend to block most things out when I’m absorbed in my work, I think I’ve been told about how I’ve missed entire days a few times.”

“Yes, that is a bit of nasty habit of yours,” said Spike, “let’s go in and say hello.”

When they entered the facility Mrs. Cake was a bit more rotund than the one Twilight knew, the blue mare with a pink mane also was only in an apron, much like Pinkie in this world. This Apron was adorned with a nearly identical one to the one Twilight was familiar with, the only noticeable differences were the cherries on top were dragon-shaped and the center one was being snatched up by a purple dragon’s hand. Also of note, Cup Cake sported a collar just like every other for Spike’s ponies Twilight had seen when she had gotten a closer look at them. Twilight blinked a bit, when she looked around the main floor it was practically identical to the inside of the Sugurcube Corner she was familiar with. The only other thing of note was what looked like a corner for foals near the cutoff to the kitchen area.

Twilight’s expectations about things suddenly came to a screeching halt when she heard the sound of several tiny hooves descending the stairs, definitely more than two. She looked over to where the stairs were and soon was greeted by the sight of six foals, three colts, and three fillies. She spotted Pound and Pumpkin easily enough, the pair now looking more like four-year-olds than the pair that was just barely older than two she was familiar with. In addition, she saw filly that had Cup’s coat color but Carrot’s mane color, this filly seemed to be about a year or so younger than Pound and Pumpkin. Then what looked like a set of triplets, with two colts and one filly among them to bring the whole set up to six. The triplets all seemed to have cream colored coats with their manes being the only major difference between them; one of the colts had a chocolate brown mane, the other had a whipped cream colored and shaped mane, the filly had a ginger-colored mane that seemed to be imitating Cup’s mane style. All three seemed to be two or three years of age.

Twilight blinked a bit before saying, “I was unaware you had so many foals,” she really didn’t want to tip anyone off about her unfamiliarity with the world just yet.

“Oh yes,” said Cup, “it’s nice of you to say,” she then shot the foals, who were all in simple shorts and shirts with no adornments, with a look of annoyance, “but they were supposed to be napping for another few hours.” All the foals gave sheepish grins before making their way back up the stairs. Mrs. Cake gave a slightly exasperated sigh, “Sorry about that; I was sure it would be another hour or so before they did something like that.”

“No Worries,” said Spike, “we’ll take two sample platters to go, how much?”

“Oh, um,” said Cup as she started placing various confections in a pair of boxes, “Twenty spines, I’m giving a bit of a discount since you are the one who technically owns everything.”

“So,” said Twilight, “where is your husband?”

“Oh,” said Cup, “he’s out making a delivery, he should be back in a few days.”

“I thank you for the treats,” said Spike, “and your honesty.” A few minutes later they were handed the boxes and made their way out of the shop after Spike gave a set of gold coins that looked like dragon scales in an equal number to what they were charged.

“Pinkie used to work here,” said Twilight as she carefully fished out a mini-cake, “she’s mentioned working at Sugurcube Corner a few times. It’s nice to get out and see things like this once in a while.”

Spike chuckled before saying, “Now, that’s something I never thought I would hear from you, Twilight.”

Twilight mentally gulped, “Well, I keep getting told to take a break from my research, and I’ve read that a little spending a little time away from your work can help your productivity.”

“Now, there’s the purple bookworm I know,” said Spike as they moved through the streets. Twilight did her best hide her discomfort when poorly covered ponies passed them by.

“So,” said Twilight, “we’re headed to Big Macintosh’s farm after this?”

“Yup,” said Spike as he tossed a small handful of cookies into his mouth and vigorously chewed them. As they traveled through the town Twilight saw how the architecture was similar yet different from what she knew was present in Ponyville, but she couldn’t quite put her finger on how or why that was.

The only thing that looked like it was changed from Ponyville in a noticeable way was the library. Instead of being an oak tree, of any kind, the tree that served as the library was a dragon blood tree that was a bit taller and wider than the Golden Oak. No surprise that the castle the Tree of Harmony gave Twilight wasn’t present; she doubted the tree itself even existed in this world.

Spike and Twilight went to take a closer look at the library, “Have ever been in this library?” Twilight asked Spike as they approached it.

“Nope,” said Spike, “I was here for its planting two or three centuries before I became the Dragonlord, I was still pretty young and foolish in those days.”

“Because at the time you didn’t know Dragonblood trees usually don’t grow in these sorts of environments,” said Twilight, “they come from an arid island near Saddle Arabia.” Shortly after her statement Twilight realized that the name of that area probably wasn’t the same here, she might have just blown her cover.

“Okay, yeah, I see your point,” said Spike, “Those texts of yours are pretty old, that nation hasn’t had that name for at least a thousand years, my archives really are too out of date.”

Twilight let out a mental sigh of relief, looked like she wasn’t in hot water just yet. “But still, how did you manage to get a healthy one so big in town in a temperate climate?”

“With a lot of help from the earth ponies in my territory at the time, after it got about knee high the tree didn’t need any more attention, the town just had to make sure the moisture levels for its area were a bit less than the rest of town for a few years.” After that, they went into the library for a bit; Twilight was a bit excited to see what this library tree was like.

The only thing of note for Twilight was the lack of her friends’ alternates. She already knew where Pinkie and Rarity were, they had even passed by an alternate version of Sweetie Belle making merry with alternates of Diamond Tiara and Silver Spoon. However, regular scanning of the skies and trees brought no signs of an alternate version of Rainbow Dash, and none of the ground moving pegasi resembled Fluttershy. It really looked only Applejack was the only one of her friends’ alternates that resided in this place. Sweetie Belle’s presence confirmed, on some level, that Rarity had been residing here before being moved to Dragon Crown.

“I’m curious,” said Twilight, “are there any available facilities for this town? It could help with deciding possible places for ponies to go after the match with Garble.”

“Oh, good thinking, Twilight,” said Spike with a grin, “let’s go check with the mayor.”

A few minutes later they were at the town’s central administration building. A pony that looked like she was a dark blue unicorn mare with a lollipop green mane, in a very skimpy secretary uniform met them and just redirected them to the mayor the moment she saw Spike.

As soon as they entered the room Twilight noticed mayor looked a bit younger with a mane that was dark pink with a light pink stripe instead of the gray she was used to. “Nice to see you again, madam mayor,” said Spike as the door closed behind him and Twilight. The mayor herself was in a conservative business suit, “I need to see that you are holding up with my attire requirements before we proceed.”

“Of course, Lord Spike," said the mayor, at this point Twilight wasn’t surprised by the fact that every pony seemed to have a collar almost identical to the ones she had seen in Dragon Crown, and pulled her jacket and shirt aside to reveal a sling bikini colored like Spike’s body with a scale pattern all throughout it, slightly straining to hold back her DD-Cup breasts, before placing the jacket and skirt back into position. “What can I do for you during your visit this time around? It’s been some time since you last visited my office.”

“I’m going to need a list of the locations of all the facilities currently not being occupied in town,” said Spike, “I have an event coming up with the potential for new ponies joining my territory.”

“Oh, of course,” said the mayor before going over to her door and asking her assistant, whom she referred to as ‘Algae,’ before closing the door again. “It might take a while to find the appropriate files.”

“We can wait,” said Twilight, “Spike has recently come to the realization that some things need to be improved more than he thought.”

Spike gave a polite cough before saying, “Yes, Twilight is quite right. She’s my best researcher, with an extended focus on magic. She’s playing the part of my much-needed aide for the time being, hence why she has fewer restrictions on what she is permitted to say.”

Twilight had a bad feeling about this, “What do you mean by that, exactly?”

“Most ponies aren’t allowed to call me out if the situation doesn’t demand it,” said Spike, “but I can understand you not being properly aware of this. Also, most ponies have trouble telling when the situation demands, your lack of awareness of such things is more of a relief, to be honest.”

The mayor blinked a bit between for a minute or two; then her secretary entered with a small bundle of files. “I’ll get on making that list for you, your lordship, right away.”

**********************

There were over a dozen residences not in use among the buildings for the town, but it had taken the mayor almost a half hour to find the addresses and transcribe them onto a fresh sheet of paper. Where they now really did drive home to Twilight just how much the rest of her friends were not in this town. House number nine on their scouting of fifteen was the tree that should have been Fluttershy’s residence. To make matters more annoying, it looked like the house hadn’t been used in years. The library also had residential rooms, but it was also devoid of any residents in addition to apparently not having any staff. Twilight had asked about the library and school before she and Spike left the town hall, the mayor informed her that Cheerilee was indeed the school’s teacher, much to Twilight’s relief she chose to not show, and the library hadn’t had any staff or residents for the past twenty years or so, Twilight showed her annoyance towards the mayor’s lack of concern regarding an overseer for the library for so long, much Spike’s amusement.

“This is a nice little place that’s out of the way,” said Twilight, “a good place for a pony that might require some time away from the rest for extended periods of time. Like maybe, a shy pony.” Twilight was doing her best to keep it together, but seeing Fluttershy’s cottage so devoid of the life and energy it seemed to hold when her friend resided there was really hard, she had almost given away the ruse, again.

Pinkie's Odd Time

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Pinkie Pie was starting to feel more than a little sore, she had been providing several ponies, and dragons, drinks right from her bosom. The most awkward had been when a pair of elderly stallions who each took up one of her juggs and drank for over a dozen minutes, the most satisfying had been when a mare with seven young foals entered and enlisted Pinkie’s services, Pinkie had only charged the mare half price instead of making it free because the mare had insisted on compensating the pink mare in some way. Now that there were no more customers, mostly because Pinkie was just closing up shop for the day, she had time to massage her aching tatas. She had a greater appreciation for mares that breastfed, especially Mrs. Cake. Although, those ponies hadn’t had to deal with fully grown adults suckling them, an experience Pinkie wasn’t entirely keen on repeating. Yes, her new employee had drunk from Pinkie’s breasts but Pinkie hadn’t felt so...numb afterward, mostly because of how brief that initial interaction had been.

Pinkie was just turning the sign to closed when Gilda, of all creatures, showed up in an onyx black sling bikini that was more revealing than she would have anticipated. Gilda had a black collar with blue flames running across with her name on it. It looked like Griffinstone was also under dragon rule, “I hope the reason you’re here is short,” said Pinkie, “I recall griffins having a bit of a poor reputation. Gilda had a surprising pair of CC-Cup breasts, the Gilda Pinkie and Twilight knew had BBB-Cup breasts and would prefer to not be caught dead in such attire.

“Oh, trust me,” said Gilda in an annoyed tone, her breasts bouncing a bit when she huffed indignantly, “I would love nothing more than to leave you all alone, but my current master finds it amusing to make me run errands for her. The Blue Flame clan is so annoying at times. Anyway, Lady,” Gilda showed some obvious disdain for the word, almost doing a fake gag, “Razel of the Blue Flame clan wishes to see Dragonlord Spike, here’s the note with the details,” she handed Pinkie a flame blue envelope with an emerald green wax seal that had blue ink etched over the insignia to show a blue flame burning through a sword. “And with that, I’m out.”

“Care to stay long enough for me to give you a tip,” inquired Pinkie.

“Thanks for the offer, pony,” said Gilda with a little annoyance, “but I have to be getting back to her territory now, I’ll pass along your offer though.”

“Now, Now,” came a melodic voice as a white dragoness about a head shorter than Spike descended in a dark crimson formal dress, Pinkie could see the dragoness decided to forgo anything under the dress to protect her modesty, “I advise you to take her up on the offer. The whole reason I sent you here was more of a test; I didn’t actually think you would encounter the Dragonlord, seeing as I was aware of the high probability of being outside his ruling city at the moment.”

On closer inspection, Pinkie could see the spines of the dragoness were sky blue and she had a pair of ivory horns that came out of the side of her head and slicked back hugging the head and stopping a few inches from the back of the dragoness’s skull while still remaining straight.

“Lady Razel, I presume,” said Pinkie, “Sorry but I’m just closing up shop here; otherwise I would be more than willing to invite you in to wait for Spike, he’s out doing a produce inspection, probably going to be out for a few hours, possibly days.”

“That’s fine,” said Razel, “just let him know I dropped in, he should know the reasoning. Come, pet.” With that, she and Gilda were off.

“Maybe you should send a griffin better suited to messages; I hear there’s a griffin named Gabriella, likes to go by Gabby, that’s probably better suited for social calls and messages. From what I heard, she should be in your territory.”

“Oh yes, the gray one with a cheery demeanor,” said Razel after stopping to hover a few feet up with Gilda next to her, “I think that’s an excellent idea, I can see why Spike lets you all go about as he does, you can have such wonderful suggestions.” With that, they were off.

Pinkie blinked a bit before heading back inside and locking the door behind her, she would need some extra cuddle time with Gummy and the other baby alligators. Sweetie Drops had already cleaned up the kitchen and headed to her new room, “We really need to have this whole fiasco fixed soon,” Pinkie muttered to herself as she headed to where the other Pinkie had for her collection of baby alligators. “I hope our friends, and the princesses, are able to find a way to fix things because we sure aren’t.

************************************************

Three hours of fun with the alligators later and Pinkie was entering her room, inside it was just as she had left it. She crashed on the bed after turning out the lights, face first, and groaned about her odd day, when she wondered how the other Pinkie could handle all this so effectively.

Arrangements for Pinkie and Twilight

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“It’s pretty amazing the Cakes are letting me stay in the other Pinkie’s room, I thought they would be a bit more skeptical when you explained things to them,” said Pinkie Pie.

“Not at all, darling,” said Rarity, who was currently in an autumn dress of her own design, a dress colored to match autumn leaves, “we’re all used to some of Twilight’s ‘projects’ not going quite as intended. Not to mention, your argument that our Pinkie and Twilight are probably spending time in your residences meant we were probably overthinking a few things.”

“Yeah, I guess,” said Pinkie as she bounced about next to the ivory mare, “I know I’ve said this before, but you really are a whole lot nicer than the Rarity back home.”

“Yes, you explained how...difficult she is to be around, and that superiority complex of hers isn’t doing her any favors. However, I can see how she could get that way; she seems to have the same talent for finding gemstones that I do.”

“Yeah, but her mark is more than a little different.”

“I know, I saw it when the one you drew, and colored in, was passed around to everypony. Does she really have that much influence?”

“Yup, and her shop is huge.”

“I wouldn’t expect anything else from a,” Rarity made gagging motion before continuing, “garish facility taking up so much space, at most, it should take up two, not five, blocks at most. I don’t recall you saying its name.”

“Her shop is called ‘Regal Scale and Thread’ and it has a lot of stuff inside.”

Rarity a made a motion of being ill before saying, “It sounds like a simplistic name I would have used at Sweetie Belle’s age if I had her understanding of fashion. I’m sure if Twilight and Pinkie learned of that name their reactions wouldn’t be all too flattering.”

“That wouldn’t really matter,” said Pinkie, “we’re lower ranked than our Rarity. She’s a platinum band, at best we’re gold or silver bands, assuming our Spike got around to actually finishing our transition to higher rankings. The only other platinum bands are our Celestia and Luna, and they hardly get any public appearances. Naturally, they’re still higher ranked than our Rarity. That all said, the Garble of our universe has been trying to usurp our Spike almost as soon as our Spike became the Dragonlord.”

“Nice to see some things don’t change too much,” said Rarity, “Garble has been antagonistic to Spikey-wikey almost as soon as they met.”

“That’s a cute nickname for him, I know our Spike would be perfectly okay with it, but the chances our Rarity would say something like that are very slim, almost non-existent really.”

Rarity hoped that Applejack would come to relieve her of her post soon, hearing any more about how insincere and ungenerous her alternate self was likely to send her into a fit of nauseousness for who knew how long. This Pinkie was almost identical to the Pinkie she knew, in personality quirks at least.

_________________________________________________

“When I read she had her own castle,” said Twilight as they entered the Castle of Friendship, “I had no idea it would be so grand, or glistening. Her library must be impressive!”

Starlight and Spike shared a look; this was definitely a Twilight response to things. “Yes, it is,” said Spike, “and she regularly likes to check and see what’s up to date. She also has a lab or two in the subterranean levels.”

“We decided it wouldn’t hurt things to have you to occupy Twilight's room, provided you adhere to a few ground rules. If you don’t, we’ll be sticking you in a guest room with limited access to everything,” Starlight stressed the word ‘everything,’ "until you either comply or our Twilight is returned.”

“Makes sense,” said Twilight, “what are the ground rules?”

“Rule one,” said Spike, holding up a digit for emphasis, “you are not allowed to remove anything from Twilight’s room, this includes replicating items and making off with the duplicate while the original remains in the designated area.”

Rule two,” said Starlight, holding up two digits for emphasis, “you are not to engage in any interactions outside of Spike, myself, or Twilight’s closest friends without at least one of the seven of us present for such interactions. The only exception to this rule is when you are interacting with any of the princesses, seeing as they are fully aware of the situation.”

“Rule three,” continued Spike, “no doing your own experiments without Starlight, myself, or one of the princesses present, this includes trying to replicate any and all experiments our Twilight has done.”

“Rule four,” continued Starlight, her face took on a much more serious tone, as did her voice, “no inquiring about spells you read about here, we think it best you do not try to learn about spells invented in this universe but not potentially have in your own because the pony in question had a completely different life course than your home reality.”

“Rule five,” said Spike, his appearance getting a bit serious as well, “while the history of Equestria is open to you in text format,” he gestured to the library and the books within, “you are not allowed to learn historical details from the mouths of any ponies or other creatures during your stay. This includes recent events that now have, or are speculated to have historic implications.”

“We’re sure Pinkie had some ground rules laid out for her as well,” said Starlight, “but hers are a bit different because it’s Pinkie Pie.”

Talking with Mac

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They were back on the train again, seeing the alternate of Ponville was...an interesting experience. From the look of things, it would take a while to get to their destination. On the plus side, Twilight had managed to see a new library but said library was just barely more up to date than the archives. At least Spike seemed to be taking the updating the archives idea seriously now. Also, she had nearly lost it when she found the place Fluttershy was supposed to be.

Twenty minutes or so on the train later they got off at a station that Twilight was unfamiliar with, a short hike away was what looked like an apple farm that was made up of two or three acres. Twilight didn’t see any sign of pears among the grove, so it looked like Mac was leaning hard into the Apple side of his family. That all said, she was worried about what this Macintosh would be like.

Of course, all her musings came to a screeching halt when she heard the cries of a mare having sex with someone. When she and Spike finally came up on the modest three-story wooden house, which had near identical aspects to the Apple homestead; they were greeted to the sight of Big Macintosh, who was clearly in the buff but thankfully had his lower half obscured by the waist-high red brick wall surrounding the structure, and the mare he was having intercourse with, who happened to be this reality’s version of Starlight Glimmer.

Before Twilight could say anything Spike said, “As amusing as this is, you two need to stop right now,” the two stopped in their sexual interaction, with Mac likely mostly inside Starlight. “Starlight,” Spike continued with disapproval, you did not clear an extended stay in this area with me, come here, now!” A completely nude Starlight Glimmer extracted herself from Mac and rushed over to stand before Spike, “I’m usually okay with this sort of thing, but as one of the Magi, you are required to inform me of where you are every few weeks when there isn’t a coliseum event going on. I was very disappointed to hear you had been in Dragon Reach a few weeks ago but did not report as such. I’m fine with your current relationship, but you still need to be punished for this minor infraction. And considering you are the second best of the Magi, this will not be a simple slap on the wrist, like you got when you first started partaking in the games.”

Starlight gulped, Twilight took the time to compare this Starlight with the one she knew. From what Twilight could tell, both Starlights had a nearly identical figure; their bust sizes were practically identical standard D-Cup sized breasts. They both also seemed to have kind of shapely legs. However, the Starlight she was looking at now appeared to have a slightly more substantial plot; something Twilight tried to actively not stare at whenever possible. That all said, she wondered what Spike’s punishment for Starlight would be. Also, her mark seemed to be a sword crossed with a spear that had a green mystic ribbon rising out between the two; this was the first time Twilight had seen a completely different mark from a pony she knew.

It seemed Spike was going through his options while she had been examining the Starlight before them. “Starlight, you are restricted the use of all magic for a week and are not permitted to participate or facilitate in pleasurable actions for the next nine days.” The silver ring on Starlight’s horn flashed at the same time as her collar. Also, be thankful the time is so brief.”

“Of course, my lord,” said Starlight with a bow, “of what service can I be with you during your time here?”

“Go and see that things Twilight and myself are not disturbed during our visit with Macintosh,” said Spike. Starlight gave a bow and departed for the structure.

“Well, that was unexpected,” said Twilight as she and Spike watched Starlight head back to the house.

“Yeah, I’m a big old softy,” said Spike completely missing what Twilight had been referring to, “I would have made it longer but we’ll need her for the entry parade for the match.” With that he and Twilight headed for the house, thankfully Mac was wearing pants when they got to the point she could make out the upper section of his lower portion.

“Of course, I never doubted your benevolence,” said Twilight, as they neared Big Macintosh. She then turned her attention to Macintosh, he had steel band on his arm and what looked like a copper shield with the symbol she was familiar with on it like a crest. “Macintosh, lord Spike has something to discuss with you.” Mac just nodded, in his apple green pants, Twilight hadn’t realized just how buff he was under all the attire she was used to and gestured for them to enter his abode.

When they entered Twilight spotted Sugar Belle, to her mild surprise, in the kitchen wearing nothing but an unadorned apron, Twilight did kept herself from looking at the mare’s flank, taking note of cutie marks and how they were different from what she was familiar with was likely to drive her up a wall or two. By the stairs she also spotted Starlight and Vinyl Scratch for some reason, Vinyl was wearing her trademark shades, looked like some things didn’t change all that much; but Twilight couldn’t make out what her mark in this reality was though.

“Make et quick,” said Macintosh, “Ah ‘ave things to do now that mah plan fer tha day were ruined.” As he was motioning to a rustic couch near the door, before going over to a chair that was facing the couch, Twilight and Spike took seats on the surprisingly comfortable couch that Macintosh had motioned towards.

“We need to put in an appearance in a few months,” said Spike, “you won’t be participating, just being part of the entourage for the actual combatant. I am also prepared to grant you any reward within my power, including actual breeding rights for a full year if need be.”

“A generous offer, milord,” said Mac, “but I’m out of the gladiator game, you even blessed my departure yourself.”

“And you won’t be playing gladiator,” said Twilight, “just putting on the uniform for one last appearance, you won’t be doing any fighting. The event in question is a special event where one selected warrior of lord Spike will be taking on several opponents at once of another dragon’s choice. Spike has already made his decision, but he wants to keep that choice as under wraps as possible. Neither side will know the selection of combatants until the day of the event, all you have to do is play the part of entourage and smokescreen. That’s all, and Spike is willing to give you considerable compensation for this. And of course, this offer is extended to Starlight since she is part of one of Spike’s three elite gladiator cores. He decided to choose one of his elites because this is an event he has to take seriously."

“How serious,” inquired Mac with a firm stare.

“My position,” said Spike, “Garble’s at it again, I had him put stronger wagers up this time.”

“Let mae guess,” said Mac, “you get his gladiators and he has to back off on his challenges.”

“For a full two hundred years,” said Spike, “and if he makes a move early, I get all his territory, holdings, and possessions, minus the attire he’s wearing at the time.”

“You didn’t mention that last part earlier,” said Twilight. “Also, why did you thank Mrs. Cake for her honesty?”

“Back before Mac was born, when she was just newly wed she lied to me about finding a vein of gemstones near Dragon Reach,” Mac winced, but how he did so suggested he had heard the story before, “even though it was her first infraction, something I usually let slide, I decided she needed to be punished.”

“He restricted her from physical contact of any kind fer a whole month,” said Mac, “and band her from any kitchen fer a week an’ a half.”

Twilight gulped, “The closest thing to any punishment he’s given me is that I’m literally not allowed to wear anything but robes.”

“Consider it justice for all the tardiness you show when summoned,” said Spike with a smirk.

Twilight held back a pout, that wouldn’t do her any favors. “Ah’ll ‘ave a talk with Starlight about this,” said Mac as he got up to go converse with the mare.

After Mac left to talk with Starlight Twilight asked Spike, “Do they need to sign any forms to be an official herd?”

“Maybe,” said Spike, “I usually waive that all and officially declare a group of ponies a herd. But since Starlight and Mac both failed to report their current living conditions,” he looked over the other two mares for a moment, “I’ll probably have them spend time filling out all the documentation and let it sit for a few weeks after having it get sent straight to me for approval. I don’t like residents of my territories withholding information from me. I guess that’s why your constant badgering me to update the archives means I’m finally going to do it, out of date info is almost as bad as deliberately false info.”

After their little chat, Mac was back and returned to his seat and said, “she’s in, a little sore over punishment but she is still very much in on the plan, says she has a few ideas she needs to mull over now. As fer mae, Ah’m in on tha plan too. Ah just want ya ta not come callin’ mae fer something like this again.”

“Rest assured,” said Spike, “you can enjoy your time as a retired gladiator after all this.”

“Ah’ll hold ya to et,” said Mac. With that Spike and Twilight thanked him for his time and began their departure.

Once they were out the door and a few feet from the house Twilight said, “Our return would probably be more expedient if I could teleport us.”

“Be that as it may,” said Spike, “calibrating your ring for that could possibly be a bit more problematic than I originally anticipated. For now, we will just have to do things like this. I did a little looking into ring calibrations the other day, suffice to say, they have mechanisms in place that are designed to specifically keep ponies from traveling instantaneously from one point to another, which is basically what teleportation is.”

“Oh,” said Twilight, “how about we drop back in on Dragon Reach for a bit, I saw a pony I want to discuss something with. Also, does Garble have any pony gladiators we need to be on the lookout for?”

“No, Garble has a twisted sense of things, most dragons are willing to let their gladiators fall as much as possible due how it usually keeps the crowd sated. But Garble is different, if his gladiators fall more than nine times he has them executed and turns them into various meals,” Twilight made no efforts to show her state of being visibly ill, even going as far as to regurgitate some of her stomach's contents directly in front of her. “Yeah, I feel the same way,” said Spike, “that’s the main reason I don’t like dealing with him.”

“Can’t you just command him to cease challenging you,” inquired Twilight after she regained her composure and sidestepped the puddle of former stomach contents.

“I suppose, but for dragons challenging each other is a right our culture holds sacred. I can’t infringe on that, no matter how much I wish I could at times. If I do that to one challenger what’s stop me from doing it to all challengers? No, as much as I want to command Garble to cease his challenges on me, I can’t without incurring serious repercussions.”

“I see,” said Twilight, she gave a deep breath as they came up on the station platform, which had no operator for some reason, “but maybe you could restrict his challenges.”

“Go on,” said Spike, “I’m listening.”

“Since he’s challenging you every few decades, or more from sounds of it, maybe you could issue a command that he is only permitted to challenge you once or twice a century. That way you're not infringing on his right to challenge you, you’re just limiting the number of times he can do it over a set amount of time. You’re the Dragonlord; you can’t focus on your duties if you are constantly challenged so frequently by the same challenger.”

“I think that might work,” said Spike, “as far as I know, no Dragonlord has issued a restriction on the number of times they can be challenged. But no Dragonlord has issued such intense changes in such a short amount of time; I suppose your suggestion might just be for the best.”

A Short Meeting With Sweetie Belle

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Carousel Boutique was not as Twilight knew it back home, and the establishment hadn’t been an active shop in years, as was evident by the layer of dust on the shop floor. Spike decided to go out and do some more inspecting while Twilight spent her time conversing with Sweetie Belle.

Now that Twilight could get a closer look at the filly she could see there wasn’t some kind of restraining ring on Sweetie’s horn but she still had collar indicating her being Spike’s pony. “So, Sweetie Bell, was it?” Twilight had to be careful; she didn’t want to tip anyone off that things were different just yet.

“Yep,” squeaked the marshmallow unicorn filly with a purple and pink mane. She didn’t have a cutie mark; Twilight guessed that without the close friendship she had with Apple Bloom and Scootaloo her journey of self-discovery wouldn’t have reached that point just yet. “What can I do for you? Does this have anything to do with my sister? I haven’t seen her in months; she never comes back here to visit, I always have to take a train to see her.”

“We’ll work on remedying that,” said Twilight, “I’ve actually had some dealings with her, and I’m not that much of a fan of her attitude. But I guess her ideas of fashionable make sense if she’s from here. Anyway, I want to know about you and your friends. Like how you’re able to live here with your parents and sister in different communities.”

“Oh well,” said Sweetie Belle, “my sister enrolled me at the school here, and she’s the most successful member of the family. My parents have their own jobs to worry about, and Ms. Cheerilee comes by each morning before classes start to remind me it’s a school day. As for meals, Diamond Tiara or Silver Spoon has me over each morning for a meal. Rarity sends me a small allowance in the mail each month and I use it to buy things like meals around town. Rarity also sends me outfits every few months, of course about half of them aren’t suitable for fillies outside a community like this.”

Twilight gave an exasperated sigh, looked like this universe’s Rarity was pushing her ideas of fashion onto her little sister. “Are Diamond Tiara and Silver Spoon your only friends? It looks like one of the fillies on the farm is around your age.”

“Oh, Apple Bloom, we’ve hung out a few times but I just have better cohesion with Diamond and Silver.”

“Diamond and Silver are both earth ponies, and so is so is Apple Bloom,” said Twilight, “do you spend time with any pegasi on occasion?”

“Not really, there aren’t really any pegasus foals around here, except the ones that come along with their parents to visit this place from time to time, I would like to get to know one though. Maybe when I leave this place there will be lots of pegasi to meet and get to know.”

Twilight was worried, this meant Scootaloo didn’t live here. Chances are her family never moved here. She wasn’t sure if it was a good thing or not if the Cutie Mark Crusader didn’t exist in this reality, seeing as much trouble as they had caused in their quest for cutie marks.

“Are you just looking after this place for your sister?” Twilight inquired.

“A bit,” said Sweetie, “Ms. Cheerilee comes by every couple of weeks on the weekend to make sure I’m keeping the place mostly clean.” That explained how the kitchen they were in was so clean despite being in the care of a young filly, but the shop floor still had a fine layer of grime to most of it.

Hearing this all worried Twilight, Sweetie Belle didn’t even have a semblance of friendship with Apple Bloom and Scootaloo. Also, it looked like Scootaloo didn’t live in this town, just where could that filly be? Twilight really hoped Scootaloo had an alternate in this world.

After almost brooding over it all for a moment Twilight said, “I’ll talk with Spike to see what we can do about your living conditions, you being mostly unsupervised isn’t healthy, at least that’s what I’ve read. What if you get hurt while you’re all alone? Or so sick you really shouldn’t be around ponies your age until you’re all better? I think it would be for the best if we at least had someone to keep you company.”

“Yeah, I didn’t think I would be living as I have for as long as I have, I thought Rarity would at least send me a letter that I’ll be spending time at her place from now on but I guess she’s just too busy for family most of the time.”

“We all need to identify our priorities and organize them appropriately,” said Twilight as she got up to leave, “some of us don’t quite get it right, other times we start getting them right pretty late. Hopefully, she’ll get her priorities right, but that might take something genuinely drastic. Don’t try to force it, that just leads to problems and misunderstandings.”

“Okay, thanks for the talk,” said Sweetie Belle.

“Sure thing,” said Twilight as she headed for the door, “take it from a pony that knows, sometimes looking over what you have in a different way can give you the perspective you require to find what you need. Just remember, what you need won’t always be what you want. Quite honestly, your family and you should be having this kind of talk, not a virtual stranger giving you a near-lecture on the subject.”

Sweetie Belle quirked a smile and thanked Twilight as the violet unicorn headed out the door.

The Ruse Comes Undone

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Pinkie was massaging her breasts; Spike had finally stopped their lactating a few days prior. It was just her and Twilight in the shop; she had sent Sweetie Drops out on an errand. Twilight wanted to give her the news, and it wasn’t good. After checking to make sure they were truly alone, Twilight gave a long drawn out sigh before saying, “I haven’t been able to find anything to help undo our current predicament. I’ve spent the past two weeks going over everything I can; nothing seems to be helpful, not even magical theories.”

“Well, that’s a bit of a problem,” said Pinkie, “hopefully our friends and the princesses will find a way to undo it all. It’s fun having my own place to work but things are getting a little annoying.”

“Yeah, and see what our friends can pull off. Thoughts on how that’s going?”

“Not as well as they probably would be if I wa there. Don’t get me wrong; Starlight is an exceptional magic user, I just wish we didn’t have to deal with this problem, to begin with. The longer we’re here the more the residual mental elements will bleed into us and our alternates. Not to mention, I’ve had to continue excuses for keeping Spike from showing me whatever is beyond those gilded palladium doors, that’s a reward for this world’s Twilight, not me.”

“Well, the other you is a genius at research, I’m sure she can figure out some way to at least contact us, if not undo the process entirely.”

“Nice to see your optimism has remained intact; or is it from the other you?”

“A bit of both, if I’m being completely honest. The personalities of the other Pinkie and Twilight are extremely similar to our own; it’s why we’ve been able to go on with our charades and ruse for as long as we have.”

“I had a feeling something was up,” came Spike’s voice, “I only caught the last few sentences, I think it best you be honest with me.”

Twilight let out out a long drawn out sigh before saying, “We switched minds with your Pinkie and Twilight. Chances are they’re trying to figure out how to fix all this with the assistance of our friends and the princesses right now.”

“Princesses?” Spike said with surprise.

“Even though we haven’t seen them in this reality personally yet,” said Twilight, “In our home universe Celestia and Luna are alicorns who rule of the land Equestria, the united form of many of the divided territories here. Equestria is a land ruled and inhabited almost exclusively by ponies. In that world managed to ascend to the ranks of the alicorns, Cadance is one as well.”

“She even had a daughter that’s an alicorn with Shining Armor,” interjected Pinkie. “The two of them are married and ruling over the Crystal Empire.”

“Ah,” said Spike, “Now that comment about the two of them being married makes sense.”

“Also,” continued Twilight, “you’re my number one assistant in that reality, I hatched your egg during an entrance exam for Princess Celestia’s School for Gifted Unicorns. Pinkie and I live and work in Ponyville with our friends: Rarity, Rainbow Dash, Applejack, and Starlight Glimmer, in addition to you.”

“Things are a quite a bit different there,” said Pinkie, “like the fact Applejack’s parents aren’t around anymore, Mac still lives with his family on the farm, the farm is called Sweet Apple Acres, and Rarity is a whole lot nicer where we’re from, for starters.”

“And that’s just the overly obvious stuff,” said Twilight, “our history is incredibly different. For instance, the Nightmare Moon incident never happened in this universe.”

“Nightmare Moon?” Spike said with confusion.

“In our universe,” said Twilight, “there was an incident that caused Luna to grow so jealous and bitter of her sister that something corrupted her and turned her into a being called Nightmare Moon. As Nightmare Moon she had was around the same height as Celestia but was pitch black with draconic eyes and wings; she was also obsessed with bringing about eternal night and a possibly a bit more mentally unstable than we can convey with words. Using the Elements of Harmony, of which there are six, we were able to cleanse Luna of her corruption.”

“After that, we had all sort of adventures,” said Pinkie with a short hop that made her bust bounce and jiggle for a few seconds, “like the time we had to fight Discord. He’s a friend to us now, thanks mostly to Fluttershy’s influence. Then there was the time we had battle Tirek, that didn’t go so well. And then there was the time we had to deal with Starlight Glimmer when she was all about purging ponies of their talents on a misguided belief that cutie marks cause nothing but trouble. And that’s just a few of the amazing things we’ve had to deal with.”

“Huh,” said Spike, “can you tell me how you and your world’s Cadance managed to become alicorns?”

“A pony just needs to realize something monumentally changing about the magic they have a connection to that is also tied to who they are,” said Twilight, “you can’t force it, the epiphany has to come to the pony naturally.”

“Hm,” said Spike, “we never had an event that produced anything like this “Nightmare Moon” you mentioned. That said, getting my Twilight and Pinkie back soon as possible is now a top priority. Twilight, I see now why you’ve been avoiding my little gift. That said, I should notice things sooner.”

“Why do you say that?” Twilight inquired with a perplexed look.

“You’re far more confident and self-aware than my Twilight, even if your personalities are incredibly similar. Pinkie was harder to pick up on.”

“Because it’s Pinkie, we know,” said Twilight. Spike quirked a smile at this, Twilight Continued, “I’ve been thinking about your agreement with Garble, do you have a written transcript?”

“No, but that does sound like a good idea,” said Spike, “Garble has a history of worming his way out of pieces of an agreement he doesn’t like and uses the excuse he ‘forgot’ that part of the agreement.”

Pinkie gave a grin to him and Twilight before saying, “Then why not turn that to your advantage?”

“I don’t know how,” said Spike flatly.

“But I do,” said Twilight, “I’m far more familiar with law, even that among dragons, than your Twilight probably is. Granted, it’s dragon law from another reality, but it doesn’t look like any of the ones I studied haven’t changed too much. I’ll write up a written transcript based on what you said was part of the agreement, with a little something extra that leans things in your favor a bit.”

“Go on,” said Spike. Pinkie then disappeared into the back of her shop before returning with a clipboard with a few leaves of parchment and a green quill and pot of purple ink. Twilight took the items with a silent thanks and started writing things out, at an impressive speed then showed Spike. To Twilight’s surprise, she had actually written things out in the written language she and Pinkie had seen for the world they were in, not the world they were from. It was a four-page document summarizing what Spike had summarized, in almost the exact same way, while also adding in that Spike would gain the home cities and towns of combatants he acquired upon victory.

“There,” said Twilight, “now, not only will he have trouble refuting his words, but we also put a few more in his mouth. I figured this would work like this because the way you describe him, he’s a bit too cocky and sure of himself.”

“It does sound like something he would wager,” said Spike as he looked over the document, he quirked a smile, “dragons have always relied on the word of each other for their agreements, especially formal ones, it’s considered a terrible taboo to go back on your word. Garble skirts this by conveniently omitting pieces he doesn’t find favorable. With something like this, we can hold him to his word. I never thought about doing things this way, and neither would my Twilight, she’s not creative enough. That’s something I plan to rectify after I get her back. Alright, let’s get to work.”

Repercussions for Twilight and Pinkie

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“I may have acted relaxed in finding all of this out,” said Spike, “but don’t think this means you two are off the hook.” Both Pinkie and Twilight were completely nude and secured to some sort of wooden cross-device by surprisingly firm restraints. An additional ring was also secured to Twilight’s horn; it kept her from being able to do any sort of magic at all. Neither pony could say anything due to the fact they had ball gags secured in their mouths rather firmly.

The room they were all in was dreary looking, likely some kind of dungeon. Neither Twilight or Pinkie recalled ever coming to this room; both were quite scared. The presence of a surprisingly cheery looking blue door only served to make things feel worse. Whatever Spike had in mind for them he wanted it to be away from prying eyes.

Twilight and Pinkie tried to struggle only to find they were being held quite firmly. Spike walked over to a table and picked up what looked like a branding iron. The item in question has what looked like a hollow heart-shaped set of flames with the letter S looking like it was modeled after Spike’s tail in the middle. After picking it up Spike gave an amused chuckle, “My magic items production expert, Sunset Shimmer, made this for me using information obtained by my Twilight Sparkle. This brand will remain on you for the better part of a week, and depending on where I place it on you the effects will be drastically different. If I were to put the brand below your beltline on the front it would dramatically up your libido to the point you would use almost anything to provide sexual relief,” Twilight and Pinkie gave a shiver of fear at that, “but that’s not where I’m going to place it on either of you. That’s more of reward, I want to punish you.”

He placed the brand just below Pinkie’s mark on her right leg, the pink mare gave a muffled scream of pain; afterward, Spike removed the gag from the mare’s mouth, “What did you just do to me?” Cried Pinkie, she really didn’t want to hear what Spike had to say.

“Weakened your legs to the point you’ll require support,” said Spike, “while I enjoy you bouncing around most of the time, this should be more than enough punishment, mostly because I find all this somewhat interesting.” He then pulled a lever that caused the cross-like device then pressed the brand to The small of Twilight’s back and her left buttcheek just to the right of her cutie mark. Spike then went back to the lever and positioned it so Twilight was facing him again, he then removed the gag as he said, “I suppose you’re wondering what I just did to you.”

“Yes, said Twilight flatly.

“Simple really,” said Spike “I increased the sensitivity of your rear, you would normally feel intense pain sitting down but the additional point I branded makes it so that your ability to pick up potentially warning pain is turned off, you’ll be able to tell the exact texture of everything you touch from the knees up without the ability to register pain. Given the fact you and my Twilight have an overly analytical mind, this whole thing is likely going to be borderline torture for you.” Twilight gave a gulp of apprehension.

“So, now what will we be doing,” Twilight inquired with a hint of fear.

“Pinkie will have to spend time at the castle for the next week making biscuits to the specifications of the castle's chefs,” said Spike, “without complaining or giving input during the entire time.”

Pinke gave a “Meep,” of annoyance, but couldn’t do anything because she was still strapped to the apparatus and couldn’t do anything else.

“You, on the other hand,” continued Spike, “will assist Sunset Shimmer with her projects for the whole week, while still having all your magic is restrained for the entire time you are working with her.”

Spike gave a mischievous smile before releasing the two mares from the devices that held them. Twilight felt the need to ask, “Anything we should know before continuing our punishment?”

“Some of the chefs have a thing about pink,” said Spike nonchalantly, “as for Sunset, she has been known to show a ‘special’ appreciation for mares, best of luck.” With that, he carried Pinkie out while pushing Twilight out. When they got to the top of the stairs, an event that took over a half hour, Pinkie was plopped down in a wheelchair that had been prepared while Spike had ‘entertained’ the two mares.

“We might as well get this over with,” said Twilight, “could a guard lead the way to Sunset Shimmer’s place of work?”

“And could I get some assistance getting around? I’m not used to operating a wheelchair at the moment.”

************************************************

Twilight found herself at what should have been the Royal Canterlot Magical Research Facility. Instead, it was just called the Magical Gear Development Department. When she stepped in the place didn’t look too dissimilar to the facility she knew, aside from all the clear signs of it showing a dragon was ultimately running the show. Twilight asked a brown unicorn mare, who was thankfully in a blue full body suit and green lab coat, to be brought to Sunset Shimmer with the explanation why she was there.

When she arrived she was greeted to the sight of an orange unicorn with a red and orange mane. Sunset immediately started making Twilight uncomfortable the moment she approached the purple mare without a word. Twilight had a bad feeling of it all. No doubt about it, this was going to be one very bad week.

________________________________________________________

Pinkie couldn’t believe what she was dealing with, to say the biscuits they had her make were mind-numbingly simple would be the understatement of the decade. And to make matters worse, the head chef kept sniffing her in a creepy way while another kept trying to pinch her plot. And the worst part of it all was that her chair was locked down at her station.

Pinkie had dealt with her fair share of harassment, even the sexual kind, but to think half the kitchen would be doing this while on duty was just an insult to her. Yup, this was going to be a very not good week.

Getting a Connection

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Twilight was surprised, this entity known as Discord was very helpful. That said, he kept shooting her and Pinkie disapproving looks over the entire time they were working together, it was like he wanted to do something bad to her but was kept off from doing. Twilight, Discord, and Luna had all been working together in creating a magical device that would hopefully not just her world of origin but also grant her and those using the apparatus the ability to communicate with the other side, there were numerous potential applications and she could theoretically try replicating things back home.

Unfortunately for Twilight, she kept on getting compared to her alternate in the most passive-aggressive ways at times. Twilight excelled at research and application of that information in ways it was described and hinted at but she lacked the mental agility to apply things outside those definitions in potentially unique ways. Spike had brought this up to her, his Twilight was more capable in a leadership position and actually had a fair bit of capability when it came to applying things to produce creative solutions. Of course, he also offhandedly said how his Twilight could do well over a dozen spells at once while focusing on how to apply them to a problem even if the spells were never explained could be used that way. The fact that the Twilight of this universe could calm an Ursa Minor using only her magic, a feat that was not recorded in the records back home, in a few ways that weren’t explained in any books of magic was an astounding feat in and of itself, and that had been when she was still just a unicorn.

Twilight, Discord, and Luna had been working on this project for over a month, possibly as much as two, and were finally approaching the first test run of the system. Twilight had input all the factor she could think of scanning the multiverse. Multiverse was a bit beyond her, even with several rows of castle’s library dedicated to them.

Something Twilight had noticed about her time in this world was her possessing shadows of personality traits of her counterpart, which included being more decisive and an actual willingness to read texts that were not research. She reasoned if shades of the other Twilight were bleeding into her then the same must be true on the reverse. It was hard to say regarding the same thing with Pinkie, mostly because she couldn’t tell what the differences in personality Pinkie and her counterpart had regarding each other, besides the obvious.

“Everything ready to go with the first test?” Luna inquired, “Discord and I are ready on our ends, what about you?”

“Just finished the systems check,” said Twilight as she looked over strange device she, Luna, and Discord had put together. This piece of magical technology would hopefully scan the multiverse for her home reality. The thing took up the equivalent of an entire room and they had to build the protective structure around to keep it safe from the elements on the off chance the local pegasus weather team couldn’t keep the weather away from the work site.

The thing looked like some sort of advanced device out of science fiction novel, one of Twilight’s new free time passions, and had an exterior casing that was clashing so bad Rarity had insisted a tacky wall be put up between her eyes and the device to prevent fainting from the “garishness” of it all, at least some things seemed to be consistent between realities.

Twilight took a look at the various screens and gauges real quick before turning to Luna and giving her a thumbs up. The midnight alicorn, dressed in a daring Midnight green work dress that bore her insignia teleported into position. Once in position, she said, “Good, then let’s see if everything is good to go.” Twilight nodded and the two mares got to work operating the machines seemingly complicated controls, Discord was on the other end of the device watching a series of monitors in violet and pink polka dot business suit with a pair of 3D glasses and a large box of popcorn that had popped corn kernels the size of his head that were colored pink and midnight black for some reason. Of course, things weren’t helped by the fact he had a theatre drink cup the size of Celestia with a cartoonish straw that was overly large but narrowed to standard large straw size the closer it got to the drinking end.

After a full half hour of working the machine, the two mares were met with failure. Another nine hours of examining the inner workings of the device showed them that some of the wiring was loose, along with a few other components, a fix that took a good half hour. Once they had all that done they tried again, Discord still treating everything like a show for his amusement.

****************************************

Another set of working the controls later and all the screens on the machine flickered into life. A very grainy view the multiverse came into view before zooming to an unseen portion from Discord’s demonstration. The view still managed to be grainy, but the course of things seemed to get narrower and Narrower before finally, they were looking at a dozen or so realities floating in the sea of the multiverse.

“Discord,” called Luna, “do you think you can find what we are looking for in this selection?”

“We can see,” said Discord who then snapped his lion paw hand to get his own set of floating screens around his head as he looked through each. One of the worlds looked like it was a few years ahead of them, seeing as there was an adult Spike with...Chrysalis? He couldn’t tell quite off the bat because of how different the changeling queen looked. Another world showed the ponies as quadrupeds and Twilight and her friends doing some sort of ceremony at the school; another two worlds saw Twilight and her friends as quadrupeds and parents; then Discord saw what he was looking for, Twilight and Pinkie as they had been described in the world the other Twilight and Pinkie had from, they had been right in saying Pinkie was a bit chubby in that world.

_____________________________________

Twilight and Pinkie were in the process of helping Spike choose a site for the new arena when a hole in the world literally opened in front of them, Discord’s face appeared just as he said, “Thank goodness you’re in good condition, like the new look.”

“Discord,” said Twilight and Pinkie in surprise.

“How did you find us,” inquired Twilight.

“And how is everything on your end,” asked Pinkie.

“Can’t complain too much,” said Discord, “Twilight’s alternate helped with the development of a device to zero in on you in the multiverse, she went a little overboard with the search parameters but that proved a blessing in this case. Listen, we don’t know how long the device can keep its lock, and without a proper understanding of the multiverse’s flow even I’m not confident I can find this place without assistance. We need to get your minds back where they belong, it would be easier if you were standing next to your alternates.”

“I’ll bet,” said Twilight, “since you managed to pull it off before you can find us again, just let me talk to the other me and we’ll see what we can do from here.”

“Will do,” said Discord. A moment later the other Twilight was on the other side of the hole, “here she is.”

“Hi,” said the other Twilight, this is awkward.”

“I know,” said Twilight, “I managed to get the ring calibrated or a few more spells. For things like memory spells, for instance. Hold there, I’m going to do a tricky memory spell and I don’t know if this ring will allow it, or if it will work over temporary breach like this.” A moment later Twilight’s horn lit up and a pair of light lavender streams were flowing between the heads of both Twilights.

A moment later the flow stopped and both said, “Whoa!” In unison.

“He’s trying to give you some time in the Alicorn chamber, that’s a great honor,” said the other Twilight.

“It’s supposed to be your reward, he wants you and Pinkie back.”

“Can’t you just use that spell you used on me?”

“Yes and no,” said Twilight, “that’s a spell that causes copies of our memories over the set amount of time to be exchanged. If I were to try doing it with the entirety of our memories, the spell would exhaust your body due to the fact I’m literally trying to cause both of us to share our entire series of life experiences. And that’s just the two of us, if either of us were to do it on the Pinkies then the caster would act as a conduit for the both of them which would mean they the caster would have copies of the memories of both Pinkies up that point in addition to those of the both of us; Do you really want to have the memories and life experiences either Pinkie in your head?”

“No,” said the other Twilight, “we’ll have to find another way to correct things for us. I hope it doesn’t take too long. I see Garble challenged Spike again, he never learns. I also like how you managed to bring my Rarity down peg or two.”

It was around this point that Spike showed up, dressed in a sharp business casual attire that was made up of a pink shirt and white pants. “Well, this is a pleasant surprise,” said Spike, “Twilight talking with Twilight.”

“It’s not going to last,” said Pinkie, “The tear is only temporary and will likely be closed by this time tomorrow. Looks like the Discord from our world, with a little help from your Twilight and a few others.”

“I used a memory spell to get a copy of the other me’s memories and give her a copy of mine, for the amount of time we’ve been here. Because of her involvement in the project that found this world I could probably act as the overseer for the production of a similar device.”

“If both Twilights manage to get it right then the two devices could possibly communicate with each other and make a stable connection that could potentially get us all where we belong,” said Pinkie.

“We’ll probably have to intentionally sabotage the machines afterward,” said Twilight, “these are devices we don’t want getting into the wrong hands.”

“I agree,” said the other Twilight, “what’s to stop an overly ambitious Dragonlord after Spike’s reign from reading about this device and using it to find a whole new world to put under their idea of proper rule, Dragonlord Torch would definitely have done so if he had access to enough information regarding any of this. After all, he did basically conquer early Equestria.”

“Then we’ll have to keep the records of all this sparse, possibly with conflicting data points,” said Spike, “and mothball all the physical remains so far and hard that making a connection between the pieces will be difficult and problematic.”

“I concur,” came Celestia’s voice from the other side of the hole before the other Twilight moved out of the way and Celestia showed up.

Celestia was just as Twilight remembered her; elegant, regal, and with an enviable figure that possessed a set of marvelous M-Cup sized breasts that almost made her mouth water, Where did that last part of my thinking come from? thought Twilight, probably a mental bleed over from the other Twilight. We really need to get everything fixed up in a hurry.

“Good luck to you all,” said Celestia as the breach began to close.

“Well, that was somewhat awkward,” said Spike, “Alright Twilight, let’s get to work on that device so we can get my Twilight and Pinkie back.”

Punishing Rarity

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“I was willing to let plenty of things slide with you,” Spike said to Rarity, “but recent events have shown me that I can’t keep doing that sort of thing, it can only lead to problems later down the line.” Spike was in a business casual blue and orange suit with an indigo shirt.

The two were in the meeting room of Rarity’s residence in Dragon Crown. The facility was a four-story manor just three doors down from the castle that was whitewashed and adorned with Spike’s insignia all throughout its exterior. The windows were all large and tinted to keep views inside minimized but treated in such a way so that the obscuring effect did not apply to anyone inside the complex. The manor also had a massive stained glass window at all cardinal points on the third level that were monuments to Rarity’s self-image and ego. And to top it off, the whole structure was made look like a castle done up in a neo-gothic style.

“You can’t be serious?” Rarity said incredulously; it was clear she was under the impression that Spike would have never thought he would actually punish her, in her mind she hadn’t done anything to earn such a distinction. Rarity was in another one of her borderline erotic original outfits, this one being indigo in color with portions that looked like impressions of the green flames that were found on the collars all of Spike’s ponies had.

“Afraid so,” said Spike, “while your works are magnificent most of the time, reports of your attitude are much more severe than I had suspected. Your actions of superiority, no matter how deserved, have earned you resentment from ponies and low ranking dragons in the city. To make matters worse, I’ve had to remind you to tone down your antagonistic behaviors as of late. So, as punishment for you increasing problematic behaviors, I’m going to have you spend the next seven months, starting tomorrow, properly caring for your little sister.”

“That isn’t too bad, I suppose,” said Rarity with a hint of indignation.

“However, if you fail to come back and genuinely act far less haughty and antagonistic than the current rumors and reports about you are saying then I’ll be forced to institute a more amusing punishment.”

“You wouldn’t dare make me fight in those arenas!”

“Of course not,” said Spike with a smirk, “Twilight Sparkle actually came up with a far more amusing punishment for you.”

“I doubt helping her do research in the archives is all that amusing,” Rarity said with an indignant huff.

“Nope,” said Spike with a grin plastered on his face, “she suggested we make you a mother.”

Rarity blanched before saying, “The only way I’m adopting any children is if you order me to, and even then I’ll be indignant about it.”

“That’s not how the plan works,” said Spike with the grin persisting.

“The plan is to have you be impregnated and act as the biological mother of the child as well as serve as said foal’s primary caregiver,” said Twilight as she entered the room, she was in a white casual robe. “And to keep interesting Spike will basically toss the names of all the ponies he knows thinks would be most amusing to knock you up, we’re thinking of letting Pinkie take part in whole thing as well.”

Rarity gave shiver before saying, “You wouldn’t dare.”

“Well if you don’t want to spend quality time with your sister for a few months we could always just jump straight getting you pregnant,” said Twilight in a relaxed tone, “all that antagonizing and mocking me knocked a little creativity into me, and one of the first things I started devising was how to best punish you.”

Rarity blinked, she couldn’t believe what she was hearing, she was actually being punished for her extended behavior.

“I suggest you go and prep your trip,” said Spike, “and pack only the necessities. And when I say that I mean only a maximum of three formal sets of attire are permitted.”

“Why do I have to prep to go anywhere if I’m looking after my little sister?”

“Because part of the punishment involves looking after her in Dragon Reach,” said Spike with a smirk.

“But Celestia and Luna don’t do much,” Rarity tried to argue.

“Celestia and Luna are alicorns and do far more than you most of the time, you just don’t seem to be aware of any of it,” said Spike. “Celestia manages the cycles for the sun, in addition to doing a considerable bulk of my paperwork and managing my finances. Luna operates the moon’s cycles and monitors the dream realm in my territory; she also is responsible for overseeing all the art projects in my territory in addition to authenticating all new works of art that come into my collection through various means. You, Rarity, hardly do more than authenticate gems and make your idea of the newest fashion fads. You are a capable individual but your work ethic has been slipping. There have been reports from dragons in my territory getting their requested works from you late, works that should be listed as priorities so high that I’m the only one that supersedes them. And that’s not even mentioning all the reports of high ranked ponies in my territory and visiting assets from other territories being treated antagonistically by you. All in all, the reports aren’t looking good for you. And to make matters worse, the bulk of those reports regarding you kept showing up late, even the high priority level ones, with signs of doctoring that I had been willing to overlook until now.”

“Spike tends to miss things here and there,” said Twilight, “but I’m so familiar with documents that can tell when their false or tampered with at this point. Spike had me going over all his files; he wanted to make sure nothing potentially important was being tampered with. When I discovered several reports relating to you, or were supposed to mention your less than gracious demeanor, had been tampered with we turned over the information to Sunset Shimmer, she’s currently developing spells and devices for detecting and undoing tampering as we speak.”

Rarity wilted at this information; her status was in more danger than she thought. “Just be thankful I decided to not entertain dropping your status,” said Spike, “but rest assured, if I start finding out about this sort of thing again I will most definitely plan for your motherhood, lower your status, and arrange for your place of residence to be somewhere so far out of your sphere of interest it will feel like torture after just a small handful of days.”

Rarity gulped in apprehension just before Twilight said, “I suggest you prep for your trip soon as possible, Spike and I discussed giving your a ‘bonus’ punishment if you’re not prepared for your train ride tomorrow.”

************************************

Rarity muttered to herself, she couldn’t believe she had one marginally annoying punishment and immensely horrendous punishment and to choose one or have both forced on her. Looking after her sister was fine but there was no way she would allow herself to experience motherhood, her figure and pride wouldn’t be able to take that kind of hit. She was one of Spike’s favorites, her band said as much, and never anticipated actually getting punished because of it.

In the back of her mind Rarity had always suspected she would be punished for her actions and behavior at some point. Now she had an early morning train to prep for, could only take three official formal vestments. And to make matters worse, Spike had imposed that ten bag limit on her ages ago, she felt she could barely properly pack with such a limited number of bags. It would probably be best not to anger Spike and make him think she was learning her lesson so she could get some of her sentence lessened. She chuckled at the unintended wording of her thoughts as she grabbed six of her “most fashionable” bags in her magic and headed to her room to pack. This was going to be a long seven months.

Reflecting on Recent Events

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Twilight stared at herself in the mirror, she was completely naked but there was no water running in the restroom. She had actually suggested forcibly impregnated another pony, an alternate version of one of her best friends. What’s worse, she actually hadn’t found fault with the suggestion until almost two hours after the announcement of punishment had been stated. Her head was getting more messed up than she thought, she was losing herself to the mental echoes of the other her.

Her punishment hadn’t helped, probably hasted the process if she had to guess. Sunset Shimmer had displayed some terrible workplace ethics when she had been annoyingly unprofessional with her sexual teasing and advancements. Blowing on and in Twilight’s ears when the purple mare was trying to relax or moving through the halls, even when Twilight was carrying objects that would be potentially ruined if she lost her focus; repeatedly pinching Twilight’s rear in a sexually playful manner, which Twilight didn’t start to feel until two days to the end of her week-long punishment; playing with Twilight’s breasts and teats at a wide variety of times, which was more sexually stimulating thanks to that brand Spike had used on her; and a variety of other actions that would typically be inexcusable in the workplace. Sunset just didn’t get away with it all; she was actively encouraged by Spike to do such things.

One of the few saving graces, from what Twilight could see, was the fact that Sunset wasn’t entirely responsible for who worked in her facility. That said, Sunset’s overtly exaggerated homosexual tendencies made Twilight’s time at the facility worse. Twilight respected Sunset’s ability to make incredible feats of magical engineering when given the time and resources to do so, such as the spell charge batteries made it so that ponies didn’t need to entirely rely on unicorns to operate or infuse magical devices.

Even so, Twilight could barely recognize herself, when she and Pinkie finally did get home would they be able to fully recognize themselves? Twilight suddenly remembered she had cast a memory spell on her other self from across a breach created by Discord; chances were more than memories of their time in each other’s realities got exchanged. After all, she had no idea how a trans-dimensional breach could affect a spell cast that passes between two worlds. “I can’t believe I did something so reckless,” Twilight muttered to herself, “that’s usually Rainbow’s sort of thing. Well, to be honest, she has been getting less reckless since I first met her. But suggest something like that, how could it take me so long to realize such I had suggested such a morally objectionable question? How did Pinkie not call me out on it? Thank goodness Rarity took the option that involved looking her sister, I really don’t want to hear about the option I made being instituted.”

Twilight heard the sound of the steps being ascended by a set of hooves; she silently hoped it was Pinkie. When Twilight threw on her peach-colored bathrobe and stepped outside the restroom she was immediately disappointed and confused, The mare that had tormented her for a week was standing before her. Sunset Shimmer was standing before Twilight, completely naked save for her collar, horn ring, and gold armband. The symbol of a purple and green sun behind six different kind of wrenches and six white tinted translucent beakers was a sight Twilight was hoping to score from her mind along with mare that bore the sign after she had returned home.

“Master Spike said you had the schematic of a project for me along with a list,” said Sunset in a cheery voice, “along with a list of materials I’ll likely need for the whole thing.”

“Nothing physical,” said Twilight, “all information pertaining to the project is to be purged from the minds of everyone who worked on it after completion. It’s something Spike doesn’t want any other dragons, or successive Dragonlords, replicating.”

“A class omega project,” said Sunset in surprise, “I’ve only worked on one other before, at least I think I have, class omega projects are a pain because every memory tied them is purged and replaced with pointless fluff from the minds of random ponies. I’m pretty sure I worked on a class omega project because I have memories working on a farm bucking pear trees from a filly’s point of view where a project from a few years ago should be. Oh, sorry, I’m rambling.”

Twilight blinked in surprise; she hadn’t expected Spike to actually have a protocol for projects that involve straight up removing pony’s memories. “Oh, yes,” said Twilight as regained her composure, “is there a reason you are without attire in my house?”

“Due to the consequences of a personal project in my home not going as planned, said Sunset, "my home ended up in an unknown location, or destroyed in a way that didn’t draw attention; I’ve been sleeping at my office since the incident. Master Spike wasn’t happy when he found out, which was around six hours ago, and ordered me to be your new housemate while a new place of residence is prepared for me.”

Twilight facepalmed, of course, Spike would do something like this to her, this world’s Spike was known for having a bit of twisted sense of humor. “Okay,” said Twilight, “I do have a few spare rooms available, I think, I’m prone to putting reading materials in spaces that see very little traffic or occupancy.”

“Perfectly understandable,” said Sunset, “I’m prone to do something similar with scientific and engineering equipment. I once put a…”

“No need for stories about what you’ve done with your spare rooms,” said Twilight, She then used a version of the memory spell she had used to undue Discord’s influence on her friends to transfer everything about the device she had gotten from the other Twilight. “There you go,” said Twilight when she finished the memory spell with the list of required materials that had followed the schematic layout. Twilight was thankful her ring was now calibrated for doing memory spells.

Sunset blinked a few times as she became acclimated to the new information in her head. “I can see why it’s a class omega project,” said Sunset, “lots of chances for a dragon to do things they shouldn’t.”

“Which is why when we do what we need to,” said Twilight, “we’re going to thoroughly destroy it and turn the most intact pieces into art fixtures scattered throughout Spike’s territory. Now, I’ll show you to your room, and no sexual advancements or teasing while you’re here without my permission.”

___________________________________________

Pinkie was not her usual chipper self, mostly because she had just spent the last three hours in intercourse with another mare. She might have always been down for a party, just not those kinds of parties, even if they did bring smiles to the faces of others. Pinkie had a number of lines she had set for herself that were never intended to be crossed, and casual sex with other ponies was now one of them.

Pinkie closed up the shop; she was thankful her employee hadn’t playfull fondled her in any way. For some reason, Sweetie Drops had been increasingly more promiscuous after Pinkie had gotten back from her punishment. One of the first things Sweetie Drops did to Pinke upon her return was fondle the pink mare’s plot while they were both in the kitchen, then things continued to escalate, and still were. Pinkie didn’t know what Sweetie Drops was planning, but her Pinkie senses told her that it probably wasn’t good.

Pinkie’s expectations and her fears were overly validated when she got to the top of the stairs after closing up. Sweetie Drops had left the door to her room open and was having a three-way with a seafoam green unicorn mare and lime green pegasus mare, the unicorn looked familiar but Pinkie didn’t want to think about such things and rushed to her room. Once she was back in her room she closed and locked the door as best she could. After plunking down on her bed she rubbed her legs, the sensation of being forcefully weakened by Spike as part of her punishment still was felt as soreness in her legs if she jumped one too many times or rushed her movement for a short time. Hopefully, the side effects would die down soon.

Rewarding Twilight and Pinkie

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Well, it happened, after all her attempts to get out of getting rewarded by Spike, something she didn’t feel all too good about, Twilight was finally going to be seeing just what was waiting on the other side of the gilded doors, the expression of the other her only made her feel more nervous and worried. So, now here she was, before the gilded doors again. Only this time, on Spike’s orders, she was in the buff.

“I get it,” said Spike as they stood before the doors, “you wanted to keep the fact that my Twilight and Pinkie had their minds swapped with you and your Pinkie. But there’s one thing your brilliant mind overlooked, my considering you for this honor came after all your wonderful suggestions. You are the one that earned this, not my Twilight but chances are thanks to you she will remember all of this.”

The doors opened with a wave of Spike’s hand and on the other side she saw Celestia and Luna, completely nude. Celestia and Luna were nearly identical to the Celestia and Luna she knew. Celestia’s magnificent M-Cup breasts and well-toned plot were there before her; Twilight could feel both her mouth watering and sexual excitement expanding more rapidly than she thought possible. Luna and her luscious L-Cup breasts and bodacious bubble plot were there before her as well; Twilight could feel her own body drooling at both ends at the sight before her. The fact that Celestia and Luna both had monstrous stallion genitals in full view only added to the violet mare’s excitement for some reason.

“I guess my punishment wasn’t so bad if this reward was waiting for me,” said Twilight with anticipation and lust in her voice.

“Well, I’m off to reward Pinkie,” said Spike, “I’ll be back in a few hours to see how you ladies are getting along.”

“For what do you need to reward Dame Pinkie for? Surely it is trivial,” said Luna, her voice practically oozing the sexual need Twilight felt burning its way through her body.

“She kept me in the dark about something monumental,” said Spike, “after being punished properly she deserves a reward for her work as well. I think I’ll give her a big ‘bonus’ for all her astounding work.” With that, he left and the doors closed behind Twilight.

“Now then,” said Celestia in her own erotic voice, “which of us should you start with? Not that it matters, every inch of your body will know both our touches soon enough.”

“How about you flip for it,” said Twilight, “and the loser rolls a die to determine which part me the winner gets to start with.”

“Ooh,” said Luna, “I like this one, sister! She wants to play the right kind of kinky games to start things off.” Normally Twilight would be screaming inside about how terrible of an idea this all was but her sexual desire was overruling all the part of her brain that would object to this. All she felt was the tingle of sexual anticipation.

An anticipation that only seemed to heighten when Celestia tossed a coin in the air and told Luna to make a call. The ache of anticipation was so great Twilight’s untouched bosom ached. No matter who won the coin toss she would be getting quite the experience.

*************_______________********************

Pinkie was surprised, she had been called and escorted to Spike’s chambers, the guards had also told her to leave her attire at the entrance to said chambers. Now, here she was, completely naked, in a room with an equally naked Spike. To say he was packing would be an understatement to end all understatements. Not only did he have two massive draconic penises, but his physique was definitely yummy to just look at. The maximum length of a stallion’s member was 18 inches, Spike was rocking a pair of members that were 26 inches long and almost half as wide as they were long, each. The very idea of anyone have just one dick being more prominent than the maximum of a stallion was mind-boggling, and Spike had a pair of them.

Pinkie could feel herself drooling at both ends at the sight before her; she started to wonder just want kind of reward Twilight had been given. Almost instinctually, Pinkie got close to Spike and got on her knees before massaging his members with her boobies. It didn’t matter to her what kind of relationship the two of them had at this moment, she just wanted to get at his cream to taste it for herself.

She wanted to feel him in her mouth then down lower, much lower. Was this bleed through of the other Pinkie, it really didn’t matter if it felt this good already. Just massaging his members was sending her into ecstasy. Pinkie had never been this sexually excited before, and she really didn’t care why she was so sexually excited at the moment.

Pinkie’s funbags stopped massaging Spikes massive, thick, smoothly barbed penises after a few minutes, the inner portion of her funbags were starting to feel sore in a way that wasn’t all that fun. “That was a good start to things,” Spike rumbled in approval, “you know, I’ve been waiting for an excuse to do something like this with my Pinkie. I like to think of myself as a bit of a gentleman, I don’t partake in intercourse with anyone, especially ponies, unless they request it of me or invite me to do so.”

Pinkie knew what he was saying, and she thought it was sweet of him. Of course, while thinking about such things she brought her mouth on his closest member to her without thinking, when it made contact with her lips it felt rough yet smooth. Before Pinkie knew it, her mouth was wrapped around his shaft all the way to the back of her throat but she felt no need to gag, maybe the other Pinkie had practiced for this moment so much that she purged herself of a gag reflex when it came to dragon penises. She felt the same rough yet smooth surface of Spike’s shaft as she moved her tongue about his rod. To her his rod tasted of honey, cinnamon, and vanilla, with a hint of boysenberry. She didn’t know what she had been expecting, but his rod tasting as such was a great surprise for her. All the while his unique musk filled her nose, the scent of lilacs and sugar. His scent and taste were intoxicating, so much so she felt like she was already developing an addiction to him.

***********_______________________************************

Celestia had won the toss but Luna didn’t mind, especially since with her dice roll she decided that Twilight effectively lose her virginity. Twilight began snapping out of her blissful haze when that was suggested, only to fall into a deeper one when Celestia’s rod plowed inter her vagina. Twilight felt so much euphoric pleasure from being taken by Celestia’s member she barely registered the pain and hints of blood that had come at the beginning. Celestia was taking her from in front and almost immediately after being penetrated by the ivory alicorn Twilight leaned in to suck on the alicorns breasts.

To Twilight’s surprise, Celestia was lactating and the milk the ivory mare produced was sweet and intoxicating. Twilight was in such a blissful haze she barely noticed Luna picking her up some time later and plopping her down on the midnight alicorn’s erect member. Still in her haze when Luna turned her into her partner, Twilight just went back to suckling alicorn titties. Luna’s juggs were also filled with milk, this milk wasn’t quite as sweet as Celestia’s but it was richer to the point of being heavier and almost some sort of cream.

When Twilight finally came too, she was positioned between the two alicorns with Celestia’s rod in her rear and Luna’s in her mouth. The texture of the midnight alicorn’s member was silky smooth with hints of feeling like the contours of a night flower's petals. And the worst part about this whole position, Twilight actually found it highly arousing. She could feel herself grow hard, possibly with the nipples so hard and stiff they could potentially punch through metal or cut glass. One thing was for sure, the other Twilight had been preparing herself for an encounter like this.

Twilight wasn’t entirely sure how or why, but she was certain that her other self had been either preparing for something like this or had been subtly prepped and groomed this sort of thing. Given how openly ponies in the city and Ponyville’s alternate were when it came to sexual interactions, it wasn’t all too surprising. All this just meant the psychic bleed over from her alternate was more prolific than she had estimated or hoped. Twilight wanted to be mad about it all but the bliss of her current predicament seemed to be overriding that. Celestia and Luna had nearly identical proportions and features to the ones she knew, as far as she could tell. At most, the dimensions of Celestia and Luna were only a very small handful of centimeters off from the ones she was familiar with.

*********************************************

Twilight bobbed up and down on Luna’s waist as she suckled from Celestia’s intense bosom. Luna’s member reached deep into her, deeper than she had read any stallion had a chance to do during intercourse. This was sex, this was bliss, this was her reward from Spike. Twilight was in a state of euphoric high for an extended period of time, she could barely form coherent thoughts for more than a few seconds before falling into the pit of pleasure again.

The torrent of pleasure that rocked Twilight’s body went on past the point she should have been concerned about the fact Celestia and Luna had stallion parts. The whole experience caused Twilight to experience a blackout. How long she was out was a mystery to Twilight.

When Twilight came to she was covered in sweat and some kind of white and sticky substances, it’s scent was intoxicating despite being mostly dry upon her body. She came to the realization she needed a shower. Celestia and Luna were having some kind of beverage, while still in the buff.

_______________________________________

Pinkie sucked at Spike upper penis, the lower one was pointed surprisingly close to her neck. Before she was aware of it a warm spray of Spike’s cum blasted the back of her mouth and neck at the same time. The warm, sticky liquid ran down her throat and oozed down her neck. The spray lasted for what felt like hours to Pinkie but was likely only a small handful of minutes at most. When the twin sprays stopped the tops of Pinkie’s tatas were covered in Spike’s splooge, they stopped running just shy of Pinkies now perfectly erect nipples.

Spike smiled down at the sleeping Pink mare as he got up from where he engaged in sexual play and intercourse with her, she was almost as fun as the Pinkie he knew. Granted he hadn't gotten this far with his Pinkie yet; they mostly played highly erotic games where they were not permitted to touch each other in a sexual manner. Spike headed to his personal shower to get cleaned off, there was more work to do in the near future. He licked his lips with his long, serpentine forked tongue, Celestia and Luna would have Twilight primed and ready for him the next time he decided to give her a special reward.

The best part was that he’d be able to do it again with his Twilight, he had been subtly preparing her for these kinds of encounters. Of course, the purple mare didn’t know it, his Twilight wasn’t all that good on picking up on a lot of cues.

Changes Not Seen

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Twilight blinked as she looked around, Spike had chosen to build the arena in the Everfree Forest. Looks like not every place in this world had a completely different name than back home, and this Everfree was far more wild and vicious than the one she knew. The paths that she and friends had used in the past were nonexistent, the presence of the Castle of the Two Sisters was nowhere within the forest. In place of the castle stood a keep that Spike had made a few passing mentions of being his old seat of power. With how dangerous the Everfree here genuinely was, the worker teams had been nearly assaulted by dozens of timberwolf packs and a variety of other creatures that called the sprawling and ancient woodland their home. Thankfully, the guards Spike provided for the project were more than capable of dealing with problems as they arose.

After her odd, and quite shameful, time with this universe’s Celestia and Luna Twilight told Spike about the circumstances surrounding the marriage of Cadance and Shining Armor. She also speculated to him her thoughts regarding Queen Chrysalis and the Changelings; chances were they would only make a go at established dragon territories if they were desperate. Spike seemed thoughtful about it all, but didn’t offer any input on the matter. She had an odd feeling about things. There were still two whole months until the big match, and it would be three months until the device based on the one used to get a connection with this reality would be in a state where it could be ready for a full systems test. This was mostly to do with the fact several of the components had to be invented in this world, as opposed to merely modified from Twilight’s homeworld.

After her quick check of how the construction was coming, which seemed to be surprisingly fast, Twilight made her return to Dragon Crow; she still was having trouble with it being called that, and back to her residence. On her way, she encountered an unfamiliar dragoness. This was Dark indigo in color with electric blue spines; she was also dressed in a lavender business suit with a dark pink shirt. The dragoness introduced herself as a “collar specialist” but did not give her actual name.

Something Twilight had learned over her time here was that ponies were not allowed to mess with the collars, only dragons were permitted to do so; ponies were allowed to mess with the horn rings, she had even been permitted to adjust a few things during her last calibrating of her horn ring. But ponies were not permitted to do any work relating to the collars, only a very short list of select dragons, a record that had its names kept completely hidden from the populous were permitted to do any and all work on the collars.

Twilight was concerned but was not permitted, no pony was, to learn any more than the basics regarding the collars. Over the course of her research on the collars, she had learned that Dragonlord Torch had commissioned the creation of the collars but the name of the dragon or dragons responsible for the actual act of creating the artifacts placed upon all ponies of legal age was not recorded.

*************************************************

Twilight was called into the castle the following morning and properly introduced to the specialist, with the omission of the name and only a general title given during the exchange. “What can I do for you this day?” Twilight inquired, she decided to play things as safe as possible, she didn’t know how much about herself Spike had shared with this dragoness.

“What can you tell me about changelings? I would very much like to know as much as possible,” said the specialist dragoness in her surprisingly melodic voice.

“They’re shapeshifters; they can mimic the appearance of almost any creatures and object. They’ve managed to mimic quite a few young and adolescent dragons, chances are anything too large or with too much mass might prove difficult for them to imitate,” Twilight stated, noticing the dragoness taking notes, “their magic typically appears some shade or tone of green, I’ve found references to their magic being any other color. Also, they’re ruled over by a queen, at least last time I checked. The queen is the largest and most powerful among the lot, possibly on par with an alicorn in terms of power, if we’re using ponies as a comparison. If one were to hinder the queen, it could potentially cripple the hive, assuming one of the drones didn’t step up to fill in the power void. What is all this about?”

“You’re mentioning of a changeling invasion in the other world resulted in me deciding to consult an expert on the collars. There are references to encounters with changelings going back a few decades before my ascension to my current position,” so Spike had informed this dragoness, “to my knowledge, no dragons have claimed to have collared a changeling. That said, I would very much like to keep a contingency in play for dealing with changelings should they prove hostile. But claiming their leader and territories would be better,” Twilight felt a chill run down her spine.

“We will not make any goes at making claims for other realities,” said the dragoness, “the subtleties regarding the rules of magic would make things far more of a hassle than we want to deal with, although some Dragonlords past and possibly future can and will have a history of being just reckless enough to try something so foolhardy. I surmise the reason you and Pinkie merely swapped minds with the ones we know, instead of a full position swap, has something to do with the safeguards in place for the collars. Do you have any knowledge of what those are?”

“I didn’t encounter any mention of those during my research,” replied Twilight.

“I see, that is fine. Problematic, but acceptable for the time being. The collars have safeguards that are meant to cancel out any magics that forcibly change a pony’s location beyond a set limit; this prevents ponies from being potentially stolen by dragons that are less abiding by certain rules. They also lockdown a pony’s reproductive abilities and can be released at the permission of the dragon responsible for the pony. In addition to those two things, the collars protect against mind-affecting magics, which means illusion and memory spells have less stability than usual,” Twilight realized that it probably wasn’t the problem she thought when she used the memory sharing spell with her other self, “and outright disables any mind controlling effects targeted at a collar user. However, the collars are only calibrated for ponies, griffins, Diamond Dogs, Buffalo, and Minotaurs. We have yet to properly encounter any changelings; we need to analyze their magical properties and design collars accordingly.”

Twilight was starting to feel ill, they were talking about potentially enslaving changelings and she had inadvertently contributed to that cause. “I get that Spike has done a lot of things that no prior Dragonlord has done,” said Twilight respectfully, “but why go through all this trouble of preparing for the ‘claiming’ of changelings?”

“They’re a potential threat,” said Spike flatly, his attire was closer to military formal than regular formal, “I’ve been getting reports that sound like they might be a changeling tactic. But the queen tends to hide in positions of power, as per your reports, and since they are supposedly in my territory, then the queen must be somewhere in this city. I want to capture her before things have a chance to escalate to a point that can’t be mitigated.”

Twilight was apprehensive, but not as much as she thought she should be, a bit before saying, “she’s probably masquerading as someone that is typically unnoticed but has a high degree of freedom around a place of power. Maybe she’s playing the part of a maid, or even the head maid if she’s growing tired of not calling the shots.”

“Now that you mention it,” said Spike, “I haven’t had a proper meeting with my head maid in months, that’s an oversight I probably should have noticed before now.”

“You should also check on behaviors, changelings can have behavior that seems a bit off from who they’re trying imitate, but not everyone will catch it.”

“Good to know,” said Spike, “this could be more problematic than anticipated.” Twilight bid the two a good day and returned to her residence, the less she had to think about changelings like that the better, it probably for the best she didn’t mention how things were regarding the events after Flurry Heart was born.

Things are Getting Too Uncomfortable

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Spike was well past the point of feeling uneasy about a few things concerning Twilight and Pinkie. Sure, the treating him like some big shot and referring to him as if he were some great ruler was fine at first, then came the completely bonkers behaviors that his Pinkie and Twilight would definitely not like. It all began after the Twilights had exchanged information, for some reason that event made this new Twilight and Pinkie feel the need to step up a rather pointless game revolving around him. Twilight literally trying to share the bed with him, with next to no nighttime attire and Pinkie nearly stealing a good portion of Rarity’s gem stock just to make him a thirty-six layered gemstone cake came to mind as the most ridiculous behavior in the past few days.

When he reported this to the others and the princesses things didn’t go over well, especially with Twilight and Pinkie talking about having a dragon to rule over ponies with reverence and tones that indicated they enjoyed that system greatly. Spike had also felt very uncomfortable with Pinkie very overtly telling him it was perfectly acceptable to fondle her anywhere he wanted; he was still way too young for the adult stuff they were implying but more than old enough and well-read to notice the implications of what was said and done. Thankfully, this Twilight was still terrible at picking up on most cues, especially the sexual kind.

“I’m not much more of this I can take,” Spike cried in annoyance to Luna, he was visiting Celestia and Luna for a bit at the excuse to Twilight and Pinkie the two alicorns had requested his presence. “The two of them are making things increasingly uncomfortable for me, I’ve told them as much but they don’t seem to quite take the hint.”

“We are aware of your plight, noble Spike,” said Luna, “but We have yet to obtain word about the link with their realm being established with ours in a stable manner. We too wish for the Twilight and Pinkie we know to return to us.”

“But chances are they might have had some subtle changes that could take some time to get over,” said Spike with a hint of trepidation in his voice.

“And We will work with them to undo the damages that were done,” said Luna, “their insistence on what they think is pleasing you and being near you is due to the culture they developed in, that doesn’t make it any less unnerving but it does offer up some explanation for some of their quirks and eccentricities.”

“They also seem to be of the opinion that when I say that the sort of things they’re doing make uncomfortable such things will pass rather quickly.”

“We thank you for bringing your concerns before Us,” said Luna, “best of luck in future dealings with them, Spike.”

Spike just nodded and headed out; he really wasn’t looking forward to what things would be like when he got back. He wanted the Twilight and Pinkie he knew back as soon as possible, if not immediately. Waking up to find Twilight curled next him in bed was one thing, but when it involved that and a distinct hint of a variety of gifts that filled a good portion of his room it meant there was a line that was being crossed that shouldn’t. He didn’t mind finding Twilight curled up in bed with him every once and a while, the two them had been known to do such things when it was clear the other wasn’t having a good night’s rest, but this Twilight had been doing such things a bit too frequently.

_______________________________________________________

“You think we’re making Spike feel uneasy?” Twilight asked Pinkie as she met the pink mare at Sugarcube Corner, Spike had departed for Canterlot and left a note telling Twilight to inform Pinkie of his whereabouts.

“Maybe,” said Pinkie, “he did mention our recent behaviors were making him uneasy, but I figured he would have gotten over all that by now. I mean, our Spike likes these sorts of things; yeah, you had to ask me about a few things you should probably do but my point still stands.”

Twilight gave herself a rather forceful slap on the forehead just below her horn, “Of course, were operating on the premise that ‘our Spike’ and this Spike have similar things that bring them comfort. From what I’ve learned, ‘our Spike’ was perfectly okay with the behaviors we’ve displayed at the age ‘this Spike’ seems to be but that’s the problem, they’re not quite the same Spike. They have very different ages and their upbringings were very different, it hasn’t even been confirmed how many actual siblings ‘this Spike’ even has or if he’s an only child.”

“Oopsie doodles,” said Pinkie, “I guess we’re both used to adhering to the whims of our Spike that the information regarding ‘this Spike’ completely flew past me, silly me. What does this Spike like?”

“As far as I can tell,” said Twilight, “cooking, eating gemstones, various other domestic acts, and comic books.”

“Let’s make it up to him by putting together some dishes at the castle we know dragons from where we’re from like and ease Spike into what we know about dragon dining that way,” said Pinkie, “I’ll also see about special ordering some comic books for him as an additional apology. From now on, we pay attention to which Spike we’re dealing with,” Pinkie’s head perked up after she said that, “I didn’t think I would ever find myself saying that in a serious manner, these times really are pretty strange. How did that project for locating home go?”

“We established a connection,” said Twilight, “but without knowledge regarding how different realities move in the space between dimensions, it’s hard to keep a lock for more than a small handful of minutes without some sort of anchor on the other side to keep the two aligned properly. I think the other Twilight was going to work on that from her end, probably going to get the proper individuals and group under Spike’s command in on the project, but I don’t know how they’ll keep the necessary information out of the claws of other dragons.”

Deceiver Caught and...What!?!?!?!?!?

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Twilight looked over at Pinkie; the pink mare was in a violet apron while Twilight was in a dark pink robe. It had been three days since her discussion with Spike and the mystery dragoness, that had disturbing implications. Both weren’t happy, this world’s Spike was actively looking for changelings for some reason.

Spike had seemed pretty reasonable over their stay, but as time went on the possible connections to the Spike they knew were slipping further and further away from what made them comfortable. Now the two of them were in a room with this world’s version Chrysalis. She definitely had a frame comparable to that of Celestia, but instead of the G-Cup sized bust Twilight remembered from her last encounter with Chrysalis the changeling queen had a set of erotically enticing I-Cup sized breasts, all topped off with silver and brass ring snuggly placed at the base of her horn only seemed to add to her eroticism. As suspected, she was masquerading as one of Spike’s high ranking maids. She was also completely shameless in her appearance, as was evident by the fact the charcoal black changeling queen was completely naked before them, seemed she was either reliant on her shapeshifting abilities to portray the illusion of attire or she had just chosen to completely disregard entire after her ruse had been undone. Her slime green areolas were just a dark enough tone when compared to her slime green tits enough to make the whole sight aesthetically pleasing. Pinkie seemed to be on the verge of drooling with excitement, Twilight felt similarly to Pinkie.

“Well,” said Spike with amusement as he and Chrysalis were beginning their chat, he was dressed in a blue and indigo business casual suit with a white shirt and midnight blue tie, “you’ve certainly proved effective at what your kind are capable of. And from what I hear, you’re quite the cunning strategist. So, how about I give you and your subordinates jobs. You’ll be provided all your needs, will have improved shelter from the elements and a place to sleep should you require them.” Twilight and Pinkie made no move to hide their surprise, it looked like Spike’s guards that were scattered across the room had the same look on their faces as well.

“A generous offer,” said Chrysalis in feigned disinterest, “just what kind of duties would my hive and myself be undertaking?”

“Nothing outside your capabilities, I assure you,” said Spike, “I would like to employ your hive as spies with you acting as my spymaster. We’ll ensure you get whatever nourishment you need; I’m even willing to place you all in places that have a high display of open, genuine love to better facilitate things. I’m even willing to give into any other requests or demands you might have, provided you are working under me.”

“I see,” said Chrysalis with mock enjoyment, “but you’re forgetting one thing?”

“And what is that?” Spike inquired, he was genuinely curious.

“Changeling queens don’t take well to being subordinates,” said Chrysalis before rising and making a show of leaving, Pinkie and Twilight both felt very disappointed in themselves for finding Chrysalis’s surprisingly luscious yet firm rear attractive. The changeling queen made a go to remove the magic-nullifying ring on her horn, a mandatory part of her meeting with Spike when she had both her arms grasped by the pair of dragon guards by the entryway she was attempting to exit. “What is the meaning of this?” Chrysalis demanded, clearly feeling like she was being treated poorly.

Spike let out a drawn-out sigh before saying, “I decided to do things diplomatically, even going as far as to make things enticing for you. I brought Twilight along so she could whip up a formal document outlining the entirety of our agreement and Pinkie along to better coordinate a formal celebration of our agreement. But it seems your sense of importance got in the way of a proper agreement that would have been probably more beneficial to you than me, I literally gave you the high ground in this and you didn’t recognize it. I’m truly disappointed, everything I offered would have made it so that you would have ranked higher than all but the most prized ponies in my collection." Pinkie and Twilight didn’t like the sound of that, “but now you’ll find your subordinates will find themselves in a similar position to the ponies, and it’s all your fault. Take her to the special chamber I had prepared in the event of this potential outcome.” The two dragon guards nodded and dragged the Chrysalis off somewhere.

Twilight was wondering why it had taken days for this meeting to happen when Chrysalis had been apprehended almost sixteen hours after Spike had gone to check on his high ranked maids earlier that very week, apparently this was because Spike had been arranging things for certain eventualities. “Aren’t you worried about her overpowering the inhibitor ring?” Twilight inquired as she and Pinkie got up to leave.

“Seeing as that’s actually a magic nullifying ring specifically designed with alicorns in mind,” said Spike, “she’ll find it rather hard to short out. Besides, she’ll have changed her tune sooner than you probably think.” Pinkie and Twilight shivered a bit at the thought of that as they rushed out of the room the sooner they were away from whatever Spike had planned for Chrysalis the better, both seriously hoping it wouldn’t be some kind of torture.

*******************************************************

Chrysalis found herself strapped to a device of some kind that had her arms and legs spread out in a near perfect X-formation. It was clear this room had been prepared in advance, and the four additional magic canceling rings on her horn was proof they didn’t want her doing anything of her own accord here. She had been locked in this dungeon, which had numerous sex tools for what felt like at least an hour before Spiked waltzed in, completely naked, and closed the door behind him then locked said door.

“Of course,” said Spike, “you could have avoided all this if you had taken up my offer, unless you requested this sort of treatment, of course. I can’t have a force as potentially disruptive as you moving about my territory unchecked, and all your hidden forces won’t make a move without your sayso, from what I’ve gathered thus far. We’re going to be here until you submit to my rule, and we’ve restrained your magic just in case you get any funny ideas. Now, I would usually leave this up to one of my specialists,” he picked up a dark forest green collar emblazoned with an emerald flame and her name inscribed artfully on it in an aesthetic she actually did seem to like but made a display of making it appear she would never show or admit to such things.”

“A collar, like those little ponies,” Chrysalis chuckled, “that won’t work on me.”

“This one was designed with changelings in mind,” said Spike with a smirk, “after my forces apprehended you I made sure to have them get a full read on your magic energies, all of them, and turned over the readings to a specialist. I don’t really know how to make sense of the equipment we used, most dragons and none of the ponies are like that as well, but the collar specialists know exactly how to read and interpret that data to make the collars we use on all the entities in our possession. You might think you’re ready for whatever I planned for you and you can whether through what I have in store for you,” he gave an even bigger toothy grin, “but very few can withstand the treatment I’m about to give you.” He strapped the collar to Chrysalis’s neck and watched the item a few seconds before it flashed the color of Spike’s fire, a few seconds later Chrysalis’s eye’s flashed the same color and tone the collar had a moment prior. “Now I don’t have complete command of your body, and you can’t resist or hold out on the commands. By the time we’re done here, you’ll be more than happy to call me whatever I want you to refer to me as.” Spike gave an erotic lick of his lips as he moved in close to Chrysalis’s face, the changeling queen gave a shiver of fear that was tinged with excitement, to her confusion.

Spike pulled a lever and Chrysalis found her rear facing the Dragonlord, “I would usually do something to get the one here to request I do what is coming next,” said Spike, “but all those tools are designed with ponies in mind and we don’t know what kind of effect they would have your kind. So I’m just going to give a good old fashioned rape, feel free to scream as much as you want, this chamber is designed to keep all the sounds in regardless of their type or intensity.” With that, he unceremoniously rammed his twin rods into both of her lower holes.

Chrysalis wanted to retort but was stopped when she felt intense pain, for about three seconds, before fireworks rocked her body. She had never felt like this before, she had always been the dominant force. At no point had even considered or entertained being in the submissive position. She neither had any idea nor cared how long this was going to last, all she cared about was keeping the fireworks of blissful pleasure exploding through her body. She hoped and desired that when she did climax, a moment she both craved and dreaded, it would be like some great fireworks finally in her head that would make the rest of the fireworks seem like a prelude.

Chrysalis did her best to just lean into it all, seeking only the pleasure that flooded her entire body. Her breasts bounced with far more elasticity and vigor than any time before, but she didn’t notice any of that due to the immense flood of pleasure that coursed through her body. A pleasure so great that at worst could be called fireworks, at best there was nothing to could act as a proper analogy. She was drowning in pleasure, all she wanted was more. She would do anything, without question, asked of her with this bliss coursing through her very being.

Neither noticed as Spike’s coloration spread out from the point Spike was ramming the changeling queen. They wouldn’t notice her changes for some time. From the point of her first orgasm, of many, Chrysalis would continue to scream about belonging to Spike, an act that would cause his sexual domination of the changeling queen to intensify in its ferocity. By the time they stopped several days would have passed.

*******************************************************

Two weeks after Spike’s try at a meeting with Chrysalis, the changeling queen was going around in what could only be described as a slutty secretary outfit with platinum bands on her right arm and left leg. Spike had also officially declared Chrysalis his new personal aide, to Twilight’s horror. Made all the more real by the fact Chrysalis was going about like Spike was an absolute authority, apparently sexually dominating a Changeling queen triggers some part of their brain to register the one who dominated them as an entity to follow without fail. The effect on Chrysalis also apparently filtered down to all changelings as well, her massive hive of several hundred thousand were now all of the opinion that Spike was a great ruling authority.

Twilight had even managed to find this world’s version Thorax, who was perfectly happy the changelings were not going with an invasion plan and happily signed up to work in Sunset’s place of occupation since he really didn’t like the idea of doing spy work. This was definitely not the kind of outcome Twilight had thought possible. Spike had only spent three days sexually dominating Chrysalis before she swore eternal fealty to Spike, she and the changelings would question what was asked of them but only so far as to better understand what was being asked of them.

Twilight wasn’t particularly thrilled by the development, especially since she had caught Spike sexually dominating Chrysalis publicly more than a few times since the whole thing started. The worst part, the entire city was perfectly okay with the display. Yes, the changelings had all lost the holes in their limbs but they all were a lighter shade of purple than Spike with their manes being a lighter shade of green from his spines. Chrysalis’s coloration was a near perfect match to Spike in mane and body; she even had a scale pattern going all throughout her exterior as well. The only thing didn’t seem to have changed were her eye color, but the shape was definitely more draconic, her areolas and her teats.

Twilight and Pinkie found it more than a little creepy to see the once prideful changeling queen now the image of the blissfully willing slave; it just didn’t feel right. Of course, next to nothing about this world felt right. From its history, to the power dynamics, and even relationships. It all felt like something that they should have never encountered, they needed to get home asap but from the last estimates, they heard that wouldn’t be until a month after the competition. Twilight really didn’t want to see ponies fighting each other in some kind of bloodsport, neither did Pinkie. Also, it was an alternate of Twilight’s brother that would be competing against four unknowns, that was never a good sign.

That all said, the changeling situation was also something Twilight wasn’t all too fond of, and neither was Pinkie. A situation made all the more annoying by various residents of Dragon Crown, especially the ponies, partaking in various erotic acts. Because of her relation and position as the changeling queen, Chrysalis was easily marked as being Spike’s, due to her station and relation regarding her hive the entire hive was also marked as being Spike’s and no individual changeling could be marked as belonging to another dragon. The worst part of it, Twilight and Pinkie found Chrysalis to be very sexually attractive. They didn’t mind some members of her hive being that way, seeing as they had some interaction with Thorax after the reform of the changelings and were not afraid to admit that he did have some physically attractive attributes when it came to a being male.

Even so, Sunset bringing changelings home with her, that mare’s new home was still in the works, to bed wasn’t something Twilight liked to see, even if they were highly attractive looking changeling mares. Pinkie ran into a similar issue with her business, some of the changelings applied to work at her place, and Sweetie Drops had brought a few mares back with her for some adult playtime.

There was even a time Chrysalis came to the archives to assess how bad things were, she had looked and acted very professional during the entire visit, until the last few minutes when she met Spike outside the archives and ended up with her face and bosom completely covered n his cum with a grin of pure bliss on her face. It was at that point Twilight decided to see if there were any ways for her to help speed up the transdimensional pinging device, she didn’t mind getting super in-depth with telling the system what to look for when they got operational.

Happy Fun Times with Chrysalis and Spike

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Chrysalis waited, she knew she couldn’t escape her bonds since they had been made by dragons with their immeasurable strength but she could wait until this dragon slipped up and set her free. Even if her ability to use magic was temporarily restrained, it didn’t mean she was without her own brand of tricks. She was used to being in control, just because she was tied down didn’t mean she still wasn’t the dominant one in the room, this dragon would find out just...Chrysalis felt him thrust his penises into her vaginal region and plot, derailing her train of thought for a moment. This was followed by a brief pain, barely more than a few seconds before it felt like a grand fireworks celebration was being performed throughout her entire body, the explosions of pleasure caused bursts of numerous exhilarating colors to dance in her eyes.

Chrysalis had been immensely used to being the dominant entity in all of her relationships, which were short and had always left her unfortunate partners drained and happy to have provided her what she had taken from them. She had done such things with old and young ponies and dragons; each one drained of their energies to the point that without assistance within the following days would likely not last long. She had dones this many times over her past thousand years or so of life, easily dominating every dragon before now that thought they could dominate her. But for some reason, the build-up for this was something that actually caused her body to eagerly anticipate what was coming, something that had never happened before. Chrysalis had been in compromising positions before, some more compromising than what she was currently in. However, none had managed to take apart her ruse with such quick efficiency, before all this it had taken weeks for her victims to get just half as far as this one had managed to pull off in less than a day of suspecting her.

Torrents of pleasure rocked through Chrysalis, torrents so strong they made the fireworks she just felt at the beginning seem like a shoddy prelude or preface to what followed, this was what it was like to be dominated.

Chrysalis had never thought to so much as entertained the idea that being dominated by another was so grand; this was a sensation that would never be forgotten by her body and mind, possibly even something more. An otherworldly bliss coursed through her every fiber down to the core of her being, a core now dyed with the essence of the very dragon that was dominating her. All her senses were not perceiving anything beyond the sheer erotic bliss of her being dominated.

_____________________________________________________________

Spike was surprised, he expected a bit more fight from Chrysalis, but just three or four seconds after he had penetrated her with both his rods she let out a feral erotic scream of pleasure and had gone completely silent. He had heard of this before, pleasure induced catatonia but had never thought it more than rumors and flights of fancy to make others feel beyond inadequate. He dared not stop, if he did this whole thing would stop and he would likely try to recreate it with other to no success. Spike wasn’t an idiot, although he did play at being one at times.

Spike decided to squeeze at Chrysalis’s left breast with his left hand; he found it to be firm and rigid like the carapace of an insect. But as he continued to feel at it he could feel it softening but keeping that firmness. It was becoming less rigid, more malleable. He figured it was just something changelings did during sex to keep their partners interested; it seemed to be an automated response when you took into account Chrysalis’s current state. He could also feel her insides changing, practically molding, to snuggly hold his cocks. It almost was as if Chrysalis’s insides wanted to massage him to ensure he didn’t pull out any time soon.

Since Chrysalis was effectively immobile, something Spike had not seen coming; he contemplated undoing her restraints as he continued to pound her. He needed to turn her apparatus over to do that but the lever was near the door, it would mean pulling out of her, something he very much did not want to do. Spike had a bit of fight with himself over it all for another ten minutes before deciding to pull out.

When Spike pulled out there was some resistance but he managed to get out from inside Chrysalis. It looked like Chrysalis was taking some time to come down from her euphoric high. To be fair, Spike wasn’t even sure how much time he had actually spent plowing Chrysalis; and didn’t rightfully care for the first he could legitimately recall. He moved the lever and flipped Chrysalis over to have her face up again. Those massive juggs were just wonderful to behold, they weren’t quite to the size of those borne by Celestia or Luna but definitely were looking like they might have a decent chance of competing against the alicorns in terms of size and playability.

*****************************************************

A few minutes after Spike had pulled out, much to her dismay, Chrysalis came out from her euphoria induced coma-like state. She felt sexier than ever, but had no clue why that was beyond a memory of getting fucked into oblivion that made her drool just from beginning to remember it. Chrysalis decided to look herself over, on the off chance her carapace was broken she wanted to know, only to find her coloration different and feminine figure more pronounced.

“Finally awake, I see,” said Spike with a cocky grin. “Just checked the timekeeper in here, we’ve been at it for almost a full day. Your body can sure last without much effort, I also like the new look.”

At some point during their intercourse, Chrysalis had undergone a change that had made her coloration match Spike's almost perfectly. Her bosom was still deliciously large, it just looked more dragonish now. Her horn had become less jagged, but still edgy enough to be attractive. It was almost as if she had transformed into his dream slave.

Chrysalis knew she should be concerned about all that, but she wasn’t. She just trotted over to the door, her fabulous funbags bouncing a bit with each step, and braced herself while sticking out her plot and said, “I swear unending fealty and loyalty to you, please rut me, master.”

____________________________________________________________

Spike licked his lips in erotic excitement, he had anticipated her possibly wanting more, but this was the fastest he had seen anyone swear allegiance to him. Usually, that took much longer, it also involved removing the ring from a spellcaster’s horn ring. Chrysalis didn’t even wait for any of that; she just requested he screw her again. He wanted to be apprehensive, but something about the fact Chrysalis had literally changed her colors subconsciously while in a state that could not be faked like she had shown caused him to remove all rings from her horn and a palladium inhibitor ring on her horn's base. Little did he know the short time her magic had returned had caused a flash of changes in all of Chrysalis's hive.

“Before we proceed,” said Spike as he approached Chrysalis, “what am I to you and what are you to me?”

“You are my master,” said Chrysalis with erotic fervor, “and I am your slave.”

“Very good,” said Spike as he thrust his rods back into Chrysalis’s lower holes. The changeling queen squealed in erotic delight as he penetrated her, her now dragonized breasts swaying back and forth as Spike pumped against her, each movement causing a cacophony of pleasure to cascade through her body. The crescendo of pleasure played all throughout her body, only allowing her to communicate in erotic moans and cries.

Spike had known this one would be special; he just hadn’t thought she would be so special he would contemplating new titles and placements for her. Chrysalis was beyond dedicated to him now, she was unerringly devoted to him, in a way no other entity conquered by a dragon had ever been. Chrysalis didn’t deserve special treatment from him, his very relationship and control over her mandated special treatment.

_____________________________________________

Chrysalis couldn’t believe she had ever contemplated making a go at overthrowing Spike, the very notion felt like a bad idea now. To her knowledge, no other changeling queen had been genuinely sexually dominated like her, they didn’t know the blissful enjoyment they were missing in their pathetic excuses for lives. Her very core was dedicated to Spike, a foreign concept before her being dominated. To her knowledge, this had never occurred before and would likely never happen again. This was something rare, something beautiful, something to be cherished. Something about her psychology was changed, something fundamental. Her thoughts of the conquered were noticeably different from before, they were the dragon notions of conquering others and were now the superior philosophy to her. A conquered civilization is meant to be subservient to the victors without fail, she and changelings were to be this for Spike now.

Chrysalis didn’t know, nor care, why the very thought of Spike as her master sent waves of pleasure cascading through her body. All she cared now was that he was her master and it was her duty, privilege, and honor to serve him in any manner he so chose. Cascading torrents of pleasure rocked her body as Spike pounded her, torrents made all the more intense by her own erotic thoughts about him.

She didn’t know when, nor did care in the slightest, that she was now on her knees sucking on Spike’s dicks as he conversed with someone on the other side of the door somehow. All that mattered was pleasing her dragon, that’s all that would ever matter in her life now, that’s the only thing that gave a sense of importance.

************************************************************

Chrysalis didn’t know how much time had passed, Spike said it was their third day together in the chamber, she really didn’t care. She was servicing one of his rods with her massive breasts while she sucked off on the other like it was some rare treat that required special care while eating. Her body was rocked with bliss just being in contact with Spike, the very sound of his voice was enough to make her wet. She didn’t know how many orgasms she had experienced with Spike, and she really didn’t care about that in the slightest now.

How was it this dragon could drive her to heights of pleasure she hadn’t even heard whispered rumors of? At this point, Chrysalis was past the point of caring, all she desired was to continue feeling this pleasure. At this point, she didn’t care about playing the part of invader or conqueror, all that really mattered was the bliss that came from being Spike’s possession.

______________________________________________

Spike could have sworn he Chrysalis’s eyes turn into hearts for a moment when he caught a glimpse of them. Given that changelings were shapeshifters and she was supposedly the most powerful of them, it wouldn’t surprise him if she could selectively change parts of her body at will. The way she begged for him to rut her, it was as if she was addicted to sex with him. He didn’t have an issue with that, sex with Chrysalis was on par with when he screwed Celestia and Luna, but it didn’t stop him from worrying about how long the effects would last.

Regardless, Spike had scored a prize no other Dragonlord had managed to acquire, and he was adamant about this treasure not trading claws under any circumstance. Changelings were around as long-lived as alicorns and dragons, at least their queens likely were. Having changeling queen at his beck and call was something to hold on to and show off to other dragons, Garble would definitely lose his cool over that in addition to his other losses.

*************************************************

It was two days after his three-day stint in the sex dungeon with Chrysalis, Spike was back at his desk, with Chrysalis under it sucking him off while she was completely nude, going over some documents that had just been sent to him. Chrysalis was his only palladium band; he made sure to let his platinum bands where the changeling queen stood in the pecking order, Rarity wasn’t happy to hear the newcomer was higher ranking than her. At least he was sure the white mare was throwing a tantrum about that the moment she read that part. She seemed to be taking competition worse and worse and worse with each successive year; Spike hoped her current punishment would help lessen and mitigate that a bit.

Chances were his hopes for Rarity having a change of attitude wouldn’t be that easy, but his new acquisitions did offer up possibilities that were closed to him. They had miscalculated the size and spread of Chrysalis’s hive, thankfully the now pacified changeling queen was more than willing to inform them of the exact placement and numbers of her entire hive. Chrysalis had visibly drooled in an exceptionally overt way when Spike had said she deserved a special reward after that. Spike had Sunset’s department doing work on equipment like the brand that would have similar effects on changelings, a male changeling subordinate had volunteered but they had been forced to conscript a female changeling for the projects as well, Sunset liked to be thorough in all the projects.

Spike was also waiting on a tailor for Chrysalis, the mare deserved nothing short of custom attire, just like Celestia and Luna. Rarity had been his best tailor, and she was in his personal employ without question, but calling her up for this or going down with Chrysalis for an appointment would be tantamount to stating her punishment was undeserved. The next best choice was in New Scale City, his brother had it worst among them all when it came to naming things, but the requested professional would take much longer than he liked to get there. He also had to cash in a favor from his brother that had been on hold for decades, the cost of getting this specialist would have been prohibitively expensive otherwise. The Dragonlord could get away with requesting a lot among dragons but even they had hard limits when it came to family, the stories about Dragonlord Torch and his kin were still discussed as something that significantly restricted everything he did well after he was no longer in the position. Spike hated the waiting, especially since before her punishment he could have Rarity in to do the job in the span of a few minutes, he realized how much he had been spoiling himself.

Changes in the Territory

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Twilight was incredibly relieved Sunset Shimmer, the mare that seemed to be a perpetual state of horny around other mares, was finally out of the house and in her own place. That mare was a bit too open with her lesbianism, practically to comedic level it seemed most of the time. Twilight was just happy to not have to share a roof with her, and more than thankful she didn’t have to keep her room’s door closed and locked almost all hours of the day. Unfortunately, Sunset’s new place was just a few doors down from Twilight now.

Twilight couldn’t understand any off what was going on with Chrysalis, that mare always came across as a willful egoist that was fully intent on exerting her will on those around her, but that wasn’t how she was now. Chrysalis was actually reveling in the whole slave experience and showed signs of genuinely enjoying it. How had Spike managed to break her so easily? Had the entire domineering queen act actually been a facade that Chrysalis herself had bought into? Was all this some elaborate ruse? If so, how long until Chrysalis snapped and made a go at resorting to her old tricks? But until then, Chrysalis was reveling in being Spike’s slave a more than disturbing degree. Spike even had special rules regarding Chrysalis, he also had special rules regarding Celestia and Luna but the point still stood.

Twilight just couldn’t fully wrap her head around the idea that voluptuous, mildly protective, slightly kinky, yet friendly mare that was now following Spike around had been a villainous antagonist she and her friends had once fought. She had yet to find the versions of Fluttershy and Rainbow Dash that resided in this universe, same went for most of the ponies she had grown up with Canterlot. Twilight didn’t even want to think about what her parents were like this universe; it was why she deliberately avoided visiting or contacting them. Twilight had to admit; Spike did a good job ruling over his territory.

A set of modestly dressed changelings passed her by on the street, a few giving her a friendly wave. The exchange reminded her how things had ended up shortly after Thorax had become the ruler of the changelings, a significant juxtaposition when compared to Chrysalis's choice of attire that was so slutty in its design it shouldn’t have even been legal for use in public. That reminded Twilight, she had heard the changeling lands were guarded by the canceling power of an artifact that had no effect on changeling magic but basically canceled out all other kinds of magic. Spike had sent some changelings, with pony assistants and dragon overseers, to gather as much data as they could on the artifact and bring it back him. He wanted to see if the selective nature of the artifact could be replicated, and if so then they could apply it to holding facilities to allow the guards full access to their magics but disable the magical capabilities of the inmates.

Before any of that could be done magical technologies with similar magical signatures to that of changelings needed to be produced, on account any other magical technologies wouldn’t be useful and chances were what little non-magical technologies available weren’t sophisticated enough for an analysis project. Apparently, the project Twilight had a hand in creating and Spike’s acquisition of Chrysalis had triggered the beginnings of a technology boom.

From the sounds of it, Spike also had commissioned the creation of a town near Big Macintosh’s farm, probably a good idea when you took the recent population boom into account. The changelings now were even friendlier than those that you found under Thorax’s rule, which was saying something. It still creeped Twilight and Pinkie out that Chrysalis was now open, gregarious, and completely subservient to Spike. It didn’t help that she openly paraded around in incredibly skimpy attire and was prone to open public displays of affection, and that was discluding her borderline nymphomaniac relationship with Celestia and Luna. Twilight still had trouble getting around how horny Celestia and Luna were in this world; it didn’t help her first genuine encounter with them had been in some sort of lust-addled stupor she hadn’t been able to hold off.

Twilight didn’t like the feeling of sexual urges for Celestia, the mare had been like a second mother to her. She didn’t like the sexual urges she had for Luna, despite being in effective exile until recently the Luna she knew was like that loony aunt you only seem to really see at family holidays. And the less said about her surprising sexual urges towards Chrysalis the better, even if she was a massively attractive mare that...no, Twilight stopped herself before that line of that went any further. That all said, changes in Spike’s territory didn’t start kicking off until around the time he had managed to get Chrysalis. Twilight had a bad feeling about coming events, especially the planned wedding of her brother.

Spike showed he wasn’t like other dragons, the fact he had multiple projects for advancing of innovations in various fields was proof enough of that, but there was one thing bugging Twilight above all else. It was something that had been gnawing at the back of her mind since she had learned about how the power structure of this world operated. Something Twilight dared not ask at the fear of being insensitive. She was going to ask it now; she had played around with disinterest long enough.

“Why is your sister even hanging out in this place?” Twilight inquired to Spike; they were at a pony operated diner that had Rarity’s stamp of approval upfront, Chrysalis was seated next to Spike in a pink-tinted translucent dress, with no undergarments to be seen, it was so transparent Twilight questioned how it could possibly make much more difference than going nude.

“My sister has a bit of gambling problem, especially when it comes to territory,” said Spike, “she lost all her territory and its residents in a duel. She only managed to keep Azure due to the fact when she was a stallion he was so new of an acquisition that he didn’t count as one of the assets she would lose. Of course a few weeks later the one she lost to ended up losing to one of Garble’s subordinate dragons. She has no territory to speak of at the moment, and will only lay claim to any territory she wins for herself.”

“Given her lack of resources desired by other parties, I guessing that could last longer than she is willing to admit,” said Twilight.

“Indeed,” said Chrysalis, “but my sources have it that she is sitting on information regarding hidden deposits in her former territories, chances are she’ll use a loophole to reclaim some of those grounds upon Spike’s victory.”

“Care to explain that one,” said Twilight with interest.

“According to dragon competition rules and guidelines, if a dragon of relation to the victor stakes a claim on property or territory the losing party has some sort of access to they are granted temporary ownership of that territory, at most, it lasts a year or two. But during that time she can treat the territory she temporary control over as if it were her full-time territory, maybe even issue some territory claiming challenges around to rebuild her territory during that time.”

“I recall learning of that policy,” said Spike, “most dragons aren’t aware of it, and even fewer try to take advantage of it.”

“Regardless,” said Chrysalis, “I sent a copy of those findings to both your siblings, seeing as you were quite insistent on making sure they are up to date on dragon policies.”

“Very good,” said Spike, shortly after his saying this a member of waiting staff showed up at their table. Twilight almost did a double take, the waitress was Sassy Saddles, and was in a mildly revealing green waitress outfit. “I think I’ll have the salmon steak, I hear the fish are extra fresh for the city today.”

“Honeyed garden soup for me,” said Chrysalis, “I absolutely love sweets but I need to watch my figure.” Twilight practically gagged on the inside at what Chrysalis said.

“Garden salad with extra onions and lettuce,” said Twilight, “I’ve been smelling extra fresh veggies almost as soon as I was in the door.”

Sassy gave a silent nod and was on her way, once she was out of earshot Spike said, “What’s that mare like where you’re from?”

“Sassy Saddles,” said Twilight before taking a moment to think, “she’s a business consultant Rarity hired to operate one of her shops, her Canterlot shop to precise. It’s a bit of surprise to see her as the waiting staff for a dining establishment.”

“Yes, well, she’s actually being punished,” said Spike, “She’s actually one of Nail’s ponies, he claims she messed up something important and he requires her out of his territory for a bit, she should be heading back home after the tournament.”

“Aren’t you worried about the competition?” Twilight inquired, she couldn’t quite understand how Spike was so relaxed about it all.

“He’s pulled a similar stunt before,” said Spike, “a four on two competition where my two were severely handicapped, they still won. My choice is probably my best bet, seeing as I’ve actually intentionally had members of all my elites go up against similar challenges.”

“Numerically, probably,” said Twilight, “but have you had them practice against other elites under similar circumstances?”

Spike facepalmed, “I take it that particular set of practice drills slipped your mind,” said Chrysalis with mild amusement, “I’ll arrange for a few such practices to go down with enough time to spare for the competition.”

“Thanks for pointing that out, Twilight,” said Spike, “I guess I really have started being too complacent.”

Final Preparations for the Fight

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A more dishonest creature would have rigged the competition grounds to give their favored combatants an edge, Spike did things differently. He actually made sure to rig the arena so that all competition was harder for all parties and any outside interference would prove next to fruitless. He made sure the equipment was so effectively integrated into the facility it came off as nothing more than design flourishes when you put your focus on any of them. And to top things off, he made the viewing galleries and VIP box have their own special flourishes and safeguards to further guard against tampering while also providing quick and efficient entry and exit of the facility from all viewing accommodations. He even made sure to have vending stalls built into the main entryway for those that wanted to have snacks while watching the show, how any rational individual could have snacks at a bloodsport event without feeling ill was beyond Twilight, the very thought of such an event made her and Pinkie actually lose their appetites.

Twilight, Pinkie, Spike, Chrysalis, Sunset, and a small team of tech ponies were looking over everything to sure it was all good to go. It was just a few days before the fight could be officiated, Garble and his entourage would be arriving shortly. From everything she learned about this universe’s Garble, Twilight didn’t like the idea of so much as doing indirect business with him. She just hoped everything would turn out for the best.

Twilight was in a sea blue robe with copper trim; Pinkie was in a baby blue apron with lilac trim, Sunset was in what could be best described as an indigo-colored slutty business suit, Spike was in a gray business suit with a white shirt and black tie. Chrysalis was dressed in a translucent orange harem girl outfit, complete with matching veil over her face just under the eyes.

Her worries were put to an even worse state when she saw and heard Garble. “Excellent place for a competition,” said Garble in a rumbling, fiery, imperious voice. “I especially like how the aesthetic shows some level of conquest over the surrounding area. I see you have a new acquisition.”

They all just gave Garble a disapproving look; Twilight almost gasped in fear and surprise as well. Garble was dressed in what looked like Fire orange ceremonial armor, complete with an ostentatiously gaudy helmet made to mimic his own appearance. With him were four completely naked ponies in nothing but collars that had an orange flame all across the center, there were no names to be found on any of them, but they all had steel bands, which were devoid of the flourish of a cutie mark imitation that Twilight and Pinkie had come to expect. It was clear; Garble saw ponies more disposable tools than genuine individuals. Their lack of attire just drew more attention to the pointlessly atrocious attire he was wearing, “Where is that white unicorn you seemed so fond of? I figured we could up the wager a bit,” Garble said in a snide voice dripping with narcissism and a superiority complex.

The four ponies he brought for the competition looked like Bulk Biceps, who had wings that seemed far too small for his body to fly effectively for extended periods of time like his counterpart; what looked like the counterpart to Chancellor Neighsay, he didn’t look like he was in too good of condition; a green earth pony mare that looked a bit undernourished; and the pony that had brought Twilight’s attention to full, what appeared to be the alternate version of Rainbow Dash, she definitely had the feisty attitude and aside from looking like she hadn’t had anything of substance to eat, was nearly identical in body structure and form to the Rainbow Dash she knew.

“Still mistreating your ponies, I see,” said Spike with contempt.

“And I can see you still insist on dressing up your possessions so they look prettier,” retorted Garble, “I really don’t care either way this goes, seeing as this is the last chance for all my combatants.” This caused Twilight and Pinkie to shiver in disgust and fear, they had heard what Garble likes to do with the ponies thinks failed him one too many times. It also seemed he missed that Chrysalis wasn’t quite a pony, small miracles do happen it seemed.

“Don’t worry, I won’t be telling my choice what you brought to the match, as per the agreement,” said Spike, “but I did think to have a written copy of our agreement transcribed for both of us, a third copy is with my sister so as to make sure you can’t wiggle out of pieces of the deal.” Wit that Spike handed Garble a reworked version of the transcript Twilight had initially written out. “Tell me if you spot anything that doesn’t sound right.”

Garble made a show of reading over the document a few times before bringing his face away from it, “I don’t see any problems, I was worried the wager didn’t have enough stakes. Tell you what, since we still have some time before the competition officially starts, let’s add in a little something extra.” Chrysalis lifted the clipboard and pen she was carrying and prepared to write down everything, “Upon my victory I also get that prized white unicorn of yours, the one that can find gemstones with little to no effort, if you seize victory this time I’ll turn over my breeding town closest to your territory to you with no fuss.” He caught sight of Chrysalis writing it all down.

“Sounds like a deal,” said Spike, he was still feeling very assured things wouldn’t go too bad for Shining Armor. “My assistant will get to work writing up the new transcripts at the earliest convenience, you should have a copy of the new agreement in your claws by the time the additional betting starts for the fight.”

Rainbow didn’t seem to notice Twilight or Pinkie, it looked like she had a directed seething hatred aimed directly at Garble to the point she had tunnel vision. Rainbow and the others looked like they had suffered quite a bit of abuse, most of it was clearly not consistent with the kinds of punishment one would receive in the arena.

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Garble gave an annoyed look; it was clear he hadn’t been expecting any written changes to be dealt with so quickly. Of course, he hadn’t expected to be backed into a corner with a written copy of his agreement with Spike either. Chances were Spike would have numerous backups of the written agreement and probably shared a few copies with various other dragons he had good relations with. The last thing he needed was the former Dragonlord breathing down his neck for violation of dragon agreements, which he would get if Spike really had shared any copies with former-Dragonlord Torch’s daughter, Ember. Spike and Ember had a closer relationship than Garble liked, numerous rumors that were neither confirmed nor denied about the two of them entertaining the idea of being mates.

Spike liked to make love to his pets, Garble found such an act distasteful. Garble only fed his ponies the bare minimum for the lifestyles he chose for them, something Spike severely disapproved of. The two of them had always been at odds, even before the competition to see who would succeed Torch as Dragonlord. Garble had practically rigged the ordeal against Spike, yet Spike had somehow managed to beat him to the scepter, he was still sore about that.

Spike was no fool, and definitely, far from being an idiot, his only real weakness was that he cared too much about his toys. The lesser species; ponies, diamond dogs, minotaurs, and griffins were all far beneath dragons. Changelings were nothing more than tales told by the lesser races to keep their unruly ones in check; the yacks were under the dominion of an ice dragon recluse that didn’t bother making an appearance when the prior Dragonlord called forth everyone for the challenge to be the next Dragonlord; and there was little available for these “kirin” creatures it was likely they were as real as changelings.

Granted, a dragon that claimed dominion over changelings or kirin would have great bragging rights but chances of that happening were probably less than zero. Garble may not be the brightest of dragons, a fact even he was willing to admit at times, but he was by no means an idiot, his firm grasp over his territory was proof enough of that. Claiming the pony cloud city was a stroke of genius, the less any other dragons knew about how absurdly lucky that bid was the better. He had the ponies broken up into three groupings, entertainment, breeding, and leisure. He had hoped that battle-ax of a cyan pegasus would have given into his rule like the rest he had broken after just her first three bouts in the arenas, he had tossed her in there when she was a scrappy young filly that had barely learned to fly, but she just kept at it. She badmouthed him in and out of the arena, made crude gestures in his direction whenever she so much as saw his silhouette or visage, and the only way to genuinely keep her in line was to threaten harm on those she felt closest to; Garble despised her but she was too much of a success for the fights for him to do his usual “retirement” of a pony. This match was his best chance to either be rid of her or show up Spike; either way should have been a win for him.

But now Spike had a written version of their agreement, it said almost exactly what they had agreed upon. Betting pieces of his territory on a match that was supposed to be skewed in his favor was definitively in the realm of his style, doubly so when it came to his grudge against Spike. This match would mean he would lose the pony cloud city, its name didn’t matter but the fact of who controlled it did, the one who controlled that city controlled the weather of almost any other dragon’s territory, barring a few special cases. Of course, he didn’t like the fact the best combatant for his territories was a pony that regularly seemed to defy the very orders she was given.

What Garble didn’t think of was the fact his orders were just vague enough to allow an angry pony to deck him a few times before he ordered them to stop. Thus far, the cyan pegasus was the only subversive in his slave ranks. He dared not execute her, he was well aware of the possibility of creating a martyr, better to just play off her loss as something that happened as a result of a miscalculated wager.

Now he just had to find a place to stay without being reliant Spike. Garble wanted a place that would give him the comforts he had grown attached to but he didn’t want any of what he was looking for to come to him via Spike’s misguided sense of courtesy. He also wanted to not be in Spike’s capital, chances were everything he was looking for were in the capital city but he wanted to be as far from Spike’s center of power as possible. Garble had always been told his pride would undo him in the end, he just waved it off every time because of that same pride, chances were it would bring him to ruin sooner or later.

The Match Begins

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Garble was feeling confident, Spike only had one champion but he had four. Granted, finding a place to stay in Spike’s territory was always a pain and a half but he managed it, hopefully for the last time. Garble hated hearing about how regulations in Spike’s territory insisted his ponies be better fed and cared for, what use did he have for rules and regulations regarding disposable tools, they were too short-lived to require any real care. He could almost taste his victory, Spike’s champion would soon be arriving.

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Shining was in his gladiator outfit, which was just something covering his groin and rear with a sash-like strap that moved across his front from the top left of the item’s front over his right shoulder then connecting to a similar point in the back. He didn’t mind this outfit too much; he actually had grown fond of it over his time in the arenas. What made him feel much better about all this was the fact all his closest friends were in a procession on the way to the arena with him, it was great to see Mac and Soarin again. When this was all over he planned to have a guys’ night out with them and just fool around like they had when they were younger, Spike more than allowed that with his policies.

Shining didn’t know much about the other dragons, other than what he learned during the time that surrounded his matches with their champions, but he did know quite a bit about Garble when compared to most other dragons aside from Spike. He had even watched a match between Garble’s champion and Spike’s go-to pony for the arenas when he was younger, that same pony had taught him the basics of the arenas and how to best make it through with minimal damage. Garble had a habit of barely feeding his arena ponies, the only ponies that were fed well were his breeding ponies, and his “leisure” ponies actually looked like they were spoiled when it came to food more than a few times when Shining saw them.

Garble had a policy of not permitting any of his ponies to wear clothing, something Spike and Shining thought was just plain stupid. Shining was not looking forward to the fight; his policy was to give a good show while keeping damages and injury to a minimum. Shining was thankful that his baby sister had provided him with new options in terms of magic, all of them fit with his combat style and approach.

Shining and the rest of the elite gladiators made their way to the arena, the look of shocked disdain on Garble’s face was almost worth the price of admission alone. Spike had gone around to all of them and struck a deal, he liked to keep his ponies happy and healthy. And from the sounds of it, they had gotten a pretty good deal, he, Soarin and Mac had both joked about being fathers on occasion but he hadn’t thought that would actually be one of the incentives for going with Spike’s plan for arrival at the arena, not that he was complaining. Half the time he went down with Cadance or Spitfire they were screaming about making them pregnant, he honestly couldn’t tell if they were just being kinky or genuinely wanted to be knocked up, either way worked for him, though.

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Rainbow Dash wasn’t happy, she was running on barely enough to operate properly and partnered with three other ponies she had never worked with before, it didn’t help she found didn't of their bodies particularly attractive. Garble just wanted to humiliate Spike or get rid of them all, it didn’t matter which way it went for him. Rainbow secretly hoped Garble would just get a massive gut punch and fall so hard he wouldn’t be able to move for days on end, but him getting humiliated publicly was a close second.

Rainbow hadn’t heard much about Spike, other than he was the current Dragonlord and had beaten Garble to the punch for the position, something Garble was incredibly sore and sour over. She figured anyone that could get under Garble’s scales like that was leagues above what she was familiar with. Two hundred years ago Garble had seized control of Cloudsdale, back when the city was still called that, through nothing more than sheer dumb luck, the particulars weren’t on record and any historical text that made so much as a passing mention was either burned ages ago or locked away in Garble’s private vault somewhere.

They all had heard Garble’s wager meant they would be transferred to Spike and their homes would be made into his territory as well, just because they all planned on losing this competition didn’t mean they weren’t going to put up a good fight. Rainbow was going to give it her all, her speed was her pride and joy and she wasn’t about to do anything that prevented the masses from knowing she was one of the fastest ponies alive.

Garble met them at the space before the gate into the arena and tossed them each a loaf of rock-hard bread and water in a leaky waterskin. “You’re getting extra rations now because no matter which pony he Spike sends out, you can rest assured they are one of his best gladiators, Garble growled at them, “Don’t disappoint me.”

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Spike was waiting in the VIP box with Chrysalis when Garble entered and took a seat next to him, “It all starts in the next few hours, the best champion shall reign supreme,” grumbled Garble.

“No personal attendant for such a momentous event,” said Spike mockingly, “for shame.” He took solace in the fact Twilight, Sunset, and Pinkie were all in a different viewing location for the event, the less contact they had with Garble the better.

“I found my duties so tedious I started sourcing them out to the resident of my capital city, my position means I have a lot to deal with. The alicorns do good work, but I didn’t realize how good it felt to have a personal assistant before one of my researchers suggested it and showed me the benefits, she’s back to her original duties and this is my new personal aide,” he gestured to Chrysalis, “she was closer than you might think but not quite as expected when I found her. Rest assured, her devotion to me is without question.” Chrysalis merely gave a curt bow, saying nothing. Spike had instructed her to play the part of a mute in Garble’s presence.

“Really, now?” Came a female dragon's voice that carried an air of importance and respect for Spike in equal measure, “I should look into my assortment and pick an appropriate selection then.” Spike and Garble both knew this voice, it was Ember, the daughter of the former Dragonlord, “Thank you ever so much for the invite, Spike, things in my territory have been absolutely dull the past few decades.” She came into view, she was wearing a dark maroon business dress with a large “V” section up front, it did an excellent job of showing off her impressively big EEE-Cup bust, she didn’t feel inadequate next to others with a larger bust size and was proud to play mock jealousy on more than a few occasions. She also liked to make sport of irritating Garble.

“I take it that pony you claimed your capital from two thousand years ago has finally become more agreeable,” said Spike, “maybe you could make him play the part of your personal aide?”

“Well, he is one of my prized possessions, and I am more than proud to show him off whenever possible,” said Ember as she settled into a seat on the opposite side of Spike from Garble, “I’ll think about it. When is this competition supposed to start?”

“Any moment now, we’re just waiting for the go-ahead from the combatants they’re ready to the gatemasters.”

“Excellent,” said Garble, “I trust my choices will not hold things up.” He then gave a sneer and mumbled something about disgraces under his breath.

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The gates to the arena opened and Shining stepped out in his ceremonial gladiator attire with a stunning spear in hand. He would remain true to his style, no killing. Rules of the arena just said that the battle would cease when all combatants were no longer able to continue, a paralysis effect fed into those words quite nicely.

Rainbow and the others entered the arena as they always did, naked with a single weapon at the ready. For Rainbow it was a handaxe, even though she wanted to use something else Garble had given her the command she could only use the handaxe only in all arena battles; the other pegasus, Rainbow never got the names of her fellow combatants because Garble insisted no ponies have names in his presence or where he can read things, had a crossbow with a clip of 20 bolts; the unicorn had a spear, probably to mirror the weapon of choice their opponent possessed; and the earth pony had a war hammer, that heavy head looked like it could do some damage and the Spike looked like it would not be something you want to deal with. This match was not going to be fun.

Rainbow raced forward in flight, she would have been faster if she had been fed better, at the most speed she could muster. The sound of the crossbow firing and the other ponies charging could be heard. Then out of nowhere came this massive, translucent lavender shield bubble. Rainbow pulled away just fast enough to avoid striking it with her body, but not fast enough to avoid clipping her wing on the shield. The sound of the bolt cracking on the shield confirmed it was indeed a shielding spell. The unicorn tried to form a breach in the shield with his own magic wrapped about the spear but it only resulted in the weapon changing from a spear to a staff with a bunch of cracks at one end.

Before he could respond further the unicorn went down thanks to a spell that completely paralyzed him, another slammed into the earth pony and stopped him before she noticed the shield slowly receding, before the bubble completely disappeared the other pegasus was frozen in the arena with a paralysis spell as well.

Now it was just Rainbow and this opposing pony, he didn’t seem to try zapping her with any spell, probably assessed her speed was too good for a single hit. She planned on giving a good show, and she was going to deliver, as soon as she figured out how. Rainbow dashed to the other side of the arena; more distance meant things were more in her favor until she could figure out how to circumvent the unicorn’s shield, mid-range spells, and spear.

The Match in Earnest

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This blue pegasus was fast, Shining was more than willing to admit that but it seemed her malnourishment hindered her abilities, especially her reaction time. It looked like Garble’s priorities weren’t any different from when Shining was a colt. Shining had some sort of need to prove himself when he was younger, becoming a gladiator had been his choice. Most went out to retire after five or six years of official fights in Arena, they became one of Spike’s elite gladiators when they passed the threshold of a thousand battles, this was Shining fourteen hundredth match. After this last match, he was going to call it quits in the arena, barring some very special circumstances. With Spike after you cleared seventy official matches, you were free to retire from the stadium, if you were a gladiator you were not allowed to retire from his arena before that mark was met.

Back when he was younger Shining found himself fighting dozens of matches a week, then six or seven years ago he found himself only competing in a few matches after almost half a year of inactivity on his part. Yes, the elite gladiators didn’t see matches as often as the lower ranking gladiators, but before that point at least he got two or three matches in every month. He had been referred to as the “Rising Star of the Magi” almost as soon as he made it into Spike’s elite unicorn gladiators, and no one had bothered to change the title. Shining was fine with all that, but it was a bit embarrassing to still be called that sort of thing when he had been the de facto leader, of sorts, of the Magi for almost half his time within them.

This blue pegasus mare was definitely intent on drawing the match out, Shining wasn’t sure if she knew about the agreement but if she did that meant she was intent on making her opponent work for it. That suited Shining just fine, he had no respect for combatants that had no intention of putting on a show. But he couldn’t make the fight last too long, the paralysis spell he used only had a five-minute time limit before dissipating, and it had already been two minutes since he fired the first of the three. And while firing off other spells his shield lost power and faded out due to lack of focus on it, he couldn’t do a trick like that again because it had relied upon a surprise that likely wouldn’t come again.

Shining decided to take a noticeable risk, this maneuver would leave him a bit drained but would be worth it if he managed to score so much as a glancing hit. Shining started charging the spell, it would take some time to build up properly.

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Rainbow dropped the ground, her ability to stay airborne was fading, best to keep her wings in reserve when she needed to make quick evasive actions. The white unicorn seemed to be prepping a big spell; he seemed to be counting on her apprehension to win it for him. She didn’t know how long the paralysis induced by his spell would wear off, but from the act of him trying to do something big, it probably meant it would be fading out any moment now. This was her chance at getting in close and scoring, assuming he wasn’t anticipating such a play.

Rainbow screwed up her courage and made a dash for it; almost all her energy was being put into this. She wasn’t flying, but she was using her wings to give the run a massive boost. This play was her lost shot; she wanted to at least be able to say she gave it her all. She held her ax close, blade facing outward, if she extended any arms, especially the one with a combat tool, outward too soon it would cause unnecessary drag.

This was her last shot score any kind of blow, there was no way she was going to pass it up. Her future was riding on the outcome, and even though the preferable outcome came at a loss she would never forgive herself for the happenings if she didn’t do anything to make some sort of show at earning it. Rainbow had fought a few unicorns, but none that anyone would rightfully call an elite in the arena before now.

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Shining smiled at the sight of the cyan pegasus mare running at him faster than she probably should have been able to, she was probably using her wings to add a little extra thrust to her movement, clever. But this actually was playing into his plan; the build-up was actually a combination of spells that he was going to fire off simultaneously, it was more effective at closer distances than at range. Just when his opponent would be at range to properly ready an attack at the speeds she was going without noticeable issue, Shining would be releasing his spell; it was time to end this match.

Shining wanted to end the match quickly as possible, and his final adversary was making sure he finished it all in style. He would have to thank her after this, assuming she was willing to accept his gratitude. Shining always did have a thing for pegasus mares, but he always liked to make sure they were will to have intercourse with him. He had lucked out with Cadance, she had been a special gift from Spike for his earning the position of Head Magi, shortly after sharing the same complex with Cadance he started to learn just how much of a kinky mare she was. Of course, shortly after that, he started bringing Spitfire and a few other pegasus mares home with him for a night or short visit only find them moving in with him a few days later. Something told him this pegasus probably wasn’t going to join his little herd.

Just when the blue pegasus mare was at twenty feet from him, the distance she started bringing her weapon out for a swing, Shining unleashed his combo spell. The spell was a combo of a magic force blast, magic chain, Shadow, and binding spell. The spells all together created a minor amalgam effect. In addition to pushing the target back and thoroughly binding all their limbs, the combo also disabled the target’s magical abilities for a few seconds and had a paralyzing effect on the target. His opponent couldn’t move even if she wanted to, the match was ended.

Shining was visibly exhausted after that stunt, if the match had gone on any longer after that he would have bit it hard. The effects of that combo weren't known for having lasting effects, but you needed short spell durations in the arena anyway. No doubt, if Twilight was watching she would come and pester him about the combo after the match, maybe come back to him a few days later with what she thought would improve the efficiency of the maneuver.

*******************************************************

“You always lose your matches against me because of a lack of foresight and failure to give your gladiators proper care,” said Spike nonchalantly, “those combatants you sent in are mine now, along with the towns and cities they hail from.”

“Just wait until the next match,” grumbled Garble.

“Which reminds me,” said Spike, he turned to Chrysalis and said, “turn on the stadium-wide audio system, I have a few announcements to make.” Chrysalis nodded and left the room, a minute later a 1950s style microphone rose out of the ground, “To all the spectators, no matter what demographic you are, I have a few things to say.” Garble didn’t like where this seemed to be going, “we, the dragons, enjoy a position as the rightful rulers of our dominions and territories, and what we do in those territories is our business. That said, I am now establishing new policies that are non-negotiable, any found in violation of these policies will be forced into compliance by the scepter, but I only see that as a last resort. Item one, all collared individuals are to treated in such a way they are considered healthy for their species, to this end I will have specialists that answer only to the organization that reviews health standards that I am establishing and will be out in effect in the next year or so, the sight of malnourished ponies, like those brought before my champion today are a sign of a need to hold ourselves to higher standards. Item two, from this moment forward, any standing Dragonlord can only be challenged three times a century. Garble, due to his poor habits has already exceeded this mandate. Any found in violation of these policies, regardless of when they were stated or enacted will be held accountable and suitably punished. Since these are new policies, I’m willing to let things slide for the past five decades or so. Sadly, Garble has made it a habit to challenge me at least once a decade, since he is still very much in a state of infraction on the second policy, I will personally issue his punishment.”

When Spike turned his attention to Garble, he just got a mean look for a moment before Garble said, “I doubt any punishment you can enact will have lasting effects on me for more than a few decades, at most.

“Garble, aside from your primary city and its neighboring breeding community, you are stripped of all your territory for the crime of repeated failed assault on the Dragonlord. What is left of your former territory will be parceled out to the dragons who either wish to claim it for themselves or will be immediately handed it if it is found to be bordering their territory.”

Garble gulped, even though Dragonlords the power do such a thing, very few actually did. No dragon could recall the last time a Dragonlord had done so, the next few weeks would not be fun, especially since he couldn’t reclaim the territory for a minimum of three months, by which point all his former territory would be under the command of who knows how many dragons. He also didn’t like this mandated caring for pets and slaves, what one did in their territory was their problem and no one else's.

What Spike did was unprecedented, no Dragonlord had ever set a limit on how many times they could be challenged before, but no Dragonlord had caused as many changes to the status quo as Spike had before. Dragonlords usually ruled with power and overbearing authority that was reinforced by said power, Spike ruled by means less overt but still showed how much he could flex the power of his authority when needed.

Placing the New Ponies

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Spike was both excited and apprehensive about what was coming, all the ponies that had fought Shining Armor were now in the collaring room of the processing center. He was not happy about the fact three entire towns would need to be collared, turns out the earth pony and bulky pegasus were from the same place. In addition to acquiring those places, Spike had to name them, mostly because Garble’s taste in names was as uninspired as it was narcissistic. Garble and all the other visiting individually had left the site almost four hours prior, which left Spike with more than the usual cleanup from such events.

Spike let out a shallow, drawn-out sigh before saying, “First thing, above all else, I need to have your names on file and record, I keep tabs on my ponies and having their names in files helps due to my lack of ability to keep up with names at times. This is my new personal aide,” he gestured to Chrysalis, “her name is Chrysalis, her main duty is to keep me on task. Secondly, we will be getting you decent meals; attire might be a bit tricky at the moment on account the pony I usually call on for this sort of thing has a few more months of punishment to contend with for behavioral issues. That all said, I would like to learn your aspirations in addition to your names; I find my subordinates and subjects are more productive when they have a choice in the matter of what they do.”

The four all looked at Spike in surprise, they had all gone practically their entire lives not being called their names in a public environment or any dragons before now. Rainbow, who had a brashness to her that hadn’t been beaten out of her, stepped forward and said, “My name is Rainbow Dash, I don’t care what I do as long as I’m the fastest around and can prove it.”

“Hmm,” said Spike, “Pinkie did say something about needing a dedicated delivery service, she also said the faster things get to their destination the better, I’ll post you with her until you ask for a change of employment and we’ll see if we can work something more your liking and speed out.”

“Um, thanks,” said Rainbow in surprise, “who is Pinkie?”

“One of my special ponies that I keep in the city, said Spike, “she runs and manages a party store, I’ll give you a proper introduction to her later. Now, who is next?”

“My name is Bulk Biceps,” the bulky white pegasus practically shouted, “as long as I can put my muscles to use helping out I don’t really care where I go.”

“Ah,” said Spike, “we have some construction crews that made some help requests recently, we’ll see if they require a pony with your physique as soon as we can.”

“Already have it marked down on the to-do list,” said Chrysalis, “and I just sent a message to one of my runners to look into the matter.”

“Brutally efficient as always,” said Spike, “that’s why I always make sure to set time aside to ‘reward’ you properly.”

“That’s scheduled for the end this week,” said Chrysalis with a smirk, it was clear she didn’t miss a beat.

“My name is Neighsay,” said the unicorn, “I am interested in furthering the education of ponies in a manner that will be mainly to their benefit.”

“It is on the itinerary and I have some subordinates looking further into the matter,” said Chrysalis as she scribbled something in her pad.

“Excellent,” said Spike, “I take education in my territories more seriously than most other dragons. And you, my dear?”

“I’m Garden delight,” said the green earth pony mare, “I just want to give everyone tasty food.”

“Excellent, there are some communities in my territory that need good dining establishments.”

“I’ll see to it that the crews working on the new town near Macintosh’s farm get word so they can begin prepping for a dining establishment,” said Chrysalis, “you did say we needed to be on the lookout for potential businesses for the area.”

“Indeed, I did,” said Spike, “now, another reason why I require your names is because I like to have the names of all collared individuals right there on the front of the collar, it’s so if I ever encounter you at a later time or date I can know who you are at a quick glance. Now, behave yourselves and things will go quickly.” With a gesture, the collar replacement team entered the room and with that, he and Chrysalis left the room.

__________________________________________________________

“How do you think things are now?” Twilight asked Pinkie, she was quite a bit worried, Rainbow looked like she hadn’t a good meal in ages; if that was how Rainbow was then things probably weren’t any better for Fluttershy.

“You said Shining won the match,” said Pinkie as she placed the last of the roasted almond pegasus figures on the four-tiered rectangular cake with frosting that made it look like as if it were a cloud, “I’m sure Spike’s just orientating them all to how things work in his territory and making some much-needed arrangements.” She took out her set of frostings that were designed to act like paints and started painting the almond pegasi to look like Rainbow Dash, “I didn’t need your report on that, I was there for the match too. You think this world’s Dashie will like her welcome cake?”

“Definitely,” said Twilight, “if she has as much of a high opinion of herself as our Dash. She would probably appreciate it more if it came at the end of a good meal, one where she could just stuff herself.”

“Good idea,” said Pinkie, “if her preferred foods are like those of the Rainbow we know, I know just what to make for her. Good thing the shop is closed the public right now, they’ll probably come to visit here at some point. I better get to work on the buffet, I’ll make it as good as I can do with what I can get a hold of.”

“I’ll help, whichever of the four comes to visit, they will need some good food. Besides, more ponies means more you can haul back. Where is Sweetie Drops?”

“I already have her out gathering more baking supplies, which is going to be hard when you consider the state of most businesses at the moment.”

“Then we better get a hurry on this, no telling when they could come by.”

*******************************************************

Rainbow was surprised, the four of them weren’t eating together as a unit, they were each taken to a different part of the city and set up with potential work partners, those work partners were the ones that took each of them out for some food. Rainbow was nervous, she was the last of the four to be brought to her first place of potential employment. The structure looked like some giant being had barfed up a bunch of party materials, but in an attractive way, and there was a lot of pink! Rainbow had no problems with pink; it was an okay color, her best friend back home had a naturally pink mane after all.

When she entered with Spike and Chrysalis she saw a purple unicorn setting out dishes on a collection of pushed in tables, it all looked so good she could feel her mouth watering. Then it happened, the sexiest pony she had ever seen bounced into the room in nothing but a blue apron, her bubble pink coat, and fluffy dark pink mane was eye-catching in all the right ways. She was little pudgy in the gut and plot, but just meant more to play with and love. She started wondering where those thoughts were coming from; she had never had any kind of feelings of that nature regarding other ponies.

“The unicorn is Twilight Sparkle,” said Spike, “she's my head researcher, but she focuses mainly on magic in her studies. The pink pony over there, that is Pinkie Pie, she is my greetings and party specialist, she also happens to be one of my best cooks outside the castle.”

Rainbow’s wings just flashed out in sexual excitement as the pink mare approached, “Hi there,” said in a bubbly voice, the happiness in it was almost contagious, “I’m Pinkie Pie, and you must be Rainbow Dash. If you’re wondering how I know, I make it my business to know everypony.”

“Ahem, yes,” Spike coughed, “Pinkie is also in charge of the backups for all dossiers and personal files, she knows how to keep them safe and I know she won’t abuse the information at her fingertips for malicious reasons or ends.”

“I made a buffet of things I’m sure you’ll like,” said Pinkie, Spike and Chrysalis, along with Twilight, took this as their cue to leave, “you can go about it any way you want.” By the end of the sentence Spike, Twilight, and Chrysalis had left the building, “and when you’re done with all that I have special sweet I made just for you.”

Rainbow saw the plates but ignored them, she just went straight for the platter of sandwiches and tore into them like a dragon in a sea of gemstones. After that she moved onto the wraps, then rolls. She paused at the omelets, she had no idea how to approach this food.

Pinkie just giggled in amusement at it all; Rainbow was even thot her giggles were cute. This food was the tastiest thing she had ever had, which wasn’t saying much when you considered most of the food she had been given over the course of her life was something you could barely call food to begin.

About a half hour after Pinkie had shown her how to dig into an omelette, and even fed her personally with the first one, Rainbow was sitting in a chair enjoying the feeling of a full stomach when Pinkie came out with a massive cake that looked like it had been made emulate clouds that was adorned with little versions of her. This was the best day of her life, it almost made her feel bad about going as hard on Shining Armor as she had. Rainbow and other ponies had learned Shining’s name during Spike’s orientation session.

Pinkie set the massive cake down before Rainbow and placed a plate, fork, knife, and napkin down just a little bit closer to Rainbow than the cake. “Enjoy,” said Pinkie in her chipper voice, “if you want, after this, we can either go out for some fun or stay in and have some fun, it’s all up to you.”

Rainbow looked at the cake, she was still feeling stuffed from her gorging several minutes prior but she also felt it would be rude to not eat the cake as soon as she possibly could. It was at right around this time she realized she was still naked; Pinkie didn’t seem to mind though, at least she didn’t say anything about it. Usually this wouldn’t bother her but Spike had said something about getting her and the others clothes, it kind of looked like the term “attire” was stretched to its furthest limit with Pinkie only going about in an apron, she had seen other inhabitants of the city going around in a variety of outfits, some more revealing than others.

Rainbow wondered, just what would her outfit be like? Who would be involved in the decision besides herself? Why was she sexually attracted to Pinkie Pie?

The Cloud City

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“Garbled Storm Fort” was no name for a city, a military facility maybe but not a highly populated area that was filled with non-military individuals. Spike looked about a bit, what to name it? That was the million spine question at the moment. Spike and Chrysalis were now standing in the cloud city; Spike was busy looking around. Also, Spike was not happy with how accurate he could call out on Garble’s penchant for names, the place was almost as narcissistically named as it was moronically named. Thankfully the place had been evacuated of all Garble’s subordinate dragons.

“What shall we have the city named, Master?” Chrysalis asked in the manner he had grown to enjoy, her voice was so sensual it made him feel like he was getting hard at times.

“I’m trying to think of that,” said Spike, “my siblings and I have a bit of an issue with giving things and places names, have any suggestions?”

Chrysalis took a moment; it looked as if she was thinking, “I’m sorry to say, my lord, that changelings share your plight of lacking proper naming ides.”

“Well it was worth a shot, maybe something will hit me before I do the big meeting thing.”

“According to the records I was able to acquire, both the official and unofficial, Garble had all his subordinate dragons pull out of the area, he also had all critical posts for the city helmed exclusively by subordinate dragons. So basically, the city’s entire infrastructure has been left in shambles because of your acquisition of this city, the same is likely true of other communities you acquired as part of your deal.”

“That sounds like Garble, thinking positions of power are only effective when held by a dragon. It looks like I’m going to have to appoint a lot of ponies to new positions and do something about restoring the infrastructures.”

“The price of being the one in charge, my lord.”

*********************************************************

It was almost two hours since Spike had arrived in the cloud city, it took longer to set things up than had been anticipated. Spike looked around, this square didn’t have nearly as many ponies as he had feared, or hoped, but there were still quite a lot of pegasi gathered around. “First thing is, before all else,” said Spike to the crowd, “Garble no longer has control of this place, as per an agreement of competition, control of this place was ceded to me. I’m aware this city’s infrastructure is in shambles because of Garble’s way of doing things, that is not how I have ever done things. I am the current Dragonlord, Spike, I have no doubt many of you have heard terrible things about me as part of Garble’s propaganda. I can’t speak towards their validity because I haven’t heard what they are just yet, just know that my approach to things is much different.” With that a collection of four dozen buffet tables had their tops pulled off by Chrysalis’s magic to reveal a massive spread of food, “All the food on the tables is here for your enjoyment, none of it contains anything of danger to ponies. I know because ponies made and tested it all the way up to the point that delivery started.”

Chrysalis floated in a collection of boxes that had been enchanted to not fall through the clouds, “And as part of an effort to make you feel more comfortable,” said Chrysalis, “we have brought to you a wide selection of clothing for you to wear in any manner you wish, please enjoy these gifts along with your provided meal. Once you are comfortably attired and have eaten as much as you are can from the provided spread. We regret to inform you that we may not have been able to provide enough for everyone here to be properly sated, but at least there should be enough here to help begin undoing the lack of nourishment you have been given up until now. Take this as your cue to start getting food and clothing, we just ask you to do so in a manner that is respectful to all who are gathered here. Once you are properly fed and attired we will continue with this meeting.”

Also, as part of this meeting, Spike had Spitfire and several of his other pegasi helping to hand out food to all the ponies that approached the tables, three pegasi to manage each table was the policy enacted by Spike. Most of the buffet tables were almost covered by their spreads. Also among the pegasi handing out food was a much healthier looking Rainbow Dash, who had been genuinely surprised when she heard Spike asking for pegasus volunteers for the trip to the cloud city. Also in the background, were some unicorns armed with the cloud walking spell, Twilight and Sunset among them. As much as she was loathsome to teach the spell to Chrysalis, Twilight had complied with the request without being forced into it, the spell was then quickly sent down the line to all the changelings in her hive.

**************************************************************

Three hours, and many dirty dishes later, the massive legion of pegasi that constituted the crowd and nearly devoured everything at the tables, a certain pink maned yellow pegasus mare had caught many there with surprise at just how much she could down in the time the pegasi spent feasting. Rainbow had even commented being surprised the yellow mare could put away. All the pegasi were genuinely surprised to see other pegasi managing the crowd to ensure all the participants got to at least have some of the spread before anyone else came back for more, which many did indeed do. The greatest surprise to all the citizens was the fact Rainbow Dash was there to assist with things and willingly chosen to be a part of all that was going.

Twilight had looked like she wanted to say something but stopped herself quite quickly. All the pegasi were in outfits of varying levels of scanty, but none had any comments for complaints. Fluttershy was in a string bikini, a scandalously small one, after she had gone through the boxes and picked out an outfit, Twilight had a hard time processing that Fluttershy would consciously, and willingly, choose such an outfit for herself. Granted, most of the less revealing outfits had already been pilfered from the boxes before Fluttershy had gotten there but it was still a surprise that out of the literally dozens of boxes Fluttershy had only looked through four before picking out what she saw as the most complete outfit. And it wasn’t just mares that had this sort of revealing dilemma, most of the stallions were also in surprisingly revealing attire as well.

Apparently, Spike likes ponies in skimpy outfits. Twilight wasn’t happy, she just kept the spent the rest of the visit to the cloud city giving Spike the stink eye. Rainbow’s attire, and the term is rather loosely used in this case, consisted of a sports bra and thong, and nothing else at all. All in all, what all the ponies were wearing was still better than nothing.

“Now that you’ve all had some good food go into you,” said Spike, “It’s time to deal with other pressing issues. This city, henceforth, shall be known as Firmament Sanctuary. I want to convey to you that this is a safe place for you all once more.” Spike was usually pretty bad with names, taking a look at most of the names for communities in his territory could easily tell you that, but when he put his mind to thinking about what he wanted to convey for the community he could spit out a few gems. “In the coming weeks citizens will be placed in positions of power within the city’s infrastructure but until then, I will have ponies I have had access to for quite some time overseeing things while I have the appropriate individuals gather the necessary information that will assist in my choosing a more qualified individual from among the populace for each position. Now, before I depart, I will introduce you to your new temporary administrators and do my best to answer questions and address any concerns you have.”

**********************************************************

Five hours, Spike had just spent that long speaking with the residents of his new cloud city, answering questions and the like. It seemed he had opened a massive set of floodgates when he said he would address questions and concerns the ponies of the city had. Thankfully, a few of them expressed gratitude for having the city get a more dignified, and pony sounding, name.

Chrysalis already had changelings going about learning what they could about the entire population of the city. As per his policy, Pinkie was getting a copy of the reports on ponies as well. The pony known as Fluttershy had asked if it was possible to move elsewhere, Spike had not only given her definitive yes but also had an up to date map of his territory, minus the freshly acquired communities, shown to all the ponies there and pointed to each community and gave a brief summary of what they were like, in the case of the town going up next to Macintosh’s farm he stated the town was still being built and what he hoped the community would be like.

Twilight finally got a chance to get a better look at Rainbow’s mark, without coming off a bit of a pervert. Rainbow’s mark in this universe was her distinctive tri-colored bolt in the form of a shield with a spear-shaped lightning bolt composed of three complementary colors to those of the shield crossing over it. It seemed oddly fitting for Rainbow, seeing as she was the most willing to get into a fight back home. That said, Twilight was concerned about the relationship she had with Pinkie in this world.

Regardless, Twilight did approve of Spike’s name for the alternate version of Cloudsdale. The ponies here were in for a bit of a rough transition period. Limited wardrobes aside, all the ponies who called the city home were looking much better.

Arriving in the Crystal Territory

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As much as it annoyed her to do so, Twilight was working with Sunset on a number of projects, not just the transdimensional device. She was assisting in creating a set of helmets that would allow the users to make use of her memory sharing spell, with numerous safeguards and security measures to ensure misuse from the intended function was much more difficult. Twilight really wanted to get the interdimensional beacon device up and running, but it seemed they were having issues producing some of the parts.

Twilight was laying on her bed in the nude, she would be doing it in her nightgown but the collar’s magic made that option an impossibility, staring at the ceiling wondering just how far she and Pinkie would sink into depravity here before getting back home. As she stared at the ceiling, she heard the sound of Shining and Cadance rutting each other, again, and did her best to tune it out, with minimal success. That was at home, right now she was experiencing her second night on the train, the relative simplicity and minor vibrations of the train car as it moved over the tracks was a nice respite from the intense opulence that was Twilight’s home in this world.

Twilight’s plans went sideways when she was informed she would be joining Spike on a trip to Ember’s territory, Twilight didn’t like the implications of things when you took a look at what the Spike in this universe was like. She had barely caught a glimpse of Ember on her short visit, now she was on a train with Spike heading north. Twilight didn’t think much of it, that is until she recalled Spike mentioning that he had offered to help Ember with a project to see if they could grow crystal plants outside their usual place. The only place crystal plants that Twilight could think of was the Crystal Empire, she suddenly started wondering how Ember had gotten control of the Crystal Empire.

That line of thinking got her wondering how Ember had managed to best King Sombra. Twilight started wondering just how Sombra was bested by a dragon when everything she knew about fighting him said a lone dragon shouldn’t be enough to defeat Sombra. She magicked a bathrobe over to her and tightened the belt for insurance, she didn’t want to be caught in the buff as she moved about the train.

The ride was about as fast as she was used to, taking two to three days to get to the Crystal Empire. Spike, Chrysalis, and Twilight had boarded the train just two days ago. The Crystal Empire should be coming up on their stopping route within the next few hours. That all said, Twilight still didn’t understand why Spike insisted she come along on this trip.

She needed to be back helping with the device, even if Sunset was being distracted by her and actively trying to distract her as well. Okay, so maybe it wasn’t a good idea to have Twilight and Sunset in the same set of rooms together, seems Spike had paired them up during the rebuilding of Sunset’s abode just so he could get an idea what the two them in the same general area for extended periods of time was like. And, chances were, Sunset would likely make an active movement to find Twilight if they were in the same city for the time being.

****************************************************************

When Twilight was finally dressed and could see the Crystal Empire gleaming on their way to the gleaming city. From what she could see, there was nothing different from what she was used to, at a distance anyway. When they pulled into the station she saw towering, gleaming statues of Ember, completely naked, covering the city. The statues were erected in much the same way Spike’s was back home, but at least his statue had something protecting his modesty.

Almost ten minutes after Twilight had spotted the first set of statues the train pulled into the station and she got off with Spike and Chrysalis, there was no one at the station to greet them. Thankfully, the 3 of them didn’t have any luggage, the closest thing to luggage any of them had was Chrysalis’s clipboard with notes and a set of writing implements in her immediate reach. Looking around Twilight noticed the crystal ponies were following a similar attire scheme to that of the alternate Canterlot, just a bit more glittery and with more naked ponies. The three made their way to the castle after confirming all their traveling companions were at or near the platform.

“I’m guessing Ember defeated King Sombra,” said Twilight as they made their way through the city.

“Yup, she pummeled and collared him,” said Spike without a hint of snark or irony, “he’s one of her ‘special’ appropriations. Not to mention, his abilities are quite useful.”

“What abilities?” said Twilight in surprise, “all I really know about him is that he was a practitioner of dark magic and it corrupted him into becoming a shadow when he was defeated in the world I’m familiar with.”

“Well,” said Chrysalis as they were making their way to the castle, “according to records I was given on this place, Sombra was the reigning dictator before Ember bested him and took this place as her territory. I don’t know anything about dark magic, but according to what Ember has shared he has some sort of innate magic that allows him to grow and manipulate crystals. It is the presence of this ability, and the properties of the crystal and jeweled produce are the reasons for her intense power among most of the ruling dragons.”

“If I remember correctly, Ember was a chief contender for Dragonlord. The way I remember things, Spike managed to claim the scepter then turned it over Ember and said she could have the job.”

“Well, it’s nice to hear how things were for another me,” said Spike with amusement, “but in this world I managed to beat Ember and Garble by a sizeable margin, Ember bowed to it with the kind of grace one who enjoys a good competition would but Garble didn’t take it well, hence our pointless rivalry. Did your Spike do anything amusing in his brief few minutes as Dragonlord?”

“I wasn’t there personally,” said Twilight, “but I heard from the Ember Pinkie and I know that Spike ordered Garble to give immense hugs to a number of dragons and was not permitted say how or why he was doing it. Now, I know you don’t want to use the power of the scepter to command other dragons to do things they might be against, but maybe you could at least use its power to make Garble less hostile or something to that effect.”

“I will consider it,” said Spike, “at the very least, I might be able to actually relax a bit more if I do decide to pull that off. Also, that sounds like immense comedic gold; I’ll have to get the details from the Spike you’re familiar with.”

A few minutes later they were coming up on the castle; guards appeared to be crystal earth ponies, in very revealing armor for some odd reason, Twilight could do more than make out the bulges that evidence of where their penises were. Now, Twilight would never admit this to anyone, especially herself, but she was conflicted over her attractions to the anatomically superior proportioning of muscle on the earth pony stallion figure, in that one set of notes she wrote on what she wanted in the ideal partner that she immediately burned and resolved to never reference or speak of again, and the anatomical layout that is the wings of pegasus stallions. Admittedly, both her brother and Applejack also seemed to have an attraction to wings in a manner that might just be more than a fetish. But for Twilight, it was an attraction to both the forms of the male earth pony and pegasus for slightly different reasons that drew her initial attention. And this place was just making those thoughts more pronounced, especially when they were in armor that had more to do appealing to unrealistic Fantasy settings and erotic imagery.

It seemed Spike and Ember had similar tastes in how they had the ponies under their command attired; Twilight really didn’t want to think about the implications of such things, especially with specimens that the sight of which were making her have to fight erotic thoughts of her own. Twilight was very concerned about what the psyches of Pinkie and herself would be like when they finally managed to get home, more than she wanted to contemplate thinking about.

Spike's Surprising Problem

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That strange project had allowed them to make contact with Twilight; the one Spike knew better than this other one in her body. It was never a fun sight to see Twilight in next to nothing playing with her bosom, it made him feel uneasy. Casual comments by Twilight and Pinkie the past few days were just making him feel uneasy. Of all the problems he would have in the world, Spike had not anticipated Twilight being an erotic ditz. It was one thing to see Twilight had pulled an all-nighter with a sizable nest of books, it was completely different when she did all that with a small collection of saucy fantasy books with literally no attire to speak of. Pinkie was less of a problem, mostly because she didn’t room in the castle and actually bothered to wear some semblance of clothes half the time, the other half had her going through town in little more than an apron casually commenting that it was her usual attire.

To make matters worse, Twilight’s eating habits almost seemed to be from some sort of pornographic film half the time. They really needed to get everything fixed soon as possible, possibly sooner. Thankfully the actions of Twilight and Pinkie weren’t anything lewd, although they did seem to get awfully close to being that way on more than a few occasions. Of course, Twilight being unintentionally erotic was a problem in its own right. Spike didn’t know the circumstances regarding his counterpart, but the Twilight he knew was like an older sister to him, and no matter how you sliced it, being sexually attracted to your own sister was a bit off-putting.

The situation with Pinkie wasn’t much better, why did this Pinkie have to be such a tease? Spike had gone to bed in his room, on his bed, and made sure the door and windows to the room were closed and locked several times only to wake up the following morning with Pinkie’s bosom as his pillow for some reason. Like this morning, and as a bonus she also made it so he was missing his pajama top.

***********************************************

After getting up and taking a quick shower, which now involved locking and bracing the door to keep unwanted guests from entering, Spike was in the middle of making breakfast when Pinkie popped up, in just a purple apron with her mark on it and nothing else. “Pinkie, I’ve told you at least a dozen times, wear more than an apron when in the kitchen, I want this place to be as free of possible contaminants as possible.”

“Sorry,” said Pinkie, “but I’m not wearing my collar and the commands of my Spike supersede any command you give me. Besides, I always go around in nothing but an apron back home.”

“Well, you aren’t home now,” said Spike in minor annoyance as he facepalmed and let his hand slide down his face for a moment, “and your choice of attire is making everyone around town start to feel a bit uneasy. For the foreseeable future, which means the remainder of your stay in this world, I recommend you wear a shirt and pants when you are out in public or moving about town. I honestly don’t care what you have on under that, nor do I think anypony else will either, but the least you could do is be courteous to the locals.”

“Okie Dokie Loki,” said Pinkie in her usual chipper voice, “I’ll get on that tomorrow.”

“How about now,” said Spike pointedly, “just go see Rarity and explain the arrangement we’ve come to. And for the love Celestia, please don’t wander around with nothing or next to nothing around me, it might be fine with your Spike but it makes me feel uncomfortable, same holds true with Twilight.”

“What is she doing?”

“Stuff that’s almost as distracting as what you’ve been doing, thankfully I managed to convince her to tone it all down. Not that it’s any help half the time.” Spike thought back to his conversation with Twilight, she seemed to understand what he was getting at but only shifted from wearing nothing during her late times in the library to wearing next to nothing, seeing his adoptive sister in only her undergarments really didn’t make him feel any better, sometimes it made him feel worse.

As always, the attire Rarity made was a visual spectacle, Spike just wished this Twilight didn’t insist on “sexy” undergarments during her visit with said white mare. Revealing outerwear was one thing, but revealing undergarments was an entirely different issue. When asked, both Twilight and Pinkie said something about their Spike insisting on showing off in the capitol. Spike groaned and gave himself another facepalm every time he had to explain they weren’t in the capitol.

He had sent more than a few letters to Celestia, Luna, and Cadance about it all. All three responded in a manner that reflected their usual flairs. Cadance’s response was a package that once opened contained the sound of her laughter for a full half hour, much to Spike’s chagrin; Luna’s response was a formal statement about how males were expected to take the “eccentricities” of guests, especially females, in stride as they did their best to entertain them; and Celestia’s response was a formal letter that basically amounted to something akin to Cadance’s box full of laughter. When he looked back at Luna’s letter he realized that it too was making a jovial jest at him.

For some reason, all three princesses found his plight highly entertaining. Spike did his best to just tune out their highly unusual behavior. Things had gotten so awkward that Owlwicious was actually making it a habit to sleep and nap in Spike’s room, that’s how Spike knew things were more serious than what everyone thought, under most circumstances, the owl wouldn’t even entertain the idea of being so close to him for such an extended period of time. If things kept up like this Spike was sure that he was going to experience some sort of nosebleed, a prospect he did not look forward to, especially since Pinkie and Twilight were already causing him to have blood rush to his face more frequently than he was willing to admit.

Ember's Twilight Deal

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“Um, Spike,” said Twilight completely naked in Spike’s room, “is there a reason you are insisting on me be completely devoid of attire here?”

Spike just smirked and said, “It has something to do with an arrangement I have with Ember, nothing to be too worried about.”

“You promised her some ‘special’ alone time with, I get it.”

“Well yes, there is that, but only if she’s gotten my okay after you finish helping her with research. She wants to know how possible it is to grow crystal and jeweled plants outside this city’s boundaries, mostly so she can have little groves and the like in the rest of her territory, I’ve had Applejack and her family assist with the research, the results aren’t as promising as we hoped.”

“So now it’s on me, you want to see if I find how all the crystal flora came to be or at least the earliest known records and any recorded circumstances regarding their appearance so we can share the info with Ember.”

“Correct,” came Embers voice as she entered the room, “I very much like your figure, it’s just to the specifications Spike said they would. You will follow me to the room I have prepared everything, as you are, understood?”

“Yes, ma’am,” said Twilight with a bit of hesitance in her voice. She resigned herself to following through, mostly because she knew Spike could just order to do just that and she wouldn’t be able to properly resist any of it. Besides, a little research might just what she needed to get her head back in the game, even if it wasn’t related to what she wanted to know, at the very least, she could compare notes to how it is back home afterward. When turned to leave she saw Ember’s lack of attire, all Ember was wearing, if you could call it that, was a petite bikini top and a diamond-studded silver tiara.

************************************************

After Ember popped up in at Spike’s room she led Twilight down a hall, the walk was very suggestive on Ember’s part, as was evident by the way Twilight’s attention kept going to the dragoness’s rear and legs involuntarily and the way Ember had given her knowing smiles during the ten minute walk; it also didn’t help that almost every male guard, pony and dragon, was showing some signs of embarrassment when they looked at either female.

The halls they moved through were mostly sparse, aside from the few guards and statues of Ember Twilight spotted as Ember led her through the halls. The journey finally ended when Ember stopped before one of the rooms and threw open the doors, inside was an array of a dozen or so research tables that were mostly stacked with books, scrolls, and other texts. Twilight’s eyes bulged in excitement, wonderment, and confusion.

“All these texts you’ve managed to confirm have to do with crystal plants and agricultural practices of the area?”

“No,” said Ember as she brought greater attention to her prominent bosom with b folding of her arms beneath her bust, “most of these just have at least one mention of development or growing of such plants. That said, the written dialects also seem to go back so far that even Sombra can’t do any better than get a glancing idea of a very small handful of words with the much older texts. You have your work cut out for you,” she then led Twilight to a set of four empty tables with a singular chair at the table closest to their approach, “I’ve instructed three pegasus guards to assist you in your query, they should be arriving here in a few minutes, I wanted to make sure they understood their orders properly and you were situated here when they arrived. The other three tables are for three categories: Useful, Semi-useful, and Not Applicable. I’ll leave it on you to decide which is which and instruct the guards accordingly. Once you have found what we are looking for managed to sort all the texts your work here will be completed. The reward you earn will be based on the results of your research.”

“But how will I be able to properly read the older material?” Twilight inquired.

“I couldn’t find anything to help with that, but Lord Spike said probably had a lead on that, what he thinks he’s found should be arriving here in the next few days. I made sure to make sure the newer material would be the first on your reading list, what you need for translating the older texts should be here by the time you get that far, at least that’s what Lord Spike has assured me of. We’re both also hoping your talent for research might also mean you can decipher the older texts with little effort.”

“Glad to see you have such high thoughts of my abilities and talent.”

Ember said nothing and just left the room. About a half hour after Ember had left, three crystal pegasi, two stallions and one mare, entered the room and Twilight started them off with getting her a few small armfuls of texts. It wasn’t easy for Twilight to ignore them, thanks to the fact they all had pin-up quality bodies, but she managed to do just that thanks to her academic nature.

*******************************************************

Three days, that was how long Twilight had spent going through the texts, and still had a little over half collection to go, she had actually spent several hours on a few because they had some sort of clue or just had really misleading wording. Thankfully, the monotony, which had the guards feeling extremely bored due to how their orders were worded, was interrupted by the arrival of Chrysalis, utterly naked if you didn’t count her horn ring and collar as attire, with a small box of some kind of small box twice the size of her fists bunched together.

“Master Spike,” said Chrysalis, in a sultry voice, as she approached Twilight’s table, “managed to procure these for you,” she set the package, still wrapped in brown paper and letter twine, on the table before Twilight, “although, he did mention he expected only one of them to be available for your use.”

“Probably had strike up quite the deal,” said Twilight in a bit of a sassy snark, “seeing as these sorts of magical items are hard to come by, not just procure.”

“Indeed,” said Chrysalis, “you’ll be told the necessary information when the time is appropriate.” With that, the changeling queen sashayed out of the room.

“Um, who was that?” The crystal pegasus mare, who had been unwilling to share her name with Twilight for some reason, inquired.

Twilight turned to look at the citrine mare for a moment before thinking about it for a moment and saying, “Chrysalis, she is Spike’s latest acquisition. She also serves as his personal assistant, and before you ask, yes, he does fuck, quite frequently. And yes, her figure is highly attractive and very lustful to look at, any more moronic questions before moving onward?”

The three crystal pegasi shook their heads as Twilight turned her attention to the package with an eye roll hidden from the three as she did so. It wasn’t hard to see two of the three were immensely attracted to Chrysalis, judging by the bulge in the pants of one of the stallions and the very overt look lust directed at the changeling queen the mare seemed to have. After turning her attention to the package, Twilight got to work undoing the packaging.

Within the box, she found three small items in cases of their own. Twilight first lifted out what looked like a glasses case, when she opened it she gasped and almost let go of the case and nearly dropped it; the item inside the case was a pair of Runic Translation glasses, back home Princess Luna had a pair on display in her personal museum that was open to the public, the establishment had an almost criminally low price of admission. She closed the case and turned her attention to the next item. Picking up what looked like it could pass for an overly large ring case, Twilight carefully opened the case to reveal what looked like a gold-rimmed monocle with runic symbols carved into the boarding gold; a Runic Informer Monocle, also extremely rare, Celestia had one in her private collection that she showed off every four to five years to societally high ranking ponies just to see and gauge their reactions, much to the chagrin of Twilight and several of the castle staff. After looking the item over she set the case next to the open case for the glasses then turned her attention to revealing the final item in the box. Twilight pulled up what looked like the case for some sort of necklace or pendant, opening it revealed a mask that was made from a kind of brass with a highly pronounced blueish tint; an Orichalcum Language Mask, the artifact predated the founders of Equestria by an almost incalculable span of time, the only one Twilight was aware back home was in a museum that was a good month’s journey by airship or boat from Equestria, and even then you needed to go through an arduous process of just being permitted to enter the building while also paying a small fortune just for admission. Twilight had never been to the place personally, but she had read numerous academic materials on the artifact in question.

Thinking over her options, Twilight carefully closed the cases for the monocle and mask and put them back in the box before plucking the glasses out of their case and perching them before her eyes. After all that Twilight got right back to work, this time going at a bit more of an accelerated pace.

************************************************************

Twelve days and nine hours, that was how long it had taken Twilight to fully get through everything that had been collected for her to go through. Once she found the first genuinely promising document, which was feat in and of itself when you took the time to look at the veritable pyramids of reading material that were the Semi-useful and Not Applicable tables, the small and neat collection that was the Useful table didn’t quite look as intensive, the materials on the table were just barely enough to make a small cabin. And that wasn’t just visualization for the sake of description, her helper guards really did make structures out of all the materials in those designs out of boredom while waiting for her to complete the task at hand.

Emerald Sky, the green colored crystal stallion, was overjoyed when he heard Twilight say she was going to send one of them to get some writing materials for her to translate the older script to something more easily readable but felt the wind fall out of his sails when Twilight chose to send Kuzanite Wing, the violet-pink stallion to collect the materials she asked for. Kuzanite came back a half hour later with two boxes of materials, one filled with notepads and the other filled with writing pens that already had the ink in them.

Twilight spent a good six hours making four different copies; she sent one off with Emerald Sky and the other off with the citrine mare. After the two had left she turned to Kuzanite and said, “It’s interesting how you managed to hide the fact you’re actually a mare, I’m guessing you couldn’t use that charm without Lady Ember’s permission.”

“Um, yes,” said Kuzanite, who had been quiet to the point of making the rest of the occupants of the room think said pony was mute. “Citrine Burst,” so that was the orange mare’s name, “tends to make things different for other guard mares, her overtly open sexual attraction to mares tends to make things difficult when she is working with other mares, even when you openly and flat out tell her you aren’t interested. Lady Ember doesn’t do anything about it because she finds it all too amusing.”

“I see,” said Twilight, “if I can find a way to make things a bit easier for you I will, I’ll also leave a note regarding Ms. Burst in my reports to both Spike and Ember.”

“Thank you, ma’am, much appreciated.”

**************************************************

“Thank you for your hard work,” said Ember as she looked over the notes Twilight had handed off to her some hours prior, they were in a meeting hall with Spike, who was now dressed in a business casual shirt and pants colored blue and pink. “Looks like I lost the bet, oh great Dragonlord,” she said turning her attention to Spike, “What was the wager again?”

“You get Twilight and two of mine of your choice if you win, I get one of yours and Fuck you for as long as I want if I win,” said Spike with a smirk. “Seeing how Twilight seems to have taken a shine to the pony known as Kuzanite Wing, I think I will be claiming her when we leave. But I think I’ll take up the rest of what you offered now.”

“I thought as much,” said Ember, removing the entirety of her attire, which only consisted of a petite bikini top and bottom.

Twilight took this as her cue to leave the room; she really didn’t want to see what it was like to see two dragons going at it. She also made haste to be as far as way as possible, she had no intention of hearing the sounds of two dragons fucking each other.

Fun Time for the Purple and Blue Dragons

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Spike hadn’t always thought of Ember as someone he would want to bang for the seven-plus centuries since he had met her, but the past few decades having him want to get extra intimate with her. He wanted her to be the mother of his children, but not the “I am the Dragonlord” sort of way, if he wanted to do things that way he would have done something like that the moment such feelings started coursing through him. Spike wasn’t the kind of dragon to just use his power and status to get what he was after the moment he wanted it, he liked testing his patience.

When you had the power to get whatever you want, whenever you want, things were just not as worthwhile. It for that reason he had instituted the current practice dragons enjoyed. They were still free to do whatever they wanted in their territories; they just had to keep communities in place and establish one city or town as their ruling ground, he thought it was a much more enjoyable alternative to a lair.

Now, here he was, in the buff with an equally naked Ember. Ember definitely had an attractive body; she was possibly one of the few dragons even ponies could agree had an erotic body. He certainly hoped their lovemaking would be legendary.

///////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////

Ember didn’t want to admit it just yet, but she had been hoping for an interaction like this with Spike for the past few decades. Dragons were attracted to three things: treasure, power, and territory. Spike had everyone beat, he had the most territory and kept winning more in competitions. None were more potent than the Dragonlord, despite Garble’s continued failed attempts to prove otherwise, and as the daughter of the former Dragonlord, it was her duty to make sure she had offspring with a mighty sire. As for treasure, she had all the other dragons beat with her claiming of the Crystal Territory, everything that grew here was practically a crystal or jewel already. She didn’t mind the current Dragonlord knowing the secret to her nearly infinite supply of delectable snacks, although she did feel a bit miffed that she had lost one of her Crystal Ponies in seemingly simple bet with Spike, but the pounding that was to ensue would more than make up for it.

Ember usually wasn’t envious, she took the form and figure of entities with a more erotic looking body than hers in good grace, usually. For the first time in as long as she could recall, she was actually jealous of the figure of another creature, Chrysalis had a form and figure that were exceptionally erotic, and Spike had the audacity to flaunt her about as his personal aid, Ember almost got wet at seeing his unintentional abuse of power and position.

She made a salacious smirk before saying, “Are you just going to stand there or are you actually going to go through with it?”

Spike blinked a few times before saying, “Sorry, I was just enjoying the vision of your form.” Ember got a glimpse of his twin members, a feature of every male dragon, and felt some sense of approval at the sight of them. They were bigger than what ponies could usually get, which was a given with dragons, but weren’t small by dragon standards, of course looking at them his two penises were barely on the larger side of average for a dragon male his size. But Ember knew size wasn’t everything, something her father seemed to not fully get. She subconsciously licked her lips erotically as Spike approached.

Spike positioned himself behind her, nothing too out of the ordinary when it came to dragons. But what came next caught her off guard, a way she rather enjoyed, with Spike getting a firm grip on her exposed waist and thrusting both of his members right into her while pulling Ember back from where he held her. The twin penises might not have been as long as what she had expected but they were definitely a bit meatier than she had anticipated.

Ember gave out an involuntary erotic moan, Spike had almost immediately hit her pleasure points the moment he was a decent ways in. Spike was already up to his hilts inside her; she could feel him snuggly placed a decent ways into her womb. It was almost as if he was designed to be her perfect partner. Every single one of the pleasure points within her vaginal region was being stimulated in just the right way, and Spike hadn’t even started moving yet. Ember was going to be a quivering mass of pleasure when this was all over, and that was just what she wanted. Maybe if she was lucky, Spike would shoot multiple loads into her. Ember didn’t say anything, and dragons didn’t give signs to other dragons unless intended to see males fight them for breeding rights, but she was at peak fertility now.

Something very few non-dragons were aware of was the fact that after reaching sexual maturity, which usually occurred around a dragon’s first century or so, dragon females were only at optimal impregnation conditions for about eleven months once every decade and the rest of that time they had an incredibly low fertility level, it was why several more powerful dragon males tended to have multiple mates. The prior Dragonlord, Torch, had not only been her father but also attempted to sire offspring with almost two dozen dragonesses, but Ember had been the only one of his offspring to live long enough to full sexual maturity. She didn’t feel bad about her literal dozens of siblings kicking the bucket before reaching maturity because it happened all the time with dragons. That said, Ember was the sole daughter to make it as far as she did, and only nine of her brothers had lived long enough to reach sexual maturity.

That all said, only three of her brothers had managed to live a bit longer than that, but none of her siblings had managed to live long enough to the rite of becoming Dragonlord. Ember felt so sorrow for her lost kin; she was raised to not dwell on such things. Besides, she was getting plowed by the current Dragonlord, and him just taking it slow and steady was sending torrents of pleasure surging through her body.

***************************************************************

It was hour nine of their lovemaking and Spike had already let loose three loads into Ember, both dragons still had plenty of energy and stamina to keep going. Spike wasn’t entirely sure if they could continue at the rate they were going. But it was just so good to be inside her.

Without giving her any sort of warning, Spike picked up Ember by her thighs and said, “I think we should move this to a different venue since your lovely form is blocking my view of what is immediately ahead of me I will be reliant on you to navigate us. So, please, try to remain cognizant and coherent until we reach the destination you have selected.”

“Of all the enticing things you could do,” Ember said in an erotic groan, “this is among the best. Alright, first you need to go out the door behind us and go down the hall three passages and make left then…”

*****************************************************************

One complete half hour, and many poorly disguised looks of surprise on pony faces later, Spike was in in the throne while Ember bounced up and down on his members and lap in an energetic, playful eroticism.

As a sort of show while they engaged in sex Spike and Ember had made Twilight and Sombra engage in intercourse for about a half hour while they both watched and fucked each other, much to the chagrin of Twilight and Sombra. Shortly after that, Twilight left to spend time looking over whatever had caught her interest at the library, Sombra couldn’t go anywhere on account Ember had given him orders enforced by the collar to never leave the throne room with the caveat he could not climb past the third step of the dais or sit upon the throne.

They had been engaging in sex for about three hours in the throne room, which brought their total time screwing each other up to twelve hours, when Spike roughly, yet carefully, grasped at both her breasts and caused Ember to release an erotic scream that reverberated through the throne room, and possibly a few other rooms, for a full twenty minutes, her actual scream had only last just shy of three minutes.

Ember was having the time of her life, especially when she felt fireworks rock her body then fade into a series of torrents of pleasure that washed through her in waves for an unknown amount of time.

*******************************************************

“Three days,” said Chrysalis with an impressed tone, “You engaged in a sexual relationship with Lady Ember for three days, without stopping.

“Yep, and she enjoyed it so much decided to gift me two personal train cars,” said Spike as the train, with said cars, pulled in with one of the two before Spike and his entourage. “Chrysalis, you and the rest of the mares will be in the front car of the two, Twilight and I will be in the back among the two.”

Twilight turned to Spike with surprise and said, “Just what are you planning?”

“Oh, nothing much,” said Spike with a chuckle, “you’ll be ‘entertaining’ me while the rest of the girls run errands for us, mostly me, and get to know each other better.”

“Yeah, but calling in a collar specialist is probably going to be a pain,” said Twilight as they boarded, “if you sent a notice out now we might get lucky and meet them at the station around the time we get off the train.”

“An excellent idea,” said Spike as the doors to the lavishly furnished crystal train car, complete with erotic paintings of Ember on three of the walls in intricate crystal frames. Twilight felt a little unnerved by the sight and silently prayed that the other car wasn’t as off-putting. “I think I’ll put these around my personal chambers,” said Spike as he went over and eyed one of the images.

Neither of them felt the train begin to move, for entirely different reasons. Twilight had a few ideas of why Spike wanted her alone with him, none of them were all that pleasant for her to think about. She also didn’t like how her body seemed to have a feeling of sexual anticipation.

Spike's Special Twlight Time

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“You know,” said Spike as he turned his attention towards Twilight, “I hadn’t initially planned on this, but that memory sharing spell of yours caused a massive change in my plans.” Twilight looked at him with confusion; she honestly wished she pretend she didn’t know where he was taking this. “Remove all your clothing and put in the corner closest to you.”

Twilight followed the command with silent annoyance; she didn’t like how she ended up in these situations, after tossing her attire to the corner she was commanded to turn around and brace herself on the wall, just as she was doing that she felt the train pick up speed. She then felt Spike’s monstrous lower dick twerking the top of her rear, the feel of it sent the sensation of sexual excitement in Twilight’s body up a few more notches than she had been dreading. After twerking his lower penis on Twilight’s rear for a few minutes, Spike lowered it so is lower penis was at the entranced to her anus and began lightly penetrating her rear while twerking his upper dick on her derriere, the sensation sent sparks flying through Twilight’s system.

After doing the twerk/tease for a few minutes Spike moved on to double penetrating Twilight, both his dicks went into Twilight about six or seven inches. Twilight could feel more sparks spread through her body, so much so she came close to losing her cognitive abilities for a moment. Thankfully, she was able to keep it together; unfortunately, that meant she was very much aware of the intense pleasure pumping its way through her body.

Twilight gasped in surprise as she felt Spike’s tail slide between her pert breasts as caressed them with his hands, his tail slide up and down between her breasts in a pleasing manner as he kneaded her breasts. She could feel her mind going blank from what could only be described as a pleasure overload. Twilight could feel her mind swimming in endorphins; it was like being in a comfy fog and warm bath at the same time but not all at once.

Spike leaned in close and whispered erotically, “Answer my questions correctly and you’ll be feeling more of this, understood?” Twilight, unable to make any real cognitive response, just let out an erotic groan of pleasure in response. “OOps, took it a little too far with you,” Spike chuckled and eased up on Twilight a bit. “Okay, if you want to get back to all that pleasure, you’ll have to answer three questions correctly.”

Twilight could feel herself coming out of the pleasure induced haze; she felt a need for more. “Now then,” said Spike, “I’m going to ask you three simple questions, if you manage to answer them all correctly I’ll go back to giving you pleasure. Are you ready for the questions?”

Twilight tried to say something but just gave a moan of need. She tried to verbally reply three more times, only to have the response occur. She felt frustration welling up in her body, she willed her body to use actual words, “Yes, I’m ready,” said Twilight in a lustful tone.

“Good,” said Spike with a chuckle, “first question?”

“What am I?”

“Master,” said Twilight in an erotic tone, almost as quickly as Spike had ended his question.

“Nice to see you got the easy one,” said Spike with a smirk. “What are you?”

“Whatever you desire, master,” said Twilight erotically.

“Nice to see we’re on the same page. What is your purpose?”

“Whatever you want it to be,” she said with an erotic moan. Instead of saying anything else Spike just rammed his twin rods back into Twilight, her eyes rolled back in sheer bliss as pleasure erupted in waves through her entire body.

When Twilight came to she was bouncing up and down on Spike’s lap with both his poles inside her vagina and rear, the pleasure was still miring her senses but at least she was some level of cognizant of the world around her. She couldn’t stop her movements, she didn’t want to stop her movements. Twilight didn’t know what to think at that moment, she blacked out again when Spike said, in an amused yet husky tone, “It is now time to undo the restrictions upon your body.”

****************************************************************

When Twilight came to, again, she was on something soft, but still very much naked. Gripping the side of her head with her left hand as she got up Twilight said, “Oi, what happened and where am I? How long was I out?”

“At least five days,” came Twilight Velvet’s voice in a saucy tone, “you’re in a private part of the complex, I still find it amusing that my patrons keep signing up for time, even after all the times they saw me carrying and with you and Shining as infants.”

“Wait, what?” Twilight almost shouted in surprise.

“Right, Master Spike said to bring you up to speed on a few things,” said Twilight’s mother as she came to sit on the bed next to Twilight, the mare was completely without attire and only wore what looked like her wedding ring on her right hand, the Twilight Velvet Twilight knew back home usually wore it on her left hand, and what looked like a platinum chain suspended by a pair of nipple piercings, said nipples looked really perky. “I’m the best courtesan in Master Spike’s collection, marrying your father, who was never one of my clients, and having you and your brother did nothing to change that. I’ve remained Master Spike’s number one courtesan almost since I established the brothel.” Twilight stared at her mother; the mare had an E-Cup size bust and round yet firm plot that was a bit bigger than that of most mares.

“What?” Twilight shrieked, of all the things Twilight feared that was not even a factor in any of the scenarios she had run through her head.

“As to why I started the brothel, it was because I had been sexually preyed upon. I established the Watching Stars brothel as a way for mares that had been taken advantage of to take the force that had felt like it had ruined their lives and turn it into a source of empowerment.”

Okay, that sounded more like the Twilight Velvet Twilight knew and loved, but this one didn’t seem to be a thrill seeker. Of course, what came next told Twilight this was basically her mom, as much as she hated to admit it. Twilight did feel some relief her father wasn’t part of her mother’s clientele, the thought of her other being a high profile prostitute and madame was enough of a shock.

“That Spelunking trip we had last year was glorious, especially since I got to see your brother get in the fray against an unknown monster.”

“Did he get some kind of bonus for bringing it in?” Twilight inquired.

“Yep, new trinkets for all of his mares. Your brother’s wedding ceremony was beautiful, pity you did everything to avoid your father and I but considering the issues at the time I can understand why. It’ll be so nice to get my Twilight back, when is that going to happen.”

“Hopefully, within the week,” said Twilight, “why do my chest and plot feel so sore?”

“Master Spike decided to repress your endowments, seeing as he thought they might cause conflict with the attention he meant for Rarity. But recently he decided it was time to give her some actual competition, so he decided to undo the seal on your assets, you’re almost as well-endowed as me.” Twilight Velvet then gestured to a full mirror on the other side of the room; Twilight approached it.

When Twilight saw her reflection she gasped, her plot and bust were both approaching rivaling Pinkie’s assets. To make matters worse, Twilight had thoughts of being really sexy when she admired her naked form. All in all, Twilight didn’t like where things were heading.

Spike's Unwanted Ship

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Spike couldn’t quite make out what was going on, or even how things had gotten this way. He had just made an offhand comment about making himself some special pancakes the night before and now somehow found himself on a cruise ship purchased entirely by “Twilight” and out in the middle of the waters off the coast of Manehattan with Twilight and Pinkie and Starlight. When Twilight got home she was not going to be happy, or even amused. When Spike had woken up on the ship and realized he was on a ship, an extravagant one at that, he immediately sent word to Celestia, Luna, and Cadance. Celestia sent a dignified and composed response back about looking into limiting Twilight’s buying power during the time her other self was “visiting” and left it at that; Luna’s response was that of amusement and saying she would send over ponies to act as the crew and see about getting the vessel into port, she also sent the latest model of personal camera and asked for Spike to take many pictures for her and Celestia to “observe” at their earliest convenience; and Cadance had sent a letter that had started off like that of the caring figure she was, only for it stop halfway and have a literal magical copy of her voice laughing for a solid minute.

When Spike had found out Starlight was on the boat with him she confirmed Twilight and Pinkie were both on the boat and she was there to mostly make sure things didn’t get even more out of hand, seeing as she somehow missed Twilight buying an entire cruise liner then paying the crew to take them to a specific point before just leaving the ship out in open water, she had thought that Twilight was just privately chartering the vessel for Spike, her, and Pinkie up until the point the crew weighed anchor and left.

“Well, at least she didn’t pull this stunt with an airship,” Spike deadpanned.

“She almost did,” said Starlight in a flat tone, “but I managed to talk her out of it by pointing out airship kitchens don’t usually tend to have a lot of stocking space. Of course, that didn’t stop her from sending in a commission and design for a new kind of luxury airship, don’t when or if the response letter will be coming in though.”

Spike just gave Starlight a deadpan look before grabbing the clipboard from his waist and pulling out an ink pen from the pouch at his side, living with Twilight had taught him to always be prepared to write something, and wrote a note on it addressed to Princess Celestia with a very brief yet descriptive note on what Starlight had just told him. After sending the note Spike turned to Starlight and said, “What kind of damage can I expect?”

“Well, considering they made extra sure to have the entire pantry stocked shy of the minimum overflow point and are likely to just have some not-so-subtle clues leading you to the kitchen, probably after you’re out of the guest rooms. In all likelihood, the two of them will use all of this as an excuse to show you what they do for their Spike; I just hope I don’t get dragged into it.”

“Considering how Twilight as a houseguest has been treating us,” said Spike with annoyance, “you will, then we’ll both have even more to put on the report for when we get our Twilight back.”

“Augh,” said Starlight in annoyance, “I know Twilight is doing everything she can to get back, but she’s probably being curtailed by the stars know what.”

“I know we’ve both said this to each other several time over their stay,” said Spike in a defeated tone, “but we just have to do the best to mitigate the damage during their stay. Honestly, I think these developments might have been among the better outcomes, considering how much about their world they shared with us.”

“Yeah, I guess,” said Starlight with a defeated voice as they approached the exit of the hallway, “but I still don’t have to like it.”

“I’m in the same boat as you,” said Spike, “both literally and figuratively, today.”

They both swung open the doors to find a set of signs that had Spike’s name in big bold lettering with arrows pointing down a specified path.

“These weren’t here when I went to check on and warn you.”

“I figured they would do something monumentally ridiculous, I just didn’t think it would be this soon,” Spike gave out an exasperated sigh. “At least the damage we’re going to see is going to be mostly minimal.

***********************************************************

After following the signs for almost ten minutes the two finally arrived at the doors to the ship’s main kitchen Starlight was pulled into the kitchen via a remote teleportation courtesy of Twilight’s magic. Spike had a bad feeling about what was coming. After taking a few minutes to steel himself against all the possible worst-case scenarios he could think of, Spike did his best to walk confidently into the kitchen. When entered it was worse than he thought, he nearly fainted from the scene before him.

Twilight and Pinkie were both in aprons, with no other attire, with happy smiles and a simultaneous statement of, “Welcome to the kitchen, Master. Everything has been made ready for you.”

Off to the side, a very annoyed looking Starlight was also in a naked apron, grumbling about things she would rather be doing. Spike could feel a nosebleed coming on but thankfully managed to prevent the effect.

“Alright, ladies, this is just ridiculous. Did you really have to drag Starlight into this production?”

“No,” said Twilight, “but she just looks so cute like this, a whole lot more than all the other outfits she’s worn every other time I’ve seen her.”

“I know, because you told us, that the naked apron is mainly Pinkie’s thing back home for you two, but did Twilight have to do it as well? And was it essential to force me into the same thing?”

“Oops,” said Twilight, “I guess I just followed Pinkie’s lead a little too closely and wanted Starlight to as well.”

“Called it,” muttered Starlight.

“I’m just going to ignore all the shenanigans and have those of you who want to act as my kitchen aides.”

“Well, since I’m clearly dressed for the part,” said Starlight in a deadpan manner, “might as well join in on the fun. Besides, it will probably be better if I just keep a close eye on these two, for the time being, me departing to change attire might prove...hazardous.”

Without another word Spike just got to work in the kitchen, he directed Twilight and Pinkie to get him refrigerated and dry ingredients; Starlight acted as the one to make sure they didn’t overdo anything and stop them before they took things a bit too far. Twenty minutes later, Spike had made a large set of stacks of waffles, half of which had gemstones baked into them.

Spike did his best to not look at the three mares in nothing but aprons, and failed miserably, the whole time he worked and attempted to eat. It was made increasingly more awkward when Pinkie and Twilight insisted on feeding him the food. Spike had insisted he could handle it all on his own, which was immediately followed by him putting his food on serving platter haphazardly, throwing a serving top over the platter, and rushing to his room while stating quite loudly that he did not want to be disturbed for at least an hour. After getting to what he hoped was a safe place on the ship, for the time being, he pulled out his clipboard and pen and hastily scribbled the events of the encounter as much as he could and sent it off to Celestia. After that was done, he got to work eating his self-made breakfast and hoping it would relax him, it did but not as much as he had been hoping.

Twilight's Strange Family Time

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Since she already found out about her mother in this universe, and said mother was apparently in on the situation, Twilight figured it was time to just have a family meeting and come out with everything. It was a few days after she found herself in her mother’s whorehouse, a thought that still made Twilight uncomfortable, and the whole family was meeting at her parents’ place. Back home Night Light and Twilight Velvet had a modest looking manor with a few rooms for overnight guests, but here they had a mansion that took up two, maybe even three or four lots, that had an extravagant gateway that was adorned with statues of a naked Velvet in various poses and materials alongside a wide selection of yard art that was very astrologically themed. From what Twilight could make of the backyard, what little of it she could see, her parents had a full on observatory outback surrounded by what she was guessing was a hedge maze.

A pegasus maid, in an exceptionally revealing maid outfit, met Twilight at the door and led her to the mansion’s version of the family room. In the corners Twilight could make out marble statues of her parents without any clothing, they were off-putting and enticing at the same time, a sensation that made Twilight incredibly uncomfortable. Her parents, Shining Armor, and Cadance were all there, minus all their clothes.

“Oh, right,” said Shining as the maid made a bow of respect and left to attend to other duties. “You don’t know the rules for this house like our Twilight, when not working or spending more than a few minutes you are supposed to go about the house naked.”

“Was that one of the rules dad came up with before either of us was born?” Twilight inquired as she shrugged off her dark green robe and tossed it onto the nearby coat rack that had a variety of attires hanging from it.

“Actually, I’m the one who instituted the rule,” said Velvet with pride in her voice, “I don’t like seeing other ponies try to hide their physical traits.”

“Seeing as you run a whorehouse I’m not surprised,” Twilight snarked back, not one pony seemed surprised or indignant, then without thinking she snarked, “what’s next? A strip club?”

They all turned to look at her with confusion, Velvet responded with, “I’ve never heard of such an establishment.”

Of course, Thought Twilight, With legal, and very open, dens of sex the concept of a pseudosexual environment never developed here. Well, time to ruin things further. “A strip club is an establishment where mares and stallions, all legal age, perform a bit of dance number, usually around a big metal pole, on a stage. The dance number also includes the removal of their outfits, which are often more revealing than quite a bit of the typical pony attire I’ve seen around here, and going straight down to dancing naked. Anyone can enter, they even serve food and drinks to tables and a bar, but if you want extra or private services, you need to pay extra. Also, patrons often throw or hand money to the dancers. Their proper title is ‘Stripper’ but many prefer to use the term ‘Exotic Dancer’ and it’s not uncommon for a few to come off the stage, especially if they’ve been offered or given a large amount of money personally, and give an open dance to the payer.”

“Why hasn’t anyone done this before, it sounds wonderful,” said Cadance with excitement, this caused Twilight to wince.

“There are a few rules regarding the dancers,” Twilight continued, “the two biggest ones being that you’re only allowed to touch the dancers if they allow it and the other being the dancers are there to entertain as many as possible and thus patrons are not permitted to have sexual relations with them. If you’re partnered to one, you do that sort of thing away from the establishment. In other words, the closest anyone gets to sex is a sexual tease.”

“I’ve been looking for some sort of business to do,” said Cadance, “and this sounds great, it’ll allow girls of all kinds to have some fun, especially those that don’t feel ready to commit to something like what Madame Velvet runs.”

“The two would work well together,” said Velvet in contemplation, “and it would allow the girls that want a break from the usual to still entertain others. Is there anything else we should know?”

“Most strippers go by a stage name,” said Twilight, “but it’s more of a personal preference, seeing as some genuine pony names have sounded pretty close to the stage names of some strippers, from what I heard. Some strippers even like to do a little imitation; I cannot tell you how many cases of strippers imitating Celestia, Luna, Cadance and myself I heard of on more than one occasion. I would tell you more, but I’ve actively worked to block such those sorts of things from my mind.”

“No worries,” said Night Light, Twilight was really uncomfortable seeing her dad’s junk. Chances were, since her mother ‘assets’ were bigger than back home then her dad in this universe was packing a bit more as well, a thought she really hated thinking. “What you gave us is plenty, I’m sure Cadance and Velvet will be hard at work discussing how to maximize everything before the day is out.”

“Well, the girls have been feeling like they need to do more, especially Cadance,” said Shining, “and this way I will know for a fact that I will always know who is sleeping with my wife.”

“Shiny’s a bit possessive of his mares,” said Cadance with a giggle.

“I just don’t like other ponies touching any of my herd,” said Shining, “the rest of the girls wanted to come but Cadance convinced them to wait a bit on all that.”

“I see,” said Twilight with a faux interest, she did her best to avoid looking at her brother’s junk but failed more than she would like to admit. Why were all the stallions she knew packing it in this universe? “The devices to help fix the problem should be mostly done by now; Sunset Shimmer was set on the project personally by Spike.”

“Good to hear,” said Velvet, “she’s the best tech expert we have.”

“Yeah, but I could do without the overly overt interest in other females,” said Twilight rubbing her left arm with her right hand, and absentmindedly playing with her bosom with her left hand.

“Oh look, honey,” said Night Light excitedly, “she shows uncomfortable nervousness the same way you do.”

“Well, no matter where she is from,” said Velvet, “Twilight is still Twilight.”

At that statement, Twilight became aware of the actions of both her arms and ceased her activities with both. “So, I’m guessing you’re all interested in what you’re like in my home universe.”

“Start with Shining,” said Cadance with excitement.

“Shining Armor, in my universe, was captain of the Royal Guard in Canterlot, our version of the city currently known as Dragon Crown, and married Cadance a while back, after they moved to the Crystal Empire, what we call the place the dragoness Ember rules over, they had a filly named Flurry Heart, she’s absolutely adorable, and a magical powerhouse in her own right. Of course, being an alicorn will do that for you. You see, in my universe, Celestia, Luna, and Cadance are all alicorns, I recently ascended to being an alicorn from being a unicorn myself, then a few months after that Flurry Heart was born, and is the first known born alicorn I am aware of. Cadance has a magic that can amplify the genuine love ponies have; it’s very strong. Mom is still very much a thrillseeker back home, but she’s an author where I come from. I’m not sure what dad does in this universe, but from what I’ve seen he’s probably the closest to his counterpart. And on another note, Shining and Cadance do not have any additional partners, that I am aware of.”

“Oh, good,” said Shining, “I would hate to come off as an imitator, especially of myself.”

*****************************************************

After a few more minutes of chatting, the family was around the table for a meal, still devoid of clothing, enjoying an extravagant meal. Twilight knew things were just getting more odd, and she felt a need to broach a particular subject, she just didn’t like that it had to be said. “Once the devices are finished and we manage to create gateway back to my home universe Pinkie and I will hopefully be getting back to how we’re supposed to be in both universes,” said Twilight in cautious manner, “that said, if any of you would like to join us on the trip to observe it all we probably wouldn’t mind too much. That said, do your best to cover up when joining for the visit, my Equestria has very different socially acceptable standards.”

“I think it would be fun to see,” said Night Light, “might give some ideas of how to do a few things.”

“About that,” said Twilight, “Spike stated that after we hopefully fix everything and everyone has returned to where they need to be, the device will be shut down and dismantled then have all its parts scattered across the land and everyone who worked on the device have their knowledge of the device’s development and creation be purged and replaced with random memories that have little to no relation to the project itself.”

“An Omega protocol,” said Cadance in surprise, “those are extremely rare these days, might make for something interesting later on.

After that, the conversation devolved into more mundane, and slightly more embarrassing, subjects. The worst part, for Twilight, was just how open about their sex lives her family in this universe were. To make matters worse, she nearly fainted when her family discussed how they would be going at each other at the table but felt like Twilight would be missing out and decided to keep from doing so until she came to family gatherings with a significant other.

Pinkie's Problems

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Pinkie stretched as she woke up, she looked over at her clock and found she had actually woken a full two hours before the alarm she had set. Pinkie had at least four hours before the shop had to open, she decided to get a shower and get to baking some tasty treats. Pinkie suddenly became acutely aware of someone suckling her breasts, with vigor. She threw off the sheets to find Rainbow going at it with gusto on her right breast while Sweetie Drops was hard at work on Pinkie’s left breast.

Pinkie was sure her alternate would be really happy with this development, at the moment Pinkie was not. Pinkie was always up for a party, as was her alternate, but ponies sucking on her big mammaries without permission was just rude, at the very least they could have waited for an invitation. Pinkie suddenly came to a realization, back home she wouldn’t even be having these thoughts. Chances were more of the other Pinkie’s mindset was bleeding into her brain more than she had hoped, the way Twilight had expressed it implied that it would be slow. Then it hit Pinkie like a load of bricks; they had been in this other universe for months, of course, some of the aspects of their alternate’s psyche would have bled into their thinking by now.

Pinkie really hoped that mental bleed through would diminish once they managed to fix everything, she also really wanted to tell the two mares suckling her to stop but couldn’t bring herself to do so because of how pleasant the sensation was. After letting them continue suckling her for a few minutes, Pinkie said, in a half amused voice, “Alright girls, fun time is over, for now, we need to start getting ready for the day.”

Rainbow Dash and Sweetie Drops groaned with annoyance as they disengaged from Pinkie. After washing up, individually without each other, the three headed down the stairs and began prepping the establishment. When Pinkie was satisfied with all the prep work and the first of the baked goods were out of the oven and in the display case she flipped the sign and opened the door.

Almost as if by clockwork, three dragons and Lyra were in through the door. The dragons were dressed in a manner that stated they were business types and only in here for a quick bite, Lyra was in some very revealing lingerie and went straight for Sweetie Drops. The dragons just ordered some pastries and coffee then were out the door. Lyra’s collar indicated she was one of Spike’s, like roughly eighty percent of the city. Pinkie was hoping Twilight would be back soon and give her a breakdown on things.

Pinkie really wasn’t liking this, it was fun for the first few weeks but now it was just a constant reminder of just how much trouble she and Twilight were in. It also didn’t help that almost every pony she saw was in erotic or borderline erotic attire. If this universe’s Spike was anything like the Spike back home, all of this just proved how much of a perv he could be without proper guidance. Of course, this whole thing also proved how much of a disregard for proper attire dragons genuinely had.

************************************************

Pinkie was in the alligator pool section with two large bags of alligator food for the lot, it was four hours after closing time and she finally had time for a breather. The Rainbow Dash of this universe was surprisingly handsy, and not in the fun or good way. And she was having those thoughts again, Pinkie really wanted to get home and get these not-family-friendly thoughts out of her head, or at least exceedingly diminished. She had a feeling that getting everypony back to where they belong wasn’t going to automatically fix everything, it would be nice if it did but chances are that even with magic it would take some time to diminish the effects of their “visit” and chances are several visits with a good psychoanalyst would be required.

Technical Difficulties

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Twilight was not happy, Pinkie was in the same boat as Twilight, and Sunset didn’t seem concerned either way. They had been called down to see a test start of the machine and test run of the helmets. The helmet demo had gone mostly okay, aside from the two ponies doing the testing commenting on now having memories of an event they wished they had never been part of, on both sides, without any further explanation. From the look of things, they had already managed get all the problems with the helmets fixed but the interdimensional pinging device was another story.

The device that was to act as their beacon home was not functioning as it should, the most they got out of the test run was a flicker across one of the screens and a low beeping for a split second after waiting for a little over a half hour. Twilight just facepalmed and went over to shut the machine down then take a look at its internal working. After flipping the device, open Twilight said, “Sunset, I think we’ll all be very disappointed if it turns out this mistake was intentional, because you know Spike is going to force the truth out of you one way or another. The main power coupling is loose, the auxiliaries are all unconnected, and it looks like the magic energy converter is missing, which probably means the backups for that system are missing as well. To top it off, it looks like the transceiver systems aren’t linked into the system as well. Even if everything else was fully functional, without that array nothing can be achieved.”

Sunset gave a very audible gulp, she then said in an apologetic voice, “I kind of rushed the project a little, I didn’t think it was all that pressing, so I just had the foundations and casing built before moving on to other projects, then I kind of rushed the rest when I got a reminder that one of the reasons you were coming here was to check the progress of this beacon.”

“Sunset, I’m very disappointed in you,” said Spike, “I thought I impressed the importance of the project on you. Since we still require your skills with magical technologies, I’ll have to get a bit more creative with your punishment. Thankfully, I got a reminder to anticipate this sort of outcome and prepared your punishment beforehand.” Spike snapped his claws and Chrysalis, in a stripper’s rendition of an office secretary’s outfit, sashayed in with three items in the hold of her magic.

When Sunset spotted them, she paled a bit, started making distraught noises. “Oh, it’s not that bad, deary,” said Chrysalis in a disturbingly sweetly sounding pseudo-compassionate voice, “it will only be until you actually manage to finish the project.”

Twilight spied the objects as they passed her, and got a bit of a chill at their sight; a chastity belt, some sort of bracers, and a mask of some kind.

“No, not the inhibitor gear,” said Sunset with genuine fear in her voice, “I can’t believe that would come to haunt me now.”

“Care to explain?” Twilight inquired.

“It’s a special set of gear I had commissioned that is designed to be used as easily on almost any creature,” said Spike, “as a precautionary measure we’re having several sets tuned to also work on changelings. It was a joint project between my top technical minds and the dragons responsible for maintaining and calibrating the collars and rings. Basically, it’s intended to mainly be used on problematic individuals, by restricting certain behaviors, words, various other choices. Sunset might be the best tech mind I have currently, but her rather open sexual nature and tendency to adjust priorities as she sees fits from time to time is more of hinderance now. And not amusing, for the time being, so we’re going to reinforce the behaviors that are more acceptable for this project. Besides, every once and a while she needs these sort of reminders.”

Twilight and Pinkie cringed at that thought, hopefully with her focus more clearly directed, Sunset would get the device up and running within a few days. The two mares decided it was in their best interest to head back to their places of business and just get back to that, at the very least they could have their day not feel like a total waste.

**********************************************

Three days after the fiasco, when everyone had returned, the device was all good to go. Sunset looked like she had been galloping a marathon with weights tied to her legs and arms, and sounded like it when she explained everything to everyone. Spike still berated her for not having finished the project properly in time for the prior unveiling. Twilight and Pinkie really didn’t want to think about things involving Sunset for the rest of their stay.

Home and Dealing with Problems

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The devices connected and they were finally on their way back home, with the helmets to fix the issue being in the wrong bodies well in hand. They had just managed to get the message through for Discord to open the rift. What they had waiting for them was a host of headaches, only made worse when Twilight and Pinkie exchanged memories, and thankfully personalities in the process, with their counterparts. Things got really uncomfortable when everyone at their home universe saw Chrysalis was along for the ride, and in what looked like a stripper parody of a secretary’s outfit, then things got really weird when the visiting Spike used a spell to share pieces of what it was like to grow up a dragon with their Spike; apparently he used Twilight’s magic research back in his home reality to act as the foundation for his own magical studies.

Twilight was livid when she found out her counterpart bought a cruise liner for the sole purpose of pleasing Spike, Pinkie had a similar reaction when she learned of what her counterpart had been up to regarding supplies and outfits. Discord just laughed at the whole scenario, he was apparently getting a great deal of amusement out of the entire affair, much to the chagrin of all the princesses. Twilight was not looking forward to discussing here experiences with everypony, especially her brother. Before all that though, she had some business to attend to.

Turning to her alternate as they were readying to leave for a bit, Twilight said, “YOU BOUGHT a CRUISELINER?!?!? WHAT WERE YOU THINKING?”

“What exactly is that? I’ve heard of that.”

“This massive boat that’s made really extravagant with places for those on it to enjoy all sort of activities and luxuries,” said Twilight’s alternate excitedly.

Twilight facepalmed, before saying, “A bit of an oversimplification, but that is a decent enough summary,” Twilight then launched into a detailed summary of what defines cruiseliners, while also through in what makes luxury airship different from a basic airship.

Chrysalis, and the alternate Twilight, unsurprisingly, were taking detailed notes on Twilight’s exposition. Which was followed by the alternate Spike making a statement of making those both happen after he gets home.

*********************************************************

“...and that is why we don’t waste our resources so frivolously. Honestly, it’s a miracle my reputation is as intact as it is, even if Spike and Starlight were both running damage control. It seems I am going to have to do a few more changes to the system to guard against this sort of thing again. Thankfully, your attempts to purchase an airship were halted before things got to the same point as the cruise ship.” Twilight had been on a rant about responsibilities and what is deemed ‘acceptable’ in her home dimension almost as soon as her mind was once again where it needed to be. Pinkie had actually been assisting Twilight on that, mostly because some of the stuff her alternate had ended up doing in their absence.

Pinkie had been mostly amused by her alternate’s antics, until she found out said alternate had purchased a considerable amount of land with construction plans just a short way out on the edge of Ponyville proper. Needless to say, her amusement died out pretty quickly, mostly because, in her words, that was “party material finances” she would never get back. Ironically it was both Twilights and the alternate Pinkie that pointed out what having that space would mean for her party planning business.

After Twilight’s Twi-rant, has her friends were prone to call it, the Alternate Spike and the others from the alternate world left, hopefully, to enact the Omega Protocols and dismantle the beacon once they had the portal closed. Twilight, after making sure everyone was present, Twilight took things to the castle and gave a detailed account of her experiences on the other side, Pinkie adding everything she encountered. Most of their friends and present family were suitably turned off by what they heard about things, aside from Rainbow Dash making some comments about wanting to have a Colosseum to have all the bouts she wanted to with willing competitors. To save them all from that madness, for a short time at least, Twilight said they’d discuss that with the appropriate experts at a later date.

“...but now, I need to go and arrange for psychological counseling for Pinkie and myself,” said Twilight as she finished things up, “once everything has been arranged we will get back to our duties as needed.”

“We understand,” said Luna, “your experiences were far outside the realms of our understanding, both my sister and myself, but we will always be here should you require assistance or advice. I would be more than honored to assist you in locating your best options in this endeavor, let us hope that things don’t get too awkward.”

“I’m with you on that,” said Pinkie, “I’ve had enough confusing mind stuff for quite a while. It’ll be difficult picking up our normal lives after everything we’ve been through, and we might even have some relapses, those usually aren’t very fun.”

Epilogue

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Twilight was now organizing her library, how had her other self managed only to mess up select sections of the library while making the rest even more organized? How that was even possible was beyond her, especially since the one responsible was supposed to be another her. “Well, better get started,” said Twilight with a hint of annoyance.

Almost two hours later, Twilight had her library back to its neat and orderly state, and soon after finishing was going through the stacks get every book she could on the relation between magic and transdimensional theory. “Hey Twi,” said Spike as he entered the library, “lunch will be ready in a half-hour or so, need me to handle anything while you work things out here?”

“Oh, Spike, thanks for the reminder, I need you to get in contact with Starswirl and set up a meeting with him, tell him it has to do with proper testing of some of his spells.”

“What should I tell him if he asks why you are setting up this meeting?”

“Because testing of his ‘clairvoyance’ spell in a magically shielded area is what led to that whole debacle with Pinkie and me from an alternate reality inhabiting our bodies for an extended period of time.”

“Oh, that will definitely get his attention. When I’m done with that, I’ll take care of the rest of my errands.” With that, Spike left the room.

_________________________________________________________________

Meanwhile, at Rarity’s place, Rarity was giving a very fussy Rainbow a measuring session.

Rainbow was fidgeting as Rarity measured her out, much to Rarity’s chagrin. “This would go faster if you just stayed still, if you hadn’t spent so much time fidgeting you would have been out of here by now,” said Rarity with a huff of annoyance.

“I still don’t see why we need to dress up for a game like Ogres and Oubliettes,” said Rainbow as she stopped moving about in her birthday suit for the seventeenth time that session, but only for a small handful of seconds.

“I thought it would help get us into character; Spike said everyone has their own way of playing and I thought it would be nice try dressing up as our characters to help get into their headspace.”

“But won’t Discord’s magic take care that for us? Last I checked he’s kind of obsessed with that game and will take any excuse to play it,” said Rainbow as she started to fidget again.

“While normally that would be true,” said Rarity with a tone and look that actually managed to make Rainbow freeze for the remainder of the session, 5 minutes, with a look of shocked fear, she had forgotten Rarity could be scary like that at times. “Sugar Belle will actually be running the game, and it’s just for us girls this time around, the boys will be doing an entirely separate game, and the two campaigns will meet up after a few sessions. She took to memorizing the source material quite well.”

“I almost forgot she and Mac got married last month,” said Rainbow, “even though we were all there. Remind me, will Twilight be there?”

“Yes, and this will only be her third campaign, as opposed to being your eighth and my fifth.”

“Yeah, but she’s probably spent more time memorizing the source material, player notes, and campaign notes. In other words, classic Twi. Didn’t we put in a special rule for her this time around?”

“No, that’s what we’ll be doing to her with the campaign after this coming one. She’s just cycling through the spellcasting classes at this point; Twilight’s already been a Wizard, Sorcerer, and Warlock, she’s going to be a Cleric this time around, she wants to see how different arcane and divine spellcasters work.”

“She’s probably going to start writing a paper on it after the third or fourth session. Want to start a betting pool for how long it takes her to start writing the academic report? The winner gets to decide what class Twilight’s next character is going to be.”

“While I usually don’t condone such things,” said Rarity with a thoughtful look as she wrapped up her measuring of Rainbow, “I think that in this case, it could be a fun group activity, I’ll see to Spike getting out word to the rest of the group at the proper moment.”

“So, how long will it be before I get my outfit for the game?”

“If nothing pressing or important comes up,” said Rarity tapping her chin in thought, “more than enough time for the game and you to add input for any extra flourishes you might have, just remember to be much more specific with what you say, I’ll tell you if you are being too vague, again.”

“Okay, thanks, Rares,” after making sure her clothes were all on Rainbow made her way out of the boutique.

Rarity lit up her magic and brought over her memo pad. “Pinkie: Bard, again, we probably should give here the same rule as we do for Twilight at the next opportunity; Rainbow: Rogue, Scout variant; Twilight: Cleric, Arcana domain; Starlight: Wizard, Divination specialization; Ember: Paladin, Dragon Oath (custom variant made with Spike’s help); Rarity: Warlock, Fey pact; Fluttershy: Druid (first time as, 6th campaign), Forest variant, Applejack: Monk, has yet to share what variant (still deciding?), Sugar Bell: Gamemaster, 9th time in position and has warned in advance there are quite a few house rules; might be Ocellus’s first campaign, still waiting to hear back from her” after reading over the note Rarity returned the note back to where she had placed it. Things were much quieter around her place, and the town in general, since Sweetie Belle and Scootaloo had left town to pursue the beginnings of their careers in a more active manner. Sweetie had gone to learn from veteran musicians, starting with Rara and Sapphire Shores. As for Scootaloo, Rarity really hadn’t been keeping up with that sort of thing, maybe Rainbow kept atop of things like that, considering how close the two tended to be over the years.

Six years, that’s how long it had been since Twilight first arrived in Ponyville, quite a few things had changed since then. The mayor slowly being fazed out due to Twilight being the resident princess was just the most recent of significant changes, the former mayor still served as a political aid, mostly because she had more experience with politics than Twilight, Rarity, and the rest of their little group.

Rarity got to work on the outfits for the characters everyone would be playing, remembering to send a request to Applejack as to what sort of Monk she would be playing as. She also remembered to make them have their form follow the function, while the game was for fun some of the players had said they might make the outfits part of their regular rotation once the game had reached its end.