> Mission to the Pony Planet
>  by ersmiller
> --------------------------------------------------------------------------

> Awkward departures
> --------------------------------------------------------------------------

           “Anything yet?” asked Twilight, anxiously adjusting her glasses.

           “Nope. Twilight—uh, Twi still ain’t answerin’, Twily,” replied Applejack, closing Sunset’s magic journal.

           Rarity looked apprehensively at the pedestal mirror beneath the restored horse statue as Pinkie knocked on the glass with her right hand.  “Perhaps we should give her a few more minutes,” she suggested.

           Rainbow Dash groaned, “We’ve been sending messages since yesterday!  This is urgent!  Sunset needs Twi’s help now!  If she’s not paying attention, we gotta go and find her ourselves!”

           “Portal’s open!” called Pinkie Pie, calling the girls’ attentions.  They all looked over to see a pink hoof at the end of the arm that had finally passed into the mirror.  Fluttershy got closer to look over Pinkie’s shoulder in amazement.

           “Sweet!” Rainbow cheered, running over to Pinkie to copy her.  “Woah!  That’s freaky,” she added, seeing her hand turn into a hoof on the other side of the mirror’s surface.

           Applejack looked on.  “Well, at least we know that works.  Good thing Twi set it up so that the journal can trigger it from this side, uh, somehow.”

           “Darlings,” Rarity called out to her two friends who were now part pony, “perhaps it’s best to not try leaning in more than one person at a time.  If we’re really going to do this I want to make sure none of us get—ugh.” Rarity shuddered, thinking back to last week’s movie night.  “Rainbow Dash, honestly, did you really have to make us watch that horrid horror movie?  There’s no way any flies can travel through this portal with us, is there?  We can’t get mixed together during the transition can we?”

           “Oh my!  I hadn’t thought about that,” Fluttershy gasped and took a step away from the hooves she had been staring at.  “And I was actually looking forward to this a moment ago.”

           Rainbow rolled her eyes, “Relax, don’t Twi and Spike—uh, ‘Claws’ leave together, like every time they both visit?  Twi hasn’t shown up with a dragon or dog’s head yet!”

           “Rainbow, please,” Rarity pleaded, “I really don’t want you putting any more such ideas into my head before we—”

           They were interrupted by the sounds of clopping.  Looking over they saw Pinkie with both arms in the mirror clapping with the resulting hooves.  “Sounds like banging coconuts together,” she giggled.

           “Is it really necessary for all of you to go?” asked Twilight. “Some of you can stay and try to help us find Sunset.”

           “We’ve talked about this, sugarcube.  You, Spike, Flash, and the Crusaders are all goin’ to be stayin’ here lookin’ for Sunset.  We even alerted the principals about what’s up; they said they’d be helpin’ out too.  So there’s eight of ya here for her, and one of y’all’s a regular bloodhound.”

           “That’s right!” said Spike the dog.  “I’ll find her quick, I got her scent memorized.  In fact it’s easier now that it’s gotten all brimstony.”

           “Spike!” Twily chided.  “That’s not nice.”

           “What?  I definitely smelled brimstone on her yesterday.”

           Twily groaned, drooping her head low and slumping her shoulders.

           Applejack put a hand on Twily’s shoulder.  “Don’t you worry none, Twily.  Twi will help us help her.  We’ll get our friend back to normal faster’n you can core an apple.”

           “Faster than Twily can core an apple?” asked Spike.  “Have you seen her in the kitchen?”

           “Spike!” Twily protested.

           “Even I core apples faster than you and I don’t have hands.”

           “You don’t core apples, you just chew them core and all.”

           Spike just raised his head and looked at her proudly.  “Yeah, you humanes are way too picky with your food.  Much better my way.”

    “We humanes like to taste our food.”

           “Hey now,” Applejack cut in, “how ‘bout faster’n ah can core an apple?”

           Twilight sighed and smiled back at her.  “Thanks Applejack.  Just, please hurry back.”

           “We will, that’s why the five of us are all doin’ this together.  We’re gonna split up and search, uh, whatever is around the other side of this here magic portal thing, find some, er, pony that knows where Twi is and bring her back here.  Shouldn’t take more’n an hour.”

           “Applejack’s right,” Rarity added.  “The more of us searching for Twi the quicker we should be able to find her.  It’s a completely different world after all ….  Well, it is known to have some parallels to our own, but still, we don’t really know what that world looks like.  We only had a few glimpses at the Friendship Games.  It’s best we all look together.  This way we will be able to divide the time necessary to locate our princess friend and avoid interfering with their world too much.  We’ll all be back home before you know it!”

           “That is IF we ever get going!” Rainbow Dash called back to them.  “Come on, we’ll be fine!  My hoof here looks … well, I guess hooves aren’t normally blue, but it seems normal otherwise, so do Pinkie’s!  There’s no problem!  Right, Pinkie?”  Rainbow looked back to the mirror expecting to see one blue and two pink hooves at the end of her and Pinkie’s arms, but instead saw her blue hoof and what seemed to be a long clump of pink cotton candy.  “What the!?”

           Beside her, Pinkie had turned around and pressed her rump up against the mirror causing a long, curly, pink tail to appear on the other side.  “I have a tail!  I’m tail twerking!  Wheeeee-he-hee!” she cheered as she wiggled her hips around, watching her tail bounce and wag after them.  “Oohh!  I wonder if I can write my name like this.”  Pinkie proceeded to move her tail around to shape out letters with it.

           That got Fluttershy’s interest back.  “Oh wow, we really will turn into ponies won’t we?”

           “Yeah!” agreed Pinkie.  “Ponies with fun poofy tails and fur in all sorts of bright, pastel colors that don’t normally appear on ponies!  At least in this world.”

           “Don’t forget wings that won’t disappear after a few minutes!” Rainbow added.  “It’s going to be awesome!”

           “Ohh! that’s right!” said Pinkie.  She took her rump away from the mirror, grabbed Rainbow, and spun her around to press her back against the mirror revealing two blue wings as a reflection.

           “Woah, Pinkie, a little warning!”  Dash tried to turn her head around to see her wings without pressing her face into the mirror.

           “WARNING!” yelled Pinkie, causing Rainbow to startle away from her with a shout and fall backward into the mirror.  “Oops, I’ll try a little-er warning next time.”

           “Rainbow!” Fluttershy ran up to the mirror.  “Are you alright?!” she called into it, hands cupping around her mouth.  After a few seconds of not receiving an answer, she pressed her ear up against the surface then squeaked and flailed her arms to angle herself away when she felt her ear pass into the mirror.

After steadying herself, Fluttershy looked around at her friends while biting her lower lip.  She reached one arm into the mirror and gasped when she saw it turn into a yellow hoof.  She took a breath, put her other arm in, closed her eyes, and let herself sort of fall through.

Once all but her legs were inside the mirror, the rest of her seemed to be pulled in by an invisible force.

           “Wait for me!” Pinkie cheered.  She took a few steps back for a running start and jumped in after them with a cartwheel.  “Whhheeeeeeeeeee—!” her voice was cut off abruptly as she disappeared.

           Applejack, Rarity, Twilight, and Spike all traded glances with each other and their reflections in the distant mirror.

           “Well,” Rarity began, “I suppose it’s my turn then.”  She took out her cell phone and began taking selfies at various angles and facial expressions.

           “Rares, what are you doing?” asked Applejack.

           “Should that mirror disfigure me, I’ll need photos for the surgeons to use as reference.”

           “Ah’m not sure a surgeon could turn a pony head into a human head no matter how many photos ya give ‘em.”

           Rarity put her cell phone back in her skirt pocket and began slowly walking to the mirror, picking up speed and growing louder as she spoke.  “Well, then I’ll sew myself a helm that looks just like these photos and never take it off!”  Upon her final word she took one last look at her reflection and hopped forward into the mirror.

           In the silence that followed, Applejack turned to Twilight.  “Alright, Twily.  You take Sunset’s journal, we’ll use it to keep in touch.  Ya let us know if ya find Sunset and we’ll let ya know if—WHEN we find Twi.”

           Twilight took the journal from Applejack and hugged it tightly to her chest.  “Be careful.”

           “We’ll be fine, Twily.  From everything Twi told us about her town it sounds very nice and homely.  ‘Cept for when giant monsters or that Discord feller is up to no good.”  She cringed when she got a look at Twily’s worried reaction and was quick to add, “Which ah’m sure ain’t happenin’ right now.  Heh’eh.”  Her eyes darted side to side, unable to look directly at Twilight.

           “It would make sense though.  Why else wouldn’t she have written back yet?  Something must be going on over in their version of Canterville right now.”

           “If’n that’s the case, then we’ll stay inside her castle and keep safe until she saves the day.  Heck, we might even get to see our pony selves in action together as they fight whatever off!  We’ll be fine, Twily.  Ah’m sure a royal castle is well protected and not just some big empty building in the middle of a monster-infested town.”

           “Sorry, Applejack, I’m just not really comfortable with magic right now; given everything that’s been happening lately.”  Twilight’s gaze drifted to the ground and Spike stepped closer to her, placing a paw on her leg.

           “It’s alright, sugarcube.  Jus’ remember, all ya gotta think about is findin’ Sunset.  I believe she really needs ya right now.  She’s really taken to ya you know.”

           “Yeah,” Twilight blushed, “I know.  And I’ll find her.”  She looked back up at Applejack.  “And you’ll find Twi and we’ll get Sunset back to normal!”

           “That’s the spirit,” said Applejack, giving Twilight a pat on both shoulders before walking to the mirror.  She took a look at her reflection and called back with a smile.  “Ya think ma hat will still fit me?”

           Twilight smiled back.  “If it doesn’t, you might be able to borrow one of pony Applejack’s hats.  Well, assuming she wears hats.”

           “Of course she does!  Ain’t no Applejack in any world who don’t wear a good hat!”  And with that she dropped to all fours and crawled into the mirror.  “Might as well start walkin’ like this now,” she mused to herself.

           Twilight and Spike walked up to the mirror after Applejack vanished.  Spike called into the mirror, “Say hi to Claws for me!”

After a moment, Twilight placed a hand on the mirror but she felt only glass.
> Crash Landing
> --------------------------------------------------------------------------

As Applejack walked her hands and arms through the mirror she saw and felt them become hooves and forelegs.  She continued forward, passing her head and upper body through the mirror’s surface, oddly not being aware of anything else changing.  Just when she was beginning to wonder if the portal had run out of magic from all the prior transformations, she felt a tug and she was pulled through by an invisible force.

           “Wuaguhhh!” she yelled, feeling nearly weightless but quickly falling forward.  Her body twisted as if in a spiral but she felt no pain, just dizziness, and a little nausea.  She continued to swirl, her body changing shape and growing fur.  She recognized the feeling as when she and the other Rainbooms ponied-up during their performances, but the changes were much more thorough, and normally the world wouldn’t be spinning around her.  She tried to pay attention to each change but was too busy doing her best to not lose her lunch to be able to note specifics.  Suddenly she felt gravity return and she was shot out of the swirling confusion and onto something soft and furry.

           “Oof!  Ow!” it said.

           “Rares?  ‘Dat you?” came Applejack’s muffled voice as she waited for her head to stop spinning along with her new body.

           “Yes, darling,” came a muffled reply.  “Now please remove your person from my … I’d rather not say it.  Please just get up and take a few steps aside.  Pinkie, you too.”

           “I can’t,” answered Pinkie’s voice, “you’re on me!  You’ve got to be the one to, he-he, ‘giddyup’!”

           Rarity groaned, “I can’t ‘giddyup,’ all I see is pink!  At least I think it’s pink, it’s rather dark in here.  I’m not even sure which way is up!  And I can’t seem to make this body move right, I think it’s because Applejack is on top of me.”

           “Ah’m movin’, ah’m movin’!  Jus’ let me figure out which leg is which here.  Ah landed with ma face stuck in ma hat and it feels like ah’m a’top a giant, furry marshmallow.”

           “A WHAT?!” Rarity protested.  “You.  Did.  Not just call me giant!  I’m sure whatever I look like is elegant and petite for the species!”

           Applejack struggled to right herself, straightening out her now forelegs in front of her.

           “OW!  Darling, I believe you just stepped on my tail.”

           “Sorry, Rares.”

           “It’s alright, strangely it didn’t actually hurt, it just surprised me.  Such an odd feeling it is to have something stepped on when it’s growing out of my—um, never mind.”

           “OOOH!  I love odd feelings!  Step on mine too while you’re up there!" Pinkie added.

           Applejack gave up trying to figure out her body while blind and sideways and simply rolled herself to what she believed to be left of the mirror.  She felt herself roll down a small, bumpy hill and come to rest on solid floor.

           “Thank you, darling.  Now if I can just free myself from this pink tornado.”

           While Rarity attempted to right herself, Applejack got a forehoof free and managed to knock her hat off her face with a pop.  Finally able to see, she then tried to scoop her hat up between her forehooves to place it on her head.  “Strange having to do this without fingers.”  After a few attempts, whereby she kept losing her balance and falling forward, she gave up and just dropped her head into her hat and held it on with one hoof while she angled her neck back up.

           With her priorities straightened out, Applejack got the rest of her legs settled, untangled, and beneath her.  Though she stopped before attempting to stand to get a look at the room they had landed in.  There wasn’t a lot to see as the only light came from a slightly open set of double doors but she was able to make out books everywhere, not just in bookcases and on tables but also strewn over the floor.  She stopped scanning the room when she caught sight of a wriggling mass of white and pink a small ways to her right.

           “Uhh …,” said Applejack, watching a white pony attempt to untie its head from inside a large, tangled, pink tail.  The pink pony the tail was attached to was mostly obscured by a pile of rubble she was planted face down inside of.  The rubble seemed to be mostly composed of books, furniture, and various stationary.  Both ponies were completely naked.  That latter fact would have been completely natural if it weren’t for the additional fact that Applejack was pretty sure these ponies were two of her very close friends.

           As Applejack stared in surprise, Rarity’s efforts to free herself caused her hindquarters to sway in all directions and her tail to twitch and flop around.  A glimpse of something that shouldn’t be on public display had Applejack avert her gaze with a blush.  She looked further back, opposite the doors, and found the ornate mirror they had apparently been shot out of.

    It was a curious thing.  Or at least the strange equipment attached to it was curious.  For a moment she thought she recognized Sunset’s old correspondence journal sitting in a nook above the mirror, but it appeared to have the sun symbol Principal Celestia was so fond of, rather than Sunset’s dual-colored sun on its cover.

Glancing down, Applejack saw her new body’s reflection in the mirror and noticed that she was also naked—aside from her faithful hat—and decided she didn’t need to try standing just yet.  Instead, she angled her hindquarters toward the wall away from her friends, looked back, and began working on learning how to make her tail cooperate while her blush deepened.

           While she was working on that, A surprised, not quite lady-like, yell came from her right as the white pony finally freed herself from the pink tail, rolled down the rubble pile, and came to a stop.

           “Jumping through the portal,” said the white pony, “was definitely a mistake.”

           Applejack risked a glance over to the white pony to find her lying on a side with her hooves and head facing away.  Her head was swaying around from her tumble down the pile, and possibly still the journey through the mirror, but the voice and purple hair—or rather—mane and tail on this pony were unmistakably Rarity’s.  “Ah don’t know, Rares, ah crawled through and still ended on top of, uh, never mind.”

           “It wouldn’t have been so bad if this pile of broken furniture wasn’t in front of the mirror.  What happened here?  Are we in the right place?”

           “Well,” called Pinkie, her tail, sticking straight up from the top of the pile, being the only part of her that was visible, “this book my face landed in has the messages we wrote to Twi, so we’re either in the right place, or this book is an impostor.”

           “Pinkie, why exactly are you up there and why is there a pile of rubble in this—” Rarity looked around the room in front of her, “—what I suspect used to be an orderly study?  Are those walls made out of crystal?” she couldn’t help but squint trying to make out more details.

           “Well, when I cartwheeled into the mirror it kinda turned me sideways, which is weird since because I was cartwheeling I was already sideways, so I think it turned it into a somersault, and then it became a back-flip too, or maybe the other way around; I’m normally really good at both of those but I’ve never done both at the same time, and when the mirror kicked me out here it really KICKED me out here—and I think it’s a good thing it doesn’t have feet because it would really, REALLY have kicked me out here if it did—anyway, my arms and legs—or I guess I should say my legs and other legs—weren’t the right sizes anymore so I tripped and tumbled and kept rolling and bounced off something, and then bounced off something else, and I heard some stuff breaking and I bounced again, and then again, and when I finally stopped rolling I was on top of this pile here.  Oh, and then Rarity knocked me into the hole in the top and fell into my tail.”

           “I was in your tail?!”  Rarity sputtered as if there was hair on her tongue and brought up a foreleg to pick it out, only to hit herself with a fingerless hoof.  “Ow.”

           “What is in this anyway?”  Pinkie sniffed.  “Smells like dusty old books.”  She sniffed again.  “Really dusty old—aaahh, aahhh, CHOO!”

           The force of Pinkie’s sneeze blew her up and out of the hole.  Once her upward momentum wore off, she fell back down and crashed on top of the pile sending debris in all directions.  The resulting dust cloud set the three ponies into coughing fits.

           “Pinkie …, darling, are … are you … alright?” asked Rarity between coughs.

           “OOH!  My tail is really floofy and poofy and soft!  I didn’t feel that at all.  I gotta remember to always land butt first like that!  I wonder if I can bounce on it like a trampoline.  Oh!  And pony sneezes are REALLY strong!”

           Applejack moved to grab her hat off her head and use it to waft the dust cloud away but wasn’t sure how to grab it in her hoof so she just waved at the dust with a foreleg instead.  “Glad yer alright, Pinkie, but ah think we just ransacked Twi’s study.”

           “I’m afraid you may be right,” Rarity agreed, also trying to thin the dust cloud with a foreleg.  She looked around as her vision cleared.  “We’re going to have to apologize to—PINKIE!  You’re naked!”

           Pinkie was already attempting to bounce on her tail, her four legs spread out in front of her, facing her friends.  “No I’m not, silly!  I’m wearing a fur coat!  AND fur pants!”  Pleased with her pony body’s fashion sense she looked down to get a better look at herself.  She took in her fur-covered pink hooves, her fur-covered pink forelegs, her fur-covered pink belly, and her fur-covered …, she blushed.  “Oh, um … those aren’t pants.  Definitely not pants.”  She then realized she was completely on display and yelled, limbs flailing, “Don’t look at me!  I’M NAKED!”

           Applejack and Rarity averted their gazes as Pinkie wrapped herself with her four hooves.

           And then Rarity screamed, “I’m naked too!”

           Applejack’s pony ears flopped down on instinct to protect themselves from the onslaught.  “Well Twi and Sunny did say most of Equestria is clothing optional.”

           " ‘Clothing optional’ is not the same thing as nudist colony.  I’m a fashionista, so is pony Me.  Why am I naked?!  I should NOT be naked!”

           They all lay there a moment, blushing and covering themselves, and making sure to not look at each other.  Eventually Applejack reached a conclusion.  “Alright, Pinkie’s naked, Rarity’s naked, um, Ah’m naked.  We’re all naked and that’s normal for this world.  We just gotta ignore that and press on.”

           Rarity scoffed at that.  “I’m not stepping foot anywhere until I’m decent.”

           Pinkie giggled.  “We’re not stepping foot anywhere because we have no foots!”

           “You know what I mean, darling.”

           “Well ah don’t see any clothing in here so we got no choice but to leave as we are.”

           “Says the pony with a hat,” Rarity retorted.

           “Well it ain’t like I’m wearing it on the end that counts.  Besides, we’re all girls here, and we’re all ponies.  What’s it matter?”

           “What it matters is that I have my dignity to preserve.  I am a lady, and ladies conduct themselves with dignity and grace.”  Rarity looked at the hoof she had hit herself with earlier and pouted.  “And right now I have neither.”

           “Hey!” suggested Pinkie, “maybe pony Rarity has some clothing in the palace somewhere!”

           Rarity’s eyes sparkled.  “Oh that’s right.  We’re in a palace, a real live palace!  There must be closets all over stocked full of stylish, royal clothes.  I’m sure, given the situation, no one would mind if we borrowed some for however long we end up staying here.”

           “A’mazin’ that this palace was all made by ponies,” added Applejack.

           “No it wasn’t.” said Pinkie.  “It was all made by a tree, according to Twi, remember?”

           Applejack thought on that, “Strange things happen in this world.”

           “Yeah, like a school bully turning into a she-demon and then becoming our friend when an alien pony princess jumped out of our horse statue and used a crown to shoot a rainbow that turned that she-demon back into normal, which isn’t really normal for her since she’s actually also an alien pony that just looks human, and then these three fish-ponies that also just look human show up and hypnotize people with their singing until we all grow pony ears and tails and shoot a rainbow at them too, by rocking out some awesome jams in their general direction, and then a girl that looks just like our purple alien pony princess friend, but is actually a humane for real shows up and SHE turns into a—”

           “Ah get it, Pinkie,” Applejack interjected, “weird things happen in our world too.  And, ya know, now that I think about it, being naked in an alien world, in alien bodies ain’t exactly the weirdest thing we’ve been through.  So, let’s buck up already and look for Twi so we can go back home where we have clothes on.”

           A moment passed in silence.  The three mares continued to hold their positions.  Eventually Rarity spoke up.  “I don’t see you, ‘bucking up’, darling.”

           “Ah don’t see you doing it either.”

           “Normal for this world or not, I am not ‘bucking’ anything until I get some clothes on.”

           Pinkie thought for a moment.  “That sounds backward.”

           “What ah said was—oh never mind.”

           Another moment passed and Pinkie pondered, “I feel like we’re forgetting something ….  I know I turned off the oven before I left.  I put the whip cream in the whip cream fridge.  I took bolder for a walk for Maud.  Gave Rocky his favorite treat for being good yesterday.  Oh I remember!  ‘WARNING’!”

           “” ‘Warning’?”” Applejack and Rarity asked.

           “Yeah!  Remember when I gave Rainbow Dash that ‘WARNING’ that made her fall backward into the mirror and then Fluttershy jumped in after her?”

           They looked around the room again, still avoiding looking at each other.  “Where are Rainbow Dash and Fluttershy?” Rarity asked.  “They came through ahead of us.  Pinkie, didn’t you see them?”

           Nope!  I had my face in a book inside a pile of other books and broken furniture!  And then a Rarity fell on top of me.”

    “W-we do not need to speak of that last part,” chided Rarity.

           “Rainbow?!” called Applejack.  “Fluttershy?!  Where are you two?”

           “Darlings, look by the door!” Rarity pointed a hoof at a disorganized trail of books, beside a toppled over bookcase, leading to the set of opened double doors connecting to what looked like a hallway.

           “Ah have a feeling that some of this mess was here before Pinkie arrived.”

           “That would explain why the floor was so bumpy before the first time I crashed into something,” said Pinkie.

           “So,” started Rarity, “what; did Rainbow Dash make a mess and run off with Fluttershy chasing her?”

           “Why would Dash just—” Applejack thought for a second, “—she’s off enjoying her wings ain’t she?”

           Rarity sighed, “And I suspect Fluttershy is still trying to catch up with her and make sure she isn’t injured, or gets lost.”

           At that moment they all heard a loud “WHOOOHOOOOO!” as a multicolored streak zoomed past the open doors followed by a much softer “oh my goodness, oh my goodness!” from down the hall.

           The three ponies in the dark room just looked at the open doors as they confirmed their suspicions.

           “Seems to be the case.”

           “Yeah, that figures.”

           “Yepperonie!”

           Not yet willing to stand up in their current state, they simply waited as additional instances of “oh my goodness,” as well as a few calls of “Rainbow!” soft utterances of “oof!” and wordless panting all followed, each slightly closer than the previous.

While they waited for the for the inevitable yellow pony to pass by, there were also more loud exclamations accompanied by rainbow blurs passing the door.  The group tried calling out to Rainbow each time, but the blur kept flying by.

“So,” asked Applejack, passing the time, “you took Bolder for a walk today?  Ah thought ya was helping the rest of us look after Sunset.”

“I was!  But I had Bolder in my pocket with his leash on.  I was multitasking!”

Finally an “oof” was close enough to be felt through the floor as much as it was heard and the three ponies called out to the source.”

           “”Fluttershy!””

           “Eek!” came a startled reply.

           “Darling, it’s us!” explained Rarity.  “We’re still in the room with the portal.”

           “Girls?” came a relieved reply.

           “This way, Flutterpony!” cheered Pinkie.

           “I-I’m trying!  …  Oof!  … I’m … almost … oof, there!”  The head and forehooves of a panting, yellow pony landed just beyond the crack between the open doors and looked over, squinting into the darker room.  “Girls?  Are you there?” she asked.

           “Are doughnuts holey?” Pinkie asked right back.  “Oh wait, not ALL doughnuts are holey, you know, like the jelly and cream-filled ones, but we are!  I mean, we’re not doughnuts and we’re not holey, or cream-filled, but I did have jelly on my toast this morning so—”

           “Darling, I’m sure she has the idea by now,” Rarity abruptly spoke, cutting off pinkie.

           Fluttershy smiled and took a calming breath.  “We all made it okay then?”

           “Seems like it, sugarcube.  Though we also seemed to have rustled up the place a bit.”

           “ALRIGHT!  YES!” came another rainbow blur above Fluttershy who ducked low.

           “Oh, I know.  I’m so sorry,” said Fluttershy after the coast was clear.  “We’re going to have to come back and help clean up after Sunset is okay.  Rainbow Dash and I …,” she trailed off blushing as she looked back the way she came then forward past where the blur had gone.  “I’m afraid it’s not just the one room.”

           “I’m sure Twi and the maids will understand once we explain,” Rarity assured.

           “Oh I hope so.  But I’ll still want to help clean up our mess.”  Fluttershy lifted up a forehoof to look at it.  “If I can figure out how.  Also, flying is a lot harder than the birds make it look.”

    “It is?” asked Pinkie.  “But you and Dashie fly all the time when you pony-up and get wings back home.”

    “That’s true.  But, back home, all I have to do is think ‘up’ or ‘that way’ and my wings take me there.  It’s like the magic moves them for me.  But here they’re normal wings; I have to move them directly, get all the angles and movements just right, and—.”

           “YEAH!  WOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO!” the streak passed over Fluttershy’s head again.

           “Seems Dash took to it mighty well,” Applejack chuckled.

           “Oh yes.  She’s already faster than she was at the Friendship Games.  She just had a few, um, accidents early on … we both did.  So, um, I suggested we stick to this hallway.  It’s pretty empty and seems to circle around the whole palace.  At least this floor.”  With that, she gracefully stood on her four hooves and effortlessly trotted to the doors.

           The others just stared at her ease of movement in her alien form as she opened the doors wider, letting in more light.  “Oh my!  Look at you all!” she said with glee.  They stared in shock a moment longer before remembering to be embarrassed.

           “Fluttershy!  We’re naked!” shrieked Rarity.

           “All of you?  I thought at least you would have some clothes on, Rarity.”  Fluttershy looked them over as they blushed and kept themselves covered.  “Ah, Applejack, you still have your hat!”  Fluttershy smiled at them and came more fully into the room.  Outside, the rainbow blur did another pass.

           “But, darling, why aren’t you embarrassed?  You’re naked too!

           “Oh I know,” Fluttershy smiled.  “But it’s okay; I’m a pony.”  Fluttershy giggled back at them wiggling her pony ears up and down and swishing her tail back and forth.  “We’re all ponies.  Isn’t this fun?”

           They looked back at her, Rarity and Applejack in disbelief while Pinkie seemed conflicted at the use of the word fun.  “Uh, yeah, ‘fun’, it’s ….” Pinkie’s ears twitched and she looked around.  “Hey, did anyone else hear that?”

           The other girls listened, a few managing to swivel their ears about the room to better focus.  “Ah, don’t hear—”

           “WHOOOOOOOO!”

           Fluttershy looked back to the opened doors. “Besides the three of you, and Rainbow Dash, I haven’t heard anything since we got here.  I think the palace is empty.”

           Applejack frowned at that.  “What did ya hear, Pinkie?”

           “A voice.  A mysterious voice!”

           “Pinkie, darling, are you hearing voices again?”

           “It’s only ever been that one voice, but now it’s a different one.”

           “Oh my,” said Fluttershy.  “What is it saying?”

           “It’s saying …,” Pinkie simply mumbled and whispered in a deep tone.

           “It’s sayin’ whut now?  Ah didn’t understand that.”

           “Exactly!  Neither did I!”

           “That’s a bit foreboding, darling.”

           “Nah.  I guess she just sounds different over here,” Pinkie concluded.

           The other three mares traded looks.  “Anyway,” Applejack attempted to shrug but ended up only lowering her head closer to the floor.  “Fluttershy’s right, just like ah was sayin’ earlier.  We’re ponies, and bein’ naked is normal here.  So ….”  She blushed, looking at the others and took a breath.  Then she tried to stand.

           Applejack got her forehooves planted beneath her and straightened her forelegs without trouble but wobbled as she tried to push up on her hind hooves.  “Whoa.  These legs don’t bend quite like humane legs.”

           “That’s right,” Fluttershy affirmed.  “While they are much more poseable than the legs horses in our world have, they still work a bit differently than what we’re used to as humanes.  You’ll get them though, just take it easy.”

           “There!  Nothin’ to it!” Applejack smiled as she reached her pony body’s full height for the first time.  “And, uh, t-there ain’t nothin’ to be embarrassed about.”

           “Then why do you have your tail tucked between your legs, darling?”

           “Because, uh … that is to say.  Alright!  It’s embarrassin’.  Rares, if ya find some clothes somewhere, would’ya find somethin’ for me too?  Nothing too frou-frouie though.” Applejack paused for thought.  “Ya’ll think ponies even do frou-frou?”

           “As much as I prefer not to use the term; yes.  I suspect pony Rarity’s styles would be much like mine—the type that you often call ‘frou-frou’—just for a different body shape, and a, uh, horizontal back.  Maybe some saddles?  Sunset mentioned saddles.  Do you suppose they wear bridles?  I can see lace bridles as part of a chic headdress.  I wonder about foot—er, hoofwear.  They don’t nail on their shoes like horses in our world do they?  How awful must it be to change them?”  Rarity blinked, coming out of her reverie, and looked over at Applejack.  “Oh, yes, of course I’ll bring you some clothes if I can find some.”

           “Thanks.”

           “But that goes for the rest of you as well.  You find clothing, please bring some back for me.  ‘Frou-frou’ is fine of course, just make sure it is a complete ensemble and doesn’t clash with my ski—er, fur.  And be sure it’s something that will compliment my figure, and—”

           “Rares, if we find anythin’ that’ll fit you and get you to leave this room any faster, we’ll do it.  You can then go find something else you’d rather wear once you’ve covered your, ‘dignity’.  Deal?”

           Rarity looked a little indignant at Applejack’s plan but rolled her eyes and smiled.  “Deal.  But nothing—”

           “Ah-ah,” Applejack chided, causing Rarity to pout.  “Anything for you, Pinkie?”  They looked over at Pinkie to see that she was tilting her head around at different angles and twitching her ears wildly.  “Uh, Pinkie?”

           “WHAT?!  What is it?!  What?!  What?!”  Pinkie yelled before flinching back.  “Oh!  Applejack, that was you?”

           “Pinkie, darling, are you alright?”

           Pinkie chuckled nervously, “Heh, sure!  Never better.  Just listening to the voices.”

           “Voices?”  Asked Fluttershy.  “There’s more than one now?”

           “Yep.  Two, or three.  Or maybe five.  No big deal, they’re not even loud.  Just whispers really,” Pinkie’s eyes darted around the room.  “Lots of little tiny whispers,” she whispered.

           “Pinkie, did ya hit yer head during that tumble?”

           Pinkie padded the top of her head with a forehoof, “Yep!  A bunch of times.  But my hair”—

           “Mane.” Fluttershy corrected.

           —”is almost as floofy, poofy, and soft as my new tail, so it never really hurt.  Always been that way, even in our world.  Bumps to the head never bother me.”

           “Are you sure, Pinkie?  Perhaps you should head home, or lie down for a bit.”

           “No-siree-pony-Bob!  We’re here on a mission and we’re not gonna quit until we find our purple pony princess pal!”  Pinkie jumped up with a smile to show that she was fine and ready to go.  However, instead of landing on her hooves she landed on her tail, bounced forward, and did a double forward roll, ending up flat on her belly with her limbs behind her.  “I meant to do that!”

           “Now, Pink—”  Applejack attempted to follow after her but mistimed the movements of her four legs, causing a back hoof to trip over a forehoof, and she tumbled to her side.

           “Yes,” Rarity chimed in looking away to give Applejack some privacy, “I believe I’ll stay right here until some clothing can be found.  If I’m going to be walking like that, I’m going to cover myself as best as possible first.  Are you alright, darling?”

           “Yeah …,” Applejack rolled her eyes, “thanks fer askin’.”

           “Fluttershy, how did you manage to walk in here so gracefully?”

           “Oh, as you know, I spend a lot of time taking care of animals at the shelter.  One of the things I do there is help as an assistant to the veterinarians that also volunteer there.  I’ve helped a lot of animals get back on their paws and hooves, and claws, so I’ve been able to really study how they walk.  I’ve had to in order to be a good assistant.”

           Awkwardly picking herself up, Applejack asked, “So, if you don’t have any trouble gettin’ around, what was all that ‘oh my goodness’ and thumping business we heard when you was in the hall?”

           “Oh,” she blushed, “that was me trying to fly.  I thought it would be just as easy since I’ve also looked after so many little birdies, but—”

           “YEEEHAAHHOOOO!”

           She looked back at the open doors, “Well … I wasn’t able to keep up with Rainbow.”

           “Alright, so, for those of us that don’t pay so much attention to how animals walk, think ya can give some pointers?”

           “Oh of course!  But don’t you watch the horses on your farm?”

           “Not in that much detail.  Ah take care of ‘em, feed ‘em, wash ‘em, take ‘em out for rides, play with ‘em, and put ‘em to work.  If somethin’ seems wrong with any of ‘em ah call you.  Am’m not a vet.”

           Fluttershy’s ears drooped a little at that.  “Oh, I see.  Well, alright then.  Everyone watch me.”  Fluttershy turned so they could see her from the side and began walking slowly back and forth along the floor.  Taking care not to walk over any scattered books or debris.  “Front-right, back-left, front-left, back-right.  You lift your front hooves just before placing your hind hooves back down.  You should always have two or three hooves on the ground during regular walking.”

           As Fluttershy continued walking in a rough oval in front of her friends Applejack began to copy her while Rarity and Pinkie watched.

           “Front-right,” said Applejack as she lifted that hoof.  “Back-left—”

           “Now angle forward, and place your front-right hoof down right before you lift your front-left, and then place your back-left down, all in one fluid motion.”

           Applejack nodded and continued.  “Front-right down, front-left u—”  With both her left hooves in the air Applejack fell onto her side.

           “Oh my.  You want to put your weight a bit to the right before you lift up your second left hoof.”

           Applejack just sighed and began to stand again.

           “QUIET!” Pinkie shouted, startling the others.  Fluttershy let out a tiny squeak, and Applejack fell over again with a short, instinctual, whinny.  “Oh, sorry.  Ignore me.  I was talking to ‘them’.  I think there’s six now.”  When she noticed three pairs of concerned eyes on her she quickly stood up and nervously added, “And we’re walking!  Front-back, second-base, left-hook, and, um, and JUMP!”  Pinkie bent all four knees and jumped upward.  Upon landing she jumped again with all four legs while leaning forward propelling herself ahead.  “See?  Look; perfect!”  Pinkie got into a rhythm, expertly jumping all around the room.

           “Um, Pinkie, that’s called pronking, not walking,” said Fluttershy.

           “It’s perfect!  I’m a pronkin’ pony Pinkie Pie!”

           “That looks like it’d get a mite tiresome real quick, though it does look easier.”  Applejack got to her hooves, bent her four knees, and jumped.  Unfortunately, her hind legs had more power to them than her forelegs and they kicked way out behind her launching her more forward than she had intended, with her back end higher than her front.  The angle of her attack caused her to crash into Fluttershy and bowl her over.  “Sorry about that, sugarcube.  Ya’ll alright?”

           A little dazed, Fluttershy struggled to stand as she replied.  “It’s … woo, okay, Applejack.  I’m okay.”

           “And ah think ah’ll go back to walkin’.”

           Meanwhile, Rarity had remained on the floor, lying on her side, with her hooves tucked in close; just as she was when she first realized her state of attire.  She now inventoried the situation.  One friend barely able to walk, another dazed, a third bouncing around the room like a ping-pong ball and apparently hearing voices, and the fourth—

           “THIS IS SO AWESOME!”

           —Likely to tire herself out before even leaving the palace.  She clicked her tongue in annoyance.  Come on, Rarity, clothes or not, your friends need you, it’s time to take charge, she thought to herself.  Rarity smoothed out her mane with a foreleg, stood up with as much grace and dignity she could manage, discreetly tucked her tail down between her hind legs, and began to walk.  Promptly falling onto her face.
> These hooves were made for walkin' … but not much else
> --------------------------------------------------------------------------

           A few minutes later saw three ponies walking—one with the grace of a natural, two with the grace of newborns—a fourth pony continuing to bounce around the room with her head darting in all directions, and a fifth pony still circling through the hallway, ever increasing her flight speed and agility.

           “Very good, everyone!” Fluttershy cheered her friends on.  “I think we can try leaving the room now.”

           “Yeah, I reckon it’s time we flag down Miss NASCAR with wings,” said Applejack.  Rarity and Fluttershy nodded in agreement while Pinkie continued to bounce around, eying every object and dark corner suspiciously.  Fluttershy lead the way gracefully and opened the double doors wider for the two friends who wobbled after her.  Pinkie took notice and bounced closer.  Rainbow Dash made one more pass before any of them made it into the bright hallway.

           “My, she is getting fast isn’t …?”  Rarity trailed off as she got a look at the well lit palace hall.  “It’s magnificent!  Is this whole palace made of crystal?  And it’s so spacious!  The wide hall, the high ceiling, those pillars, those banners, the diamond dangly light things attached to the ceiling.  There are so many doors!  How many rooms are in this hallway?  This palace is simply divine!  Could use some drapes though.”

           “It sure is somethin’.”

           “While trying my own wings out,” Fluttershy began, “I counted at least—”

           “Yeah, this place has everything!” Pinkie called out, still pronking around.  “Big tall ceilings that make you feel tiny.  Shiny floors that are cold to the touch.  And it even has long empty—WAIT!”  She stopped suddenly in the air, having somehow gotten gravity and momentum both to ignore her for a few seconds.  Once gravity remembered it was a law of nature and brought Pinkie to the floor she looked back at her vibrating tail.  “MY TAIL IS TWITCHING!  Twitch-a-twitch, Twitch’a’twitch!  Why is—?”

           “WOOOAAHH!  Look out!”

           Pinkie, Applejack, Rarity, and Fluttershy all looked up just in time to watch a rainbow blur careen through the hallway and slam down onto Pinkie causing the two of them to bounce off the floor and into a wall.

           “Rainbow!  Pinkie!”  Fluttershy quickly rushed to her friends’ aid while two more friends wobbled over at a slower pace.  “Are you two alright?”

           “Wow,” said Pinkie, her face pressed to the floor and her legs and belly against a wall, tail pointing up as if stuck to the wall, “You’re right, I probably should have dogged that, huh?  But at least my tail stopped twitching.”

           “Pinkie, who are you talking to?” asked Fluttershy.

           “Number eight.”

           “Ughh,” groaned Rainbow, flat on the floor, gaining Fluttershy’s attention.

           “Rainbow!  Are you alright?  Are you hearing any voices?”

           “Voices?  What?  Who?  Fluttershy?”

           “Yes, it’s me, Rainbow.  We’re all here.  Are you—”

           “It’s about time the rest of you showed up!” Rainbow perked her head up.  “I was getting bored of this hallway.  I gotta get outside and REALLY fly!”

           “You mean, get outside and find Twi, right?” corrected Applejack.

           “Uh, yeah.  And I’ll find her by flying!  With how fast I can go I’ll find her in just ten seconds flat!  Did you see me?  Did you see how fast I was going!  Even without my geode!”

           “What we saw was a mighty crash just now as you plowed into Pinkie here.”

           “Oh!  Right.  Heh.  I was bored with just flying fast and started doing some tricks.  You know, barrel rolls, aileron rolls, inside loop, pelican dive.  Uh,”  Dash blushed and grinned sheepishly, “the dive could have gone better.”

           “Ya don’t say.”

           “Hey, the other tricks went just fine!”

           “Rainbow,” Fluttershy chided, “we already have a few messes to clean up, remember?”

           “Uhh … yeah.  But that was from before I got the hang of these babies!” Rainbow said, proudly looking over her withers at the blue wings she was flexing.  She then gave them a hard flap, lifting her into the air then settling down on her four hooves and looked over the other ponies before her.  “Hey, wow, I can totally recognize all of you!  Heh, that portal doesn’t really change us all that much, huh?  We even got our signs on our butts," Rainbow patted the lightning cloud on her hip.

Applejack looked where Rainbow was pointing and then back to her own hips.  "Oh right.  I think Sunset said every pony has these 'cute marks' or somethin'."  She then frowned and mumbled out while shaking her hip, "Kind'a feels like I've been branded."

"Heh, mine should be called an awesome mark!"

           “Yes, we do seem to retain quite the resemblance on this world,” said Rarity, appraising her three diamonds.   “Though I would have preferred we retain our clothing along with our features.  And if I could just locate a mirror I’d love to get a closer look at my own pony form.”

           “You don’t need a mirror, silly,” said Pinkie, her face still on the floor.  “Just look at the floor!”

           Rarity looked down quizzically but stopped, horrified, before her gaze even reached between her forehooves, and screamed.  “The floor is reflective!  Oh, no no no no!”

           “Oh, Rarity,” asked Fluttershy, “what’s wrong about that?”

           “Don’t you understand?!  The floor is reflective!  We’re on all fours and NAKED!”

           “Oh jumpin’ June bugs!” yelled Applejack as she blushed and crossed her hind legs.

           “Why would nudists design such a horror?!” Rarity shrieked.

           “But the designer was a tree,” Pinkie reminded them.  “Do they even know what clothes are?”

           “I don’t care if the designer was a tree, a pony, a rock, or a teacup!” Rarity replied.  “This simply will not do!  Rainbow!  Fluttershy!  Have either of you located any closets, bedrooms, boutiques while roaming earlier?!  Rarity needs clothing!”

           “I cras—flew into a bedroom earlier.” said Rainbow.

           “WHERE!?” cried Rarity stepping up to Rainbow her eyes wide and twitching.  “Tell me tell me tell me tell me!”

           “Um, it was down that way,” Rainbow answered pointing behind Rarity, “but I don’t—”

           Rarity turned, wobbled, and made a valiant attempt at running in an unfamiliar body.  She succeeded just long enough to pass by the portal room they had only just left before tripping over her own legs.  As she attempted to pick herself up she got a good look at herself through her reflection in the floor and screamed again.  “I’VE BEEN IMPALED!”

           The others rushed to her side.  Rainbow reached her first but overshot by a large margin and slid along the floor as she hadn’t learned how to brake, or walk, yet.  This effectively made Fluttershy the first to reach her with Applejack bringing up the rear.  Pinkie Pie was still against the wall and had started mumbling to herself.

           “Rarity, where?  Show me!” urged Fluttershy.

           “Is it some of the broken furniture from the portal room?” asked Applejack.

           “It’s in my head!” Rarity replied turning around and pointing at her forehead.

           “Uh, Rarity, I believe that’s a horn,” Fluttershy said.

           “I don’t care what it is; get it out!”

           “But we can’t.  You haven’t been impaled, it’s growing out of you.”

           “It’s grow—I’m a monster!  That portal has disfigured me!

           “Rares!  Yer a unicorn!” Applejack explained.

           “I-I’m wha’?”

           “Yer a unicorn, like Fluttershy is a pegasus, and ah’m, uh,” Applejack checked her forehead by tapping it with a hoof, “earth pony, was’it?”

           “A unicorn?” asked Rarity looking at her horn, both directly and through her reflection in the floor.  “I’m a unicorn.  I’m a unicorn!  Ooooohh!  The majestic creature of legends!  Beauty, mystery, magic.  The divine equine!”  During her revelation Rarity had stood up tall with her head high and her chest puffed out.

           Meanwhile, Rainbow had corrected herself, hovered over, and landed before Rarity.  “Uh, hate to burst your bubble there, Rarity, but we kind'a have a unicorn friend back home that turned into a she-demon and tried to enslave the school.  Not sure how ‘divine’ you can call that.”

           Rarity’s expression dropped from elation to menace.  “I’ve lost my grace, dignity, and clothing, couldn’t you let me have this.  One.  Thing?”

           “What?  Sunset and Twi said there’s lots of unicorns here.  It’s nothing special.  Besides, you don’t even have wings!” Rainbow proudly returned to a hover.

           Rarity and Applejack both leveled glares at her.

           “Not that you’re not still awesome.  You know, in your own ways.  ‘Cause you’re my friends and all my friends are awesome!  Heh.”  Rainbow bashfully placed a hoof behind her head.

           “Rainbow Dash,” Rarity warned, glaring at her.  “Where was that bedroom?”

           “Uh, that way.  Not far.  Door’s still open.  Can’t miss it.”  Rainbow Dash pointed further down the hall behind her and hovered a little higher, keeping her distance, as Rarity more calmly walked down the hallway.  Once she had gone a little ways Rainbow turned to Applejack and Fluttershy.  “She's not going to be happy when she finds that bedroom.”

           “Why not?” Asked Fluttershy.

           “I think it was Spike’s.”

           “RAINBOW DASH!” came an angry shriek a moment later.  “Find!  Pony!  Clothing!  Now!”

           “Woah!  Yes ma’am!” Rainbow answered, a slight quiver in her voice, and darted into the nearest room away from Rarity.  Not one second passed before a loud thud was heard.

           “Be careful, Rainbow!  Try not to make any more messes,” Fluttershy called as Rainbow left the first room and proceeded to the next, at a slower pace, with a hoof pressed to her forehead.

           Rarity calmly returned to Fluttershy and Applejack shortly after Rainbow made it around the hall’s bend.  “Now then.  We wait for Rainbow’s return, get dressed, find Twi, and leave this horrid world!”

           “Oh Rarity, it’s not horrid.  I think this place seems nice,” said Fluttershy.

           “Yeah, Rares, we can’t judge a whole world just because a magic portal decided not to give us any clothes.

           Rarity looked sternly at Applejack and Fluttershy, advancing on them as she spoke, “When I stay at a hotel I expect polite room service and a bellboy to carry my luggage.  When I go to a spa I expect a mani-pedi and a relaxing soak in a hot tub.  When I enter a magic portal to another world and end up in an alien body I expect it to dress me for the occasion!  Is it so difficult to provide proper accommodations?!”

           Fluttershy and Applejack began to cower and back away from their friend’s tirade.  Applejack, not having practiced walking backward with four legs ended up tripping and landing on her hindquarters rendering her unable to backup any farther.  “Now, now, Rares, ah—”

           Applejack was saved from Rarity’s growing anger by a buzzing sound from the portal room.

           “EEEAAKKKK!  NOW THEY’RE BUZZING AT ME!”  Pinkie jumped up and began to pronk in a circle around her friends.  “MAKE IT STHAP!”  Too preoccupied to notice the proximity of the nearest wall, she jumped directly into it, bounced, and landed on her back with her four legs splayed out in all directions.

           “Pinkie!  Cover yourself!” Rarity looked away with a forehoof over her eyes.

           “Rarity!” Pinkie shrieked from the floor.  “There’s more important things here than our horsey hoo-haws!  You’re being udderly ridiculous!”

           Fluttershy trotted to Pinkie and began petting her mane.  “Pinkie, it’s okay, that buzzing isn’t in your head; we hear it too.”

           “Oh!  Okay then,” Pinkie smiled.  “I’ll just go back to mumbling and whispering back to numbers three, eight, and twelve.  I should probably start naming them.”

           The other three girls looked at each other, concerned for their pink friend.  Applejack glanced toward the portal room where the buzzing was coming from and made a tilting motion with her head in that direction.  Rarity and Fluttershy nodded and the three of them walked toward the sound as Pinkie began mumbling to herself again.  “None of yall's hearing voices, right?”

           They shook their heads.

           “No, darling, just this buzzing.  Any idea what might be causing it?” Rarity asked then gasped.  “Our cell phones!  Could it be they came through with us?”

           “Ah don’t know, Rares.  Ah suspect they’re with our clothes … wherever that might be.  And even if they did, there ain’t no satellites here for ‘em to connect to.  No way to get calls or texts.”

           “Texts!  Sunset’s journal!” concluded Fluttershy.

           “Darling, you’re right!  Twily must be writing to us.  Pinkie found this side’s copy earlier; it must be somewhere in this mess.

           “Oh, I am very sorry about the mess,” Fluttershy looked around the room.  “Though, it wasn’t this bad when I left.”

           “I’m afraid we had some ‘accidents’ of our own.  Accidents we shall not speak of.”

           “Hey, over here.” said Applejack, attempting to push away some debris with a hoof.  “Sounds like it’s under here.  There anyway to turn on the lights in here?  Still a bit dark.”

           “I’ll look for a lamp or light switch, darlings.  You two find that journal.”

           Fluttershy joined Applejack in locating Sunset’s correspondence journal.  Eventually a little glow could be seen in the darkness as Sunset and Twilight’s combined cutie marks were uncovered.  “Here it is!”

           “Bring it over here," Rarity called.  "I found a small lamp.  Though it’s not plugged into anything.  Perhaps it’s battery powered?”

           “Do y'all think ponies know batteries?  Twi seemed confused by a lot of the tech in our world.”

           With a click of a button, the lamp Rarity found was brightly shining.  “Seems they do,” Rarity answered.  "Magic batteries, perhaps?"

           The ponies looked at the journal on the floor as they faced another problem.  “Uh, how do we carry it over there?” asked Applejack.

           “Oh, I have an idea.”  Fluttershy sat down and used her forelegs to scoop up the journal, at which point it stopped buzzing, and held it under her barrel.  She then eyed the table underneath the lamp Rarity found and spread her wings with determination.  Flapping them hard, she lifted herself into the air.  However, the angle of her back from a sitting position caused her to fly backward.  “Woah, oh my!”  Fluttershy attempted to correct herself but only managed to wobble side to side with her hind legs running in place.  “Ahhh!  Oh my goodness, oh my goodness.”

           “Fluttershy, turn!”

           “I don’t know how to turn,” she said as her right hind leg clipped the edge of the equipment connected to the portal and spun her around, causing her to fly in a backward circle.  “Ahh!”

Applejack wobbled toward her, reared onto her hind legs, and tried to stabilize her with her forelegs only to fall onto her back the moment Fluttershy knocked into her.  The impact startled Fluttershy and she squeaked and dropped the journal on Applejack’s muzzle with a thud.

           “Gahh!”

           “I’m so sorry!” said Fluttershy as she bumped into the table she had originally been trying to get to, and knocked the lamp off of it.  “AHH!  I’m so sorry!”

           “Fluttershy, stop flapping!” suggested Rarity.

           Fluttershy immediately stopped flapping her wings and folded them against her sides on instinct.  She landed like a sack of bricks on top of some books in the corner of the room.

    “Oof!”

           “I didn’t mean all at once, darling!  Are you alright?”  Rarity went to check on her while Applejack groaned and rolled onto her belly to stand.

           Applejack looked at the journal that had bounced off her face, and the small lamp that had thankfully survived the fall.  She walked over to the lamp, looked at her hooves, sighed and picked the lamp up with her mouth.  Better this than the journal, she thought.  She placed it down next to the journal and used a hoof to push open the cover.  Rarity and a dizzy Fluttershy joined her as she attempted to flip to the latest page without folding or ripping any pages in the process.  “There’s got to be a better way.”

           “Rarity, can you turn the pages with your horn?” asked Fluttershy.

           “I suppose I could try, but I don’t see how that would be an improvement,” she answered.  Applejack made way for Rarity who leaned down and pressed the tip of her horn in between some pages of the journal and lifted, finding some blank pages.

           “Uh, sugarcube, I think she meant with horn magic.”

           “Oh!"  Rarity grew a self-satisfied smile, "I had completely forgotten we unicorns could do that.”  Her smile faded as she thought for a moment.  “How do we do that?”

    “Um,” offered Fluttershy, “I usually see Twily gesturing with her hands when she uses her telekinesis, but not always.  Maybe the gestures make it easier but aren’t necessary.  Oh, but that’s with her geode, not a horn, and Twi's never used magic in our world.”

    “What about your diamond shields?” asked Applejack.  “What do ya do?  Jus’ think or gesture them movin’ and they go?”

    “Hrmm,” Rarity hummed.  “After a fashion, yes.  I suppose I could try the same on the pages.”

    Rarity raised one hoof and made swiping motions in the air over the book.  When that failed to do more than generate minute amounts of wind, her face scrunched up in mounting concentration and the swiping intensified.  She then tried the other hoof.

    Neither hoof proving successful on their own, Rarity then leaned back and stood on just her hind hooves and gestured with both front hooves.

    She was on her second double-hoof swipe when gravity, plus her new pony physiology brought her front half crashing onto the crystal floor with a startled, “Oof!”

    “You okay, Rarity?”  Fluttershy asked, moving to stand beside her.

“Yes, dear.  I’m fine,” was Rarity’s reply as she saw Fluttershy’s outstretched hoof and accepted it.

Fluttershy tried to help her up but misjudged the leverage and merely fell on top of her with a surprised, “Eep!”

Hoping to help her friends save face before giving in and snickering at them, Applejack went back to flipping pages with her hooves, “Never mind, girls, ah think we’re almost there.”

It only took a few more seconds before she finally found the latest message.  They began to read noting that, while the text started clear and smoothly written, just like Twily’s usual handwriting, it slowly degraded into a sloppy mess with spelling mistakes and a complete lack of punctuation.




Are you girls okay?  I’m getting worried.  I thought you were going to write back to let me know you’re all okay.

You’re not stuck over there are you?  Did you find the other journal?  Did you find Twi?  Are you in her palace?  Or did you come out of the wrong portal?  Is there more than one portal in that world?  Are you even on the right world?!  Twi said there were other worlds so there must be more than one portal!  You could be anywhere now!  Oh please write back!  We should have waited for Twi to write us.  We should be just searching for Sunset!  I should be searching for Sunset!  Please, please, please write back!  Can you even write back if I’m still writing?  Do these journals work like walkie-talkies and I have to stop writing before you can reply?  Or are they more like cell phones and we can both write together?  What am I saying writing?!  This is a BOOK!  How does it even do ANYTHING other than be a book!  None of this magic stuff even makes any sense anymore.  You all just walked THROUGH a mirror.  That shouldn’t happen!  It was normal glass a moment ago.  I tried walking through it and just hit my head!  Then I started writing in this journal and Spike put a paw through and it turned into a claw!  That’s just wrong on so many levels.  He offered to follow you to make sure you’re all alright, but I said no!  What if you’re all lost?  I don’t want him lost too!  Are you coming back?  Are you getting this message?  Do I need to stop writing so you can write back?  How are you going to write back as ponies?  You won’t have hands!  You don’t have hands.  How do ponies write without magic?  How do ponies have magic?  How does magic exist?  YREARGGGGHHHHH!  None of this makes any sense, and I actually just wrote YREARGGGGHHHHh, that’s not even a word, I don’t know what that is except maybe some horribly formed onomatopoeia and I actually expect that to show up in another journal in a different world lived in by magical talking ponies on the other side of a magic mirror on our high school’s front yard!  If I hadn’t seen it for myself at the friendship games back when I turned into that horrible horrible ▓▓▓▓▓▓▓▓▓▓▓▓▓ THING i never would have believed in any of this or maybe i just passed out then and this is all a dream and the friendship games are still going onor maybe i passed out earlier because theres no way those giant carnivorous plants at the race werereal so i must have pased out earlier than that i must be in some kind of quesadilla fueled coma or hallucination i beged them not to make me eat those at lunch im so glad theyre nice to me now but that’s part of the halucination2 isnt it i must be passed out in the nurses office in crystalprep with a stomak ache EVERYTHING I KNOW IS WRONG




           The message ended there.  Rarity and Applejack looked at each other in a panic.  “Darling, we have to write back this instant!  The poor dear is losing her mind over this.  WE NEED A PEN!”  They stumbled off as quickly as they could.

           “But she’s right," Applejack called to her, "what do we do when we find a pen?  Ah can’t write with these hooves, an’ you don’t know how to work yer horn!”

           “We’ll think of something!” urged Rarity as she looked over the desk where she found the lamp.  “But we need a pen first!  All I’m finding are feathers.  Why are there feathers on a writing desk?!”

           “Quills!” exclaimed Applejack.  “Are those quills?  And ink?”

           “Oh!  You’re right, darling.  How quaint.”

           “Quaint; nothin’!” Applejack waddled back to the journal.  “Bring them over here, and the ink!”

           “Do you know how hard it is to get black ink out of WHITE FUR?!”

           “Auugh!  Fine!  You get the quills, just show me the ink.”  Applejack met up with Rarity.

Rarity pointed out the ink jar and picked up a bundle of quills in her mouth to take back to the journal.  She tripped over her hooves in her rush; the surprise caused her to drop the quills as she tumbled.  When she stood up, the quills were clinging to her coat and she began trying to pick them off with her hooves.

           Spotting the ink jar on the table Applejack took it in her mouth, followed Rarity back, and spat it onto the floor.  “The jar’s closed; you wouldn’t have gotten nothin’ on ya!”

           “Wait!  The jar’s closed?!  How do we open it?!”

           “Uh, ah-ah don’ know!”  Applejack thought for a moment.  “Okay, Ah’ll grab the lid in my teeth and you grab the rest of the jar in your teeth and we’ll twist!”

           “We’ll spill it all on the floor!  And ourselves!”

           “Yeah, but there should still be enough left to dip a quill into.”

           “But, but,” Rarity protested.  “Ohhh!  Alright!  Twily needs this now!”

           Applejack bent down and grabbed the lid in her mouth and took a few steps away from the journal.  Rarity darted forward, tilted her head, and got her teeth around the thicker base of the jar.  They paused a moment as they got a look at each other and how close their faces were—their parted lips nearly touching—and blushed.  Their eyes both dropped to the jar they each held between their teeth, mostly obscured by their muzzles, and back up to their eyes.  “Wisst!” said Applejack.

           “Wru?”

           “Dwist!”

           “Oo!”

           The two of them twisted their necks trying to pry off the lid.  They kept losing their balance and ended up circling themselves as they re-positioned their legs to remain standing.

           “Aiit!  Orth ay!” said Rarity.

           “Wht?”

           “Orher wy!”

           “Oo!”

           “FLOPPY EARS!  Get the soap!” came a yell from Pinkie Pie out in the hallway.

           They stopped and gave each other confused looks, then glanced at Pinkie for a moment, before Rarity called out, “Dwisst!”

           They twisted the other way, finally popping the lid off without further trouble.  Ink splashed onto the floor.  They both backed up and Rarity squealed, angling her neck and the jar upward to keep as much ink in the bottle as possible.  She cringed; feeling wetness on her hoof and not wanting to think about how much may have splashed onto her fur coat.

           Applejack spat out the lid, jumped around the ink spill, nearly tumbling to her side upon landing, and went for the quills hanging off Rarity.  “Ow!  dun rte ee!” Rarity protested as Applejack got more than just quills.

           “Furrppphh!  Fuprh!” Applejack tried to spit out two of the three quills, and the bits of white fur, she had grabbed in her mouth.  She ended up losing all three quills and bent down to pick one back up.  “Ow!” she cried when she got the wrong end and with a bit more force than she wanted.  She spat it back out again and tried to grab it as it flittered back to the ground, only succeeding in bashing her muzzle into the floor when she missed.

           “Wss go’n un?” Rarity tried to ask, unable to look down to find out.

           “Ah got it, ah got it, jus’ hold on!”  Applejack made another try for the quill and got it in the middle with the ends sticking out the sides of her mouth.  She turned to Rarity, still holding the mostly empty ink jar, and reared back for a better angle.

           Rarity’s eyes looked from the jar to the quill in Applejack’s mouth, then back to the jar, and back to Applejack.  Her eyes widened seeing how unsteady Applejack was walking on just her hind legs and pony hips as she neared the jar with the quill tip hanging out the left side of her mouth.  “Arefful, Crful!”

           “Old dill.  Hld sill.”

           Applejack concentrated, slowly leaning to the side with the pointed end of the quill hanging out of her mouth on hips not meant for bipedal posing.  She held her forelegs out to the opposite side and slightly behind her for balance; waving them about as if they were still arms.  And for the first time since arriving in the pony world, the group of brand new ponies did something, relatively, right the first time.  Applejack pulled away from Rarity with a quill properly tipped with ink in her mouth and smiled.  She dropped back down to all fours, looked down to find the journal, and yelled through the quill.  “NUUUUU!  Id closded!”

           Rarity’s eyes went wide again and she spat out the jar to the side of the room, making sure it landed far away from the both of them, and dived for the journal that had closed after they left it.  “Hold on, darling.  Don’t let that quill drop!

           Rarity checked her forehooves and cringed when she found only one to be free of ink.  She flipped the book open with the tip of her horn, but it was to a page that was already filled.  She then used her clean right forehoof to flip through the pages as quickly as she could, without tearing them apart, while she held the other side of the journal down with her horn.  She needed to lift her head away each time she flipped through additional pages so she could trap them down with her horn.  A few pages got folded and crumpled in the process, but no tears.

She found Twily’s preserved mental breakdown and the first empty page beyond it.  “AH HA!”  She circled her hindquarters around the journal while holding the pages open for Applejack with her horn and hoof.

           Applejack eyed the empty page, leaned down with her head turned sideways and tilted ninety degrees, so that the ink end of the quill was down toward the journal, but stopped before closing in.  “Wru du ah wrte?”

           Rarity resisted the urge to facehoof with her face still in the journal, “Just write ‘we’re OK!’  We’ll handle specifics later!  And don’t get any ink in my hair!”

           Applejack nodded and was about to attempt writing when the portal flashed and an object slammed into Rarity’s side knocking her away from the journal which promptly closed behind her.

           “Ahhh!” squeaked Fluttershy, collapsing back into the pony world.

           “Frudersy?” asked Applejack.

           “Twily’s okay,” Fluttershy explained, picking herself up, “she just needed some calming down.”  She looked around seeing Rarity covered in feathers, Applejack looking mournfully at the closed journal at her forehooves, and ink splotches over the floor and on both their fur coats.  “What’s going on here?”

           Rarity and Applejack looked at each other, then at Fluttershy, then the portal, then back to each other.  Applejack spat out the quill and averted her eyes.  “Nothin’.”

           Rarity stood up and began brushing the remaining quills off her coat with her clean hoof.  “Indeed.”
> Time out for Fashion
> --------------------------------------------------------------------------

           With Twily's sanity preserved, the three girls-turned-mares, most of whom were still embarrassed over their lack of clothing, had little to do but wait for Rainbow Dash to return and practice walking and flying in the meantime.  They had moved back into the hallway to keep from tripping over books and the other assorted objects strewn about the mirror room.  Rarity's walk had become a bit less ungraceful.  Applejack skipped the grace and moved on to trotting clumsily.  Fluttershy perfected her stationary hover, though she struggled to do any actual flying without bumping into the walls.  Pinkie, however, had just continued to mumble to herself.  The three made a few attempts to check on her but she always said she was fine and continued her mumbled conversations with nothing.

           "I don't understand what's taking Rainbow Dash so long.  She's clearly very fast; with her speed it shouldn't take long to find some clothing somewhere," said Rarity.

           "Maybe she's having trouble figurin' how to carry the clothes back here.  After all we still don't know how we're gonna take just Sunset's journal with us," answered Applejack shaking her head.  "Ah jus' don't get it; these people, ah mean, ponies have—”

“Ponies are people too, you know.  Especially in this world,” Fluttershy corrected.  "The term 'people' "—Fluttershy sat on her haunches and tried to use her forehooves to mimic quotation marks but blushed when she realized she couldn't—"Um, the term 'people' is not species specific."

“Uh, yeah, ah suppose you’re right.  These pony people have a full society here.  They got cities, an' magic, an' battery operated lamps apparently.  They’ve got to have a way of caryin' around their things when they's always walking on all their hooves.  If'n it weren't for how much trouble we're already having just walking normally we could try balancing it on our backs or carry it with one hoof and walk on the other three.  But at this rate that ain't gonna happen for a long while."

           Fluttershy looked sad for a moment and added, "Remember when Twi first came to visit, before the Fall Formal, and Sunset made that … video about her to keep students from voting for her?"

           "Sadly yes, darling.  I hope all copies of that have been deleted.  What about it?"

           "Well, even though Twi had hands she carried some books in her mouth as if it was instinct.  I’ve seen her writing with a pen in her mouth too."

           "Ah thought about that but there has to be a better way.  Ah mean, carryin' a book in yer mouth?  Wouldn't that ruin the book?  An' what about germs?  I don't want to do that to Sunset's journal.  An’ it's what connects our worlds ain't it?  Anythin' happens to that an' we can't get home until another … however many moons until the thing opens on its own."

           "But animal mouths are actually a lot cleaner than human mouths," Fluttershy informed.  "We should be able to carry things like that just fine.  And it's Sunset's old journal that keeps the portal open.  We use the new one to write in."

           "Saddle bags!  I'll make us some saddle bags," Rarity exclaimed with glee.

           "How ya gonna sew 'em; with yer hooves?"

           Rarity sighed, absently trying to flick the dried, black ink off her left forehoof, "Maybe we'll find some?  I'd go home and bring some here if that would actually work.  How did Twi come to our world wearing clothes and a backpack but we all end up here naked when we started with clothing?"

           The sound of heavy scraping caused their pony ears to swivel down the hallway.  "I got clothing!" Rainbow's voice called down.

           "Oh splendid!" Rarity cheered.

           They followed the scraping sounds down the hallway meeting Rainbow at the hall's bend.  She was flying backward, with her forehooves looped in the rim of a large hardwood wardrobe, and dragging it along the crystal floor.

           "Rainbow Dash!  Why are you dragging that whole armoire?!"

           "What the hey is an 'arm wore'?"

           "Armoire; wardrobe; closet.  That!" said Rarity pointing to the wardrobe.  "Just put it down; you're scratching Twi's floors!"

           Rainbow let go of the end of the wardrobe she was dragging and it dropped onto its back with a thud.

           "Rainbow!  Gently!"

           "Do you know how hard it is to carry something like that without fingers?"

           The other three girls traded looks.  "Yes, darling, I believe we can imagine, but you could have just come to us and directed us back to the room you found this in."

           "You can barely walk and you freaked at your reflection in the floor.  How were you going to handle reflective stairs?"

           "Ya dragged this up a staircase?" asked Applejack.

           "Down actually … and it was kinda more like I dropped it down a staircase."

           "Rainbow!" chided Fluttershy.

           "It slipped!  No fingers remember?  Come on, Rarity's the one that wanted clothes.  I'm fine like this.  I'm awesome; let people look if they want to.  I mean, this world has the right idea.  It's a world where you never have to do laundry.  I'm up for that!"

           Applejack started laughing, "Still sore after the pink bras thing?  Even Ah know not to mix ma whites and darks."

           "Gah!  I can't believe you had to see that." Rainbow, still hovering, crossed her forelegs as if they were arms.

           Rarity raised a hoof to her forehead in exasperation, wincing when it bumped her horn.  "Getting back to the matter at hand"—

    "Hoof," corrected Fluttershy

    —"It's too late to worry about the damages to Twi's palace now, but we're going to have a lot of apologies to make when we finally find her.  Let's …,” Rarity trailed off looking more closely at Rainbow.  “Darling, what is that in your hair?”

“Mane,” corrected Fluttershy.

“What?!  There’s more?” Rainbow groaned, wildly batting at her mane with her forehooves.  “I got attacked by some kind of confetti cannon in one of the rooms.  Some kind of party trap left by pony Pinkie I guess.”

The other girls looked around a little worried.  Rarity glanced down at the wardrobe, “And you’ve already checked the armoire, correct?”

“Yeah, yeah, it’s clean.”

“Good.  Let’s just see what we have in here and get on with it, shall we?"

           Rarity and Applejack tried to open the doors of the fallen wardrobe with their hooves but were having trouble keeping purchase as they lifted up.  Dash rolled her eyes, "Here, let me help you wingless ponies," she laughed and moved to hover above the handles.  Her friends gave her a mild glare as she slipped her hooves in the crack between the doors, caused by Applejack and Rarity opening them part way, and flung them open from above.  Inside the wardrobe was cause for yet another apology they would have to offer their princess friend as the clothing and jewelry within were all strewn about in a jumbled mess.  "Oops.  Heh, did I mention dropping it down the stairs was an accident?"

           They looked into the wardrobe and sat down to free up their forehooves to shift through the mess.  "Oh my," said Rarity as she looped a foreleg through the hook of a hanger and lifted up a blue dress with a star pattern along the bottom edge and a star-shaped clasp at the front.  "This is delightful.  I ought to make something like this for Twily."

           "Oh it is beautiful.  Do you think pony Rarity made that for Twi?" asked Fluttershy.

           Rarity hummed and looked closer, searching for an identifying tag.  "Ah ha!  It's my logo!"  She held up the gown in her hooves to show off a dark tag sewn to the inner side of the dress decorated by a pair of eyes inside a stylized R.  "This is one of mine!  Or, well, one of pony Rarity's at least.  I'm sure she wouldn't mind me using it for inspiration."  Rarity paused and then gasped, "Ideaa~ She and I should trade notebooks!  I bet there's much we could learn from one another!"

           "Hold on now," said Applejack then pointed at Rainbow.  "Dash, did ya take this out of Twi's bedroom?  Are we goin' through her personals?"

           "You know how many rooms I searched through just to find this?  There's just no clothing anywhere!  And, actually, most of the rooms are empty; no furniture or—whoa, look at this one," said Rainbow holding up another outfit.  It was a full-body smock, long enough to cover all the way down to a pony's hooves with only a hole for a pony neck and a smaller hole for a tail.  It was deep purple and decorated with a sun and a star appliqué and completely covered with various meticulously designed constellations.  A teal bow with a star-shaped clasp was fixed to the collar.

           “Eeh!” Rarity made a slight retching sound.  "I've seen better fashion at a comic convention.  The design is horribly amateurish; as if the designer started with an ill-conceived idea and just didn't know when to stop."

"Since when do you go to comic conventions?" asked Rainbow.

"Never you mind," Rarity replied, turning her head away with a slight blush.

Fluttershy also turned her head to hide a matching blush with her mane.

           Rainbow turned back to the dress and snickered, bringing the dress closer to Applejack who leaned in and joined Rainbow's mirth.

           Rarity turned back to them.  "What's so funny, you two?"

           Curiosity perked, Fluttershy walked up behind Rainbow.  "Oh, my," she cringed and stepped away avoiding looking at Rarity.

           Brow creased, Rarity asked again, "What is so funny?"

           Rainbow snerked and hovered over to Rarity with the dress, showing her the tag.  "It's one of yours."

           "Eugh, that can't be right.  That tag must have been sewn on the wrong dress.  Or perhaps pony Rarity was having a bad week, happens to all of us."  She backed up a step and motioned with a hoof.  "Please, darling, put that ghastly thing away."

           "Heh-heh, sure," as Dash moved to put away the dress she found that the opposite side had a few holes surrounded by frayed, blackened threads.  "Weird, it's got holes all over it."

           "Oh dear, that didn't happen when you dropped it down the stairs I hope," said Fluttershy.

           "Doubt it, looks like burn marks."

           "How odd; I'm afraid this one is also a bit scorched," said Rarity inspecting the nicer blue dress.

           "You think Spike sneezed on them?  He did say he breathes fire when he sneezes.  It's so strange to think he's actually a scary dragon on this world." said Fluttershy.

           "That may be, though I doubt Claws is a big scary anythin' in this world; both of them's too sweet ta be scary.  Oh here's nice a simple one," said Applejack pulling out a one-piece yellow dress with a white stripe at the bottom and a pink ribbon tied to the collar.  "There's a little scorch mark at the bottom, but it's clean enough.  Ah think ah'll go with this one."

           Rarity looked over the yellow dress, "Are you sure, Applejack?  It's so plain.  A completely lazy design.  I'm sure there's something much more fashionable in here."

           "And by 'fashionable' ah think you mean 'frou-frou'," chuckled Applejack.  "Oh look, heh," she said pointing to the tag.  "It's also one of yers."

           Rarity gaped at her logo on the tag and blushed.  "Perhaps I won't be looking over pony Rarity's notebook."  She then perked up, "No, I … I mean, she, must have been on a deadline!  O-or Twi must have refused—"

           "Frou-frouing it?"

           Rarity gave Applejack a flat stare.  "Yes …, refused 'frou-frouing' it."  Rarity huffed and continued, "I really don't believe that color will compliment your coat."

           "We're not here to make fashion statements, Rares.  With any luck we'll be gone before too many poni—people even see us.  It'll be good enough."

           Rarity sighed, "I suppose.  But I will not wear a burnt dress.  I hope they're not all like this."  Rarity carefully put away the blue dress and resumed her search.

           Applejack set aside the yellow dress she picked out and turned around to call on their fifth member.  "Hey Pinkie—"

           "What's up?!" she replied from roughly three inches from Applejack's face.

           "Holy Toledo!" Applejack exclaimed and took a step back, tripping on the open door of the wardrobe and falling in.  "Gaah!" she jumped back out as she landed on something sharp and pointy.  "Ow.  Pinkie!"

           "What?"

           "I thought you were …," she sighed.  "Never mind.  Ya feelin' better?  Want some clothes?"

           "I'm fine; I asked the voices to take five."

           "Uhh."

           "And I don't think I'll need clothes.  They told me it's not necessary."

           "You can understand them now?" asked Fluttershy.

           "Not really; it's more of a feeling."

           Applejack and Fluttershy traded looks, "If ya say so."

           "What's this about voices?" asked Rainbow.

           "Oh, that's right, you were flying circles out here when the voices started in here," Pinkie said first pointing a hoof around the hall then clopping herself on the head with a bonk.  “Ooh!  That also sounds like banging coconuts together,” she then bonked herself a few more times.

           "Uh, should we be worried?"

    "More than usual?" mumbled Applejack.

           "Nah!  Most of them seem nice," Pinkie answered with cheer.

           Meanwhile Rarity had continued looking through the wardrobe and uncovered the object Applejack's posterior had found.  "SHOES!" she cheered bringing everyone's attention back to the wardrobe.  She reached in and placed a hoof inside a blue horseshoe and drew her hoof back delighted when the shoe remained on her hoof.  "And they don't require nails!"  Her glee faded when the shoe landed back in the wardrobe with a clink.  "Well poo."

           "Oh, these stockings are cute," Fluttershy smiled as she lifted out a stocking designed with stripes of multiple shades of purple.

           "Oh stockings!  Wonderful, I can wear some to hide the ink stain on my hoof.  If I can find any that compliment my fur color."  Rarity looked near the collection of stockings Fluttershy found and located a set of four light blue stockings.  "Oh yes, these will work.  Now how about a matching dress?"  After a little more searching through the remaining dresses and other articles of clothing Rarity pulled out a bright blue gown decorated with flower appliqués with a matching flower necklace and a yellow ribbon likely meant to be tied around the back.  "Yes, I believe this will do nicely.  Wonderful craftsmanship."

           "He, he, he; shouldn't that be craftsponyship?" suggested Pinkie.

           Rarity chuckled at that and was happy to find her logo on the tag, which she then eagerly showed off to her friends.  "I suppose so, darling; excellent craftsponyship.  Not that I like to toot my own horn"—Pinkie's eyes snapped to Rarity's horn—"of course, but pony Rarity does know a thing or two it seems.  "Though this dress is much better suited to Twi's complexion, er, fur color than my own, but beggars can't be choosers I suppose."

           "Perish the thought," Applejack deadpanned.

           Pinkie's eyes remained glued to Rarity's horn while she slowly crept closer.  "Rarity, I'm sorry, but I have to do this.  I have to know!"  Pinkie put a hoof on one of Rarity's withers to steady herself as she raised up on just her hind legs.

           "Pinkie?  What are you—?  Oh no!"  Rarity realized too late what Pinkie was up to and was unable to step away before Pinkie brought her mouth down on Rarity's horn and tried to blow.  "PINKIE!  Gah!  Geh!  Eeeehh!" Rarity protested as Pinkie's cheeks puffed out.  Rarity dropped the dress back into the wardrobe, took a few steps back, jumped with her forehooves, and pushed Pinkie away.  "Eeeeeewwwuuughhppppphhh, uuuuuggghh.  Pinkie, why?!"

           "I had to know if your horn was tootable!  It's not," she said with a disappointed tone, her ears flopped low.  "But, you know…," she added, smacking her lips and perking her ears back up a bit, "it tasted a bit like powdered sugar.  Hmm, a bit flowery; minty; a touch of lavender maybe.  Neat!  I gotta find another unicorn to compare."

           Rarity crossed her eyes to look up at her moist horn and added a cringe on top of her cringe, "I need a washcloth and soap; water; sanitizer!  I could feel that!  And your tongue!  The ridges!  Eeeegh, I feel so dirty."

           "Oh not at all, it tasted nice and clean."

           "My horn was in your mouth!"

           "Yup!  We can make it even; want my hoof in yours?"

           "NO!"

           The others just looked on in varying states of concern and mirth.  Rainbow ended up siding with mirth and fell to the floor laughing.  "You think the ponies call that a hornjob?"

           Rarity looked incredulously at Rainbow for a few seconds before she reached into the wardrobe, grabbed one of the dark purple stockings, and began to awkwardly scrub her horn with it.  "Eeeewwwwwewww."

    "And now she's 'polishing it off'!  Ha-ha!" laughed Rainbow, still on her side on the floor.

           "Ah guess we're gonna have ta make sure Twi has that stocking washed," chuckled Applejack.

           Fluttershy gasped, "Oh I hope she won't mind.  Oh my; not to mention our going through her wardrobe and wearing her clothes to begin with."

           "Forget the whole wearing them issue.  Who's going to tell Twi why just one of her four purple stockings had to be washed but not the rest?" joked Rainbow.

           "NO ONE!" shouted Rarity as she let go of the stocking and used that hoof to point first at Rainbow and then at Pinkie making it clear which of her friends she was commanding.  "No one will be speaking of this, ever.  We'll put the full set in a pile and tell the maid they're dirty.  That's it!"

           Rarity then noticed that her friends were staring up at her horn, Rainbow and Applejack biting back snickers, Pinkie smiling that smile she gets before bursting into hiccup-inducing laughter, and Fluttershy cringing that cringe she gets when she's hoping people have forgotten she's in the room.  Rarity looked up and noticed that the stocking was still dangling limply off the end of her horn.  Her face grew red and she took a breath.  She brought a hoof to the stocking and gently brushed it off with all her remaining dignity.

           Then she waited as calmly as possible for Rainbow, Applejack, and Pinkie to stop laughing and pick themselves off the floor.

           "Now then.  If we're all ready to continue …," Rarity looked at her friends as they calmed down, some wiping their eyes dry, others still snickering a little, another—having not laughed at all—pretending she had no desire to.  "Twi might be taken aback to see us wearing her clothes when we find her, but I believe she'll understand our discomfort; she knows nudity just isn't normal in our world.  And being our friend, I'm sure we'll be alright.  And she just might be so surprised to see us in her world that she doesn't even think about it anyway.

           "Especially after she sees the messes we all made!" added Pinkie.  "That'll be an even bigger shock and she won't be thinking about the clothing at all then!"

           The others cringed sheepishly as they considered the broken furniture, scattered books, and ink stains in the portal room, the scratches in the hall caused by the wardrobe, the damaged wardrobe itself, the Pinkie slobber on a stocking, and various other messes they had collectively contributed to.

"We will of course help clean," insisted Rarity.

           "Of course," added Fluttershy.

           "You bet yer bottom dollar."

           "Absopositiveately!"

           "Yeah, probably a good idea," even Rainbow agreed, rubbing the back of her head sheepishly.

           "But that's for after we find Twi and get her to Twily and Sunset," concluded Rarity.  "For now, we have our outfits picked out, let's get dressed and truly start our search!"

           "Yeah, yeah.  Just hurry up.  Some of us are waitin'," urged Rainbow.

           "Won't take long, Dash.  Jus' got to get them on."  Applejack and Rarity looked over their chosen dresses.  "It shouldn't be …," she paused, gently pawing at the yellow material with a hoof, "hard?"

           Rarity and Applejack looked at the dresses, then at each other, then back at the dresses, and then at their hooves.  Applejack looked up to Rarity again, expectant, and smiled bashfully as she waited for the fashionista's instructions.  After a short moment, Rarity spoke, "So, any idea how we should go about putting these on, darling?"

           Applejack sighed, "This could be a while."
> Let's FINALLY get this show on the road!
> --------------------------------------------------------------------------

           "Well so much for bein' back within the hour," Applejack sighed, looking over herself and Rarity.

           The group had no real idea how long it had been since arriving on the pony planet.  They had eventually found clocks but they were hours different than they should have been considering what time it was in their world when they left.  They concluded that the two ends of the portal were in two different time zones.  They knew it was just past noon when they left home, but it seemed the sun was still early rising in the pony world.  Even without usable timepieces, they knew that with learning how to walk and fly, and now with the time it took two of them to get dressed, they had to have spent close to two hours, or maybe longer, as ponies.  And they still hadn't even left the building.

           While Applejack and Rarity got dressed, Rainbow Dash had gotten bored and left to check through the remaining rooms in the palace, promising to be careful and not try to pull off any more stunts.  What she really wanted to do was leave the palace but the others suggested they check every room first to make sure they hadn't simply missed someone who might know where Twi was.  Rainbow had returned to find Applejack and Fluttershy tying the ribbon of the dress Rarity had chosen into a bow just behind her withers.  Applejack was already in the yellow dress and Pinkie didn't seem to be in the area.

           "Do ya really need the bow, Rares?" asked Applejack.

           "Yes, darling, it compliments the dress wonderfully, pulls it in to better show off my figure, which I’m assuming is still considered attractive here, and if we slide it forward a bit we can use it to cover what I believe are wing holes that would look horribly out of place on a non-pegasus like myself."

           Applejack just rolled her eyes, "Fine."

           "I think it looks very nice," added Fluttershy as she worked with Applejack to pass the ends of the ribbon between them to set up the knot.

           "Are we still doing this?!" asked Rainbow.  "Why can't you just let it all hang out?  It's no big deal here."

    "H-hang out?!  There's something hanging?" gasped Rarity.  "Someone please tell me I'm still female!  I never thought to check!"

    There were blushes all around, especially on Applejack.  "Uh," she said, "you are.  Caught a peak earlier—accidently!"

           Before there could be any followup to that, or even to check for her friends' reactions, Applejack quickly changed the subject.  "Did'ja check out the rest of the palace, Dash?"

           "Yeah, and there's no one in here.  The whole palace is empty!" answered Rainbow.

           "Why would a royal palace not have any guards, or maids, or, ya know, royals, in it?  Makes no sense."

           "Do you think something is happening in town?  Some kind of—" Fluttershy gulped, "—m-monster attack?"

           "Nah, nothing like that," Rainbow replied.  "I got a look out some windows and the town is full of ponies just walking, and flying, around like it's a normal day."

           "Were any of them wearing clothing?" Rarity's eyes sparkled.

           "Uh, maybe?" Rainbow thought.  "Oh, yes, um, a couple hats, some saddles and stuff, but most of them were as naked as me and Fluttershy.  Because we're ponies and covered in fur."

           "A whole world of just ponies; isn't that wonderful?" asked Fluttershy.  "Oh I can't wait to see the town!"

           "I'd like to see the town too.  You know; NOT through a window?  I thought the whole idea of us all coming through was so we'd all look at the same time and get this done faster.  If I hadn't been waiting on the rest of you I might have found Twi on my own by now!"

           "Just hang on to yer britches—er, tail or somethin’—Dash.  We'll be done here in jus' a moment.  Ready, Fluttershy?" Applejack asked as they each gripped the center of a loop they made in tying the ribbon.

           "Ready!"

           And they pulled the loops tight, setting the bow in place.  "Why thank you, darlings.  Let's have a look shall we?"  Once released, Rarity walked to the nearest section of wall with good lighting and checked her appearance.  "Oh yes, this does look lovely.  A bit large for me, but I believe we are ready."

           "Ugh! Finally!" cried Rainbow looking over her friends.  "Wait.  We are ALL ready, right?  Where's Pinkie?"

           " 'Fraid the five minute break 'the voices' gave her earlier was up a while ago.  She's down the hall a bit mutterin' to herself again."

           "Uhh …," started Rainbow hovering lower and speaking quieter, "she's not going to go psycho on us is she?"

           "Rainbow!  That's not nice," admonished Fluttershy.  "This is our friend we're talking about.  You even defended her when Sunset made the same suggestion."

           "Yeah, well, that was old, mean Sunset talking so I had to defend Pinkie.  But, you know; Pinkie has always been a bit weird and now this is weird on top of weird.

           Fluttershy continued, "Pinkie once told us she's been hearing voices for as long as she can remember and she hasn't 'gone psycho' yet."

           "No, she said she hears 'a voice' just one.  Now she's got how many in there?"

           Applejack cut in, "She keeps sayin' she's fine and wants to help.  We already suggested she head back home but nothin' doin'."

           Rarity sighed, "I'm afraid I'm not sure how much help she's going to be if she just continues to mutter to herself."

           The girls thought for a moment and Fluttershy offered, "Why don't we ask her to stay here in case anyone comes to the palace while we're out searching?"

           "Splendid idea.  And the rest of us will head in different directions and check back here every … half hour?  Hrmm, I suppose that won't work; none of us have watches or our phones."

           "No prob!" insisted Rainbow.  "There's a big clock tower in town; we'll go by that."

           "Fine by me," said Applejack.  "Every time the clock tower passes another half hour we pop back here and check on Pinkie to see if any of us has had any luck.  Oh!  And check the journal too, ‘case Twily calls us."

           "Sounds like a plan, darlings."

           "Dash, which way to the exit?" asked Applejack looking up and down the long hall.

           Rainbow pointed down past the bend where Pinkie had stopped to mutter, "Down that way, hang a left when the hall turns to the right.  Big staircase.  Can't miss it.  Have fun walking.  I'm taking the shortcut!"

           And with that Rainbow took off for the nearest window at top speed.  "Wait, Dash!  That window's—" Applejack's warning came too late as Rainbow learned the hard way what she was being warned about.  "—Closed."

           Rainbow slid down the window and landed with a whump.  "Ow, yeah, I knew that.  Just, uh, kinda harder to stop than I thought it would be."  Fluttershy was at her side in short time to check on her crash-prone friend.  Rainbow quickly shook off the birds and stars orbiting her head.

“So ya spent all yer time earlier tyrin’ to go faster and never learned how ta stop?”

“You only need to stop when something goes wrong.”

“Like how ya just launched yerself at a closed window?”

Rainbow shrugged, “Eh, learning how to stop is on the list.”  She then hovered back up to the window, and sheepishly looked for a latch.  Fluttershy hovered up alongside her and, spying the latch, they opened it together, thankful that the latch was simple enough to use with hooves.

           A soft breeze flew in through the opened window carrying clean, fresh air, unlike any they had felt before.  It felt purified, ionized, yet still carrying gentle, pleasant smells of nature.  They could clearly smell flowers, fresh grass, and morning dew.  Absent were chemicals, asphalt, car exhaust, all the smells of a city or even their mid-sized town.  The breeze itself seemed to have a clean, sparkling, feel to it.  Too absorbed in the breeze were they to ponder how a breeze could feel sparkling.  It just did.

           "Oh, oh my.  That feels so wonderful," sighed Fluttershy.

           "And just look at those clouds."  So taken with the sky, Rainbow's hover began to silently drift forward out the window.

           "Rainbow?  Fluttershy?" called Rarity as she looked quizzically at her winged friends.  "Yes it feels quite nice, but why are you two just …," she trailed off looking to Applejack who shrugged with one shoulder, just as confused as she.

           "Snap outta it!" Applejack called a moment later waking Fluttershy from her stupor.   Rainbow, however, kept going forward.

           "I gotta fly!" she cheered upon clearing the windowsill and took off like a rocket.

           "Wha-wha—Rainbow!" came Fluttershy's voice having her senses returned.

           "You okay, sugarcube?"

           "I … I'm not sure what happened.  But, the air is just so wonderful here.  I guess I got a little overwhelmed.  And … so did Rainbow?"

           "Ah don't see what's gotten in'ta you two.  Sure it's nice an' all, but I don't see what's to write home about."

           "Well, I suppose you're right.  It is just … a nice breeze isn't it?" Fluttershy pondered her earlier behavior as she slowly descended to the floor.  "Do you think Rainbow will remember to check in every half hour?"

           "Ah hope so.  It's not like we have any chance of catchin' her at that speed.  We don't have no choice but ta keep goin' and hope she either comes by or one'a our pony selves grabs her an' brings her back here.  Come on; clearly Dash ain't doin' this all in 'ten seconds flat' after all.  Les' go tell Pinkie the plan an' head out."

           Fluttershy took another look outside the window.  First seeing the clock tower Rainbow had mentioned and then noticing the quaint little village around it made out of houses with thatched roofs, dirt roads, a little fountain with a pony statue, a tiny market, and most importantly: pastel-colored ponies!  She saw them walking and trotting around on the ground to and from the different little buildings and market stalls.  Everything was so colorful!  She saw trees populated with squirrels and birds; some breeds not known to reside in her own Canterville.  She looked up to the sky where Rainbow had vanished and she saw a few clouds with little houses on them that appeared to also be made of clouds.

           As she watched, stunned and trying to make sense out of what she was seeing, a pony came out of a house-shaped cloud and she watched it fly back down.  As the pony neared the ground Fluttershy had drifted forward, not even realizing she had returned to a hover, and peered over the edge of the windowsill to keep track of it.  And that's when she noticed how far away the ground was.  "Eeeeekk!" she screamed, the shock having caused her to forget the fact she was safely hovering with her own wings.  She panicked, her wings snapping to her sides, and she dropped.  Fluttershy put her forehooves out and they caught the windowsill as she fell past it, the rest of her body swinging down and smacking into the wall.  "Aaaaaahh!  Help!"

           "Darling, you're alright!" Rarity rushed up to her.

           "She's right, sugarcube, jus' let go.  I promise; jus' let go and you'll be safe," Applejack arrived a step later.

           Fluttershy considered her friends' words and knew they wouldn't lie to her, but the decision to trust them and drop or not was literally taken out of her hooves when she lost her grip.  "AAAAAAHHHH—!" and fell about two inches to the floor behind her.

           "Them windows ain't that high up on the inside."

           "Oh my goodness, I feel so silly.  Of course I was alright the whole time; I’m sorry."

           Excited tweeting came from the window and they all turned to see a little bird chirping at them with a worried expression.

           "Oh my, it's okay, I'm alright," Fluttershy reassured the little bird.  "I'm sorry to have startled you, my little friend.  I just had a little panic attack, nothing to worry about.  But thank you for the concern."

           Relieved, the little bird wiped its brow with a wing, chirped happily again and flew off.  Fluttershy turned back to Rarity and Applejack.  "What a nice little birdie he was.  He was so worried I may have been in trouble that he—" she stopped, her jaw dropped open and her eyes widened.  "I … I think that was an Ectopistes migratorius!  They've been extinct for a hundred years!"  She turned around to face the window, "WAIT!  LITTLE BIRDIE, WAIT!"  Before Applejack and Rarity could respond, Fluttershy had taken off after the little bird almost as fast as Rainbow had earlier, and in a moment, she was out of sight.

           "”Fluttershy!”" her friends called in vain as they rushed to the windowsill and placed their forehooves on it.

           "Well …," said Rarity, turning to Applejack, "We were planning to split up after all.  Fluttershy and Rainbow Dash just have a head start.  Nothing to worry about."

           "Ah suppose," Applejack thought for a moment, looking over the town.  "Ya think it's the wings?"

           "What do you mean?"

           "As soon as that window opened, Dash and 'Shy were in la-la-land.  Granted they was closer to the window than us, but still, it didn't do nothin' to us 'cept smell nice."

           "Twi and Sunset have mentioned there are some fundamental differences between the pony types.  The fresh air could have sparked something in them."

           Applejack thought on that and dropped from the windowsill and back onto all fours, "Gives new meaning to the phrase 'bird brained' if'n that happens to all 'em pegasi, ah guess."

           "Then what about Pinkie?" Rarity asked, also dropping to all fours before they began to walk toward their other friend,  "She ended up an earth pony like you, but she's acting crazy and you're not."

           "Ah think she just hit her head somptin' fierce."

           "Pinkie hits her head rather often but rarely seems to ever be phased by it."

           "Straw that broke the camel's back, maybe?  Might be time to get her skull an X-ray ta be safe."

           "Perhaps.  I do hope we can get her back home soon."

           "As soon as we get out of this palace we can join ….  Well, honestly, it might be down to just us two at this point.  With Pinkie how she is, Dash gallivantin' 'round the skies, and Fluttershy apparently chasin' birds, ah think we're the only two who're gonna be looking for Twi."

           "I'm afraid you might be right.  We'll just have to split the town into two, instead of five, and take half each.  As long as we keep meeting back here regularly to give Pinkie our updates we should be fine."

           "Uh, Rares.  Ain't this were we left Pinkie?" asked Applejack looking at what shouldn't have been an empty hallway.

           "Oh dear."


***   ***   ***


           After a few minutes of searching and calling Pinkie's name, while heading in the direction Rainbow indicated would lead them out the palace, the two remaining off-worlders in the group found themselves … needing even more minutes figuring out how to safely walk down stairs on four hooves.  Once they managed to reach the bottom of several flights they found themselves, finally, in the palace foyer, looking at the front doors.  One was left open.

           "I do believe this means she's gone on without us," concluded Rarity.

           "Right, so, same plan, just without checking in with Pinkie?"

           "Yes, seems like the best plan for now.  Every half hour, on the half hour; and remain here for about five minutes should some of us not quite make it on time."

           "An' all we're doin' is lookin' for Twi, someone that might know where Twi is, or one of us; well, our pony us'es anyway."

           "Exactly, darling.  And we should refrain from telling anyone we are from another world.  Even in a world of magic I suspect that may be odd enough to attract the wrong kind of attention."

    “Right.  We ain’t lookin’ to get holed up in an equine nut house.”

           They made their way across the foyer toward the doors, pausing just before them.  "Do you think this is gold?" asked Rarity pawing at the closed door.

           "Well it is a royal palace," answered Applejack pushing the other door the rest of the way open.

           They saw before them what appeared to be a solid gold staircase, with six steps between a pair of curved banisters, leading down to a well-traveled dirt and stone hoofpath.  This path led toward the marketplace of the little pony village.  The clock tower was easily visible standing above the pony activity, it read 6:48.

           "Alright, so we meet back here first at seven thirty and then every thirty minutes after that," said Rarity, closing the large royal doors before following Applejack down the steps.

           "You got it, Rares, we're doin' this together an' no more dilly-dallying is gonna—" Applejack stopped, her whole body freezing once she stepped her right forehoof onto the ground from the bottom stair.

           "Applejack?" said Rarity.  Not receiving a reply, she proceeded down the steps on her stockinged hooves.  Walking around to Applejack's front, Rarity saw complete shock on her face.  Applejack's eyes were wide, her pupils large and slowly continuing to dilate further, her mouth hung open, and her breathing was deep and slow.  "Applejack!" Rarity tried again reaching out a hoof to press against her friend.

           The surprise of being touched caused Applejack to step back, her front-most hoof raising into the air from the ground.  She shook her head as the shock drained from her face.  "Whut?  Rares?"  She looked down at her hoof and tentatively touched it to the ground again.  Immediately upon contact her eyes widened again.  "You feel that. Rares?  This world is alive!  It's all around us."

           "Darling?" Rarity took a step back as Applejack walked her other three hooves off the stairs and onto the ground, never lifting the first in the process.

           "It's amazin'!  It's like the whole world is a living, breathing person."

           "P-perhaps you should—"  As Rarity began to offer a suggestion Applejack splayed out her four legs and laid her belly flat on the ground.

           "Ah hug the Earth, and the Earth hugs back!"

           "Darling, I think maybe you should get back on the stairs."

           "What am ah wearin' this thing for?" Applejack stood and struggled to pull off the yellow dress.  "Ah don't need this."  Finished undressing she lay back down and began rolling on the ground ending up on the grass to the side of the hoofpath and closed her eyes.  "Rares, ya need to feel this!  There's life all 'round us.  Ah can feel the ground, the grass, those flowers planted by the palace."—Rarity looked over to see that there were indeed flowers planted by the palace. —"Ah can feel … trees … apple trees.  Apple trees!  Home!"

           Applejack's eyes snapped open and grew wide.  She jumped to her hooves and galloped, expertly, toward the south.  "YEEEEEEEHAWWW!"

           Rarity stared after her friend as she ran off, far faster than she herself could hope to match, and disappear over a gentle hill.  Once alone, she looked around.  There were a few ponies in the distance around her, mostly toward the marketplace, only one or two had looked back after Applejack's cheer, and those had already gone back to their errands for the day.  She looked at the clock tower.  6:50 it read.  Forty minutes until their first scheduled regrouping.  Then she thought over her friends' actions in the past two hours or so.

           Dash fully absorbed in her wings.  Fluttershy chasing a bird.  Applejack … chasing trees?  Pinkie … what was even up with Pinkie?  And they hadn't even told Pinkie the plan yet.

           They had all gone off on their own, all acting in strange ways.  Pinkie started not long after arriving on the planet,  Rainbow and Fluttershy as soon as that window opened, and now Applejack the moment she touched the ground.  Would they all make it to their regroupings?  But more importantly Rarity wondered …

           "Am I the only sane one left?!"
> Masterpiece Theatre from a fly on a wall
> --------------------------------------------------------------------------




06:28 AM


High up on a crystal wall, sat a bored, depressed, and very unimportant, horsefly who didn’t feel like doing anything at all. Aside from a blue winghorse crashing into walls earlier, it just seemed like a really slow day.

“… Flrbbbbb! Ker-Plop! Klonk! Plop! Splatt! Sploosh! Thunk! Touché! Whack! Whamm! Whap! Zlonk! Zlopp! Zlott! Zowie!”

The fly looked down and saw The Pink One appear after tumbling down the main staircase. Horseflies stayed away from The Pink One.

Nevertheless, the horsefly took notice. It was a slow day after all. “Oh wow! That didn’t hurt at all. I love my tail!” she exclaimed.

The Pink One pulled her tail into a tight hug. “I wonder if Sunset ever misses hers.” After a moment she sniffed it and seemed delighted, but then took a bite and seemed disappointed and stood up.

“Ohh! Those doors were important! And I bet those are too!” The Pink One trotted over to the palace’s front doors but seemed to be having difficulty walking straight.

“What’s that? Outside? Sure, why not?!” The horsefly didn’t know what The Pink One was talking to.  The horsefly didn't really care.

Humming to herself, The Pink One stepped up, pushed a door open, and bounded out of the palace, leaving the horsefly alone again.




06:48 AM


Later, the horsefly saw an orange horse and a white hornhorse also come down the stairs. These two were walking strangely too.

"I do believe this means she's gone on without us," said the white hornhorse.

"Right, so, same plan, just without checking in with Pinkie?" said the orange horse.

"Yes, seems like the best plan for now. Every half hour, on the half hour; and remain here for about five minutes should some of us not quite make it on time."

"An' all we're doin' is lookin' for Twi, someone that might know where Twi is, or one of us; well, our pony us'es anyway."

"Exactly, darling. And we should refrain from telling anyone we are from another world. Even in a world of magic I suspect that may be odd enough to attract the wrong kind of attention."

“Right. We ain’t lookin’ to get holed up in an equine nut house.”

The two horses made their way across the foyer toward the doors, pausing just before them. "Do you think this is gold?" asked the white hornhorse pawing at the closed door.

"Well it is a royal palace," answered the orange horse pushing the other door the rest of the way open.

"Alright, so we meet back here first at seven thirty and then every thirty minutes after that," said the white hornhorse, closing the large royal doors before following the orange horse down the steps.




06:51 AM


Barely any time passed before the white hornhorse came back in while wearing the yellow dress that was over the orange horse on top of her own dress. The white hornhorse, did a strange kind of drunken shimmy and got the yellow dress to slide off her and onto a bench inside the palace’s foyer. She then left and closed the door behind her.




07:15 AM


“Alright, but the front door should be open,” the horsefly heard before the front door opened, letting in teacher horse and a yellow winghorse. “I’m going to the library to check out a few books since I’ll be having a few extra vacation days.”

“Oh, you are?” asked the yellow winghorse while following teacher horse across the Foyer and through a side door which began closing behind them.

“Yes, since Twilight started Spring break a few days early for her Friendship School….” The horsefly couldn’t hear the rest through the closed door.

However, it wasn’t long before the door opened again and the yellow winghorse returned but called back, “Um, Miss Cheerilee. Strange question—if you don’t mind. Um …, where do I live?”

Teacher horse then joined her, and they walked outside. A few minutes later teacher horse went back into the side door, but left it open.





09:03 AM


The horsefly was woken up by the front door being opened again and an orange horse came in. “Hey!” she called, trotting inside, “Anybody here?”

There was no reply.

“Ah, sorry ah’m late. Some things, uh, well, some things happened. But ah know where to find Twi now. Hello?”

Still no reply.

“Dagnabbit!”

The orange horse sighed and looked around noticing the open door. She stepped through and tried again. “Hello?”

“Hello? Is that Applejack?” a voice came from further within and orange horse continued after.

Shortly later, the orange horse and teacher horse came back to the foyer and left the palace.





09:10 AM


The housefly didn’t have a chance to fall back to sleep due to a white hornhorse bursting into through the front door wearing saddlebags, a clean set of stockings and shoes, and a colorful dress with a matching headdress. Floating behind her in a blue glow matching her horn’s was a sketchbook and pencil.

“Girls?!” she called. “Girls! I’m so sorry I missed our earlier meetup times, but I know where Twi is!”

With no reply she quickly proceeded up the stairs.

Over the next half hour, the horsefly was kept awake by the white hornhorse walking up and down the stairs, checking the doors over and over.





09:45 AM


The horsefly was disturbed yet again by an orange horse. “Hello?” she called. “Anybody here? Anybody know what a changeling is? Some frightened ponies seem to think there are some in town or something. I’m guessing it weren’t a good thing.”

“Darling!” a voice answered from the stairwell. “I’m here! I’m here!”

“Rarity?!” The orange horse rushed forward to toward her.





10:05 AM


Just as it was drifting to sleep, the palace walls themselves woke the horsefly by vibrating slightly when an explosion of sound and rainbow light spread out over the whole town like a thick ring. The colors of the ring filtered in through the Palace’s windows, lighting up the crystal walls and dazing the horsefly.





10:11 AM


A white hornhorse and an orange horse rushed into the foyer from the stairwell and were halfway across the room when the front doors slammed open and a yellow winghorse stumbled in. Leaves, berries, mushrooms, dirt, and other small forest-based paraphernalia clung to her coat while twigs, tree bark, and other larger forest-based paraphernalia seemed trapped in her mane and tail.

“”Fluttershy?!”” The orange horse and the white hornhorse yelled.

The yellow winghorse looked at the pair, took a deep breath, and yelled back.

“WE ARE SO BUCKING SCREWED!”





~~ Fin ~~

> 07 Rarity: "A Diamond in the—Ooooh, Diamonds!"
> --------------------------------------------------------------------------

06:51 AM

“Well, no matter," Rarity assured herself, “Sane or otherwise, the plan remains unchanged. This is fine." She nodded resolutely. "That's right. Everything is fine. Just find Twi and tell her what's going on. She’ll know what to do.” She stood still a moment longer and muttered to herself after a few blinks. “She'll know what to do about four girls in various levels of sanity, or lack thereof, scattered throughout an unknown town on an alien world while residing in alien bodies we know nothing about and full of alien magic we cannot control.”

Rarity looked past the little hill Applejack had disappeared over, hoping to see a pony with a familiar color scheme or hat reappear further down where the land leveled out, but no such ponies appeared. She looked around for pink, a color that so often stood out, and found an unusually high amount, but nothing pony-shaped. She looked up and found several ponies with wings flying about, but none were bright yellow or had rainbow-striped hair or tails. “Yes, this is fine. This was the plan. I just have to pick a direction, find a pony with features I recognize, and ask them where the princess is. What could possibly go wrong?”

Rarity closed her eyes, sighed, and mentally chastised herself for asking such a forbidden question.

“Alright then!" With her eyes still closed, Rarity began to turn around intending to pick a random direction but stopped when she felt a slight buzzing that startled her, causing her to lose her balance and almost stumble to her side. The buzzing subsided and she opened her eyes but saw nothing that could have caused it.

Thinking it best to keep her eyes open instead, she took in her surroundings. Twi's palace stood tall in front of her, seemingly an actual tree made out of crystal. A majestic sight. A thick trunk leading up to a multistory living area with multiple balconies. Above them a center spire grew into to the Twilights’ sign, or 'cute mark' as seemed to be the local nomenclature.

To the left was the hill Applejack had disappeared over. Left of that was mostly greenery: grassy fields sparsely populated with trees, shrubbery, and residential-looking huts. Turning further left …

“A marketplace!” Rarity smiled. "Perhaps there’s a boutique! I don't have any money, and Twi is unlikely to just happen to be in such a place right at this moment, but I could really use a quick stroll through my happy place to calm my nerves right now. Perhaps I’ll even find pony Rarity.”

Before setting off, she carefully scooped up the dress Applejack had so rudely discarded and brought it back inside. Without hands, Rarity could only think to balance the dress over one of her forelegs and flip it up over her back. The dress met the ground a few more times, and got up close and personal with Rarity’s face twice, but eventually came to rest on her back as intended. Getting it off was easier, but Rarity was glad no one had seen her shimmy in encouraging it to slide off of her and onto a bench inside the palace’s foyer.

Leaving the palace, and closing the door behind her again, Rarity finally set out. As she walked, as carefully as she could so as to not trip over herself in public, she looked left and right to take in the sights. Oddly, the buzzing from before kept reappearing in fits and starts, never all that strong, but enough to start getting annoying.

Eventually, while pausing in front of a jewelry store, Rarity could no longer ignore the buzzing and shook her head thinking small insects—horseflies?—were flying around her. No such bugs revealed themselves but Rarity noticed that the buzzing was strongest when facing the shop. A glance into the window brought a light blue glow to her attention and she leaned forward to get a closer look.

“What is—?”

Bonk

“Ow!” Rarity backed up a step having banged her horn into the shop window. “That’s going to take some getting used to,” she muttered to herself while glancing up at it only to realize the appendage itself was the source of the glow.

“Aah! My horn’s glowing!” she shouted in surprise. “W-what do I do?!”

Rarity turned and looked into the crowd. Earth pony, earth pony, pegasus, earth pony, pegasus, unicorn!

“Miss!” she called to the first unicorn she saw while moving toward her as fast as she could without falling. Her resulting gait not unlike a drunken stupor. “I … I have a horny problem!”

The unicorn mare startled back a step at Rarity’s advance. “Um, a what problem?”

“Could you help me with my horn?”

“Uh …,” was the unicorn’s reply. “I-in what way?”

“Can you douse my horn, darling?”

The mare’s eyes widened sharply. “I, uh, don’t think we know each other well enough.”

With that the mare galloped away leaving Rarity to look on at the audience the conversation had attracted. At least seven ponies, including a few unicorns, were giving her some very strange looks.

Rarity froze and shifted her eyes left and right, and then up at the sound of wings indicating her audience was even larger. That glance up also revealed that her horn had lost its glow.

“Ha!” she barked out a laugh. “Ha, ha … ha, w-would you look at that; it stopped! Everything’s fine! Absolutely fine. If you’ll all excuse me ….”

Carefully placing one hoof behind the other Rarity slowly backed up, remembering almost too late that she had four legs now instead of two and rushed her forelegs backward to keep up with the hind pair before her barrel touched the ground. Noticing that her behavior only attracted more strange looks, Rarity quickly came up with a fool-proof exit strategy.

“Is that Sapphire Shores?!” she yelled, pointing off in the distance behind her audience. Once all the ponies turned, Rarity made use of Pinkie’s earlier discovery and jumped with all four legs, pronking as fast as she could around the nearest corner.

Embarrassing and unladylike, the first three pronks were nevertheless effective in getting her around the corner. The fourth pronk got her privacy.

The fifth put her face in the dirt.

It wasn’t long before she heard the confused murmurings of ponies noticing there was no Sapphire Shores to beg autographs from. She was just righting herself and about to begin the process of brushing herself clean when she became aware of some of the voices, and footsteps—hoofsteps?—, growing closer. She began to slink back, looking for a dignified escape when a loud pair of crashes sounded from deeper within the marketplace drawing attention away from her.


*** *** ***


07:04 AM

After sneaking away, during the convenient diversion, Rarity continued further into the marketplace, her horn still buzzing from time to time.

“What are you doing up there?” she growled at it.

“Who me?” asked a pegasus coming in for a landing.

“Oh no, no. Ha, ha. Just talking to myself.”

Rarity slipped around another corner, into an empty alley, and sighed, closing her eyes. This only served to intensify the buzzing. She groaned and dipped her head. The buzzing changed in pitch. Confused, she tried moving her head around, effectively pointing her horn in different directions, each giving off different pitches and intensities like a radio or old TV homing in on a signal.

“What? Are you trying to lead me somewhere?” she asked her horn. “Is that something you can do? Do you know where Twilight is?” A moment later she blushed realizing she was essentially talking to herself and expecting an answer. Instead she set off again, this time following her horn.

“Well, I’ve heard of following one’s nose,” she mused to herself. “I suppose this isn’t too far from that.”

Grocery store. Hospital. Dentist clinic. Florist. Restaurant … also selling flowers, but as food, apparently. Quills and Sofas … what an odd combination.

A commotion near that oddly-named shop brought her attention to a pile of sofas, one with a hole in the back.

She was about to question the nearest pony about the scene when she realized that her horn was apparently detecting multiple signals, or whatever it was her horn was buzzing about, and some buzzings were stronger than others.

Deciding her horn was the more pressing concern, she following the strongest ‘signal’ and came to a delightful-looking building that seemed to look like a cross between a tent and a castle, or a merry-go-round. It was wonderfully decorated in blues, yellows, and purples with silhouettes of prancing ponies on an upper level. For a sign there was another pony silhouette wearing a dress and bridle.

“A boutique!” Rarity cheered. “All is forgiven, horn. You do know what I like.”

Rarity stepped closer to the front door, noting ironically it was an old-fashioned stable door. Sadly, there was a sign hanging on the top portion.



~
Carousel Boutique
Reduced hours due to business abroad
10:00 AM – 2:00 PM
Very sorry for the inconvenience
~



“Aw,” Rarity pouted and checked the clock tower in the distance. “That’s not for another three hours. What kind of proprietor leaves behind a perfectly good boutique without an employee to see to customers?”

Not ready to move on, Rarity peeked through a window and gasped.

“Oh my! Those are wonderful designs. Dresses, hats, shoes! Designer saddles and saddlebags. Even chic headdresses with lace bridles too. Sundresses by the windows to catch the morning light. Oh, those look like Shadow Spade costumes! Rarity shifted to another window for a closer look. “What attention to detail!”

Her eyes wandered over the dresses and, purely by happenstance, fell upon a sign with a familiar logo.

“That’s my logo! Is this my shop? I mean, pony Rarity’s shop?” She looked again and noticed several designs quite similar to her own works, just for four-legged bodies.

Rarity looked to the closed sign and bit her lip. “Oh please be like Caneighdians and leave your doors unlocked!”

She got to the door, happy to see rotating handles rather than round door knobs, and hooked a pastern in the upper door’s handle to give it a twist.

Click

“Eeee!” Rarity squealed (in a ladylike manner of course) as the door opened, but frowned when the lower door remained shut. “No matter,” she giggled, moving to turn the lower handle as well. Except the lower handle wouldn’t move.

She stood there, looking at the tantalizing wares within the boutique through the open upper half of the door. She looked around, she looked up. Ponies milling about around town, but all with their attentions elsewhere. She gathered her four legs, looked at the opened portion of the door with determination, and pronked.

Thud

If at first you don’t succeed ….

The second attempt managed to clear the lower door without adding to her head, and horn, aches but left her stranded on top of that door with her forelegs inside the glorious shop, and her rear, including legs, hanging outside.

Rarity risked another look behind her to check her dignity, happily noting that no one had yet to take notice, and wiggled herself forward. She faceplanted with a thunk; her lower half later sliding sideways to join the rest of her on the floor.

“Ow.”

Outside, a light olive earth pony watching, hidden within a bush, sneaked away unseen.

Rarity stood and took in her surroundings within the boutique. Absently she drew forward, her legs seeming to act without command.

And then so did her horn.

Shining brighter than ever before, Rarity’s attention was taken off the wonders within the boutique and up to her own forehead, and then the floor when she realized her horn wasn’t just lit but also dragging her whole body across the room.

“Horn! I can walk well enough!” Rarity tried to demonstrate by lifting a hoof, only to trip over her other three and end up on the floor again.. “Horn, stop!”

When her horn ignored her, Rarity looked ahead at her apparent destination. What appeared to be a closet.

The closet door was closed.

And looked rather solid.

Thunk

“Ow.”

Rarity took a calming breath and stood, growling up at her horn. “Alright, horn. What is so important you had to throw you and me both into a closed door?!”

She reached up to grab the door’s handle but stopped when she realized there was no handle and rather a plain, round door knob. She looked at her hooves. “Now why would hooved creatures design round door knobs?

“I don’t suppose you can do something about this?” she looked up and asked her horn.

She received no reply.

Left on her own, she reared back onto her hind legs and trapped the doorknob between her forelegs. She squeezed her forelegs around the doorknob and twisted. However, the doorknob refused to budge for she could get no traction while wearing the stockings from Twi’s armoire.

Dropping back to all fours, Rarity tried to strip out of the stockings by trapping one under a hoof and pulling. This proved to be of little effect as the stockings were well fitted and had little traction over each other.

For plan B, Rarity carefully bit the end of one to pull it off with her teeth. This gave her a gross reminder that she had been walking around town with them on.

For plan C, Rarity worked from the top, rolling the fabric down her legs until both stockings popped off.

Forelegs now naked, she frowned at the black ink stain on her hoof, but tried the doorknob again.

She reared back onto her hind legs and trapped the doorknob between her forelegs. She squeezed her forelegs around the doorknob and twisted. And twisted. And twisted. And lost her balance.

Pulling herself up off the floor again, Rarity fumed, scowling at her hooves and then the doorknob. “I’m going back to the dresses, thank you very much!” Rarity declared at any interested parties and turned back to the room full of wonderful designs.

Her horn had other ideas, however.

Thunk

“Ow.”

Rarity looked up from the closet door her face had again been pressed against. A brief glimpse of murder in her eyes.

“Fine!” she declared. “I can figure this out. All these ponies have hooves, they can’t all be stumped by doorknobs.”

Looking closer at the doorknob she realized it wasn’t perfectly round, like many doorknobs back home, as it was slightly elongated, being taller than wide, and had a bowl shape at the top. Switching to look at her hoof revealed similar. In fact, the nail growing out of her hoof was somewhat heart-shaped, with a dip at the top, unlike equines in her own world.

She raised one leg to the doorknob and placed a whole hoof over it. The hoof and nail were even flexible, allowing her to squeeze for a better fit. A simple twist at the pastern opened the door easily.

She looked down at her hoof again, flexing it, noticing that she could flex it so far as to join the open tips like two fingers, making it truly heart-shaped. “Well. A heart in every hoof. That’s rather adorable.”

Finally inside the closet, her horn lit up again, actually being useful this time as the room was quite dark. The buzzing returned and Rarity felt herself drawn forward to what appeared to be a treasure chest.

Thankfully the latch was already open and Rarity was able to simply push up on the cover to open the chest.

Inside, lit by the soft blue light of her horn, were gems. Gems of all sorts. Rubies, sapphires, opals, diamonds.

Rarity’s eyes widened, her breath caught, two of her knees gave out and she clung to the rim of the chest.

“Oh my.”

With a hoof hooked over the rim she touched a few. They were real. She pushed a few around. There were more underneath. She scooped a diamond up into her hoof. She named it Jerry. She smelled Jerry. He … didn’t really have much of a smell. Something she had always wondered about. But he was gorgeous.

“Oh my. Just … just one of these could … NO! These are not mine,” Rarity warred with herself. “These belong to pony Rarity. But she wouldn’t mind sharing, right? I suppose we are sisters after a fashion. Why … how does she even …? Wait!”

Rarity carefully, and reluctantly, put Jerry back in with the other gems, turned around and started toward the main room, but stopped after a few steps and looked challengingly at her horn. She slowly swung her head around a little bit, and gave it a few taps. It didn’t light up and there was no buzzing so she continued on but still kept a wary eye on it.

Back among the lovelies, Rarity got closer and took in more details. “A diamond studded saddle? Rubies in this headdress? Opals lining these boots? This whole belt is just strung together gems!”

She checked the price tags but the numbers didn’t mean anything to her without having any point of reference with the Equestrian economy. Then she noticed a simple handkerchief—hoofkerchief?—behind the counter with her cute mark in the corner. Those diamonds weren’t printed on but rather real diamonds arranged to match the design. "Hopefully that's just ornamental and not functional. Such a cloth could be painful if the user is not careful."

Lost in thought, Rarity kept walking, leaving the shop and heading into the residential portion of the building.

“These gems aren’t for her. They’re nothing to her except one more tool to improve her designs for her customers. To make them …,” she looked up, taking in the new room she found herself in, “fabulous!” she gasped.

Rarity’s eyes sparkled brighter than any gem upon finding a back room filled with supplies and unfinished designs. Around the room were spools of thread, piles of materials, pony-shaped mannequins—poneighquins?—more gems, and photos and sketches of old designs.

“Her inspiration room!”

Finally, by the far wall, stood an easel holding a canvas with pony Rarity’s latest work, still unfinished.

“This? But, I … this is a design I’ve been working on!” She looked around at the supplies, thought back to the gems.

“And now I know how to finish it!”
> 08 Fluttershy: “The Bird and the—Oh my.” AKA “1,353 words of Fluttershy talking to a bird, and then other stuff.”
> --------------------------------------------------------------------------

06:43 AM

"WAIT! LITTLE BIRDIE, WAIT!" Before Applejack and Rarity could stop her, Fluttershy had launched herself out the window after the Ectopistes migratorius almost as fast as Rainbow Dash had earlier.

"”Fluttershy!”" her friends called to her from back inside the palace of Friendship but she was already too far away to hear them. Not that she would have taken notice for she was too focused on her task.

Must find extinct birdie! Must. Preserve. Species!

Sadly, the bird had already flown out of visual range, even for her new pegasus eyes, so Fluttershy had little choice but to keep flying straight in the direction she had seen him leave. Straight out and slightly up.

She flew over thatched rooves, little hills, a pond, and into a thinly wooded area along the edge of the town.

“Little birdie!” she called, looking around. She saw nests as she flew past them but with the Ectopistes migratorius having been extinct for more than one hundred years, she only knew what the birds themselves looked like through pictures, and had no knowledge of their nests. All she could do was try to find one that she couldn’t identify.

“Amareican robin. Western bluebird. Red squirrel. Bank swallow. Baltimare oriole. Pygmy owl. Mexicolt violetear. Wait, what?”

Fluttershy turned her head back toward the nests she had just passed. Those birds don’t all nest in the same types of woods, or even the same countries. This world really is magical!

She smiled brightly for just a moment at that thought before she noticed just how fast she was flying. “Eep! Um. Oh, oh, oh my goodness!” She returned her head to look forward just in time for a tree to teach her that, like Rainbow Dash, she had yet to learn how to brake.

“Ohmygoodne—oof!“

Some trees have more fluffy greenery on them than others. Luckily, Fluttershy’s flight path had taken her into one of the more cushy examples.

Fluttershy took a moment to steady herself and her breathing before attempting to stand. She was still working up to it when a tweet came up behind her.

“Ah! Little birdie?”

Coo!

Relieved, but still draped over a tree branch, Fluttershy turned her head to track him and smiled. “I found you! Well, I guess you found me. Again.”

The little bird landed on a branch just in front of Fluttershy and looked her over in concern.

Coo oo?

“Yes, I’m alright. You’re so kind for asking. I was actually out looking for you.”

Coo?

“Yes you,” Fluttershy giggled when the bird pointed a wing at himself.

Coo

The bird let his wing down with a slight blush.

“I was just so surprised to see an Ectopistes migratorius that I had to talk to you again.”

Co-o-oo-oo od-co-o-do-o-os?

“A passenger pigeon.”

Fluttershy was treated with an adorable head tilt from the little bird.

Coo-o?

“Oh no," Fluttershy said with a little wave of her hoof, careful to not slip off the tree branch. "I’m not saying you’re public transportation.”

Oo?

“It’s the name of your species.”

Ood-oo?

“No, I’m not sure who decided that exactly.”

Coo-ooo-codle!

The bird stood up tall and puffed out his chest.

“Oh. Well ‘pigeonous amazingous’ does sound more impressive. I’m not sure it’s proper Latin though.”

Ooo?

“Sorry, I don’t make the rules.

Oo oo?

“All I could do is write a letter to the government.”

Coo Coo

“That’s a matter of opinion.”

The bird shrugged.

“Not saying it will do anything, but it wouldn't be the first time I wrote a letter for one of my little friends.” Fluttershy looked around with a blush, her ears flopping down. “Much less scary than using the phone.”

Oo?

“A phone? Oh, a phone is a …, uh, never mind. I wanted to ask you something important, little birdie.”

The little bird adjusted his stance, leaning slightly to one side, and gestured with a wing.

Oo-coo-co

“Oh! Robert. Sorry.”

Cooo coo

Fluttershy pulled her head back in surprise and rushed to cover her mistake. “Ah! Yes, we, uh, have known each other for years. Of course I haven’t forgotten your name.”

Coo!

Robert crossed his wings over his chest.

“No, no! You definitely don’t just look like all the other pigeons. I can tell you apart easily.”

Co oo?

“Yes, of course. Because, uh, you’re so much more … handsome than the other pigeons. All the other birds, really!”

Robert stood taller and suavely preened a tail feather.

“That’s right. Strut that thang!” Fluttershy giggled.

Immediately stopping, Robert gave Fluttershy a lopsided look.

“Was that weird? That was weird. Sorry.”

Coo

Robert nodded.

“Oh, right! I came after you because you’re an Ectopistes migratorius and—“

Coo-ooo-codle!

“Sorry. A ‘pigeonous amazingous,’ and, well, you’ve been extinct for more than a hundred years, so—“

Robert lifted a wing and sniffed under it.

Coo oo-coo?

“Oh, no, no. You smell fine!”

Coo-odle!

“Sorry! I know you’re not that old!”

Oo-coo!

“Yes, it’s quite clear you’re in your prime. Young, strong. I already said handsome.”

Ooo oo!

Fluttershy blushed and cleared her throat. “… Yes, and, I’m sure you are quite, um, virile.”

Robert nodded smugly.

“What I meant was that there just aren’t any of you around anymore back home.

Coo?

“Oh, I realize there’s plenty of you here in Canterville—“

Coo do-oo-le?

“ ‘Ponyville’? Oh that’s adorable!”

Robert leaned in closer and tilted his head, looking Fluttershy over again noting the twigs and leaves in her mane and fur.

Coo?

“Oh I feel fine.”

Coo

“Well …,” she passed a hoof through her mane, knocking a few twigs and a patch of leaves free, “I suppose I did just crash pretty hard.”

Co!

She cringed sheepishly. “And, I did have that panic attack. But I feel alright now.”

… Oo?

“I’m sure,” Fluttershy nodded, returning to a smile. “And it's pretty relaxing up here on this branch. I bet it would be nice being a tree. Anyway, by ‘back home’ I meant where I grew up. There aren’t any, um, ‘pigeonous amazingouses’ there anymore.”

Coo oo dou-dle

Fluttershy leaned forward, her jaw lowering with a slight gasp. “There are no trees in Cloudsdale? Anywhere?”

Coo oodo

“It’s made of clouds?” her eyes widened and she looked up, remembering that house-shaped clouds she saw earlier. “The whole town?”

Oodo oodle

“City? And it’s just pegasi there?”

… Ooo-oo coo doo?

“Yes, I’m sure I’m okay.”

Robert pat the front of his head with a wing.

Coo!

“No, I haven’t hit my head. But you’re right. Not having any trees would make it difficult for many species of birds to nest there. But I wasn’t talking about Cloudsdale.”

Coo?

“Yes, well, I did grow up in Cloudsdale, but what I meant was. Um …,” Fluttershy’s eyes flicked. “Uh, let’s say, my ancestral home?”

Oo?

“Um, pretty far away. In a way.”

Co

“Yeah, so I was going to ask if you would be interested in maybe moving there and I could breed you.”

Robert hopped back in surprise and tweeted more loudly.

COO! OODLE OO-COO?!

Fluttershy’s yellow fur gained a bright red tint. “WHAT?! No, no, no! Not with me! W-with, other Ecto-to-p-pis—passenger pigeons!”

Robert's eyes hardened and he pointed an accusing wing at Fluttershy.

COO! COODLE!

“YOUR PIMP?!” Fluttershy’s voice squeaked. “NO, NO, NO! I wouldn’t—“

OODLE!

“No, no! I’m not saying you’re that kind of bird!”

COODLE-COO OODLE!

“You’re married!?”

OOO-ODLE!

“Three chicks?!”

COOO!

“I was her midwife?”

COO-O!

“You named one after me?”

Coo-oo

“An egg on the way?”

COO-COODLE!

“Oh, yes, yes. Of course I remember your wedding!”

COODLE!

“I was a bridesmaid?”

OO!

“Even a dress?”

COO-OO-OO!

“Angel Bunny officiated? He’s ordained?”

OODLE COOO!

“No, no, I’m not saying you’re not committed to your wife!”

Coo oddle

“Yes, you love her very much.”

OODLE!

“Of course you’d never cheat!”

DO!

“I’m so sorry! This got so very out of hand!”

Coo?

“Hoof?”

Coo?

“Talon?”

Coo

Although confusion had taken some of the bite out of Robert's tweeting, placing his wings on his hips gave a clear message. Fluttershy took a deep breath before continuing. “I very much apologize to you and your family, and congratulations on the new egg!”

Co-oo!

“A week ago? Well, I’m, um, happy to hear about it … again?”

Robert tapped his claw on his tree branch.

Coo oo?

“No, I’m sure I’m not getting you mixed up with another pigeon.”

Robert looked down and his tone turned depressed.

Ooo Oo

“No, I don’t like Raymond more.”

Oo-oo Oo

“Aw, I’m sure everybody loves you too.”

Fluttershy smiled when Robert peeked up at her.

Co-ooo?

“Of course I mean it.”

Cooo

“Help you collect worms?”

Coo!

Fluttershy looked down at her forehooves and grimaced, thinking of how birds typically transport worms without the use of fingers.

“Um. How about later in the week? I have something I need to do—ah!” Fluttershy snapped her head back and put a hoof to her forehead. “That’s right! You don’t happen to know where Princess Twilight is do you?”

Robert eyed Fluttershy suspiciously.

“We were actually looking for her when I had my panic attack.”

Coo?

“Yes, and then I saw you and thought I could do some good for my worl—uh, ancestral home if I could repopulate your species there. And, well, I’d need breeding pairs for that. Ah! But you’re married and with four chicks already! That’s great! If you’d all migrate there and we get another family too, then, when your chicks are old enough we can mate them with ….”

Fluttershy paused when she noticed Robert’s jaw hanging in surprise.

COOO COODOODLE OO COOD DOOCO!

The tirade caused Fluttershy to duck sharply back, her breath catching in her throat. Such language!

“No, wait! I’m not suggesting your daughters are—“

A simple gesture cut her off. Robert had his wing held up curled almost into a fist-like ball with one center feather standing up straight.

He paused there a moment, letting it sink in, and then flew off.

Fluttershy simply lay there stunned.

“An extinct pigeon just flipped me the bird.”


*** *** ***


06:58 AM

A moment later, still reeling from that train wreck of a conversation, Fluttershy remained lying there on the branch that had stopped her unplanned flight unaware that she had been slowly slipping backward since pulling back from Robert’s tirade. Once enough of her body slipped down the side of the branch for her to notice the drag, she scrambled for purchase with her forelegs but soon found herself falling from the tree.

Her life passed before her eyes and it was only from the final scenes that she remembered she now had wings.

FOOPFF

No sooner had she opened her wings than she found herself resting on her back on the softest, albeit chilly, bedding she had ever felt.

She looked below her and saw wispy curls of white fluff.

“I’m … in a cloud?”

She played her hooves within what, to her mind, should have just been frozen water vapor and found that thin strands gave and broke away easily but thicker clumps gave some resistance despite not really appearing fully solid. The cloud extended upward a few feet—hooves?—on all sides, likely dented by her landing.

She carefully rolled over, stood, and looked up to see trees, including the one she had fallen from, extending high above her.

“Why is there a cloud so low? And how—”

“So it can water my petunias,” came a dull voice beside her.

“Eep!” Fluttershy startled away from the voice, though she made poor progress due to a decidedly reduced amount of friction on lumpy terrain that wouldn’t stay completely still. When her hooves slipped she flailed to keep herself upright succeeding only in digging down through the center of the cloud. As the cloud expanded from her actions she had to spread out her hooves to keep from falling through a newly created hole in the center as she slipped deeper inside.

“EEK! That’s cold!” she shouted when a bit of cloud got a little too personal.

“Well it is a left over snow cloud from the winter—they’re very cheap this time of year—I planned on letting it warm up before using it but ….”

The sudden cold touch had caused Fluttershy to flinch up, drawing her four legs in close. The joints of her hind legs caught and trapped in some cloud material while her upper half slipped and fell completely through the hole. Now facing straight down at a snow-covered ground only inches below her, Fluttershy was able to peek to the side to see a rather old-looking donkey.

“Mr. … Cranky Doodle?” she asked. The voice had sounded familiar.

“Just call me Cranky,” he said with a practiced frown.

“Are you sure? That seems a bit disrespectful.”

“It’s my name, Fluttershy. One of life’s downers.”

“Oh.”

“Anyway,” Cranky Doodle Donkey continued, “I was going to let it warm up before having the cloud courier come back to kick-start it. But it seems that won’t be happening now.”

Confused, Fluttershy looked around and saw that the ground was only snowy directly under the cloud she was trapped in. The rest looked to be either bright green grass or freshly planted garden dirt. “Did I do that?”

“Yep, when you landed,” Cranky mumbled.

“Oh my goodness. I’m very sorry, um, Cranky.”

"Better than you going splat. Something happen to your wings?” Cranky's voice kept ever steady and grumbling.

“Oh, no. I just was surprised. I wasn’t expecting to fall out of that tree. My mind was on other things.”

“I heard.”

“You … heard?" Fluttershy gulped, her face slowly gaining a blush, "Me and Robert?”

“Yep.”

“The, the whole thing?”

“Came out when I heard the crash. Thought I’d have to chase off the neighbors’ foals again," Cranky flicked his tail in the general direction of a distant house.  One with a small playground.

“Um, um, I can explain.”

“No worries, Fluttershy,” Cranky assured her, walking back to his cabin. “We all have our … ‘hobbies’. Maybe you can join Matilda and me some time.”

Still upside down in the cloud, Fluttershy turned a bright red, but not due to gravity.

“Oh, my," she considered. "Cranky and Matilda's classes are going to be weird for now on.”


*** *** ***


07:07 AM

Too embarrassed to ask Cranky about Twilight, Fluttershy had waited till he was back inside his cabin to extract herself from the remainder of the snow cloud. Once standing, and with the snow cleaned off of her, she wasn’t sure what to do with the remaining cloud and just left it hovering like thick fog and trotted back toward the center of town.

She hoped Cranky would be able to save the garden. Petunias were Matilda’s favorite flower. At least they were for Canterlot High’s Matilda.

She did manage to move the cloud to let the sun shine on the accidental snowfall. She smiled to herself, thinking she actually just pushed a cloud, as if it were solid, with a hoof. Her own hoof! Attached to her own fur-covered leg!

Afterward, she decided to head back for the palace and try to talk, and apologize greatly, to her friends for rushing off while they were still working on the plan.

She could easily see the top of the palace over the little hills and buildings in the town, but she had a ways to go. So she unfolded her wings; now that she knew how to use them.

In theory, this should have worked.

“Oh, dear, oh, dear, oh, dear. Oh my goodness!”

Flying high, over the buildings, was too scary.

“Oof!

“Ack!”

Flying low produced too many obstacles, including the buildings. Yes, she could fly. Yes, she could turn. She could even fly in a straight line fairly quickly now. But her turning, and stopping, abilities still were far less graceful than her walk.

Having managed to cover a fair distance toward the palace anyway, she came to ground just on the outer edge of the marketplace almost teaching herself to land safely.

Almost.

Fluttershy took a moment to catch her breath, and brush herself off again, then trotted the rest of the way.

She never noticed the mint green unicorn stalking her through the deep grass.

After a few minutes, came across several ponies who looked like they might be counterparts of people she knew in her world and considered talking to them, but shied away when unable to do so one-on-one. Groups of shoppers being too quick to wander around too close. So she continued on, taking in the sights as she went.

Farmers’ market. Clothing store, ah, I’ll have to tell Rarity about that. Hospital. Flowers. Oh there’s the clock tower! Oh and … “Quills and Sofas” … that’s an odd combination.

A commotion near that oddly-named shop brought her attention to a pile of sofas, one with a hole in the back. The hole seemed roughly pony-sized.

Several times she tried to call to a pony on the edge of the crowd to ask what was going on but never got her voice loud enough to be heard.

And thus, Fluttershy found herself back at the closed front doors of the palace of friendship wondering if it was appropriate to knock or just enter unannounced.

“Um … hello?” she called softly through the doors. “Anybody in there? … Pinkie? Girls?”

No reply.

“Hello,” she tried louder and walked up to knock on the door. “It’s, um, Fluttershy.”

“Hi, Fluttershy!”

“Eep!” Fluttershy turned quickly as the voice had come from behind her and greeted the earth pony mare she found there, noting a very familiar set of colors, mane style, and sign. “Um. Oh! Miss Cheerilee?”

“Sorry if I startled you. And you know you can just call me Cheerilee, right?” The teacher smiled brightly, possibly slightly more than necessary at the end.

“Oh, of course, sorry.”

“No, no, it’s alright, Cheerilee waved her off. "But, why are you standing out here? Is Rainbow Dash pulling pranks again?”

“What? Oh, no. But I wasn’t sure if I could just walk right in.”

“Why wouldn’t you? The lower floors are always open to the public.”

“Oh? Oh. Yes, of course," Fluttershy gave the teacher a smile that she couldn't help but make awkward.

“And you don’t really count as just ‘the public’ here. Don’t you have keys to the private areas?”

“Um, yes. But, they are … at home?”

“Alright, but the front doors should be open.” Cheerilee pressed forward on one door and it opened easily. “I’m going to the library to check out a few books since I’ll be having a few extra vacation days.”

“Oh, you are?”

Fluttershy followed her across the Foyer and through a side door which began closing behind them.

“Yes, since Twilight started Spring break a few days early for her Friendship School I decided to do the same for the town school so all our students can play with all their friends from either school.” Cheerilee led the way past a receptionist's desk and bookcase-filled hallway.

“Oh that was nice of you.”

“Thank you. Of course that means all the students in both schools will have a little unexpected homework to be turned in once vacation ends. But I just kept thinking that if it’s a friendship school, it would be silly keeping them from the friends they’ve made with the town students. Even if my students are younger than most of them.”

“Oh, yes. That does make sense. Um, Do you know why Twilight closed her school early?”

Cheerilee stopped to turn toward Fluttershy. “No. But don’t you? You’re much closer to her than I am, and one of the teachers there.”

“I’m a teacher?!”

“Yes? For the kindness class. Are you feeling okay?”

“I teach kindness?” Fluttershy's jaw dropped.

“You’re voted ‘Teacher of the Month’ almost every month. Your students even take extra pictures of you each month. Last I saw you have almost thirty photos on the hall of fame. The school hasn't been open nearly that long.”

“I, what. Really? I hope they don't use a camera with a bright flash.”

Cheerilee paused, her head tilted in confusion a moment before stepping forward and placing a pastern on Fluttershy’s forehead. Taken aback, Fluttershy stepped back and ducked slightly.

“Sorry,” Cheerilee apologized and held back, “Teacher’s habits. Are you alright?”

Blushing, Fluttershy stuttered in reply, “Oh, um, yes. I’m fine. Little bit of an off day is all.”

“Is that why you came back early?” Cheerilee asked.

“ ‘Back early’?”

“Yes. You all got on a train yesterday.”

“Yesterday?”

Cheerilee frowned, moving forward to check Fluttershy’s temperature again. “You do feel a little warm.”

“Oh! Um. Yes, maybe I’ll … take a nap after I … feed my animals? Which is why I came back early?” Fluttershy smiled over-warmly, eyes going a bit too wide.

“I thought Dr. Fauna was going to help out. It’s why her clinic’s hours are reduced this week.”

“Dr. Fauna? Oh, yes. Dr. Fauna is helping out, but I wanted to help her to help me out. Because it would be helpful to help both of us, um, help us both.” Fluttershy’s smile increased in size.

“You’re getting warmer,” Cheerilee informed her, still checking Fluttershy’s forehead.

“Oh?” Fluttershy laughed awkwardly.

“I think you’re going to need that nap.”

“Yes! Right away!” Fluttershy turned and galloped for the door they had come through, leaving Cheerilee with her foreleg still in the air, but stopped and turned upon stepping into the foyer. “Um, Miss Cheerilee. Strange question—if you don’t mind. Um …, where do I live?”
> 09 “Rainbow Dash: "Busting Clouds and Taking Names”
> --------------------------------------------------------------------------

06:41 AM

"And just look at those clouds." So taken with the sky, Rainbow Dash's hover began to silently drift forward out the window.

"Rainbow? Fluttershy?" came what might as well been a whisper behind, and below, her. "Yes it feels quite nice, but …," to Rainbow there was no more sound, just the air around her, the sight of those clouds so far but so within reach, and the feel of the slight wind in her hair, tail, fur, and feathers.

"I gotta fly!" Rainbow cheered upon clearing the windowsill and took off like a rocket.

She didn’t hear the next voice calling out to her either.

Rainbow began by flying straight out from the window, picking up speed, her hair whipping behind her.

Unlike in the palace halls and rooms, she now had open air and breezes around her.

Her starting point of the palace window already had her above the buildings, and many of the trees in town, but below the clouds.

She’d fix that soon enough.

Many often called her reckless, that she took too many risks and jumps into things without thinking, but Rainbow would disagree.

“It’s dangerous to fly so fast and so high without learning properly first,” she could imagine her friends saying. “It would be unsafe to reach for the clouds without training yourself with a safety net first.”

But of course Rainbow knew this. She took her time when she needed to.

If her friends would want her to test her wings safely before flying up to a cloud then of course she would.

She looked around.

Found a tall tree.

She aimed straight for it.

Matched her best speed from her hallway practice.

At the last moment she angled and circled full around it.

Turning: Check, she thought.

She looked down.

She found a pond.

She flew over it then dove straight down.

At the last second she pulled up sharply, the tips of her tail and hooves only just brushing the surface.

Recovery: Check.

She smiled.

NOW she was ready for those clouds.

One quick glance was all it took to find one.

Wasting no time she climbed right for it!

A slight chuckle escaped her. The Twilights, and even Sunset, would tell her all about aerodynamics and angles and wind resistance and weight to speed ratios and all sorts of other math.

None of that was necessary.

You just needed to feel the air over your feathers and they’d tell you how to get there.

You just needed to listen.

And in that moment, the only moment she focused on, the skies were bright, the weather clear.

As she zeroed in on her destination, the air, her wings, her feathers, they all were telling her everything she needed to know.

That cloud was all hers.

FOOPMFF

“WOOOOOOO-HOOOOOOO! YEAH!”

Rainbow relaxed her wings, her momentum still carrying her almost directly up, and angled herself around, letting the eggheads’ aerodynamics rotate her to face back on her path from the pond.

She saw it was almost clear; a straight shot back to the pond. The cloud she had flown through was nothing more than wisps of vapor spread around in a doughnut shape.

And those wisps were continuing to fade away.

She was still gaining altitude by the time all remaining traces of that cloud had gone.

“Heh, heh,” she laughed.

And then she took in the view.

“Whoa.”

So bright. So green. So blue. So … pink.

It was a world right out of a storybook. A kids’ storybook. For girls. Colored in super bright markers and crayons. And glitter pens. Lots of glitter pens.

She was too high up to get a lot of detail. She was pretty sure the little colored ants with tails were ponies.

The palace she came from stood out nice and clear. A yellow and pink ant with wings just shot out from it toward some trees.

“Wow! Go Fluttershy! Knew you’d figure it out!”

She let her go, there was so much more to see and do.

A few of the buildings were fairly big. There was a huge, what looked like a mansion made of crystal, next to the palace.

There was the clock tower she saw before. Little thatch houses spread around the town. Other buildings and huts, mostly clustered together, looked like a marketplace. Several bodies of water. Several wooded areas. One in particular was large, dark, and somewhat foreboding.

“Hmm …,” she eyed it with interest.

Her ascent was coming to an end. Time to pick a new destination.

They came here to find Twi. But at this height, with this speed, she could find Twi in her sleep!

Did she really need to looking start right away?

She looked around for another cloud.

And found a string of them that looked like they were meant for her.

She opened her wings.

Felt the air press against the undersides as she began to descend.

Got the angle just right.

And went at it.

First cloud was tiny. Smaller than the one she had already gone through.

FOPFF

Gone.

The second and third were larger.

FOOPMFF

FOOPHFF

Vapor.

The fourth was pretty sizable, but wouldn’t be a problem.

PAFFPHHFF

Dissipating.

The fifth looked like a house.

“Wait’what?”

FOOPMFF-BANG-PAFFPH-CRASH-ARF-ARF-ARF-PAFF-EEEEKK-”SORRYMA’AM”-FOOPMFF

Upon clearing the cloud-house, Rainbow turned herself around to look back, having forgotten the string of clouds numbered six.

FUMMPH

“Ugh,” Rainbow groaned, plastered firmly into the side of the sixth cloud.

She just hung there, a little dazed, seeing the cloud-house—now with extra ventilation—shrink as the distance increased. She looked down and realized the force she hit the sixth cloud with caused it to speed away. Why the cloud hadn’t popped like the others before she didn’t know.

How she was attached to, and nearly inside of, something that really shouldn’t be solid she also didn’t know.

She wriggled around and eventually freed both her forelegs and pressed them into the cloud.

It really was solid.

Sure, it wobbled, but it was still solid. It was like extra firm gelatin.

She pushed harder, freeing her wings then flapped them, slowing the cloud to a halt.

Finally also freeing up her hind end, she flapped to a hover beside the cloud and punched it in annoyance.

A small amount of rain fell from it.

“Huh.”

She tried again.

“Hay!” complained a voice from below.

Rainbow looked down and saw a patron at a restaurant's outdoor table trying to eat a now soggy salad.

“Sorry!” Rainbow shouted back down

Looking back to the cloud revealed it was still raining. “Um.”

She punched it again.

The rain fell faster.

“Shoot! Uh.”

With no clear way to stop the rain, Rainbow simply planted both forehooves into it and flew forward.

Visibility wasn’t the greatest while pushing a solid cloud, but Rainbow was able to squint and look through some of the thinner wisps of fluff.

“What’s going on?” came another shout from below as another pony got an unexpected shower.

“Ack!” asked a newly wet pony in a sundress.

“Watch it up there!”

"I just had my mane done!"

Rainbow flew faster as more complaints came up, not aiming, just trying to move the leaky cloud away from town.

Unfortunately, she seemed to be right over the center of town.

Spying another cloud at a lower altitude gave her hope of a quicker fix.

She passed the troublesome cloud above the other and flew back to watch.

The higher cloud’s rain fell into the lower cloud.

The raining cloud was slowly shrinking with its losses, and the rained on cloud was growing with its surplus.

No further rain escaped to the ground.

“Heh, that works.”

“Something wrong with those clouds?” asked a voice behind her.

“Gah!” Rainbow startled and hover-turned around.

“Whoa, sorry. Didn’t mean to scare you,” the pegasus replied.

“Hey, what do you mean, scare? You didn’t scare me.” Rainbow looked over the pegasus. Dark gray coat, blue and white hair in a mohawk-style. She realized he was clearly a male when her eyes drifted a bit lower. Also noting he was naked. “… Whoa.”

The pegasus raised an eyebrow but continued. “So … the clouds?”

Rainbow’s eyes snapped back up to the pony’s face. “Clouds! Uh, what about them?”

The pegasus blinked, “Something wrong with them? You’re draining one into the other instead of busting them. Do you want it to explode or something?”

“It’ll explode?”

“Well, yeah, eventually. You’re not adding any cloud fluff, you’re just stuffing more rain into it.”

“Um,” Rainbow scratched her head with a hoof, “is that really how clouds work here?”

“Is that …, how else would they work? Aren’t you on the weather team?”

“What, I’m a forecaster here? Weather reporter? Wow, that’s gotta be lame.”

The pegasus flew closer and peered closely at the top of Rainbow’s head. “Did you fly too high and get ice between your ears?”

“Hey, my ears work just fine,” Rainbow protested.

“So, then, this is for some kind of stunt? Smash through a waterlogged cloud and create an optical rainbow around you?” He perked his head up and thought for a moment. “Huh, that could be cool, but you’d have to get the cloud saturated just right or it might not be just the cloud that explodes.”

Rainbow just hovered there a moment trying to process a set of words that probably would have made more sense if not bundled together in their given order.

“It’s another prank, isn’t it?” the pegasus concluded.

“Prank? Oh!” Rainbow perked up, finding the perfect way to find her missing friend. “Yeah! Gonna drop it on Twi. Yeah! She’ll never know what hit her!”

“ ‘Twi’? Twilight?” The pegasus backed up a little bit. “You’re going to drop an exploding cloud on top of an alicorn princess?”

“Yup! Know where she is?”

The pegasus held up his forehooves. “Uh, I don’t think I want to be a part of this.”

“Aw, come on! It’ll be fun and she’ll never know you helped.”

“Well, I can’t help anyway. Haven’t seen her for a few days. I think she’s out of town.”

“Out of town?!" Rainbow complained. "That sucks! How do I find out where she went?”

“I thought you would know. Doesn’t she tell the five of you everything?”

“Five? Oh, you mean The Rainbooms.”

“Rainbooms? I thought you were focusing on new tricks, you haven’t done a rainboom in a while. What’s that have to do with Princess Twilight?”

“What do you mean ‘haven't done a Rain—?” Rainbow blushed. “Hey! We don’t have that kind of relationship! Those rumors are completely false! Who even started those?! And I’m not turning tricks either!”

The pegasus tilted his head. “Uh, Rainbow Dash, what are you talking about?”

“What are you talking about?!” Rainbow defended, gaining some altitude in her hover.

There was an awkward silence before the pegasus backed off. “You know what …? I’m gonna get back to training. You have fun, uh, exploding clouds.”

“No, hey, what’s-your-name, wait!” Rainbow reached out to him.

The pegasus turned back with a confused expression. “… Thunderlane?”

Rainbow’s own expression turned thoughtful for a moment then broke into a cheer. “Thunderlane? Oh sweet, dude! You got wings here too!”

“Did you fall asleep in the Dizzitron?”

“The what now?”

“Okay …,” Thunderlane nodded slowly. “How about I bring you to the hospital?”

“What? No! I gotta find Twi!”

“You can ask your friends.”

“Yeah! I’m asking you." Rainbow gave Thunderlane's shoulder a playful nudge. "We’re friends, right?”

Thunderlane’s brow crinkled, “You forgot my name.”

“What?! I didn’t forget, I just didn’t recognize you at first.”

“The only other pegasus in town with a coat even close to my color is a blonde," he pointed to his mane.

“You know I don’t pay attention to hair.”

“She’s also a mare?”

“Huh?”

“On second thought, you stay here and I’ll go get you a doctor.”

“HEY! I don’t need a doctor!”

“Okay,” he scratched his chin and gave her a smirk, “how about I just race you to the hospital?”

“You’re on!”

Thunderlane grinned and turned away, quickly accelerating to a high speed.

“Hey, wait! Where is the hospital?!”

Too late; Thunderlane had already rounded a corner forcing Rainbow to fly after him at her cloud bursting speeds from earlier just to keep pace.

“Forget it, Rainbow,” he called to her as she reentered earshot. “You may be fast but you’re not the only Wonderbolt in town!”

Before Rainbow could reply, he had dived into the marketplace, weaving around a stall.

Rainbow followed, gap widening only slightly as she readjusted to the new angle.

“Wonderbolt? Don’t you mean Wondercolt?”

Thunderlane waited for Rainbow to catch up again and smirked, “Well, I am a pretty wonderful colt.”

Coming up fast on a tall pile of hay bales, Thunderlane swerved sharply around them.

Rainbow attempted the same by climbing but caught the top bale and flew right through it.

Rainbow shook her head to remove the strands of hay blocking her face.

Saw how much of a lead Thunderlane had gained.

And poured on the speed.

“I’m every bit as wondercolty as you!” she called out once caught up.

“You’re a mare!”

“What? Oh, right. Horse terms.”

“Horse …? You’re not nearly that tall.”

Thunderlane then made a sharp turn around a building and flew into an alley.

“I’m aerodynamic!”

Rainbow made the same turn, but had to use all her hooves to push against the wall to keep from hitting it. Essentially running along the wall while her wings held her aloft.

When she looked forward again to check on Thunderlane, he had increased his altitude to fly over another wall at the end of the alley. Rainbow had to tuck her legs in and again push, jumping off the top of the wall to keep up.

Following that, Thunderlane kept straight and Rainbow managed to close the distance as they reached the mouth of the alley.

Only for Thunderlane to suddenly stop in mid air. “Whoa!”

Rainbow saw the maneuver and recalled a part of her last conversation with Applejack.




“So ya spent all yer time earlier tyrin’ to go faster and never learned how ta stop?”
“You only need to stop when something goes wrong.”




Before smashing into a tall stack of sofas on a passing cart.




“Eh, learning how to stop is on the list.”




“Ugu … should have made it a shorter list,” she groaned.

“Rainbow!” Thunderlane laughed, “you just broke rule number one. Again! Wait till I tell Spitfire! They don’t call you Crash for nothing.”

Rainbow’s head, sticking out the back of a sofa, shook off the stars in orbit around her and saw a sign declaring the name of a shop.

“Quills and Sofas? The heck?” she pondered, just before becoming aware of the stack collapsing under her newly ventilated sofa.

The sofa tumbled free of the rest of the stack, heading for the ground.

Rainbow’s face protected what was left of it.

And everything went black.
> 10 Applejack: "Home?" AKA: "4,381 words of earth pony head-cannon world-building”
> --------------------------------------------------------------------------

06:50 AM

"Ah can feel … trees … apple trees. Apple trees! Home!"

Applejack's eyes snapped open and grew wide. She jumped to her hooves and galloped, expertly, toward the south. "YEEEEEEEHAWWW!" she shouted, leaving Rarity behind to stare on at her, shocked.

She quickly curved around the palace of Friendship, passed small houses, and sped over gentle hills of lush, green grass. She felt plant life all around her as each hoof touched the ground, her gallop, requiring all four hooves to lift in the air for brief moments, caused slight gaps in the strongest of these feelings, but each landing seemed to bring them all back even stronger.

Never did she have to wonder where she was going. She couldn’t see it, but she could feel it. Home. As plain as the muzzle on her face.

Plainer really, considering that her muzzle was a nose only a couple hours ago.

But that gave her all the more drive to seek out the growing feelings. Apple trees. Home. Family.

The gentle earthy smells of the town began to grow stronger, forming into the telltale scents of farm life. Apple farm life.

A few gallops later, a welcome sign appeared in the distance that spurred Applejack on faster.



~—~
Sweet Apple Acres
~—~



She gleefully galloped past the sign and open gate finding herself among the apple trees. She smiled as she neared the source of ….

An odd thought struck her and she slowed and came to a halt.

“Is something callin’ me?”

She looked around at the trees. In all directions were the beautiful, bright greens and whites of blossoming apple trees. “Blossoms? It’s Spring here? It ain’t Spring back home.”

Still, there was that urge, that call, coming further on. And so Applejack continued at a slower pace.

Getting closer, she noticed more oddities. “Most of these trees ain’t been pruned, but they’re growing just fine. Right shape to grab the sunlight an’ everything. Although … they’re so tall and why them lower branches so high up, like shade trees? How are ponies supposed to pick the fruit?” She looked down at her new hooves. “Pony Applejack climbs ladders like this? Does she pick with her teeth? But then what? If she drops them in’ta a basket from that high they could bruise.”

Continuing to examine the trees confirmed that there were few points where the trees were pruned, yet the trees looked and felt very healthy, and the amount of blossoms suggested there would be a bountiful harvest come summer.

And then she was there.

She arrived at the call she felt.

She looked up at the trees she found herself at. Greens and reds this time. Full, ripe apples hung from those healthy branches, ready to be harvested.

“What? But isn’t it …,” she looked back at the blossoming trees, “Spring?”

Looking forward, she saw more trees with ripe fruit and others with neither fruit nor blossoms.

She walked forward and placed a hoof on the nearest tree.

Applejack remained there a few moments.

She felt the tree’s life as if it were connected to her own. She closed her eyes.

“Quite healthy, Almost ninety years old. No rot in your trunk.” She opened her eyes and looked up at the tree’s full branches. “How are you still producing so much fruit at your age?”

The tree yielded no reply.

So, Applejack got closer, rearing up to add her other forehoof against the tree’s trunk.

“You’ve seen a lot in your time, haven’t you? So many winters and harvests.” She got closer still, wrapping her forelegs around the tree in a hug. “I bet you’ve seen many members of the Apple family grow up as they used you for shade and enjoy your fruit. And … they’re that heavy? I see … It’s like a cow that needs to be milked. You was calling to be harvested!”

Applejack stepped back, lowering to all fours again and called up to the laden branches. “Don’t ya worry nothing, Rainsworth, I’ll Help ya lighten that load.”

Smiling, Applejack turned but stopped and tilted her head.

“Rainsworth?”

She turned back to the tree. “Is that your name?” She blinked. “Well, it ain’t like ah don’t name a lot of my trees back home. But … how do ah know your name?”

Confused, she walked up to the next tree over and placed her hoof on it.

Again, she felt the life of the tree connect with hers and closed her eyes.

“Healthy. About seventy-five years old. Pruned once. Heavy load of apples to be harvested.” Her eyes opened in wonder. “Bloomington.” She stepped back. “You have a name too. And ah know what it is!”

Unable to help it, Applejack giggled. “Rainsworth, Bloomington. Don’t ya fret now, ah’ll take care of ya both faster'n two flicks of a tick's tail.”

Now, how to pick them? she wondered. The lowest apples were fairly high up, but there was a somewhat lower branch on Bloomington that looked reachable.

She jumped and reached as high as she could, but only just tapped the branch with her forehooves. With a second attempt she managed to curl a foreleg around it but was unable to hold on and fell back down.

“Dagnabbit!” she grumped and idly struck the trunk.

“Oh! Sorry Bloomingt—ow!” she flinched when an apple dropped onto her head.

“Huh. Guess they really are all ready to come down.” But she was faced with a dilemma. “So where’s the barn? Gonna need a ladder and some baskets for the apples. Can’t just keep shaking their trunks and hoping for the best.”

Then an idea struck her and she lay down on the grass, closing her eyes. She could feel the trees around her. Most were blossoming, but others were ready to harvest, others still had been harvested recently. She felt grass and flowers, and … several sizable, rectangular gaps in the plant life.

“Well, barns tend to be rectangles.”

A likely destination found, she got up and trotted off.

Shortly later, she found herself near a rectangular gap in the grass that, indeed, turned out to be a barn. Nearby, located in some similar gaps, were other buildings, one that looked like a quaint residence. She smiled. “Perfect. Ah can harvest some apples to help out our trees and see the family. Ah’ll be able to ask them about Twilight while ah’m here and make it back in time to meet up with Rares.”

She entered the barn … and lost a portion of the sensations she had of the life around her. Frowning, she looked at the wood floor of the barn but stopped and concentrated. She could still feel everything as before. It was all still there, just muted somewhat. The frown faded and she looked for the harvesting supplies.

Ladders. Full and empty baskets. Pruning tools. A few horse—pony—drawn carts with harnesses.

“That’s exactly what I need!”

She opened the barn doors wide to let in more light and to make way for the cart. She then got behind the cart, rearing up to place her forehooves on the back and pushed it forward. Returning to the more familiar two-legged walk felt quite odd with a pony’s hips.

Once it was set just out of the barn, Applejack went back for the nearest ladder that looked tall enough, hooked a hoof around a rung and … not sure how to walk with just three pony legs, simply dragged it with that one hoof and walked beside it. She then went back for the baskets.

She tipped a few over and rolled them up to the cart, again walking on two legs while pushing.

This left her at the edge of the barn with a cart, a ladder, four empty apple baskets, and no idea how to get them up into the cart.

The ladder, she surmised, shouldn’t be too hard. She looped her foreleg in one of the rungs as before and simply flung it up toward the cart. It landed with one end in the cart’s bed as intended, but the other end still on the ground.

Not quite what she was going for, but it presented her with a solution for the baskets. The ladder was a perfect ramp!

She went around to the first basket, still on its side, and rolled it to the ladder’s end and up a couple rungs. Once she could go no further without walking up the makeshift ramp herself, she debated actually walking up the ramp, but given how unsteady she already felt just on the ground she decided it best to just give the basket a strong push to get it up the rest of the way.

The first attempt failed, Applejack not supplying enough oomph, and it simply rolled back down.

The second attempt got the basket all the way to the end of the ladder. Unfortunately, the weight of the basket at the higher end of the ladder informed Applejack quite rudely that standing over the lower end while on two legs was not the best plan.

The shock caused her to pitch forward, landing belly-down on the ladder. She lay there a moment with a moan as gravity brought the ladder, with her on it, back down. The basket, still on the upper end of the ladder, then followed.

“Gah!”

After a moment for recovery, Applejack repeated the steps from before, but this time instinct took over and she turned and kicked the basket up the ladder with her hind legs. She then jumped forward to as to not get personal with the ladder once more.

“Third time’s the charm!”

However, this time the basket rolled up the ladder so fast it banged into the head of the cart’s bed with enough force for Applejack to realize it would have been nice if she had thought to check if the cart had a parking brake.

As the cart began to move forward, Applejack also thought how it would have been nice if the barn wasn’t located at the top of a hill.

After a short chase, Applejack thanked, with many apologizes to, Sir. Barks-a-lot for stopping the cart without causing it damage and was relieved that he himself was unharmed. Then she wondered if it was pony Pinkie who named that particular tree.

Since one basket was carried, and the ladder dragged, from the barn by the cart, Applejack decided to cut her losses and just use what she had. She pushed the cart away from the blooming Barks-a-lot and wiggled into the pony harness.

She then had to figure out how to tighten it around herself.

The harness seemed simple enough. Mostly just two poles holding an arch to go over the pulling pony’s back, and a strap to go under the pony’s barrel to keep it from sliding off.

But how does one tighten such a strap without fingers?

With the arch already over her, the strap was hanging limply from the left side. She just needed to grab that, round it underneath her, thread it through a buckle hanging on the right side, pull it tight, and affix it in place.

With her hooves and teeth?

She bent her head down and grabbed the strap in her teeth while reaching her right forehoof under her barrel to pass the strap to while keeping herself from falling into the dirt by leaning on her left foreleg. This taught her the amount of flexibility Equestrian ponies have in their necks was indeed great enough for such a contortion. Catching the strap in her hoof, however, was the tricky part.

Once transferred from teeth to hoof, all Applejack could do was either let it slip out of her hoof or press her hoof up against her belly to hold it in place. Doing the latter required her to then slide her hoof right, dragging the strap through her fur so she could eventually transfer the strap back to her teeth from the right side.

There were a number of failed attempts.

There were a number of little patches of fur missing from her belly from some of these attempts.

There were a number of profane words and phrases spoken.

A few she invented on the spot.

Some of these were too loud to be considered “spoken.”

Once more passing to and trapping the strap with her hoof, Applejack grumbled, “If only I could get this to stick to my hoof, things would be so much easier.”

It was just at that moment with her head bent down under herself from the right, about to make another pass of the strap from hoof to teeth that Applejack lost her balance and stumbled. Instinctively she lowered her right foreleg to the ground for balance but found she was unable to. The too-short-to-touch-the-ground strap was stuck to her hoof!

This caused her to fall over.

Now lying on her right side on the ground and her right forehoof in the air from being stuck to the hanging strap of the harness, Applejack had to figure out not only what just happened, but also how to fix it.

She pulled her hoof toward her but it was as if the strap was glued on to her hoof. This was a bit of a disturbing thought given how some glues in her world were made.

Unable to pull her hoof away from the strap, Applejack attempted to stand.

This proved difficult given her current situation.

She rolled onto her back first, then used her three free legs to slide herself backward, away from the cart, eventually managing to get to a sitting position on her hindquarters. She stood on three legs and pulled, walking backward. Teaching herself how to do so in the process.

It was her hope that the strap would just release itself from her hoof, but she ended up dragging the whole cart forward.

Taking another look at the bottom of her stuck hoof showed that there was no visible reason for the strap to be stuck, it just seemed to be held there as if glu—magnetized—to it.

“Okay, Applejack, think. This has got to be some sort of magic. I just said, ‘stick to my hoof’, and it did. Alright,” she looked at her hoof intently, “Le’go.”

She pulled.

Still stuck.

“Let go,” she enunciated.

She pulled.

Still stuck.

“Dagnabbit! Get off ma hoof, you dang lousy piece of—oof!”

She found herself on the ground again when her hoof was freed.

From her position, she looked at her previously stuck hoof but found nothing unusual about it. At least nothing that was different from the last time she had looked at it.

She got up and tapped it to the strap, pulling back immediately as if it burned her, but the strap hardly moved.

A second attempt, contact lasting longer, had the same result.

For the third attempt, Applejack held her hoof against the strap and spoke clearly, “Stick. To. My. Hoof.”

When she pulled away, the strap followed!

Applejack immediately yelled, “Le’go! Le’go! Le’go!” while pulling away.

And found herself on the ground again when the strap let go.

She looked at the strap a moment and tried again.

“Stick to my hoof,” she said and pulled away, taking the strap along.

“Let go.” The strap released.

A few more repetitions followed to be sure.

“Huh.”

Applejack then checked the ground with her newfound mind’s eye, locating a rock of appropriate size. “Stick to my hoof,” she commanded it before lifting. “Let go.” The rock dropped.

She repeated this a few times as well; with multiple rocks. Eventually she could replicate the phenomenon without speaking.

Stick.

Release.

Stick.

Release.

“Well, that aught’ta help.”

Applejack then returned to the cart’s harness and tried again with her new discovery.

Once in position, she bent her head down and grabbed the strap in her teeth while reaching her right forehoof under her barrel to pass the strap to while keeping herself from falling into the dirt by leaning on her left foreleg. She then stuck the strap to this hoof, lifted her head up and to her right side, slipped the end of the strap into the buckle and then bit the end in her teeth and pulled it tight.

Upon releasing the tightened strap, the harness was now properly fit to her size.

“Hoo’wee!” she shouted. “Ah did it!” Chuckling, she walked forward and the cart came with her. “Now to free Rainsworth and Bloomington of them apples.”

It was not difficult to find her heavy load-bearing trees, she could feel them when she closed her eyes, even knew them by name, and she was back in short time.

Now, not seeing any way to hold more than one apple at a time, or carry the basket with her, Applejack figured what she had to do was set up the ladder, climb up it, stick an apple to her hoof, climb down the ladder, put the apple in the basket, and repeat.

For every apple on each tree.

She frowned, thinking how long it took just to … do everything else that day.

She frowned harder when she realized she didn’t know how to get the harness off of her.

Some minutes later revealed that the buckle released easily when pulled again at the right angle. Easy enough to do even with just her teeth. Sticking the bucket and ladder to her hooves got them set up against Rainsworth much quicker, and with less fuss, than getting them onto the cart had been.

But climbing the ladder?

Applejack took another look at the underside of her hooves. Humane feet are long and curl to some degree, conforming to objects such as terrain that isn’t flat or, in this case, rungs of a ladder. Hooves can’t do that. Instead, she noticed that the “frog” or palm was well depressed compared to the nail, and the nail was an open circle, and she could easily twist her pasterns in ways equines in her world couldn’t.

It seemed an obvious conclusion.

She walked up to the ladder, reared up to her hind legs, placing her forehooves on the sides of the ladder as close to how she would with hands as possible and “sticking” them there for safety. For her hind pair, she stood on a rung and turned them both to the left to catch the rung in the opened back part of the nail.

With a smile, she leaned around to take in her accomplishment from various angles.

This led to her suddenly finding herself on the ground.

Some time later, after a number of attempts, falls, and tests, she learned that hooves don’t “stick” quite as well without at least one touching the ground.

“Ah’m startin’ to hate all these picky magic rules,” she grumbled while more carefully climbing the ladder to get the first of Rainsworth’s apples.

Once high enough to reach the lowest apples, Applejack reached out and stuck one to her hoof. She pulled it off Rainsworth and, thinking she deserved a reward for her troubles, decided this apple would be it.

She brought it to her muzzle.

And it dropped into the basket.

“Consarn it!” she yelled and tried, more carefully, again.

The second apple made it to her mouth and she took a bite of the most delicious apple she had ever tasted. While it was a mostly familiar flavor, something between a McIntosh and a red gala, it was also different enough that she wasn’t sure what type of apple she was actually eating. It was so crisp and pure. Clean without chemicals or pesticides. It felt like there was a magic right inside the apple. It felt …

Sparkling.

She couldn’t help but moan.  Deeply.

“Applejack?” asked a young, familiar voice behind her.

Startled, she inhaled at just the wrong moment and choked.

“Applejack!” the voice shouted in concern, “Are you alright? Do ya need the Hindlich maneuver?”

A few coughs and chest beatings cleared Applejack’s airway. “Nope, no. Ah’m okay,” she assured the owner of the voice before looking behind herself.

She saw before her a small, yellow, earth pony filly with apple-red hair wearing a large, pink bow.

Applejack just stared. Her jaw dropped. “A-Apple Bloom?”

“Uh, yeah?” Apple Bloom replied.

“Is that you?”

“Um …, yeah? Are you okay?”

Applejack leaned backward, hardly noticing the instant drop back to the ground, never once taking her eyes off the little pony.

“Apple Bloom?” Applejack got to her hooves and walked up to her.

“Applejack?”

They just stood there a moment, staring at each other. Apple Bloom with a questioning tilt of her head and worried expression, Applejack in wonderment.

“My stars and garters,” Applejack smiled, “Ain’t you just cuter than a bug in a rug? Why, that bow is as big as your little head.”

“Uh, huh?”

Giggling, Applejack closed the distance and pulled Apple Bloom into an embrace. “Hee, hee. Ah don’t think ah ever wana let ya go.”

“Whoa, whoa! What?”

“You’re just so tiny and precious! Ah'm gonna keep you safe forever.”

“A-Applejack? You’re not gonna start makin’ me wear helmets all the time again are ya?” Apple Bloom tried and failed to get her forehooves freed from Applejack's grasp.

“No siree. Ah’m gonna keep you safe right here in ma arms.”

“Forever? In your arms?”

“Forelegs?”

“Why are ya actin’ so weird?”

Applejack blinked, reluctantly laxing her hold on Apple Bloom. “Um, weird? What do ya mean?”

“Ah mean, something’s up. Right, Big Mac?”

“Eeyup.”

The other voice came from more to her side. “Mac?” she asked, looking over.

Every bit as tall as in her world stood a creature pushing the limits of the term “pony.” He was the same red and yellow as she was familiar with, though he wore a yoke around his neck. She looked him up and dow—

Up, AJ, up! She told herself. Yer brother’s naked! Eyes UP!

“Mac!” she said much louder than necessary, snapping her eyes back up to his mane, locking them there and no lower for safety. At some point, Apple Bloom wriggled out of her hold and she dropped back to all fours. “Uh, howdy!”

Big McIntosh’s eyes flicked to Apple Bloom who looked back equally confused.

“We’ve been watching you,” Apple Bloom explained, “And—.”

“Watching me?” asked Applejack.

“Eeyup,” answered Mac.

“So, uh, just how long have you been watching me?”

“Since you rolled the cart down the hill,” answered Apple Bloom.

“That long eh?” She blushed. "You, uh, been listen' too?"

"That was a lot of words you've told me to never say."

“Eeyup!” Mac added with a harsh tone and glare to match.

Applejack chuckled nervously, reaching up and partly covering her face with her hat.

“So, what’s going on?” Apple Bloom pressed.

“Um,” Applejack pushed her hat back to its proper location and her eyes flicked between her counterpart’s siblings. “I was just thinking I’d harvest Rainsworth and Bloomington here.”

“One apple at a time? Why don’t ya just buck ‘em?”

“Do WHAT to 'em?!”

“Buck ‘em.” Apple Bloom turned and kicked Rainsworth with both hind legs and every apple simply dropped off the branches and into the waiting basket.

“Wha?!” Applejack stared. “How? Y-you mean this whole time, that’s all ah needed to do?”

Apple Bloom and Mac traded glances.

“Eeyup?” answered Mac, an eyebrow raised.

“Are you runnin’ a fever or somethin’?” asked Apple Bloom.

Applejack didn’t respond, still looking dumbfounded at the easily harvested payload. If ah could only do that back home.

“Is that why you came back early?” Apple Bloom tried again.

“Early?”

“Yeah. From Canterlot.”

“Canterlot?”

“Eeyup.” Mac chimed in.

“You said you’d be gone a while this time. The Princess called you all.”

“Twilight called us?” asked Applejack.

“No, Celestia did. Twilight's a princess now too, but she's just a princess. Celestia’s ‘The Princess’.” Apple Bloom thought for a moment. “Although, maybe that’s being unfair to Princess Luna, they're supposed to be equal on the throne now.”

“Right. Just a princess. Of course. Ah knew that.”

Apple Bloom looked to Big McIntosh.

“Nope,” he confirmed.

“Okay, Applejack, think it’s best you lie down. We’ll finish the rapid field on our own just fine.”

“Rapid field?” asked Applejack.

“Yeah, you know, the …, are you testing me?”

“Uh ….”

Apple Bloom straightened up her bow and seemed to enter into exam-taking mode. “We put extra earth pony magic in some fields each season to get the trees to bud monthly.”

“Monthly? Really? Then why don’t we do that to all the fields?”

“ ‘Cause the trees in the rapid fields need ta recover for two or three years before we can harvest them normally again.”

“Three? Wow. But still, monthly harvests …,” Applejack trailed off, turning to look at the laden trees, thinking of the financial benefits.

“Um," Apple Bloom's scholastic stance faded, "you did know that already, right?”

Applejack turned back to Apple Bloom but wasn’t able to keep her eyes fixed on hers. “Uh, yes. Of course ah knew that.”

“Nope,” declared Mac.

“Yeah,” agreed Apple Bloom, “Yer taking a nap.”

“Ah am not taking a nap!” Applejack protested. “Ah feel fine.”

“Don’t make us call Granny!” Apple Bloom challenged.

“Granny Smith?”

“Huh? What other grannies do we have? That’s it!” Apple Bloom turned to her brother. “Mac!”

“Eeyup!” Mac turned and began heading off.

“Now, now, wait just a durn minute!” Applejack called out, stopping Mac. “So Twilight’s in Canterlot city?”

“You got on the train with her!” Apple Bloom declared.

“An’ it’s just that easy to get to?”

“Easy to—? It’s right up there!” Apple Bloom pointed north and up.

Applejack looked and found a mountain. Plain-looking at first until she noticed what looked like a mix of castle and small city attached to the side of it. “That’s Canterlot?!”

The next thing she noticed was being lifted in the air and placed on something furry. She looked down to see Big McIntosh’s back under her as he trotted her off toward the buildings she saw near the barn.

“Something’s wrong with you today,” a concerned Apple Bloom told her. “And yer gonna take a nap and we’re gonna get the doctor and maybe Zecora or somethin’ ‘cause somethin’ ain’t right an’ yer goin’ nowhere till we find out what.”
> 11 Rainbow Dash: "Hospital General"
> --------------------------------------------------------------------------

Whoa! Rainbow! You alright?


She’s looking pretty out of it.



How many hooves am I holding up?



“~I’m~a~pretty~pony~”



That’s not a good sign.


Sorry, Rainbow. I guess I’ll go get that doctor after all.


My designer Larson camelback, ruined!



Little more worried about the pegasus that slammed into it.


Is that Rainbow Dash?


I thought she was in Canterlot.



Easy now. Nothing looks broken, but let’s be careful.



Paging Doctor Hayward, Doctor Fine, Doctor Hayward.


Welcome back Ms. Dash. Just can’t stay away can you?


No cranial damage or spinal trauma.



Built up a resistance, perhaps?



I suspect she’ll be fine after some rest.


I’m sorry, dear, Ms. Dash needs her rest. You can come visit later.
> 12 Applejack: "Family?"
> --------------------------------------------------------------------------

“Something’s wrong with you today,” a concerned Apple Bloom had told her. “And yer gonna take a nap and we’re gonna get the doctor and maybe Zecora or somethin’ ‘cause somethin’ ain’t right an’ yer goin’ nowhere till we find out what.”

Applejack frowned. She found out how to get to Twi, but … Applejack thought, I’m here now, I could see what the pony versions of the rest of my family look like then slip out the back to talk to Rares.

Wait! That’s right! This is my chance! her mind shouted.

“Ya know what?” Applejack spoke up with a smile. “Maybe ah should take a quick rest. Ya say Granny’s home?”

“Eeyup,” Mac answered.

Applejack took a deep breath. Somewhat difficult when draped over the back of a trotting pony. She took another, and a third to steady herself.

She couldn’t help let that smile grow wider. “Are Ma and Pa home?”

The answer took away that smile.


*** *** ***


07:20 AM.

In a grove beside a little hill set to catch the evening light more than the morning’s, Applejack solemnly walked over a cobblestone pathway between twin rows of trees.

Her pony's siblings had let her go to make the visit. It was getting close to the anniversary after all. It wouldn’t be the first time that the date had brought about some strong emotions in them. They even wanted to go with her, but she needed to do this alone.

She wanted to look up, but kept her eyes on the path, afraid of seeing what she knew she’d find.

Seemed someone kept good care of the place. The path was clear of debris, flowers grew alongside it. She could feel that the plants were healthy and grown more for beauty rather than yield. Many were young.

The path wasn’t that long and she was soon at the end.

She took a breath and looked up.



~–~
In loving memory: Buttercup
In loving memory: Bright Mac
~–~



“What!? P-Pa died too?”

As her eyes began to mist, Applejack reached up and took off her hat to hold against her heart.

“Ah suppose … suppose it shouldn’t be so surprising. It was touch and go for a long time with Pa back home. We might’ve … lost him too.

She looked over the double gravestone. “Ah guess she misses ya both even more than ah do.

“Ah had hoped ah might get to see you two up an’ healthy again. T-talk to ya both. Ah know you two ain’t really my parents an’ yer ponies an’ all, but ah still hoped ah’d ….”

Applejack paused and steadied herself. “Ah should back up. ah’m a different Applejack. Ah’m from another world. Ah know: it’s weird to me too. We all—my friends and me—came here ‘cause one of our other friends is in trouble an’ we have a friend here we think can help."

She looked up and nodded to the twin gravestones.  “That’s the honest reason ah came here today. But not the whole of it, not fer me. Ah have to admit, ah’ve been wanting to come here ever since we learned there was another world with other us’es in it. If there was another Applejack, then, well … maybe ah could talk to her parents. Maybe ah could see your faces again when they ain’t just in photographs. Ah could hear you two laugh, call me Jackie again.

“Haven’t been called Jackie since you died, Ma. Well, Pinkie calls me that sometimes, but she’s just playing. Doesn’t mean the same.

“Maybe ah could see Pa walking again.”

She looked down at her hoof holding her hat and chuckled slightly, “Even if it would be with four legs an’ not two. That’s sure taken some gettin’ used to.”

Applejack shook her head and put her hat back on. “Ah ought ta be going. Ah should tell Rares an’ the others where to find our friend. It was nice to talk to you at least.”

With her eyes closed, she could hear the sound of birds twittering among the branches, she could feel the plants and trees planted around the burial site, the lush grass, the trees. Many of them were apple trees, of course, but there were trees of all sorts spread around. It was beautiful. Even with her eyes closed.

But one tree in particular stood out to her.

She opened her eyes and walked up closer, toward Buttercup’s side of the gravestone.

A very young tree. Perhaps two or three years old. Not yet budding, but it would soon begin to bear fruit.

“A pear tree,” Applejack smiled. “So they know too.”

“Applejack?” an old voice asked and Applejack turned around.

It was hard to tell in the shade of the hill who the old stallion with an old fashioned push mower over his back was, but the voice was familiar. It reminded her of someone who died not long after coming into her life

“… Grand Pear?”

“Ah, there you are,” Grand Pear replied. “Your brother and sister said you came to visit.”

Applejack could only stare as he walked into the light.

“Are you alright?” he asked.

“Oh, uh, yeah,” Applejack sputtered. “Guess ah … uh, had a few things to clear out of my head.”

Grand Pear nodded, joining Applejack looking over the graves, “It’s getting close.”

There was a moment of silence before Applejack spoke up. “When was it you found out?”

Grand Pear glanced over a moment with a frown. “A few years after it happened.”

Applejack looked back to him and he continued. “She never stopped sending me letters. But, of course I wouldn't read them. Couldn’t throw them away though. Just kept them in a box in a closet.” He dropped his head slightly. “One day I noticed they had stopped coming. I assumed she had given up, that the last letter was her telling me off and vowing to never write to me again.

“Eventually I noticed I had fallen into a routine, one that included checking the mailbox for her letters, and even sometimes the grounds nearby in case the mail pony dropped them by mistake. One day I checked that last letter she sent. I thought I’d just go ahead and read her venting off at me and be done with it. But in that letter," Grand Pear smiled, "I read about my youngest granddaughter losing her first tooth! I didn’t even know I had any grandfoals."

His smile faded, “I didn’t get it. True, Pear Butter was never the vindictive type, rarely ever got angry, but still, she stopped writing with that letter? It just got me wondering. And grandfoals? It wasn’t for a few weeks though that I read through the other letters. All of them. I couldn’t stop; not to eat or sleep. And she wrote so much.”

Grand Pear dropped his head lower. “She wanted so much for me to reply, to see her family. But I just couldn't. But I did want to know why she stopped, so I wrote a letter to an old friend still in town here, one of the few bridges I didn’t burn that night I left her behind.”

He slowly turned and walked up to the double gravestone, “He told me what happened. And tanned my hide for not being here for her.”

Applejack gave him a moment then an opening to continue. “And the letters are how you knew about us when you came back.”

“She even sent pictures. Drawings and photographs. She loved you. They both did, and Granny Smith. She had so much to say about all of you. So much love for all of you.”

This brought a smile to Applejack’s face, which was short lived when he continued. “Just not for me.”

“Hey now,” she stopped him there, “Ma never would have kept writing those letters to you if she didn’t love you too.”

“Still should have been here for her. For all of you.”

“Well ah can’t argue with that,” Applejack told him straight. “But yer here now ain’t ya? And ah know she’d be happy for that.”

Still looking at her name on the gravestone, Grand Pear nodded. “I sure hope so.”

“Ah know so, Grand Pear Pear,” Applejack replied, using Apple Bloom’s nickname for their surprise grandfather.  “You don’t mind that we wrote ‘Buttercup’ do ya?”

“Not at all. It’s how you knew her, and it’s who she was … for the happiest part of her life.”

“But her letters mean she never forgot where she came from.”

Grand Pear looked back at her and smiled. “Thank you, Jackie.”

Applejack blinked and did a half step back, one hoof kept in the air.

“May I call you that?” asked Grand Pear.

She slowly lowered her hoof back down and smiled. “Ah’d like that.”

“It was in the letters. Your parents’ names for you and your siblings.”

“Just the good ones, Ah hope,” she chuckled.

He scratched his chin coyly. “Oh, now. There were a lot of letters.”

That turned Applejack’s chuckles into a full laugh.

Grand Pear joined in.

After a moment, Applejack calmed herself and took notice of the mower over Grand Pear’s withers. “You keep the place nice and tidy.”

“Three times a week if I can.”

“Well how about ah help ya out and trade some stories about family.”

“You mean about your mother?”

“Ah mean family, an’ that includes you too,” Applejack assured him. At his smile she added, “Always good when the family grows.”

“Yes,” he agreed. “Yes it is.”

Grand Pear let the mower slide off his back and down his side so the pole was pointed up and then pushed it so it would angle over to Applejack. “So, while we trade tales, I’ll tend to the gardens while you mow?”

“Sounds good to me,” Applejack agreed, catching the mower against her side.

She looked to the mower. Hooves or teeth?

“Uh ….”


*** *** ***


09:03 AM

“Hey!” Applejack called, trotting into the palace of friendship, “Anybody here?”

There was no reply.

“Ah, sorry ah’m late. Some things, uh, well, some things happened. But ah know where to find Twi now. Hello?”

Still no reply.

“Dagnabbit!”
> 13 Rarity: "Stitching it Together then Running Away From It"
> --------------------------------------------------------------------------

??:?? AM

Rarity took a few steps back, smiling as she admired her work. A poneighquin stood by the window for lighting, fully decked out in a flowing gown of three colors across five layers, a headdress, and anklets. Colored gems were affixed in strategic locations to catch and refract the light. To her right was the easel from before, but now sporting a finished blueprint for that very dress. Beside it was another easel with a matching two-legged humane version of the same dress indicating shaped sequins, beads, and reflective tape to be used in place of gems.

“I do love when a design comes together.”

The large, satisfied smile on her face began to turn to confusion as she thought back to how she put the dress together, or even how she was able to hold and use the pencils to draw out the designs. She looked down at her hooves. “How did I …?”

Then she noticed the light blue glow reflecting on the floor.

“Now why are you lit again?” she asked her horn.

Wondering if it was picking up any more “signals,” she turned around expecting to feel that buzzing again and froze at what she saw.

Fabric, poneighquins, dresses, gems, pencils, sequins, appliques, thread, pins and needles.

All of them hovering in the air surrounded by a light blue glow.

Rarity backed up.

Her entourage followed her.

She stepped to the side.

Her entourage followed her.

She stepped to her other side.

Her entourage followed her.

She screamed, “Ghosts!” and galloped out of the room.

Her entourage didn’t miss a beat.

Rarity’s escape attempt led her up a set of stairs and down a hallway.

“I’m sorry! I didn’t mean to offend, I just wanted to help!  The dress was calling to me!”

“Rarity?” a young, and strangely familiar voice, called from a side room but Rarity was already past that part of the hall and finding herself at a dead end.

With nowhere to go, and only a potted plant to hide behind, she ducked, hoping the dead end wouldn’t be literal.

The poneighquin was the first to strike, crashing into the wall beside her. This was followed by dresses and stacks of fabric all landing on and around her in heaps. Next up were gems, and various supplies, some more solid than others.

“Ow, ow, ow!”

Pulling up the rear were assorted spools of thread, two pencils, and … the needles. Thankfully most of these bounced around her harmlessly, but one needle struck true.

“Yipe!” Rarity leaped forward in surprise, bounding into the back wall with a thud.

“Rarity? Are you alright?” came the voice again.

Rarity just moaned. “Is it over?”

“Is what ove—oh. Huh?”

From under the now stationary dresses and supplies, Rarity shifted, noting that her horn’s glow had stopped. She turned and pushed the fabrics away to find her new companion.

A small, white unicorn girl with mulberry and rose hair stood before her. Rarity paused as recognition hit her.

“Sweetie? Sweetie Belle? My goodness, how adorable. Just look at you!”

“Look at me?! Look at you!" Sweetie answered, her eyes wide. "What happened? What’s with all the fabrics? Are you wearing one of Twilight’s Gala dresses?”

“I believe I may have angered some ghosts or a security system.”

“We don’t have a security system or ghosts. The Cutie Mark Crusader Ghost Hunters and The Cutie Mark Crusader Home Protection Agency proved one and destroyed the other.  At the same time actually.” Sweetie blinked and shied back with a sheepish grin, "Sorry, again, for that second one."

“But everything was floating in this eerie blue glow.” Rarity kept looking around for anything else that might be glowing blue, or on the warpath, or both.

“Blue—? What kind of blue?”

“Cornflower blue.”

Sweetie Belle tilted her head and slightly squinted one eye. “Is Discord messing with our magic again?”

“Our magic?”

“Yeah. You know …,” Sweetie trailed off, lighting her own horn in a light green, almost matching her eyes, and lifted some of the scattered debris. “Hmm, mine’s fine. What did you do? Try to make him wear a suit with too few colors again?”

“I, uh, possibly? I was just working in pony Ra—um, my inspiration room when I was chased by the supplies I was working with. I had just been wondering how I could have done it all so fast.”

Rarity watched as Sweetie’s green glow shook out and folded the uncut fabrics in mid air, no hoof gestures or anything, Sweetie was just standing there following everything with her eyes, head only slightly bobbing along.

Rarity then looked down at a stray diamond—was that Jerry?—and thought about getting a closer look.

Suddenly, Sweetie backed up and unfolded one garment, holding it between them as if a shield.

“Just making sure it’s safe,” she said.

When Rarity looked back down she saw the diamond floating up to her in that light blue glow. Her eyes widened and she turned her head left and right watching Jerry follow. Elated, she focused on an opal, also lifting it in the air with the blue glow and naming it Toodles. “I did it! I must have figured it out when inspiration struck and never noticed.” She looked down at Sweetie. “Look, Sweetie! I did it!”

Sweetie slowly peeked out from under her makeshift shield. “You’re okay now?”

“ 'Okay'? Just look at this!”

Rarity picked up more gems, sorting them by type; the fabrics, shaking and folding them out as Sweetie had before; the pins, sticking them safely into a pin cushion. She giggled, dancing her forelegs on the floor with happy little cloppy sounds.

Moments later Rarity took stock. All the previously offending objects were in the air again, but under her control. “Look, Sweetie, look!”

“Yeah, yeah. I see,” Sweetie replied with a dull tone. “Showoff,” she mumbled after. “I guess Discord got bored. You can always tell Fluttershy about it when she gets back from your other shop. That’ll get him in hot water.” Sweetie blinked and put a hoof to her chin in thought. “Wait, aren’t you supposed to be there too?”

“What, dear?” asked Rarity, still focused on her newfound telekinesis.

“You’re supposed to be in working in your other shop today. All of you got on a train first thing yesterday morning. You said you might be gone a while and asked me to watch the boutique.”

“Oh." Rarity snapped her head back up toward Sweetie. "Oh, of course. She’s—I’m in, I mean I was in the other one. Since early yesterday? And Princess Twilight?”

“ ‘Princess’ Twilight?” Sweetie stressed her sister's use of the royal title.

“Yes, is she—I have more than one shop!?” Rarity gasped.

“Are you okay, sis? You’ve had three shops for a while now.”

“T-three?" Rarity stuttered and tried to show the count on her hoof but quickly found the error in such an attempt. "Not just one whole shop of my own, and not even just two, but I have three whole shops filled with designs of my own making?!”

“Well … yeah? Though it’s not just your stuff. You have that showcase aisle in your Canterlot one for new designers and Coco Pommel has a department in your Manehattan shop.”

“I have a shop in Manehattan? The Manehattan? The height of sophistication, elegance, culture, energy, beauty, majesty, the greatest city in our nation!? I have three shops and one is in that Manehattan?”

Sweetie looked around nervously for a moment. “… yes?”

“Oh!” Rarity pronked in place. “That’s marvelous, simply marvelous!”

“O-kay?” Sweetie’s eyes followed Rarity up and down as she jumped in her giddiness.

“Where’s the third one?”

“Third one?”

“Yes, dear. You said there’s three. Canterlot, Manehattan, and where’s the third one?”

Sweetie’s mouth slowly opened and her brow crinkled up in confusion. “We’re standing in it?”

“This isn’t Canterlot or Canterville?” Rarity turned to look out the nearest window.

“This is Ponyville. Where we live?”

“ 'Pony-ville'?  I live in a village but I have shops in the capital and greatest city in the nation?”

“Actually, I’ve always liked Canterlot better.”

“Oh, my," Rarity gasped, turning back from the window but looked up as if imagining words on a banner. "It’s like a rags to riches story. A fashion pioneer braving the harsh mainstays of the more wealthy, established brand names to strike out a name for herself and wins against all odds!”

“Rags? We were never really that poor," Sweetie explained calmly. "Mom and Dad just like the simple life.”

It was a few moments before enough stars left Rarity’s eyes for her to remember she had an audience and a mission. “Oh! And you said Princess Twilight is at one of my shops in one of those wonderful cities?”

“Um, you were on the train with her. But if you’re back already, maybe she is too?”

“Oh, no, dear,” Rarity scrambled for a plausible excuse her pony counterpart might use. “I just came back because I … uh. I misplaced … my … travel … hat?”

Sweetie looked up at her for a quiet moment, seemingly processing the information. “I can help you find it. Which one do you want? You are just bringing one, right?”

There were many such travel hats in her own closet back home, but what would a pony version of herself have? How much information could she give and not seem even more out of place in this magical world? “Um, yes, just the feather cap should suffice?”

Sweetie blinked. “Which one?”

Rarity blinked back.  She needed something more specific, but not too specific. "The Shadow Spade replica from volume two?"

"Which one?"

“Oh pff," Rarity waved her off, "you know, it doesn’t matter. I got caught up in a project and—I should just be getting back to the train station to get back to, er, which shop was it I’m supposed to be in right now?”

“You didn’t say. Both maybe?”

“Um, well, no matter. We shall sort things out. And thank you for agreeing to watch this boutique while she—I’m gone off to the other two boutiques. What a helpful and adorable little sister you are!” Unable to help herself, Rarity sat on her haunches to hold out her forelegs and lifted Sweetie into the air with her magic.

“Eek, Rarity!” Sweetie protested until she was brought into a hug. “Awe, I love you too, sis.”

A few moments passed with Rarity enjoying the cozy hug, petting pony Sweetie’s mane.

After the third set of giggles from her older sister, Sweetie cleared her throat. “Um, Rarity? If you still want me to run the shop, I’ll need to get it ready.”

“Whatever for, dear? The sign said ten.”

“Yeah. It’s almost nine.”

“Nine?!” Rarity gasped. “But it was only seven when I got here. Oh, no! I was supposed to check in every half hour!”

“Check in? With whaa—?!”

Sweetie’s question was cut off when Rarity let go of her and rushed back toward the boutique entrance.

“RARITY! Put me down first!”

“But I did!” Rarity stopped and turned to see everything she had picked up in her magic, including Sweetie Belle, following behind her in the air. “Oh. Dreadfully sorry about that.”

With a thought, all the items, and filly, were neatly lowered to the floor and Rarity turned back toward the staircase.

“RARITY!”

“What, dear?” Turning back to her counterpart’s sister revealed everything to still be in the now familiar blue glow and lazily drifting just above the floor. “Um, hrmm. I seem to still be having difficulties,” she sheepishly explained.

Sweetie gave her a half-lidded stare and, used an odd sort of doggy—pony?—paddle to swim higher up within Rarity’s glow until they were nearly the same height. She then reached out and quickly flicked Rarity’s horn with her hoof making it twang and vibrate. Instantly Sweetie and all the objects stopped glowing blue and dropped to the floor.

“Oh!” Rarity’s hoof went to her horn to stop its motions, a dull throbbing beginning to form in her skull behind it. “Um, thank you.”

With a groan, Sweetie picked herself up off the floor. “Don’t mention it.”

“Now I must be going, uh, back to, um, my other shops!” Rarity called back as she continued on.

Upon crossing the main show floor she realized she had been correctly galloping without thinking about it and she had already unlocked and opened the door with magic easily. She stopped, looked back toward the inspiration room, and smiled.


*** *** ***


09:10 AM

Rarity burst into the palace of friendship’s main lobby wearing saddlebags, a clean set of stockings and shoes, along with the new dress and matching headdress she had just finished. Floating behind her in a blue glow matching her horn’s was a sketchbook and pencil.

“Girls?!” she called. “Girls! I’m so sorry I missed our earlier meetup times, but I know where Twi is!”

With no reply she quickly proceeded up the stairs, counting the landings to be sure she got the right floor. Upon arriving, she recalled that counting was unnecessary as the floor she needed was the only one with various debris strewn about from an overexcited pegasus.

“Girls?” she kept calling, trotting toward the room with the mirror portal. “Girls? Is there anybody here?”

She found herself looking at her reflection in the portal and quaffed her mane and tail. She was getting used to this pony thing. But where were the others?

She located Sunset’s correspondence journal and used her magic to open to the last page with writing on it. Still nothing new since Twily’s breakdown.

With nothing else to do, she levitated the journal into her saddlebags and began heading back to the main lobby, cleaning up the worst offending messes along the way.

“I suppose I wait. Shouldn't be that long till someone shows up.”
> 14 AJ & FS - Part1: "It's a Nice Place to Live..."
> --------------------------------------------------------------------------

09:03AM

“Hey!” Applejack called, trotting into the palace of friendship, “Anybody here?”

There was no reply.

“Ah, sorry ah’m late. Some things, uh, well, some things happened. But ah know where to find Twi now. Hello?”

Still no reply.

“Dagnabbit!”

Faced with silence in the palace foyer, Applejack sighed and looked around noticing an open door that she didn’t recall being opened before. She stepped through and tried again. “Hello?”

“Hello? Is that Applejack?” a voice came from further within and Applejack continued after.

She found an unmanned—unponied?—receptionist’s desk followed by a hallway lined with bookcases leading to a wider room filled with many more bookcases. “Hello?” she called back.

“Down here, AJ.”

She looked down to see a staircase to a lower floor with more bookcases, reading nooks, and study tables. Glancing up revealed another staircase to more bookcases. “Sure is Twilight’s palace after all,” Applejack commented to herself.

Next to an old fashioned library card catalog, and wiggling under a pair of saddlebags to get it on her back, was a mare with a familiar hairstyle and color scheme. “Miss Cheerilee?” she asked, carefully walking down the stairs.

“Oh, you know you don’t have to call me Miss, Applejack,” replied Cheerilee with a worn smile.

“Sorry, Ma’am. Just bein’ respectful of my elders.”

“AJ, we’re almost the same age.”

“We are?”

Cheerilee’s ears folded back and the edges of her mouth crinkled all so slightly. “I used to be classmates with Rarity. We were only a grade ahead of you.”

“Oh!” popped Applejack. “That’s um, that’s interesting.”

“ ‘Interesting’?”

“It’s even Spring here.”

“Yes? Winter Wrap Up was a few weeks ago.”

“ ‘Winter Wrap Up’?”

Cheerilee paused, her head tilting slightly. “Are you feeling alright? Is something going around? Is that why Twilight started Spring break early?”

“What? Going around?”

“Fluttershy was also acting strange.”

“Fluttershy was here?” Applejack’s face and ears perked up.

“Yes. Almost two hours ago?

Applejack’s face and ears drooped. “Oh.”

“Yes, I suggested she go home and take a nap. Poor dear needed me to tell her where she lived. I considered walking her there but she took flight.”

“So, she went home?”

“She headed off in that direction," Cheerilee paused with a slight cringe, "eventually.”

“You know, maybe ah should go make sure she’s feeling alright.”

Cheerilee smiled. “That might be a great idea. I can go with you, I was just leaving myself.” She patted the book-shaped bundle in her saddlebags.  "Just need to check these out."

“Oh don’t worry yourself, none. Ah’ll be sure she’s taken care of.”

“Alright, AJ. Go and make sure she rests if she needs it.”

“Will do!” Applejack smiled back.

Cheerilee continued to smile as well.

Applejack blinked.

So did Cheerilee. “You need me to tell you where she lives don't you?”

Applejack chuckled nervously.


*** *** ***


07:20 AM

Without any better ideas, Fluttershy had left the palace following Miss Cheerilee’s directions. She blushed, thinking back to how confused Miss Cheerilee seemed and how awkward the conversation had been.


Where’s the bridge?
Where’s the Everfree Forest?
Wrong way? I thought you said East.
The sun rises WHERE?


She headed east, away from the rising sun, and kept a look out for any familiar and friendly-looking ponies on the way. However, it was the same situation as before. Some familiar ponies, many friendly-looking ponies, but few who were alone, making Fluttershy nervous about randomly trotting up and talking to them. Especially after what happened with Miss Cheerilee, Mr. Cranky Doodle, and … Robert.

Being mostly open spaces, she had taken to the air again, more confident in her wings than before, now that there was little risk of planting herself into the side of a building or other object.

She was enjoying the feeling of flight. Not only was she a pony now, but one with feathered wings. Pony and bird in one. It gave her a warm fuzzy feeling. Doubly so when feeling the wind through both her feathers and her fur.

Wanting to keep from going too high, she focused on staying about as high as the second story of the few buildings that had them in this part of town. At least, until she ran out of buildings. Without an easy marker of altitude, Fluttershy erred on the side of safety and kept even lower near the ground. So much so that she nearly didn’t clear the sudden appearance of the bridge she was looking for, accidentally kicking the safety rail and recovering at the last second.

She trotted the rest of the way.

It was such a pretty town now that she slowed down and took in the sights. Green fields, so many flowers, animal life everywhere.

Getting closer to the forest edge, the birds greeted her in song as they passed overhead, bunnies poked their heads out of their burrows to cutely wiggle their noses at her, and squirrels chittered and even waved happily at her.

Everything about this world was amazing.

She didn’t notice the rustling in the bushes ahead of her.


*** *** ***


09:09 AM

“Well that was awkward,” Applejack mumbled on her way through Cheerliee’s instructions to Fluttershy’s cottage after parting from her just outside the palace.

A brisk trot carried her over cobblestone and dirt paths, letting her feel the life around her through their connections within the earth. No longer rushing as fast as she could allowed her to really take in her surroundings. The sights, the sounds, and smells, and how it all felt. It truly was a world run by magic at every literal step.

Pegasus ponies flew about pushing clouds around!

Unicorn ponies carried all sorts of trinkets in the air around them!

Earth ponies tended fields of healthy crops with no signs of pesticides or other chemicals!  Even manure was rarely used.  Seemed there was little need with earth pony magic.

Her path only just skirted around the edge of the marketplace, so she didn’t get much of a feel for the town itself, mostly just the world in general. She did spy a few signs and banners, however. Even a few familiar-looking ponies.

Quite a few mobile booths were also along the edge, seemingly a farmers’ market of crops, flowers, and other local goods. Thinking back, Applejack recalled a similar booth in her pony family’s barn ready to be set up for sales.

From the path, she could also see a few other staples of a town. Restaurants, hospital, bank, parks.

“Uh, ‘Quills and sofas’? Well, ah suppose that's not the strangest thing I've seen.”

One pony, looking just like Mrs. Cake, tended to flowers planted just outside what looked like a building shaped like a giant cupcake. “Is that the Sweet Shoppe here? Might try looking for the others there if’n ah can’t find Fluttershy at ponyshy’s home. Pinkie at least is bound to pass by there at least once today. Ah wonder what she and the others have all been up to today. It’s been hours now.”

Passing over a bridge, Applejack left the town proper and found herself heading toward a forest. The Everfree, according to Cheerilee. “Can’t believe it’s so close to town here. Back home it takes a few hours on the road to get to our Everfree.”

Mulling it over some more, Applejack frowned. “Best stay out of there. If ah remember correctly, Sunset mentioned the Everfree forest is a bad place to be in this world.”

Applejack’s frown didn’t lighten up as she felt the trail ahead of her weave but still mostly point toward that forest. “Fluttershy really lives out here?”

There were few other buildings in the area. Animals seemed to be all around, though.

And … were they staring at her?

“Something ain’t right here.”


*** *** ***


07:27 AM

A cottage came into Fluttershy’s view.

Home sweet home, apparently. The cottage did match Cheerilee’s description of her pony counterpart’s home at least.

It was …

…

Everything she had always dreamed about.

A cute little cottage just out of town beside a charming forest, a bridge over a relaxing little stream, surrounded by adorable animals, all under a beautiful sky.

And she was one of them. A pony/bird hybrid animal herself!

She just stood there a moment taking it all in and sighed, inhaling crisp, clear air.

Trotting closer, she saw fencing for various animals, a chicken coop, feed bowls and troughs, pet houses, animal toys. It was her own little paradise of littler paradises for animals.

She giggled to herself and trotted over the bridge, nearing the front door, then giggled again waving to the critters who popped out of their homes to greet her. “Hello, little ones,” she greeted back.

Finally at the cottage’s door, she stopped and took a deep breath, then reached for the door that may or may not have been locked. “Oh, I hope, I hope, I hope. Please be open.”

She stopped once she realized she didn’t know how to open a door with her hooves. “Oh, dear.”

While looking down at her hooves to try and figure out a solution, a much, much smaller door down below opened and a small bunny hopped out.

“Ah! Oh! Hello there … A-Angel? Is that you?”

The little bunny looked up at her with an expression that began as surprise but quickly turned to confusion, then suspicion.

The nuance escaped Fluttershy’s elation.

“Oh my goodness! Angel Bunny! It really is you isn’t it!”

Without a single thought about how to do so with her pony body, Fluttershy easily swooped down and scooped the little bunny up into her forelegs and used her wings to keep to a hover to more easily pet his pwecious wittle bunny ears.

Angel Bunny remained still, letting the whole thing play out with an unamused expression on his face.

Shortly after Fluttershy began giggling again, the pwecious wittle bunny decided he had had enough and began to bark out some tiny squeaks of protest.

Squeak

“Oh, what’s that, Angel?" Fluttershy asked the bunny she had clutched to her chest.

Squeak*queak*Squeak

“I’m not sure I understand.”

Angel wriggled in Fluttershy’s grasp, freed a foot, and thumped one of her forelegs a few times.

“Oh, you want to get put down?”

In reply, Fluttershy got another squeak and a few more thumps.

“Okay. Here you go, Angel.”

Once on the ground, Angel took a hop away and looked back up at the yellow pegasus mare.

He knew not only was Fluttershy supposed to be in Canterlot, but also something seemed off about her in general. Perhaps his intel was correct after all. He passed a glance over at a bush where the tip of a mint green unicorn horn wasn't fully hidden.

This would have to be tested.

An evil glint appeared in his eyes.

Thoroughly.
> 15 Pinkie Pie: "How Many Pinks Could a Pinkie Pony Ponk if a Pinkie Pony Could Ponk Pinks?"
> --------------------------------------------------------------------------

06:20 AM

Number Nine, Number Nine, Number Nine, Number Nine, Number Nine, Number Nine, Number Nine, Number Nine. “Hey, Number Nine? You still up there? Or is it in there? Near there? Behind there? Still can’t figure out if you’re in my head or I’m out of my head or what.”

From her seat on a bench down the hall in one of the upper levels of Twilight Sparkle's palace, Pinkie Pie had returned to talking to …, the other new ponies might say “herself,” but Pinkie would say …

“Voices, hello, is Number Nine sleeping or something?”

Her friends, the new ponies down the hall, were too busy to take notice. Rainbow had flown off to look through Twilight’s palace again, Rarity and Applejack were struggling to put on dresses from Twi’s newly portable closet, with Fluttershy helping but also trying to sneak peeks out a nearby window to see the town.

“Because,” Pinkie continued talking while seemingly trying to stare at her forehead, “while Numbers Four, Five, Six, and Eight keep whispering and mumbling in my left ear, and Ten through Fifteen, and Seventeen keep making funny sounds in my right ear, and Nineteen just keeps tapping my nose, Number Nine actually said ….”

Pinkie stood up and began tapping her hooves on the crystal floor to make rhythmic clopping and clicking sounds. “And that almost sounded like some kind of morse—or maybe horse?—code that could actually, maybe, mean something important—not that the rest of you aren’t doing important things. It’s just that making sense isn’t something you voices have been doing a lot of. And this is ME talking! Seriously! I usually understand all sorts of thing everyone else misses.”

She returned to the hall bench. “Not only that, but I think what he—wait! ‘He’? She? It? How am I supposed to know if he-she-it just taps in code? Same with you, Nineteen.  Actually, I can’t tell with most of the rest of you either. Numbers One and Three sound like girls. Numbers Five through Eight sound like guys. But I can’t do much with the mumbles and whispers and noises and things most of you are doing.”

A moment, and a few tilts of her head, later Pinkie continued. “Nope, that’s not helping. Mumbles are still mumbles when they get louder. They just become louder mumbles. So make sense or quiet down.”

After shaking her head, and eventually standing back up, Pinkie stood still for a moment and smiled, then started idly pacing the hall to practice her four-legged walk.

“Yeah, that’s better. Would have preferred to actually understand you though, but at least you’re not hurting my brain’s ears now. Hey, you aren’t just having some kind of party up there without inviting me are you? Because, well, I’d be happy if you’re having a party—that’s great—but not inviting me would be mean. I mean, it’s my head after all, I should be invited too! I’m a party expert. Just think of all the goodies I’d bring! I know where I keep the good stuff up there! I could really blow all your socks off! If voices wear socks. If not, maybe I’ll blow your vowels off. But then you’d be even harder to understand.”

She looked over to her friends at the wardrobe, seeing Applejack having gotten that yellow dress on, Rarity awkwardly pulling out pieces of her own chosen dress—and its many accessories—to attempt wearing, and Fluttershy walking up to the nearest window again. She focused on Fluttershy’s walk and tried to straighten her own. One of the voices perked up louder, seemingly offering pointers which Pinkie attempted to follow.

“What’s that? Other leg? What? Nope, didn’t get that. Wait, this way? Kumquat pudding? That does sound delicious! No? Oh! That way? Still no? How about this? Slower? Okay, then, faster? Like that? Hey! Where am I?”

When Pinkie looked up from her walk she noticed a set of grand doors, much larger and more intricately decorated than those that had led to the previously found bedrooms and the portal’s room. They seemed to be made out of a transparent crystal revealing a staircase on the other side.

“Oh hey! These look important.”

She pushed, she tried to pull, she pushed some more. Then she noticed the latch, opened it with a natural flick of her tongue, and pulled again by hooking a pastern around the handle and doing an awkward three-legged backward skippy pronk that seemed the most happily awkward natural thing in the world.  Though, she had only been in that world for an hour or two.

Pinkie giggled, anticipating all the other happily natural awkward things she might yet experience before going back to her own world.

She then walked back up to the top of the first stair and looked down.  “I wonder where these lead. Phff, besides down, silly! Yes, I’m talking to you, Number Eight.”

Still looking down, she leaned forward, hoping for a better look, eventually pushing her balance too far forward for a four-legged creature..

“That’s a lot of—Woop! Oof! Ack! Eek! Ow! Eep! Ufff! Ouch! Pow. Blap! Ping! Whaam! Thwip! Biff! Bam! Pow! Bap! Bang! Bloop! Blurp! Boff! Bonk! Clange! Clank! Clunk! Crash! Flrbbbbb! Ker-Plop! Klonk! Plop! Splatt! Sploosh! Thunk! Touché! Whack! Whamm! Whap! Zlonk! Zlopp! Zlott! Zowie!”Sound FX quiz!

Once on the ground floor and no longer moving, Pinkie uncurled herself from the ball she had instinctively rolled into. “Oh wow! That didn’t hurt at all. I love my tail!”

Pinkie pulled her tail into a tight hug. “I wonder if Sunset ever misses hers.” After a moment she sniffed it and was delighted to discover it smelled just like cotton candy. Another moment later she discovered it did not taste like cotton candy. Somewhat disappointed, she stood and found herself in a large foyer at the bottom of the steps.

“Ohh! Those doors were important! And I bet those are too!” Trotting over with a small amount of difficulty, yet tripping only once, Pinkie made her way to a set of doors at the other end of the foyer.

“What’s that? Outside? Sure, why not?!” Humming to herself, Pinkie stepped over, pushed the door open, and bounded forward once the first light of the alien world washed over her.

The brightness made her eyes light up.

The delightful sounds made her ears perk up.

The … something or other made the voices cheer.

It looked like a party just waiting to happen.

All it needed was someone to shout …

“Surprise!”

Pinkie’s cheer grabbed the attentions of several nearby ponies. They turned, saw her, and most either giggled or waved, all of them smiled!

Pinkie smiled back. It all felt so …

Sparkling.

And then some ponies began to approach.

And Pinkie remembered she hadn’t actually set up a party yet.

“Oh wait! Not surprise! Unsurprise yourselves! I, um, forgot I’m not done yet! Pretend you haven’t been surprised yet! I gotta go!”

Now doubly surprised, and also confused, the townsponies stopped and looked at each other with their usual Pinkie-just-did-something expressions for a moment. Then, almost at once, they all shrugged and went back to whatever they were doing as Pinkie Pie pronked off in the opposite direction.


*** *** ***


06:30 AM

After some pronking off randomly, Pinkie eventually came to realize she was just pronking off randomly and not accomplishing anything important. She immediately stopped where she was. The air around her seemed to hold her in place above the ground for a moment and it almost sounded like a speeding car had just hit its brakes. She looked down.

“Huh. How’s that keep happening?”

Number Nineteen then booped her on the nose and she drifted to the ground.

“Thanks, Nineteen!”

Looking around, Pinkie saw she was on a dirt trail quite some distance from the marketplace. In the other distances around her were birds, trees, a pond, a park, clouds (in the sky), a bunch of things that didn’t seem important at the time, an advertisement for a polka contest, and a few ponies wandering about.

“Okay, Pinkie, what do? You were looking for Twi but then you had to go and pre-surprise a town full of party-ready ponies, now those ponies are going to be wanting a party so I gotta pop that party soon or the surprise will wear off before I can surprise them for real at that surprise party that’s not so surprising for a surprise party anymore!

“But,” Pinkie sat on her haunches, “I’m new to this town and I don’t have any supplies and don’t know where anything is, and I—“ Pinkie’s eyes grew wide. “Hold the phone! I’m new to this town! That means I haven’t met anyone here! That means there’s a town of new friends just waiting for me to meet them to become friends! Even the friends who are already friends because I’m friends with them in my world! Forget the party! This whole day IS a party! I have to meet everybody in the whole town!

“What’s that, Thirteen?” Pinkie asked her head. “Well, of course I’ll find Twi-Twi. That’s easy. I’ll invite everyone I meet to my Welcome-to-the-Pony-Planet—wait. No, not quite right Maybe: Mission-To-The-Pony-Planet? Hmm. Well there is something familiar about that title, but ‘Welcome’ fits better in this context. Okay, so, Welcome-to-the-Pony-Planet,-Pinkie-Pie-From-Another-World-Party!"

Pinkie stopped and tapped her chin, giggling for a moment at the fur there. “But is it right to throw myself a party? That seems a little self absorbed. Do I have that kind of ego?"

She played again with what felt like a soft beard made out of fur. “Nope! No I don’t. So I have to have a better party title. Oh, I got it! I’ll call it the Hi-My-Name-is-Pinkie-Pie-and-I’m-New-in-Town-Even-Though-I-Probably-Look-Just-Like-Someone-Else-You-Know-Who-is-Also-Named-Pinkie-Pie-But-I-Want-to-be-Your-Friend-Too-Party!"

Pinkie's eyes widened almost more than it seemed her face could handle. “That's perfect! I’ll invite everyone I meet to my Hi-My-Name-is-Pinkie-Pie-and-I’m-New-in-Town-Even-Though-I-Probably-Look-Just-Like-Someone-Else-You-Know-Who-is-Also-Named-Pinkie-Pie-But-I-Want-to-be-Your-Friend-Too-Party and I’ll have everyone I invite also invite everyone they know, and that way Twi is bound to end up at the party! While I’m at it I’ll also ask where I can find party supplies.

“It’s a perfect plan! Absolutely nothing can possibly go wrong at all!”

Pinkie stood up and held a foreleg high in the air, triumphantly declaring her inevitable triumph.

“How’s that sound, voices? …. ‘Perfect’? Is that what you said? …. ‘No’? …. What’s crazy about oatmeal? …. I don’t have any eye-patch emergencies right now. …. Ooh! ‘Chimicherrychangas’ also sound delicious. …. ‘Needs more cowbell’? …. Why would I need a cucumber for that?”

A quick, rapid head shake quieted the voices down as a sound not unlike ping-pong balls colliding in mid-flight seemed to ring out from Pinkie’s ears multiple times. Pinkie stopped and waited. Eventually the sound of a bowling ball striking pins replaced the ping-pong balls, and then silence.

“Onward!” Pinkie cheered and headed off toward the park. “My new pony friends aren’t going to friend me without me.”

In the park she found several ponies, most of whom were on the younger side, or were parents of the younger ponies, but four stood out to her, not only as being about her age, but also very familiar.

“EEEEE! It’s my favorite musical girls!” she called out to them. “Well other than my fellow Rainbooms,” she followed up to herself before pronking over to the pair of benches three were lounging and one was sitting on.

“Oh, hay, Pinkie,” said an earth pony with a light olive coat and blue and fuchsia hair.

“Hello, Pinkie Pie,” joined another earth pony with a gray coat, near black hair, and a white and pink bow-tie. Beside her, a mint-green unicorn waved. A white unicorn wearing sunglasses and headphones on her other side nodded her head. Actually the white unicorn had already been nodding her head and just kept going. But she did smile.

“Hey, girls!” replied Pinkie. “I’m new to town and looking to make my first pony friends! Well, if we don’t count Twi, Sunset, and Starlight since I made friends with them in my world already!”

“Uh,” questioned the green unicorn. “what?” She, and the other three mares traded confused expressions.

“Oh! Right. I should introduce myself. My name is Pinkie Pie!”

“Pinkie,” said the gray earth pony, “We’ve known you for years.” She turned to the olive mare. “Are you making sense of this, Vinyl?” The white unicorn shrugged, still nodding her head. “Bon Bon?”

Before she could answer, Pinkie spoke up. “ ‘Bon Bon’? Ooh! I love bonbons. Great nickname. But you haven’t known me for years because I’m a different Pinkie Pie from a different world and I know people just like you from my world who aren’t exactly like you but very similar, and now that I’m in this world I get to make friends with you for the first time all over again!”

Pinkie smiled warmly but was met only by three confused expressions. The white unicorn had simply stopped nodding her head.

Suddenly, Pinkie gasped and then started laughing. “Yeah, I probably should explain more,” she spoke up at her head before looking back at the four ponies. “I think one of the new voices in my head is telling me I should prove it, so here goes.” She pointed to the white unicorn on her right, “Your name is Vinyl Scratch,” she moved her hoof left, pointing to each pony in turn. “Your name is Octavia Melody. Your name is Lyra. And your name is Sweeti—“A yellow glow surrounded her muzzle, holding her lips together—“Durfs.”

Lyra and Bon Bon traded panicked expressions. Lyra’s horn was lit in the same color as Pinkie’s muzzle.

“Silly, Pinkie,” chuckled Lyra. “That’s Bon Bon.”

The glow faded and Pinkie continued. “Exactly! And how else would I know all your names if I didn’t already know you in another world?”

“You know our names,” said Bon Bon, “because we, including you, have lived in Ponyville for years.”

“Ponyville? We’re not in Canterville?”

“I’ve never heard of a Canterville,” explained Octavia. “Just Canterlot.”

“Oh, so you call it Ponyville here? Neat-o. You know, my town of Canterville used to be called Humaneville”—Lyra’s eyes grew wide and her ears perked straight up.—“until our Canterlot city got so big we kind’a became a part of it. So they changed the name to Canterville. But some people just call it Canterlot since we’re technically a district of the city now. Our school is even called Canterlot High because it got renamed from Humaneville High after the city funded its renovations a few years back. That makes sense, right?”

Lyra’s eyes flicked quickly between Pinkie Pie and Bon Bon a few times. The latter met her gaze and discretely shook her head. Lyra’s jaw fell slightly at that in disbelief.

“So you’re telling us,” began Octavia, “That’s there’s more than one Pinkie Pie … again?” She placed a foreleg over her brow. “It is too early and I have not had nearly enough tea for this.”

“Yeah!” agreed Bon Bon. “Maybe you should take a nap. You should take Vinyl with you. Looks like she’s ready for bed. It’s late for her. Bet she was up all night again.”

Looking over, the four other mares noticed Vinyl’s head had drooped forward and her breathing was deep.

“Vinyl,” Octavia called, giving the sleeping unicorn a few taps.

Vinyl’s head picked up and she snorted slightly, looking around before focusing on Octavia and tilting in confusion.

“Seems there’s good reason to spend the day sleeping,” Octavia answered the unvoiced question. She then turned back to Pinkie and smiled. “Well, ‘Pinkie,’ it was … apparently nice to meet you … again, but I believe I am going back to bed for a nap and an aspirin.”

“What?” cried Pinkie, “but I haven’t invited you to my Hi-My-Name-is-Pinkie-Pie-and-I’m-New-in-Town-Even-Though-I-Probably-Look-Just-Like-Someone-Else-You-Know-Who-is-Also-Named-Pinkie-Pie-But-I-Want-to-be-Your-Friend-Too-Party yet!”

The other four mares blinked.

“Yes. Time for a nap,” decided Octavia.

“Don’t worry, Pinkie. We’ll be there,” added Lyra, getting a nod from Bon Bon. “We’ll even help spread the word.”

“You will? That’s great!” Pinkie pronked forward and grabbed Lyra into a tight hug. “We’re gonna be great friends! Just like the people in my world who look so much like—whoa!” still unused to pony hips, Pinkie fell forward on top of Lyra.

“Pinkie!” yelled Bon Bon.

“Oops, sorry! It’s weird being in this body. I’m used to just two legs and feet! Not four legs and hooves!”

Lyra again glanced at Bon Bon who only replied in a quick shake of her head while Pinkie stood and backed away from Lyra.

“Okay!” cheered Pinkie. “If you’ll spread the word here, I’ll go around town and meet more new friends for the first time for the second time!" She paused with a hoof to her chin.  "Or would that be for the second time for the first time?" She shrugged and addressed her audience again, "Either way, make sure you invite Twi-Twi, oh, and Starlight too! It’d be great to also see my other old pony friend again.”

With that, Pinkie happily pronked off, humming a merry tune and occasionally talking to herself.

The four mares remained where they were, trading blank and confused looks. Only Lyra moved and to simply get up and sit back on the bench.

“I believe the phrase is,” Octavia started, “Well, that happened.”

Bon Bon was about to reply when Pinkie called back to them.

“Oh! I almost forgot! VINYL! LYRA! CAN I LICK YOUR HORNS?!”

“WHAT?!” shouted back Bon Bon.

“I WANT TO KNOW WHAT THEY TASTE LIKE. I’VE ALREADY TRIED RARITY’S AND I NEED TO COMPARE. I BET LYRA’S TASTES LIKE MINT!”

“YOU ARE NOT TASTING LYRA’S HORN!”

“AW, WHY NOT?”

“NO. JUST, NO! GO INVITE PONIES TO YOUR PARTY AND NO TASTING HORNS!”

“BUT RARITY’S WAS DELICIOUS!

“NO!”

“Awww.” Dejected, Pinkie moped away for a few steps but then perked up again when she remembered that she still had so many new friends to make again and continued pronking away.

They watched her disappear in the distance. Octavia couldn’t help notice the blush on Bon Bon and Lyra’s faces. “Methinks the lady doth protest too much,” she said with a smirk.

Lyra and Bon Bon stiffened up. Vinyl chuckled.

“What?! I, I don’t know what you’re talking about!” Bon Bon argued.

“Mint, was it?”

The blushes on Bon Bon and Lyra’s faces deepened. “We, we’re just friends,” Lyra explained.

“Best friends,” Bon Bon affirmed.

“Yes,” agreed Octavia. “You always say that. In fact you always tell each other that …” she leaned in close to the pair, “while sporting bedroom-eyes.”

“HEY!” Shouted Pinkie who had just reappeared over a far hill. “IF I CAN’T TASTE HORNS MYSELF COULD YOU JUST TELL ME WHAT THEY TASTE LIKE? WHAT ABOUT VINYL’S?!”

“NEVER YOU MIND!” shouted back Octavia.

“Awww,” Pinkie sighed and disappeared again.

Lyra and Bon Bon traded sinister expressions and turned to Octavia who suddenly blushed.

“Now who are just ‘best friends’?” Bon Bon asked, earning a snicker from Lyra.

“Yeah,” agreed Lyra. “Now who doth protestest too mucheth?”

“Well, I, uh, that—,” Octavia sputtered.

Vinyl burst out in laughter.

Octavia spun around. “Vinyl! This is not funny.”

Vinyl only laughed harder.

Scrunching up her muzzle, Octavia reached out, and with a flick of her hoof, turned up the volume of Vinyl’s headphones in an attempt to drown out the laughter.

It didn’t work.

“Well, then,” Octavia declared. “I am to retire till noon at the earliest. Possibly noon tomorrow if more Pinkies appear.”

With a lofty gait, Octavia walked off toward home.

The other mares watched her for a moment till Lyra reached a hoof out toward Vinyl who returned the gesture with a bump. “Nice,” Lyra approved.

“Lyra!” Bon Bon protested. Lyra only looked back to Bon Bon then shrugged in the direction of Octavia’s swaying backside.

With a blush, Bon Bon cleared her throat and reached out a hoof toward Vinyl who bumped it in return.

Their exchange completed, Vinyl got up and followed Octavia, continuing to nod her head in rhythm with the sound from her headphones.

Lyra and Bon Bon watched as she caught up to Octavia and gave her flank a playful bump with her own. Eventually, Octavia returned the gesture only a little less playfully than Vinyl had.

Once alone, Lyra turned to Bon Bon, her expression quickly turning serious.

“We are so following Pinkie!”


*** *** ***


06:40 AM

Pinkie thought to herself. And then she thought to her voices. And then she thought to herself more when having voices she couldn’t understand most of the time answering her thoughts felt too weird even for her.

Tired of just thinking to herself, Pinkie opened her mouth.

“Well, I didn’t get to try any new unicorn horns and I forgot to ask about where to get party supplies, but I did invite four new-old friends, and even if two of them are going to take a nap first, they said they’d help invite other ponies too! And they’re all well liked back home so they must have tons of friends here they can invite! This is great! Got to invite more and still got to get supplies!”

She reached into her mane and rummaged around setting off random clunking, squeaking, and chirping noises from within. “It’s not like I carry enough with me for a whole town at all times!” She pulled her hoof out and a large assortment of party paraphernalia fell to the ground.

A dozen party poppers, two cans of aerosol cheese spray, three cans of whip cream (still cold), twenty party hats, a bag of one hundred balloons, a blank canvas with crayons and markers, two trombones, and a rubber chicken signed by Cheese Sandwich.

“Nope. Not nearly enough for a whole town. At the very least I’d need more food, more party hats, decorations, and a helium tank, and maybe a few kazoos.”

Pinkie thought over the found supplies as she went into the task of restocking them into her mane. “That’s weird. Two trombones? I usually just manage to get the one up there, and that's pushing it. Where’d the other come from, and where’d my cookies and textbooks and stuff go? Oh, wait! My tail!”

Turning to look back at her tail, Pinkie grabbed for it, only for it to get tugged out of her reach as her body followed her head and neck. She tried again, awkwardly turning completely around multiple times chasing it on the three hooves she wasn't reaching with, but her tail always eluded her.

Before her next attempt, she stopped and told her tail firmly, “Stay!”

Her tail was very obedient. “Good girl.”

Giving it a shake and reaching in to grab more supplies returned twenty more packs of one hundred balloons each, another fifty party hats, five cell phone chargers with different connections, and a Pin the Tail on the Donkey set.

“Darn,” she said while packing it all back into her tail. “That covers the balloons and maybe the party hats—I wonder how many ponies are in this town—but not the food, decorations, and helium.”

Tail now resupplied, Pinkie put a hoof to her chin. “Although … I did hear once that pegasus ponies can fly because they fart helium.” She continued to ponder that postulation a minute longer. “Nah. After all this time, Sunset would have said something if there was a freely available source of infinite helium I could tap into, right?” She laughed, “And if it were true, everything would be floating all the time in the pony version of Mexicolt.”

She tapped a hoof against her chin in thought. "Oh, and Pin the Tail on the Donkey might be considered rude around here. Maybe I can make it a Pin the Nose on a Clown instead?"

Pinkie set off again to meet more new-old friends, and find sources of party supplies, only to make it just a scant few steps before she felt something tugging. She looked back to see her tail stretched out like taffy, the tip holding its position from before. She whistled, releasing her tail from the invisible hold. It snapped back to its normal form, fluffiness, and position behind her with a whip-like effect.

“Hoouuywhnniiieee!” Pinkie let out a whinny in surprise when the tip struck her hindquarters. “Whoa. That was neat. Well, when in Roan ….”

Rearing back onto her hind legs, Pinkie whinnied again to announce the start of a dramatic, cinematic galloping sequence, “Ho-wee-in’neeee.” Disappointed that her voluntary whinny sounded nothing like a real whinny, she tried again, standing straight up and raising her forelegs high in the air. “Whoouuy’wiinnnn’eee!” The second attempt was an improvement, but still not quite right.

Gravity won out over her experience with pony hips and balance before she could make a third attempt.

“Oh well, I guess I’ll just trot. Oh, what’s that?” she asked her head. “Oh right. The pronky, jumpy thingy is much faster!”

Pinkie gleefully returned to her now familiar pronking down the dirt path until she came to an open field outlined by trees, saw a purple and yellow pony-drawn carriage parked off in the distance, and turned straight for it.

Arriving at the carriage, Pinkie reared up and knocked on the shuttered side window.

“Hey!”—There was a thud from inside—“Are you open?”

More sounds of shuffling, clanging, and banging were heard from inside. Eventually there was a popping sound and white smoke began flowing out of the vents and cracks of the carriage.

This was followed by coughing and a blue unicorn wearing a nightcap opening and popping her head out the window.

“Hiya!” Pinkie cheered at the asphyxiating mare.

Cough “Pinkie?” Cough “What are you—*cough*—doing here?”

“Saying ‘hiya’ to you!”

“Trixie gathered that, but why?” Trixie got her coughing under control and shot Pinkie a tired and annoyed glare.

“I was wondering if you were open and had ice-cream to sell,” Pinkie replied, unphased by the glare.

“Ice-cream?!" Trixie drew back in annoyance. "The Great and Powerful Trixie does not sell ice-cream!”

“Oh. That’s too bad. I saw the carriage and thought you might.”

“What?! This is Trixie’s Cherished and Dependable Caravan! It is not an ice-cream cart!”

“Aw.” Pinkie’s ears flopped down. “I suppose it’s just as well, I don’t have any money. But, anyway,” her ears perked up again, “Hiya!”

“You already said that.”

“I know, I’m starting over!”

Trixie rolled her eyes.

“Hiya, I’m Pinkie Pie!”

Trixie blinked, adopting a dull expression. “Trixie is aware of this. Sometimes painfully so.”

“No, no, no! I’m not the Pinkie you know, I’m a different Pinkie from a different world and I’m here to make friends with all the ponies who look just like the people I know in my world so that way I’ll be friends with two versions of each of my friends!”

Trixie blinked. “What?”

“I want to invite you to my Hi-My-Name-is-Pinkie-Pie-and-I’m-New-in-Town-Even-Though-I-Probably-Look-Just-Like-Someone-Else-You-Know-Who-is-Also-Named-Pinkie-Pie-But-I-Want-to-be-Your-Friend-Too-Party!”

Trixie blinked again. “Ocellus, you’re trying too hard. Even Pinkie isn’t this random.” She pulled back and closed the shutters on her caravan. “Trixie is going back to bed.”

“Wait! What’s an ocellus?” Pinkie pushed her face against the shutters, trying to peer in through the small slits.

“Part of an insect’s eye, and your name.”

“But I'm not an Ocellus, I'm a Pinkie Pie”

The shutters opened, pushing Pinkie back, and Trixie poked her head out, squinting as the sunlight hit her eyes again. She peered closely at Pinkie. “Ocellus went home for Spring break and The Pink One is in Canterlot. Who are you?”

“I’m Pinkie Pie,” Pinkie repeated.

“Whatever is going on, can it go on somewhere else or wait another hour or ten?”

“Well," Pinkie looked up in thought, "I suppose I can invite other ponies first and come back.”

“Good, no sooner than nine o'clock. Trixie needs her beauty sleep, she has a performance tonight.”

“Okay, but before I go, can I lick your horn?”

Trixie paused. “Say that again?”

“ ‘Okay, but before I go, can I lick your horn’?”

Trixie's jaw lowered slightly, and it was a moment before her eyes widened and her ears perked up. “T-Trixie still hasn’t even let Starlight douse her horn yet!” Her cheeks blushed and puffed out in annoyance. “Not that she’s ever asked.”

“Ohhh! Where is Starlight? I wanna see her as a pony!”

“As a pony?" Trixie snapped back to Pinkie. "What do you mean, Pink Confusion?”

“Is she here?”

“No, sadly, she’s gone to the Crystal Empire to visit Sunburst,” Trixie replied, then added in a grumble, “bet she’s doused his horn.”

“Aw, that’s too bad, but I hope she has fun with whoever that is, wherever that is, and whatever that is! But will you come to my Hi-My-Name-is-—“

“Pinkie! Or whoever you are. Yes. Trixie will attend your party so long as saying yes means Trixie will get back to bed and it won’t get in the way of her performance.”

“Yay!” Pinkie pulled her into a hug over the windowsill. Trixie’s eyes bugged out for a moment before she managed to recover. “So what kind of performance? A magic show?” Pinkie asked after releasing Trixie.

“Of course it’s a magic show. The Great and Powerful Trixie will be debuting three new Grand and Potent tricks tonight!”

Pinkie’s eyes moved up to Trixie’s horn. “I bet being a unicorn in this world and having a magic horn is very handy”—a bush nearby suddenly rustled—“for a magic show! Or would that be horny?”

Trixie raised an eyebrow. “Trixie sleeps now.”

Before Trixie could retreat to her caravan, Pinkie poked her head into the window, startling Trixie into falling back onto her floor. “Wait! Where do I go to get party supplies?!”

“Try the marketplace!”

“Oh yeah. Good idea! Oh, wait! Where do I get money for the supplies, or free supplies because I have no money, honey?”

Trixie groaned. “Go to Sugarcube Corner and get it from Pinkie’s stash.”

“Oh, that’s a great idea! I’m sure she won’t mind if I use some of her supplies for a Hi-My-Name-is-Pinkie-Pie-and-I’m-New-in-Town-Even-Though-I-Probably-Look-Just-Like-Someone-Else-You-Know-Who-is-Also-Named-Pinkie-Pie-But-I-Want-to-be-Your-Friend-Too-Party! I’d let her do the same in my world. Though I’d rather work together on it and really welcome her!”

Trixie looked up at her with leveled eyes and responded in a dull, flat tone.

“… Great.”

“So where’s this corner of sugarcubes?”

“Also in the marketplace!” Trixie let her annoyance decide the tone.

“Thank you!”

“Close the shutters!”

“Okey-dokey-Lokey. Or should I say, oney-doney-poney. Sleep tight! Oh! And if you see her, make sure to invite Twilight to the party. We’re looking for her!”

Pinkie closed the shutters of Trixie’s caravan and pronked happily away, now having another pony set for her party and knowing where to get party supplies.

Behind her, poking out the top of a bush was the tip of a mint-green unicorn horn.



> 16 Meanwhile: "The Agents of S.M.I.L.E. Frown"
> --------------------------------------------------------------------------

06:35 AM

Lyra Heartstrings, once all other ponies were out of earshot, got off the bench and turned to Bon Bon, her expression instantly turning serious. “We are so following Pinkie!”

“What?” Bon Bon countered. “No we’re not.” She had a been there, done that look on her face.

“She’s acting strange!”

Bon Bon raised an eyebrow. “She’s Pinkie.”

“She said she’s from another world.” Lyra bounced excitedly on her hooves.

“That was already a probable theory," Bon Bon nodded. "Highly probable.”

"She also said she's hearing voices in her head."

"You can’t seriously tell me you're surprised by that," Bon Bon chuckled.

“But it’s not the same Pinkie. It can’t be. She even said so. Do you really think our Pinkie would ask to douse my horn?”

Bon Bon’s forehead furled and her eyes squinted slightly. "Not if she knows what's good for her."

“And she said she was from Humaneville. Humane!”

“You really need to stop reading those comics.” Bon Bon shook her head.

“But it’s such a great series!”

“Even the spin-off where they all turned into dogs?”

Lyra cringed. “I don’t care how great Susan Summer’s redemption story was, she and her series will never become canon!”

“You’re such a humie.” Bon Bon playfully rolled her eyes.

“Thank you.” Lyra smiled.

“But there’s no such things as humanes.”

“Plenty of fossilized remains suggests—“

“Lyra—“ Bon Bon warned.

“The Dream Valley dig just last year—!“

“Are we really going to do this again?”

“Yes, because that Pinkie also said she’s not used to having four legs and hooves.” Lyra held up a forehoof for demonstration. “You know what has only two legs and no hooves?”

“Minotaurs.” Bon Bon let the smug pour off her.

Lyra opened her mouth to counter but no sound came out. She stared down at her hoof. “Wait. Minotaurs may not have forehooves, but they still have hindhooves! Humanes have neither. They are completely hoofless, and furless.”

“And that’s just gross," commented Bon Bon with a slight shiver.

“Don’t be speciesist.”

“I’m not!" Bon Bon raised a hoof in defense. "It’s not possible to be speciesist against a species that doesn’t exist.”

“But, but. What about her saying Humaneville?”

“We know she reads the same comics," Bon Bon explained, "and she’s Pinkie. She got reality and fantasy mixed up.”

“We’re still following her!”

"There's really no need," Bon Bon waved her off with a smile. "She’s crazy but not dangerous.”

“She knows your real name!” Lyra whispered after double-checking to make sure they were alone.

Bon Bon cringed. “Right. Nice save with clamping her muzzle by the way. How did she find that out?”

“I know I haven’t said anything. And even ‘being Pinkie’ can’t explain that one.” Lyra considered that for a moment. “… I think.”

Bon Bon adopted a classic thinking pose. “She seemed to believe ‘Bon Bon’ was my nickname.”

“Well, it is.”

“It’s my cover. Not quite the same thing.”

“Even more reason she shouldn’t know it. Something is definitely going on here.”

Bon Bon’s eyes widened. “Wait! I just remembered. A report from S.M.I.L.E. hidequarters said all six of the Flower Rangers are in Canterlot right now. Princess Celestia called them all in for something. What’s Pink Petunia doing here?”

“She isn't Pink Petunia, she's an impostor and that's exactly why we need to follow her.

Bon Bon leveled a stare at Lyra. “Right, that’s the reason you’re so gung-ho about this.”

“We’ll treat it as an impromptu spying mission for S.M.I.L.E., and learn what this ‘Pinkie from another world’ knows about humanes!”

Special Agent Sweetie Drops looked at her partner and sighed. “Alright. But don’t forget it’s a mission to protect F.R.O.W.N. and not satisfy your nerdiness.”

“Of course,” Special Agent Heartstrings replied. “Nopony or miscellaneous creature is going to infiltrate the Friendship Ranger Organization of Worldwide Neighgotiations on our watch!”

“Other than Queen Chrysalis last year?” Drops raised an eyebrow.

“Doesn’t count. We were off the clock," Heartstrings gave a definitive nod.

"We don't have 'a clock'."

"Well I had a cold and you look amazing in a nurse's uniform.”


*** *** ***


06:45 AM

The two secret agents, after deciding that following the likely fake Pinkie Pie was the best thing for Equestria, and both at least claiming that there were absolutely no other more pressing reasons for doing so, proceeded down the path they had seen her disappear over.

“You know,” Agent Sweetie Drops began, “this could be a trick.”

“What do you mean?” asked Agent Heartstrings.

“She came right up to us and gave us an elaborate story that has us following her.”

“You think this is just a distraction?”

“She knows I’m a S.M.I.L.E. agent, told us directly that she’s not the Pinkie we know, and knew to play into your obsessions with humanes.”

“But how?”

“The first one I have no idea, but for the second; everypony knows you’re gaga over humanes.”

Heartstrings bristled over that. “I don’t … I don’t talk about them that much do I?”

Drops looked over at her partner with a raised eyebrow. “You walk around on two legs with hand-shaped hoofboots on your forehooves when you think nopony is watching.”

Heartstrings’s cheeks developed a bright pink shade. “Y-you saw that?”

“More than once.”

“It was just cosplay! I was practicing my balance!”

"And you still sit weird, even in public."

Before Heartstrings could counter, and before the rosy tint drained from her face, they heard a startled, “Hoouuywhnniiieee!”

They looked at each other. “Somepony got the drop on her?” suggested Heartstrings, and they rushed forward.

“Ho-wee-in’neeee.”

The agents gave each other another, confused, look as they came to the crest of a small hill and saw their pony of interest in the distance. They saw her rear back to stand straight up on just her hindlegs, with her forelegs high in the air and shout, “Whoouuy’wiinnnn’eee!”

She remained standing like that for just a moment longer with a mildly disappointed droop in her mane. The impostor took a deep breath, presumably to try … whatever she was doing again, but promptly fell onto her side.

“Wouldn’t a humane be fine standing on two legs?” asked Sweetie Drops.

Heartstrings’s ears lowered against the sides of her head. “You really think it might just be another Chrysalis operation?”

“There's no guarantee that Chrysalis doesn't still have followers who haven't gone over to Thorax's kingdom. But if this is one of hers then I think she needs better infiltrators.  This one seems to be practicing how to whinny to make herself sound like a real pony. Right out in the open no less.”

“But it could still be the real thing, right?” Heartstrings's eyes held onto as much hope as possible.

Their target then began speaking to herself and trotting away. Still talking to herself, she switched to a fast pronk and the agents sneaked more quickly in pursuit.

Drops considered Heartstrings's question. “A humane version of Pinkie who somehow got turned into a pony and transported to our world at the same time the real Pinkie just happens to be out of town? That’s both unlikely and conveniently timed. How would she even have gotten here?”

“Some of the legends mention a rainbow bridge, or a really skilled pegasus could fly one over.”

“But neither turned the humanes into ponies. We wouldn’t have fossilized evidence if it did. Also, she said she’s from a town called Humaneville. That’s a little on the muzzle.”

“And Ponyville isn’t?”

“It’s also the name of the town in your comics.”

Heartstrings frowned, thinking that over as Pinkie changed directions, heading off toward a familiar caravan. “Looks like she’s visiting Trixie. We’ll need to find cover.”

By the time the two had hidden themselves and crept close enough to listen in on the conversation without being spotted, the sleepy and annoyed Trixie had already poked out her head, gone back inside, poked her head out again, and gotten pulled into a Pinkie-Pie-patented Pinkie Hug.

“For simplicity we should come up with a code name for Impostor Pinkie,” said Heartstrings.

“How about Finkie? For False Pinkie,” Drops suggested before focusing on the pink creature's conversation with Trixie.

“So what kind of performance?” they heard Finkie ask after releasing Trixie from her hug. “A magic show?”

“Of course it’s a magic show,” replied Trixie. “The Great and Powerful Trixie will be debuting three new Grand and Potent tricks tonight!”

“I bet being a unicorn in this world and having a magic horn is very handy”—

“Handy!” Heartstrings let out a surprised whisper from within the agents’ hiding bush. "She said 'handy'! And Trixie’s never said anything about humanes before so it’s not a trick."

“That doesn’t mean anything,” Drops hushed her. “It’s a normal phrase that ponies say. Like ‘handles are handy’.”

“But ponies don’t have hands. If humanes don’t exist, shouldn’t they be called hoofles and be … hoofy?”

“No, because they were invented in Minos by the minotaurs. They have hands.”

“I know they have hands!“

“Not too loud,” Drops warned her.

“The handle predates the minotaurs’ industrial revolution.”

“Wasn’t that …," Drops thought back to her history classes, "thousands of years ago?”

“According to the Ancient Aliens magazine—“

“No, Lyra, not the weird mane guy again.”

“He has a name."

"Do you know what it is?"

Heartstrings gaped at her partner for a moment. "It starts with a G."Couldn't figure out how to ponify Giorgio A. Tsoukalos.

"Exactly."

"Okay, fine, the ‘weird mane guy’. He said—.”

“She’s getting away!”

“What!?”

In the distance, they saw Finkie pronking toward the marketplace.

“Should we question Trixie about Finkie before following her?” asked Heartstrings.

“No time! Fake or not, odds are any Pinkie would be easy to lose track of and cause a lot of commotion around town.


*** *** ***


06:50 AM

"YEEEEEEEHAWWW!" A shout came from the side as the agents pursued their potential Pinkie poser.

“What the hay? Was that Applejack?” asked Drops, looking in the direction of Princess Twilight Sparkle’s palace.

“Sounded like her,” answered Heartstrings.

“Orange Poppy is also supposed to be in Canterlot right now!”

“They got her too?” Heartstrings gasped.

“We don’t know if there is a ‘they’ yet!”

“Did S.M.I.L.E.’s report say how long the Rangers were supposed to be out of town?”

“No, but rumor was it’s something big. Maybe a week or more.”

Heartstrings frowned. “So something is clearly wrong if any of them are here now.”

“Very likely.”

“Where’s Finkie going?”

“I don’t know. I think she and Trixie were talking about the marketplace, but Finkie just seems to be wandering off,” Drops explained. “It’s all residential this way.”

“Maybe she doesn’t know where the marketplace is.”

“How could she not know—?”

“Maybe if she’s never been to Ponyville before.”

Drops thought that over a moment, both still trotting after Finkie’s last known heading. “It’s looking like that might be the case. Might be a good idea to split up. I’ll keep after Finkie, you look into what sounded like Applejack.”

“What?! Why can’t I get Finkie?” Heartstrings protested, earning a flat stare from her partner. “Oh, come on. I’m an agent too now! I’ll be professional.”

The stare continued.

“I saved the day in Operation Swiss Cheese,” Heartstrings declared before moving closer to Drops. “My first mission.”

Drops sighed, “Yes, you did. I remember.” This earned her a large, smug grin from her partner. “You do remind me enough after all.”

“Yes, yes I do!” Heartstrings giggled.

With an eye roll but also a smile, Drops surrendered. “Fine. You go after Finkie and I’ll look into what happened at the palace. First chance you get though, head home and grab your communicator, maybe your whole hoofpack.”

“Roger that, Agent Drops.”

In reply, Sweetie Drops turned quickly and broke off toward the Friendship Palace.

She arrived just in time to see not Applejack, or an impostor of her, but rather Rarity …, or an impostor of her, exclaim, "Am I the only sane one left?!"

“Even White Lily now? And what was that about being sane? This is three now; is all of F.R.O.W.N. compromised?”

Drops had to quickly back off and hide behind a tree as the … “Falsity” began looking all around her. Sneaking a quick glance rewarded her with the sight of Falsity spinning around with her eyes closed and losing her balance.

“The hay is she doing?” Drops muttered to herself before ducking behind the tree again as Falsity opened her eyes and took in her surroundings.

From behind the tree, Drops could just make out Falsity cheering. “A marketplace! Perhaps there’s a boutique! I don't have any money, and Twi is unlikely to just happen to be in such a place right at this moment, but I could really use a quick stroll through my happy place to calm my nerves right now. Perhaps I’ll even find pony Rarity.”

Drops tilted her head. “She doesn’t know the real Rarity is out of town?”

On her next peek, she saw Falsity making a very awkward-looking attempt to carry a simple yellow dress and place it inside the palace. Drops tilted her head at the number of times the dress landed on the ground or on Falsity’s face, and at that strange walk Falsity had. And then, after chancing a brief foray from her hiding place, saw Falsity give the oddest wiggle to get the garment off herself to rest on a bench inside the palace. The real Rarity would have been mortified to be seen acting like that.

"Okay, shopping is a very Rarity action, but why doesn’t she know about Princess Twilight and ‘Pony Rarity’? Are they running on bad intel.? At least this confirms that these are indeed impostors.”

After returning from the palace, Falsity headed off toward the marketplace with a stilted gait.

Agent Sweetie Drops followed at a distance.

“It's going to be another of those Ponyville days.”


*** *** ***


07:07 AM

Agent Heartstrings rushed to keep up with Finkie. The pink pony, or pony-like creature, appeared to have quite a lead on her, but Heartstrings could still see the clear pronking pattern in her target’s hoofsteps. Eventually, after a few minutes at a full gallop she could hear the telltale sproinging of each bounce. Just like the real Pinkie’s pronk.

And then she was gone.

Heartstrings caught one glimpse of the pink impostor pronking behind a small group of trees but never did Finkie come back out. She carefully crept up to the trees, circled around them, listened carefully. Nothing.

After some consideration, she took a risk and jumped into the group, and even climbed one of the trees, but there were no pink ponies.

She groaned, resting her head on a tree branch and letting her ears flop down. Humanes can’t just disappear like that, she thought. Changelings, though, they can mimic plants just like they can ponies. I could be standing on her right now.

It took a moment for that notion of standing on top of a disguised changeling—a potentially hostile one—to fully sink in. Once it had, Heartstrings snapped up and pushed back, losing her hoofing and falling backward off the branch.

“OOF!”

Another groan escaped her as she caught her breath, lying belly up on the ground just in time to see a yellow pegasus pass overhead.

“Oh, dear, oh, dear, oh, dear. Oh my goodness!”

Heartstrings blinked and turned to watch the mare’s fast, but awkward flight. Is that? It is! They got Yellow Daisy too?

One final look at Finkie’s last known location, and Heartstrings made her decision. If these really are changelings still working with Chrysalis, Finkie will remain disguised until I leave or she decides to impersonate me instead. Best to change targets.

Fluttershy never flies that high alone unless some creature is in trouble. And she doesn’t normally fly so fast. And she’s usually more ….

Just as Heartstrings was about to finish her thought, the yellow pegasus lowered her altitude to fly alongside the buildings only to awkwardly swerve around one and nearly crash into a second.

“… Graceful.”

Just moments after the word passed her lips, the pegasus made what some might call a landing, had they flunked flight school.

Heartstrings made use of the time the pegasus spent brushing herself off to sneak closer through some tall grass and confirm the pony to be, or at least look just like, Fluttershy.

Okay. Code name Swindle-Shy? Flutter-Faux? Phonyshy!

Heartstrings crept after Phonyshy, following her into the marketplace.

Phonyshy traveled around the edges of the marketplace, avoiding crowds—“Well, that’s not unusual for Fluttershy”—occasionally approaching lone ponies, but always backing away instead of making contact. Usually when other ponies approached.

Looking for a specific pony to impersonate? With the Flower Rangers out of town, who could be a more high profile target than who she is now? The Mayor?

In addition to scoping out targets, Phonyshy seemed to be sightseeing, taking in every shop name and market stall without too large a crowd. And then came an exception. There was a particularly large crowd gathered near the Quills and Sofas shop. Phonyshy walked up to a few ponies watching the commotion, but not part of the crowd itself, and appeared to speak, but nopony seemed to notice her. She may simply have been too quiet to be heard over the commotion.

“Lyra,” came a voice behind her.

Heartstrings turned to see an earth pony mare with a light olive coat, wearing large sunglasses and a blue and fuchsia … clown wig?

“Bonnie?” Heartstrings asked. “Wow, that’s some wig.”

Agent Sweetie Drops blushed. “It’s not a wig.”

“You keep a mane curler in your hoofpack?”

“I keep everything in my hoofpacks.”

“How long does it take to straighten back out?”

Drops took a deep breath. “Too long. But we’ll deal with that later. What happened with Finkie?”

“I lost her in some trees. Just seemed to disappear. Or maybe turned into a tree.”

Taking a look left and right, Drops ushered Agent Heartstrings away from the crowd, setting up near an unattended flower stand. “So it’s changelings then?” she whispered.

“I don’t know, and worse, I found Phonyshy.”

“ ‘Phonyshy’?”

”Yellow Daisy; followed her here.”

“Her too? I followed Falsity here,” Drops cringed.

“White Lily?”

“Yeah. And I didn’t see her myself, but there’s also a Pseudo Dash.”

“Even Blue Begonia?”

“See the pony-shaped hole in that sofa over there?" Drops pointed to the center of the commotion. "Word on the street is 'Rainbow Dash' made it with her face. They took ’her‘ to the hospital, but the injuries seemed minor.”

“Did you see any Flapjacks?”

“ ‘Flapjacks’?”

“Orange Poppy impostors.”

“You’re going with ‘Flapjack’ for her? What part of that means impostor?” Drops gave her partner a look and noticed she was staring off in the distance. Drops followed her gaze and noticed a food card selling pancakes and heard a rumble from her partner’s stomach.

Heartstrings blushed. “We skipped breakfast this morning to meet up with Octiscratch on time.”

“Right. Anyway, I didn’t see a ‘Flapjack,’ but Falsity did seem to have been talking to somepony, and we did hear her voice.”

“So that’s all of F.R.O.W.N. except Purple Rose copied?”

“Haven’t seen a," Drops paused, thinking of a code name, "… ‘Twilight Swindle’ yet.”

“And where is Falsity now?”

“She broke into the Carousel Boutique. I came back here to find out what caused this commotion. I should get back over to check on her or confirm Pseudo Dash now.”

“So, Falsity is at the Boutique, Pseudo Dash is in the hospital, Phonyshy—“ Heartstrings turned to watch the yellow pegasus separating herself from the crowd, “—seems to be heading for the palace, Finkie is missing, and Flapjack and TwiSwi are unconfirmed.”

Drops sighed. “We have potentially hostile changelings all over town. We’re going to need backup.”

“Who could we call on this short notice?”

It was hard to tell under the poofed up mane, but two light olive ears flopped down as Drops cringed, already regretting her answer. “We’ll call … Special Agent Diablo.”

“Oh no,” creaked Heartstrings, “Not the bunny.”



> 17 Meanwhile: "The Horror"
> --------------------------------------------------------------------------

07:10 AM

“We have potentially hostile changelings all over town.”

Lily Valley didn’t hear the rest, and most of what came before fell by the wayside with that last statement by the pony in the clown wig. Who even was that pony?

From within her hiding place under her flower cart, Lily just shivered and muttered to herself, “The horror. The Horror!”

Another changeling attack by that evil queen who attacked Canterlot during the royal wedding. Lily hadn’t been this scared since the last time she discovered two caterpillars on a single flower stem. One caterpillar she could deal with, but two at once? What was she supposed to do with that?

And to think, if she hadn’t dropped that seed packet under her booth she never would have gotten close enough to hear that strange clown pony’s conversation. Just five minutes ago she was such a young and carefree pony. Oh, what an innocent time that was.

She had to tell Roseluck and Daisy. It was time to make for the bunker!


*** *** ***


07:12 AM

“This is awful!” cried Daisy. “Changelings?! In Ponyville?”

"But they're friends now," explained Roseluck.

"Do we know for sure all of them are friendly?" Lily Valley asked.

"How would we know that?!"

"We don't!"

“We need to tell the princess!”

“We can’t! She left town yesterday and the changelings are impersonating all the Harmony Council members!”

“They’re impersonating ponies that are out of town? That’s great! It’ll be easy to tell who they are!”

“But they could just change to a different pony at anytime! Nopony is safe!”

“I’ll get the hazmat suits from the closet!”

“What’s that going to do? This isn’t a cutiepox outbreak!”

“That’s right, they’re shapeshifters. They copy ponies, and imprison the originals, but they don’t infect them with anything … I think.”

“It will stop them from touching us or drinking our blood. That’s how they copy, right?”

“They’re not vampires.”

“Could they be vampire changelings?”

“I, I don’t think so?”

“There are vampire bats in Applejack’s orchard, so why not vampire changelings?”

“The changelings are coming from Sweet Apple Acres?!”

“Those bats turned Fluttershy into one of them!”

“Was that what happened? I thought it was a spell.”

“I think changelings just need to look at us to copy us.”

“That’s all? This is a disaster! The horror!”

“I was in Canterlot during the invasion and I’ve also seen Ocellus do it.”

“Who’s Ocellus?”

“She’s the changeling student in Twilight’s school.”

“Oh, is that her name?”

“She seemed like such a nice pony … bug … thing.”

“You ran away from her screaming when you saw her.”

“I came back! Eventually. I apologized too! Poor girl looked so sad.”

“It was Zecora all over again.”

“I know! I said I was sorry.”

“Could these changelings be the same? Are they just trying to make friends?”

“Why would they do that here? Wouldn’t they go to the new King?”

“And why would they be disguised as the Harmony Council?”

“And that clown pony said they were hostile!”

“There are clowns now?! The horror!”

“The horror!”

“Changeling clown invasion?”

“And they’re vampires!”

“It was only the one clown and they aren’t vampires!”

“That you know of!”

“There could be hundreds more disguised as … what’s the opposite of a clown?”

“Politicians? Mimes?”

“Those are worse than clowns!”

"A mime killed my mother!"

"Wait, what?!"

"It turned out it was all part of the show, but I was still traumatized!"

"Uh."

“I still have nightmares!”

“I don’t see how clowns and politicians opposites.”

"Clowns are supposed to be colorful, funny entertainers but they're scary, and politicians are boring and drab, but keep us safe."

"My dad told me they're the same, but one group pretends to be fools, the other pretends not to be."

"Hay! I like Mayor Mare!"

“Didn’t Mayor Mare dress as a clown for Nightmare Night once?”

“Don’t destroy my world view!”

“Could the Mayor be a changeling?”

“Anypony could be a changeling!”

“This is awful!”

“This is a disaster!”

“We need to warn the town!”

“The whole town!”

“We’d have to go outside for that!”

“I’ll get the hazmat suits!”

“The horror!”
> 18 AJ & FS - Part2: "...But I Wouldn't Want to Visit"
> --------------------------------------------------------------------------

09:15 AM

Applejack’s worries piled higher. Maybe she was paranoid but she could feel a growing number of eyes on her the whole way. She didn’t know if it was her new pony magic telling her this, her imagination, or a case of the heebie-jeebies.A real case of the heebie-jeebies. For all she knew heebie-jeebies were an actual thing in this world.

And they could be all around her!

Even worse, that forest, the dangerous one according to Sunset, had a cottage matching Cheerilee’s description right at the edge.

“Can’t be that dangerous if Fluttershy lives so close, right?” She looked around, noticing a lack of other residences in the area. “All by her lonesome.”

She took a breath and turned back to the cottage.

Just in time to see a pair of squirrels on the side of a tree looking back at her. The look in their eyes was clear.

She wasn’t imagining anything.

“Uh, hello there, uh, squirrels, is Fluttershy around?”

She smiled brightly, making herself look as friendly as possible and thought the situation through. “Can all ponies talk to animals here? Fluttershy seemed to understand that bird just fine back in Twi’s palace. But is that just Fluttershy or all ponies? Fluttershy's been able to talk to animals since we got our geodes. And how smart are squirrels here? Maybe Ponyshy trained the animals to guard her, that’s why they’ve been staring at me! Makes so much sense now!”

The two squirrels glanced at each other, then turned back to Applejack, made some noises that Applejack was sure wouldn’t translate well on prime-time television, and scampered away.

Some more rustling all around her drew her attention to the sides as grasses and bushes swayed for just a moment before everything fell silent again.

“Uhhh …. Okay?” Applejack’s eyes darted around. “What in the Sam Hill am ah walking into? What did Fluttershy walk into?”


*** *** ***


09:00 AM

Fluttershy couldn’t believe it.

Angel was never this demanding back home!

Sure he got cranky if story time got interrupted before bedtime, or if his tail wasn’t fluffed just right, or if he didn’t get the right brand of carrots. But this Angel? Does he normally demand a three course salad with his tea that had to perfectly match the picture on the recipe book? Does he always get impatient if it took too long to find the right ingredients in the cupboards? Or even take too long to figure out where the cupboards are in the cottage? Or the pantry? Or to figure out how to open them once found?

There was also the issue of actually preparing the food with hooves. Opening boxes. Not dropping boxes. Knowing where each animal preferred to have their food left for them. Learning all their names. Hoping Robert wasn't still angry if he and his family were nearby.

And the other animals were acting strange too. So critical. As if they were silently judging everything she did. Sunset was right that animals are smarter in this world than back home, but did that completely alter their behaviors too? They had seemed so cheerful at first. But that changed more and more as their breakfasts were being prepared.

And isn't a bit late in the day for breakfast? I usually feed my animals much earlier than this.

They had slowly begun giving each other glances, giving Fluttershy more space, ducking into small spaces and under low tables. Some began to look angry.

They all seemed to watch Angel Bunny.

Has he been giving orders? Is that what those gestures meant?

Oh my! Is that a jackalope? They’re real here? That’s amazing! Wait. Is he sharpening his horns?

Was that a tiny torch? That little, adorable hamster wasn’t going to light it was she?For anyone who doesn’t think a hamster can be dangerous.

As Fluttershy finished preparing food for every creature, they all walked, flew, or otherwise moved to their respective meals. She noticed that none of the animals had begun to eat. With each completed meal, the owner(s) had come up and inspected the food while other animals watched. They sniffed the offerings. Some licked. A few took nibbles. It was as if they were worried about poison.

Fluttershy looked around at all the animals.

The animals all turned to look at Angel.

Angel looked at Fluttershy.

“Oh, dear. Have I done something wrong? I tried my best to do what your Fluttershy would do.”

With that said, there was a sudden change in the eyes of all the creatures in the room.

Angel grabbed a toothpick off the counter and raised it as if it were a sword.

He barked some squeaking orders.

The other animals suddenly retreated to parts unknown.

Angel smugly folded his tiny arms and gave Fluttershy a satisfied smirk.

A moment later the animals were back.

And they were armed.

“Oh dear.”

They had chosen fight. Time for Fluttershy to choose flight.

She turned and rushed for the front door.

A kitten was there.

He was so cute!

But he was blocking her path!

She turned around and ran for the back door.

It was closed.

Thankfully it had a doorknob similar to the cupboard doors she had practiced on and it only slowed her down a little.

Once outside she just ran straight from the cottage, remembering she had wings after her path was blocked by a stream, then flew until she realized she wasn’t actually being chased anymore.

Fluttershy looked behind her. The animals had stopped. They had all just stopped and were shaking their weapons at her while barking, chittering, honking, mewing, squeaking, tweeting, quacking, and making various other animal sounds at her.

They were all lined up at the bank of the stream, even the ones that could fly. Perhaps it was the edge of her pony counterpart’s property.

It was also the edge of the forest that she had flown deep into.


*** *** ***


09:17 AM

Applejack continued on, wary of the sudden lack of animal life. Not even the birds were chirping. But then again, they could all be in on it together, couldn’t they?

But in on what?

She crossed the bridge leading to Ponyshy’s cottage and found what she could only describe as tiny pitchforks and tiny, burnt torches. The torches appeared to have been lit, but recently put out.

“What in the—?”

A sudden thud behind her caused her to jump and spin around.

Nothing was there.

“Consarn it!” she called out to the emptiness. “What’s going on?! I nearly jumped out of my sk—uh, fur.”

More rustling got Applejack to spin again.

That bush moved. She was sure of it.

She rushed to the door, used her recently discovered knowledge of hooves to … find out it was locked. She was trapped outside.

“Fluttershy!?” she called, knocking on the door. “Anyone?”

A sound of wings passed quickly behind her and she turned to again find nothing. Those didn’t sound like Fluttershy or Rainbow Dash’s pegasus wings. Smaller. A bird, perhaps.

“Alright, now. Ah ain’t here to hurt nobody. Ah come in peace.”

No change.

“Er. Take me to your leader?”

Another rustle and another got Applejack spinning and taking a few steps backward.

Suddenly pain!

The sharp spike in her hoof made her jump, the slap against her backside tumbled her forward, making a half somersault.

From her new position, belly up on the ground, she saw her attacker.

A simple rake left discarded along with the pitchforks.

Applejack stood back up, growling her frustration. “That just gets my goat!”

“BwaAaAa. I don’t belong to you,” bleated a voice.

Applejack snapped to her hooves and turned to see a goat in what appeared to be a post officer's uniform, carrying a sack of letters.

“Who are you?!” she asked, ready to defend herself. Or at least make the attempt, not really knowing how to fight with a pony’s body.

“Name’s Gort,” he answered.

“Gort, the goat?” Applejack asked with a confused tilt of her head.

“Yes.”

“Well, what are you doing here?”

Gort pointed at his postal worker’s uniform. “Muffin’s out with the feather flu so I’m covering her shift.”

“What with the who now?”

“Mail call for—“ Gort checked an envelope he pulled out of his sack, “—Fluttershy. Is that you?”

“Uh. No.”

“Then I’ll leave it in his mailbox.”

With that, the Gort simply put the letter in a mailbox outside Fluttershy’s cottage and turned to leave.

“W-wait!” Applejack called. “Uh, Gort. Sir. What was all that rustling just now? And the thing with the animals?”

Gort looked back, confused, holding out a map of the town. “Rustling? Animals? Don’t ask me. I’m on loan from another town. Just trying to find the next house on the route. I’m already an hour behind.”

Applejack looked on as Gort returned to the map and trotted away.

“So …” Applejack began. “It was just in my head all this time?”

After Gort faded into the distance and disappeared around a corner out of sight, Applejack turned back toward the cottage.

And came face to face with a hoard of animals of all sizes holding tiny pitchforks and tiny, lit torches. A bunny stood at the front, an arm held high holding a toothpick pointed directly back at her.

“Nope. So much Nope.”

She decided to not stick around and headed back the way she had come.

The animals gave chase.


***   ***   ***


09:06 AM

Fluttershy looked forward again, away from the line of protesting animals just in time to dodge a tree branch by changing the angle of her wings and ascending just enough to clear it. She then had to do the opposite to dive under the next branch.

This forest was growing thicker the more she traveled. Much thicker than she had realized from the outside.

She thought about slowing down, but it felt like her wings wanted to beat at their own rate as if they were trying to keep pace with her heart.

After a few minutes, however, it was her lungs that signaled a halt.

Finally slowing her wings enough, Fluttershy came to ground on some snow, apparently left over from the colder temperatures of winter thanks to the thick shade under the thicker trees.

She looked around while catching her breath. It was still day wasn’t it? The patch of forest she found herself in was so dark the sun might as well have been setting.

Fluttershy thought back to the cottage. What did she do? Why were those animals so upset? Some of them looked angry, but others …, others were afraid?

“Oh no! Did they realize I wasn’t their Fluttershy and thought I was trying to hurt them? No wonder why they were upset! Should I go back and try to explain? Those poor little cuties must be so confused!”

She wiped some sweat from her forehead, frowned at dampness left behind in her fur, and considered her options.

“If I go back, they might hide or attack again. They have better ears and noses than I do; they might know I'm coming back before I could even see the cottage. That won’t work at all. I’d have to get a friend to help. Someone they trust. I have to find pony Fluttershy!”

With a new goal, in addition to also finding pony Twilight, Fluttershy took a resolute breath and turned back toward town.

Or tried to.

“Um. Oh dear. Which way was it?”


***   ***   ***


09:30 AM

The chase didn’t last long, all things considered, though it felt quite a bit longer. A pony at a full gallop with an army behind her is a mighty fast creature after all. The birds dive-bombing her were a concern though. Thankfully Applejack managed to be nimble enough to avoid their “ordnance,” leaving haphazard trails of white and black splotches in their wake.

It was the animals themselves who broke it off. Once they got fairly close to town, they all stopped, forming a line as if daring her to try returning.

Applejack did not return. She kept going.

“Not sure what’s going on, but there’s no way Fluttershy would be back there!  Best to try the palace, maybe she got back now.”

She spied the star atop Twi’s palace in the distance and headed straight for it.

Well before arriving, she came to another strange sight. Though it was the sound that first alerted her.

It sounded like three sets of heavy breathing. Filtered heavy breathing.

At the base of the town side of the bridge were what appeared to be three ponies wearing hazmat suits.

“Oh, now what?” she groaned.

The three turned to her and paused.

Applejack stared.

All three ponies looked back at her through hoods with clouded over face-places.

One-by-one they began screaming at her.

“CHANGELING?”

“CHANGELING!?”

“CHANGELING!”

Then they all ran off toward town, yelling in unison. ““CHANGELING! Help!””

Applejack could only stare for a moment longer.

“Maybe we should’a stayed home.”



> 19 Meanwhile: "Okay.  Whose bright idea was it to call Discord?"
> --------------------------------------------------------------------------

09:40 AM

“CHANGELING!”

“CHANGELING!”

“CHANGELING!”

Rose, Lily, and Daisy, all in their hazmat suits ran away from a stupefied Applejack yelling in unison. ““CHANGELING! Help!””

“It’s Applejack!” shouted Daisy once the three had rounded the bend.

“It’s a changeling that copied Applejack and stole her identity!” shouted Rose.

“It’s sweltering in this hazmat suit!” shouted Lily.

“We need to get help!”

“I thought we were going to warn the town!”

“I wasn’t expecting to run into a changeling before another pony!”

"If it hadn't taken almost two hours to get these suits on—"

"I thought you had them!"

"I told you I don't have enough closet space."

"But you're the one with the bunker!"

"That's why I don't have the closet space!"

"I thought you put them in the bunker!"

"I don't have closets in there either!"

"Then why were the helmets in there? They're supposed to be with the suits!"

“Girls, Focus! We need to warn ponies and get help!”

“Who do we know who can deal with changelings?”

“You mean other than the ponies who are already changelings now, like Applejack?”

“Are we sure they have the princess yet?”

“No. But we know they have Applejack and the clown pony said the other four were taken out too.”

“Please, enough with the clowns! They're almost as bad as mimes!”

“Sorry, I forgot.”

“If we can’t go to the Harmony Council then we’ll have to tell Mayor Mare.”

“No!”

“Why not?”

“I can’t stop thinking about her in that clown wig now!”

“Oh, pull yourself together, mare! It was just a wig for Nightmare Night!”

“We’ll talk to the Mayor. You can wait outside her office.”

“What if the Mayor is also a changeling?”

“Then we’ll tell her secretary.”

“What if her secretary is a changeling?”

“Why would a changeling be her secretary?”

“To get close enough to the Mayor to impersonate her instead.”

“By that logic only one of them would be a changeling.”

“That’s still a bad thing.”

“Not if we tell them both at the same time.”

“Wouldn’t that put one of them in danger?”

“Wouldn’t that put us in danger?”

“We should go to the police.”

“Can the police do anything about changelings?”

“They can do more than us!”

“But how much more? The police just keep the peace when ponies break the law.”

“And Ponyville doesn’t have much crime. We only have one sheriff, a deputy, and that guy who’s always reading magazines at the doughnut shop.”

“That is the sheriff!”

“Really?!”

“We’re doomed!”

“The horror!”

“This is awful!”

“This is a disaster!”

“The horror!”

“You said that already!”

“The situation is that horrifying!”

“There’s nopony left who can help with changelings!”

“I can see if The Doctor is back in town.”

“No, Rose, things just get weird when he’s around!”

“Doctor who?”

“That weird stallion with the screwdriver thing.”

“Oh no, not him! I was attacked by a plastic poneighquin last time he showed up!”

“That wasn’t his fault!”

“Isn’t Derpy dating him now?”

“This isn’t the time for gossip!”

“Are you jealous?”

“We are not discussing this!”

“But aren’t they off on a trip?”

“I thought she had feather flu.”

“That’s a cover.”

“What?! Why wasn’t I told?”

“So you are jealous!”

“I am not jealous!”

“So we can’t go to the princess, the mayor, the police, or Rose’s ex—“

“He’s not my ex!”

“—then who can we call?”

“Discord?”

“. . ..“

“. . ..“

“. . ..“

“We are not calling Discord!”

“Then we'd have changelings and Discord! No way!”

“Calling Discord would be a bad idea.”

“Discord just by himself is worse than changelings!”

“But Discord isn’t evil now, he just plays pranks!”

“Discord planted us during Winter Wrap Up!”

“Bees chased me for a week!”

“Is that why you got that beekeeper’s suit?”

“I’m not letting anything pollinate me until I’m ready!”

“Uh.”

“How would we even call Discord?”

“We’re NOT calling Discord!”

“But Discord would help if he knew Fluttershy is in danger!”

“But Fluttershy left town yesterday. So changelings didn’t have to ponynap her so she’s not in danger. Just us.”

“Are we sure Discord can’t just hear us now?”

“What do you mean?”

“Discord always just seems to show up when ponies talk about him. It’s like, call his name a dozen times and he appears or something.”

“Really?”

“So ….”

“Uh ….”

“How many times have we said Dis—his name?”


*** *** ***


m504:9a

At that time—if one were to use the right clocks—, not too far away—in the far off realm next door—, in a place where up was up—but only when it wanted to be—, and where the senseless was sensible—on a good day—, Discord’s ears were ringing.

“Hay! What’s all that racket?” asked Discord’s left ear.

“I don’t know,” answered Discord’s right ear, “I can’t hear anything over all this ringing!”

“That’s what I’m talking about! What’s with the ringing?!”

“What’s with the what?! Speak up!”

“Say again? I didn’t catch that!”

“What?!”

“What?!”

“You heard me!”

“No I didn’t!”

“Yes you did!”

“Prove it!”

“You just proved it by saying you didn’t!”

“You calling me a liar, buddy?”

“My name’s not Buddy, pal.”

“Well my name’s not Pal, buddy!”

Still arguing, the only two of Discord’s body parts that actually matched each other, including in personality, burst into flames with anger.

“Now look what you made me do!”

“What did I do? This is your fault!”

Tired of the conversation, a paw and a claw that more appropriately matched the rest of Discord’s body by not matching each other at all came up and plucked the offending appendages off his head and dropped them into a water-filled tuba.

“Please excuse me a moment,” said Discord, a little loud as he could no longer hear his own voice, “my ears were burning. Some ponies have been talking about me.”

Discord added a soap packet to the tuba and shook it up, generating a thick foam. Once satisfied, he blew through the mouthpiece emitting a sharp B-flat and sending the foam, soapy water, and his ears flying across the room to splat against the far wall.

A snap of his talons took the tuba out of existence. A snap of his fingers returned the previously offending ears back to the sides of his head. The foam and soapy water were left alone to dry.

“Ah, much better. Doused, washed, blow-dried, and ironed flat with one note.”

Discord settled back down with a pleased grin and closed his eyes.

A lazy moment passed in silence.

“Seems like there might be some delightful chaos in Ponyville right now.”

“Oh dear,” said his companion, “do you have to go?”

“Nah. Those three always get upset over the tiniest things. Besides, if I popped over to Ponyville every time there was some chaos I’d be there half the Saturdays each year. That might actually be enough to wear out my welcome. If it’s important, Fluttershy or Starlight will call me. If it’s an emergency, or if she thinks I’m responsible—excuse me, I mean if she thinks I’m to blame—Twilight will call me; none of them are even in Ponyville. It should only be the background and secondary ponies right now.”

“So where is Flutters then?”

“Oh, they’ve all gone to Canterlot on Tia’s behest.”

“A beautiful city. I loved the royal gardens.”

“Ding!” said the oven after politely clearing its throat.

“Brownies are done!” perked up Discord.

“Righteous!” cheered his companion.

“You know,” began Discord, snapping his fingers to place the treats onto a platter between the two of them that had held only crumbs just a moment ago, “if more creatures simply had your brownies I suspect there would be far fewer ‘emergencies’ in this world.”

“Oh I know. The world just needs to slow down and bliss out.”

“Have you ever thought about sharing the recipe? Sending it to Pinkie and the Apple family would easily spread it across the Equestrian mainland; if you don’t mind apples getting added to them. Then with Twilight’s new school, and unofficial role as friendship and fix-the-problem-so-Tia-doesn’t-have-to ambassador, the world would soon come to mellow out together.”

“I am loving that idea, but I’m not sure about bringing them to the school.”

“Oh, Twilight has adult students too," Discord assured his guest. "Besides, are you telling me you were already an adult the first time you tried these?”

“I’ve always been told I have an old soul. It was only my body that seemed young."

“I believe it’s matured since then.”

He was met with a half-lidded smile. “Is somecreature getting thirsty?”

“You know it, Treesy.”


*** *** ***


09:45 AM

Back in Ponyville, three mares, still in hazmat suits, looked around nervously.

“Okay, no more saying you-know-whose-name,” decreed Rose.

“Right,” agreed Daisy.

“Let’s just tell everypony in town about the changelings and somepony will know what to do!” declared Lily.

“Finally! A plan that can’t go wrong!”
> 20 Rarity: "Checking In"
> --------------------------------------------------------------------------

09:12 AM

Rarity cleaned.

Rarity checked the foyer.

Rarity cleaned.

Rarity checked the foyer.

Rarity got tired of waiting.

And cleaning.

Rarity went outside with pony Rarity’s sketchbook and pencil, stood by the steps outside the front door and sketched.

Rarity got bored when she realized too few ponies wore clothing in this apparent nudist colony!

Rarity looked out over a balcony to observe the town.

Rarity found a spa!

Rarity considered the concept of ponies using hooves to get intimate with her own brand new pony parts that she herself had not even taken the time to inventory yet and declined.

Rarity got frustrated.

Rarity went back inside.

“Alright, Rarity,” Rarity told herself, wandering the upper hall outside the portal's room, “What do we know? We know Twi is in one of my shops, either in Canterlot or Manehattan. And, according to that table with the map on it, Canterlot is not that far away by train. Assuming the train schedule allows for it, we could be there and then back to our world with Twi in just a few hours!”

She stopped and began pacing in a circle outside the portal's room. “But Manehattan seems much further away, though it’s hard to tell when my only map has no scale for measure. Is the map itself even to scale? It seems its features are sized by interest rather than geography like a tourists' map. Also, I don’t actually know how fast the trains are in this world.

“I need to remain in or around the palace should my friends return looking for me or the others. But would they even do that? It was only Applejack who was a part of refining the plan all the way through. Rainbow, Fluttershy, Pinkie—Especially Pinkie—all took off early. But how early? How much of the plan had we discussed before they left? Will they think to stop back here on occasion or will they wander the town looking for me? Well, at least Applejack will return … eventually. I just need to wait.

“Unless!” she stopped suddenly. “Unless they’ve gone back before me! I spent so much time on this dress that—perhaps they thought I had gone back early? I should write to Twily!”

Rarity giggled, her serious face changing to match. “And I can actually do that now that I know how to use my horn properly!”

She got out Sunset’s correspondence journal, laid it on the nearest table, and … struggled to get her magic to let go of it.

After several failed attempts to get the book to stay on the table and not keep floating, Rarity sighed and resorted to the Sweetie Fallback Method and tweaked her horn with a hoof.

Suddenly, everything in her magical grasp fell to whatever surface was under them. In addition, a dull pain reappeared at the point just behind where her horn connected with her skull. “I simply must find a proper way to let go of things.”

Rarity then flipped to the last message, tweaked her horn again to let go of the book’s pages, and re-read that last entry as written by Twily.

“Oh dear. Is this really such a good idea?” If I write to Twily, assuming she’s still just as frazzled as before, and the others haven’t arrived home yet, would I send her into another breakdown?

“But Fluttershy traveled back through the portal to talk to her directly and she said Twily just needed some reassuring.

“But it’s Twily. We all know she’s a little high-strung. This could still have a poor effect on her.

“But if I don’t write to her? It’s been hours since the last communication. At least three, or is it longer now? I’d have to find a clock to know.”

Rarity looked around the hall and into the nearest two rooms.

“For someone so … what’s the nice way to put this? Exacting? Just so? Detail oriented? It’s odd that there doesn’t appear to be many clocks around. Perhaps she has spells to alert her to the time? It's not like she has a smartphone.”

Returning to the journal, Rarity also returned to arguing with herself. “If I don’t write, and they have returned home, or if I don’t write and they haven’t gone through then I’ll be stuck waiting longer. But If I do write, and they have gone through, then I can simply go and join them now.

“But if the others did go back already, having been unable to find me, wouldn’t they have called Twily and asked her to write back here? Since Twily hasn’t written back to us yet, which likely means she hasn’t found Sunset, that should also mean the others haven’t gone back. Oh, but they don't know I have the journal and the ability to write in it! Or perhaps Twily did find Sunset and she’s in danger!”

Rarity frowned, grabbed the pencil in her magic, and began writing.



Darling! It’s Rarity. Are you well?




A minute or two passed and Rarity considered writing more when she got a reply.



Rarity! It’s good to hear read from you. Have you found Twi yet?






In a way, dear. I know where she is, but I have not yet met with her.




Rarity paused, considering if she wanted to ask about the others. But if they had returned, wouldn’t Twily have already mentioned them?

She decided to ask about Twily’s search instead, hoping she’d also mention the others in passing.



Sdo, ihd ayvoe u tfhien d




It was then that the oddity of using a magical book made of paper pages and a plain writing utensil as a communication tool reared its head. What happens when people are writing in both linked books at once? Answer: the written letters appear on top of each other.

Rarity stopped, and so, apparently did Twily, as no further letters appeared.



?




Eventually a single question mark appeared. “Is she asking me to go first?” Rarity chanced a quick message.



Should I go first?”






Yes, please. And perhaps we should treat the journal as an old fashioned walkie talkie and write “over” when we finish writing.

Over






Oh, yes. That makes sense. I was going to ask how your search has fared.
Over.






I think we’re getting closer. Flash went to the city since he has a car. And he said he actually convinced one of the siren girls to help out over there. Wallflower Blush joined the search here in town (we never even noticed her following us). Spike’s not getting Sunset's scent anymore so we’re pretty sure we’ve cleared everything we can without risking trespassing charges. There were some strange lights to the southwest about half an hour ago so we think she might be in Ghastly Gorge. We’re waiting for the bus to take us that way now.
Over






Why on Ear multiple Earths would she be there?




After a moment of no replies, Rarity realized her omission.


Over





In Ghastly Gorge there’s little she could accidentally burn.
Over




Rarity sighed at that.



I see. Poor dear.
Over






Will it take you long to get to Twi?
Over






Hopefully just an hour or two.  However, if I remember correctly, didn't the two of you and Sunset discover that time is different in the two worlds. Didn’t you say this side runs twice as fast?
Over






It actually varies considerably due to the moon cycle in Equestria being manually controlled through magic instead of static like ours. Their moon cycle actually seems to control the time balance between the worlds. But it has been close to a fairly steady 2 to 1 ratio since the return of their Princess Luna. Their months are about twice as long as ours now. But that can change any time she wants it to.
Over




Rarity thought that over for a moment.



There are so many strange things in our lives these days.
Over






No kidding.
Hey, does Sweetie Belle have a driver’s license and access to your parents' van? That would make getting to Ghastly Gorge a lot easier.
Over




The thought nearly made Rarity drop her quill as if she had tweaked her horn.



Oh heavens no! She does have a learner's permit but I’ve seen her drive! Do not let her get behind a wheel no matter how much she begs!
Over!






But how is she going to learn?
Over






NO!
Over!!




A thought came to mind and Rarity quickly added to her last entry.



NO!
Over!! my potentially many dead bodies!
Her driving is almost as deadly as her cooking.
Such a thing should not be possible!
Over!!!






Alright. I might be able to get one of the principals instead. School is ending soon.
Over




Rarity sighed in relief but a moment later smiled mischievously.



How about Big McIntosh? I believe Wallflower may have a crush on him. She's a nice girl, and so shy. Let’s use this unfortunate situation to help her out. I suspect Sunset would like that.
Over






Half the girls in the school have a crush on him. But are you sure that includes Wallflower? Is this really the time for playing matchmaker?
Over






It’s always the time for playing matchmaker!
Over






Now you’re sounding like Cadance.
Over




Rarity hummed approvingly.



I believe like Cadance. And Wallflower's Blush was quite telling. She was certainly taken with someone on our adventure last week. If not Applejack's brother, then it had to be Applejack herself.




Rarity paused a moment, a smirk on her face, before continuing.



Unless it was you or Sunset.
Over




There was a suspicious pause before Twily replied. And was her handwriting a little less calm at first?



It must have been Mac then.
Over




Rarity's smirk turned dangerous for a moment before a shade of panic mixed into it.



Wait, she’s not reading this is she?
Over






Wallflower is reading a map right now.
I’ll text Big McIntosh. Class should end in a few minutes. I hope the principals don’t mind letting another student out for this since he does have only one more class.




Rarity flipped to the next page to see the rest of Twily’s message.



Over




Rarity breathed a little sigh of relief.



And I’ll rejoin the o




She stopped. Should she suggest joining the others now? The whole point in messaging Twily was to learn if they had gone home.

She crossed out what she wrote and tried again.



And I’ll rejoin the o
Anything else going on over there? Where are you right now?
Over




The next entry had different handwriting. Less exact and precise, but more flowing and flowery.



This is Wallflower. We’re at the bus stop. We were planning to ride as far south as possible and walk the rest of the way to Ghastly Gorge, but Twilight said she’s trying to get a ride. Over.






And it’s just the two of you?
Over






And Spike, and eventually whoever she’s texting. She won’t tell me. Over.




Rarity smiled.  Twily was safe and seemed calm, and none of their friends had contacted her via phone so she it was clear that they were still on the pony planet. Also, Wallflower clearly hadn't read about the matchmaking plan, so more good news there.



Splendid. Tell her I’ve learned how to use unicorn magic and will be bringing Sunset’s journal with me so we can write to each other anytime now. Doing it with hooves was simply not an option before.
Over






It’s still hard to believe this whole pony thing is real. Over.






I have 4 hooves, bright, white fur, a pair of saddlebags over my back, and a horn and tail growing out of me. It’s quite real.
Over






Maybe I can try it sometime. Over.






Once this is all over, perhaps you can. I believe you might enjoy it. Very green. Flowers and plant life everywhere.
Over






:-) Over.




Rarity chuckled at the handwritten emoji. Another message came in before she could reply.



And is it really "clothing optional" like Sunset said? Over.






Very, I'm afraid.
Over




There were several pauses in Wallflower's response.



Oh. Well, they are ponies after all. Over.






Yes, but thankfully there are plenty of options for those of us not into going au naturel. The Rarity of this world has THREE boutiques! Including in Manehattan! I'm wearing quite the wonderful number right now in fact! Made by the both of us!
Over






Oh, good. That makes it easier. Over.




Rarity chuckled again.



Don't worry, darling. Us Rarities will have you covered in any world. You need only ask.
Over






Thank you, Rarity Rarities. Over.






Anytime.
I’ll rejoin the others here and go after this world’s Twilight, now that we know where she is.
Over






OK. Take care. Over and out.




“Alright, then.” Rarity nodded resolutely and put the magic journal back in her saddlebags, tweaking her horn to get it to stay. “Twily is getting closer in her search, and so are we in ours. Now I just have to …” she frowned, “go back to waiting because I have no idea where the others are!  Perhaps this search isn't going so well.”
> 21 Rainbow Dash: "I'm a Pretty Pony"
> --------------------------------------------------------------------------

08:30 AM

“Rainbow Dash?”

“Ngh.”

“Rainbow!”

“Huh? Wha?”

Rainbow Dash opened her eyes, quickly shutting them in the bright room.

“Oh! I’ll turn the lights off!”

Once the room dimmed on the other side of Rainbow’s eyelids, she slowly opened them again. “Where am I?”

“The hospital.”

Rainbow turned her head toward the voice and saw a small, orange and purple pony with tiny wings. “Who are you?”

“Oh no! You didn’t lose your memories did you?!” The extra little pony turned to her side and pointed to her cute mark. “You remember me, right?”

Rainbow followed the hoof and gave the most appropriate commentary. “You have a shield on your butt.”

“Flank,” the pegasus corrected her.

“Same thing?”

“But you remember it, right?”

Rainbow snickered. “Butt.”

“Flank.”

“Butt.”

“Rainbow!" the extra little pony's voice insisted. "Do you remember my cutie mark?”

“Cute mark?”

“Cutie mark!”

“More like an awesome mark, right?”

The response was immediate. “Yeah! Totally awesome!”

The orange pegasus seemed to forget her surroundings and stared at the image on her butt for a moment, taking a step back to let it shine in the remaining light coming in from the window. Her eyes hazed over as she stared deeper. “It’s so awesome.”

Suddenly remembering the situation got the little pony to rejoin the rest of the world. “You remember it, right?”

Rainbow thought back. “Didn’t the Canterlot Movie Club add logos to their banner a few months ago? They were shields weren’t they? What do shields have to do with a movie club? Were they protecting movies? Oh, hey, this wingpony is orange and has purple hair.”

The little pony watched intently, almost making out the gears turning in Rainbow’s head.

“Scootaloo?” asked Rainbow.

“You remember me!” Scootaloo cheered, rushing forward and pulling Rainbow into a tight hug.

“Of course I remember you, squirt! How could I forget my biggest fan?”

“Are you alright?”

“Besides having difficulty breathing?” Rainbow choked out.

“Oops.” Scootaloo backed off and sat in a chair beside the bed while Rainbow sat up and flexed various joints.

“A little headache, and my nose feels a bit swollen. But I think I’m good. What happened and why am I a pony?”

Rainbow’s assessment had Scootaloo brightening up more and more … until the last few words. Those had her worried. “Uh … ‘why are you a pony’?”

“Yeah. The last thing I remember is—“ as Rainbow sat up further, she felt something shift behind her and looked at her back. “I have wings! Sweet!”

“Rainbow? Are you okay?”

“Okay? Why wouldn’t I be okay?” Rainbow said, reaching back to touch her feathers..

“I’m thinking of a few reasons right now.”

“Hey! What happened to my hands?!”

“And there’s another one,” Scootaloo said, watching Rainbow examine her hoof.

“Oh, never mind. Ponies don’t have hands. That makes sense,” Rainbow shrugged and lay back down contented.

“I’m glad it does for one of us.”

“Do I have a tail too?” Rainbow peeked under her blankets. “Yep, and I’m naked too. No gown?”

“It was just your head that you hit. It’s not like you needed surgery.”

“I hit my head?”

“With a sofa.”

“I hit my head with a sofa?” Rainbow felt her head with her hooves.

“Pretty hard, apparently.”

“Is that why I have wings now? How does that work?”

“You’re a pegasus pony.  Always have been, that's why you have wings.”

“Always? No way!” Rainbow looked back down at her hooves. “Couldn’t have been a pony Monday. I was rocking out in a guitar-only jam session in school with Applejack and Sunset. I had hands then.”

“Applejack and who?”

“Sunset Shim—wait.”

Scootaloo saw the gears turning a little faster this time.

“Whoa!” declared Rainbow. “I remember now. The portal, the wings, the clouds, the—“ she flinched, “sofa.”

“Portal?

“Oh no!" Rainbow shouted in alarm. "I’m in a pony hospital?”

“Yes?”

“I gotta get outta here before they dissect me!” Rainbow sat back up and shot the door a worried look.

“Dissect?!” Scootaloo's eyes went wide and she also turned to face the door.  "W-why would—?"

“Yeah, Sunset ended up in one of our hospitals once and we had to break her out before they realized she was an alien.”

“Alien?” Scootaloo turned back to Rainbow.

“Yeah. So, like, we split into three teams. Fluttershy and Applejack were the decoys, Rarity and Pinkie wore disguises and snuck Sunset around, and Big Mac and me were the getaway team.”

“Uh.” Scootaloo's eyes flicked side to side.

“Yeah, we had the whole security team and a bunch of doctors and Lab Coat after us!  I think he was some kind of scientist guy.”

“Wha—?”

“So how do we get out of here?”

Scootaloo blinked at her potentially mental mentor a few times then slowly turned to point at the window.

“Yeah? Sunset had a window too, but it was the third floor so it wasn’t like we could have just dropped her out ….” Rainbow looked back at her wings. “Wow. That makes things so much easier. I don’t even need to get dressed first! Come on, squirt!”

Quickly flinging off the blankets, Rainbow awkwardly got her four hooves under her and jumped down to the floor. “We’re getting out of here!”

She took a step forward. Then a second. Then found herself face down on the floor. “Oh, right. I haven’t learned how to walk yet.”

Out of sight behind her, Scootaloo’s jaw had dropped slightly, her head was tilted to the side, and her brow was crinkled up. She raised a foreleg, as if to ask a question. “Um, I, uh, what …?”

“But who needs to walk when we’ve got wings?”

Rainbow gave her wings a single flap strong enough to lift her in the air and easily covered the distance to the window.

Scootaloo shook her head in a last ditch effort to find sense within the past five minutes, gave up and filed them away in the same place as her Pinkie Pie memories, then trotted over to see Rainbow finishing her struggles to unlock and open the window.

Some more flapping and Rainbow was out the window and in a hover looking back in. “Whoo! Easiest hospital-jailbreak ever!”

Still inside, Scootaloo had jumped up and pulled herself onto the windowsill with her forelegs but stayed there, looking down at the ground two floors below them. “Uh.”

“Come on! We still gotta get out of here before the docs check in.”

“But I can’t. You know that.”

“Scootaloo, use those wings! Let’s go!” Rainbow made a come here gesture with a foreleg.

“But.”

“Flank.”

“I’m serious!”

“Me too. We got to go.”

With a look of great determination, Scootaloo, began flapping her wings and took a great leap out the third storey window.

She didn’t get far.


*** *** ***


08:40 AM

“You okay, Scoot?”

“Huh, what?” Scootaloo looked around, seeing that she and Rainbow Dash were just inside the treeline of a wooded area.

“You kinda fell, so I grabbed you,” Rainbow explained. “I mean your wings seem a little small, but I thought you’d be fine.”

“Small?! Rainbow Dash! How could you?”

“Huh, what?”

“You know I can’t fly!”

“You can’t fly? What, are you too young or something?”

Scootaloo looked up at her long time idol and quickly turned around to hide the tears that started to form. “Why are you acting like this? After how much I got picked on about it. Diamond and Silver have stopped but being a pegasus who can't fly still hurts.”

“Uh, sorry.” Rainbow attempted to back up a step, only to end up suddenly taking a seat on the ground. “I didn’t mean to tease you. I didn’t know.”

“How could you not know? We’ve been like sisters for years! Are you saying that putting your face through a sofa made you forget?”

“What, no. I didn’t forget. I’m … I’m, well, I'm not actually your Rainbow Dash.”

Scootaloo looked up, but didn’t turn around. “Ocellus?”

“What’s an oh-sell-us?”

Scootaloo dried her eyes and turned around to give Rainbow a critical eye. “So you smashed into a sofa and now you think you really are Rainbow Dash? Can that happen to changelings?”

“What’s a changeling?”

“Okay." Scootaloo sniffed. "We’re going back to the hospital. But you’re not off the hook about getting me to jump out a window!”

“We can’t go back to the hospital. If they did blood tests or something they might realize I’m not a pony.”

Scootaloo pointed a hoof toward Rainbow's face.  “So you admit you know you’re a changeling.”

“No, I’m not a whatever that is. I’m just not a pony. Normally. I was changed into one earlier today.”

“Huh? How?" Scootaloo scratched her head. "Starlight and Twilight are out of town. Trixie? That can't be right. She just does teacups.”

“There’s a Trixie here too? Let me guess; is she a unicorn?”

“Okay. Who are you really?”

“I’m Rainbow Dash!" Rainbow brought up her forelegs and tapped her chest to stress the point. "Just not your Rainbow Dash. I came here from another world through a portal in Twi’s palace.”

“Really?”

“Really.”

“Huh.” Scootaloo mulled that over. “Well, I guess I’ve seen weirder things. Especially involving Twilight's palace.  So, how did you know my name?”

“There’s a Scootaloo in my world too. And a Trixie … unfortunately.”

“Can that Scootaloo fly?”

“She doesn’t have wings.”

Scootaloo gasped. “That’s horrible!”

“No, no, no. I don’t normally have wings either.”

“What!? No! I can’t even imagine that!”

“We’re not ponies in my world, we’re humanes.”

Scootaloo blinked. “Those things that Lyra keeps talking about?”

“Huh?”

“Furless minotaurs.”

“I’m not sure what that is.”

“Two legs, hands instead of hooves on their forelegs, no wings, horns, or magic.”

“Okay. With no fur and no tail that kinda fits.”

Scootaloo pulled her tail in close and hugged it. “No tail? Eww.”

Rainbow shrugged. “Just more to brush, right?”

Scootaloo sat down on her haunches, taking a moment to shift through it all. “So she can’t fly either, but that’s actually normal for the kind of creature she is? She’s not … different?”

“Right," Rainbow nodded but then thought for a moment. "Though, now that I think about it, she does kinda has a bit of a limp. Something with her knee I think? Hip? She doesn’t really talk about it.”

Scootaloo sucked in a breath and let her head drop, prompting Rainbow to quickly attempt to add a remedy.

“She’s actually the fastest kid I know.”

“Really?” Scootaloo looked up, eyes filling with hope.

“Yeah, with that scooter she always has. She can pull some pretty sick tricks too. She’s awesome in the skate park. Teaches even me a thing or two sometimes.”

Scootaloo jumped to her hooves. “I have a scooter too! I use my wings to speed me up! Nopony’s faster than me. Except for you.” Scootaloo fluttered her wings as evidence, making a buzzing sound.

“Yeah! Now you’re talking!”

“So are you faster than our Rainbow Dash?”

“Ha! Of course I’m faster. I run so fast I’m a blur. Literally!”

“Can you show me?!”

Rainbow cringed and scratched the back of her head. “Well, I’m not really sure how to run with four legs and hooves. Not a pony, remember?”

“Oh, right.”

“I can fly though!”

“But I thought you don’t have wings as a minotaur.”

“Humane.”

Scootaloo's tail twitched when she thought back to the idea of such tailless creatures. “Yeah, that.”

“Yeah, so I don’t usually have wings, but after Twi and Sunset did some crazy magic in my world I can grow them anytime I do something that’s extra awesome! And then the geode I got at Camp Everfree gives me super speed which even works with my wings out!”

“Awesome!” Scootaloo's wings pomfed out in excitement.

“I know!”

“So can you do a rainboom?”

“Do a—?" Rainbow frowned. "Hey, the Rainbooms and I don’t have that kind of—are you old enough to be talking about this?”

“What?”

“I don't think you're old enough to be hearing these kinds of rumors. Even if they are fake. Which they are!”

“Huh? I just want to know if you can pull off a rainboom.”

Rainbow blushed. “I'm not pulling off—Nope! Not talking about this!”

“But, it’s like our Rainbow’s signature flying stunt. One of them anyway, she’s got a lot.”

“Oh. It’s a—that makes more sense" Rainbow scratched her chin, a smile growing on her face. "Signature stunt, eh?  Hmm. Meaning if I do better than her at it, I win? Tell me more.”


*** *** ***


09:40 AM

“What do you mean ‘she’s faster than that’?!” an exasperated and exhausted Rainbow Dash asked between pants.

“Well, she is,” answered Scootaloo.

“But we’re supposed to be physically identical. I mean, well, the Twilights have different hair and Twily has glasses, but they look the same otherwise.”

Scootaloo thought on that.  “But our Rainbow has had wings all her life. She knows everything there is to know about her wings and flying. You just got them today. You gotta know how to use them right. Right?”

“You mean I gotta study, like, aerodynamics and angles and wind resistance and weight to speed ratios and all sorts of other math?”

“Kinda, yeah.”

“Aw come on!" Rainbow groaned. "That’s turning flying into homework! You're supposed to just feel the wind on your feathers and stuff! You know, just listen to them tell you that stuff!”

Scootaloo tilted her head. "Feathers don't talk."

"Well, not literally!"

“I’ve seen Twilight help her out with the math and physics stuff sometimes, now that she has wings too. Pony Rainbow got even faster after that.”

“She’s got more practice and she’s got an egghead doing her homework?! That’s totally cheating! There’s gotta be a way to get faster today. Even the odds.”

“Well,” Scootaloo began, a sheepish look on her face, “I might know a way.”

“Whatever it is, let’s do it!”


*** *** ***


09:55 AM

“And you said you’ve done this before?” Rainbow Dash asked, narrowly forcing the warble out of her voice.

“Yea, we do stuff like this all the time,” answered Scootaloo.

“ ’We’?”

“The Cutie Mark Crusaders.”

“Who?”

“Me, Apple Bloom, and Sweetie Belle. They aren’t the Crusaders in your world?”

“Oh, they’re the Canterlot Movie Club back home." Rainbow blinked "Hey! Same initials.”

“They’re just a movie club? What about cutie marks?”

“We call them dream signs. We just kinda dream them up while we sleep and then put them on stuff we own.”

“That’s it? But, but—“

“Flank, flank,” Rainbow continued the gag.

“—But, we, everything, all that—Really? It’s that easy?”

“I don’t know about easy. They just happen when they happen. Happens to everyone eventually, we just never know when that will be.”

Rainbow continued while Scootaloo sat, looking a bit dazed. “I got mine years ago when I realized how awesome I was at, you know, everything; like sports and racing, and standing up for my friends. It was the night after some bullies were picking on my world’s Fluttershy. I totally wupped their sorry butts—“

“Flanks?”

“—In a race so hard that it just showed up in my dream like it was a part of me. Actually, Fluttershy got her dream the same night. Said she had run off during the race, got lost, and followed a field of butterflies back to town.”

“That sounds like how our Dash and Fluttershy got their cutie marks.”

“Neat.” Rainbow shrugged.

“How’d I—I mean other me get hers?”

“I don’t know how, but all three of the Movie Club members got them the same day a little before the Friendship Games.”

“The what?”

“Oh it’s a school thing. We were totally awesome at it this time. I’ll have to tell you all about it later.”

“Yeah!" Scootaloo hopped in place. "I can’t believe I actually know two Rainbow Dashes!”

“And you’re going to help me be faster than her in both worlds instead of just in mine. Because I’m totally faster than her in mine already!”

“I can’t wait to see you two together. You totally have to race each other!”

“You bet we will!”

“Yeah!” Scootaloo cheered and shot a hoof toward Rainbow and held it there.

Rainbow looked at it, then at one of her own. “Am I supposed to shake it?”

“Hoof bump!” Informed Scootaloo.

“Oh! Like this?” Rainbow mimicked Scootaloo’s gesture and bumped her hoof to hers.

“Yeah!” Scootaloo cheered louder.

“Ha ha,” Rainbow chuckled.

Then Rainbow looked back at their project. “… So, you’re sure this is a good idea?”

“Ponies ask us that all the time,” Scootaloo answered nonchalantly.

“And?”

“Well,” Scootaloo shrugged, “It’s not like that’s ever stopped you either.”

Rainbow stopped a moment then nodded. “True.”

“Yeah?”

“Yeah. Let’s do this!”

The pair of ponies traveled away from the pair of wood posts in the ground. Scootaloo trotted, Rainbow drifted in a hover, still not trusting her legs for graceful mobility.

“But—“ Rainbow started.

“Flank!”

“Is that gag getting old yet?”

“Nope,” Scootaloo answered with a slight chuckle.

“Good. Anyway. But since the three of you can’t fly, have you really done this before?”

“Not quite this But—“

“Flank.”

“—I’ve done this with a giant ramp to get to Cloudsdale.” Scootaloo pointed to a faraway mass of clouds that looked oddly like a city skyline.

Turning to look, Rainbow dropped her jaw a moment. “Cloudsdale? That’s Cloudsdale? That looks like a—like a city made of clouds?”

“What else would it be with a name like Cloudsdale?”

“In my world it’s just a suburb full of skyscrapers, and it’s next to a valley. You know. A dale.”

“So the buildings touch the sky or clouds?”

“Neither, well not literally. Clouds are way higher up in my world. Like miles high.”

“Wow." Scootaloo looked straight up. "Must make it hard for your weather teams to move them around.

Rainbow looked down at Scootaloo with a quizzical expression and considered asking for clarification but her rising impatience with not moving fast had caught up with her. “You know, this is cool and all, but if we keep comparing worlds we’ll never get this thing going.”

“Oh, right! So, anyway, when I did this, Cloudsdale was right above Ponyville—“

“Ponyville?”

“That’s where we are now.”

“Oh.”

“So since all I needed was altitude. So I had the ramp pointed straight up and had Apple Bloom and Sweetie Belle launch me with this giant slingshot!”

“But since I need speed,” Rainbow cringed having admitted to being even the tiniest bit less than awesome at something involving moving fast, “we have the slingshot running down this big hill leading to the edge of a cliff.”

“Right! You’ll ride one of my scooters down the hill, picking up speed with your wings out as the slingshot forces you over the edge of the cliff. Once you’re airborne just keep flapping and doing your Rainbow Dash stuff while aiming for the ground, like at a forty-something degree angle to keep going even faster! Then just keep going until you get that rainboom and pull up really hard. Now that’s physics!”

“Yeah! Take that Twilights and Sunset! We’re doing math stuff without your help.”

Rainbow’s face was full of cocky confidence until Rainbow’s brain remembered the results of her last math test.

“Say, Scootaloo,” Rainbow asked nonchalantly, “what do you normally get on your math tests?”

“Math tests? I got a B on the last one.”

Rainbow wiped her forehead in relief with a surprisingly natural-feeling swipe with her wing as Scootaloo continued.

“But I usually get C’s.”

With a gulp, Rainbow looked down at the very taut and slightly vibrating slingshot straps surrounding her on three sides, the edge of the cliff at the bottom of the hill at least fifty feet away, and the scooter she had one hoof on. “You don’t say.”

“Ready?” Scootaloo shouted with her hoof poised to release the slingshot.

“Uh, actually ….”

“What?” Scootaloo leaned in to listen to Rainbow’s suddenly quieter voice causing her hoof to push into the lever holding the slingshot band and releasing it.

Rainbow clung tightly to the scooter when the strap slammed into her backside and propelled her down the deep slope.

As she saw the cliff edge approaching she had only one comment.

“Meep.”

Fluttershy would be proud.
> 22 Pinkie Pie: "Pinker, Party, Pinkie, Pie"
> --------------------------------------------------------------------------

07:08 AM

“WHHEEEEEEEEEEEEE!” cheered Pinkie all the way down the long slide, eventually finding herself thumping to a halt at the bottom in a … well, she had no idea. She couldn’t see anything.

It was just like during the slide. After Number Twenty-Six told her to pronk into that little group of trees, lift up that fake branch, and jump into the hole it was covering, she had spent the majority of the rollercoaster-like slide ride in near blackness.

“Wow, Twenty-Six, you were right about that slide, that was a super fun shortcut to wherever this is! But are you sure it was okay to leave Lyra up there? Number Twelve said it looked like she really wanted to talk to us, or maybe just me. Or both. And she tried really hard to keep up without us noticing, just seems mean not to invite her down the slide.”

In the total darkness it didn’t matter but Pinkie looked up at her forehead. “What’s that? It’s a secret? Which part? The slide or this place? Because the slide was awesome! All those ups and downs and loop-de-loops and—Where are we again? I can’t see a thing. There’s a what? Aardvark noodles? Which way?”

Pinkie stood and began blindly following the voices around the … wherever place she was in.

“Two steps forward! Right turn! One step back! Wait. One step forward? So, now it’s two. What? Okay, left turn and two steps forward. That was my other left! OW! Oh! You meant that other left! Okay, reverse! One and a half steps back, the other, other left, then two steps forward and now tongue flick?”

And then there was light.

In the room.

“It’s more like a cave I think. … Oh! Thirty-Two, you’re right. Due to the speleothems growing from the ceiling, it is more of a cavern than a cave! That’s smart of you. Maud would be impressed. I should introduce you to her if I can ever find a way to get you out of my head so you can talk to each other.”

Finally taking a good look around the cavern, Pinkie noticed filing cabinets, streamers, balloons, disco-balls, wrapped presents, cakes, party hats, lollipops, gumdrops, party poppers, muffins, cupcakes, plates, ribbons, paper whistles, cotton candy, wrapping paper, empty gift boxes, confetti, candy canes, and all sorts of other party planning stuff.

“It’s pony Pinkie Pie’s party planning cave-a-palooza! I mean pony Pinkie Pie’s party planning cavern-a-palooza!”

Pinkie immediately took care of priority number one.

“Mmm, that’s a good cupcake. Now for priority number two! What’s in those cabinets?”

Turning to the nearest and opening a random drawer, by playing Eeny, meeny, miny, moe on it, then pulling with her tongue, revealed a long series of file folders labeled with the names of various people. In the folders were details of all the kinds of things each person liked and disliked for the purpose of planning the parties for them.

“This is just like my super-duper party planning Pinkie Drive back home, but old-school!” She glanced at her forehead. “I know it’s called a thumb drive, but I’m Pinkie Pie so I painted it pink to make it a pink thumb drive and just call it my Pinkie Drive for short. I keep it safe in my party planning closet with all my supplies!”

Pinkie gasped. “Pony Trixie was right! I have all the supplies I need now for my Hi-My-Name-is-Pinkie-Pie-and-I’m-New-in-Town-Even-Though-I-Probably-Look-Just-Like-Someone-Else-You-Know-Who-is-Also-Named-Pinkie-Pie-But-I-Want-to-be-Your-Friend-Too-Party! But now that I have all this info, I need to read up on the pony versions of my friends to make sure they don’t happen to dislike different things that their humane versions like. It’d be awful if I set up a whole corner for Twi-Twi only to find out she’s scared of ladybug-shaped pancakes instead of firefly-shaped quesadillas or something silly like that.”

Pinkie did a quick spin, counting all the filing cabinets, and took a deep breath, her eyes bugging out slightly. “I. Must. Read. Everything!"

She stopped and giggled. "Wow, I wonder how many times the Twilights have said that.”

She then opened the first folder and began to read. “Just call me Pinkie Party-Egghead Pie!”


*** *** ***


09:15 AM

“Heh, heh, heh! Bwahahaha!” Pinkie laughed darkly, her face in shadow from the overhang of her mane and the folder she held below her muzzle. “And now I know just as much about the ponies, dragons, donkeys, cows, griffins, yaks, changelings, seaponies-slash-hippogriffs, and other assorted creatures in and around this town as my pony person does! Mouhahahaaaa!”

Suddenly the smirk on her face turned to a bright smile as light seemed to filter in on her face from no discernible source. “Or at least I know everything I need to throw them all the best Hi-My-Name-is-Pinkie-Pie-and-I’m-New-in-Town-Even-Though-I-Probably-Look-Just-Like-Someone-Else-You-Know-Who-is-Also-Named-Pinkie-Pie-But-I-Want-to-be-Your-Friend-Too-Party ever!”

A glance and an annoyed glare was shot up to her forehead. “No thanks to all of you up there! You know how hard it is to read with thirty-six, five halves, and three quarters of you voices all mumbling and stuff in your heads?” A slight pause. “Yeah, that’s what I thought! Do any of you even have heads? You’re all getting loud again too. Pipe down!”

Pinkie returned to the folder in her hooves. “Oh, hey. How am I holding this thing in my hooves? I don’t have fingers.” At this, the folder simply dropped to the floor.

After a shrug, Pinkie slapped her head onto the floor and stood back up, the folder sticking to her mane. She then nodded quickly to the opened cabinet drawer to flip the folder inside, perfectly adhering to its established alphabetical order. “That’s better.”

With a determined smile of epic proportions, Pinkie turned to face the party cavern’s main slide and began marching forward. “It’s time, fellas and gals. Time to …,” she stopped. “Um, time to find out where this big slide leads to I guess. Gotta get back to town and pick a location for the party, and make sure ponies will show up, and make sure one of those ponies is Twi.”

The march turned into a few pronks, the last of which placed Pinkie on the end of the slide where she waited patiently.

For five seconds.

“Has it really been five seconds already? So how do I start this thing?”

Looking for buttons revealed none so Pinkie tested a hunch. “Mush!” she shouted to the voices and she began to rise up the slide.

“Wait! Take me back down, voices!”

Pinkie dropped back to the floor of the cavern, after flipping backward off the end of the slide, marched to the light switch, and flicked it off. “Forgot to turn off the light.”

With the cavern very cavernous in the darkness, Pinkie marched back to the slide, stubbing a hoof in the process.

“Ouch! This place could really use some motion sensitive lighting.”

Resuming her march got her back onto the slide. Making a request to the voices to send her back up restarted her ascent.

“Thanks again, Nineteen!”

The slide took her up through a trapdoor, that thankfully opened for her, and into a very colorful bedroom.

“Hey, whose bedroom is this? Uh, oh, am I breaking and entering again? … What’s that, voices? … Oohhh! This is Pony Pinkie’s bedroom? It’s so perfectly Pinkie! And so perfectly Pie! I love it! I guess this is my house! Whew! No new lawsuits.”

Pinkie gasped upon seeing a small, green lizard standing next to what might be the recently pressed button controlling the trap door that let Pinkie into the room. “What is that? Is that …? Are you …? Gummy?!”

The lizard blinked its left eye.

“Oh, Gummy! It is you!.”

Pinkie rushed over, scooped the lizard into her forelegs, did a sideways barrel-roll, tossing Gummy high into the air, landed supine on pony Pinkie’s bed, and caught Gummy on his way back down.

Completely unfazed, Gummy blinked his right eye. And then his left.

“You’re alive! I mean, like, for real!”

Giggling, Pinkie attempted to tickle Gummy under his chin only for Gummy to trap her hoof between his toothless gums.

“Hehehehehe! That tickles, Gummy. Say, what’s it like being alive compared to being a stuffed animal?”

Gummy blinked his left eye. Then his right. And then both together.

“Hmmm. Figuring you out is going to be like the voices, huh? Wait! Are you one of the voices?! That would explain so much! For the past hour or so, while I was in my private party planning cavern, I’ve been hungry for raw muskrat and deer and I don’t think those are cupcake flavors. And now I really want to lick Rainbow Dash’s wings for some reason.”

Gummy blinked his right eye. And then his left.

“What do you mean, ‘old joke'?”

Gummy blinked his right eye twice. And then his left.

“I don’t know what that means.”

Gummy blinked his left eye twice. And then his right.

“You’re right, Gummy! There’s not enough time! I have a party to pop! I have supplies, personal knowledge of the ponies and other creatures in town, now I need to scout a location, and I still need to finish inviting every pony in town, especially Twi since she’s the reason we all came here!”

Gummy didn’t blink.

Pinkie hugged her pony’s lizard tightly. “You’re such a smart alligator, and so selfless! I promise you’ll be invited too!  Oh!. And make sure you invite every pony you see!”

Giving Gummy a little toss into the air, Pinkie rolled off the bed and marched down the stairs before Gummy bounced onto the mattress.

Gummy blinked his right eye. And then licked his left twice.

Down one flight of stairs, Pinkie found herself in a hallway and continued down another flight to find herself in a—

“Totally the most amazing, wonderful, delicious-smelling, fantastic, delightful, spectacular, yum-a-rific bakery I’ve ever seen!”

“Why, thank you, Pinkie,” said a kind voice.

“Oh, you’re welcome, newest voice that sounds very familiar and oddly coherent compared to the other new voices in my head today.”

“Pinkie?” asked the voice. “Over here, dear.”

“Wow, new voice! You made it out of my head! That’s great! I can start inviting you to parties and introducing you to my friends!”

“Pinkie? Please just turn around.”

“Sure thing, Number Forty-One,” Pinkie said while turning around.

“I’m actually—"the voice cleared its throat—"still thirty-nine, dear. Don’t you remember? You do plan my birthday parties.”

Finally locating the source of the voice, Pinkie exclaimed, “Mrs. Cake! It’s you! How did you get to be one of my voices?”

“Um. ‘Voices’, dear?

“I got a bunch of new ones now! They’ve been talking to me all day!”

“They’ve been talking to you … in your head?”

“Yup! Loud and unclear! Sometimes very loud.”

Mrs. Cake looked around a bit uneasily. “Are you …? You know what? Never mind. I’ve learned not to ask that question.”

“What question?”

“Oh, nothing, dear. Though, I am surprised to see you. You told me you’d be in Canterlot for at least a week. Baked up quite a storm the other night before you left so we’d have extra stock while we’d be short a quad of hooves.”

“I’m in Canterlot right now?”

"Well," Mrs. Cake pointed a hoof at Pinkie. “Apparently not? I can see you right there.”

Pinkie let her smile fade slightly. “But I can't see me. That means I can’t meet pony me today.”

Not missing a beat, Mrs. Cake kept right on through that, “If you say so, dear.”

“Oh, by the way; I’m Pinkie Pie!”

That one gave her pause. Mrs.’s Cake’s eyes flicked side to side then back to Pinkie. “Uh, yes? I know. We’ve known you for years. You’re our tenant and employee.”

“No, no, you’re thinking of pony me. She’s apparently in Canterlot, because you told me that, which is too bad because I really wanted to meet her. I’m a different Pinkie Pie. I just came to town today and I want to invite every pony in town to my Hi-My-Name-is-Pinkie-Pie-and-I’m-New-in-Town-Even-Though-I-Probably-Look-Just-Like-Someone-Else-You-Know-Who-is-Also-Named-Pinkie-Pie-But-I-Want-to-be-Your-Friend-Too-Party!”

Mrs. Cake stared back at Pinkie. She blinked twice. “Okay. Just let me know where, when, and what to bring.”

“Thanks, Mrs. Cake! I’ll let you know as soon as I do! I have more ponies to invite and I need to pick a location!”

Back in stride, Mrs. Cake rolled on through, “If you’re inviting the whole town, it would be best to have it at Twilight’s palace, the marketplace, or Sweet Apple Acres.”

“Oohh! Thanks for the insight! How about the marketplace but near Twi’s palace? Like right out front.”

“What time?” Mrs. Cake walked to a counter and pulled over a notepad and pencil.

“Oh, dear. I should have asked Trixie when her show was. I promised to not do them at the same time. And I have to do it soon because I need to get back to my world and help a friend who kinda grew bat wings again. But I also haven’t invited many ponies yet because I’ve been learning where everything is and how to walk and make sense of all these new voices. I really don’t know when to set the party.”

“Don’t worry, dear. Trixie's party is in the evening and I can make advertisements to say the party be will outside the palace when the bell-tower rings. Ponies can hear it around the whole town.”

“Will that work?” Pinkie bounced on her hooves.

“We’ve done that before. That is, with … ‘pony Pinkie’? Turnout will be lower, at least early on, but at this way everypony will know there'll be an event.”

“Perfect! I’ll go and invite more ponies! You’re the best in both worlds, Mrs. Cake!”

Pinkie rushed up to her pony counterpart’s friend, landlady, and employer and gave her a big hug which the older mare returned.

“Take it easy out there, Pinkie. Try not to get too hyper today.”

“Who, me?” Pinkie laughed her way out the door.

In the silence the followed Pinkie’s departure, Mrs. Cake took a slow, deep breath.

She looked around at the roughly thirteen customers who had been perusing her shop’s wares before Pinkie’s appearance. They were all looking back at her and at each other. She walked to the service bell on the counter and rung it three times loud and clear.

A moment later Mr. Cake appeared. “What is it, Cupcake?”

“Carrot, Pinkie’s off her meds.”

Several ponies, fearing the worst, ducked under nearby tables.


*** *** ***


09:30 AM

Outside, Pinkie dashed into the street and took in her surroundings.

The marketplace.

One building looked like a gingerbread house with a giant cupcake on top and she salivated, thinking how delicious it—

“Oh wait, that’s the building I just came out of! Silly me. It’s not delicious at all. Wood, paint, plaster, and straw bricks aren’t edible after all. I’ve tested them plenty of times.”

So she looked around further. Vegetable stands, florists, restaurants, a bank, a—

“Is that?! …” Pinkie pronked over to a shop with a wonderfully sensible sign and a large pile of sofas outside. It appeared an earth pony male with pale amber fur, dark hair, and a dapper blue dress shirt was cleaning up and arranging the sofas onto a cart, except for one with a hole in the back. She quickly moved right up to him with wide, starry eyes.

“Ooooh, a shop just for quills and sofas? That’s a great idea! It’s like a shop for setting up your own comfy writing desks! Get a nice sofa and quills and ink and parchment, and you got yourself a nice, little, cozy place to relax back on and take notes, or write a letter, or do your homework! Oh, wait. Scratch that last one, homework is rarely ever relaxing no matter where you do it. He he, unless your name happens to be Twilight or Sunset. Am I right? Although, having a nice, little, cozy place to relax back on can still improve the whole homework experience at least a little for the rest of us. I almost always do my homework while on my giant, inflatable doughnuts or my giant, inflatable cookie chair or my giant, inflatable balloon mattress—my sisters usually sit on rocks, especially Maud—. How’d you ever come up with such a great combination shop? Did you have, like, a long lost twin brother raised in some far off country by a quill farmer who grew up and traveled the world selling only the best quills door-to-door while you grew up the son of a simple sofa salespony here in town who just happened, during a rare vacation abroad when a freak storm blew your airship off course to crash land on an island that didn’t have any people OR desserts on it because it was a deserted island rather than a desserted island, find your brother there because he was on another airship that also crash-landed there a week earlier and you noticed he looked just like you when you tried to sell him a comfy sofa that survived the crash at the same time he tried to sell you a set of writing quills to write S.O.S. letters to put in bottles to throw into the ocean with to try and get rescued, and then you actually got rescued a month later when a regular watership crash-landed on that very same island and you all got together to create a new, giant ship from the salvageable pieces of the three ships that crashed and you finally got back home and invited your twin brother to join you in your sofa shop to make it a quills and sofa shop?!”

“Pinkie,” said the owner of the shop, “I’m the one who told you that story.”

“Really? So that’s why it sounded familiar!”

“Always did wonder why my cutie mark was a sofa and a quill." The shop owner scratched his chin. "Always thought it meant I should work with feather-filled sofas until I found I had a twin with the same mark.”

“Hey! How are Little Buddy and the Skipper too?”

The shop owner smiled. “Oh, they still send us letters from time to time. They’re doing quite well with their resort on that island. They have a nice ship repair service now too since so many of them keep crashing there. Good business being so close to the Bermuda Horseshoe.”

“So, if you’ve told me that story before, but we’ve never actually met, are you one of my voices?”

“One of your—Pinkie, we’ve known each other for years.”

“Actually, you’re thinking of pony Pinkie. I’m a different Pinkie Pie. I just came to town today and I want to invite every pony in town to my Hi-My-Name-is-Pinkie-Pie-and-I’m-New-in-Town-Even-Though-I-Probably-Look-Just-Like-Someone-Else-You-Know-Who-is-Also-Named-Pinkie-Pie-But-I-Want-to-be-Your-Friend-Too-Party!”

The shop owner looked back at Pinkie.

For more than a few seconds.

“… Right,” he finally said, plainly.

“Yup,” Pinkie agreed.

“And there’s just two of you this time? No more?”

“Well, Sunset and the Twilights said, in theory, there’s an infinite number of worlds that could have other Pinkies on them, but—“

A sudden breeze stopped pinkie and she looked around the empty marketplace. “Hey, where’d everybody go?”


*** *** ***


10:00 AM

“And then I looked around and no one was there! Isn’t that so strange?”

“YEAH!”

“Yeah!” Pinkie agreed with the large, exuberant, white stallion. "I mean, seriously. And it happened three times around town! Ponies just—poof—gone.” She looked around at her audience back in the park. Bulk Biceps was beside her where he had been pushing a cart, Cloudchaser and Amethyst Star foalsat Dinky; further away, Caramel and his date were on a picnic blanket and some parents watched their foals play in the playground.

Cloudchaser leaned in toward Amethyst and whispered in her ear. “Pinkie seems off today.”

“Pinkie always seems off,” whispered back Amethyst, “especially when she’s on.”

“I just want to invite everybody to my,” Pinkie took a breath, “Hi-My-Name-is-Pinkie-Pie-and-I’m-New-in-Town-Even-Though-I-Probably-Look-Just-Like-Someone-Else-You-Know-Who-is-Also-Named-Pinkie-Pie-But-I-Want-to-be-Your-Friend-Too-Party! Why is this so hard?”

Cloudchaser and Amethyst shot each other raised eyebrows. “Should we be worried?” asked Cloudchaser.

“It’s just Pinkie being Pinkie. She’s just a little extra ‘Pinkie’ today is all.”

“YEAH!” agreed Bulk with full volume after catching the whispered conversation.

“I just don’t get it,” Pinkie continued unawares. “I mean, was it something I said? I’ve just been telling ponies how I’m not the Pinkie they already know, but a different Pinkie from an alien world and I just want to make friends here.”

“Sounds like she’s being more than just a little extra Pinkie,” whispered Cloudchaser.

“Okay, it is a little odd for her,” Amethyst conceded.

“YEAH!” Bulk added.

“So far, the longest conversations I’ve had in this world have been with the voices in my head.”

“The what now?” startled Amethyst, catching a glance from Cloudchaser.

“YEAH?” Bulk asked with a slight warble to his roar.

“The voices!” Pinkie explained bonking a hoof against her head. “I got almost fifty in there now. And I’m still getting new ones.”

“In your head?” asked Cloudchaser.

“Y-YEAH?” Bulk distressed.

“Yeah!” agreed Pinkie. “They’re really hard to understand but some of them have been helping out and telling me things about this world and what to do.”

“You have voices in your head telling you what to do?” Amethyst’s tail flicked with worry.

“Uh, YEAH?” Bulk squirmed.

“YEAH!” answered Pinkie. “Not a new thing really. I’ve always had the one, I just have at least fifty more now. And they can get pretty loud. Hurts my brain sometimes.” She bonked the side of her head with a hoof a few more times.

“Oh! That’s uh,” began Cloudchaser.

“Unfortunate?” added Amethyst.

“YEAH!” Bulk concurred.

“So, uh,” Cloudchaser glanced to Amethyst while standing up.

“Yeah! Uh, yes,” Amethyst picked up, also standing. “Maybe you should get some aspirin or something. Heat week’s coming up soon; don’t want to have a headache on top of that!”

The two mares turned and ushered their charge toward the playground. “Good luck with your party,” called back Cloudchaser.

“YEAH!” Bulk helped.

“But you’ll come, right?” Pinkie asked.

“Oh, oh sure. We’ll try, might have some, uh … laundry to do first though,” Cloudchaser squeaked.

“YEAH!” Bulk waved the three goodbye.

“Okay!” Pinkie cheered over the whole park. “But make sure you invite other ponies too. Oh, and Twi! We need to talk her up and take her out on top of inviting her to party down!”

“YEAH!” Bulk added again.

“You can say things other than ‘YEAH’ right, Bulky?” asked Pinkie.

“YEAH!” Bulk answered truthfully and it was a moment before he thought to prove it. “Uh, you want a massage or some cinnamon nuts?”

“YEAH! Gimme your nuts!” cheered Pinkie.

Halfway across the park, once distant enough from Pinkie, and still making way toward the playground, Cloudchaser and Amethyst continued their whispered commentary.

“You still think that’s just Pinkie being a little extra Pinkie?” asked Cloudchaser.

“You think we should call somepony?” Replied Amethyst.

“Well, it is Pinkie. She has all sorts of varying levels of weirdness from week to week.”

“Yes, but she’s never been dangerous.”

“No, never.”

“I’m sure everything’s fine.”

“Though,” Cloudchaser put a hoof to her chin while still walking on the other three. “The flower trio were screaming about changelings earlier.”

“What?! But we’re friends with changelings now. They weren’t in those hazmat suits were they?”

“They were.”

“Great,” sighed Amethyst. “Full panic mode.”

“Yeah, totally overreacting.”

“Exactly!”

“It’s just Pinkie!”

“Being Pinkie!”

“Nothing to worry about.”

The two mares chuckled, finally reaching the edge of the playground only to hear Pinkie’s voice behind them.

“HEY, AMETHYST!” Pinkie shouted across the whole park. “CAN I LICK YOUR HORN?! OH! AND DINKY’S TOO? I GOTTA KNOW WHAT THEY TASTE LIKE!”

The three ponies stopped, as well as most of the parents around the park. Dinky looked up at her horn, and then at her two foalsitters. “Why would she want to do that?”

A magenta glow appeared around Amethyst’s horn and lifted Dinky onto Cloudchaser’s back. “Take Dinky home. I’ll go to the donut shop and get the sheriff,” rushed Amethyst.

“Hold on, Dinky!” Cloudchaser called, taking flight.

Once the three were gone, a confused Pinkie Pie turned to Bulk Biceps. “Huh. Any idea what’s gotten into them?”

“YEA—! Uh ….” Bulk halted his reply and considered his answer.

He didn’t get very far, however, before an explosion of sound and rainbow light spread out over the whole town in a thick ring.

“THIS IS AWESOME!” cried a bluish blur that might may have been a pegasus pony of some kind, though it was moving much too fast to tell.

“Oh, hi-Rainbow-Dash!-Bye-Rainbow-Dash!” cheered Pinkie as the blur passed overhead.   "Oh, wait! You want some nuts?!"
> 23 Friendship is: "Getting (some of) the Band Back Together"
> --------------------------------------------------------------------------

09:35 AM

Rarity cleaned.

Rarity checked the foyer.

Rarity revisited the palace’s highest balcony to look over the town again.

Rarity—heard ponies screaming.

“”CHANGELING! Help!””

Rarity looked over the railing toward the noise.

“My goodness, what was that all about?”

Rarity saw what appeared to be three ponies in garish garb. “Hazmat suits? What is—? Applejack?!”

In the distance, watching the three hazmat ponies scamper away was a pony with a familiar color scheme and an unmistakable hat.

She watched as Applejack just seemed to stare for a bit until the ponies had run some distance from her, then turned around nervously as if expecting to be followed. Seemingly relieved that she wasn't, Applejack toward the palace.

“Applejack!” Rarity shouted and rushed inside and down the stairs toward the foyer. She was just close enough to hear when Applejack opened the door and entered.

“Hello?” Applejack called. “Anybody here? Anybody know what a changeling is? Some frightened ponies seem to think there are some in town or something. Ah’m guessing it weren’t a good thing.”

“Darling!” Rarity answered, still working her way down the stairs. “I’m here! I’m here!”

“Rarity?!” Applejack rushed forward to the stairs, meeting Rarity part way up. “You’re a sight for sore eyes!”

“And so are you! I’ve been so worried!”

Meeting together, Rarity reached a forehoof up and around Applejack’s withers to pull her into a hug. Applejack copied the motion.

And they both lost their balance on their remaining legs.

With each holding one foreleg in the air and their overall forward momentum, they crashed into each other.

Lips first.

“Mmmn?”

“Mmph!”

Off balance, surprised, and on a staircase, they toppled over.

After bouncing down a few steps, the two new ponies ended up in a situation similar to how they began their time as ponies, except this time Rarity was on top and both of them could see everything.

Also, neither of them had thought to end the kiss.

They stared at each other’s eyes, unchanged from their journey through the portal.

Until Rarity had to breathe.

With a loud gasp, Rarity pushed, lifting herself up off her longtime friend and stumbled to the side.

She heard Applejack behind her slowly get her four hooves under her and stand.

Blushing hard, Rarity cleared her throat and slowly turned to face her friend who glanced over with a matching blush before they both looked away again.

Silence.

A moment later, Applejack cleared her voice. “So, uh, Rares?”

“Yes, darl—uh, Applejack?”

“Ah think you just kissed a horse.”

Surprised, Rarity looked over and saw Applejack looking back at her. The blush was still quite potent, but it was paired with a rather jubilant smirk.

Rarity blinked. Blinked again, and let out a snicker. “I believe you did as well.”

Applejack let out a sputter that turned into a full blown guffaw which Rarity joined her in.


*** *** ***


10:00 AM

“And then ah ran into them ponies in the hazmat suits who ran off and came here and we ….”

“I'm quite aware of the rest, darling.”

Rarity and Applejack sat on a bench, looking out over the railing of the palace’s balcony recounting their experiences in the pony world while they searched for their friends from up high.

Applejack chuckled, “Ah believe that’s another thing”—she adopted a high class accent—“we shall not speak of?”

Chuckling along, Rarity replied in kind. “Darn-tootin’, y'all!”

After settling, Rarity continued, placing a foreleg over one of Applejack's. “But you're sure Fluttershy got away?"

"Not sure what was up with them animals but there was no sign of Fluttershy."

"That's a relief. Once we find at least one more of our friends, we should start searching for the missing two.

"Eeyup," said Applejack, moving to stand over the railing. "Can see most of the town from here. We're bound to see one of them soon."

"And you said Apple Bloom indicated Twi is in Canterlot?” Rarity followed Applejack to the railing.

“Yes’m.”

“Good. Sweetie Belle wasn’t sure if it was Canterlot or Manehattan and Canterlot is the closer of the two by far.” Rarity smiled a very satisfied grin. “And I know where in Canterlot too!”

“Where’s that?”

“Guess, guess!” Rarity's excitement eagerly escaped her in the form of tiny pronks as she hopped in place, her shoes clicking on the crystal floor.

“Er, the palace?”

“My shop! MY shop!”

“Didn’t you say your shop was here in town?”

“It is!" Rarity squealed. "That’s the amazing thing. I have Three shops! Three! One here, and the other two are in Canterlot and Manehattan! The big cities! And Manehattan! The center of sophistication, elegance, culture! It’s the fashion nexus. All the top designers are there!”

“That’s right swell. Ah’m happy for you, Rares. Sounds like quite an achievement.” Applejack looked around sheepishly. “Though, um …, Isn’t that pony Rarity’s achievement?”

“Oh, but that’s the beauty of it, Applejack! Our pony counterparts are older than us! They got their starts earlier. The achievements they have made are essentially in our future!”

“You sure?”

“Yes! We’re still in school and there’s only so much we’re able to do right now as far as careers go! But our pony counterparts graduated years ago and have moved fully onto their adult lives. This dress I’m wearing now"—Rarity did a slow spin to show it off—"I found unfinished in pony Rarity’s inspiration room. It’s a design I’ve had in one of my own sketchbooks back home for some time now. We were working on the same dress! Their past successes are to be our future successes!”

Rarity danced her hooves with a little giggle. “I’m going to have shops in the two biggest cities; a name-brand that spreads across the nation!”

Applejack smiled for her friend and thought back to her experiences in town. “Seems pony AJ’s still on her farm with her family.”

“That’s wonderful, darling. That’s what you want. Stay close with your family, build up the farm."

"And pony Rarity still lives in Ponyville even with her nationwide success."

"Exactly right! We're not breaking up the group! I can’t wait to finally meet our pony selves in Canterlot. Talk about all the things they've experienced; the similarities, the differences.”

“Fer sure,” Applejack agreed. “And there’s some things ah’d like to talk about with mine.”

“So much so, darling.”

“Though,” Applejack scratched her chin in thought, “there’s two things ah ain’t getting here.”

“What are those?”

“First, you say our pony selves is older’n us, maybe 'cause time ain't the same in both worlds, but ah found Miss Cheerilee and she got near ornery when ah called her Miss because she said she’s the same age as pony Rarity. Was in her class and everything.”

“Oh. I see." Rarity tapped her chin with a shoed hoof. "That’s quite … interesting?”

“That’s what ah said! Also looked like pony Apple Bloom was a lot younger than pony Mac compared to their age difference in our world. Time seems all screwy here.”

“Yes, I must concede. Ages don’t appear to be consistent. You'd think everything would just be off by the same number of years. And your other question?”

“Apple Bloom said Twi and all our ponies were in Canterlot because Princess Celestia called them for something. Why would the ruler of a nation have another princess and her friends make a road trip to a clothing store? Wouldn’t it make more sense they’re at the city palace?”

Seeing the stars forming in Rarity’s eyes, Applejack added, “Even if your pony is a close friend and a great dress designer. If’n the big princess just wanted a dress, why’d she call all six of them and not just pony you?”

Rarity deflated and adopted a thoughtful expression. “Yes, that is odd.”

“Could it be possible that something big is going on and pony Rarity lied to her sis so she wouldn’t worry?”

“You think they could be on some sort of dangerous mission for the crown?”

“Ah’m betting that could be it.”

Rarity stood and joined Applejack looking out over the railing at the large castle city in the distance.

Suddenly she perked up, literally as Applejack noticed Rarity’s ears move from a droop to standing at full perkiness. “Or!” posited Rarity. “Or it’s a large, secret, order that needs many hands—er, hooves—on deck. Some kind of private meeting, or visiting dignitaries with high security, or preparation for awards! Our pony selves have saved this world many times and, unlike us, they get to let that be public record. Why, I bet they are renowned heroes nationwide!"

Rarity giggled. "I bet the Manehattan taxicabs fight over each other for the honor to ferry them around the city at a moment's notice!"

"Would ponies even have taxis?"

Rarity either ignored or just didn't notice the question. "I suspect Pony Rarity just wants to surprise precious Sweetie Belle. You should see her. She really is quite adorable as a pony.”

“Don’t ah know it!" cheered Applejack with a smile. "Pony Bloom’s bow is bigger than her whole head. Made me just want to cuddle her like a kitten.”

“Oh, I did! I scooped her Sweetie up in my magic and gave her such a hug!” Rarity gasped, turning away from the rail. “That’s right, I haven’t shown you the magic I’ve learned. Unicorn magic is wonderful! You said earth pony magic lets you feel nature?”

“Oh, it's amazing, Rares! Ah can tell what’s growing around me and how healthy everything is. It's like Ah become one with nature whenever ah touch it. Ah can even get a little bit of it way up here, now that ah know what to feel for. According to Apple Bloom, we can also make things grow faster and healthier, and we can get all the apples off a tree with just one kick! Maybe ah’ll try that with my geode on once we get back home.”

“That sounds like the perfect set of skills for farm life! Let me show you what a unicorn fashionista can do with her horn.”

Applejack watched Rarity’s horn and saddlebags light up in a blue color. One flap of the saddlebags opened and out came several items also in that blue glow: A sketchbook, pencil, pincushion with multiple sewing needles stuck in it, and a spool of thread. The other flap opened and out came Sunset’s journal that opened and flipped to Rarity’s conversation with Twily and Wallflower.

“See?” Rarity asked, pointing a hoof at the writing. “I can move things with my mind like Twily can back home, and it’s refined enough to write with. And over here ….” Rarity gestured to the thread and needles.

The spool unraveled and a thin thread traveled out toward the eye of a needle that had been pulled out of the pincushion. Rarity squealed slightly as the thread easily passed through the needle’s eye.

“It’s so much easier than with hands! The magic grips every part of the thread I want so I can squeeze the end and make sure it doesn’t split going through the eye. No need to wet or twist it. And even better! Watch!”

A second needle came free of the pincushion and was just as easily threaded by the same strand as the first. “I could sew two dresses at once like this!”

“Could’ya really?” asked Applejack, somewhat in awe of the display.

Two more needles came out of the pincushion and the thread flew through both their eyes. “FOUR!” Rarity giggled, lifting the four needles strung together with the thread and moving independently with her mind. “Four dresses at once!”

“But how do you watch four dresses at once? Don’t you have to look to see what you’re sewing?”

Rarity stopped and turned to look at Applejack, her expression deflating a bit. She looked back to the needles to see that they had drifted while she was looking away. “Hmm.”

“Heh, sorry, Rares. Didn’t mean to bring you down a peg.”

Rarity sighed and rolled up the spool, placing the needles back in their cushion and all items back in the saddlebags. “Quite alright, darling. I suppose it was a bit silly. After all, we’re only going to be in this world a few hours more. Though, it might be fun to come over from time to time and offer pony Rarity a hand—er horn—if she gets any particularly large orders.”

Applejack perked her head up. “That's right. We make friends with our ponies today and we, and they, could be visiting back and forth anytime." She then noticed something odd. "So why’s the bag still glowing like your horn?”

Rarity looked down at the saddlebags and sighed before tweaking her horn with a hoof and a slight, resulting flinch. “I have yet to figure out how to let go of things.”

Applejack laughed then took off her hat, by simply touching a hoof to it, and waved it around showing that it was stuck fast to her hoof, despite any arguments from a little thing called physics. “Ah suppose we all have a lot to learn about being magical ponies.”

She then passed the hat from one hoof to the other and back again a few times.

Rarity watched in fascination at the sticky display just as an explosion of sound and rainbow light spread out over the whole town in a thick ring.

“THIS IS AWESOME!” cried a bluish blur that might have been a pegasus pony of some kind, though it was moving much too fast to tell.

Applejack and Rarity stared after, whatever it was, for a better look but could only see the rainbow trail it left in its wake.

They turned to face each other.

“Rainbow Dash?”

“Rainbow Dash!”


*** *** ***


10:10 AM

Rainbow Dash (because why wouldn’t she be the cause of that explosion?) made several laps around, over, and through the town. The initial, circular explosion of light had dissipated into the distance, but the rainbow trail behind her was still bright and clear.

The rainbow trail was, thankfully, also dissipating behind the object that might have been Rainbow Dash, seemingly at a constant rate. The faster the object went, the longer the trail became. This kept the trail from completely covering up the whole town, but still seemed like a giant, 3D game of “Snake.”

In another repeat of their first minutes in the world of ponies, Rarity and Applejack kept calling out every time the blurred speck that may or may not have been their blue pegasus friend passed near the palace.

Several times the speck traveled out of sight and they wondered if the show was over, only for it to return shortly later.

Several times the blurred creature passed overhead, leaving the rainbow trail almost close enough to touch, though neither pony on the balcony decided it wise to make such an attempt.

Several times the creature's wild path careened into various objects such as hay bales, gardens, carts and wagons, doors and windows, and at least one more random sofa.

When the display had first started, Rainbow Dash had been shouting in jubilation with excited phrases such as, “AWESOME!” “YEAHHH HOOOOO!” “BEST STUNT EVER!” “OH MY GOSH OH MY GOSH OH MY GOSH OH MY GOSH!” or, “IT’S LIKE I’M TOTALLY FARTING A GIANT RAINBOW!”

However, once she began to wobble and crash into things, the shouting changed to a somewhat less pleased tone with not so positive phrases such as, “MY BAD!” “TOTALLY DIDN’T SEE THAT!” “OH MY GOSH OH MY GOSH OH MY—WHAT WAS THAT?!” “OH CRAP! LOOK OUT! MOVE MOVE MOVE MOVE MOVE!” or, “HOW DO I STOP THIS CRAZY THING?!”

After several minutes, which left considerable damage around town and more than a few uprooted trees from the Everfree forest, the object passed out of sight and there was one final crash leaving only silence in its wake.

Until three ponies in hazmat suits were seen screaming and galloping away from the terminal event.

Stunned, Rarity and Applejack slowly turned to face each other, each managing to blink an ounce of realization into the other before gasping and raging for the stairs to the main foyer.

“”RAINBOW DASH!””

They were half way across the foyer when the front doors slammed open and a normally unassuming, yellow pegasus pony stumbled in. Leaves, berries, mushrooms, dirt, and other small forest-based paraphernalia clung to her coat while twigs, tree bark, and other larger forest-based paraphernalia seemed trapped in her mane and tail.

“”Fluttershy?!”” Applejack and Rarity yelled.

Fluttershy looked at the pair, took a deep breath, and yelled back.

“WE ARE SO BUCKING SCREWED!”
> 24 Fluttershy: "Nice Doggy?"
> --------------------------------------------------------------------------

09:40 AM

Lost.

Fluttershy trotted around the thick woods as best as she could with the uneven terrain and natural objects.

She knew she had flown away from the rising sun, so she had to move toward it now. That would be easier if she could see it.

She had already tried to fly above the canopy but the trees grew so thick here that it was more like jumping from branch to branch than flying and her coordination with pony jumps and flight still wasn’t up to the task.

So she trotted, and walked, and crawled as the need may be.

“I hope the others are doing better than I am,” she kept herself company. “I found out Twi is in Canterlot. I’m not sure where that is if we’re actually in Ponyville, not actually Canterville. Sunset said geography between the two worlds is similar, but there’s no Ponyville in our world so that doesn’t help. And if the others also know Twi isn’t in town then what are they doing now? Are they trying to meet up? Or … Oh, no! They didn’t leave without me, did they?”

Before she could freak out over that thought, Fluttershy heard rustling in the distance.

And then she smelled a foul odor.

And then heard something growl.

And then she felt her fur stand up.

And then there was nothing stopping her from freaking out.


*** *** ***


09:45 AM

After the thankfully short-lived freak out, Fluttershy came to her senses back a few yards, and up a few branches. This gave her a slightly better view of the origin of the rustling, odor, and growl.

Not far ahead of where she was, right where she would have been if she had not been warned off, was a small clearing in the trees and a cave slightly hidden by some bushes.

She couldn’t see what was in the cave, but it sounded BIG.

Fluttershy decided to find a new route.

The branch that broke under her weight didn’t give her that option.

“Eeeeeek!” she shouted all the way down to the thankfully soft patch of snow on the ground.

Good news: she wasn’t hurt.

Good news: she got a better look at what was in that cave.

Bad news: it got a better look at her in return.

At nearly twice her size, it looked a bit like a wolf if wolves were made out of trees and scary, glowing, green eyes.

“Um, hi?” Fluttershy tried as meek and nonthreatening as she could. Which didn’t require any acting.

The wood wolf stood, a threatening gleam in its eye and a more threatening growl from its mouth.

Fluttershy righted herself and began to back away as the lumbering wolf approached.

“Eek!” Fluttershy turned to run only to find herself trapped by trees and rocks on all sides not containing a snarling wolf whose bark was its bite.

She faced the creature and tried to fly but her wings seemed glued to her sides.

It took another step.

A loud crack sounded and the creature whimpered, falling back on three legs.

Fluttershy gasped, her veterinarian’s instincts directing her gaze to a split log in the tree wolf’s front right leg.

“Oh, my! You’re hurt!”

The creature retreated back into its cave.

Fluttershy kept her eyes on that bad log wondering if such a creature would heal.

And if she could help.


*** *** ***


10:00 AM

Fluttershy smiled at the creature slowly walking around the cave, testing the vine bandage she made for it.

It still limped but seemed to bark happily. Though even a happy bark from this creature sounded like a hungry animal moving in for the kill.

That thought struck Fluttershy at just the wrong time as the creature came right for her.

She chuckled nervously as it came close, taking a tentative step back toward the mouth of the cave.

The creature gave no reaction and closed the distance.

Fluttershy, no longer having the option of escape, looked up at the creature’s jaws coming down to meet her.

She braced herself.

And was gently knocked by a wooden muzzle as the creature nuzzled the side of her head, panting happily.

“Aw, you’re just a cute little baby puppy, aren’t you?” She giggled back at it when it licked her face with what appeared to be a green vine instead of a tongue.

Her giggling turned to coughing when the full extent of the creature’s stench hit her.

“A cute puppy who really needs a breath mint. Maybe a toothbrush, or maybe … wood polish? Something pine-scented maybe?”

Almost as if it understood her, or perhaps it did, the creature stopped licking her and sniffed her instead.

It stopped, looking confused.

And then a collection of logs, which may have been a stomach, rumbled against each other making a loud percussion. Though the result was far from musical.

“Oh, poor thing. You sound hungry.”

Fluttershy looked up at the creature’s eyes. “What kinds of things do you eat?”

The creature looked back to her, its stomach rumbling louder and its teeth seeming to moisten as if salivating tree sap.

Fluttershy’s face darkened. “Oh.”

She began backing out of the cave. “I’m sure you have friends who will help you find food … other than me, right?”

The creature seemed content with letting her leave until its stomach rumbled again and it stepped forward, howling.

“Eek!” Fluttershy ran out and around the cave, keeping away from the thicker forest she had already passed through. The forest behind the cave was much thinner, allowing for easier trotting and, thankfully, galloping.

She took off at her fastest pony run, hearing the creature following behind her and howling again.

After rounding a large pile of rocks, Fluttershy heard another howl answering the first. And then another. And another.

And then a whole chorus.

“Eep.”

It wasn’t long before she could also hear rustling in the bushes, see trees being pushed around by large creatures, and smell that horrible breath from much more than one source.

Suddenly a tree to her side seemed to get ripped from its roots and tossed aside. Fluttershy looked over and saw a much larger version of the creature. Her first reaction was elation. “Aw, I bet that’s his mom coming to help him find food.”

Then she remembered what “food” was to them and ran faster.

Finally coming to what appeared to be a hoof path in the forest, Fluttershy had to make a decision, but still wasn’t sure which way would lead to town.

It was at that moment that a loud boom rang out followed shortly after by a bright ring of rainbow light. The ring passed through the trees, causing them to shake and get pushed back slightly, almost as if it was a physical object or at least accompanied by a very strong wind.

The creatures behind her crouched down and hid as the ring passed over.

She did the same.

Once it had passed, she made her decision and ran down the path heading for the origin of the ring hoping it wasn’t a larger, hungrier creature.

She took flight, the pathway being mostly clear up to several pony heights.

She risked a glance behind her to see several of the creatures behind her, not just the two from before. Some were running away, most seemed confused and not going anywhere, but three were still chasing her.


*** *** ***


10:10 AM

LIGHT!

Fluttershy saw light!

The creatures were still behind her, and it sounded like some of the confused ones had eventually decided to rejoin in the chase, but she was almost out of the forest.

She could see green fields and pony houses in the distance between the trees.

The creatures behind her roared.

Running short of breath, Fluttershy finally cleared the tree line.

“Woohoo!”

But a quick look behind her showed that the creatures followed her out.

She didn’t have much time to worry about that, however, as she very quickly needed to dodge a long trail of rainbow light, like a laser, behind a pony-sized object.

There was no telling what the thing was or what it was doing other than using the laser to spell the words, “HECK YEAH!” above the field.

Fluttershy managed to dodge the first loop the object made near her and kept going. As the object swung around, presumably for another exclamation point, she heard it say, “OH MY GOSH OH MY GOSH OH MY—WHAT WAS THAT?!”

She kept flying as fast as she could, veering off to the side away from the object.

Her new heading brought her face to face with her pony’s cottage.

There were still animals outside.

A squirrel waved a tiny pitchfork at her.

She veered off in a different direction.

She heard a screech and then, “OH CRAP! LOOK OUT! MOVE MOVE MOVE MOVE MOVE!”

She paid it no mind and kept going, flying aimlessly away from the forest.

She passed over a bridge and turned, seeing Twi’s palace come into view, and made directly for it.

She had to veer around again when a pony in a hazmat suit pointed at her and screamed.

“It’s a Fluttershy!”

Two more hazmat ponies joined in.

“Run!”

“She’ll eat our souls!”

She flapped harder, aiming directly for the front doors of the palace.

The wood wolves screamed.

She heard a series of thuds behind her.

The rainbow laser passed overhead twice more in an erratic pattern.

There was a loud crash.

The hazmat ponies screamed again.

She flew straight for the doors, but her wings gave out, causing her to skid along the ground, stopping just before the palace stairs.

As quick as she could, she got to her hooves, stumbling up the steps to the doors, and slammed them open with all her freaked out might, continuing to stumble forward.

“”Fluttershy?!”” Applejack and Rarity yelled.

Fluttershy looked at the pair, took a deep breath, and yelled back.

“WE ARE SO BUCKING SCREWED!”
> 25 Friendship is: "Getting out of town before they make you pay for damages"
> --------------------------------------------------------------------------

10:15 AM

Fluttershy turned and quickly pushed the palace doors closed, then slowly slid down them into a panting heap on the floor.

“Good heavens, darling! What happened?” Rarity cried, rushing to Fluttershy’s aid.

“BIG!” Fluttershy attempted to answer while catching her breath. “Lasers, masks, screaming, animals, attack, big, big, wolf, wood, woody wolfies, running, growl!”

“You were attacked by a big laser wolf in a mask with a woody?” asked Applejack.

“Goodness,” cried Rarity. “Did a wolf try to get fresh with you?”

Fluttershy gave Rarity a questioning look and shook her head no.

“Then what did happen?”

Fluttershy took a few more deep breaths then tried again pointing toward the palace doors. “Big wood wolves try eat me!”

Alarmed, Applejack and Rarity shot each other looks and Applejack went to the front doors, perking up an ear against one to listen.

Rarity followed behind her, taking out her pincushion and readying four of the sewing needles as weapons.

Applejack looked at her and whispered, “What’s four needles gonna do against a bunch of big wood wolves?”

“Well it’s not like they are giant wolves made of wood.”

“THEY ARE!” Fluttershy yelled. "Like hungry trees with legs and teeth!"

Rarity gulped and put the needles away. "Some of the m-monsters Twi and Sunset mentioned that exist in this world?"

“Okay, here’s the plan,” said Applejack, rearing up to place her forehooves against the door Fluttershy wasn't behind. “Open this door a mite with your magic so you can see out. If you don’t like what you see ah’ll slam it shut and you help push.”

“Right.”

Rarity focused on the door Applejack stood up against and it began to shine with a blue glow. Fluttershy, now no longer panting hard watched nervously as the door opened slowly.

Very slowly.

Very, very slowly.

“Rares? You even moving it yet?” Applejack whispered

“I’m taking it slow. I don’t want my face eaten by a giant wolf tree!” Rarity whispered back.

Finally able to see a crack of daylight between the doors, Rarity angled herself left and right to look through it. Not seeing anything dangerous she opened the door further. Then a little further. And further still.

“Whoa!” yelled Applejack as she fell over, unable to remain upright against the opening door.

“Oops, sorry, darling.”

“Oh, my,” squeaked Fluttershy. “Are they gone?”

“Seems so. And so are some trees by the forest’s edge. Must have been Rainbow’s … whatever that was.”

“Rainbow?!” Fluttershy perked up.

“That’s right!” Applejack added while righting herself on all fours again. “We saw her crash!”

“Rainbow crashed!? Oh no! We have to check on her!”

“Maybe you should rest here and we’ll check on her, sugarcube.” Applejack gave Fluttershy a pat on the mane.

“No, I have to go too,” Fluttershy determined while trying to stand and having a difficult time with it.

"Not if'n you can't even walk. We'll come back once we know what's going on."

Seeing Fluttershy's distraught expression, Rarity perked up, lighting her horn. “Oh! I have an idea!"

Fluttershy looked down as the blue glow also covered her and she felt herself lifting into the air. Her wings popped out instinctively and she tried to flap and run, but her six limbs were too tired to be effective. She gave up and simply watched as she was moved toward Applejack and then dropped, perpendicular, on her back.

Applejack and Fluttershy blushed slightly at each other before giving Rarity a matching set of questioning looks.

“We’re ponies,” she explained. “Embrace it!” She flicked her horn with a hoof to let go of Fluttershy and galloped out the door.

Applejack looked up at Fluttershy. "So now she's okay with being a pony?"

"Now she has clothing on," Fluttershy explained.

"Oh, right." Applejack chuckled before taking off after Rarity, eliciting a few squeaks from Fluttershy as she struggled to find something appropriate to hold on to.

Applejack caught up to Rarity easily despite the extra weight and faltering sets of hooves on her back.

Rarity took it in stride, keeping pace beside them and using her magic to pick twigs and other debris from Fluttershy’s fur and hair.

Neglecting to drop the items from her magic grasp resulted in a trail of objects floating and following behind them as they searched out their next friend.

"So," began Applejack to pass the time as they galloped, "is 'bucking' some kind of pony profanity? A ponefanity?"

Fluttershy blushed. "Um, I think it's one of those many-purpose words. It can be an innocent word, or something more … naughty."

"Wherever did you learn such a thing?" asked Rarity.

"Oh, well, you see …," Fluttershy blushed harder, "a little birdie taught me."


*** *** ***


10:30 AM

"Are you sure it was here, Rares?" asked Applejack.

"I'm positive it was at least near here," Rarity replied.

"There's a clear, um, 'path', leading this way," Fluttershy helped. Her position on Applejack's back letting her look around more freely, taking in all the damages.

"You mean path of destruction?" Applejack was more honest.

"I didn't want to say …," Fluttershy trailed off.

As they rounded another corner, following ripped up cobblestones, cracked windows, and felled signs, they got a look at a large, white, red, and pinkish building with a sign out front.

"Tell me that ain't a hospital," worried Applejack.

"I believe it is, darling," Rarity sighed.

"Oh, dear! A window on the third floor is broken," informed Fluttershy.

"Could you fly us up there to take a look?" asked Rarity.

Fluttershy looked at her friends then back to her wings. "Um, I'm not sure if I can get up there alone. My wings are still pretty sore."

"What if ah gave you a boost?" Applejack offered.

"And I'll help with my magic!" Rarity added.

Fluttershy gave her wings a single flap. "I can try."

"Wonderful!" Rarity cheered her friend on while trotting closer to the hospital. "So let's get under the window. Fluttershy, you can try to get off from Applejack's back and flap yourself to a hover."

"Sounds weird when you put it that way," Applejack commented as Fluttershy blushed.

"Well, I don't know the terminology," Rarity protested as Applejack crouched down to let Fluttershy climb off.

The tired pegasus pulled herself forward to Applejack's left but lost her balance, putting her face on the ground with her hindlegs still draped over Applejack's back. Applejack shimmied to the right away from Fluttershy to help her and she flopped to the ground. Applejack then walked back and offered her a hoof to help her stand up, using her newfound earth pony magic to keep her other three hooves planted so as to not fall onto her friend in the process … again.

Fluttershy dusted herself off while Applejack replied.

"Ah think Ah know what you're suggesting. We have Fluttershy hover above me and Ah'll push her up with my hooves then you horn her over the rest of the way?"

"We're using horn as a verb?" Rarity asked.

"Girls," Fluttershy attempted.

"Well, we say things like 'hand that over' when passing things with hands, so why not 'horn that over'?" Applejack insisted.

"Girls," Fluttershy attempted with a tiny bit less authoritative apprehension.

"I see what you mean, darling, but then why can't we say 'flap to a hover' when there are—"

"GIRLS! Eek!"

Applejack and Rarity looked around and then up to find Fluttershy already making the attempt at flying up to the broken window, but with a wing that didn't seem to want to keep pace.

She was losing altitude fast.

"Ah got ya!" Applejack rushed into position under Fluttershy, got a quick reminder that all of them except Rarity were naked, re-angled her eyes away from the hind section, and jumped up with all her might. Applejack's forehooves connected under Fluttershy's chest and propelled her back up, knocking the wind out of her in the process.

Then Rarity came beside Applejack, lit her horn, focused on Fluttershy, and pushed her up and over to the window. Not an easy task for the new unicorn who had yet to lift anything heavier than a mildly filled pair of saddlebags and a little sister. Fluttershy, still flapping as well as she could, kept dipping and swaying in the air, careening tail first into the wall twice.

Eventually close enough to do so, and while facing the correct way, Fluttershy reached out, grabbed the windowsill, and pulled herself in, falling to the floor inside with a thud loud enough to be audible from the ground outside.

Applejack and Rarity cheered. Rarity danced side to side, happy to have triumphed and that their friend was safe.

A series of additional thuds, seemingly timed with Rarity's motions, reminded Rarity to give her glowing horn another tweak. All the various forest objects and debris Rarity had pulled off Fluttershy fell to the ground and there was another thud from the room above.

"Sorry, Fluttershy!" she called.

"S'okay," came a soft, woozy reply.

In the hospital room, Fluttershy focused on getting her bearings, hoping that at least one of those bearings would stop the room from spinning.

Once complete, she got a good look at the far wall and noticed Rainbow Dash planted face down on a mattress, the rest of her splat against the wall.

"Rainbow!" she gasped, rushing to her friend. "Are you alright?"

"~I'm~a~pretty~pony~" Rainbow warbled, words further mumbled by the mattress.

"Yes, you are," Fluttershy assured her, petting her mane. "You're a very pretty pony."

"~Mmm~"

Fluttershy checked for injuries and then looked around the otherwise empty room. Seeing they were alone and Rainbow was without visible marks, a sly smirk grew on her face, and she leaned in closer to Rainbow's ears. "I could tie some ribbons in your mane and tail if you'd like."

"~Thank~you~"

Rainbow's murmur set Fluttershy into giggles. "Okay, Rainbow, I'll get all sorts of pink and purple ribbons and bows for your mane and tail. I can even put them into braids! Get Rarity to pick out some gowns and dress you in style! You'd be the prettiest pony ever!"

"~The~prettiest~pony~eve—w-what?!" Rainbow wiggled, hooves flailing out to try and push her face away from whatever was covering it. Fluttershy helped her out by pushing Rainbow's hind legs so she'd end up flopping onto the bed. "P-pretty pony? Who is?!"

"You are!"

"No way! I—" Rainbow had finally perked her head up and noticed the yellow pony in the room, then looked down at herself. "Oh, right." When Fluttershy giggled harder, she looked back up and turned to the side, pointing at her flank. "See this? I have lightning on my butt flank! I'm not pretty! I'm awesome!"

"Well, I think you're both. And always have been," Fluttershy smiled brightly at her oldest friend. When Rainbow gave her a twisted look, she added with another giggle, "Got you to wake up too! Are you alright?"

"Wake—?" Rainbow looked around the room. "What the?! I'm back in the hospital? It's even the same room! We gotta get out of here, quick! Wait! Which Fluttershy are you?"

That stumped Fluttershy for a moment until she remembered there were currently two of her in this world. "We have chemistry together." When Rainbow blushed, she was quick to add, "The class! I followed you through the portal, and yes, we need to find Pinkie so—"

"Then we both have got to get out of here before they try to dissect us!"

"Dissect?!" Fluttershy gasped, placing a hoof over her muzzle. "But why would—?"

"Remember how we had to break Sunset out that time?"

"Oh, my goodness! W-we need disguises and Pinkie's rubber chicken army, and—"

"Nope! We just need that window and our sweet wings!" Rainbow fluffed hers out and pointed to Fluttershy's.

Fluttershy looked back at her wings and smiled, also fluffing them out. "That's so much easier."

"I know, right! Come on, let's go!" Rainbow called, flapping over to the windowsill. "Hey, where'd this glass come from? Who broke the window?"

"You don't remember?"

Rainbow took to the air inside the room and pantomimed her reply. "I remember pulling off this awesomely sick stunt! I was flying all over town with a rainbow coming out of my butt. I wrote my name in the sky with it and everything!"

"It was coming out of your … really?"

"Yeah, I think it was like one of those optical illusions and it just looked like my tail was super long, but yeah." Rainbow landed and flicked her tail side to side. "Tail comes out of my butt so that means the rainbow did too."

"Oh."

"And then I saw you zooming out of the forest and I came over to, you know."

"Show off?" It was the natural answer.

"Yeah! But then these giant tree wolf things jump out after you and I kinda slammed"—Rainbow clopped her hooves together for impact—"into one of them and they all took off!"

"Oh no!" Fluttershy gasped. "You didn't hurt them did you?"

" 'Hurt them'?! Looked like they wanted to eat you!"

"Oh, they did, but they were just hungry. One of the puppies has a bad leg too. Poor thing."

" 'Poor thing'?! They—"

Rainbow cut herself off when she heard the sound of a cart rolling up to her door.

"Quick! Out the window!" Rainbow whispered, flapping over to the windowsill.

"Oh goodness!" Fluttershy galloped over, reaching her just as someone knocked on the door.

"Alright, Rainbow Dash," cheered a male voice, getting Fluttershy to turn and face it. "Time for your follow-up evaluation. With luck, you'll be cleared to go in 'ten minutes flat'!"

The door slowly opened and the voice continued with an added chuckle. "I'm sure you're just itching to launch yourself out that window."

Fluttershy eeped, remembering that they were aliens on this world and that she needed to get Rainbow out of the room.

And then instinct took over.

She leaned into her forelegs and kicked out behind her with both hindlegs. She felt a solid thump as she bucked her friend out the window.

"Aaaaaaaaa!" that friend cried on her way down toward the ground.

"Ah, Ms. Fluttershy," said the source of the voice entering the room. Here to visit Ms. Dash?"

"Yes!" she replied stiffly, ducking back slightly.

The doctor looked around. "Is she out?"

"Yes," she squeaked.

"Bathroom?"

"No—Yes!" Fluttershy covered. "B-bathroom."

The doctor came more fully into the room. "What? Is the window broken?"

"Uh …."

"You're not cut are you?"

"N-no."

The doctor lit his horn and the many glass shards were pushed to the side of the room. "I'll call a janitor to cast a mending spell right away. I suppose I might as well discharge the sheriff while I'm at it. Seems a cloud exploded on him. Too much water was placed in it."

"Oh dear."

"Oh, he's recovered already. Just a headache now."

"That's good."

"Please let Rainbow know I'll be back in a few minutes to see her."

"… Okay."

Giving her a kind smile, the doctor turned and left the room

"Whew," Fluttershy took a breath in relief only to remember a moment later what she had done to Rainbow. "Eep! Rainbow!"

Outside, the three girls below looked up as their other winged friend jumped out the window out of concern more than bravery.

They realized this was the case when it became clear she had forgotten she had wings.

"Eeeeeeeeeeeeeek!" she screamed.

"Fluttershy! Flap wings!" Rarity cried.

Fluttershy opened her wings and flapped them as hard as she could. Applejack got in position to catch her. A blue glow surrounded her and slowed her down.

Rainbow Dash scoffed and simply flew up and grabbed her.

Unfortunately, Rainbow wasn't expecting Fluttershy to reach out and hug her around the wings.

The two winged girls fell right on top of Applejack, knocking her onto her back. "Oophh!" was her only possible comment with a face full of yellow feathers.

Rarity rushed up to the three of them. "Darlings! Are you alright?"

"Rainbow?"

"I'm fine, 'Shy."

"Applejack?" asked Rarity.

"Oophh!" Applejack repeated.

Fluttershy still had her four legs around Rainbow, trapping her wings. Her own wings were spread out over Applejack's face.

Neither of them could move, however, as Rainbow was on top and couldn't see with her face in Fluttershy's chest.

Rainbow blushed brightly once she realized where she was pressed up against, but that dimmed slightly when she also realized there was nothing there but fur. Though it was really soft and tickled her muzzle.

Applejack pushed but quickly stopped, worried about what she might have been pushing on when Fluttershy eeped again in a particularly high pitch.

Rainbow struggled but was caught in Fluttershy's surprisingly strong grasp, still shocked from the fall and possibly whatever Applejack had pushed on.

Rarity got all three of them in her magic grasp and tried to lift but gave herself a neck ache. She then wondered why the strain was in her neck and not her horn.

Rarity then changed to focus on Fluttershy's hooves to un-trap Rainbow. Once she got her blue glow to cover all four of Fluttershy's hooves without the rest of her, she pulled them all away from each other.

Finally free, Rainbow's wings pomfed out and she gave them a flap propelling her backward away from Fluttershy and straight into Rarity's face.

The collision was strong enough to lift Rarity's forehooves off the ground. Suddenly off balance, Rarity instinctively grabbed the closest thing she could find for support. This turned out to be Rainbow and they both dropped on top of Applejack and Fluttershy.

"Oof!"

"Ow!"

"Eep!"

"Oophh!"

With a push, Rarity got off Rainbow but sent herself on a roll, tumbling down the sides of her friends and landing on the ground.

Fluttershy was jostled out of her stupor and blushed, noticing Rainbow's face in what used to be her bosom.

Rainbow, feeling the weight lifted off her, checked over her shoulder first this time, and then flapped her wings to get off Fluttershy and landed next to Applejack.

Fluttershy took this opportunity to also get off Applejack by rolling to the side.

Rarity, meanwhile, had stood up, thankful that she landed upright—or belly down at least—so as to not damage her new dress, then had brushed it and herself off, just in time for Fluttershy to land on her back, knocking her to the ground again.

Applejack, now able to breathe air not filtered through pegasus feathers, picked her head up, fixed her hat, and rolled onto her hooves. "You two okay over there?" she asked as Fluttershy rolled again, getting off Rarity and onto solid ground.

"I believe we are now," said Rarity, checking on Fluttershy and her dress again.

"We really need to stop doing this," Applejack sighed.

"Doing what?" asked Rainbow.

"Falling on top of each other. This is the third—"

Rarity cleared her throat loudly.

"Second"—Applejack blushed—"time now."

Quickly, when it looked like Rainbow was going to question that, Applejack continued. "Alright, so now that we know where to find Twi—"

"We do?" asked Rainbow.

"Dash, that was the one goal we had. Ah thought you were going to do it in ten seconds flat."

"Um," squeaked Fluttershy, "I don't know where she is either."

Rainbow pointed a hoof at Fluttershy. "See? It's not just me."

"But I did get attacked by a cottage full of animals, lost in the woods for more than an hour, and chased back to town by a pack of large, hungry wood wolves. Even after taking the time to patch one of them up. They weren't friendly at all!"

Rarity and Applejack gave Rainbow a look.

"Hey! I was in the hospital!"

Rarity gasped, "Heavens! Whatever for?"

Rainbow blushed and looked away. "N-nothing?"

"But you're okay now, right?" asked Fluttershy with large eyes.

"Y-yeah. I'm fine. S'all good." Rainbow covered by shining a forehoof against her fur and trying to make it look nonchalant.

"Whew."  Rarity, relieved, took another breath.  "We know that Twi is in Canterlot. It doesn't seem to be far, but I've only seen it on a map without a scale so I'm not sure."

Applejack spoke up, pointing to a mountain north of the town, "Canterlot is that there castle on the mountain."

""That's Canterlot?"" exclaimed Rarity, Rainbow, and Fluttershy.

"Was Ah the only one doing the research?"

Three faces passed her less than happy looks.

Applejack cleared her throat. "Er, maybe Ah just got lucky?"

"So how do we get there? asked Rainbow.

"We take the train!" cheered Fluttershy. "Miss Cheerilee said our ponies all got on a train yesterday."

"And I have money for the train! I hope pony Rarity doesn't mind me borrowing it though."

"Oh, me too." worried Fluttershy.

"I could just fly there," Rainbow informed them.

"Ah think it best we stick closer together for now on. Besides, we don't know where in Canterlot she is. A couple likelies, but no guarantees." Applejack nodded to Rarity who was already puffing up in pride. "We can explain on the way"—Rarity deflated a bit, having been ready to gush about her three shops again—"but we need to find Pinkie first."

"HA!" Rainbow proudly exclaimed. "No problem! I saw her when I was being awesome!"

"Was this before you were laying out a trail of destruction in the town or during it?" asked Applejack.

Rainbow raised a hoof, pomfed out her wings, and opened her mouth to speak when Rarity simply pointed at the hospital's broken window.

Putting down her hoof and wings, Rainbow mumbled, "Pinkie's in the park."

"Which Pinkie? Because I was just there and didn't see any of them!" came a cheerful voice.

The four girls turned and found a bright pink earth pony smiling back at them.

"Ohmygosh!" she yelled. "I found you!"

"Pink—!" Fluttershy attempted only for the four of them to be pulled into a tight hug by the fifth. Pinkie's forelegs somehow stretching long enough to do that. Though not long enough to allow all four girls to continue breathing.

"I found you! I found you! I found you! I found you!" Pinkie cheered through the loveable, and potentially lethal, assault on her friends. "That's one 'I found you' for each of you. But where's Twi-Twi and pony me?"

"Pin—"

"—kie—"

"——can't—"

"———breathe!" the four squished girls took turns to exclaim as best as they could without air.

"Really?" asked Pinkie, letting go of them all. "I can breathe just fine!"

Back on the ground again, the four took deep breaths. Eventually, Fluttershy got up and attempted to hug Pinkie at a more safe intensity. This put them both on the ground again with Pinkie giggling through the resulting feather mask.

Pinkie returned the hug, blowing on the feathers a little to make a small gap, then retried her greeting. "Nice to meet you, I'm Pinkie Pie!"

"We know, Pinkie," said Rainbow after standing and un-collapsing her airway.

"I know you know Pinkie," Pinkie replied. "Now you know another Pinkie! Oh wait. Was there a comma in there?"

"Pinkie, darling," Rarity began, again brushing off her new dress after Applejack helped her up, "You're still the only Pinkie we know."

Rainbow and Applejack shot each other a quick glance, only just now considering what might happen once that changed. Fluttershy, also starting to consider such a situation, sobered up, letting Pinkie stand.

Pinkie giggled again, backflipping onto her hooves. "Actually, you know two now! You see, I'm new to town! I just happen to look just like a Pinkie pony you already know."

"We know," Rarity tried again, "you're not pony Pinkie."

"Wowie!" Pinkie started looking all over herself. "What gave it away? Do I have a not-pony something sticking out of me? That might explain a few things."

"We know because we're not ponies either, and we've been informed that all our counterparts are in Canterlot."

"Oh, okay!" Pinkie nodded immediately. "I've actually been informed that too, but you never really know with a Pinkie. So Now what?"

The other four girls looked at each other, trading glances. Finally, Applejack cleared her throat.

"Alright," Applejack said, "we're back together, we have a destination, and we have money to get there. Let's get to the train station." She looked around. "Does anyone know where the station is?"

"I got it!" Rainbow was eager to declare. "I know where everything in this town is! I've been all around and through it a ton of times, remember?"

Rarity again pointed at the broken hospital window.

"Yeah, well," Rainbow scratched the back of her head with a forehoof, "princesses are rich, right? Twi can cover things. And it's for a good cause!"

"Rainbow brings up a good point … in a roundabout way." Rarity tapped her chin before frowning at the dusty horseshoe she had done it with. "I don't like just leaving the town after all this property damage, no matter how accidental.  And I don't want to leave it all on Twilight's treasury."

"Nothing for it, Rares. Some things are more time sensitive than others. We should find Twi first, and then take care of the rest after," Applejack said.

"If you're sure it's alright," squeaked Fluttershy.

"Wait! We're leaving?!" asked Pinkie. "We can't leave! I'm popping a not very surprising surprise party any hour now!"

"If it's a surprise party, why is it not very surprising?" Rainbow asked.

"Well, it's a surprise party because I yelled 'SURPRISE' out to everyone when I first left Twi's palace, but it's not very surprising because I was so excited to see so many new/old and old/new friends-to-be that I forgot I didn't have a party set up so I had to tell all those adorable ponies that the surprise party had to wait until I was ready, and then I started going around to invite everyone I saw to my Hi-My-Name-is-Pinkie-Pie-and-I’m-New-in-Town-Even-Though-I-Probably-Look-Just-Like-Someone-Else-You-Know-Who-is-Also-Named-Pinkie-Pie-But-I-Want-to-be-Your-Friend-Too-Party, so those ponies won't be surprised either. Also, Mrs. Cake is making posters about it."

"Yeah," Rainbow agreed, "that's not very surprising now."

"Pinkie! We weren't supposed to tell anyone we aren't really ponies!" yelled Rarity.

"We weren't?" gasped Pinkie.

"We weren't?" echoed Rainbow.

"If the locals find out what we are we could get into all sorts of trouble," explained Applejack.

"Oh," Pinkie giggled, "maybe that's why so many ponies ran away from me."

The other four traded looks."

"Maybe we should get on the train now after all," whispered Fluttershy.


*** *** ***


10:42 AM

"We're in luck," Applejack told Rarity, leaving Rainbow, Pinkie, and Fluttershy by the benches. "Next train to Canterlot is due to arrive in less than five minutes and the conductor says we ride for free!"

"W-we do?" Rarity asked, fidgeting on her hooves.

"That's right! The man—uh, stallion?—said it's on account of saving the town and all. So maybe you were right about the whole Twi and pony us's being at your shop for a special occasion. Maybe we'll see them all dressed up in their Sunday bests!"

Rarity smiled brightly at that but kept fidgeting. "Quite wonderful, darling. But, um, did you say five minutes?"

"Less than five! Talk about service. Seems things are getting better. We're back together, we're on the way to Twi, we even have our new pony bodies figured out!"

"But no time for a quick pop over to our world first?"

Applejack leaned over to see the top of the Twilights' cute mark spire visible over the town's buildings. "It's a bit of a walk. You wouldn't get halfway to the palace, let alone up the steps and back here in just five minutes. Why? Is there something wrong?"

"No, no, not wrong so to speak. It's just something I'd rather not do here." Rarity blushed.

"Well, what's the matter?" Applejack lowered her voice and leaned closer. "You know I'd help you in anything, Rares. Just ask."

Rarity looked in to her friend's eyes. "I'd rather not have help in this matter, just familiarity."

"We've been through a lot of embarrassing things today already. One more ain't gonna hurt our friendship. A hundred more wouldn't"

"Thank you, Applejack. I feel the same way, but this truly isn't something I want help with." Rarity began tapping her hooves.

Applejack put a gentle hoof on Rarity's wither and carefully held her in a one forehoofed hug. "There ain't nothing we can't get through if we're together; and it don't matter what world we're in or what bodies we have!"

Rarity looked back at Applejack, her eyes a little glassy. Rarity's fidgeting had only increased, however.

"Wow!" exclaimed Rainbow, swooping by as the whistle of an approaching train sounded. "I hope they have toilets on the train. Looks like Rarity needs to piss like a racehorse!"

Rarity blushed brightly and said nothing.

Applejack took a step back.

"Eenope."
> Meanwhile: “Well that happened”
> --------------------------------------------------------------------------

07:11 AM

“Oh no,” creaked Special Agent Heartstrings, “Not the bunny.”

“If you alert the bunny I’ll buy more of those special imported oats you like,” Special Agent Sweetie Drops sweetened the deal.

Heartstrings considered her options. Bunny = Oats | No bunny = No oats. “Does it have to be me?”

“The bunny doesn’t like me,” Drops explained.

“The bunny doesn’t like me either.”

“He tried to attack me with a carrot last time just because I interrupted his nap.”

“Well … Just one carrot?” dismissed Heartstrings.

“He sharpened it first, and you know how much combat training he's been through.”

“But still just the one?”

Drops lowered her eyelids slightly, smiled, and sweetened the deal further. “I have more costumes than just the nurse’s uniform. Some you haven’t seen yet.”

Heartstrings stood a little taller. “I’ll alert the bunny.”


***   

   ***


09:09 AM

Cheerilee waved goodbye as Applejack went to see Fluttershy. It was so odd how the two of them reacted to her directions. Everypony knows that Celestia has raised the sun in the west ever since she got her cutie mark for doing it. It was in all the history books! Sure the sun used to rise in the east, but the Unicorn Council at the time considered the new direction a symbol of a new age. Even if Celestia later admitted to it being a simple flub that first day.

Cheerilee then chuckled thinking back to one of Princess Luna’s visits where the matter came up. According to the lunar diarch it was a deliberate prank of juvenile rebellion where she and her sister picked a different direction each morning and night, including north and south. Apparently King Bullion had removed cake from their royal menu as some sort of power play over the new princesses. Eventually an agreement was made but the sisters kept on using west as the old King hated mornings and had already built his castle on the west side of a hill to avoid them.

With another glance in Applejack’s direction, Cheerilee saw her passing over a hill toward Fluttershy’s cottage just seconds before Rarity showed up rushing toward the palace from the marketplace at a full gallop.

“Okay,” Cheerilee told herself, “something is clearly going on today. Time to go home, feed my cats, and put the storm shutters back up.”


***   

   ***


09:15 AM

The Great and Powerful Trixie let out a grandiose and pretentious yawn, finally ready to start her day.

The Kempt and Dapper Trixie bathed in her travel wash basin and brushed her mane, tail, and coat. Traded her sleeping cap for her magician’s cap and donned her magician’s cloak.

The Hungry and Hygienic Trixie had breakfast, brushed her teeth, and put on deodorant.

The Suave yet Coy Trixie checked her appearance in the mirror, blew herself a kiss, and left her caravan.

The Intelligent and Wise Trixie then remembered that conversation with the Pink Confusion.

Finally, the Brave and Heroic Trixie galloped all the way to town screaming for the sheriff.


***   

   ***


09:20 AM

Special Agent Heartstrings straightened out her tie, smoothed down her business suit, and put on her sunglasses. With a smile she walked to her mirror and combed her slicked back mane. Nopony would recognize her. Not with the sandy-blonde mane and tail dye and catcher’s mitt as a decoy cutie mark. No, no. She wasn’t Lyra Heartstrings anymore, she was a talent scout for a national sport team!

“Bon Bon’s not the only pony who can blend in,” she told herself, posing in the mirror. “I make this look good.”

After alerting Special Agent Diablo, she had hurriedly hid herself when Phonyshy showed up.  She watched for a bit before the bunny got annoyed with her peeking in through the windows and left to allow him to do his own investigation lest she taste the wrath of his custom carrot-nunchaku again.

"That's two carrots, Bonnie. Those things can hurt! Must have just taken them out of the freezer."

With Sweetie Drops keeping watch over Falsity and Pseudo Dash, and Finkie completely in the wind, Heartstrings went to check in on Sweet Apple Acres for any possible Flapjacks. She bought a crate of apples as a cover and learned that “Applejack” had indeed returned from Canterlot early and apparently needed some time alone. The other Apple siblings had notably passed some glances off to a side of their property, however, and Heartstrings stealthily found Flapjack tending a garden with Grand Pear, the pear farmer who recently moved into Ponyville. Unfortunately, she was unable to get close enough to listen in without risking being seen.

She needed a disguise before getting closer.

And needed to take home the apples she had just bought.

Applejack was athletic, Heartstrings decided. It made sense she might get scouted for some kind of sport. She already plays Buckball after all.

With a final nod at her not-Lyra reflection, she levitated her S.M.I.L.E. hoofpack, disguised as a simple briefcase, onto her back and headed back out her front door.

“Where’s the sheriff?!” shouted a gabbling and panicking Trixie as she rushed toward the marketplace.

“Uh, oh.”


***   

   ***


09:43 AM

Panting heavily, Special Agent Sweetie Drops collapsed into the grass behind a tree and fumbled in her hoofpack for her binoculars and parabolic microphone.

The first time she had checked on Pseudo Dash, after confirming three more with Lyra, the Rainbow impostor was still unconscious in the hospital, so Drops could only confirm that she did indeed exist. Then, with nothing happening there, Drops switched back to Falsity, who was designing a dress and looking as if it was the first time she had ever seen precious gems before. Then it was back to check up on Pseudo Dash, who was still asleep.

After that it was back to Falsity to see her running from various items levitated in her own aura. After a conversation with the real Rarity’s little sister that couldn’t be heard from Drops’s hiding tree outside, Falsity got dressed and rushed to Princess Twilight’s palace. Sadly, it was not possible to hear what was going on in there either. Drops tried grappling up to a balcony only for Falsity to pop out a different one and for the doors to be locked. As far as Drops could tell, Falsity was just cleaning, checking the palace doors, and filling a sketchbook with any pony she saw wearing hats and dresses, but growing frustrated after only four ponies qualified.

Drops would have tried picking the lock if she did not also have Pseudo Dash to check in on back at the hospital. But of course, by the time she had retrieved her other emergency spy kit, the one with the microphone in it, Pseudo Dash had already left the building without being discharged.

Drops eventually saw the telltale rainbow tail flying in the sky and tracked it to a hill where the impostor was talking with Scootaloo.

“I’ve seen Twilight help her out with the math and physics stuff sometimes, now that she has wings too,” Drops could just make out Scootaloo saying through the microphone’s earpiece. “Pony Rainbow got even faster after that.”

“ ‘Pony Rainbow’?” Drops muttered.

“She’s got more practice and she’s got an egghead doing her homework?!” Pseudo Dash shouted. “That’s totally cheating! There’s gotta be a way to get faster today. Even the odds.”

“ ‘Even the odds’?” Drops gasped.

“Well,” Scootaloo began, “I might know a way.”

“Whatever it is, let’s do it!” Pseudo Dash agreed.

“First, we got to get some supplies. I’ll show you the way.”

Pseudo Dash then picked up Scootaloo and flew off, the filly holding out a hoof to show the way.

“No! Not more running,” grumbled Drops.

With a groan, Drops packed up her stuff, slung her pack over her, and galloped after them.

On the way she considered the conversation. “Scootaloo knows that Pseudo Dash isn’t the real Rainbow Dash, and Pseudo Dash wants to even the odds? Is Scootaloo an impostor too? What about the other Crusaders? And what odds are Pseudo Dash trying to even? Are they planning a direct fight this time?”

Soon, Drops discovered, while this might not be the real Rainbow Dash, she could still fly faster than Drops could run.


***   ***   ***


09:47 AM

“CHANGELINGS!” shouted a mare in a hazmat suit.

“IN PONYVILLE!” shouted another one.

“THE EVIL KIND!” clarified a third.

“RIGHT, NOT THE NICE ONES!” agreed one of the first two.

“Oh no,” groaned Agent Drops, still trying to catch up with Pseudo Dash. “What are they doing?!”

Still keeping pace, Drops watched the hazmat ponies gallop through the marketplace, heading straight to the donut shop where the sheriff “worked.”

“They’re going to start a panic like that,” Drops growled.

Looking forward again, Drops could no longer see Pseudo Dash anywhere and reluctantly pursued the hazmat trio instead.


***   ***   ***


09:50 AM

The Donut Dunker, a quaint little eatery selling all sorts of donuts, breakfast meals, coffees, and other assorted cheap, mass-produced, and quick to eat treats for ponies on the go.  There were several tables, a row of bar stools lined up at the counter, and a few patrons scattered about.

With a loud bang, three ponies in hazmat suits burst in through the front doors and rushed forward.

“SHERIFF!” pleaded one.

“Changelings!” announced another.

“Ooh! Triple berry scones?” noticed the third, while rushing past a copy of the menu.

Behind them, a light olive earth pony mare wearing large sunglasses walked in and headed for a table along the side wall. The mare was panting heavily, but tried to play it off and blend into the background behind a discarded newspaper that managed to hide all but the top of her blue and fuchsia mane styled into a large, frizzy ball.

The three hazmat ponies rushed up to the sheriff’s favorite stool only to be blocked by a rope barrier under a sign reading, “On break till 09:30 AM.”

“You’ve got to be kidding me!” shouted one hazmat pony.

“But changelings!” repeated the second.

“How much are those scones?” inquired the third.

Sitting at the next table over, a Bored and Annoyed Trixie turned to the lead two hazmat ponies as the third walked to the counter to ring the service bell. “Trixie has already been here for thirty minutes to alert the sheriff, but he seems to be in no hurry to return to ‘work’.”

“But Ponyville is in danger!” said the first hazmat pony.

“So is the sheriff’s rest and relaxation, apparently,” replied Trixie. “He was supposed to be back twenty minutes ago!”

“If the sheriff comes here when he’s working, where does he go when he’s on break?” said the second hazmat pony.

“He sculpts clouds,” answered the cashier, arriving at the counter then pointing straight up. “Any of you own a hot air balloon?”

“The horror!” the third hazmat pony shouted.

“Actually, he’s not that bad,” the cashier countered. “Has a display in Los Pegasus. Looks just like Princess Twilight and her friends”

“Oh, that one?” Trixie rolled her eyes. “Eh, Trixie’s seen it. ‘Suppose it’s not bad exactly but—”

“Not that!” the third hazmat pony cried. “I can’t eat my scone in this!”

Trixie and the first two hazmat ponies looked over at the third to see her staring at the scone she had just ordered, baffled as to how to eat it through the sealed suit and face-plate. It was dented on one side as if she had already tried simply bending down and biting it.

While rethinking her strategy, the scone began to glow blue and levitate. Then, with a flash, the scone was inside the hazmat pony’s helmet, balancing on the pony’s muzzle. Or at least half of the scone was there.

Trixie was munching on the other half.

When the two hazmat ponies not eating half a scone turned back to look at her, Trixie simply shrugged.  “Trixie’s commission fee.”

“You could have just taken off the helmet,” the cashier suggested.

“We can’t do that!” exclaimed the first hazmat pony.

“Evil changelings are in town!” added the second.

“Mhm mmh,” the third tried to help while chewing her scone.

“But the changelings have reformed. And what good would the suits do?” asked the cashier.

“Not these changelings!” insisted the first hazmat pony, taking no notice of the logical question.

“They copied all of the harmony council members!” the second insisted more.

“MHM MHH!” the third attempted to insist something.

Taking smaller bites than the third hazmat pony allowed Trixie to speak more clearly. “Trixie is aware. She was spoken to by a Pinkie Pie impostor.”

“How did you know she was an impostor?” asked the cashier.

“She was acting very strange.”

Everypony within the donut shop stopped what they were doing and stared at Trixie.

This included Special Secret Agents Sweetie Drops and Heartstrings, each peering over the tops of the newspapers they had been hidden behind.

Trixie finished a bite of her purloined scone. “Strange for Pinkie,” she explained.

When the confused stares didn’t go away, Trixie elaborated. “It was like her mind was … 'there', at least as far as it usually is for her anyway, but her memories weren’t. But she still claimed to be Pinkie Pie, although she said she’s a different Pinkie and that she was throwing a party for the whole town because she wanted to meet everypony. Unlike the last changeling to copy Pinkie, this one is actually putting in an effort. Even has a cover story of being from a different world if she acts differently than ponies expect her to. And it's even plausible for her.”

Away from the spectacle of Trixie and the hazmat group, Sweetie Drops blinked and did a double-take at the figure to her left: a dapper mare in a business suit with a sandy-blonde mane and tail, and catcher’s mitt cutie mark, but a too-familiar-to-mistake face. “Lyra?” she whispered.

Heartstrings giggled quietly. “Hay, Bonnie. Saw you come in. I make this look good, huh?”

Drops smiled back. “I bet you told your mirror the same thing.”

Heartstrings blushed.

Trixie had taken another bite of the scone, frowning slightly at how dry it was and wondered if the recipe was designed specifically to get customers to buy more coffee. “When you think about it, everypony is strange in their own way, except Trixie, but being really strange is an art form and such artists have their own very distinct styles as intricate as hoofprints. Trixie has gotten to know the Pink One”—Trixie rolled her eyes—“quite well since becoming Starlight’s friend and frequent substitute teacher. This was a good forgery, but still a forgery. Trixie knows how to spot tricks." She struck a proud pose. "It's her name!”

During Trixie’s speech, the two secret agents had settled back behind their newspapers and discretely shifted closer to each other.

“So what did I miss?” Drops asked quietly, eyes passing over random portions of the newspaper and keeping one ear swiveled toward Trixie and the rest.

“Not much,” replied Heartstrings, doing the same. “Just Trixie sitting and mumbling about no sheriff, and forgetting to bring her bit purse with her, for the past half hour. Who are the hazmat crew? Flower trio?”

“Sounds like it. Must have had a visit from Finkie or the others that raised some red flags with them. Not sure why they’re in the suits though. Oh, I’ve confirmed Pseudo Dash by the way, but she woke up and flew off. She’s not as fast as Rainbow but fast enough for me to lose her.”

"And I've confirmed a Flapjack," Heartstrings added.

“So, what do we do now?” exclaimed the first hazmat pony over the agents’ whispering.

“Mhh!” seconded the third hazmat pony.

“Oh, finish your scone,” chided the second.

“As Trixie mentioned,” Trixie began mentioning again, “Trixie was waiting for the sheriff since before it was cool.”

“Oh! I’m sorry,” apologized the cashier. “I meant to change that sign. The sheriff tried sculpting a cloud that exploded on him. He’s at the hospital.”

“Why would a cloud explode?” asked the first hazmat pony.

“Did a changeling set a trap?!” suggested the second.

The third hazmat pony gasped and had to cough to clear the scone from her airway.

“Somepony saw Rainbow Dash pushing a cloud around earlier. She was raining it on everypony,” recounted the cashier.

The hazmat ponies shot panicked expressions at each other. At least it appeared that way. It was hard to tell through the face-plates.

The first hazmat pony turned to Trixie. “You can save us though, right?”

“That’s right! You’ve saved Equestria once already!” the second cheered.

“And against changelings!” the third finally managed to speak again.

This time it was Trixie’s turn to choke. “I—Trix—wha?”

“You can do it, Trixie! Save Ponyville!” the second hazmat pony hopped in place excitedly.

“Yeah! Shoot a firecracker up their—”

“Rose!” the third hazmat pony cut off the first.

“Flower trio confirmed,” Drops stated matter-of-factly from the secret agent corner of the restaurant.

“They’re really asking Trixie to save the town from a changeling invasion?” Heartstrings shook her head.

“When the last barrel’s empty, your only choice is to scrape it dry,” explained Drops.

“But, but, Trixie has a show tonight!” chickened Trixie, possibly even more loud and clear than she might have intended.

“Princess Twilight will give you a medal!” encouraged Rose.

“Yeah—“ The second hazmat pony was cut off by Trixie slapping a hoof in her face-plate.

Trixie blinked. “Twilight will …? Twilight will give Trixie a medal!” She began to chuckle. “Not just Celestia and Luna this time, but actually Twilight will have no choice but to recognize Trixie’s greatness and give her a medal with all of Ponyville for an audience!”

The other ponies in the shop grew uneasy as Trixie’s chuckling turned more than a shade dark.

“Trixie …,” Trixie paused, adjusted her cap, and swooshed her cape to milk the drama, “has work to do!” Trixie announced, flourishing a hoof in the air. “Hazmat ponies!” she addressed the three in a commander’s voice. “Go alert the town. Ponyville will be saved at Trixie’s brilliant and victorious battle tonight!”

Drops groaned as the hazmat flower trio scrambled out the door. “This will not end well, will it?”

“Not at all,” confirmed Heartstrings as Trixie marched out the door at a slower pace. “Should we wait before following them?”

“Yeah, give it a minute then follow Trixie. I’ll wait another minute and go after Falsity in the palace,” Drops told her partner before asking, “So, who are you?”

Heartstrings passed her disguise a proud smile. “A talent scout for a national sport team!”

“But what do you know about sports?”

“I play hoofball with my friends in Canterlot. You know, Minuette, Twinkleshine, Lemon, and Moondancer? Even Twilight once in a while.”

Drops looked back down to her partner’s fake cutie mark. “But hoofball doesn’t use catcher’s mitts.”

“Uh,” Heartstrings looked down to her flank.

“You just wanted something with fingers, didn’t you?”

Heartstrings blushed.

“And what’s your name?” Drops chuckled.

“Um, Talent Scout?”

Drops muffled her laughter with the newspaper. “We’ll work on it.”

Just as Heartstrings was joining in on the chuckling, an explosion of sound and rainbow light spread out over the whole town in a thick ring.

“Was that a rainboom? I thought you said she wasn’t as fast as Rainbow!” Heartstrings gasped, turning to look out a window.

“Seems she managed to even the odds.”


***   

   ***


10:05 AM

Only scant moments after leaving the donut shop, and still a bit creeped out over Trixie’s laughter, three mares in hazmat suits looked up as an explosion of sound and rainbow light spread out over the whole town in a thick ring.

“WHAT THE HAY WAS THAT?!” shrieked Lily Valley.

“IT SOUNDED LIKE A RAINBOOM!” answered Rose.

“Rainbow Dash is going to be mad that a changeling copied her moves!” cried Daisy.

“EEEK! It’s coming this way!”

“Run! Just bucking run!”

“The horror!”


***   

   ***


10:06 AM

Rushing outside, Special Agents Drops and Heartstrings observed the now familiar rainbow trail that resulted from Rainbow Dash’s rainbooms. They quickly noticed that the trail alternated between erratic and smooth movements, as if the creator kept gaining and losing control.

“What do we do now?” asked Agent Heartstrings.

“Wait for her to finish and chase after?” replied Agent Drops.

“And just stand here in the meantime?”

“We can hide by the edge of the Everfree. Use the treeline as cover.”


***   

   ***


10:10 AM

Strips of rainbow light were spread over the skies of Ponyville, created by what appeared to be a blue pegasus pony. But three mares in hazmat suits knew better. That wasn’t a pony. That was a changeling infiltrator working for their evil queen.

“What do we do?!” demanded Daisy, running from each new pass of the changeling.

“What can we do?!” despaired Lily, running in circles with her eyes closed.

“We’ll hide under the bridge!” declared Rose, running toward it.

“What will that do?!”

“Keep us from getting a rainboom to the face!”

The three looked up at the crazed display of loops, zigzags, and dives the rainbow trail included, and worse, how close some of them came, and made for the nearest bridge.

It was only a few seconds later when they all heard a tremendous set of roars from the forest on the other side.

“What was that?”

“It sounded like a timberwolf!”

“No, it sounded like a lot of timberwolves!”

“Could they be changelings too?”

“Does it matter?! They’ll still have sharp, pointy teeth!”

“And claws!”

“Keep going for the bridge! Timberwolves can’t swim, they get too waterlogged!”

The rainbow passed overhead again, zooming out in front of them and they heard it say, “OH CRAP! LOOK OUT! MOVE MOVE MOVE MOVE MOVE!”

Nearing the bridge, Rose slammed her hooves into the dirt and skidded to a halt, the other two piling up behind her and falling to the sides.

“It’s a Fluttershy!” Rose said, pointing to a yellow pegasus-looking changeling.

“Run!” said another as the pegasus veered around them, heading for the Palace of Friendship.

“She’ll eat our souls!”

“Can changelings do that?”

“I don’t know, just run!”

The timberwolves screamed.

There were a series of thuds.

The rainbow laser passed overhead twice more in an erratic pattern.

“Changelings, timberwolves, and lasers!”

“Oh, my!”

“What’s next?!”

“Please not zomponies, please not zomponies, please not zomponies!”

“Yeah! Not again!”

“It wasn’t real last time!”

“It was close enough!”

They rounded a corner and ran through town.

The rainbow laser passed them like a rocket, tearing up the ground, breaking windows, and crashing into a third storey room of the hospital.

The three hazmat ponies screamed and ran.

“This is a disaster!”

“That’s it! I say we’ve warned enough ponies! Back to the bunker!”


***   

   ***


10:38 AM

“They’re not still following us are they?” whispered Special Agent Heartstrings.

“Well, I don’t smell them anymore, so that’s a good indicator,” answered Special Agent Sweetie Drops.

“I—I’ve never even seen a timberwolf before except in pictures,” Heartstrings stammered.

“They only come so close to town if they’re chasing food.”

“I AM NOT ON THEIR MENU!” cried Heartstrings, collapsing on the grass.

“If only I had my Everfree supply kit. I could have taken down a couple.”

“There were more than a couple!” Heartstrings panted.

“Which is why it’s a good thing they stopped!” Drops collapsed next to her partner. “There has been too much running today. If only the timberwolf repellent in this case wasn't expired.”

"I thought you got a new one."

"That was the shark repellent."

“Ugh," Heartstrings groaned, "why do you even have that?"

"It works on land-sharks too," Drops defended.

"Are there any around?"

"Uh." Drops blushed.

Too tired to follow up, Heartstrings turned to more important things. "So now what do we do?”

Drops took a moment to think. “The rainboom ended a while ago, by the hospital I think. We should go there.”

“Carry me.”

Drops just groaned.

“No?”

“No.”

“Well, I’m not carrying you. Earth ponies are heavy.”

Passing Heartstrings a flat look, Drops replied in a matching tone. “Thanks.”

“I didn’t say you're fat or anything.”

“You just did.”

“I said you’re not fat. You’re just heavy.”

Drops gave her a stare.

"I mean, if you were a pegasus, you'd be lighter. You know, hollow bones verses …," Heartstrings pointed in the general direction of her earth pony partner.

"You're digging a hole, Heartstrings."

"I'm a unicorn! I don't have that kind of muscle! Maybe I could levitate you far enough?"

When Drops's expression failed to change, Heartstrings chuckled nervously and struggled to her hooves. “Hospital was it?”

Drops trugged after her.

A few dozen steps later Drops asked her partner, “Any further thoughts on the impostors? Any theories?”

“Besides Finkie, I’ve only seen the other two at a distance,” Heartstrings replied. “Phonyshy seemed happy to see Diablo though so she doesn’t know him nearly as well as we do.”

“Falsity and Pseudo Dash apparently didn’t know the ponies they're copying aren’t in town.”

“Then how could they copy them?”

“Photographs?” Drops suggested. “I believe all a changeling needs is a good photo to get a passing facsimile.”

“So Chrysalis gave them photos to copy from and then they just picked the wrong day to try to replace them? They know them well enough to act like them … reasonably at least, but not know their schedule?”

Drops slowed a moment, deep in thought. “What if this isn’t an invasion, or at least not a planned one?”

Heartstrings gasped, eyes lighting up. “So, you think they might really be legit from another world?”

”If they were,” Drops’s brow crinkled, “how would they have gotten here? Discord maybe? Teleportation mishap?”

”If it was either of those, why would Finkie be trying to have a town-wide party?”

“Because our Pinkie would.”

Heartstrings nodded. ”Right. And that means the impostor would have to also. Either because she really is an alien Pinkie, or she’s an impostor keeping in character.”

”Personally, I’m thinking these are changeling foals.”

“Foals? I suppose as long as they are old enough to copy adult mares. But why would you think they’re foals?”

”Well,” began Drops, “think about it. If your mom wanted revenge on the mares who kicked her to the curb, multiple times now, I bet you’d hear her mumbling about it all the time.”

“Okay. And probably always be in training to capture and replace those mares.”

”And more importantly, getting annoyed by how often it gets brought up.”

”So, what?” asked Heartstrings, “her latest, uh, brood? Litter? Swarm?”

“Clutch? Changelings are hatched.”

“Okay, so her latest clutch decided they were tired of waiting and Chrysalis doesn’t know they started early?”

”Don’t tell me you never snuck out of your parents’ house while you were growing up. Go to a late night party maybe?”

Heartstrings blushed slightly as more than one memory came back to her. ”Well, a party, sure, but not to get revenge on—is there something I should know about your parents? Maybe why I haven't met them yet?”

”What!” Drops squeaked. “No, no. It’s just a theory. You know, think like the enemy and all that.”

”Right," with a little consideration, Heartstrings let that slide. "So, Chrysalis has foals, trains them for their whole lives to replace her enemies, but they get impatient and didn’t wait for the green light, so their intel wasn’t complete?”

“Could explain their behavior, like why they can't whinny right, have trouble with unicorn magic, and why these changelings aren’t on Thorax’s side. They weren’t around, or too young for his rebellion. Chrysalis might have a new hive.”

”If she does, we’ll have to alert S.M.I.L.E. Hidequarters.”

”And to find out, we’ll have to capture the impostors,” Drops declared.

Heartstrings mulled that over. "Think Chrysalis will show up looking for them?"

"Very possible. Either that or she'll just lay more eggs."

"How? Is she married?"

Drops cringed. "I think I'd rather not know the mating habits of the changeling queen."

”Hay, there they are.” Heartstrings pointed out a group of five possible changeling foals standing near the Ponyville hospital.

Drops looked to where her partner was pointing, saw her targets, saw the lack of hiding places near them, grabbed her partner, and dove back around the building they had just emerged from.

“We can’t capture all five at once!” she told Heartstrings, pulling her spy kit off her back and setting up her binoculars and parabolic microphone. “Here, keep watch while I set this up.” Drops passed the binoculars while she worked on the microphone.

Once she got everything running, they heard Falsity yell, "Pinkie! We weren't supposed to tell anyone we aren't really ponies!"

"We weren't?" gasped Finkie.

"We weren't?" echoed Pseudo Dash.

"If the locals find out what we are we could get into all sorts of trouble," explained Flapjack.

"Oh," Finkie giggled, "maybe that's why so many ponies ran away from me."

"Maybe we should get on the train now after all," whispered Phonyshy.

Drops perked up, “Confirmation they aren’t ponies and that they aren’t all running on a unified plan.”

“They’re also heading for the train-station,” added Heartstrings as Pseudo Dash flew off with the other four galloping after.

Drops did a double take and haphazardly set into packing up her equipment. Their targets were nearly out of sight by the time she finished. “Let’s go!”

They rushed after the group but were quickly stopped by a hospital orderly and a potbellied pegasus with a badge. They both looked angry.

“Um,” Heartstrings took a step back, noticing some glass beside the hospital, “You don't think they think we broke the window do you?”


***   ***   ***


10:48 AM

By the time Special Agents Drops and Heartstrings arrived at the train station, the train their targets had presumably boarded was nearing full speed away from the station.

“We missed the train!” despaired Heartstrings. "How did the sheriff not know that was a rainboom? Just how thick are the hospital's walls?"

"Or, he thought Rainbow had too good an alibi," Drops offered, rushing to the ticket counter.

“Hello, sir,” Drops addressed the ticket agent. “Was Miss Pinkie Pie on that train?”

The ticket agent smiled back at her. “Why, yes she was, Ms., um—“

“Bo bo,” said Drops, fluffing her poofy mane. “I’m a traveling clown and was hoping to get some pointers from one of Equestria’s premiere party planners! We had planned to meet here in Ponyville, but my grandmare was sick and I had to delay!”

Heartstrings raised an eyebrow at the sudden backstory then quickly rushed forward. “And I’m her agent, uh Clown, um, Catcher.”

Drops turned to her partner and gave her, and her fake cutie mark, a lopsided look, but said nothing.

“Darnedest thing,” the ticket agent continued, “all five of them and our princess—oh, and the little dragon boy—left for Canterlot yesterday, and now they’re going back there again. Must have come back on last night’s red-eye, or a pegasus courier. Maybe they all forgot something important. Although …,” the ticket agent trailed off for a moment, "only Rarity had anything new with her, and it was only clothing."

After chuckling, he added, "I suppose it's not the first time though."

“When’s the next train to Canterlot?” asked Drops.

The ticket agent looked over his schedule. “Looks like noon.”

“That’s over an hour away!” Heartstrings pointed out.

“Sorry, ladies, that’s the next one heading north.”

“Thank you, sir,” said Drops. “We’ll take two tickets. It’s only an hour delay, we’ll find them.”

"Yeah," Heartstrings added quietly, "They can't cause all that much trouble in just an hour, right?"


***   

   ***


10:50 AM

High up on a wall inside of a train, a tired and cranky horsefly had decided that Ponyville was too fast-paced and was on its way to a new life in a comparatively quiet city, noticing all too late the five familiar-looking horses below.
> Masterpiece Theater 2: Trains, Trains, and Explosions
> --------------------------------------------------------------------------

High up on a wall inside of a train, a tired and cranky horsefly had decided that Ponyville was too fast-paced and was on its way to a new life in a comparatively quiet city, noticing all too late the five familiar-looking horses below.

Unfortunately for the horsefly, the horse carrier it snuck aboard had already begun moving. It begrudgingly decided putting up with some annoyance where it had just gotten comfortable would be better than bothering to find a new place to sleep.

That was until The Pink One began chasing the blue winghorse all around the train and yelling about her ears.

In the commotion, the blue winghorse found itself getting sucked out a window and the other horses started yelling.

The horsefly decided it was time to find a more peaceful place to be.

So it also flew out a window.

After the initial chaos of winds, the horsefly enjoyed the quiet flight back to that little horse town.

It even fell half asleep mid flight and lost all track of time. Exactly what it had been hoping for.

Until an explosion of light and sound blared out, startling it awake again to see rainbow light flashing in the sky.

Horseflies can’t groan, so it just buzzed louder in annoyance and continued on.

The light eventually faded and the horsefly had begun to return to sleep when another rainbow explosion woke it back up.

What a noisy day, the horsefly buzzed louder.

It continued on, wings growing weary, when another horse carrier appeared on the tracks.

The horsefly wasn’t able to react in time and found itself getting sucked into an open window.

This was fine. The horsefly could rest its wings, and there was only an olive horse and a green hornhorse in the car.

It stopped being fine when the two horses began what appeared to be a mating ritual. It wasn’t even their season yet. What a waste of energy.

The horsefly left the horse carrier, continuing on and ignoring the startled scream behind it as well as the yellow winghorse, purple hornwinghorse, and purple scalething sitting on the roof.

This time the horsefly was left alone.

Until another horse carrier surprised it, again finding itself getting sucked into an open window.

This carrier contained a young, yellow horse, a young, orange winghorse, and a young, white hornhorse.

The young ones were always so noisy.

The horsefly didn’t stick around to rest and left right away.

On the horsefly flew, following the carriers’ tracks.

But peace was simply not meant to be.

Another rainbow explosion, closer this time as if following the horsefly.

And then another, and another.

If the horsefly could count higher than two, it would have been appalled.

Not once in its fourteen-hundred hour long life, not that it was counting, had the elderly horsefly encountered such a busy, or annoying day. Some had come close, but those those were more in its youth when such things were fascinating. Now though, the horsefly just wanted peace and quiet.

Finally, the horsefly reached that town again and flew to the top of the first horsebuilding it came to, the need to rest its tired wings too great to go further.

Buy why were the horses screaming?

It crept forward and looked around.

Horses running and flying, zipping around like its own kin.

A horse carrier came to a halt and familiar horses came out of it.

Including the Pink One.

Wait.

Why were there two of the Pink One?

Why were there two of the orange horse, and the blue wing horse, and the yellow winghorse, and the white hornhorse?

Stunned, the horsefly watched on.

The running continued, the yelling continued.

What were those things flying around? Why were there so many?

Why were they exploding?!

“CITIZENS OF PONYVILLE! SEEK! REFUGE! HERE!”

If the horsefly had eyelids it would have blinked, blankly at the loud and pompous blue hornhorse.

“Oh swat this,” it buzzed in its horsefly language, jumping down onto the horse carrier tracks. “I should have been dead at least four hundred hours ago anyway.”

The horsefly couldn't count that high, but it could make an estimate.
> Preparations, Plans, and Pizza
> --------------------------------------------------------------------------

“And then I found pony Pinkie’s really neat-oh party cavern under the most amazing, wonderful, delicious-smelling, fantastic, delightful, spectacular, yum-a-rific bakery I’d ever seen. And then an alligator bit my hoof. It tickled!”

“I wrote my name in the sky for the whole town to read. And I did it with my butt flank!”

“My pony’s little sister is one of the most adorable things Ah ever did see. And Ah got to talk to my grandfather again.”

“Miss Cheerilee’s pony seems nice. And Mr. Cranky Doodle Donkey is an actual donkey here.”

“Wow. So he really is an a—?“

“Rainbow!”

As the train went about its way toward the capitol castle, the intrepid pony neophytes regaled themselves with their tales from the past few hours.

Though they were still down one member.

Between stories, Applejack had stolen a few quick glances down the hall toward where Rarity had rushed off to once learning where the restroom was, and now took a look out the window to see their destination much closer than before. A little worried, she considered checking on her, but was relieved when the now familiar white unicorn finally reappeared.

Rarity walked calmly toward the chatty group. Head up, appearance immaculate, stride strong, purposeful, and dignified.

However, the blush on her cheeks told a different tale.

All the conversations stopped as Rarity took a seat next to Applejack.

Rarity ignored the silence and simply, and nonchalantly, looked out the nearest window.

Applejack looked at Rarity with an inquisitive smile. When she was also ignored, she looked to her friends. Rainbow Dash snickered quietly. Fluttershy quietly turned to look out her own window. Pinkie Pie was … much too quiet for Pinkie. Though, Applejack noticed Pinkie’s pony ears were twitching and she was shaking her head slightly with a shifting set of facial expressions as if listening to competing conversations.

Seemingly on her own, Applejack welcomed her friend.

“So, uh, it all come out all right?”

Rarity responded immediately by glaring back at her, eyes seeming to flash as red as her deepening blush.

“Whoa Nelly!” Applejack jerked back, telling herself it was just a trick of the light. “Okay, that was the wrong phrase to use.”

Rainbow Dash let out a snort of laughter as Applejack tried to counter. “What Ah mean is, uh, you feeling … relieved?”

Rarity glared a moment longer before clearing her throat and turning back to the window.

Applejack swallowed and looked around. Fluttershy still looking out her window. Pinkie bonking herself on the head repeatedly, ears still twitching. Rainbow snickering louder.

She considered just waiting until Rainbow surrendered her battle against tact and laughed outright so the heat would shift to a new target. Though, while the thought was certainly appealing, she felt it best to defuse the situation first.

Rainbow beat her to the punch though.

“Must have been like living an episode of National Geographic.”

“So!” Applejack jumped between her blushing and guffawing friends and cheered loudly with a smile larger than was naturally possible. “We’re off to the city palace! Or, perhaps, Rarity’s city boutique! Isn’t that right?”

Applejack sighed with relief to discover the phrase city boutique was not only the more preferred one, but also received well enough to save Rainbow’s life when Rarity’s glare was replaced by a smile as bright as the sun.

“Oh! Yes, yes, yes!” Rarity spoke—and in such a gleeful gush—while turning back toward the group. “Has Applejack told you about my three boutiques? Two of them in cities? One in Manehattan?”

When Rarity paused and turned, expectantly, to Applejack, the latter was quick to pipe up. “Ah! Uh, no, Ah figured you’d want to tell all about it yourself.”

That was the right answer twice in a row as Rarity launched into the full explanation.

Fluttershy turned back around and listened happily.

Rainbow’s laughter faded out to bland resolve, bordering on boredom, before it was able to spark violence.

Pinkie seemed to only get bits and pieces as her attention was split, though split with what was anyone’s guess.

Applejack was just happy they all survived.

Sitting through the full spiel again was a little daunting, but it was always nice to see Rarity so happy, noting her smile was just as cute in pony form.

She quickly turned to the window and adjusted her hat when a flash of memory from the stairwell in Twi’s palace brought a blush to her cheeks.

“So, we’ll find Twi, Claws, and our ponies at your Canterlot boutique?” asked Fluttershy once Rarity was finished.

“Well,” Rarity whined, “to be fair, we’re not absolutely sure. But it’s either there or the castle. We know they were all called by the head princess.” After a slight pause, Rarity squealed happily. “Either way this will be a fun trip. Either we see one of my city boutiques or we get to meet royalty! More royalty that is! Or maybe both! Perhaps the other princesses are at my shop as well.”

“Royalty?! Oh my! Is my mane okay? Should I brush my …” Fluttershy checked her mane, then a thought occurred to her and she also checked her tail and fur coat noting her fresh-from-the-dangerous-forest appearance, “everything? I’m not sure how I’d do that.”

“Not to worry,” Rarity lit her horn and a variety of horse grooming paraphernalia including brushes, combs, even hoof picks levitated out of her stylish saddlebags, “I prepared for such an occasion!”

Applejack chuckled, “Of course you did,” but checked herself over as well, taking off her hat to smooth down her mane.

Fluttershy gasped excitedly at the floating tools, then smiled happily as Rarity started pampering her all over, removing remains of forrest and smoothing her hair, tail, and coat. “I guess not wearing clothing wouldn’t make getting ready for the day much quicker after all. Not with all the fur and tail to tidy.”

Rainbow shrugged then just shook her head and hips to refresh her wind-blown look and was done with it.

As for Pinkie … the group, years ago, had learned that brushing her curls was not something to be attempted in less than ideal situations, such as while on a moving train, or without strong conditioners and specially designed power-tools, and was left alone.

During the sprucing up, the five ponies filled Rarity in on the cliff notes of what she had missed while she was indisposed.

“Has anyone thought about what to do when we get there and ponies start wondering why there’s two of all of us?” asked Rainbow once Rarity was caught up. “And won’t there be security around a bunch of royal princesses?”

Rarity stopped brushing down Fluttershy’s coat, Applejack stopped brushing off her hat. Pinkie kept on scratching at her ears, having completely stopped paying attention.

“Cosplay!” Fluttershy offered cheerfully. “We’ll just tell ponies we’re cosplaying as our heroes! Like that convention in Baltimare.”

When she realized what she had just said, Fluttershy blushed and Rarity helped Fluttershy hide behind her long, pink mane with a quick brush. Rarity herself discreetly avoided eye-contact with their other friends.

“Is that something ponies do?” asked Rainbow. “Most of us, and most everyone else we’ve met here, were naked. What, we say we dyed our fur and put fake pictures on our butt flanks?”

“Why do you keep saying ‘butt flanks’?” asked Applejack.

Rainbow gave hers a pat. “It’s funny!”

“That’s more like our hips ain’t it? Not our butts?”

“Well, maybe you had to be there.”

“Uh huh,” Applejack decided to just let that one stand. “Ah suppose in a clothing-optional shindig like this that might be how the ponies do it. If anybody asks, we’re just really good at it and we don’t break character often.”

“Of course! I’m good at everything I do,” Rainbow pointed a hoof at herself.

“Case in point.” Applejack rolled her eyes.

“Gah! That’s it!” Pinkie shouted, startling the others in the car. “I am putting my hoof down!” She then did so with a bang and continued to shout at her head, bonking herself occasionally. “Numbers Twenty through Forty-Two! Quiet down up there! I can't hear the others think!”

“Pinkie?” Fluttershy put a hoof on her friend’s withers. “Are you okay? Should we talk louder?”

“No, not you, girls,” Pinkie replied. “I think Forty-Five through Fifty-Three are trying to talk to me but Twenty through Forty-Two are so loud I can't hear them. And it sounds like some of them are bowling—" she winced, "—It feels like some of them are bowling. And now I smell pizza. Someone smell my ears! Is there pizza in my head?”

Pinkie looked to her left. “Dashie, smell my ears!"

“Do wha—?!” Rainbow leaned back and fell off her bench as Pinkie pushed the top of her head right up to Rainbow’s muzzle.

“Smell my ear pizza!”

“Ugh! Pinkie, no way!” Rainbow rolled onto her belly and haphazardly re-categorized her hooves beneath her.

“Come on, please? I need to know I’m not crazy.”

“That ship might have sailed,” Rainbow muttered as she stood back up.

“I also need to know what toppings they’re using so I can update my shopping list.”

“Yeah, out of port and full steam ahead,” Rainbow finished her previous thought.

Now upright, Rainbow turned back to Pinkie only to have a large, pink ear filling her whole vision and jumped back in surprise. “Gah!” She took to the air, rising near the ceiling and hovering away a bit.

Pinkie pronked after her. “Are they having a pizza and bowling party without us?”

“Don’t ask me!” Rainbow flew off with Pinkie giving chase up and down the narrow train hall. Pinkie was easily able to pronk up to Rainbow’s altitude but was not quick enough to counter her evasive maneuvers—poneuvers?—and never managed ear-to-nose sniffing range.

Their friends just watched on. They knew there really wasn’t much they could do but let it play out.

“Uh, Rainbow Dash?” Pinkie eventually stopped and called from the floor near her original seat, allowing Rainbow to get some distance hovering near a window. “You might want to come down.”

“I’m not smelling your ears.”

“No, that’s not it. The train’s gonna—“

“Whoa!” Rainbow shouted as the train’s path took a sharp turn and she found herself pushed through the open window.

“Rainbow!” gasped Fluttershy as Rainbow got left behind the speeding train. Pinkie waved.

“Is there any way to request a stop?” asked Rarity.

“Ah got it!” Applejack turned toward her window, having noticed the pull-cords above them. She had nearly trapped it between her teeth when a blue pegasus flew up and splat into her window from the other side, startling her onto the floor.

Rarity lit her horn and opened the window to let Rainbow tumble back in, on top of Applejack.

Pinkie couldn’t help but comment. “You caught back up to the train, Dashie! And a seven-point-five point landing too! I'd give it a thumbs-up if I had any left."

"Of course I caught up," Rainbow countered after Applejack pushed her back into a sitting position so she could get up. "It's a steam-powered train. No way it'd be faster than me. But how'd I get sucked out the window?"

"The train turned and you didn't," Pinkie explained. "Isn’t it kind’a weird how physics in this world just seem to pick and choose when they are going to kick in?”

The other girls, including Rainbow and Applejack still on the floor, stared at Pinkie thinking back over the past few years. “In this world?” they all secretly thought.

Lost in thought, Pinkie mumbled to herself, "Or I guess it should be 'it is'? Number eighty is saying physics singular, not plural." Not waiting for comment, Pinkie shrugged and walked up to Fluttershy. “Smell my ears please?”

Fluttershy scrunched up her muzzle at the concept, but, seeing that their two friends were alright and had already untangled themselves, leaned toward the top of Pinkie’s head and gave a sniff. Then a couple more.

“What do you smell?” asked Pinkie. “Cheese? Pineapple? Pepperoni? Deluxe? Meat lovers’? Triple-Decker cupcake surprise? What kind of pizza is it? There’s no Vegemite is there? I’m allergic and I don’t want that stuff in my brain; I get itchy.”

“Um. Cotton-candy and strawberry bubblegum?”

“There’s gum in my ears too?!” Pinkie shouted. “Eww!”

Pinkie shook her head and flicked her ears while Fluttershy tried to clarify, “No, I think that’s just your mane. Your shampoo maybe?” But Pinkie had already changed tactics: her forehooves were clamped over her muzzle and her cheeks were puffed out.

The girls could only stare as pressure seemed to build, her mane and cheeks expanding, until there was a POP and a small shower of confetti blew out of Pinkie’s ears.

“Wow!” Pinkie cheered. “That feels much better!” She sniffed the air. “All clear!”

The girls stared a moment longer as Pinkie returned to her seat before Applejack piped up. “Physics ain’t the only thing strange ‘round here.” She thought on that some more. “Though Ah suppose that ain’t all that new, is it?”

Three heads nodded in agreement, and the girls just avoided the spots where the confetti had fluttered to the floor.

“Well then,” Rarity eventually returned the group to task, “What’s the new plan? For when we get to the city.”

“Are we going to the castle or the boutique?” asked Fluttershy.

“If we are voting, then I of course vote for my boutique,” Rarity chippered a vote.

“Yeah, but how do we get there?” asked Rainbow. “It’s a city. It’s not like the train will bring us right to your door.”

“Ohh! Unless the train station is like a mall and your shop is inside!” Pinkie offered.

Rarity bit her lip and made no attempt to answer.

Sensing the hesitation, Applejack spoke up, “You wouldn’t happen to know where your shop is do ya?”

Rarity drooped her head with a sigh.

Fluttershy gave her a hug. “I’m sure we’ll find it.”

Applejack joined in, pointing toward the car’s doors. “There’s a rail map by the entrance, Ah saw it commin’ in. Seems the city is divided into districts. There’s a station right near the castle, and a few more elsewhere ‘round about.”

“Ha!” Rainbow perked up. “That’s perfect! We’ll just split up again, take a different station each and meet up at the castle.”

“Uh,” Applejack groaned, “We found out what happens when we split up back in pony Canterville—”

“Ponyville,” Fluttershy corrected.

“—Maybe it’s best to keep to a single group while in the city. Bigger place and all.”

“Was there a fashion district? Shopping district?” asked Rarity, heading to the map to check. “There is! My boutique’s bound to be in this area,” she said, tapping a spot on the map. “Seems modest enough for an easy search.”

“Is it near a station? Or in one?” asked Fluttershy.

“Or on one?” added Pinkie, drawing odd looks. “What? There are ponies with wings, floating houses made out of clouds, and castles made out of trees made out of crystal grown in seconds with living areas and furniture already inside. Couldn’t there be a train station with a mall on a second floor?”

The girls looked at each other sheepishly. “The map doesn’t,” Rarity cleared her throat, “specify, exactly. But there is a station in the appropriate district. It’s even the first station we’ll come to!”

“That’s all well and good,” Applejack offered, walking up to join Rarity, “but Ah say the castle would be the best bet. We know exactly where it is and there’s a station right to it instead of somewhere nearby. And Ah bet if our ponies ain’t there, the big princess already knows of Twi’s portal and we can just tell her the truth. She was Sunset’s teacher and all. She might even help us herself.”

Rarity turned to Applejack, pouting.

Applejack frowned slightly. “Ah know, Rares, ya want to see your pony’s other shops, and Ah don’t blame ya. Ah’d want the same if Ah was the creative type.”

Rarity’s eyes got larger, shimmering.

Applejack flinched back. “N-now don’t give me that. Going to the castle ought to be the best, quickest way to get’er done.”

Rarity let her bottom lip quiver just a little bit.

Applejack held her ground.

But didn’t last long. “Alright, alright. We’ll make two teams.”

“Splendid, darling!” Rarity cheered, instantly recovering and pulling Applejack into a snuggle. “So which of you are coming with me and who’s going to the castle?” she called to their friends, missing Applejack’s blush.

“I’m with AJ,” piped Rainbow. “I’d rather take the direct route.”

“I’ll go with you, Rarity,” offered Fluttershy. “I’d like to see some pony dresses if it doesn't take long.”

All eyes turned to Pinkie to see her mumbling to herself again.

“So,” Pinkie seemed to ask the air, “usually it’s just an indeterminable number of hours and other times it’s overnight, but only when there’s cake and a mystery plot? What kind of train service is that?”

“Yoo-hoo,” Rarity called cheerfully. “Pinkie, dear. Which team would you like to accompany?”

“Huh, what?” Pinkie turned back to her friends. “Teams?”

“Yes, we’ve decided that one team will go directly to the castle and the other will search for our ponies at my boutique. They’re bound to be at one of the two locations. Each team will get off at a different train station.”

“Oh, but why both? Doesn’t the castle make more sense? That's where Sunny’s old teacher lives and she’d know who we are, right?”

Applejack nodded in agreement. "See? Even Pinkie—" she was cut off when Rarity’s flank gave hers a little bump.

“We’re doing both because it’s possible they are performing special royal duties at my boutique, for visiting dignitaries, perhaps in secret, I suspect.”

“Ooh!” Pinkie’s face brightened in understanding. “I guess it would be super secret if their doing there duties over they’re and not the castle! And Team Boutique wouldn’t have to worry about the royal guards putting them in the dungeon if they think Team Castle is up to something nefarious.”

Applejack and Rainbow gave each other slightly uneasy glances for a moment before Applejack smiled. “Ah'm sure they’ve seen ‘cosplayers’ before if we need to lie our way in.” She blinked, "Can't believe Ah just said that."

“Wait!” Pinkie scratched at her chin, forcing herself to not giggle at how fuzzy it was. “That didn’t feel right.

“What didn’t feel right, Pinkie?” asked Fluttershy.

“Applejack planning to lie to royal guards?” asked Rainbow.

“Only if necessary,” clarified Applejack. “We can tell the princesses and our ponies the truth, but the guards might not believe us and things could go sour before we get to them if we say or do something too weird.”

Pinkie had ignored the exchange and was counting on her forehooves. “‘Their doing’; ‘there duties’—,” out of forehooves, Pinkie rolled onto her back and continued with her hindhooves, “—‘over they’re’? What’s wrong with that?”

“That sounded right to me,” Rarity said.

“Yeah, it sounded right, but something was off.”

Applejack and Rainbow gave each other slightly less slightly uneasy glances again before Rainbow scratched the back of her head. “Why don’t you go with Rarity?” she offered with a big grin before mumbling to Applejack, “Best she goes where there won’t be guards.”

“Yeah,” agreed Applejack. “Try on some dresses while you’re there.”

“Their?” asked Pinkie. “Which one?”

“Uh …, yes?” Applejack tried.

Pinkie nodded, but kept on her back, talking to herself and counting on her hooves again. “This was easier with fingers,” she mused.

“O…kay?” Rainbow concluded and flew a few benches away, after checking out the window to make sure the train tracks were heading straight. “I’m going to take a catnap.”

"You mean a ponynap?" Fluttershy giggled.

"Do ponies take naps?" Rarity asked her.

"Well, this pony is going to take a nap,” Rainbow answered. “Wake me when we get there. I want to be rested when we meet the other me."

"Whyever for? You’re the athlete among us. Surely you can’t be tired already. Or did that stunt back in Ponyville take a toll?"

Rainbow scoffed. "Of course I’m not tired, but you think I can meet another me without some kind of awesome competition happening? I'm planning to be at the top of my game and show her who's the best Rainbow Dash in the multiverse!"

As Rainbow lay down on her chosen napping bench, Applejack and Rarity looked to each other with concern. Applejack leaned in and whispered up at Rarity’s pony ear. "You thinking what I'm thinking?"

"That, perhaps, we should have come to this world with a smaller group?" Rarity whispered back.

"Dash could be home right now using her super speed looking for Sunset."

"Fluttershy could be organizing the local birds for a massive search."

"And Pinkie …," Applejack trailed off and the two of them looked over to their pink friend.

“What?” Pinkie looked up at the roof. “Whose 'pink friend'? Who said that? Number Two, was that you? All you voices are giving me a super unfun headache.”

"Would be at a more comfortable level of 'Pinkie' back home?" Rarity suggested.

"Exactly. Ah think they might have been more effective staying there helping Twily, with just us two working on finding Twi." Applejack rolled her eyes. "Ten seconds flat my—uh," she looked down at herself, "plot?"

"Yes, less time playing with her new pony wings, and putting her face through sofas, and more time putting her already practiced skills to use. But c'est la vie. We can't change anything now and I suppose there hasn't been too much damage aside from some broken glass and scraped floors."

Only just enough time had passed after Rarity's summation for her and Applejack to notice Rainbow's deep snoring when an explosion of light and sound blared out. It was hard to tell from inside the train as it wound through a patch of forest, but the origin seemed to be from the mountain they were heading for.

Applejack, Rarity, and Fluttershy quickly looked out their nearest windows to see a rainbow streak bee-lining straight for the little town they had just left.

There was something very familiar about that trail and the rainbow ring spreading out from behind it.

After a few blinks, all three of them slowly turned to face the bench their rainbow pegasus friend had selected for a siesta and saw her still snoring away.

“Um,” began Fluttershy, “do you think they know we’re here?”
> Meanwhile: This Wasn’t on the List!
> --------------------------------------------------------------------------

Canterlot, a city of glamour and sophistication. The capitol of the pony nation, Equestria.

There were hustles and bustles all about as many well-dressed, and well-undressed but still well-coiffed, ponies milled about. Ponies in waste management uniforms and royal guards all with trash-bins over their backs like saddlebags spread out around the city, though there was little trash for them to pick up.

The skies were clear, though a pegasus weather team was bringing in fluffy, white clouds and leaving them in apparently designated locations. Some pegasi were consulting instruction sheets and making adjustments as they went.

In between the arriving clouds, the sun shone down gently as befitted a beautiful Spring day, almost smiling down upon the city ponies as they knew their Princess of the Sun to do.

All in all, it was peaceful but busy. It was a typical, unremarkable, Canterlot day.

At least on the surface.

Any who took a closer look would wonder why royal guards were actively seeking out trash to pick up. Why were there decorations inexplicably being affixed to buildings, statues, and other attractions? Were the shadows cast by the clouds making a pattern? And why did they seem empty of rain? Also … was their visiting Princess of Friendship fretting more than usual?

“Twilight!” Rainbow Dash called in a rush, while coming in for a fast landing. “Finally! Been looking for you all over!”

Near a pristine park, Princess Twilight Sparkle trotted back and forth over a multi-point path with a quill and part of a checklist in her magic grasp. More of the list dragged behind her, the rest piled up on the cobblestone trotway somewhat nearby. “Did you finish your tasks already?” she asked Rainbow.

“No time for that. We—“

“'No time'? No time?!” Twilight yelled, startling a nearby civilian. Twilight noticed the offense and smiled sheepishly, waving and apologizing. Once they were alone, Twilight continued with the loudest yell she could whisper, “What do you mean, ‘no time?’ What time is it?”

“Um,” Rainbow drew back as Twilight approached her, “I don’t actually know? I just, there’s—“

“You don’t know the time?! Then how do you know we are out of time?” Twilight began looking around. “Where’s the sundial?! There’s supposed to be a sundial beside the park! Did it go missing? We can’t have important things going missing now!”

“Uh—“

“Oh, that’s right.” Twilight brought a foreleg up to her brow. “They had to move it when that high-rise was built because it cast a shadow on it for half the day.” Getting a look at her pastern, she yelled again, “Why am I not wearing a watch?!”

“Because you never wear a watch?”

“Then I’m going to start!”

“Oh, great,” mumbled the pile of checklist.

“Wha?!” Rainbow jumped back from the sudden dialog from a voice more befitting a small, green and purple dragon than a checklist.

“Can you imagine Twilight with a watch?” the checklist continued. “She’d become even more uptight about everything. She already plans a lot of her schedules to the minute. With a watch she’d be planning them to the second.”

“Spike?” asked Rainbow, poking at the checklist pile.

The little dragon poked his head out from a developing hole and gave the latest frizz in Twilight’s mane a nod, “Where else would I be right now?”

“Where else would you want to be?”

“Should I make you a list?” Spike snarked up at Rainbow, lifting a bit of his swaddling for a prop.

“I thought we didn’t have time for this,” remarked Twilight.

“Right!” Rainbow snapped back. “There could be a problem in—“

“Oh, no. What step are you on?”

“Step?”

“On your list!”

Rainbow blinked. “List?”

“I gave you a list!” Twilight looked her over, using her magic to search Rainbow’s mane. “I gave all of you lists.”

“It’s not—whoa! Hey! It’s not there!” Rainbow answered as Twilight’s magic shifted to search through her wings and tail.

“You didn’t lose it did you? If we don’t have time, how will I make you a replacement in time?!”

“No, no! Forget about the list!”

Spike gasped. “Uh, oh!” and dived for cover back inside the pile of checklist.

“‘F-forget about the list’?” Twilight’s eyes grew large and glassed over slightly. “Do you know how long it took me to me to make that?!”

“I wrote it!” mumbled the pile of checklist. “It was all night and all of yesterday since before dawn. Claw’s still got a cramp in it.”

“Twilight, we could have bigger problems than the list,” Rainbow answered.

“The checklist isn’t a problem, the checklist organizes problems so they can be fixed. But with no checklist the problems can’t be organized, so they all get jumbled and you don’t know what’s been fixed yet and what hasn’t been fixed yet, so you keep fixing the same things over and over and not fixing the rest of the things because you’ve forgotten what those things are because you don’t have a checklist so not having a checklist becomes a problem because you don’t have a checklist and that’s a problem that you can’t solve your problem with because you don’t have a checklist!”

Rainbow slowly backed up a step, then imagined Pinkie Pie as an egghead and took another. “Twilight. How much coffee have you had today?”

“Why?! Did you bring more?!” Twilight asked in a rush.

“Maybe we should go see Rarity or Celestia for some of that calming camel tea.”

“Chamomile,” corrected Spike, poking his head out of the checklist to see if it was safe yet.

“I’m fine! It’s fine,” Twilight assured her friends. “How far through your list did you get before you lost it?”

“Most of it! And I didn’t lose it!” Rainbow defended herself. “I left it behind.”

“You ‘left it’?” Twilight’s eyes bugged out.

Spike shook his head then ducked for cover again.

“I put it where Applejack would see it … eventually. Probably.”

“Applejack has her own list!”

“Twilight! There’s more important things happening right now. Didn’t you see the rainbooms?”

“Yes, I saw three rainbooms,” Twilight answered, voice a little tense. “I had hoped they meant you were being extra productive—with your list.”

“I flew all the way to Ponyville and back! Rainboom each way! Top speed!” Rainbow considered mentioning her time for both laps but thought it best to save that for later.

“Why did you go to Ponyville now? We have work to do in Canterlot and we don’t have time—or do we? What time is it?” Twilight looked to the dragon eyes inside the checklist pile. “Spike! Find out what time it is!”

Spike simply pointed up at the sun. “Hour or two past noon maybe?”

Twilight relaxed. “Oh, that’s a relief. We have time to write Rainbow a new checklist.”

Rainbow slapped a hoof in her face. “You can do that later. Right now there’s something else that’s happening that’s not on the list!”

Twilight grabbed Rainbow by the withers and shook. “What do you mean there’s something ‘not on the list’?”

Spike sighed, wading out of the pile of checklist, “I’ll need to get more parchment for this won’t I?”

“In-n P-Pon-nyv-vi-ille,” Rainbow got out before pushing Twilight back. “Only the second and third rainbooms were mine. The first one wasn’t exactly me!”

Twilight stared back at her for a moment. “… and?”

“ ‘And’?” repeated Rainbow. “What do you mean, ‘and’? It was a rainboom!”

“Well, it’s not like you invented them,” answered Twilight. “There are tales of rainbooms dating back millennia. They only fell into myth because the most recent mention is well over three centuries old.”

“Exactly!” exclaimed Rainbow. “Meaning I’m the only one that can do them!”

“That we’ve confirmed in current times,” Twilight countered. “This isn’t a problem, it’s a good thing! You’ll have a new flying buddy to practice with at high speeds.”

“Who was it?” Spike asked taping a quill to his chin. “You said Ponyville? Thunderlane is also a Wonderbolt. Has he been studying your moves?”

“Thunder—?“ Rainbow started. “No, Thunderlane’s thing is endurance and carry limit. He doesn’t have the speed for a rainboom.”

Spike gasped. “Is it Scootaloo? Is she flying now?!”

Rainbow shook her head. “Kid’s awesome, but getting in the air for the first time and pulling off a rainboom isn’t something that can be done in the same day.”

“Well, I’m sure we can look into it next week,” finished Twilight, turning back to and grabbing her list in her magic. “For now, we have some very time-sensitive things to worry about.”

“But!” Rainbow gasped, looking back at her two friends. Twilight smiled and checked off another item on her list, Spike looked back at her and shrugged before trying to gather the checklist pile in his arms. “But that’s not everything! And it’s extra time-sensitive!”

Twilight looked back at her and waited.

“I said I went to Ponyville.”

“Did you find the pony who did it?” asked Twilight.

“Yes! Me! Well not me me, sort of,” Rainbow faltered.

Twilight blinked at her, then looked at Spike, then at her list, then back to Rainbow, lowering the list. “Okay? Meaning …?”

“I flew all over, but nopony was pulling off tricks or stunts, but I found a bunch of damaged stuff.”

“Damaged?”

“You know. Like when I rainboom too close to town.”

“Broken windows?” Spike asked.

“Yeah," Rainbow admitted.

“Torn up streets.” Spike added.

“That too.”

“Scattered store signs ripped from their posts.”

Rainbow scratched the back of her head with a blush.

“Tumbleweeds made from what used to be garden plants,” continued Spike.

“Toppled over bookcases,” Twilight added with a frown.

“Alright, yes, yes, that stuff!” Rainbow relented. “But I don’t do that anymore.”

“Two months ago—“ insisted Twilight.

“Usually!”

Twilight and Spike exchanged glances.

“Look,” Rainbow tried again, “I followed the trail and found Scootaloo and she told me that there was another me but she came here from a world of furless minotaurs through a portal in your palace!”

“What?!” Twilight shouted. “She came here?”

“And pulled off a rainboom on her first day as a pony?” asked Spike.

Rainbow turned to him and smirked. “Scootaloo had to help her with a giant slingshot. Guess we know who’s the fastest Rainbow Dash in the multiverse, huh?”

“But why would she come here?” asked Twilight. “She could have just written to me.”

“Using Sunset Shimmer’s journal?” Spike suggested. “The one still in the palace?”

Twilight gasped, “She must have written to me and came through when I didn’t answer.”

“It’s not just the other me,” said Rainbow. “Before I talked to Scootaloo, I checked AJ’s place and Apple Bloom said AJ was there a little before me. Said she was looking for you.”

“Two of them came through?” stressed Twilight. “What about Sunset and the others?”

“Did the other me come here?” asked Spike. “I hope he hasn’t sneezed on anything flammable.”

“I don’t know. I checked Fluttershy’s too and her animals were patrolling her land and Sweet Feather with torches.”

“Torches!?” cried Spike.

“What happened?!” groaned Twilight. “What are they doing here?”

“I don’t know about the animals, and I didn’t see any of the other world us’es myself,” answered Rainbow, “and Apple Bloom only said that the other AJ was just acting strange and didn’t even know where Canterlot was.”

“Wait,” interjected Spike. “So the other Applejack was just ‘weird’? She didn’t say anything about being from another world?”

“Probably worried she would confuse ponies or get in trouble,” explained Twilight. “Imagine if they all went around telling everypony they were from another planet filled with tall, mushy, two-legged creatures with ‘hands’.”

“Yeah, I remember that argument,” said Spike. “Good point.”

“Really?” asked Rainbow. “I think we’ve had weirder things happen in Ponyville.”

Spike and Twilight looked at each other and shrugged.

“Yeah, I guess it’s easier to swallow here than in their world,” agreed Twilight. “But they might not know that.”

“Hey, mine knew that!” Rainbow defended Rainbow.

“Hopefully the other Pinkie Pie also didn’t come through and try explaining things to everypony,” commented Spike. “She’s not the best at explaining things … especially the times when she’s too good at it.”

Twilight took a quick breath to brace herself before asking, “What else?”

“That’s all, really. After seeing the animal army and knowing the other AJ was looking for you, I checked at the train station and asked the guy there if he had seen me get on a train earlier.”

“You didn’t actually word it just like that did you?” asked Spike.

“Why not?” Rainbow replied. “We all just agreed there have been stranger things.”

“Yeah, but that's not an envelope we want to keep pushing!” explained Twilight.

Rainbow scratched the back of her head “Well. He said yes. She got on a train heading here.”

“She’s in the city? Now? All of them or just Rainbow?”

“Whoa! No, no, no. I’m way faster than a steam-powered train!” boasted Rainbow. “I passed it a while back. Thought you would want to check it out too, so I came to get you since it’s not like she, or they, will be going anywhere else before they hit the station. We can fly back and see what’s going on before they get here.”

Twilight stopped for a moment before taking a quick look at the sun’s position and then the long checklist. She sighed. “Why today?”

“I’ll roll up the list,” Spike offered excitedly.

“No, Spike, I’ll need you to keep working through it.”

“What?! But what if Rarity came through too? I want to see what she looks like as a pony.”

“You already know what she looks like as a pony.”

“Not this Rarity,” Spike explained, his wings fluttering slightly. “And … and, um, oh!  I haven’t had much reason to do a lot of distance flying since I molted! I could use the practice.”

“Fine,” Twilight relented, before taking the bottom end of the list in her magic and beginning the lengthy process of rolling the whole thing up. “But we should let somepony else know before we leave.”

“Fluttershy should be at the overhang working on the bird choir in private,” Spike suggested. “She’ll be on the way.”

“That’s right. Good thinking.” Twilight gave Spike a bright smile, before turning a look toward Rainbow. “It was on her list.”


*** *** ***


“You doing okay, Spike?” Twilight asked, checking to make sure his wings were angled right.

“Yeah! This is great!” he called back. “Flying off a mountain is easy! You barely have to flap! I’ve never just glided for so long!”

Twilight smiled at his glee but followed up with a warning. “Yes, but you have to be careful about—whoa!”

Her wings faltered and she flipped to the side, falling out of control.

Rainbow didn’t miss a beat and angled into a dive to follow.

Once righted and the two returned to their intended flight-path, Rainbow finished Twilight’s sentence, “Updrafts and clear-air turbulence.”

Seeing Twilight’s now sheepish face, Rainbow added with a laugh, “That was on one of the practice exams you gave me for the Wonderbolt Reserves exam.”

“You remember that? I thought they weren’t working for you.”

“I knew that one before. I’m surprised you forgot.”

Twilight rolled her eyes and stuck her tongue out, but was jostled by another draft and quickly worked to steady herself.

Turning to her other side, Rainbow addressed the group’s other member, “You didn’t have to come with us.”

“Oh, I know,” giggled Fluttershy, “but it’s so exciting that there’s another me from another world. I can’t wait to ask her about the animals there. I hope she’s nice.”

“She’s just as kind as you are, Fluttershy,” answered Twilight. “She really helped me out the first time I went to their world.”

“Yeah, but,” Rainbow cut in, “we don’t know if she’s here. We know Other me and Other AJ are, but we don’t know about the other Other us’es. And,”—Rainbow looked to Twilight—“weren’t we telling ‘Shy so that nopony would think we’ve gone missing? Doesn’t her coming with us mess that up?”

“Oh!” Fluttershy answered. “Don’t worry, I gave Tweety a note and told the choir birds there might be another me around. They were excited too!”

“So, how much further out was their train?” asked Twilight. “I think we’ve been gliding for half an hour now and there’s been nothing on the tracks so far.”

“Yeah!” shouted Spike, angling into a loop. “This is great!”

“Well, at rainboom speeds, I’d almost be at Ponyville already!” Rainbow called back. “At this speed, and the speed of the train in the opposite direction, and how long it’s been since I passed it coming back … uh.” Rainbow paused.

“Should we have brought an abacus?” asked Spike.

“It shouldn’t be much further!” Rainbow quickly finished, giving Spike a look.

“I see smoke!” gleed Fluttershy, angling downward slightly.

“See?” called Rainbow, following and quickly passing Fluttershy.

Twilight chuckled and did the same, but kept pace with Fluttershy.

Spike decided to match Rainbow’s steeper descent.

As they descended, the train emerged out from behind a bend in the track around a hill. A steam engine with six cars behind it.

“Woo!” Spike shouted, passing Rainbow.

Rainbow wasn’t having that at all and flapped her wings, easily matching Spike’s progress. “Heh, heh. Somedragon’s having fun.”

The descent continued. The wind rushed over Spike’s scales faster than he’d ever felt before.

“Spike!” Rainbow called. “Level out!”

Now a few hooves below the tallest trees in the area, Spike took notice of his altitude and speed. And the speed of the oncoming train. “Uh, what?!”

“Slow down. Angle your wings a bit, get some altitude. Get back above the treeline!”

Spike made the attempt, shifting so that the air-pressure would slow him and push him back up. He wobbled and looked around for a reference point to steady himself when he heard Rainbow call out again.

“AND DON’T HEAD STRAIGHT FOR THE TRAIN!”

He looked up to see the train’s smokestack dead ahead.

No sooner did he have time to think, “dead ahead” did he notice Rainbow’s hooves under his arms lifting him up and over the top of the stack.

And right through the smoke, sending them both into coughing fits and covering them in soot.

Rainbow slowed to a hover as the train passed below them. Twilight and Fluttershy quickly joined them.

“Spike!” Twilight shouted, barreling into the two of them and pulling Spike into a tight hug, ignoring the soot. “Are you okay?”

While Rainbow righted herself from the midair body-blow, Spike coughed again and looked up. “Heh. Oops?”

Beside them, Fluttershy came up and gave Rainbow a more gentle hug, that still managed to get soot over her, before patting Rainbow on the back to help with the coughing.

“That’s it!” Rainbow called. “You are joining me in more flight training.”

“Sorry!” Spike dipped his head.

“You too, Twi. More turbulence training.”

“Sorry,” Twilight copied Spike.

“We’re just glad you’re okay, Spike” Fluttershy assured him. “Maybe I’ll join in for more lessons too.” She suddenly perked up with a giggle. “Oh! Maybe Other Fluttershy and Other Rainbow Dash will join too! This is so exciting!”

“We’ll have to find out who’s really here first,” said Twilight, gently letting Spike go to set into his own hover. “I’d like to know if my ‘Other’ has wings.”

“Time to catch a train and find out!” Rainbow announced, launching herself after the speeding locomotive that had passed by them.

The other three looked at each other, blinked, quickly recalled what they were there to do, and followed after at their best speeds.

Those best speeds varied considerably between them.

Rainbow was already right behind the train when the others started moving. Fluttershy was in second place with Twilight and Spike following behind her. Twilight had caught up and reached the last car of the train around the time Rainbow had finished a quick sweep along one side of each of the cars, peeking in through the windows.

Seeing this, Twilight opted for landing on the roof of the last car rather than flying alongside it, and helped Fluttershy and Spike join her. They then watched Rainbow match pace with the train, more closely looking into each window from the other side.

She took particular interest in the car they were on top of.

Growing curious, Fluttershy decided to join her.

Taking off from a moving platform at such a high speed was tricky, but she managed it and matched speed with the train shortly later. Her interest with finding the other her being enough encouragement.

Fluttershy came up beside Rainbow and peeked into the neighboring window.

And blushed deeply.

“Oh my! Eek! Oh, they’ve seen us!”

Fluttershy quickly returned to the roof of the train car. Rainbow followed after, a blush forming on her cheeks as well, only just visible through the soot.

Twilight and Spike stared at the two of them a moment.

“What did you see?” Twilight asked. “And did I hear a scream?”

Fluttershy looked to Rainbow.

Rainbow cleared her throat. “Um. So. They’re not in there.”

“What? You checked the whole train, right?”

“Yeah, they’re not in there!”

“Wait,” Spike spoke up, “then what were you watching?”

“Um,” Rainbow started, glancing at Fluttershy who blushed harder. “There’s a couple of mares making out under us.”

“Really?” Spike perked up.

“Rainbow!” Twilight admonished her. “That’s private, you shouldn’t—Spike!” She turned to the young dragon creeping to the edge of the roof.

“What?! I wasn’t …” He blushed. “I was.”

“That clown really loves that businessmare, I guess,” Fluttershy commented.

“Huh?” Twilight asked her.

“Well, that’s what it looked like. Big, frizzy mane. Very colorful. And the other was in a suit. Kind of adorable actually.”

Twilight pondered that a quick moment before getting back on track. “But our Others weren’t there.”

“Yeah, I don’t get it,” said Rainbow. “This was the only train I passed.”

“Rainbow,” started Twilight, “when you asked the ticket agent at the station if he had seen you get on a train ‘earlier’ today, did he say how much earlier?”

“Uh, no? But there was no way their train could have gotten past me without me noticing.”

“But were you watching for trains on your way to Ponyville, or just on your way back? And how closely did you check through the forested areas and the tunnels running up through Mount Canterhorn to see if there were any trains making the ascent?”

Rainbow blinked and scratched the back of her head. “Well … now that you mention it.”

Twilight put a hoof to her face. “That means they are already in Canterlot!”

“Probably heading for the castle,” Spike added.

“Okay, no big deal,” said Rainbow. “We just fly back there and we’re all set.”

“Fly up the mountain?” asked Spike looking back to the imposing mountain they had just glided down from. “All the way?”

“Why not? I’ve done it plenty of times. Good exercise for the wings. Great cardio.”

“Can’t we just ride the train back?” Spike hoped. “Wouldn’t that be faster?”

Twilight shook her head. “Except for Rainbow it would be, but we haven’t bought any tickets.”

“But we usually ride for free,” said Rainbow. “You know, because we’re heroes, and you’re a princess!”

“We still need express permission for each ride. There are rules.”

“You’re a princess,” Rainbow tried again. “You make the rules.”

“Not from the roof of a train I decided to land on. There’s a process to making government laws.”

“It doesn’t have to be a law! It’s just one train from our local station.”

“Girls,” Fluttershy attempted to butt in.

“But it’s a national rail line,” Twilight countered.

“And you’re a national princess and even regular pegasus ponies hitch rides on it all the time!” revealed Rainbow.

“Girls,” Fluttershy tried again.

Twilight considered that. “A series of mirrors could allow the conductor to look for hitchfliers.”

“Oh, come on! Ponies get tired wings!” Rainbow argued.

Fluttershy rolled her eyes. “Girls!” It’s always the third time, she thought to herself as her friends stopped and turned to her. She took a breath. “Spike, do you think you can make it up the mountain? Rainbow could teach you how to ride the updrafts.  It's faster that way.”

“Really?” he asked. “Yeah! That’s like gliding up, right?”

“Kinda,” agreed Rainbow, “But it’s still a lot more work than coming down.”

“Then it’s settled. Let’s clean off this soot and fly back up,” declared Fluttershy in the verbal equivalent of putting one’s hoof down while wearing fuzzy bunny slippers … that squeak.

“Oh, I hope they’ll be okay till we get there,” Fluttershy added.

Twilight put a hoof to her chin. “Well, they made it all the way from the portal and through Ponyville, learned at least the basics of how to be a pony and where the train station is, the train should have brought them directly to the castle, and Princess Celestia will know how to help them.”

She shrugged. “They should be fine.”
> Canterlot Part 1 - A Maze of Confusion
> --------------------------------------------------------------------------

It wasn't long after that rainbow trail streaked from Canterlot, over their train, and toward Ponyville that five aliens to the pony world reached the base of the mountain, but it took quite a while for the train to snake around and through various tunnels in its ascent.

At least fifteen minutes before the group had arrived at the first of their chosen Canterlot train stations, an identical streak had passed back overhead, from the opposite direction of the first, to land above on the city of Canterlot. Of course, this was also while the train was just entering another tunnel and it was impossible to determine where in the city the streak had landed. So, the girls decided to stick with the plan and head to their agreed upon two separate destinations rather than to try and seek it out.




*** B-Team ***




They arrived at the station Team Boutique was waiting for and Rarity, Fluttershy, and Pinkie Pie stepped out of the train and onto the platform. Shifting to the side to let other ponies board, they turned and waved to Applejack as the train began to depart for its next stop. Rainbow Dash was still asleep.

Over the previous few minutes, while the train approached and finally entered the city, Rarity had become more and more enrapt with the views she was able to sneak through the windows. The architecture, the majesty. And now, standing within that city on her own … four legs, the full giddiness could no longer contain itself.

“Wha-haa, he-he,” she squealed, dancing her hooves on the platform like a mildly inebriated natural. “Isn’t this all so lovely, darlings?”

“It is quite pretty,” Fluttershy agreed. “Not at all like Ponyville. Not that Ponyville wasn’t pretty, but that was a different kind of pretty. More trees, more animals—” Fluttershy stopped, her eyes widening, before looking around. “Animals …,” she mumbled to herself.

Meanwhile, also mumbling to herself, Pinkie walked into a pole.

“I did—? Ow!”

The sudden bonk and yell drew Rarity and Fluttershy’s attentions while Pinkie rubbed her forehead.

“Pinkie? Are you okay?” asked Fluttershy.

“I’m fine. But these voices are being mean. Good thing I’m not a unicorn. I bet that would have hurt.”

Rarity looked up to her horn, then the pole Pinkie had run into, then thought about the throbbing from still having to tweak her horn to let go of things she picks up in her magic. “I can imagine.”

“I can’t! It must be awful to be horny all the time,” Pinkie replied, turning to Rarity. “How do you do it?”

“W-what, I—you do not have to word it quite that way!” sputtered Rarity.

“Why not? It’s true. I mean, your horniness is just right out there all the time for anyone to see. It’s standing straight out and—“

“Stop, stop, stop, stop!” Rarity shushed her. “I’m quite sure the ponies don’t use such phrasing to discuss their horns.”

“Then how would they discuss them?”

“My preference would be to not until we find out properly,” Rarity insisted.

“Okay, let’s ask that guy about his horn!”

Rarity and Fluttershy turned around and saw a rather fancy unicorn pony wearing what appeared to be a tuxedo jacket, purple bow-tie, a monocle, and a conspicuous absence of pants, just as Pinkie began pronking in his direction.

Their eyes grew wide. Fluttershy eeped, Rarity gasped. Pinkie giggled.

“I vote we hide before Pinkie gets there,” whispered Fluttershy.

Thinking she had an idea that was better, Rarity lit her horn and grabbed onto all four of Pinkie’s hooves intending to drag her away from the unsuspecting stallion.

She quickly learned that Fluttershy’s idea would have been the better one when her ability to hold a moving Pinkie was not sound. She recalled Fluttershy’s escape from the hospital and how attempting to help untangle the resulting pony pile caused in an inexplicable neck ache.

It seemed even with the lack of a physical connection, magic or no magic, levitation requires some sort of leverage and a solid grip.

Rarity failed at least one of those.

She managed to encircle her aura around Pinkie’s hooves as intended, but Pinkie kept on pronking before Rarity could begin to pull. And with each pronk, Rarity’s head was shoved up and down as if her horn were tied to the excited pony.

Up Down Up Down

And Rarity still hadn’t learned how to let go.

Worse, Pinkie took the scenic route to the stallion, circling around poles, potted plants, and ponies with luggage rather than just going down the length of the platform.

“Rarity!” Fluttershy gasped at the display and quickly tried to help with the first idea that came to mind.

A quick double flap of her wings got her up and over her friend.

And then she let herself drop on top of her.

This succeeded in only pressing Rarity to the platform while Pinkie pronked on.

They learned that Pinkie had quite the power in those legs as each pronk now bounced not only Rarity’s head, but all of Fluttershy as well.

"This … is … not … help…ping!" Rarity cried between faceplants. The angle was just off from tweaking Rarity’s horn against the platform, possibly the one time where such a thing could have been helpful. Instead, it was mostly her muzzle being pressed into the hardwood.

They were saved as one bounce succeeded in Fluttershy falling forward and brushing Rarity’s horn hard enough to tweak it, releasing her from the invisible tether.

Of course, this happened only one pronk away from Pinkie reaching the fancy stallion anyway.

A dazed Rarity and Fluttershy watched as their pink friend got the pony’s attention with a cheerful greeting.

“Hiya!”

“Well,” he answered her, looking up from the newspaper in his magic, “Miss Pinkie Pie, a pleasure.”

“You know me? Does that mean I know you too?” Pinkie scratched her chin, trying to place his face against non-pony faces in her large mental inventory.

He paused. “Yes? I should hope so.”

“Oh wait!” Pinkie shouted. “You’re Fancy Pants! Or at least your name is. And having ‘Fancy Pants’ for a name is pretty fancy pantsy, but if you have any fancy pants you should know you forgot them at home. Anyway, I read your file in Pinkie’s party cavern! You prefer yellow cake with vanilla frosting and red rosettes. You like ballroom dancing and collecting Wonderbolts memorabilia, and your guilty pleasure is watching mares walk by and staring at their tails while pretending to read a newspaper!”

Fancy Pants took a step back and his monocle dropped to hang from its string when his eyes widened too far to hold it. “Uh, m-mares take good care of their tails,” he sputtered. “I’m simply … r-recognizing, and appreciating, their efforts.”

“Good for you!”

“T-thank—thank you.”

“You like mine?” she asked, turning to the side and giving it a wag.

Taken aback, Fancy Pants nevertheless followed the curled curl of curls that was Pinkie’s tail. “Quite entrapping, my dear.”

“Is it ever!” Pinkie shouted. “I’ve got so much stuff in here! You want a party hat?” Without waiting for an answer, Pinkie whipped her tail up and down and a few party hats gained momentary freedom and upward momentum. Pinkie caught one in her teeth allowing the rest to be re-trapped within her tail, then placed the chosen one on Fancy Pants’s head.

He looked up at it, then used his magic to reposition it to be on top of his head, rather than covering his horn.

“Hey!” Pinkie pronked once in place, “So, I was talking with my friend, Rarity”—she pointed to Rarity and Fluttershy, still flat on the platform and wishing they had hidden themselves far away—“You know Rarity too, right?”

“Why, yes of course. Always a delight.” Though baffled, and embarrassed, Fancy Pants still greeted them with a polite bow.

Rarity meekly waved back at him.

“Well we were wondering …”

The waving ceased and Rarity cringed.

“How would you describe your horn?”

Fancy Pants paused again. Eventually he answered with a modest, “Serviceable.”

Pinkie turned to face Rarity. “Rarity! He said his horn is serviceable!”

With a blush, Rarity took notice of a small gathering of other ponies, mostly unicorns, watching with confused expressions and groaned, covering her face with her hooves.

Fluttershy did the same but added her wings.

Riding a high, Pinkie felt the need to continue and turned back to Fancy Pants. “So would you also describe yourself as being horny all the time?”

Quietly, Rarity moaned into the floor, “Someone shoot me now.”

Fancy Pants just stared, a blush beginning to grow on his face. He too noticed the other ponies.

“I say; would you look at the time?” he squeaked. “Quite, quite. I believe it is quite late. I’m afraid I must take my leave.” After another quick look around, he added, “Promptly.”

As he walked away, Pinkie waved. “Okay! Nice meeting you!” She then pronked back to Rarity and Fluttershy, still hiding behind their hooves and wings respectively. “Well I made a new friend and we haven’t even left the station yet!”

Fluttershy and Rarity uncovered one eye each and glanced at each other, thinking maybe they should have gone straight to the castle after all.




*** C-Team ***




The first station came and went, sending Rarity, Fluttershy, and Pinkie Pie on their way. Still on the train, Applejack took command of Team Castle. Her first task: wake up the other member.

“Dash!” she called, receiving only continued snoring as a result. “Rainbow!” she tried a few more times a little louder, though not so loud as to annoy the passengers that had boarded at Team Boutique’s stop.

Meanwhile, Rainbow snored on.

With a roll of her eyes, Applejack began rocking her back and forth with her hooves, then called again. When Rainbow still failed to wake, she gave the bench beneath her friend a quick punch, or kick. Since she was technically using a foreleg and a hoof rather than an arm and a hand, she wasn’t sure what to call it.

“Next stop,” an announcement called out, “Canterlot Castle.”

“Shoot!” Applejack looked out the windows and noticed the train already slowing with ponies lining up to depart.

“Come on, Dash, ya lazy …. Get your ‘butt flank’ movin’ before Ah kick/punch it movin’. We gotta go!”

The car doors opened and ponies began filing out.

Applejack gently punch/kicked Rainbow onto the floor with a resulting thud.

Rainbow snored.

Applejack groaned.

Rainbow snorted. “Huh, wha’?”

Applejack halted halfway into punch/kick number two. “Dash! We’re at our stop!”

“Great!” Rainbow exclaimed from the floor while stretching. “Time to kick some—“

“Time to get off the train before it leaves!”

“Huh?” Rainbow looked around, noticing sophisticated ponies getting onto their train car and a rather large castle outside. “Whoa. Oh! Uh ….” She tried to flap her wings to get herself righted but felt pins and needles throughout one of them. “Gah! I slept on my wing!” Instead she tried to use her hooves to work herself upright and standing but was still having trouble with her pony legs, having used only her wings since coming through the portal.

The group of new ponies had nearly finished crowding in and Rainbow had only just gotten standing. Applejack figured there was only one way to get off the train in time.

She flipped her hat off and caught it between her teeth. Then, ducking her head low, she rushed toward Rainbow and got underneath her barrel to lift her up and on to her back just like she had carried Fluttershy earlier.

“Holy—! AJ! Wha—Put me down!”

Applejack ignored her and focused on plowing through the boarding passengers. Unfortunately ponies are longer than they are wide and a perpendicular pegasus pony perched precariously upon her posterior made things difficult.

She managed to wade into the throng and pass the initial wave, but shortly thereafter, Rainbow’s head and/or rear clipped some oncoming ponies and knocked her to the floor. Along with the poor civilian(s) her end(s) collided with.

Turning around, Applejack saw Rainbow Dash looking a bit dazed as if watching stars flying around her head. Better that end than the other, she thought to herself before noticing the small pile of peeved ponies, underneath Rainbow, looking back at her. “Uh, sorry folks. We, uh, kinda of in a rush here.”

Suddenly multiple glows appeared all around Rainbow and she was lifted into the air and rudely dropped back over Applejack’s back, knocking the wind out of her.

“Thank’ya kindly,” she wheezed, “whoever which of y’all unicorns did that.” Finished with her farewell, she turned back to rush the doors.

She was just shy of them when she realized she was missing something important and turned to face the crowd again. “My hat! Has anyone seen—Mmmph!” She was cut off when it was shoved onto her face. “Much obliged,” she muttered and turned and finally jumped forward, only to bounce her hat-covered face off the closed train doors.

“Aww nuts,” she muttered through her hat as the train began moving again.




*** B-Team ***




“I’m really sorry about that, girls,” Pinkie apologized again. “I just got so excited and the voices were so encouraging. They kept saying things like ‘keep going’ and ‘he so horny’ which I thought meant talk more about horns, but then others were saying things I shouldn’t repeat. And they’re all so loud now.”

With Fancy Pants having escaped, Rarity and Fluttershy had decided to do the same. In their haste, they neglected to check the train station for a more detailed city map, though they had at least gotten a good enough look to conclude there were neither boutiques nor malls within the station itself so they felt no particular need to brave a return.

Instead, they’d found a secluded place to regroup and began walking away from any ponies to have seen the commotion. They knew they had to be in the correct district; they just needed to find the correct building.

“I thought you couldn’t understand them,” recalled Fluttershy.

“I usually can’t. Usually it’s like I can feel kind’a what they mean, and other times I get real words. But most of it doesn’t make sense. That’s starting to change though. I’m getting a lot more words.”

“Well, at least you shouldn’t have to worry about them too much longer,” Rarity consoled her. “We need only get to my boutique to acquire some help, and we’ll be off, back to our world.

“I’ll be nice to get some peace and quiet up here,” Pinkie replied, stopping her pronks to tap her head. “Gotta literally clear out my head.”

“Should we ask for directions?” asked Fluttershy. “Maybe that will help us get there faster.”

“After the fiasco with that stylish stallion,” Rarity said with a cringe. “I would prefer to not involve other ponies if possible. He knew our names! Our ponies must be well known here, and why would we need directions to a shop 'I' own? It would be too strange and I don’t want to impact pony Rarity’s image …,” Rarity shot Pinkie a look, “more than we already have.”

“That makes sense,” sighed Fluttershy.

“I’m not being a party-pooper am I?” worried Pinkie. “For wanting them out of my head?”

“Oh, Pinkie,” Fluttershy laid a wing over Pinkie’s back, ”It’s your head. They should, um …, find their own?”

“But I don’t want to end their party if they’re still having fun. I don’t feel them bowling anymore, and I don’t smell pizza. But what if they’re still having dessert? Many kinds of cake and ice-cream don’t really have a strong smell. Maybe I’m just not noticing it.” She gasped, “And what about sleepovers? Are they staying in there all night? What happens if I go back through the portal while they’re still in here? And will they snore?”

Rarity and Fluttershy traded glances. “Perhaps we could ask for directions after all?” Rarity changed her tune. “Oh, Fluttershy!” she called out, pointing at a tree. “I see some birds in that tree. Could you ask them if they’ve seen ponies walking out of any shops wearing any particularly stylish fashions anywhere?”

Fluttershy shied back. “Um, I don’t know if that’s a good idea. I’ve tried talking with the animals in Ponyville a few times but it never seemed to go well. Animals are very perceptive, after all. I think they might have known something was strange about me. Many animals can be very …,” She looked at the tree. There were at least three birds in that tree but, were they staring at her? “Territorial.”

Sensing the deflation in Fluttershy’s voice, Rarity attempted to give her a hug, stumbled, and caught herself. “Darling,” she said instead, “If you feel it’s for the best, we’ll just have to explore the marketplace. Which could even be a bit of fun while we're here!” she finished with a cheer, spying a set of outdoor stands and shop signs.

Gaining a smile, Fluttershy perked up. “Maybe we'll see a florist? See what kinds of plants ponies grow? Applejack mentioned earth pony magic.”

“That’s the spirit!”

“Maybe some pony pizza shop?” Pinkie popped in. “Smelling the pizza from before got me a craving.”

“I’m afraid most of the eateries are in another district. This area is more artistic in nature. For instance …,” Rarity looked around, “Oh! An antique shop.”

Fluttershy giggled, “There are old horseshoes hanging in the window. And a black saddle and a … is that a bridle and bit?”

“Dear me. I hope that’s an antique shop, and not something more of the adult variety. It’s right on Main Street.”

“Is there also a Tail Street?” Pinkie asked.

“Maybe on the other side of town?” Fluttershy offered with a giggle.

“Ooooh,” Pinkie ooohed. “ ‘The Canterlot House of Enchanted Comics’! I wonder what kind of comics ponies draw.”

“Oh, Fluttershy! Your cosplay idea might work out after all,” Rarity pointed out a shop next to the comics by nodding her horn at it.

“A costume shop?” Fluttershy guessed, seeing pony-shaped suits and various accessories such as pirate eye-patches and peg legs (sold as sets of one to three), superhero capes, mermare tails, hair and fur dye, and temporary, heat-transfer cutie marks.

While passing by the costume shop and taking in the other sights, a loud bang brought their attentions back as a large creature began grumbling in the doorway that was clearly not designed for its stature.

“Will of Iron is still getting used to this pony architecture!” Even when speaking to itself, the creature’s voice was deep and booming.

Their eyes went wide taking in the large, muscular … man? It stood perhaps three times taller than any of them in their pony forms. This was clear as, due to shop signs running along the ground, it was possible to only see the creature’s top two-thirds or so and only a pony’s mane would be visible if standing behind those signs. It had a pair of horns on its cow-shaped head, and a ring through its nose. It was vaguely humane-shaped as it walked on two legs with hands instead of hooves at the end of its arms.

It had slicked-back blond hair and was covered in red fur.

“Oh my goodness!” squeaked Fluttershy.

“What is that?!” Rarity followed suit.

“This guy’s also horny. Twice over!” Pinkie felt the need to point out.

The large creature, unaware of his audience struggled a bit and managed to dislodge his horns from the wooden doorway’s top bar leaving behind two large notches alongside several matching pairs throughout the bar. He picked up a barrel of costume accessories and carried it to an empty stand in front of the shop.

“And huge,” Fluttershy gawked.

“It could almost be humane if not for the cow head,” said Rarity.

“And red fur,” added Pinkie.

“That’s clearly a bad dye job, the hair too. Those are most definitely not their natural colors.  Quite overdone.”

“I think it’s a minotaur,” breathed Fluttershy.

“Well it sure isn’t a pony,” Rarity concluded. “Is that why ponies wear saddles here?” Rarity pondered. “Do they give rides to minotaurs and other creatures?”

“It may not be a pony, but It sure is naked like most of them!” Pinkie also pointed out.

Rarity and Fluttershy blushed deeply.

“N-not completely,” Rarity countered. “It at least has a tie, and I’m sure with that body shape it must be wearing pants behind those signs. Especially since it’s clearly male. A ‘bull’ I suppose.”

“So many muscle. Much male,” droned Fluttershy.

Rarity turned to Fluttershy. “Darling, are you … are you drooling?”

“He could ride me all—“ Fluttershy blinked and backed up a step, her wings fluttering for a moment. “Droo—?” She quickly wiped her mouth and pretended her fur didn't get wet. “I’m not drooling.”

Rarity was about to press when they were startled by the creature’s booming announcement.

“Get your wings here! Give them a try, and you will fly! Wings all shapes and colors. Look like an alicorn princess for just twenty bits!” In a quieter, quicker voice, the creature added, “Wings don’t actually grant flight. Not responsible for injuries made in flight attempts. No refunds after two hours. See terms and conditions.”

The girls turned back to watch the creature holding up a pair of wings, seemingly made out of foam or cardboard, in each hand. Both were purple.

“Those look like Twily’s wings when she pony’s up,” Rarity noted.

“Thank you M. A. Larson!” Pinkie suddenly shouted.

“What was that?” asked Rarity.

“I don't know, but a bunch of the voices started saying that I should say that.” Pinkie rubbed her ears with a strained expression. “And they don’t seem to like it when I ignore them.”

“What’s a Larson?” asked Fluttershy.

“There’s a company named Larson that makes wonderful sofas,” answered Rarity. “They apparently exist here too. I saw a camelback Larson in Ponyville. Sadly, it had a large hole in it.”

“What does that have to do with a red bull giving out purple wings?”

“I have no idea!” Pinkie cried. “The voices never tell me what any of this stuff memes!”

“Memes?”

“And now the voices are telling me this gag is getting too forced and meta and that it should end so we can get on with the plot.”

There was a pause as Fluttershy and Rarity looked between themselves and Pinkie a few times. Confused, Fluttershy looked back at her rear end. “Um, what kind of, um … ‘plot’?”

“Perhaps we should just continue on,” Rarity suggested. “At the rate we’re going, the other team will have gotten help and will be waiting at my boutique before we’ve even found it.”




*** C-Team ***




Having disembarked the train at the following station, Applejack and Rainbow Dash found themselves covering the distance back toward their intended destination on hooves and wings respectively. Thankfully not only did they have a railroad track to guide then, but their destination was simply too large to miss. Seemed the castle was large enough to be seen throughout much of the city. All they needed was to find their way to an entrance.

“So this is a pony city, huh?” commented Rainbow, hovering beside Applejack.

"There's so much to look at here. I feel like my durn eyes are gonna pop right outta my head," Applejack marveled.

“Yeah. It’s not packed solid like our Canterlot City, or Manehattan, but it’s really …,” she trailed off.

“Flashy?”

“I was going to go with bright … and colorful,” Rainbow finished. “These ponies really like their colors.”

“Mmm,” Applejack nodded. “Ah still much prefer the countryside, but this place sure is right pretty.”

“Not as many pegasus…es though. Is that how you say it?”

“We can ask our ponies when we meet them.”

“You sure you don’t want me to just pick you up and fly you there?”

“Ah am very sure! Ah’m keeping my fee—hooves firmly on the ground, thank you.”

“It’ll be faster if we fly.”

“It’ll be safer if we walk.”

“Okay. You walk, I’ll fly!”

“Sure! So long as you stay right down here. No more splittin’ up. It ain’t that far.”

“Boring!” Rainbow moaned.

“Aw, would you—just take in the sights if you’re bored. We’re on an alien world here. Plenty to see.”

Rainbow simply pointed up and Applejack followed her hoof to see pegasus ponies flying about. Most pushing clouds around, others seemed to be shopping with laden saddlebags. A group of younger ponies were playing some kind of mid-air game, kicking around a ball tied to a cloud. Goals were above and below the playing “field” and kept in place with glowing propellers.

“Well, there’s plenty on the ground too!” Applejack insisted, looking around and pointing things out. “There’s a library, Ah think. A cafe. Is that grass they’re serving? Over yonder there’s, uh, guards picking up trash? Cleanly folk here.”

“Books, grass, and trash-pickers?” scoffed Rainbow. “Come on, AJ. I gotta fly!” She pulled off a loop that twisted into a barrel roll before settling beside Applejack again.

“You’ve done enough flying in Ponyville, what with the broken windows and all.”

“That was an accident!”

“But there’s more stuff to break here, and taller buildings.”

“Fine,” Rainbow groaned, her tail flicking in annoyance. The sudden appendage movement startled her and she looked back and flicked it again. “Huh, neat.”

“Hey, lookie here,” Applejack called and pointed to the side with her muzzle, since she didn’t know how to walk on just three hooves. “Now, ain’t that a big stack of fruit? Wonder if them apples are from Sweet Apple Acres.”

Rainbow stopped playing with her tail and looked off to the side where Applejack was pointing. She saw bins, barrels, crates, and simple tarps on tables all covered with apples, oranges, mangoes, kiwis, watermelons, and other juicy fruits. A few ponies were around with clipboards, seemingly taking inventory. “Uh, yeah. Ponies must love fruit.”

“But that ain’t a shop or anything. No sales are being made, and they’re even keepin’ ‘em roped off.

“Saving them for later?”

Applejack and Rainbow Dash looked at each other and shrugged—which was easier for Rainbow as she wasn’t using her forelegs to walk with.

They continued on, following the train tracks around a corner. Not long after, they heard a familiar voice from behind them. “You think that’s enough kumquats? Anypony get anymore? I know it wasn’t on the list, but that’s such a fun word to say! Kumquat, kumquat, kumquat! … Oh, really? I’ll help you with that!”

“Was that Pinkie?” asked Rainbow. “She’s supposed to be with ‘Shy and Rarity.”

“That’s right,” Applejack answered, turning around.

They rounded the corner again and saw an unmistakable pink mane attached to an equally unmistakable pink pony helping another pony lift a crate, presumably of kumquats, on top of another.

Afterward, the pink pony giggled and joined some other, mostly earth ponies, having just arrived with folding tables and were setting them up—using both teeth and hooves. “Isn’t it funny how we take for granted how easily we can do so many things with our hooves? I mean, dragons and gryphons, and hippogriffs, and minotaurs, and Discord all have these claws and things on the ends of their not-hooves parts that are great for gripping stuff, and if you think about it, isn’t it strange we can do that just with our hooves? Imagine if we didn’t know how to do that! Wow! What would that be like? That would make life crazy difficult. Am I right?”

Most of the earth ponies gave her strange looks, or nodded in agreement, and kept working. A unicorn pony with a table in his magic grasp looked to an earth pony near him and tried to copy her method of unfolding a table with hooves only and ended up getting trapped inside it when it folded up on him.

“Yeah! Like that!” said the pink pony who was most definitely a Pinkie Pie of equine origin, before helping him out with two flicks of her mane. “You ponies all set here? I have a lot more to check on and I’m running a little late.”

An earth pony wearing an official and important-looking helmet nodded at her and Pinkie began to bounce away humming a happy tune.

A few bounces in, Applejack and Rainbow Dash stopped staring, realizing their chance was literally bounding away. “Pinkie!” shouted Rainbow.

“Get her!” Applejack called out.

Rainbow took off as fast as she could get her wings going—which, as she had yet to pace herself with her pony counterpart, she could only assume was both awesome and radically fast—with Applejack galloping after her.

Meanwhile, Pinkie had already bounced out of sight.

The wake created by Rainbow’s speed directly over where Pinkie had been caused several displays of fruit to topple and scatter.

“Dash!” Applejack called to her. “Watch it! Fly higher!” Passing by the displays, she looked over her whither and apologized to the workers. She then plowed right into a pair of unicorns in fancy shirts and scarves with their muzzles pointed up too high to see her coming. “Awful sorry ‘bout that,” she uttered as quickly as she could before continuing on.

“Hrumph,” scoffed one of the unicorns. “Country ponies.”

Continuing down the street Pinkie had disappeared into, Applejack quickly came to realize that Pinkie and Rainbow had both vanished.

“Consarn it!”




*** B-Team ***




Rarity, Fluttershy, and Pinkie walked on. Thankfully, while many were curved around the mountain, the streets were roughly in a grid, like many cities in their own world, so they weren’t lost, they could return to the train station if they needed to. However, while there was a main, or “Mane” street and the signs spelled it, many of the nearby streets were just as populated with shops and activity, if not more so.

They didn’t know how many streets there were, they didn’t even know how long the streets were. That boutique could be anywhere.

Walking around aimlessly wasn’t working.

They needed a map.

“We know we need a map,” said Pinkie. “But where should we go to get one?“

She looked over to her friends, currently sidetracked by a pony shoe store. “In our world,” she answered herself, “I’d go to a gas station. But something tells me that won’t work in a pony world. A feed supply and water trough maybe?”

She cocked her head. “You’re right, Fifty-Nine, drinking out of a shared drinking trough that’s left outside all day would be icky. That’d be like a bunch of people all eating the same cake by just taking bites out of it without cutting out slices first, and also after licking it too! I bet the pony world ponies would prefer a water fountain or a cooler. But that’s getting further away from the concept of a gas station. What about a restaurant or convenience store, or a touristy-type place?”

“What’s that, Sixty-Three? We passed one a little while ago?” Pinkie turned around and gasped, reading a sign above. “The Tacky Yak Gift Shoppe! Yaks best at smashing prices on tacky gifts’! We did pass one a little while ago!”

Giggling, Pinkie pronked not one block back the way they had come to a small store selling models of Canterlot and other castles, figurines of the royal alicorns, chintzy trinkets, and maps of local celebrity homes, eateries, and shops. “Now that’s a convenient touristy place!”

Once inside, and after hugging several of the cute, little plush pony Twilights, all of which squeaked, “Friendship is Magic,” it was a simple matter of picking up a thankfully free, considering Rarity was the one with the bits, map of the city. “I agree, number Twelve. Take that, plot convenience!” Pinkie cheered. “What’s that, Forty-seven? Plot contrivance?”

She shrugged and began heading back. “Eh. Either way we have a map.”

Once back outside, with the map in her tail, she heard her name being called.

“Pinkie? Pinkie Pie?”

With the bright sun a contrast from the darker store she had emerged from, the pony the voice belonged to was just a dark, blurry outline.

“Oh, good,” the pony continued, “We’ve been looking for you.”

As the outline sharpened, Pinkie made out a simple, straight tail and mane that curled to the pony’s right. No frills, no fuss. Very familiar. There was also something on top of the pony’s head.

“A horn? Twi? Is that you?” Pinkie asked. “Who’s that Pony?”

“Twi? Twilight? I’m not …, oh, the mane,” she said.

“It looks just like Twilight’s.”

A slight change in the head of the pony’s outline suggested she rolled her eyes. “Actually it’s her mane that looks like mine. Back when we were fillies, even before we became classmates, we met at the library and she copied it when she realized it’s possible to have a flowing mane that’s still easy to maintain. She didn’t bother with the topknot though. Wanted to completely get rid of the bun she used to have before her PCSGU interview.”

Pinkie’s eyes, now having adjusted to the light, saw before her a unicorn with yellowish fur and a mostly red and purple mane and tail, that was a little on the frizzy side, wearing egghead glasses and a sweater. “Oh, that’s Moondancer!”

“Oh, sorry, I’m in the sun aren't I?” Moondancer moved to the side, making it easier for Pinkie to see her without squinting. “We started wondering if you got held up at the fruit banquet.”

“That sounds like a delicious place to get held up at.”

“I can’t argue there, but we still need to prepare for the procession and we can’t eat the guests’ food.”

“Of course not! That’s party planning one-oh-one!”

“Don’t want to,” Moondancer lowered her voice, “offend and create an international incident.”

“That’s party planning one-oh-two!”

“Speaking of which,” Moondancer adjusted her glasses, “I was looking through their history books and stumbled onto a sensitive cultural issue that we need your help to avoid.”

“Wait? My help?”

“We can’t find Twilight.”

“Neither can we!”

“She must be taking care of something that came up. I’m sure she’ll be back soon. For now, you are second in command of the planning committee.”

“Wow! That’s impressive!”

Mouth still parted slightly, Moondancer paused to give Pinkie a look. Her bushy eyebrows tilting. “Yes … so … we need you in the planning room.”

“Oh, alright. Lead the way!”

Moondancer turned and set off. A few pronks into Pinkie following suit, Pinkie suddenly stopped and let herself drift to the ground, whipping her tail in the process to eject the map she just picked up. “Wait! I have to get this map to Rarity and Fluttershy!”

“Can it wait? I don't want to have to go all the way to her boutique and back.”

“Oh she’s not there yet,” Pinkie assured her before turning to the shoe shop. “She’s there now!”

Moondancer looked to follow Pinkie’s pointing muzzle and considered that with a confused expression. “She’s shopping for shoes now? Didn’t she already …?” she trailed off with a shrug. “Then again, what do I know about fashion? I wear sweaters all year.”

Before Pinkie was able to reply to that, Moondancer’s horn and the map lit in a pale, pinkish color. “Just a sec., I’ve been practicing.” Moondancer bit her lip and pointed, first to the map and then toward Rarity by the shoe shop. A moment later there was a flash and the map was suddenly landing on Rarity’s back. The sudden appearance making Rarity let out a loud whinny and jump to the side, into a bush.

“Ha! A new personal best!,” Moondancer cheered.

“Oooh!” Pinkie awed. “Nifty!”

"And nothing burst into flames this time!" Moondancer's face paled right after she finished her sentence. "Maybe I shouldn't have aimed directly over Rarity … but it all worked out. Let’s go before she realizes that was me!”

“Sure thing, Mooney. But shouldn’t we tell them we’re leaving?”

“Why? We’re just going to meet up again in a few hours. And I’d prefer Rarity doesn’t know I’m the one who startled her into a bush with a remote teleport spell. She saw what happened with my previous attempts on those bottles of mane and tail conditioners she threatened to use on me, right after she tried to replace my sweater with a gown! I’m keeping my distance.”

Pinkie shrugged and, following along again, began narrating, “So, Rarity and Fluttershy now suddenly have that map they needed, and I’m off on a mysterious side-quest that came out of nowhere and is likely to lead to random, unexpected, shenanigans. I guess this was both a plot convenience and contrivance! Maybe even a twist!”

“Who are you talking to?”

“Everybody! I think?”


*** 

 ***


“It’s fascinating all the different styles and designs ponies have come up with just for hoofwear,” beamed Rarity, looking into the shop window. “They’re not as varied as shoes for feet in our world, but some of them are quite beautiful.”

“Maybe you and pony Rarity could adapt shoe designs from our world for ponies,” offered Fluttershy.

“I’ve been thinking along those lines. I’ve not explored much into making footwear myself, and I suspect pony Rarity may be the same, but she could sell the designs or partner with a shoemaker, or farrier as it may be.”

“Maybe the opposite would work too.”

Rarity giggled. “Pony-themed footwear in our world, and their clothing in general. At the very least I’ll be able to add to my gift idea list for Applejack. I suspect pony designs would be wonderful at a rodeo. And sturdier than my typical work.” She gained a slightly dejected expression. “It can be so hard to get her into my designs, but something about her just makes them looks so beau—uuywhnniiieee?!”

Suddenly feeling something land on her with an almost electric shock, she bounded to the side with a whinny. The offending object drifted to the ground just after she landed in a bush.

“Rarity!” cried Fluttershy, stepping around the thing to check on her friend.

“Did I just whinny like a horse?” asked the bush.

“Um. I would say like a pony, actually.”

“Should I be embarrassed?”

“About the whinny or being in a bush?”

There was a pause. “Yes.”

Fluttershy poked her head up and looked around. “Well, I don’t think anyone was watching, so, no?” However, before turning back to Rarity, she spotted a tree with at least five birds in it. There was no question this time. They were all clearly staring right at her.

Rarity cleared her throat, grabbing Fluttershy’s attention again, and slowly emerged from the bush, smoothing down her mane and dress along the way. “What happened? It felt like a static shock through my … fur. Still odd to say that.”

“S-something landed on you,” Fluttershy answered, turning to the discarded object but huddled close to Rarity, giving both the object and the now empty tree uneasy glances.

Rarity picked up a stick from under the bush with her magic and, from a distance, used it to poke the thing. When it failed to react, she used the stick to turn it over. Still nothing, they approached cautiously.

“Paper?” asked Fluttershy, gently tapping it with her hoof.

Rarity picked it up in her magic and read the cover. “ ‘Things to do in Canterlot.’ It’s a map!”

“How did it get here?” Fluttershy looked up. “Did a pegasus drop it, or … birds?”

More interested in the contents of the map than its sudden appearance, Rarity unfolded it to reveal a cartoonish map of the major city streets with large labels pointing to various landmarks, homes of famous ponies, and shops. “My logo!” she pointed gleefully to a shop on the corner of Spur and Trotway.

“The ‘Canterlot Carousel’?” Fluttershy read.

“That’s it! In Ponyville it was The ‘Carousel Boutique’! Keeping to a theme. That’s my shop!” Rarity squealed, tapping her hooves on the ground. “I wonder if the third one is called the Manehattan Carousel. Hrmm, though I'm not sure that would fit with the fashion mystique there.”

Continuing to look over the map in Rarity’s levitation aura, Fluttershy pointed elsewhere. “I think this is the train station where we got off.”

“And where are we?!” A giddy Rarity prompted, looking around for nearby street signs.

“So, um, here’s the comic shop we passed, and, um, well … we went the wrong way.”

“Oh, you have got to be kidding me,” Rarity sighed. “Well, no matter. We now where it is, we should hurry and make up for lost time. Where’s Pinkie?”

They turned to their friend’s last known location.

Then the surrounding areas.

Then off in the distance in all directions.

“Pinkie?!” Rarity called.

“Oh dear,” Fluttershy fretted.




*** C-Team ***




“What the—? Where did—? How in—? Pinkie!” Rainbow had called out, zipping back and forth along the street looking for the elusive native pink pony. And the next street, and the next. She had flown up, over, and around buildings. Looked into shop windows. Accidentally accosted a hot-air balloon pilot, among others. Took a quick break to score a goal in that cloud-ball game the younger pegasus ponies were playing. Then realized she was lost and had left Applejack behind.

“Whoops.”

She flew to the end of the street she was currently in for one last attempt of finding the Pinkie Pie they hadn’t brought with them, and began retracing her flight-path.

“Let’s see …. Around that statue, over the motel that looked like horse stables, past the restaurant that smells really good.” She made sure to check inside the restaurant, but no pink ponies. At least none that were pink enough to be a Pinkie.

She eventually found herself back at the fruit display and asked the ponies there about Pinkie, but they said they weren’t expecting her back for a few hours.

At no point did she find Applejack, nor any other familiar ponies.

“Well, at least one of them must have gone to the castle,” she decided. With a shrug, she gained some altitude and shot straight for the highest spire of the royal building.


*** 

 ***


Vanished Pinkie Pie or not, vanished Rainbow Dash or not, Applejack pursued the two in the direction she recalled seeing them last before her unicorn body-checking incident. She had given chase for a while, searching for her blue friend or her pink friend's pony counterpart. Or, really, just any familiar face.

It was the failed Ponyville plan all over again.

But this time with two focus targets.

Two focus targets that had completely outpaced her.

She knew Rainbow was simply too fast for her to hope to catch up to, especially with those new wings of hers.

And there was no telling what a fully magical version of Pinkie would be capable of.

She wouldn’t be finding them on her own.

With a sigh, Applejack took in her surroundings.

She frowned when she realized she had gone too far to have any chance of finding any rail tracks.

Then her ears dropped when even the castle wasn’t visible anymore with the nearby buildings being particularly tall.

Though she was pretty sure she knew which direction she had come from.

Pretty sure ….




*** B-Team? ***




Pronking along behind her new friend, Moondancer, and no longer on the lookout for a specific building, Pinkie was free to take in the sights.

Colorful shops. Pleasant parks. Deliciously odoriffic restaurants, bakeries, and candy stores.

Suddenly, she spotted a big, pink mass of cotton candy in the corner of her eye, and she giggled.

“He-he-he, that’s just my hair and tail reflecting off a window, silly.”

But another glance later, she realized there was more than two.

“Oooh! A cotton candy factory!” Pinkie exclaimed.

“I know, right?” a voice answered.

“It’s so neat to watch it get made in those spinny machines, huh?”

“So mesmerizing.”

“Yeah, but you have to be careful, I got my hair caught in one once.”

“Oh me too! Pulled me right in! Got really dizzy!”

“That part was fun!”

“Yeah, but I also got cotton candy all in my mane, tail, and fur!”

“Takes so long to clean that up.”

“Yeah. I tried to just eat it, but I also kept getting bits of mane. They were the same colors!”

“I tried that too. It just doesn’t work.”

“I had to get help from my friends to scrape it out and a hot bath to dissolve the rest.”

“Same here. All that cotton candy lost.”

“Yeah. That was so sad.”

“I was trying a new recipe too.”

“I lost that recipe in the cotton candy.”

“And I wasn’t able to remember what I wrote down.”

“It was a tragic loss. It was so good!”

“We’ll never have that recipe again.”

Pinkie sighed, the sad memory washing over her and she turned from the shop window to her new friend.

That friend also turned to look back at her.

She looked awfully familiar.


|
Pink fur: 
Pink mane: 
Mane that looks like cotton candy: 
A Tail that looks like cotton candy: 
A cute nose meant for sniffing yummy foods: 
A mouth to laugh with and spread smiles to others: 
Light blue eyes that twinkle anytime someone else smiles: 

|

She lifted her front-right hoof and the pony lifted her front-left in exactly the same way.

She lifted her back-left hoof and the pony copied with her back-right hoof.

She stuck her tongue out and blew her a raspberry, receiving one in return.

She giggled and the pony giggled back at her.

""That’s a very realistic mirror,"" they both said.

When her giggling intensified, with two hooves in the air, Pinkie lost her balance and fell over.

The mirror pony remained standing. “You okay?” she asked, stepping closer to help Pinkie up.

“Yeah,” Pinkie replied, holding out her hoof to receive the help. “Thanks.”

Pinkie hooked a hoof around Pinkie’s pastern and Pinkie helped get Pinkie standing again. Pinkie giggled at Pinkie.

“I actually haven’t been a pony for very long,” Pinkie told Pinkie through her giggles. "But it’s always fun making new friends. One of the funnest kinds of fun!” she cheered.

“Fun?” Pinkie asked.

“FUN!” Pinkie reiterated with a cheerful pronk.

Pinkie blinked. Her giggling stopped.

Pinkie also stopped giggling, taking a closer look at Pinkie.

“Wait a second,” Pinkie said.

“Hey!” Pinkie whooped. “Aren’t you—?”

Pinkie was cut off when Pinkie suddenly screamed, startling Pinkie who let out a matching scream.

Both Pinkies ran off in opposite directions.

One yelling, “Twilight! I found another one!”

The other yelling, “Why am I yelling?!”


*** 

 ***


Meanwhile, Moondancer had just noticed there were no Pinkie ponies following her anymore.

"Perhaps Spike wasn't kidding about getting a cupcake-flavored leash."
> Canterlot Part 2 - Fashionable Disasters … Among Others
> --------------------------------------------------------------------------

“Whoa.”

Rainbow Dash took in the sight of the castle. First she’d ever seen not on TV, and here she was flying over it with her own wings.

It consisted of multiple connected and separate buildings within a large courtyard. What was clearly the main structure had multiple high towers connected at their bases as well as through bridges at various heights. Every tower was capped with a spiral dome of mostly purples and yellows, and there were balconies everywhere!

Before going in for a landing, Rainbow circled the courtyard and castle for a full cycle, getting a complete look at it. On the southern side, opposite the city, she could also look down the cliff of the mountain and all the way to Ponyville. Their starting point of Twi’s palace was still just visible in the distance.

It gave her flashbacks of hang-gliding with her parents off the side of Mount Canterhorn back home and she was tempted to use her altitude to check her speed getting back. But she shook her head. She had a job to do. “Maybe later,” she told herself, “On the way back, instead of the train. Maybe that will be the contest with pony me.”

Now, she had a decision to make. There were so many places to land.

Those balconies looked pretty sweet, but would it be better to use the main entrance? It was a royal palace with security, right? Would landing on a random balcony be like sneaking in the back door of a theater?

While working on this conundrum, she noticed multiple guards watching her from around the courtyard and on the balconies. Some of them seemed to be watching her rather closely. She shrugged—maybe they were just bored—and landed on a balcony half way up a mid-sized tower. She could at least give some of the guards something to do for a little while.

The door leading inside was flanked—Rainbow chuckled—by two guards in full armor. One of them rolled his eyes. “Miss Dash. You know, entourage of Princess Twilight or not, you’re supposed to check in for your first visit to the castle each day.”

Taking a step toward the guards, and returning to a hover after tripping over her hooves, Rainbow scratched the back of her head. “Um, you’re sure I haven’t been here today?”

The guard turned to a small plaque on the wall and flipped it up with his magic. Underneath was a scroll that unrolled showing what appeared to be a list of names. “Not yet.”

“Oh, can I sign it now?”

“You’re supposed to sign in at the main entrance if not in the company of the crowns.” He looked to the other guard who simply shrugged her wings. “But I suppose you do have elevated status.” He levitated over a pencil and Rainbow stared at it.

“Uh ….” She looked down at her hooves, then at her flapping wings. “How?”

“The logs are magically linked. Your signature will appear in all of them.”

Rainbow smiled sheepishly. “Right. I knew that.” She looked at the pencil. “Just like I know how to sign my name.”

She landed again and stepped forward, almost falling on her face but her wings caught her just in time. “Ha-ha-heh. Been doing a lot’a of work today. Arms are—legs are all tired. Heh.”

Drifting closer, close enough to reach the pencil without having to walk this time, she landed again and reached for it with a hoof.

The guard’s magic lowered it for an easier reach.

Rainbow stared at the floating pencil next to her hoof, trying to figure out how to use it, or even hold it. She acted on her first thought and brought her other forehoof up and clamped the pencil between both. Now on just her hind legs, her balance was off and she fell forward. “Whaa!”

A quick flap righted her, and she continued flapping just enough to stay balanced. “Heh, really tired. Been busy, busy all day!”

The guards were nonplussed. A slight eyebrow raise from one and an eye roll from the other.

Keeping the pencil between her forehooves, Rainbow flapped her wings to stay upright and hopped forward toward the list under the plaque.

The guards gave her odd looks but remained silent.

There was plenty of room on the scroll so Rainbow leaned forward, by slowing her wings slightly, and reached with her hooves.

The pencil was pointing straight down so she first pressed the top end against the wall to rotate it between her hooves so that the point faced out. Then she squeezed it to keep it still and began writing.Hooves and pencils don't mix.

The result was less than stellar.

Or legible.

The guards looked at it curiously.

“Wow!” exclaimed Rainbow. “I guess I really need a nap!”

She attempted to give the pencil back but dropped it on the floor. “Whoops! Let me get that for you.”

Rainbow returned to all fours and slid her forehooves toward the pencil till it was trapped again, then returned to a hover, presenting the pencil to the guard who grabbed it in his magic after a curious pause.

“So, um,” Rainbow addressed them, “is Twi around?”

“Princess Twilight Sparkle and the rest of her entourage left early this morning to take care of preparations for this week’s events.” He looked to his partner who shrugged again. “Don’t you know that? You’re supposed to be helping. We’ve seen you flying around occasionally.”

Glancing between the two guards, Rainbow chuckled, “Of course I know that. I have been helping. I just wanted to know if any had come back.”

“We wouldn’t know, only one signature is required per day.”

“So they could be here?”

“It’s possible, but unlikely. The castle interior has already been prepared. Though they, and you, are on the schedule for a meeting later today.”

“Oh, then how about the other princesses?”

“Preparing for their own meeting with the ambassadors. They are not receiving guests for non-emergencies at this time.”

“Well, that sucks.”

“Prince Shining Armor may be available.”

“Who’s that?”

The guards paused and looked at each other, the back at Rainbow. “Princess Cadance’s husband?”

Rainbow looked blankly back at him.

The guards returned the confused stare.

“Okay …. So, can I wait for Twi here?”

“You may. Although, you are welcome to return to your suite to take a nap if you’re … tired.”

“I have a suite?”

The guard, being so confused, tried to scratch his head having forgotten he was wearing a helmet. “It’s a shared suite with Princess Twilight and your friends.”

“Wait. We all have a suite together, and Twi and the others have already been here but not me?”

The guard gave his partner another glance, receiving only yet another shrug in return. “You left yesterday night saying you were going to sleep outside as you did not like the guest in the neighboring suite.”

“I slept outside rather than a royal bed because I didn’t like someone?”

“That’s what we heard you tell the others as you flew off.”

“Who is it I didn’t like?”

“The royal manedresser.”

The silent guard grunted, and she finally spoke in a muffled, sarcastic mutter, “Can’t imagine why.”

Rainbow gave them a lopsided expression. “A manedresser? Like a hairdresser? Why would I leave over—?”

“Rainbows!” came a flamboyant cheer.

“Oh no,” Rainbow cringed. She didn’t need to turn around to know that voice.

“Couldn’t stay away forever, could you?” the voice grated on. “Just had to come back to the ol' Zeph-meister.”

“Nope!” Rainbow shouted, launching herself off the balcony fast enough to spin the guards’ helmets.

“Aw, don’t play hard to get!” called Zephyr Breeze, taking off after her. “But I know you love to be chased!”

The guards corrected their helmets and looked over the railing, seeing Rainbow dash around the tower and out of sight with Zephyr gliding down at a leisurely pace, letting gravity and air-pressure do the work for him.

“Putz,” commented the quieter of the guards.

“Yep,” agreed the other before looking back at Rainbow’s signature. “So … you think Miss Dash’s behavior gives credence to that anonymous changeling alert?”

The other guard shrugged.

“Hrmm. I’ll send a report just in case.”


*** 

 ***


Pinkie Pie was a capable girl, not a child by any means, and could take care of herself.

That’s what Rarity and Fluttershy told themselves when they decided there was no point in searching for her any longer. She had clearly gone off somewhere, for whatever reason, and they all had their goals set. One of them was to get to specific locations, the other already was to find and recruit help. Help that had a better understanding of pony magic and their world. Help that wouldn’t need a map. Help with their own wings and horns, and a lifetime of having learned how to use them properly.

It was simply the best option to head for pony Rarity’s Canterlot Carousel boutique now that they knew its location. They would have to locate Pinkie later if she did not turn up on her own.

And after some rushing through the streets, it stood before them in all its glory. Similar in color scheme to the clothing shop Rarity worked for in her own world, though brighter and with a much more regal design. Not the samey rectangle after rectangle of their strip mall back home, but a pleasing, slightly rounded front and a slanted roof that came to a peak not unlike a castle. At the base was a short staircase nestled between two large windows to show off the fashionable couture within.

“Eeeee!” Rarity squealed as before, rushing up to the second new Rarity boutique of the day. Fluttershy watched on, using a forehoof to cover her giggle.

At first making way for the door at the top of the stairs, a glint in the light brought Rarity to one of the windows instead. Fluttershy could hear her “Oooh” and “Aaah” over the wares on display.

Fluttershy stifled most of her giggling and calmly walked to the front door, smiling at her friend as she opened it, a bell ringing inside. “We can get a closer look from inside,” she tittered.

Rarity let out a small squeak turning to join Fluttershy, taking the steps in two bounds. “Of course, of course!”

After Rarity passed her, Fluttershy let out another little giggle and sighed, happy to have finally gotten to their destination. She took one more look out at the pony city of Canterlot but froze. There they were again.

The birds.

More than a dozen now. Spread over four trees.

They were all watching her.

With an eep, she quickly rushed in and closed the door, making sure to step away from the windows and take a breath before turning to examine the shop.

Inside, the boutique was spotless, freshly cleaned and shined. Displays were everywhere and covered with dresses, skirts, saddles, headdresses, even the occasional suit. There were changing booths, tasteful decorations aplenty, and a curved staircase leading to a second floor where more goods could be seen at its edge!

A table set to the side was stocked with refreshments. Prints of familiar cutie marks representing apples and balloons suggested the prep team behind them.

There seemed to be an earthy theme to most of the displays, both for clothing and decorations. Many of the outfits seemed designed for darker coats and wing holes were present in many more of the display models than the mostly unicorn city would suggest needing.

There were no ponies behind the counter, but a pair of customers mulled about the shop and a conversation behind a privacy curtain suggested an employee was providing someone with assistance.

Sadly, neither of the voices were a copy of Rarity’s but rather of unknown mares. One voice, giving out suggestions and advice, seemed quite sophisticated and patient, the likely employee they would need to talk with to find their pony counterparts or helpful princess.

Of course it would be rude to interrupt the conversation. So there was time to explore!

Rarity did a quick trot from table to table, from display to display, checking the dresses, and checking for her logo. She was pleased to confirm that this was indeed pony Rarity’s boutique. Nearly all the major pieces were hers, while various accessories had been added in from other sources, such as shoes and items made from materials she rarely worked with. She was also pleased to find almost half the second floor was dedicated to showcasing works from novice designers, with a sign stating that ninety percent of all sales went directly to the designers after purchase.

Fluttershy remained on the first floor, more leisurely exploring the dresses, delighted over the softness in some of the fabrics and how many designs sparkled with gems.

It was only a few minutes before two mares emerged from the privacy booth. One was wearing an adorable gown that complimented her colors nicely.

The other mare had blue fur and wore a more modestly skirted, black dress under a gold saddle. She was strikingly tall, including her horn. Hers must have been twice as long as Rarity’s with several more rings in its spiral. The horn even came to a sharp point. Fluttershy blushed slightly, thinking perhaps it was best Pinkie hadn’t accompanied them.

The other customers, likely friends of the customer from behind the curtain, rushed up to the other mare and gushed over the dress she was wearing. The pony wearing the dress gave a twirl, giggling back at them, and the whole group began making their way to the front counter.

“Spin my spindles,” called the tall pony with a smile, “Fluttershy. I wasn’t expecting you so soon.”

Fluttershy startled back slightly at the sudden greeting but waved at the stranger.

“Your dress is ready for tonight. Go on in back if you’d like to see it,” the tall pony finished, continuing with the group’s move to the counter.

Fluttershy looked up to the second floor to see Rarity watching the happy customers with a gleeful smile. She gave Fluttershy a nod.

Turning back to the counter to see the group talking excitedly about a dance while paying for the gown, Fluttershy meekly worked her way around them, past the “Employees Only” sign, and through a door to a back room.

Huddled up front were dresses not currently on display, possibly overstock or designs for customers to request them by name, with completed orders along a side wall.  Labels with dream signs or "cutie marks" indicated the pony they were meant for.

Not seeing any ponies inside, nor her own triple butterfly sign, Fluttershy continued.

Behind the completed dresses were office, and other supplies necessary for running a business as well as a workshop with dresses still being worked on, dress-making supplies, and design boards for when inspiration struck away from home.

Then, worn over a … “poneighquin” was a gorgeous tan gown. The poneighquin had a butterfly sign against its stand indicating it was made for her pony counterpart. The dress was a much darker shade than she normally wore and very earthy, adorned in flowers and vine-like ribbons. Around the head of the poneighquin was a headband of more flowers. Accessories sat on a shelf nearby consisting of shoes, stockings, and a butterfly-shaped clip.

The dress was Spring personified—ponsonified?—it even smelled like a gentle Spring breeze.

She walked up to it, noticing a large mirror as she got there. She watched herself through it, the first time really getting a good look at her pony form. The reflections in Twi’s palace and various windows gave an idea earlier, but the room the mirror portal was in was too dark at the time to give her such detail. In contrast, pony Rarity’s workroom had plenty of windows to light up the space. She looked herself over, turning around and fluttering her wings, then stood next to the dress and imagined wearing it. She was so tempted to try it on, but it was meant for a different Fluttershy, and getting it on could take her hours given her lack of coordination with her alien body. And she didn’t want to risk damaging it.

A door opened and closed upstairs pulling Fluttershy’s attention upward to see Rarity greeting her on her way down the steps. “Fluttershy, you found your dress!”

“It’s gorgeous, Rarity. I really want to try it on, but I shouldn’t”

“Whyever not, darling?”

“Well, the time—“

“Oh, not to worry, I can help you get it on faster.”

“But,” Fluttershy began to protest as Rarity lit her horn and placed the flower headband over her mane. “Oh, thank you, but I meant there are other things we should be doing, and—wait, when did you change your dress?”

She paused, finally getting a good look at Rarity, not in the three colored gown she had been wearing since they all had returned to Twi’s palace, but a new, mostly dark-red dress of earthen tones.

Rarity giggled sheepishly, taking a moment to give a twirl to show off her dress, “I admit I couldn’t help myself. As for ‘other things’, I am well aware Twilight gave us tasks to complete, but it’s hardly like we can’t spend a few minutes making sure we look fabulous doing them.”

“Well, I suppose,” Fluttershy relented, smiling at pony Fluttershy’s dress a moment before looking up in surprise. “What do you mean by ‘Twilight gave us tasks’? We all agreed we would come here.”

“Of course we did, darling. But it was Twilight who assigned tasks as usual.”

Fluttershy mulled that over a bit. “Some of them, but I thought—“

“Poor Spikey-Wikey having to write out all those long checklists. I’ve just about finished mine, but I hope the others are all right. Twilight and Spike in particular had a terribly long list. I was planning to check on them soon. How are you doing on yours?”

With a gasp, Fluttershy’s eyes went wide. “You’re Rarity!”

Rarity gave her a lopsided expression. “Of course I am.”

“I mean you’re pony Rarity!”

“What else would I be?”

“We’ve been looking all over for you!”

“I’ve been right here. Are you feeling alright?”

“Oh, I’m sorry,” Fluttershy blushed. “I should introduce myself.”

“I should hardly think that’s necessary. We’ve known each other for years. You’re one of my most dearest friends.”

“Aww.” The admission gave Fluttershy a deeper blush and a sudden rush of shyness.

Seeing this, Rarity stepped forward and gave her a hug. “You must be getting anxious over the events this week. But you mustn't worry, dear. I’m sure everything will turn out wonderfully.”

Fluttershy leaned into the warm hug, closing her eyes. Not the first time she’d ever hugged a pony, but it was her first hug as a pony. Squeezing Rainbow Dash into her chest while collapsed on top of Applejack after jumping out of a hospital window didn’t count.

A gentle breeze passed over them and she opened her eyes, looking over Rarity.

Birds.

At least twenty birds were sitting on the window sills along the wall.

All those tiny eyes were on her.

But that wasn’t the worst part.

Two of the windows were open.

And there were no screens.

“Um, R-Rarity?”

“What is it, darling?”

“Do you have a back door?”

Rarity pulled back, giving Fluttershy a concerned look and pointed a hoof. “Yes, it’s back around the staircase. Leads under the archway.”

Fluttershy took notice that Rarity’s hoof was pointing well away from the direction of the birds and thanked her politely.

Rarity noticed Fluttershy was looking past her and turned around. “Oh, it’s your choir! Hello Tweety,” she waved at a small canary. “Are you still practicing?”

The bird chirped and Rarity turned to Fluttershy for a translation only to find her gone and the flower headband fluttering to the floor.

She blinked. “Was that a yes?”


*** 

 ***


Rarity watched the tall, blue pony ring up the price for the gown the customer was wearing while they continued their conversation. The customer decided the dress was too beautiful to take off so soon and ended up wearing it home. After she received a box of dress-care supplies large enough to pack the dress into for later storage, she and her friends turned for the main entrance.

With the group leaving, Rarity smiled to herself, enjoying the bright, joyful faces of that customer and her friends. That’s what she loved so much about her work. Making that special gown for each customer to adore, that moment where her hard work became all worthwhile just made her heart soar every time, even, apparently, when it was a dress designed by another Rarity. Although that dress was quite similar to one of her own designs still just on paper.

She leaned over the rail of the second floor dreaming of the day she owned her own boutique instead of just managing a small collection in a strip mall outlet. Maybe even a chain of three boutiques. Two of them in cities! Perhaps pony Rarity would visit her next time!

The thought made her squeal quietly, but not quietly enough for pony Rarity’s employee to not hear her.

“Rarity!” she called in a posh, chiding voice. “Sneaking away to watch the customers again? How will you ever get your work done?”

Taken aback, Rarity stopped and cringed. “Uh ….”

Before she could follow up on that thesis, the employee began laughing, her features softening to a smile. “I swear you rush out here near every time you hear the bell.”

“Um ….” Despite the new joviality of the employee, Rarity’s second draft didn’t get much further. “I was just checking if the others had shown up,” she finally managed, beginning to pad down the stairs.

“Others? Your friends from Ponyville?”

“Yes, yes, um …,” Rarity confirmed but trailed off, not knowing the employee’s name, “darling.”

The employee adopted a sly expression. “Any friend in particular? One with a hat, perhaps?”

Something in the employee’s voice grabbed Rarity’s attention and she looked up, only to stumble off the final stair and into a dress on display, knocking it over.

“Oh dear,” Rarity gasped, quickly catching parts of the dress in her magic. The rest tumbled to the floor for her to add to her magical grasp a moment later.

“Oh?” the employee cooed, her smirk deepening. “Let’s see; which of your friends wears a hat all the time?”

“Applejack?” supplied Rarity, straightening up the fallen dress.

“That’s her!”

“Has she been in?” Rarity queried while attending to the fine details of the dress’s arrangements.

“Well, I haven’t seen her since this morning, but she’s bound to turn up again eventually.”

Rarity brightened at that, beginning to approach the counter again. “She’ll be here soon then?”

The employee’s response was a brighter, sly smile and a raised eyebrow.

“Why are you looking at me like that?” Rarity asked.

“Oh,” the employee giggled. “No reason. Except you seem to enjoy when she visits you at work.”

“Of course. I always enjoy seeing my friends—“ Rarity paused. “Wait, you don’t think …? She and I?” She giggled, “Oh, no, darling. We—“

She stepped forward again and heard a crash behind her. Another dress lay on the floor, knocked over by the first one still in her magic’s grasp. “Oh no, no.”

She then grabbed the second dress and its accessories, straightened them back out, but they followed her when she went to put the first dress back in its place.

With the first dress down again, she turned to see the second dress right in front of her. With the first dress having swung around as she did, now hovering next to the second.

“Feathers and frocks, Rarity,” the employee giggled in a victorious tone. “You don’t say.”

“I assure you this has nothing to do with my feelings for Applejack!” A moment of thought later, a blush grew on Rarity’s cheeks and she added, “Of friendship!”

Both dresses now back on the ground and arranged to perfection, Rarity continued. “Applejack and I are just friends. Wonderfully so. But that is all.”

To give her statement finality, Rarity nodded and both dresses nodded with her, coming out of their careful alignment. She looked to the dresses, then to the employee, then back to the dresses. Each time, the dresses moved slightly with her head. She grumbled, realigning and perfecting the dresses again, all the while the employee watched with a satisfied smile.

For the third time, the dresses were perfect. Now all she had to do was get her magic to let go of them.

But that employee was watching. Rarity considered that and what might happen if the employee saw her tweak her horn to let go. Was it okay to let this pony know she wasn’t the Rarity she expected?

While pondering this, the front door opened and a familiar pony in a familiar hat trotted in.

“Rarity, good. Ah was hoping Ah’d find you here.” Turning to the employee for a moment, she tipped her hat politely. “Howdy, ma’am.”

“ ‘Howdy’,” the employee returned in her own accent, grin spreading as the scene unfolded in front of her.

Rarity had snapped her head over to the doors as they opened, jiggling the two dresses again. “Applejack!” she called, flicking her eyes between her, the dresses, and the employee without turning her head so as to not jostle the dresses more. “How are you? Weren’t you going to the castle?”

“Ah was, Rares, but Ah got split up from Dash. Ended up finding my way here looking for her.”

“Oh you did, did you?” the employee smirked.

“Well,” Rarity stalled, “perhaps Rainbow is at the castle?”

“That’s what Ah’m hoping. Ah’m heading there next, just wanted to check in with you, see how you’re doing.”

“Of course you did,” the employee gleed. “You’re such a good friend to Rarity.”

Rarity blushed deeper, flicking her eyes toward the employee again. “I’m fine here, da—pplejack.,” she cleared her throat before remembering the whole reason for being in the pony world to begin with. “Have you found Twilight?”

“ ‘Fraid not, Rare. Saw Pinkie for a mite, but, well, she’s Pinkie so it didn’t last long.”

“Ah, a pity,” Rarity sighed.

“Well then,” Applejack straightened her hat, “Ah’m off for the castle. See y’alls later, Rares, Sassy.”

Applejack nodded at the both of them, turned, and exited at a gallop.

Mentally sighing, it was a quick moment before Rarity considered something. “ ‘Sassy’?”

“Yes?” answered the employee.

Rarity did a double-take, the glowing dresses shifting behind her. “Your name?”

“What about it?” asked a confused Sassy.

“How does Applejack know …?”

“Well, I would hope she knows my name by now. She ‘checked in’ often enough yesterday.” Sassy let her smirk double. “Unless you think that she’s always so focused on you that she never remembers it.”

Rarity’s jaw dropped. “That was—pony!” She rushed forward, the dresses clattering in her wake alerting her to: stop, place them down, flick her horn hard enough for it to twang audibly and give her a second of double-vision, and rush for the door again.

Sassy winced at the display, sucking air in between her teeth and putting a hoof to her own horn in sympathy.

“Applejack!” Rarity called from the steps outside her boutique. She searched but could not find any trace of her. She did, however, see the castle in the distance, and a street heading off in that direction.

She bounded forward again, got a few gallops past the stairs, and gasped. “Fluttershy!”

Rarity then quickly turned and rushed back in, rounding the counter and into the back room. “Fluttershy?”

Seeing only (fabulous) dresses and supplies, she ventured further, calling her friend’s name until she reached a rear exit. She opened it and called again.

With no sign of Fluttershy, Rarity galloped back to Sassy. “Are there any other exits besides the front and back?”

Taken aback, Sassy hesitated, “Oh! What? No, just the two. Although a pegasus could fly out a window, I suppose.”

“Thank you!” Rarity called, rushing back out through the workroom and rear exit.

In the quiet following Rarity’s departure, Sassy stared at the door to the workroom for a moment before going to the accosted dresses and finally arranging them back to perfection. “Poor dears. The event planning must be getting to them after all.”

Rarity’s voice called from the second floor. “Sassy?”

Sassy looked up to the railing and blinked. There stood Rarity, perfectly composed and wearing a completely different dress than she had a moment before. “Instant dressing is one thing, but teleporting too?” Sassy muttered to herself.

“What was all that yelling about?” Rarity asked.


*** 

 ***


“And then one of the maids loved her new style so much she asked The Princess about getting a royal manedresser for quicker touch-ups whenever important ponies visit,” Zephyr explained to a near catatonic Rainbow Dash, sitting on the ground with her head against the wall.

“That’s great, Zeph,” Rainbow droned through clenched teeth. “So happy to hear it.”

“I haven’t done much with the princesses themselves. Having flowing manes like theirs means they have their own, personal dressers, but I work with many of the staff, and the guards of course need work with all that awful helmet damage! Everypony wants a piece of that magic Breeze!”

“Uh, huh.”

“Of course they tell me that everypony who works in the castle needs to have some kind of rudimentary guard training in the event of an emergency. I’ll be fitted for armor in a few weeks or so. I bet I’ll be the talk of the town. A magnet for the mares.”

An odd sort of strangled sound emerged from Rainbow.

“Aw, Rainbows, Don’t be jealous. You know you’ll always be my only one.”

The sound intensified.

A trio of guards and a pony in a Wonderbolts’ uniform watched the pair from across the courtyard.

“She doesn’t look particularly tired,” a ranking officer commented while observing through binoculars. “Everypony looks like that after listening to Zephyr for ten minutes. If he wasn’t so good at mane therapy …” He paused to give his flowing locks a quick caress. “I'd have had him thrown out a month ago.”

“Sir,” said another guard, “he hasn’t been here a month yet.”

“Preemptive strike,” he answered. “Let me see her signature again.”

The officer continued after looking over the logbook. “And you said she used her hooves to write this?”

“Yes, sir. Surprised me too. Just squeezed them together with the pencil in between, barely had any grip on it. And she used her wings to keep rearing back rather than just hovering. Didn’t even seem to remember that she hadn’t been at the castle yet today.”

“For the latter, maybe she blocked Zephyr from her mind; I try the same every day. Boy still hasn't noticed we use earplugs when he works on us. For the former, perhaps she kept her hind legs on the floor for stability?”

“This is Rainbow Dash, sir,” said the Wonderbolt. “I wouldn’t be surprised if she could write an essay while hovering upside down in a wind tunnel. Well, not an essay. Daring Do fanfiction though—You get the idea.”

“Writing with her hooves?”

“Of course not. With her mouth, like any sane pegasus.”

The officer put down the binoculars, passing them to a guard. “Have her watched for now. And let me know if any of the other Harmony Bearers are acting strange. Take direct action if you need to. Could be nothing, but we don’t want to take risks with the ambassadors here.”

“Yes sir!” the guards saluted.

“Should I inform the other Wonderbolts, sir?” asked the Wonderbolt.

“Might be a good idea,” the officer replied. “We need to get to the bottom of this.”


*** 

 ***


Fluttershy took a breath and looked around.

The area out the back door for the Canterlot Carousel was under an archway acting as a shaded underpass, or covered alley, for several neighboring buildings. Being completely covered on top meant that there was good security from the mysterious birds. However, with Rarity’s boutique being at the head of the resulting alley, they’d see her if she stayed in place.

So, she galloped down the alley, passing doors for several other shops, till she rounded a bend and stopped shortly later to consider her situation.

“A-are they still following me? Why won’t they say anything? They just keep to themselves and stare! I didn’t recognize any of those birds from Ponyville, but there were a lot of them, I may have missed a few in the trees. Did a bird from Ponyville tell them I wasn’t the Fluttershy they know? Are they hiding torches somewhere?

“I knew it! I’ve frightened the Ponyville animals so much they’ve sent out messengers! Are all the animals in Canterlot in on it?” Fluttershy looked around, eyeing every shadow. “They could be anywhere.”

MRRROWW!

“Eek!” Fluttershy shrieked, launching into another gallop away from a black and white cat, as well as the boutique. "I don't have any tuna!"

Behind her, the cat watched, puzzled as a door opened. An elderly mare gestured at the cat with an umbrella in her magic. “Sylvester! Knock it off.”

Around another bend and stopping short of the end of the covered alley, Fluttershy looked back the way she came. “What do I do? How do I find pony Fluttershy if I have to hide from all the animals?”

She looked back and slapped a wing over her face. “I was just in a clothing boutique! I could have made a disguise with Rarity’s help!” She gasped. “Rarity! I found pony Rarity! But I can’t get back in now! The windows are open for the birds and that cat was so impolite.

“I’ll have to try to get to the castle! Pony Fluttershy wasn’t here, maybe she’ll be there. Or someone will know how to find—“

“Fluttershy!” came a yell.

Startled, Fluttershy looked up and was immediately tackled by a blur of speeding pink.

Flat on her back and covered with a pony-colored pink—she shook her head—a pink-shaped pony—that wasn’t much better but it begged an obvious question, “Pinkie?”

“Fluttershy! Emergency!”

“What?!” Fluttershy opened her eyes wide as Pinkie got off her. “What’s wrong?”

“I found a Pinkie pony!!”

“That’s great!” Fluttershy cheered. “Where is she?”

“Um,” Pinkie helped Fluttershy up. “I don’t know anymore.”

“Why not?”

“Running and screaming!”

“What? Who was running and screaming?”

“Us!”

“From what?”

“Each other!”

“You ran away from each other? Why—wait! Which Pinkie are you?”

“The Pinkie who needs to find the other Pinkie!”

“That doesn’t—do you know Sunset Shimmer?”

“Of course! Who doesn’t?”

“Oh, right. Not like she hasn't been here before. Um, but you know about the portal in Twilight’s palace, right?”

“Yep! But now we need to track a Pinkie before we lose her trail, and Pinkies are very good at hiding their trails! I should know, I am one!”

With that, Pinkie scooped Fluttershy onto her back with a deft neck movement and began galloping off.

“Eeekkk! Pinkie!” Fluttershy shrieked out a louder than usual squeak while holding onto a large helping of cotton candy mane. “I’m still n-not sure w-which Pinkie you a-are. Have you been to Sunset’s world?”

“Yup!”

Fluttershy thought a moment, as difficult as that was while being rattled around on top of an excited Pinkie, and realized that “Sunset’s world” wasn’t really easy to define anymore. “W-what I m-mean is have y-you been t-through the p-portal?”

“Yup!”

“So-o, you’re m-my Pi-inkie?”

“Of course!”

“Okay! So-o-o w-where are w-we going-g?”

“The castle! The other Pinkie ran kinda in that direction, and it’ll be easier to catch her with you helping!”

Fluttershy—carefully—looked back, seeing the receding group of buildings Rarity’s boutique was a part of. She decided that the Rarities should be alright. Pony Rarity’s boutique wasn’t a particularly large building; they’d find each other. Going to the castle was the best thing to do.

Things would be fine there.


*** 

 ***


Sassy Saddles looked blankly up at her employer. “Zoots and zippers, Rarity. Weren’t you just down here?”

“What do you mean, darling?” Rarity answered, starting down the stairs. “I’ve been working on dresses, costumes, decorations, the exhibit all morning. I’ve been on the floor only a few times today.”

“But you were just talking with Applejack.”

“Applejack was here? She’s not having trouble is she?”

“You don’t remember talking with her?”

“I was in the back with Fluttershy just now. Poor dear suddenly rushed off. Her choir birds seemed so confused. I wish I could understand them.” Rarity raised a crumpled piece of paper in her magic. “Tweety gave me this note, but I’m afraid I can’t read most of it.” Smoothing the paper revealed it had multiple holes cut into it. “I believe he needs a hooficure, or clawicure. Or perhaps he got into another fight with that despicable pussycat next door.”

Now on the first floor, Rarity glanced at two of the dresses on display and adjusted them slightly before turning to Sassy. “It’s in Fluttershy’s writing, which is odd considering Fluttershy was with me when Tweety presented it, and seems to mention that she was excited about something. Another pony I believe.”

Sassy, still confused about the whole ordeal, just nodded. “I see.”

While the two of them looked more closely at the note, the front door opened. Rarity didn’t miss a beat, “Welcome to the Canterlot Carousel, where everything is—Oh! Applejack! Come in, dear.”

Applejack smiled at her from the doorway and walked the rest of the way in. “Rarity, good. Ah was hoping Ah’d find you here.” Turning to Sassy for a moment, she tipped her hat politely. “Howdy, ma’am.”

Giving her a surprised look, Sassy replied, “ ‘Howdy’ again, Applejack.” At Applejack’s double-take, she opened her mouth to speak further but was cut off by Rarity.

“Is everything alright?” Rarity asked. “Weren’t you going to the castle about now?”

“Ah was, Rares, but, uh …,” Applejack paused, taking in Rarity’s earth-toned dress. “New dress?”

“It is!” Rarity gave a spin. “Do you like it?”

“Uh, Ah, yes, yes. Looks right swell on you,” Applejack answered, covering her cheeks by looking to the side and raising a hoof to her hat.

“Why, thank you, darling. Now, about the castle?”

“Oh,” Applejack snapped back to attention. “Ah got split up from Dash. Ended up finding my way here looking for her. Lot of them streets are curved all strange.”

Sassy gave that a lopsided look. “Really,” she deadpanned.

“Well,” Rarity considered, “perhaps Rainbow is at the castle?”

“Well, Ah’m …,” Applejack trailed off again, giving Rarity a closer look. “Did you make that dress yourself?”

“Of course I did.”

“You made that dress today?”

“Well, just the final touches. I mostly finished it yesterday.”

“Yesterday!? You made that dress, yourself, here yesterday?”

“Yes, dear. Whatever is the matter?”

Applejack smiled brightly and was about to say something when she stopped and quickly glanced at the other pony in the room. “Uh … nothing’s wrong, Ah, well, Ah was heading to the castle next, just wanted to check in with you, see how you’re doing.”

“Oh come now, Applejack,” Sassy piped up. “Now you’re not even trying to hide it.”

Applejack and Rarity both turned to Sassy with confused expressions. “Hide, uh, hide what?” Applejack asked, her eyes flicking to the side.

Sassy looked back at the pair of confused faces and centered on Rarity’s. “We were just talking about it! You were wearing saddlebags and that other dress. I had never seen it before.”

“I’ve been wearing this dress for at least an hour,” Rarity argued.

“But I clearly saw you wearing a new five-layer gown. You had a headdress, stockings, and shoes with it.

Rarity stopped, thinking that over. Applejack watched eagerly. “Was it three colors with sapphires, emeralds, and rubies?”

“I believe so, yes.”

Her eyes going wide in realization, Rarity gasped. “But that’s still unfinished back in—“

“Rarity?” Applejack interrupted. “Think you could come with me to the castle? It’s real important.”

“I thought you were going to look for Rainbow.”

“Yes, but Ah need you for something too. And Ah’d like some time to talk with you.”

Sassy perked up at that, a sudden surprised smile turning sly as she looked to Rarity. “She ‘needs you’, Rarity,” she winked.

Rarity gave both of them curious looks as Sassy herded them toward the front door. Before ushering them outside, Sassy gave Rarity a second wink and a nudge.

Rarity took that blankly for a moment before her eyes widened and a blush grew on her cheeks only to receive another nudge into following Applejack.

Stopping just shy of the door, Sassy watched Rarity and Applejack travel on, noticing how Applejack sighed just before the door closed. “Finally,” she heard her say.

“ ‘Finally’, indeed,” Sassy giggled.





> Canterlot Part 3 - Ponies in the Pound
> --------------------------------------------------------------------------

Applejack galloped into the royal courtyard, giving nods to a few guards spread around, and continued toward the castle’s main entrance. Looking up, she mused to herself, “Ah could search for Dash from one of the watchtowers.”

It wasn’t long before she realized that wouldn’t be necessary when a rainbow tail streaked overhead.

“Dash!” she called, causing the pegasus to zag in surprise. The pegasus kept going, however, disappearing behind a tower of a side building.

Applejack rushed after Rainbow, knowing she’d never be able to keep up, but hoping to at least see where she went.

With a groan of being left with no rainbow sighting, Applejack turned back only to be startled by an urgent whisper. “AJ!”

“Gah!” Applejack jumped to the side and saw Rainbow Dash crouched in the shadow of a bush.

“Not so loud!” Rainbow shushed.

Applejack looked around, seeing nothing of note other than a few guards watching them. “What’s going on? You hiding from somepony?”

“Zephyr Breeze!” Rainbow hissed back. “He’s been following me since I got here.”

Applejack could help but chuckle, “That boy just doesn’t know when to let go does he?”

Rainbow grumbled. “He keeps going on and on about being the Royal Manedresser! I can’t believe he’s a royal anything besides royal pain!”

“Ah suppose when you have a skill good enough, you get some leeway for, uh, ‘personality quirks’?”

“Yeah? Well, if he keeps this up, I’m going to quirk his ‘personality’ big time!”

“Careful, he still is Fluttershy’s brother,” Applejack chided her. “Just rain a cloud on his mane or something. That’ll send him back inside for a touch-up.”

“Huh.” Rainbow perked up, coming out from under the bush. “That could work.”

“Why you out here anyway? We have work to do.”

“That’s why I’m here. After we got separated I figured I’d just head over and see if I could nab our ponies, but they’re not here, and the princesses are busy with ambassador stuff. Whatever that means.”

“ ‘Our ponies’?” Applejack’s brow furled.

“Yeah. I don’t know what happened with Pinkie. I chased her all over but she just disappeared. And I still haven’t seen any of the others. I figured I’d see the pony me flying around somewhere but nothing. She’s in the city though. Apparently she slept outside because she didn’t want to be too close to Zephyr. Something I can understand. All the rest of our ponies slept in a suite in the castle. Twi too.”

Applejack quirked an eyebrow. “Say what?”

“What.”

“You know what Ah mean.” Applejack rolled her eyes.

“And you know what I mean. The whole point in coming here was to grab Twi. It’s been hours and all we know is that she’s somewhere in the city. ‘Least we’re in the right one this time. Meanwhile I’m stuck with Zephyr on my tail.” She looked back at her tail, flicking it a few times. “Almost literally.”

“Uh,” Applejack scratched her head, trying to unpack some aspects of what Rainbow was telling her and latched onto the part that made sense. “Ah know where Twi is, or should be.”

“Really?! That’s great!” Rainbow cheered. “Do you also know where pony me is?”

“Okay,” said Applejack, taking a step back, “that’s the part Ah’m not getting—“

“Halt!” demanded a stern voice.

Rainbow and Applejack looked over to see a small collection of guards closing in on them. The sound of flapping wings above came from additional pegasus guards and Wonderbolts.

“Uh, howdy, fellas,” chuckled Applejack nervously. “What can I do y’all for?”

“We’d like you to come in for questioning," answered the closest guard.

“What for?” asked Rainbow.

“Conspiracy to commit foalnapping.”

“Foalnapping?!” Applejack threw back.

“Foals napping?” asked Rainbow. “What’s a foal?”

Applejack gave her a quick, questioning look before turning back to the lead guard. “What makes you think we’re looking to foalnap anypony? What ponies would we even want to—?”

“Princess Twilight Sparkle, among others, by the sounds of it,” accused a Wonderbolt, honing in on Rainbow. “Where’s the real Rainbow Dash?”

All eyes turned toward Rainbow who shrank back. “Um ….” After a thoughtful pause, Rainbow reared onto her hindlegs and threw up her forelegs. “Okay, you got me! I’m not really Rainbow Dash! I’m just a really big fan of hers—because she’s totally awesome—and I wanted to come meet her.”

She looked around, but none of the other ponies seemed to know how to take that confession and it was clear it needed something more. “You like my costume, uh, dye job? And I got the cutie mark right, right? You know? Cosplay?”

While waiting for a reaction from the group, Rainbow began losing her balance and shot her wings out to counter. However, she was falling backward so the wings didn’t help. “Oof,” she muttered, landing on her back.

She quickly rolled over and tried to turn around to face Applejack and the majority of the guards, who were now surrounding them, but tripped over her hooves and landed on her face.

“Have you been nipping the hard cider again?” asked Applejack as Rainbow stumbled back onto her hooves.

The Wonderbolt members all glanced at each other, one mentioning, “Yeah, that’s really not Crash. Hers are much more dramatic.”

Seeing the continued confused scrutiny, Rainbow decided she needed a different plan. “What’s that?!” she shouted, pointing behind the densest group of winged ponies.

None of the guards turned, though a few Wonderbolts checked their peripheral vision.

Rainbow groaned and jumped for Applejack, hooking her forelegs under hers and launching into the air through the thinnest group of winged ponies.

“Wwwhhhoooaa?!” Applejack yelled. “Dash?! What the hay are you doing?!”

“Flying away!”

“What—where—WHY?! Ah have no idea what’s going on!”

Behind them, the winged guards and Wonderbolts were in close pursuit.

“Put me down, you varmint!” Applejack yelled.

Seeing the courtyard wall ahead, Rainbow flew higher.

"Ah said down! This ain't down!" Applejack shouted.

“And let you get arrested?”

“Yes!”

“What?!” Rainbow shrieked, looking down at her passenger.

“Better than getting my neck broken!”

“I’m not going to break your neck!”

Applejack’s eyes went wide and she yelled in a rush, “Yes-you-will-look-out!”

Rainbow looked forward to see a large building in front of them. Large in both width and height.

Her first instinct was to climb over it.

So she did.

But earth ponies are heavier than pegasus ponies. Especially when carrying them.

She didn’t quite manage the curve as sharply as intended, and they flew close enough to graze the building. Both of them had their forelegs entwined but Applejack instinctively kicked out with her hindlegs to keep them from smacking into it.

Earth ponies are also generally stronger than pegasus ponies. And with self-preservation screaming at her, Applejack used her full strength.

Applejack’s kick was more dramatic than Rainbow was expecting and nearly flipped them over.

Rainbow, now angled at the ground and still flapping her wings in surprise, made their altitude drop faster than gravity would have bothered to do on its own.

She quickly righted herself, swinging Applejack around in the process, and started trying to fly straight up and over the roof of the building.

At some point, dislodged from the earlier flipping, Applejack’s hat came back down to land on Rainbow’s face.

“I can’t see!” Rainbow instinctively reached up to adjust the hat, leaving Applejack to dangle from only Rainbow’s remaining foreleg.

“DASH!” Applejack shouted, clinging to her literal last leg. “Higher! Little higher!”

Hat adjusted and vision secured, Rainbow looked forward to see the chimney of the building they were in the process of trying to avoid. It was just high enough to hit Applejack at center mass with their current altitude. Rainbow quickly inclined and Applejack drew in her rear hooves, just managing to trim a nail off the edge. "DASH!" she complained to her pilot.

Rainbow looked down at her unhappy passenger and put her fears to rest. "I got this!"

The assurance was not well received if Applejack's scowl was anything to judge by.

Rainbow then looked back and caught a glimpse of several winged ponies still behind them and closing in. “Hang on!”

“You think Ah’m not?!”

“Evasive maneuvers!”

“Nope! Don’t you dare!”

“Daring and doing!”

Applejack looked forward, watching as Rainbow weaved between buildings,—"Nope!"—from alley to alley,—"Nope!"—and then began heading for one of the very dark train tunnels leading down the side of the mountain, “Nope! Nope! Nope!”

Rainbow ignored the protests and flew in at high speed. The darkness then forced her to lower her speed closer to something that might resemble just "unsafe" rather than "Ludicrous." Though Rainbow and Applejack's definitions of the words may have differed.

The Wonderbolts behind them kept at their full speed, their goggles starting to glow gently. The pegasus guards repositioned themselves to follow behind.

Just as they could see the light at the end of the tunnel, two of the Wonderbolts grabbed onto Applejack, a third gaining altitude to try and head off Rainbow.

“Whoa now!” Applejack yelled. “Dash! We should stop!”

“No way!” She tugged back, continuing to fly out the tunnel.

The added drag of two Wonderbolts clamped onto Applejack and pulling back with their wings slowed Rainbow down dramatically, and another Wonderbolt passed her. Two royal pegasus guards brought up the rear.

“Halt!” demanded a guard.

The Wonderbolt ahead of Rainbow slowed her flight and set up a blocking position.

Rainbow tried to curve around her, but the drag from Applejack and the other Wonderbolts forced her straight. She collided with the Wonderbolt and the impact separated her from Applejack.

The two Wonderbolts now carrying her slowed and kept their distance from Rainbow.

Applejack wasn’t resisting.

With two of the Wonderbolts in custody of one of their targets, the guards flew up to Rainbow, joining the lead Wonderbolt.

”AJ!” Rainbow shouted. Seeing the other ponies closing in, she groaned and took off, launching through the pegasus blockade. “I’ll get help!” she shouted back, her voice fading as she sped away.


*** 

 ***


“P-pinki-e, do we h-have to go-o so f-fast?” stuttered Fluttershy on Pinkie Pie’s back while Pinkie galloped forward.

“Well, I guess not,” Pinkie answered without slowing down. “But if we don’t then it’ll make finding that other Pinkie harder.”

“Ar-re we almost th-there?”

“Yup! Look!”

Fluttershy looked ahead and, in between bounces of her and Pinkie’s pink manes, saw the castle courtyard straight ahead. Looking up, she saw the castle itself tall overhead. “W-wo-ow.”

“I know, right?!”

On they sped into the courtyard, Fluttershy watching the bouncy, blurry buildings as they passed.

Suddenly, they stopped. Or rather, Pinkie stopped. Fluttershy was flung forward, but thankfully held tight onto Pinkie’s mane. Instead of being ejected, she swung up and around Pinkie’s head and came down, literally face-to-face with her.

“We’re here,” Pinkie explained.

Blinking away the swirling confusion, the only response Fluttershy could give was, “Oooh’eh?” right before her grip faltered and she met the ground tail first.

“Yes, ‘really,’ silly!” agreed Pinkie. “Oh look! Here come the guards!”

Enough of the world stopped bouncing to allow Fluttershy to get a few hooves under her, and what appeared to be Pinkie’s mane snaked under and helped her the rest of the way up. She turned and saw at least fifteen guards trotting their way, with nine more in the air. A moment later those numbers became five and three respectively as the blurring ceased.

“Hiya, Pointy Spear! How the foals, Mirror Shield? Did you catch that Buckball game last week, Fleetfoot?” Pinkie called to some of the approaching ponies.

“Pinkie? How do you know their names?” Fluttershy asked, her stance and voice finally becoming steady.

“Easy! Got party-planning files on all of them in the party-planning cavern!”

“Oh, right. Um, what do they want with us?”

“Oh, I’m sure they just want to say hiya!”

“Halt!” a guard demanded.

“Well, I got two letters right,” Pinkie shrugged before calling back to them. “Hay! We’re looking for Twilight or another Pinkie Pie! Have you found any?”

Five minutes later, Fluttershy watched as a guard closed and locked the door on their dungeon cell.

Her head and ears flopped forward, drooping down. “This isn’t going very well.”

“Aw, cheer up, Fluttershy. At least we’re not alone. Hiya, AJ!”

“AJ?” Fluttershy perked up.

“Ah guess they caught you too, eh?” came a familiar southern drawl, getting Fluttershy to turn around.

“Yep,” answered Pinkie Pie. “They caught us two too. But why? What did we do?” She then gasped and peered closely at Applejack. “Or what did you do?”

“Ah didn’t do anything!” Applejack defended. “Ah was just minding my own business, looking for Dash, when I finally find her and the varmint’s acting all weird.”

“Applejack!” popped Fluttershy. “Which Applejack are you?”

‘Yeah, weird like that!” Applejack pointed a hoof at Fluttershy.

“Well, I suppose that is a weird kind of weird,” commented Pinkie.

“Are you pony Applejack?” stressed Fluttershy.

“Of course Ah’m a pony,” Applejack declared. “You’re a pony, Pinkie’s a pony … probably. What are you on about?”

“No, no. What I mean is, have you been a pony all your life?”

Applejack tilted her head. “Well, yeah, unless you count transforming spells like that time I was a breezie, and Discord’s turned me into an orange a couple of times.”

Fluttershy gasped happily, losing control of her wings and fluttering up in the cell. “We found you! We’ve been looking all over for hours!”

Pinkie cheered with her, “Woo! Woo!”

“We all just had lunch together a little bit ago!” countered Applejack.

That got Fluttershy back to reality and she fumbled her wings, managing to catch herself and control her landing. “Oh, I’m sorry. Yes, I need to explain. We actually haven’t met yet, I’m not the Fluttershy you know.”

“Huh? You a changeling in disguise or a come-to-life spell, uh, something?”

“No. The-the portal in Twi’s palace. I’m from the other world!”

“Dun, dun, dunnn!” Pinkie mixed in some sound effects.

“Wait, what?” Applejack waved a hoof to summon a halt. “You’re from the world Sunset Shimmer went to?”

“Yes!” Fluttershy cheered.

“And so was the Rainbow Dash Ah met earlier?”

“Sounds like it, yes.”

“The one that got all of us arrested?”

“Eep.” Fluttershy’s excitement fell away. “Um. Probably, um, yes. Oh dear.”

“Now why didn’t she just come out and say she was the other Dash instead of this cosplayer nonsense?”

Fluttershy blushed. “Um ….” And hid behind her mane.

“Who was she cosplaying as?” asked Pinkie.

“Her other self, apparently.”

“Well that’s a lazy costume. Rarity would be so disappointed.”

“Well, we can come back to that later. For now: why are y’all here? Is it all of y’alls or just you and Dash? Why are y’all split up? The portal’s in Ponyville, why’d y’all come all the way to Canterlot?”

Seeing Fluttershy cringing a little, Applejack reminded herself that the pony in front of her only looked like her friend, Fluttershy, but was a different person. A different person with a personality similar to her shy friend’s.

“Sorry, uh Fluttershy,” she started over more calmly. “My name’s Applejack, and Ah’m pleased as punch to meet you.”

Fluttershy peeked out of her mane with a smile. “I’m pleased to meet you too, Applejack. Um, I'm Fluttershy” she cleared her throat, “We have a lot to talk about.”

“And I’m pleased to have met both of you!” Pinkie cheered, pulling them into a tight hug.

Fluttershy smiled a moment but her expression grew concerned. "I hope we won't be in here long, We need your Twilight's help."

"Ah'm sure it won't be but a mite till things get sorted. Security's high right now and somepony's bound to call Twilight soon."

Pinkie released then and nodded. “I bet it will be just long enough to throw half of a ‘We’re-in-jail-now-but-still-having-fun-together-because-we-just-made-friends-over-interdimentionational-boundaries’ party! And then we'll all get together with Twi and the others and fix everything—I hope I have enough cupcakes in my mane—What could go wrong, right?”

Fluttershy cringed. "I think we've asked that question a lot today."

"Exactly!"


*** 

 ***


Private Pointy Spear returned to his post having shut away the strangely-acting Applejack, Fluttershy, and … well, what really counted as “strange” for Pinkie Pie? If ever there was a definition it would have to be updated with every hourly report.

He nodded to his partner, receiving a nod in return, and watched the nearest Wonderbolt squad land for refreshments after pulling another surveillance round.

It was, again, strange to have to lock up such nice ponies, but something was clearly up, and they had all been ordered to be on high alert.

It was going to be a busy week. First the ambassadors needing all that extra security, then the changeling report, and now the Harmony Bearers acting strange. What was next?

“Hiya, Pointy Spear!" an impossibly peppy, yet very familiar, voice cheered in his ear before moving onto his partner and the resting Wonderbolts. "How the foals, Mirror Shield? Did you catch that Buckball game last week, Fleetfoot? And why is your name Fleetfoot if you have no foots?”

“H-halt?” Mirror Shield reacted, apparently just as confused and startled as he was seeing again one of the ponies they had just locked up.

“Well, you got two letters right, but I actually said 'hiya'! not 'halt'!” Pinkie shrugged. “Hey! I'm looking for Twilight or another Pinkie Pie that looks just like me! Have you found any?”

Five minutes later, Pinkie Pie watched as a guard closed and locked the door on her dungeon cell.

"You could have just said no!" she called out as they left her alone in the cell block.


*** 

 ***


Rarity fretted.

She had lost both her Fluttershy and pony Applejack. She at least knew that pony Applejack was heading for the castle, and it wasn’t that far away. But what about poor Fluttershy? Why had she run off? And out the back door rather than the front.

Rarity had called from the door. She had run out from under the archway and checked the sky for any yellow pegasus ponies. She had run all the way through to the other end of the covered alley and called to the sky there as well.

First Pinkie, now Fluttershy. And they had already split up from Applejack and Rainbow Dash.

It was like one of Rainbow Dash’s horror movies where the protagonists get picked off one by one.

She looked around, seeing all the bright colors and cheerful, magical ponies.

Okay, maybe not just like a horror movie. But she was still alone! And so was Fluttershy!

After a little debating, she ran back to an increasingly confused Sassy—whatever her full name was—told her to have Fluttershy go to the castle if she showed up again, and left back through the rear exit of the boutique. She then took the street that looked to be the most direct route to the castle and sped into a brisk trot while keeping an eye out for yellow wings.

The city seemed to be mostly unicorn ponies so any wings stood out, but only a few were yellow and none were Fluttershy's.

It didn’t take long to reach the castle. If only the train’s map had included Rarity’s boutique, they could have simply gotten off at the castle's station and walked to the boutique from there. It would have been closer. Being such close friends with princesses must be why pony Rarity had chosen that location.

But that was a matter for another time.

For now, Rarity needed Twilight or another princess. She needed her friends back.

From the courtyard to the castle was a short trot.

Very short considering the guards cutting her off with a stern, “Halt!”

Meanwhile, back at the boutique, a discombobulated Sassy Saddles opened a bottle of Sweet Apple Acres hard cider.


*** 

 ***


Rarity couldn’t get her blush to dim. Surely Applejack couldn’t be interested in her that way, could she?

She looked over at Applejack fussing with that vintagely adorable hat, stumbling on her other three hooves. Applejack never stumbles like that, she’s always so sure and confident and strong. Is she embarrassed about something and having difficulty concentrating? What is it she wants to tell me about?

And “vintagely” isn’t a word! Is it spreading?

A few steps later, Applejack had put her hoof down and was back to walking on all fours, her gait had evened out but still seemed off and she kept her head down, seemingly watching her hooves.

“So,” Applejack began, startling Rarity into taking a small gasp and looking forward again, “Rarity, uh, ma’am.”

“ ‘Ma’am’?” Rarity looked back in surprise.

“Uh, Ah mean, Miss?”

“ ‘Miss’? Applejack? What—is …,” Rarity blushed a little deeper, “was there something you needed to tell me?”

“Yeah! Yes there is,” Applejack called right back. “Ah’ve been trying to get to this all day.”

“You could have told me at lunch, or when we woke up together.”

Applejack was so startled she jumped slightly with all four legs. “We sleep together?” A blush grew on her cheeks as well.

“Well—we—that is,” Rarity sputtered, “in neighboring beds of course.”

“Oh! Of, of course. Neighboring beds.”

“Though we have shared beds at times. Since we’re such close friends.”

“Oh, right. Yes we have. We’ve had lots of sleepovers. Even had a couple with just you and Ah at your place.”

“Normal for friends to do that.”

“Very normal. Ah mean, it’s not like we’ve ever slept together in the nude.”

Rarity gave Applejack another curious glance. “Of course we have.”

Tripping over her hooves, Applejack crashed to a halt.

“Applejack?” Rarity called, walking up to her. She got a quick look at the shock in Applejack’s eyes before Applejack dropped her head to look at the ground instead. Rarity took a step back. Is she imagining me wearing socks?

“Uh,” was the dull response. Once Rarity jolted back, Applejack picked her head up in surprise and blinked, getting another look at Rarity.

The pony Rarity.

“Oh!” Applejack popped. “Right! Nude, ha.” She glanced down at herself, completely naked aside from her hat, as she had been for the past few hours. “Completely normal here! Nothing strange about that.”

Rarity blinked as Applejack set into a trot and passed her toward the castle. She was, wasn’t she? What styles would she like?

She shook her head. That is not the proper question right now! She chided herself and quickly turned and cantered forward to line up with Applejack.

“Like Ah was saying,” Applejack spoke again, more confidence in her voice this time, “Ah’ve been trying to get to you to talk to you all day.”

“Yes?” Rarity spoke with a slight quiver.

“We don’t actually know each other.”

“What? But of course we do. You’re my best friend.”

“Aw, shucks, Rare. Thank you.”

“Are you saying you want to be …,” Rarity considered her next word, “closer?”

“Well, yeah, Ah do want to get to know you better.”

“How much better?” Rarity’s blush grew brighter waiting for the answer.

“How about a proper introduction for starters?”

“An intro…? We’ve known each other for years.”

“We’ve known of each other,” Applejack countered, getting some of Rarity’s blush to fade in place of confusion. “Wow, that castle sure is mighty big up close.”

Rarity looked forward, noticing they had reached the courtyard and were just shy of the gateway.

“Halt!” they heard a stern voice call out from within.

This was followed by a startled, “Oh! Dear me, you gave me a fright!” The voice was quite familiar to both of them. “Could you help me, sir? I am looking for Applejack or Fluttershy. Well, actually, if you know where the princesses are or Rainbow Dash, or Pinkie Pie, that would be lovely as well.”

“That’s my voice!” Rarity cried, rushing into the gateway.

Applejack followed her. “Rarity!” she called.

“”Yes, dar—?”” came two replies, both of which were cut off when the two speakers saw each other.

Inside the courtyard was another Rarity wearing a five layer gown with various accessories and a set of saddlebags.

That Rarity looked back at the Rarity in the red dress with wonder for a moment before she brightened. “Pony Rarity!” she cheered before rushing to meet her.

“HALT!” came the stern voice again, much more urgently this time.

The command startled the three ponies who turned and saw the armored guard that spoke as well as several others approaching from all around them.

Applejack looked on and groaned. “That’s what I was trying to get to.”


*** 

 ***


A quick glance back told Rainbow that some of those winged ponies were still in pursuit. Looked like five in total.

The three in armor were lagging behind, but the two who were wearing uniforms much like her own soccer uniform back at CHS were managing to keep up.

Rainbow smiled to herself. “If the armor ponies can’t keep up at this speed, wait till they see what I can really do!”

She secured Applejack’s hat more firmly on her head, as she knew her friend wouldn’t want it getting lost in an alien world, then immediately dived down, flapping her wings, to get an instant speed boost, then leveled out and zoomed just above a street on the outskirts of the city.

Her pursuers copied her. The blue uniformed ponies handled the maneuver—poneuver?—expertly, as did two of the armored ponies. The third didn’t manage to pull out of the dive as smoothly and clanked into the walkway, losing a lot of speed in the process.

Rainbow then swerved around a large building, ever increasing her speed.

Again, the armored ponies grew more distant while the blue ponies kept up easily.

A sly smile grew on Rainbow’s face.

Competition!

She decided to first work on her speed, scanning for a direction without obstacles, finding a curved pathway through a park, and recalling what Scootaloo taught her about pegasus wings. Minus the slingshot of course.

It was an exhilarating rush.

The pathway was lined with hedges and the occasional statue.

They all just blurred by.

And so did Applejack’s hat. She would have to come back for it.

She picked up speed, curving with the pathway.

The wind roared around her and through her mane, tail, fur, and feathers.

Then, right in front of her were the three guards.

The curved pathway was a circle. She had lapped them!

She laughed, passing the slowpokes and picking up Applejack’s hat on her way through, this time holding it with her hooves instead of wearing it.

Then she looked back and saw five ponies.

She had lapped the guards but the blue ponies had been keeping up.

Redoubling her efforts, she sped up, easily faster than she had ever gone without wearing her pendant.

The wind began to sting at her eyes and she remembered that the blue ponies were wearing goggles.

Speed alone wouldn’t be the answer if she couldn’t see where she was going.

Instead, she switched to a climb, copying her cloud-hunting test from Ponyville.

Like a rocket, she shot straight up toward a nice patch of clouds, oddly laid out in a pattern almost matching the city walkways.

It didn’t take long to reach them and she burst straight through the center.

Immediately, she changed course, flying just above and along a strip of clouds.

She heard a FOPFF behind her, signaling the arrival of other ponies and she burst down through the clouds again,

She saw the three guards below. They had spread out and kept at a lower altitude, only the blue ponies followed her up to the clouds.

If her …, not so much a plan so to say, but an on-the-fly idea worked, then those blue ponies would have to find her again. But that would be easy if she kept right below a strip of cloud.

So, she dived again. Finding a patch of taller buildings and aimed for the alley between them.

Flapping her wings for more speed.

Her eyes were stinging now. Those goggles would be useful. Why wasn’t this an issue with her pendant?

She didn’t have time to wonder about that.

Just before she got below the tops of the tall buildings, she heard a guard call out.

One had seen her.

Once leveled out in the alley, she spared a glance up at the clouds. One of the blue ponies had popped under the clouds but seemed to have not heard the guard.

Rainbow veered away. That pony may not have heard the call, but he’d see the guards turning to follow her.

Two more turns through the alleys and Rainbow found herself at a dead end.

No choice but to get some altitude again.

Angling sharply upward, Rainbow praised herself for not losing much of her speed in the process. Her wings were getting easier to control!

Upon reaching the top of the stone wall blocking her, she was able to look around again.

One of the armor ponies was nearby, one of the blue ponies was coming straight for her from above. She couldn’t see the rest.

She zipped over the wall.

Right into the other blue pony!

The blue pony grabbed her around the barrel and angled her wings to force them into a spiral.

Rainbow flapped her own wings, trying to counter but only made the spin worse.

They landed on top of that wall and rolled a few times.

The blue pony pinned Rainbow down, belly up so that her wings were pressed into the stone.

Rainbow struggled, grunting with the effort. She looked to her assailant, her vision blurred slightly by the spin and irritation by the high speed winds.

She blinked away the tears.

The goggles!

Rainbow curled and reached forward, grabbing one lens of the blue pony’s goggles with her teeth, and pulled back.

“Gah!” the blue pony yelled, reaching with her hooves to try and secure them.

Rainbow kicked with her hind legs, pushed with her forelegs, and got the pony off her.

She rolled, plopped her head into Applejack’s hat, and took off again, goggles still in her teeth.

Another dive to start off, getting up to speed quickly by the time she was just above the ground.

She hit a straightaway and fumbled with the goggles, trying to figure out how to get them on her face with hooves. While at high speed. While being pursued.

She managed to get the band up around her head, but that just got the goggles stuck in her mouth like a horse’s riding bit.

Dismayed, she groaned and then yelled, noticing a hay cart passing right in front of her.

Thankfully, with the goggles/bit in her mouth, she didn’t have to spit out any hay after crashing through it.

At least it wasn’t a sofa, she thought.

She risked a look behind her and saw the blue ponies still following close behind. Two of the guards were in the far distance.

Looking forward, she took in her surroundings.

She was near the edge of the city.

Near the cliff.

Maybe now was the time for some high speed distance flying. See how long those ponies could keep up!

Veering south, she aimed for the tiny speck of Twi’s distant palace in Ponyville.

She set her wings.

And launched herself as fast as she could.

She rounded over the cliff edge. The city quickly falling up and away behind her.

The wind picked up again, whipping around her, stinging her eyes.

Movement to her right caught her attention and she turned to see another blue pony matching pace with her.

She was about to veer off, maybe angle down for more speed, when she realized this pony was a lighter blue than the others and there was no yellow lightning strip on her. And … were her mane and tail rainbows?

“Wou! Arr uo ee?” she asked through the goggles in her mouth.

The awesomely radical, very way cool pony flicked her hind hooves to the side, giving Rainbow a tap. “Tag! You’re it!” she shouted with a smirk before flicking her wings back, putting herself in an instant half-loop climb and triple aileron roll.

Rainbow watched her twin shoot back up toward the edge of Canterlot she had just dived off of. Her twin then did a double orbit around two other pegasus ponies and a smaller winged, green and purple creature before stopping into an instant hover beside them.

She tried to gasp, but the goggles in her mouth just wedged themselves in, forcing her mouth open.

The sudden blockage of her airway startled her and she faltered but quickly recovered. A quick re-angling of her wings and she copied the first part of her twin’s stunt. She didn’t quite pull off the rolls as smoothly, but she managed to get up to her twin and noticed one of the ponies was clearly Fluttershy and another closely resembled their princess friend—

Right before Rainbow and her twin were tackled by the ponies in blue uniforms!
> Canterlot Part 4 - The Royal Inspection
> --------------------------------------------------------------------------

“Halt!”

“I’d like to see the officer on duty,” Twilight politely replied as the lead courtyard guard cantered up to her.

The lead guard gestured to a Wonderbolt who flew off at high speed. The guard, two other Wonderbolts, and six other guards took up positions around Twilight, Spike, and two Rainbow Dashes, one of whom was wearing a Stetson hat. Following behind Twilight’s group were two more Wonderbolts and three pegasus guards who joined the rest of the castle protectors. The Wonderbolts gave one of the Rainbow Dashes sheepish looks as they passed.

Twilight simply sat down where she was and motioned for her group to do the same.

It was only a minute later that the Wonderbolt returned with a guard officer in tow. Twilight saw him and smiled. “Captain Rotund Shield. I am Princess Twilight Sparkle, confirmation I.D. six-one-eight-zero-three-three-nine-eight-eight-seven. And I vouch for the ponies with me as well as those you may have already taken into custody matching the descriptions of the Harmony Bearers and any more that may show up, so long as there are no more than two of each.”

Captain Rotund Shield had snapped to attention upon hearing the code and saluted the princess. “Yes, understood, Your Highness.” He gave the apparent twins a curious glance. “May I ask?”

Twilight looked over her friends and sighed. “It’s complicated. It’s not so much a secret as it is too long to get into right now. I’ll have you filled in later. For now, I’d like to make use of the West Conference Solarium, and be aware that Fluttershy—a Fluttershy, will be arriving soon from Canterlot Carousel.  Please have her directed in.”

The captain nodded to Twilight and then to a guard who cantered toward the castle. “Your group may proceed now. Should I retrieve the others from holding and send them up?”

“Right away, please. And, actually …,” Twilight turned to the Rainbow Dash wearing a Stetson, “you should go with them to give our friends a familiar face so they aren’t worried about the sudden move.”

“Oh! Sure,” the Stetson’d Rainbow replied, giving her twin another look, and trading boastful smirks, before hovering toward the captain.

“If any are available,” Twilight continued, “notify at least one of the other princesses or my brother and have them join us, but it can wait if they’re busy.”

“Will do, Your Highness.” the captain put his pastern to his forehead again and kept it there as he waited.

Twilight, looking a bit confused for a moment, eventually saluted back. “Dismissed?”

Letting his salute drop, the captain pointed to the Rainbow Dash near him and two guards before turning and leading them to a small building off to the side while Twilight led Spike and the other Rainbow Dash forward toward the castle.

Rainbow looked to Twilight with a raised eyebrow. “What were those numbers?”

“A new anti-Chrysalis measure. We can’t just keep doing the Ladybugs Awake dance every time,” Twilight paused for a giggle. “Though I’d love to see Celestia and Luna do that. Currently it’s just the princesses that have I.D. codes as a trial, but I was planning to give them to each of you as well. Only a select few guards and the other princesses know the codes.”

“And me!” added Spike.

“And I guess I know yours now,” Rainbow commented, a bit miffed she hadn’t been told before.

“But how long will you remember it?” poked Spike.

“Uh.”

“Exactly.”


*** 

 ***


“Well, locked up or not, at least that’s a wonderful dress, darling,” commented a Rarity wearing a five layer gown. “It’s a pity the lighting is so poor in here, but it was quite lovely in the sunlight.”

“Why thank you, darling,” answered a Rarity in a red dress. “And I see you finished the design I was working on back in Ponyville. It’s just how I envisioned it!”

“It is?!” gown Rarity exclaimed. “Oh thank you, darling, I had hoped it would be! I was worried you might not like it but I had seen your design and the gems and I was just suddenly struck with uncontrollable—“

““Inspiration!”” the two Rarities called out together before falling into giggles.

Amid more “darlings” than she thought ever possible, Applejack sat nearby in the same cell silently looking from Rarity to Rarity. Not that she would have been able to get in a word had she tried with the rapid giddiness of their conversation. She tried to look for differences between them, aside from clothing, but was having a hard time. Perhaps the pony Rarity, in the red dress, seemed a little more refined. Hair, tail, and fur better kept, but that could just be her experience with being a pony simply making it easier to keep all that stuff nice and orderly. Though, their voices …. It was very slight, but pony Rarity sounded a little deeper. Her Rarity did mention their ponies were years older. Would her Rarity sound like that after college? She allowed herself a small smile.

So what would pony Rarity look like in their world?

Before the blush could spread, the door to their cell block opened revealing three guard ponies and a Rainbow Dash.

“Dash?!” Applejack called.

“AJ?” Rainbow replied, racing past the guards. “I got your hat!”

“What do you mean you got …?” Applejack trailed off when she saw Rainbow fly up to their cell wearing a familiar hat.

“Huh,” Rainbow uttered seeing Applejack also wearing a familiar hat. “Guess it’s the other Applejack’s hat. Which one are you?”

“We met at the Freshman Fair, assuming you haven't always been a pony.”

“Just today.”

“Oh!” popped the Rarity in a five layer gown. “Then we met there as well!”

“Rarity!” Rainbow cheered before noticing the third occupant in the cell. “Uh, Rarities? Neat.”

“Yes, darling,” the same Rarity replied, “look who we found!”

“Pleased to meet you, Rainbow Dash,” Rarity in a red dress tittered.

“Does this mean we’re getting out of here?” Applejack asked.

“Yep!” Rainbow answered, with an air of importance. “Not only did I find the pony Rainbow, I also found pony Fluttershy, dragon Spike, and pony Twi!”

Noting the tone of voice, Applejack rolled her eyes, “That’s great, but it weren’t a competition, Dash.”

“But if it was I’d have won!”

“Uh huh,” Applejack deadpanned as the guards reached their cell to unlock it.

“Princess Twilight is setting up a place for all of you to meet in the castle,” the guard captain announced. “I’m sorry to have had you all locked up in here, but we weren’t sure what was going on.”

“Oh, it’s water under the bridge, good sir,” eased dress Rarity. “No harm done as far as I can see, and you were just doing your jobs.”

“Thank you, ma’am."

"Though, would it have hurt you at all to outfit the cell with some drapes? A rug perhaps?"

"And those benches are so hard," gown Rarity added, "standing was more comfortable."

Applejack caught the eyes of the guards and shrugged an apology.

"Uh, we shall take that under advisement," the captain offered. "Private Pointy Spear here will lead you to the meeting place while we release the rest of your friends in the other blocks.”

The two Rarities and Applejack nodded and followed the lone guard out while Rainbow, the captain, and the other guard headed for the next cell block.

“See you there!” Rainbow called to them.


*** *** ***


Arriving in the second cell block, Rainbow and the two remaining guards were surprised to see what appeared to be shimmering lights from a disco ball. They could smell freshly baked desserts, and hear dance music.

The three of them looked at each other. “Pinkie,” Rainbow explained, and the guards nodded.

Rounding the corner they could see Fluttershy, another Applejack, and Pinkie Pie all chatting and together while waiting for their exoneration.

“So much for being worried,” Rainbow commented.

“Rainbow!” gushed Fluttershy upon noticing her and rushed up to the cell bars. “Um, which one are you?”

“ ‘We have Chemistry together’.”

Fluttershy giggled at the callback and gestured to the Applejack without a hat. “I met pony Applejack.”

“Heh,” Rainbow scratched the back of her head, “I guess I did too.”

“Yes you did,” Applejack replied, walking up to the bars, “and nearly broke my body to pieces in the process.”

Rainbow chuckled nervously and tipped Applejack’s hat back at her. “Saved your hat though.”

Applejack reached through the bars with her muzzle and flipped the hat back up to where it belonged. “Does this mean we’re getting out of here?”

“Yep! Twi’s got a place we’re meeting at in the castle.”

Fluttershy breathed a sigh of relief.

“Great!” cheered Pinkie. “I have more cupcakes! Let me just pack everything up.” Quickly zipping around, Pinkie began packing up her party supplies into her mane and tail. The cell block suddenly darkened as the disco ball plopped into the pink mass. She made sure to leave one cupcake for each of the guards.

The guard captain cleared his throat, unlocking the cell door and receiving one of the cupcakes in a hoof. “Thank you, Miss Pinkie Pie. And I’m sorry to have had you all locked up in here, but we weren’t sure what was going on.”

“That’s alright, sirs,” Applejack answered. “A lot going on this week. Understandable you wanted to keep a tight ship.”

“Thank you, ma’am. Private Mirror Shield here will lead you to the meeting place while we release your other friend.”

Applejack and Fluttershy nodded and followed the lone guard out. Pinkie Pie grabbed a cupcake for him and rushed forward. “Don’t forget your cupcake!”

“See you there!” Rainbow called to them, already following the captain to a third cell block. “Again.”


*** *** ***


“Huh?” questioned Rainbow Dash, staring at an empty cell. Well, almost empty. A single party hat sat in the center of the floor on top of a doughnut.

“Hrmm,” the captain groaned.


*** 

 ***


Twilight, Spike, and Rainbow Dash sat around a large conference table with twenty pony cushions waiting for their friends from two worlds to arrive. Plenty of windows lined one wall, opposite some cabinets, with a set of doors leading to a balcony. Another wall had doors leading to a hallway. A cart of refreshments had already arrived, courtesy of the castle staff.

Spike was crunching into his second sapphire and loading a plate with a slice of cake and some fruit to make it look like he didn’t just want the cake and gems. Rainbow was munching on a Sweet Apple Acres Apple Brown Betty to carbo-load in preparation for the inevitable competition she’d have with her counterpart, having already completed a set of stretches.

The group all looked up when the hall door opened, and a guard led in an Applejack and two Rarities before bowing and taking his leave. The Rarities were still chatting and giggling with each other, the Applejack behind them seemed pleased they were getting along and smiling with them.

“Girls!” Twilight greeted them, stopping short of the Rarities, next to the refreshments cart. “Wow. Is this what it was like when you saw me meet the other me?”

“It is a bit strange,” replied the Rarity in a five layer gown. “But I am quite happy to have met my twin.” The other Rarity smiled back at her.

“Um,” Twilight looked at the three of them, “which Applejack are you?”

“Met you back in CHS,” she answered.

“Okay, now which Rarity is which?”

The Rarity in the red dress smiled and replied, “Would you care to guess, darling?” A moment later she, the other Rarity, and Applejack laughed at Twilight’s attempts to analyze them from various angles.

“Pony?” Twilight asked the Rarity in the red dress.

“Why do you say that?” she asked.

“Well, I suppose it’s cheating, but I recognize that dress design from when you were sketching it out with the others for this week.”

The Rarities giggled harder.

“Wait!” came Spike’s voice from around the table. “The Rarities are here? Both of them?!”

Spike came around the table into view.

Applejack watched the baby dragon with interest.

The Rarity in the gown smiled warmly at him.

The Rarity in the dress shrieked, grabbed a platter off the refreshments cart in her magic, and screamed, “GIANT LIZARD!” before using that platter to slap Spike out the door hard enough to propel him down the hall with a deafening clang. “That thing was huge! Are there many like that?”

Twilight’s eyes shot open almost as quickly as Spike shot down the hall and rushed after him.

The Rarity in the gown gasped and ran after them. “Spikey-wikey!”

“Spike!?  That was Spike!?” asked the Rarity in the dress, holding a severely dented platter in her magic. “Oh dear.”

Applejack took a step aside and turned to watch the two ponies race after the dragon projectile. “Ah hope he’s okay!”

“He’ll be fine,” Rainbow assured them, watching, lounging back with her hind legs resting on the conference table. “He’s been through worse.”

“Are you quite certain?” Rarity asked, looking at the platter, now vaguely shaped like a head, as she tried to get her magic to drop it back onto the cart.

“Oh yeah. Dragons are very durable, and I’ve seen Spike shake off a lot of hits before.”

Applejack and Rarity breathed a sigh of relief and Applejack walked forward. “So you’re the pony Rainbow Dash, eh?”

“Heh, yeah,” Rainbow answered and got up to get a closer look at this new Applejack. “And you’re the not pony Applejack.”

“We call ourselves humanes.”

“Huh. Like in the old myths? Daring Do found statues of some.”

“Well we have unicorns and pegasus’es in our myths too.”

“Pegasi. Daring said that there used to be an island of hoomanes a long time ago.”

A clatter interrupted them when Rarity decided to just tweak her horn again to get the platter to drop. “Sorry,” she told the two, “Still working on that.”

A sound of hooves delayed the conversation further as another guard led in a Fluttershy, a Pinkie Pie, and another Applejack.

Fluttershy and Pinkie brightened up upon seeing their friends.

The two Applejacks stopped and stared at each other. Sizing each other up.

The Applejack just arriving used a hoof to push her hat back.

The other did as well.

They both narrowed their eyes.

The Applejack in the hall pawed the ground as the other flexed her hooves as if tensing up to prepare to grab something.

Outside, a bird give three slow, dramatic whistles which were echoed by a chorus of other birds.

The moment held.

The other four girls glanced from one to the other, feeling the very air in the room tighten around them.

Then.

Suddenly.

Both Applejacks let out loud guffaws.

Fluttershy, Rainbow, and Rarity shot each other confused glances while Pinkie just giggled and got some cake.

“”Well ain’t that just a hoot!”” both Applejacks said through their laughter.

”We're just like each other,” the Applejack in the room continued.

The two Applejacks began circling each other, getting a better look as more hooves announced the return of Twilight and gown Rarity, a slightly dizzy Spike on Twilight’s back.

""Twilight!"" Fluttershy, Pinkie, and an Applejack cheered.

Twilight nodded to them with a smile before walking straight up to the Rarity in a red dress. “Not pony,” she said simply, pointing to her.

“Yes,” Rarity replied sheepishly, “we switched clothes before arriving.” Hearing this, one of the Applejacks blushed slightly, the memory coming back to her. “Is Spike going to be alright?”

“Spike?” asked Fluttershy, leaning in for a better look. “Oh my. So cute,” she whispered to herself. “The little wings. He-he.”

“I’ll be fine!” he answered with bravado, jumping down from Twilight’s back and stumbling slightly.

“I’m so very sorry, Spike.” Dress Rarity bent down to him as gown Rarity walked up beside her. “I’m so used to you being a fuzzy widdle puppy.”

“Puppy?” asked gown Rarity.

Spike blushed.

“Spike turns into a puppy going through the portal like how ponies become humanes,” Twilight explained. “And vice-versa as we’ve now confirmed.”

Rainbow spit out a laugh.

“Oohh! A little Puppy-Spikey!” gown Rarity cooed. “That must be so adorable!”

“Oh he is!” agreed dress Rarity with a giggle that spread through both Rarities, Fluttershy, and Pinkie.

The amount of purple in Spike’s scales was quickly overwhelmed by the growing red, especially after getting a look at the two Rarities standing next to each other and giggling down at him.

“Wow …,” he swooned at them, his voice trailing off along with his apparent life signs.

Twilight bent down to him. “Spike?” She waved a hoof in front of his face. “Spike? Hay. Hello?”

Gown Rarity continued giggling at him, while the aliens seemed confused.

“Looks like the boy’s going to be out of it for a while,” an Applejack commented on her way to the refreshments cart to grab an apple. "Come on, Sugarcube," she called to her twin. "These apples here are from Sweet Apple Acres. Give you a taste of the best fruit this side of the multiverse."

The other Applejack followed her, noting how her counterpart had simply taken the apple in her teeth while on the move to a cushion around the conference table. She tried the same but missed the first two times before finally grabbing it, and turned with the apple in her mouth, blushing slightly at the silliness of it all, then sat on the cushion next to her counterpart.

She had just started eating, eyes wide in wonderment at the magical taste of the pony world fruit, as Twilight walked past them with a catatonic Spike in her magic. She was sitting him down next to his plate when another Fluttershy flew in from the balcony and trotted up to her.

“Well, I checked the boutique. According to Sassy Saddles, who seems to be very jittery right now, it sounded like two Rarities, two Applejacks, and the other me were there. My choir birds said they had been following other me, but they lost track and I didn’t find any of—oh!” she stopped upon Twilight pointing to the side where Fluttershy saw two Applejacks eating apples. One of them seemed to be staring off into space and drooling. “Are they all here already?" She looked around. "Oh dear. What happened to Spike?”

“One too many Rarities,” Twilight explained.

Fluttershy began to inspect Spike when another voice took her attention to the hallway.

"It's wonderful to finally find you here, Twi."

There was another Fluttershy there.

That Fluttershy continued, "We really need your—"

They made eye contact.

“”Oh my,”” they both breathed before blushing and hiding behind their manes.

A couple seconds later they both peeked out and looked at each other curiously.

“”Um, h-hi,”” they squeaked together. ““I’m … F-Fluttershy.””

The Fluttershy by the balcony was the first to push her mane away from her face and smile. “I’ve been hoping to meet you.”

The other Fluttershy smiled back and timidly walked forward, brushing back her mane. “Um. I’ve been wanting to meet you too.”

The rest of the group just watched, letting the Fluttershies walk closer to work through their introductions. Rainbow and the two Rarities took seats at the table.

Once about three pony lengths were left between them, the Fluttershies both stopped and paused.

The others waited.

Smiling, but fiercely blushing, both Fluttershies raised a hoof and gently waved to the other then looked at the floor.

Rainbow slapped a hoof in her face.

“Come on, ‘Shy, er, ‘Shies. You’re both, uh, you. You don’t have to be shy around another you.”

The Fluttershies had looked to Rainbow at her comment, and then back to each other.

There was a pause. And then both their faces lit up brightly and they spoke together in a rush.

““How many—Oh! I’m sorry, you first. Oh, no, no. You first. Oh dear, I couldn’t possibly—You should go first—Oh, it’s okay, I’ll wait—Oh, please do go on””—

The group watched on. The Fluttershies were in perfect sync in both timing and words. Neither wanted to intrude on the other but were too excited to stop talking.

Twilight, Rainbow, two Applejacks, and two Rarities all looked about the room at each other. Pinkie giggled.

Finally, dress Rarity opened one flap of her saddlebags and levitated a gold bit between the Fluttershies and gently cleared her throat, stopping them instantly. “Heads: humane Fluttershy goes first. Tails: pony Fluttershy.”

““Oh, that sounds like a lovely idea, Rarity,”” both Fluttershies praised her in stereo.

Rarity drew back for a moment at the weirdness of that event, turning to look at one then the other, but managed to shrug it off with a blink and shake of her head. She then flicked the bit upward in her magic, and discreetly tweaked her horn to let it go.

Gown Rarity noticed this and gave her counterpart an odd look. Dress Rarity looked away with a blush and sheepish smile.

The bit landed heads up.

Both Fluttershies squeaked, fluttering their wings excitedly, and looked at the other. One Fluttershy waited eagerly as her counterpart began, tail wagging in excitement, “How many pets—?”

“Whoa!” she was cut off by Spike waking up from his torpor. “Was that real?”

He looked around and saw all of his closest friends, but with a double of almost all of them. He focused on the two Rarities and blushed.

The gown Rarity smiled back at him. “It’s real.”

Spike scratched at the spines behind his head and cleared his throat. “So, um. Who’s who?”

“Easy,” claimed Rainbow Dash. She pointed to the Fluttershy that had flown in. “This is Pony’shy.” Getting a nod in return she continued, pointing first to the other Fluttershy then to the Rarity in the five layer gown. “Other Shy, Other Rare.”

“Oh no, darling,” that Rarity replied. “I’m from this world.”

“Oh, right.” Rainbow pointed to the Rarity in the red dress. “You did that homerun with Spike.”

Dress Rarity cringed. “Again, Spike, I am so very sorry.”

“Eh,” Spike replied. “Could have been worse. Ever belly-flopped into a pool of lava?”

“Can’t say that I have.”

“Good. You don’t want to, trust me.”

One of the Applejacks cut in, looking between the Rarities, “So, when Ah got to one of y’all’s boutique saying Ah was looking for Dash, which you was you?”

Gown Rarity blinked. “Um, which Applejack are you again?”

“Pony.”

The dress Rarity spoke up, “Oh. That was me you found.”

“Ah guess that was before Ah got there and found pony Rarity,” the other Applejack added.

“Perhaps that was why Sassy was behaving so strange,” gown Rarity pondered.

Spike shook his head wildly. “This is getting confusing.”

“Yeah,” agreed Twilight. “I say we get name tags for everypony.”

An Applejack looked around. “Meaning just for the pony ponies, or all us ‘ponies’?”

“Right. Name tags for everycreature.”

Spike started off toward a cabinet opposite the balcony. “I’ll make them. The other Rainbow Dash and Pinkie Pie aren’t here yet?”

“I’m here!” called a new Rainbow Dash landing on the balcony. “But we’re missing a Pinkie Pie.”

The Rainbow sitting at the table turned to see her counterpart with Captain Rotund Shield guiding her to the conference room.

“I’m sorry, Your Highness,” the captain said with a salute, which Twilight bashfully returned. “She got out of her cell somehow. We are still looking for her.”

“Which Pinkie is missing?” Twilight asked, turning to the Pinkie in the room.

“The one that isn’t me!” she answered.

The Rainbow Dashes rolled their eyes. The two Rarities looked at each other and giggled, sharing the experience. “Pinkie,” Twilight admonished her.

“Um,” spoke up one of the Fluttershies, “Pinkie? You told me you’ve been through the portal.”

“Yep!” Pinkie concurred.

“So, you’re our Pinkie?” Fluttershy finished.

“Yep!” Pinkie nodded.

Twilight looked between Pinkie and the Fluttershies. “Pinkie, Do you even know which Fluttershy is ‘ours’?”

“Yep!”

After a pause, Twilight pressed further. “And which one?”

“Oh, Twilight, silly, you know they both are,” Pinkie giggled.

Twilight screwed up her face a moment, thinking how to follow that. “Yes, both of them are my Fluttershies, I’ve befriended both of them years ago. But one of them you are just meeting today.”

“Wow! Are you going for a personal silly record? That’s three in less than a minute.”

“But there’s no way you could have met both Fluttershies before. You and one of them have never been in the same world until today!”

“And that’s four!”

“Am I missing something here?” Spike voiced a collective thought upon returning to the table with stationery supplies.

“I think you’re missing that we’re all already friends!”

All the ponies, and dragon, in the room looked around at each other, seeing their friends, seeing their doubles, and seeing their friends’ doubles. There were smiles, nods, giggles, and a hoof bump as they all agreed.

“So of course they’re both ‘our Fluttershies’,” Pinkie concluded.

“But we still need to know which Pinkie is missing!” Twilight moaned.

“The one that isn’t me!”

“You just said that! And that isn’t helping!”

“Uh, Twilight?” began Pinkie, “That’s five because I only said that the first time.”

Twilight gawked at her, slowly noticing that their friends were starting to look away from Pinkie and toward the hallway.

She turned around and saw, standing brightly in the doorway, another Pinkie.

“Hiya!” she cheered. “Found you!”

Twilight sighed and turned back to Captain Rotund Shield. “You can call off the search.”

“Yes, Your Highness.” He saluted, but a thought came to him and he asked, “What should we do if more show up?”

Twilight jolted upright, eyes wide, ears and wings standing at attention. She took a breath, bringing her hoof to her chest then letting it out slowly. “Alert me immediately and bring coffee. Strong coffee. Luna’s blend.”

Taken aback, the captain gave a quiet whistle. Having taken the hint, he didn’t wait for a return salute and simply flew off.

The Rainbow beside him turned to the new Pinkie. “How’d you get out of your cell?”

Pinkie scoffed, “They locked me up all alone! That’s a cruel thing to do to a Pinkie. Makes her all crazy and hear voices all loud and GRR,” she growled at the end. “Of course I didn’t stay in there. And it’s not like it was the first time I’ve been arrested.” She then giggled at her counterpart. “Am I right?”

The other Pinkie nodded, giggling in return, even giving an eye-roll to whatever memory they were apparently sharing, then began pronking up to her twin.

Remembering an earlier conversation, one Applejack and one Rainbow Dash traded worried glances. They then traded them with their counterparts who instantly gleaned the trepidation and watched as the Pinkies got closer.

The two pronked closer and closer until they landed with their noses coming to touch the other’s with a pair of honks.

They both giggled at that for a moment.

Before turning deadly serious, pushing their foreheads together.

And letting out another giggle.

Then turning serious again.

They took a step back and circled each other first one way then the other, then quickly launched into the surest test they could think of.

“”Ack!"” they both shouted in unison. “”A sack of slick soapy soup spoons slid past a perilous pile of pink pointy prickle-barrel powdered pastries before Blue Bonnet balled up her baby basket bouncy bobbles into ingenious iridescent igloos filled with four fine figments of floundering fishes caught caring for crumpled-up crates of crawling criminal crustaceans charged wrathfully with wrongful wringing of unwilling silver slivers of slick soapy soup spoons!””

The Pinkies blinked and turned to their friends. “”Oh, she’s good!””

They then turned back and suddenly pointed behind the other and shouted, “”Is that a giant cherry and rutabaga favored bucket of ice cream topped with cheesecake and lasagna? Wait?! Really?”” After quickly turning around and scanning the conference room and hallway respectively, both Pinkies turned back to each other. “”Where? Did I miss it?””

“”How long are we going to watch this?”” asked the two Rainbow Dashes.

”And how long till something explodes?” an Applejack added, the other Applejack having returned to eating the mesmerizing Equestrian apple.

“Do we even know which one is which yet?” asked Spike.

Both Pinkies turned to Spike and gave a stunningly clear answer while pointing at the other, ““I’m not that one!””

“Did that really count as ‘stunningly clear’?” the Pinkie from the hallway apparently asked nothing while scratching her head, getting a surprised look from the other Pinkie.

“No it was not!” Twilight cried.

““But it was accurate!”” the Pinkies defended, the one not in the hallway slightly delayed from her earlier surprise.

“Pinkies, darlings,” dress Rarity called out. “Simply tell us which one of you is a student at CHS?”

The Pinkies spoke simultaneously while pointing at each other again, ““That one!””

Then the hallway Pinkie followed that up. “No wait! Not that one!”

Everyone else in the room took a moment to process that then let out a sigh of understanding, except a Fluttershy who only looked confused, pointing to the Pinkie in the room. “But then That Pinkie is pony Pinkie? But she’s the one who brought me here and she said—“

““Now that that’s solved, let’s eat!”” the Pinkies declared, cutting off Fluttershy, and pronking to the refreshments cart, leapfrogging over each other in the process, thoroughly confusing everyone else as to which was which again.

The other Fluttershy leaned toward her counterpart and whispered, “What’s wrong?”

While the Fluttershies whispered to each other, all the other pony pairs in the room also began having conversations with each other, completely missing the Fluttershies’ questions.

The Rarities gabbed about dresses and their places of work.

The Rainbows boasted about stunts and argued over which of them would win their looming competition.

The Applejacks discussed baking … and apples.

The Pinkies had a cake eating contest until the cake ran out after twenty seconds. They then chattered about the best parties they’ve ever thrown and the friends they’d made.

Spike and Twilight stared, blinking, and slowly turned to each other.

“Wow,” Spike gawked before frowning. “So, ours didn’t come through?”

“I guess not,” Twilight answered. “For the best, really. We have enough confusion as it is. But I don’t know why Sunset didn’t come. She would have been able to guide them around Canterlot at least, and my palace, if not Ponyville.”

“Guess we’ll have to find that out.”

“Exactly. Rainbow—the one from CHS—was too focused on Applejack—the one from Equestria, though she didn’t know which one at the time—having been grabbed by the guards to say why they came through the portal.”

“I have the name tags assembled.” Spike held up ten sheets of card-stock parchment each punctured with fur-clips. “Should I just write everycreatures’ names and species or should we choose nicknames like how you and your counterpart have ‘Twi’ and ‘Twily’ and I’m ‘Claws’ and the other me is ‘Paws’?”

Turning back to the others with a thoughtful hum, Twilight addressed the whole group, “Girls.”

Chatting and giggling continued.

“Girls,” she tried again with no luck.

“Girls!”

The pairs all stopped and looked at Twilight. The Fluttershies gave each other a sideways glance and a giggle.

Twilight cleared her throat and entered announcement mode, a second cousin to lecture mode, “So I believe we all have a lot to talk about.”

One Fluttershy perked up immediately and was about to speak when she was cut off by a Pinkie.

“And how! Did you know she lives in a bakery?!" she pointed to her Pinkie twin. "A bakery! Lives in! With the Cakes, baking cakes in a bakery where she lives!”

“And she lives with her family!” cheered the other Pinkie. “She still gets to laugh at Maud’s jokes every day, without even leaving the house”—

“Bakery!”

—“and she can also hug Marble, and pat Limey’s head every day! Maud lives adjacent to town now, but I have to get on a train or run for a long time to see my other sisters.”

“What about your parents?” asked an Applejack.

“I have to get on a train or run for a long time to see them too.”

“Ah meant the other Pinkie. The human one.”

“Humane,” the other Applejack corrected.

“Whoman?” asked a Rarity.

“Hoomane,” corrected a Rainbow Dash.

“Hum’mana-hum’mana?” giggled a Pinkie.

“The Pinkie other than me giggled that,” the other Pinkie uttered a clarification to nothing, getting a concerned look from the other, and confused looks from everycreature else.

“Humane,” the other Rarity re-corrected, ignoring the Pinkies and refocusing on the discussion.

“Really?” asked a Rainbow.

“Yeah,” the other Rainbow concurred.

“Humane?”

“Yeah.”

The first Rainbow thought a moment. “That sounds weird.”

““Weird is fun,”” said the Pinkies.

Twilight cleared her throat again. “That’s not what I meant."

Fluttershy again attempted to say something but Twilight continued. "We should really get some name tags before we continue, so what do each of you want on them?”

One set of friends looked confused at that, but the other gave knowing nods. “That’s right!” cheered an un-confused Rainbow Dash, “nicknames will make this easier. I’ll be Radical Dash. Rad for short.” She then turned to her twin, “And you can be, uh, ‘Danger … Ranger’? You know, to keep the initials the same. Sort of.”

“Why are we making nicknames?” asked a confused Applejack. “Why not just say ‘pony’ or ‘humane’ before our names?”

“Because,” began dress Rarity, “why be ‘humane Rarity’ when I could be ‘Resplendence’?”

“Uh, nicknames are supposed to be easy to say,” complained Rad. “Do you really want us to have to call you Resplendence all the time? Like, ‘hey, Resplendence! Get your resplendent butt-flank over here!’”

“Well, certainly not in such a crass sentence.”

“What about a synonym for 'rarity'?” Twilight suggested.

Gown Rarity gasped, “How about Recherché?”

““Wha?”” asked the Rainbows.

”Sounds like Fancy,” an Applejack commented.

“I—we do like fancy,” gown Rarity admitted.

“”Okay, research-say it is!”” the Pinkies conformed.

“Hold your horses there,” the other Applejack spoke up.

The two Pinkies gasped, looked at each other with giant grins, and pulled themselves into a tight hug, laughing into their manes.

Seeing that, the Rarities giggled, smiled at their twin and leaned into a hug of their own.

The Fluttershies blushed but looked to their counterpart and stepped closer, also hugging with tiny smiles on their faces.

The Applejacks stopped at the display, each turning to look at their other, shrugged, and wrapped a foreleg around the other.

The Rainbows looked at their twin, tilted their heads, and gave the other a hoof bump.

Twilight blinked, feeling a little left out, until she felt a familiar set of arms wrap around her.

“You’ve always been my horse,” said Spike.

“Aww,” Twilight cooed, giving him a nuzzle. “You’ll always be my dragon.”

“Would have been great if the other Spike showed up though.”

“Way to ruin the moment,” Twilight rolled her eyes.

As the hugs began to wind down, The Applejacks looked at each other and started to speak at once, but one cut herself off and motioned for the other to continue who cleared her throat. “What we meant was, hold on a moment, because, uh ‘Rad’ is right, nicknames are supposed to be easy to say and re-share-shay is harder to say than resplendence.”

“How about cutting that down to Share?” asked the other Applejack. “Still fits her, being so generous and all.”

“We’ll take it,” Twilight concluded. “Spike, write down ‘Pony Rarity, colon, Share’. Or maybe just ‘P Rarity: Share’. Ponies might wonder if they wear name tags that say pony and humane.”

“More than they would after seeing two of each of them?” asked Spike.

“Point taken, but still. Keep it simple?”

“Got it,” Spike replied, writing the first tag and clipping it onto Share’s gown.

“And for humane Rarity?” asked Twilight.

“How about Radiance?” Spike suggested.

“The superheroine?” the unnamed Rarity asked.

“You looked great in the outfit." Spike blushed. "At least in this world."

“Why thank you, darling. Though,” she hummed in thought. “I’d rather have an original nom de plume. Keeping with the theme, I’ll be Renae. Shorthand for renaissance. It’s fitting given that Renaissance means revival or rebirth, for I have been reborn as a pony, at least for the time being.”

“ ‘H. Rarity: Renae’.” Spike concluded, writing it down on a tag moving up to clip it on Renae’s dress.

One Applejack nodded to the other who spoke up next. “Ponyjack works for me. Direct and honest.” She then looked to her twin while Spike made the name tag.

“Ah’ll be Jackie,” the other Applejack said, getting a surprised look from Ponyjack. “Ah spoke with your Grand Pear today. Ah gave him permission to use the name. Ah hope you don’t mind.”

Ponyjack considered that a moment before giving her a smile. “Ah think that’s right swell”—she put a hoof on her shoulder—“Jackie.”

“Okay,” announced Spike, “ ‘P. Applejack: Ponyjack’ and ‘H. Applejack: Jackie’.” The Applejacks stood still as Spike secured the tags to their chest fur. “Next?”

The two Fluttershies looked at the gold bit from before, still where it had landed, and one took it in her mouth and flipped it. “Um,” said the other Fluttershy after it landed on heads, “Butterfly rhymes with my name. Does that work for everyone?”

“”How about Buttershy?"” The Pinkies suggested. “"Then it’ll really rhyme!”"

“But I’m not shy with butter. I have it all the time on toast.”

The other Fluttershy giggled, but not so loud that a cricket several rooms over couldn’t still be heard over the lack of response.

“Um, that was a joke,” Butterfly explained. “Sorry.”

“We’ve never been that good with jokes.” Her counterpart cringed at a bad memory of performing standup for all of Ponyville, before coming up to give Butterfly a gentle pat on the back. "But I liked it."

“So, we going with Butterfly?” asked Spike, getting a shy nod in return. “And you’re which one?”

“Oh! I’m from the portal.”

“If you’re Butterfly, I can be Posey,” suggested the other Fluttershy.Fun fact: The pony Lauren Faust designed Fluttershy after was named Posey.

“Oh, that’s really pretty,” affirmed Butterfly, “and it starts with P for pony. That helps.”

Finished with two more name tags, Twilight passed them out to their owners. “ ‘P. Fluttershy: Posey’ and ‘H. Fluttershy: Butterfly’.”

“Oh, should I have tried for a name beginning with P also?” asked Share.

“It should be okay, Rares, uh, Shares,” offered Ponyjack. “It ain’t like Danger Ranger starts with P either.”

“You could change Share to Pear,” suggested Jackie.

““Ohh!”” chimed in the Pinkies. “”If one Rainbow Dash is Rad, then the other can be Plaid!””

Ignoring Danger Ranger’s horrified expression, one of the Pinkies kept talking. “Wait! Shouldn’t it be Rad and Pad?”

“Heh,” Jackie chuckled, “and be forever in that time of the month.”

Only four occupants of the room displayed anything other than confusion to that comment.

“Is that a bad thing?” asked Danger Ranger.

“”Yes!”” came five replies.

“In that case, I’ll stick with Danger Ranger, or Danger Dash,” concluded Danger Dash.

“Good!” chuckled Ponyjack. “Ah can shorten that to Dang’it Dash!”

“Or maybe something else then.”

Jackie chuckled. “Since you’re a pegasus pony, how about Peggy'sis?”

“How about no?”

“Phenomenal Dash?” suggested Rad.

“”Yeah! We’ll shorten that to Phenny-Penny!” shouted the Pinkies.

“Nope,” insisted Danger Dash.

“Alright, Danger Dash,” chided Ponyjack, “Ah'm sure no pony will make fun of your new nickname, Dee Dee.”

“Okay, we’re definitely not going with Danger Dash now!”

"Aww," pouted the Pinkies. "We thought Dee Dee was cute.”"

“Primo Dash?” suggested Renae. “Meaning first and finest.”

“Hey!” argued Rad. “How come she gets that one?”

“Hay, yourself,” Danger Dash countered. “You’re already Radical. I’m taking first and finest!”

“Okay, I’m calling it,” Twilight ended the argument. “Spike?”

“Done!” he replied, holding up two more name tags. “ ‘H. Rainbow Dash: Rad’ and ‘P. Rainbow Dash: Primo’.”

“Pinkies, Your turns.”

“”Peachie and Shindy!”” they replied instantly.

“Where did you get those names?” asked Spike.

“”Peaches are pink and shindigs are a kind of party! We’re pink party ponies! Peachie and Shindy!””

“Did you two discuss this beforehoof?”

“”Why would we do that?””

“Right. Don’t know why I was expecting you to say anything else.” Spike shrugged. “I’m assuming Peachie is pony Pinkie?”

“”Works for us!”” they answered.

“Okay, ‘P. Pinkie Pie: Peachie’ and ‘H. Pinkie Pie: Shindy’.

Spike passed out the last two signs for the Pinkies, but stopped, not knowing which was which. The Pinkies giggled at him and just grabbed a sign each with their mouths then tossed them between each other a few times, “Whee! Whee!” and finally pinned them on the other’s chest.

“Um, okay?” Spike observed and decided not to get involved. “And that’s everycreature. For the humanes we have: Jackie, Butterfly, Rad, Shindy, and Renae. For the ponies we have: Ponyjack, Posey, Primo, Peachie, and … Share.”

“I do rather stand out with that one, don’t I?” Share pointed out with a concerned expression.

“Eh, don’t worry yourself none,” soothed Ponyjack. “You are the Rarity of our group. You ain’t supposed to match.”

The Rarities giggled at that, getting Jackie to blush.

“Whew,” sighed Twilight. “Now let’s move on to the whole reason you’re here unannounced to begin with." She took a breath. "Seriously! What the hay, girls?!”

The five visitors all stopped still in an instant, their eyes going wide. “Oh no!” Renae gasped. “I can’t believe it.”

“We should have been back by now,” groaned Rad.

“How much time has it been?” asked Jackie.

“Sunset needs help!” cried Butterfly.

“Sunset?” Twilight stood up in alarm. “What’s wrong?”

“I’ll explain it!” rushed Shindy. “You see, there’s this girl that found out about all the magic getting everything all magical in our world and she’s super smart, but also super mean, and she made this thingy that would suck up all that magic like Twily’s gizmo from the Friendship Games—because she stole her blueprints—but instead of going all berserk and making holes in the fabric of the multiverse and destroying everything, she made the thing stuff all that magic into a big giant glowy thing of magic and shoot it at her to make her all super powerful and amazing and evil and unstoppable and honkingly huge, but we found her first and tried to turn it off but we couldn’t because the power switch was glued in the on position or something so Sunset bum-rushed her right when it fired and the building kind of blew up and the two of them were under the pile of rubble and we were all freaking out about Sunset being hurt until this giant red claw shot out of the rubble and then we were freaking out because it had turned the girl into a horrifying awful winged monster, but then we realized it wasn’t the girl at all because Sunset got her out of the way and it was actually Sunset who turned into the horrifying awful winged monster again and she looked at us wondering why we were freaking out and I told her it was because she had turned into a horrifying awful winged monster again and she looked down and saw that she was a horrifying awful winged monster again and then she freaked out and kinda started burning everything which made everyone freak out even more and she couldn’t stop it so she jumped into a pond and it started boiling and then we tried to help her but she told us she was too dangerous and to stay away because she could feel it making her crazy and said ‘buck it I’m out!’ and flew away!”

The room was silent.

Four heads bowed, pained over the reminder of their sidetracked mission.

Five looked on in confusion and concern.

Spike gasped, remembering the form Sunset Shimmer took at the end of their first adventure in that other world.

Twilight’s jaw dropped, stunned at the revelation.

Shindy looked around casually. “Oh, she'll be fine! At this point in the story I think we can all say it’s really just a MacGuffin.”








> On a Train Bound from Nowhere (Part 1)
> --------------------------------------------------------------------------

“A Mac-WHAT?!” cried Twilight, standing up from her cushion around the conference table.

“That’s what the voices called it,” explained Shindy Pie matter of factly. “They’re saying don’t worry because it won’t be a thing until chapter thirty-nine.”

“Chapter—what?! What voices?”

“All the new voices I’ve been hearing since I came through the portal. I’m up to eighty-six now and they are loud, loud, loud! Sometimes it’s not so bad, but other times it’s like I can’t think at all. They get all,”—Pinkie hunched down and deepened her voice but spoke louder—“hey look! That unicorn’s horny, ha ha'; and exactly how crazy is oatmeal?', and 'how do I spell Phenomenal well enough for the spellchecker to fix it?' And others just say everything we’re gonna do before we do it but in past-tense, and they tell me to do and say things, and is this word-count okay?”

Twilight stood gaping at her. “What does any of that mean?”

“I have no idea. I mean sometimes they’re helpful like telling me how to get up the slide in Peachie’s party cavern and find all of you in the room here after I sneakily sneaked out of jail again. But it’s usually like having the Internet yelling in my brain and it’s all EweTube comments from random videos. Not always in the same language either. And most of them are all garbled.”

Twilight just stared on. “Wha …? I don’t—“

“HAY!” shouted Peachie Pie, rushing up to Shindy. “I have an idea!”

“What?” Twilight stupefied.

Peachie grabbed a large chunk of Shindy’s tail in her mouth and answered with a muffled, “This!” before rushing out of the room with Shindy being dragged with her.

“Wheeeeeeee!” Shindy squealed.

Once out of the room, Peachie popped her head back in to finish up with, “Be back soon! Don’t wait up!”

The nine remaining ponies and dragon stared blankly at the door closing behind the Pinkies for a few blinks before turning to see the matching expressions on all the other faces in the conference room.

Finally, Primo Dash commented, “Wow. Your Pinkie is actually more Pinkie than our Pinkie.”


*** 

 ***


The door to a random broom closet slammed open and two Pinkie ponies entered in a rush.

Peachie let go of Shindy’s tail and jumped to the door, slamming it back shut, then put her ear up to it hard enough for a BONK to rumble out.

Once satisfied that they were alone, Peachie turned to Shindy, still on the ground with her tail stretched out like taffy. Peachie met Shindy’s height by crouching down onto her belly, then leaned in close to her ear.

“Ixnay onyay ethay oicesvay,” she whispered.

“Don’t talk about the voices?” translated Shindy, her tail popping back to its normal form. “You hear them too?”

“Shhhhhh!” Peachie hushed with her hoof to her lips. She then jumped up and listened through the door again.

She turned to her counterpart. Slowly. And walked up to her. Deliberately. She stood to her full height on four legs. Dramatically. She looked down at Shindy. Seriously. And spoke important words at her. Gravely. “What I’m about to say doesn’t leave this broom closet.”

“How would it? Sayings don’t have feet.”

Peachie gasped. “Oh you’re right! No wings either” she giggled. “That makes this easy. Just don’t repeat any of this to anypony.”

“Just ponies?”

“Any creature.”

“Okay!” Shindy saluted.

“I mean, seriously. The safety of the multiverse depends on it! Or at least your universe and mine do.”

“Roger that, muchacha.”

Adopting a more serious expression again, though not so much as before, “You can’t talk about the voices. I nearly exploded Twilight a couple of times with them.”

Shindy gasped, “Not exploded! Poor Twi. She wouldn’t have liked that. What happened?”

“She tried to egghead them.”

“Ohh! Our Twily tries stuff like that too. And Sunset. Lots of things do end up exploding those days.”

“Exactly!” Peachie nodded. “Other ponies—other creatures—don’t react well.” She leaned in close to Shindy. “And they start to think we’re crazy.”

Shindy threw up her hooves. “For the past few hours I thought I was crazy!”

“That’s another thing that happens. I’ve gotten somepony else to hear the voices once. Screwball was never the same after that.” After a moment of consideration, Peachie shrugged. “But I think she likes it, so it all worked out. Now I just tell everypony it’s my Pinkie Sense and they don’t look at me like I’m as crazy as much as they did when I told them I hear voices.”

“ ‘Pinkie sense’!” Shindy cheered. “Ohh, I like that. But you’ve always been able to hear them?”

Peachie gave Shindy a contemplative look. “Since a few days after I got my cutie mark, though there weren’t many back then, and they were quiet. I thought the mice were whispering to me until Limey chased them out of the house and I still heard them. You’ve never heard them before you came to our world?”

Shindy put a hoof under her muzzle in thought. “Well, since just before I threw my first party I’ve been kinda able to hear this one voice from time to time. It sounds like me but furrier. She actually told me how to put that party together! Never been able to figure that out, and she’s been like a sister ever since; really helps me out a lot. Except I can’t talk to her back.”

Peachie copied Shindy’s thoughtful pose. “Well that’s strange. I wonder who that could be.”

A moment of thought later she shrugged, pressing on. “Any other voices?”

“There kinda, kinda have been more—sort of—but nothing that’s really been a voice voice but more like an idea voice,” Shindy explained, gesturing with her hooves. “Like, if I do ‘this’, people will smile. If I say, ‘that’, people will laugh. If I stop thinking about physics at just the right time I can do the kinds of things that Twily says I shouldn’t be able to and be helpful and get people to giggle. That last one mostly happened after Sunset stole your Twi-Twi’s crown and we blasted her with a giant rainbow friendship laser cannon. But it’s always just been little things. Nothing like here.”

“Maybe they’ve been there for you too, but too quiet for your ears to notice.”

“So they’re just stronger here?”

“Sounds like it.”

Shindy put her forehooves over her ears. “Sounds is right. They get so super loud sometimes. Especially when I ignore them, or talk to the louder ones. What are they?”

Peachie looked around the closet, inspecting the inanimate objects to make sure they truly were inanimate and didn’t have ears. “Here’s the part you can’t tell any creature.”

“Okay!”

“The voices are the real people.”

“The who-what now?”

“They live beyond the fourth wall.”

Shindy looked at each of the closet’s walls. “Which one’s the fourth?”

“No, not that kind of wall. That’s what I used to think too and I did a lot of experimenting until my parents told me to stop breaking the house.”

“Yeah, Mom and Dad don’t like when that happens. Like when I built my first party canon. I either used way too much baking soda or gunpowder or both. It’s a good thing we’re all good at masonry and Marble’s gotten really good at carpentry too, and Limey’s a great painter; it relaxes her. So what kind of wall is the fourth?”

“The fourth wall is actually like a mind wall.” Peachie thunked herself on the head with a hoof. “Something else you don’t want to break in the wrong way.”

“And the voices are behind it?”

“No, we are.”

Shindy tilted her head one way then the other. “Well, from their side, we are, but from our side it’s their behinds that are behind, right?”

“Nope, the fourth wall only has one side.”

“A one-sided wall in our minds?”

“In all minds.” Peachie thunked herself again, giving another thunk on Shindy’s. “It’s all around us, but sometimes, if we can see it, we can break through or peek around it and that’s how we do all the fun, wacky things that Twilight says we shouldn’t be able to. But we can only do them if we make people smile doing them. They have to be funny.”

“But what does this have to do with the voices?”

Peachie zipped to the side of the closet, picked up a broom, holding it vertically, and peeked around one side of the stick. “Every time we peek around the wall, the voices get louder, because that’s where they are. The wall is thinner for us, easier to hear their side through it. And it gets thinner-er when we go through it a lot.”

“I thought you said there was only one side.”

“Yeah. The real side. We’re on the not-real side.”

“Ohh!” Shindy joined Peachie on one side of the broom. “There’s only one side because how can there be another side if it’s not real?”

“Exactamundo!”

“But doesn’t that make us not real?”

“Exactamundo number two!”

“I bet that’s the part that almost exploded Twi, huh?” Shindy sat back down.

“One of them,” Peachie nodded before putting the broom away.  "There were others."

Shindy tapped her chin and stroked the fur there. “I bet she probably started wondering what it meant to not be real. And if she’s not real then what else isn’t real? Probably everything and everyone if the fourth wall is all around us. That would mean everything we know is wrong and what would be the point of anything because what is the meaning of life if life is nothing and what even is nothing and how am I even wondering that if we are nothing and who are the real people and why do they watch us and why do I see words appearing on a screen as I say all this and why are the voices getting louder again?!”

“Whoa, Shindig!” Peachie grabbed her by the shoulders, stopping the tirade of mental breakdownage. “Slowdown! It’s okay!”

Shindy grabbed Peachie the same way. “We’re not real!” She began shaking her. “HOW—IS—IT—O—KAY?!”

Peachie wiggled out of Shindy's hooves and instead pulled her into a hug. “It’s okay because we’ve always been not real but we still make people laugh. And that always matters! And that means we’ll always matter because we’ll matter to them. Even after season nine.”

“Really?” Shindy looked over her shoulder at her twin.

“Of course. It’s what we’re here for.”

“It is?”

“Yep!”

“Okay. I guess I can live with that,” Shindy sighed with a soft smile, but perked up a moment later with a gasp. “Wait! 'It’s what we’re here for'?”

“Yep!”

“That means our entire purpose is to make people laugh and entertain them!”

“Yep! We’ll always be here for people when they need us.”

“That’s great! That means I can use the fourth wall all the time and do all sorts of—eek!” Shindy winced.

“Careful,” Peachie eased her, stepping back in front of her. “You don’t actually want to break or even talk about the fourth wall too often.”

“Because the voices get louder?” Shindy closed her eyes and massaged the sides of her head.

“Yep. Also it’s really hard to do it just right, and not doing it right is one of the marks of a bad author.”

“Huh?” Shindy peeked open an eye at her.

“Uummmm,” Peachie gave Shindy a sheepish smile. “Maybe we’ll save that one for later.”

“Can I make the voices get quieter? I’ve asked them a few times but that only works for a little bit.”

“Yeah, there’s another way. Not using the fourth wall for long enough will make it get thicker again and that will make the voices quieter. But when there’s a lot of voices that won’t stop talking. Nana Pinkie made a special recipe that helps a ton.”

“Did she hear them too?”

“Yep! That’s what she made it for.”

“But Mom and Dad said I’m too young for her cooking.”

Peachie scratched her head. “Why? I’ve been eating them for years and nothing’s gone wrong yet! And if I don’t eat them my head hurts from all that noise. I tell ponies they’re my meds. I bake them into special jelly beans and lemon drops—not Lemon Drops the pony, lemon drops the candy—and shape them to look like pills. They’re great for when the voices get too loud. And that reminds me, when the voices do get loud there are certain things you should never think about.”

“How do I know what I shouldn’t think about?”

“That’s one of the things you shouldn’t think about.”

“That makes sense. And the Nana pills sound helpful. Some of the voices are mean and kinda icky, especially the louder ones. There’s been a bunch of naughty suggestions about unicorn horns.”

“Oh yeah, that happens. And that’s not even the worst of it. You don’t want to know what I hear anytime my mane goes straight down or Rainbow Dash gets ketchup on her wings.”

“ ‘Cupcakes’?” Shindy’s eyes went wide but her pupils shrank.

“Oops! That’s one of the dangerous things when the voices are too loud!” Peachie dug into her tail and pulled out a pair of bright yellow pills. “Quick! Eat some Nana drops!”

Booping Shindy’s snoot to get her to open her mouth, Peachie shoved both pills into Shindy’s mouth and pushed her jaw closed.

Shindy’s pupils quickly filled to normal and swelled larger. “Whoa …,” she gasped. “It’s like a party in my mouth and no one’s yelling as much this time! There’s still a lot of chatter but it’s so much easier to think now! And they taste really good!”

“Thanks! Ginger, thyme, mint, gumdrops, lime juice, pistachio pudding, strawberry syrup, fermented hay seeds, and lots of sugar are some great ways to flavor them! I’ll give you the recipe in case they ever get louder in your world. I’m sure you’ll make some great flavor ideas too!”

“Can I have a few more in case they get loud again before I go back?”

“Oh sure! Shake that tail!”

Both Pinkies turned away from each other. Peachie shook her tail up and down, dislodging a collection of additional yellow and assorted other colored pills that flew up and over toward Shindy who caught them in her own tail.

“Woo! I have been pharmacied. I wonder if these will work better than the Ritalin for schoolwork.”

“And remember,” Peachie warned, “no telling anycreature about the voices anymore.”

“Yeah. Don’t want any exploding Twilights!”

“Now let’s get back and see what our girls and Spike are doing.”


*** *** ***


“We’re back!” Shindy yelled after slamming open the doors to the conference room.

“Oh, hay,” Peachie added, seeing the lone occupant. “It’s Shining Armor shining armor in shining armor!”

Shining Armor, wearing a full suit of well-shined armor, looked up from the armor he was shining and rolled his eyes. “If I had a bit for every time I’ve heard that.”

“You’d be a richer prince of the Crystal Empire than you already are?” Peachie suggested.

Shining shrugged, “Guess I can’t complain, huh?”

“Nope.”

“Oooh, is this Twi’s brother?” asked Shindy.

“Yes in deedy,” Peachie answered before turning back to Shining. “How ya doing, Shiny?”

“Honesty, I’m still getting over the weirdness of seeing two Applejacks, two Rarities, two Rainbow Dashes, two Fluttershies, and now two of you.”

“Meh,” Peachie replied, “We’ve had weirder.”

He nodded. “So I’ve heard.”

“So, where the girls at and wha’cha doing here? Getting ready for tonight?”

Shining looked down to the cart containing a collection of additional suits of armor beside him and was about to answer, when Shindy preempted him.

“Oh!  He’s just here so we could have that one gag about his name, he’s not actually important to the story and the girls have all gone to the train station to head back to Ponyville.”

Shining Armor sat there blinking a moment while Peachie cringed. “Uh,” he began, “the girls have all gone to the train station, they asked me to direct you there when you showed up. What … what was that first part again?”

Peachie turned to Shindy, “You need more Nana pills.”

“Sure thing,” Shindy replied. “I’ll try some of the jelly beans this time.”

After downing four more pills, and giggling goodbye to Shining, both Pinkies left him alone again.

It was only for a moment that he wondered what that was all about before deciding it best to let the Pinkies just be Pinkies and moved onto another suit of armor to shine.

Asking one Pinkie too many questions was confusing enough. He wasn’t about to double the weirdness any more times than it already had been.


*** 

 ***


“Sign says three forty-five for north and southbound,” announced Ponyjack. “What time is it now?”

“Three thirty-five!” Primo replied from the sky, reading off the local clock tower.

Jackie chuckled quietly and leaned in toward Renae. “You have time enough if you need to—“

“Don’t you dare finish that sentence,” she replied in a gruff whisper.

Two Applejacks, two Rarities, two Fluttershies, and a Spike were standing around while two Rainbow Dashes hovered above them and a jittery Twilight Sparkle paced back and forth among them on the train station platform.

“There’s no way we can do both. Even if we find and help Sunset in a period of five minutes we still won’t make it back in time for tonight. The train arrives here at three forty-five, we’ll get to Ponyville early evening, we’ll miss the next train while helping Sunset in the other world, then the next next train back here will be around … oh no. I’ll be late to the parley. I’m supposed to be the arbitrator. I could try a long distance teleport back to the castle but I'd be so rundown after that there might not be enough coffee to keep me going through the proceedings. There's an entire ceremony involved! And then the moonlight feast and then everything else.”

"That, and coffee doesn't exactly affect you the way you think it does," Spike commented.

“Twilight,” Primo swooped down to land beside her fretting friend. “I got it covered.”

“You do?”

“Yeah. Easy. Your hot air balloon. I’ll just pull everypony back when we’re all done with Sunset. I’m much faster than the train, even with all that drag weight.”

Share let out a retort, “ ‘Drag weight’?! Honesty.”

Twilight looked back to Primo. “What do you mean pull everypony back? Spike and I are taking the humanes back home and helping them there. The rest of you will have to stay in Canterlot and keep things going without us.”

There were groans and disappointed whines all around as the native ponies and visiting aliens looked sadly at each other, realizing they would be saying their goodbyes once the train arrived. Already a few hugs had started when Primo spoke up again.

“What?! No way! Maybe you two can’t get back in time but we’ll make a trip down and back easy. And we’ve done everything we needed to do here. We’d just be sitting around waiting if we stayed. We’ll keep the ambassadors happy until you’re back.”

Twilight looked back with a frown. “And this means your list is finished?”

“Uh,” she scratched the back of her head.

“Exactly.”

“My list is finished,” Posey spoke up. “I can help Rain—I mean, Primo with hers.”

“Mine is also finished aside from a little extra touching up on a few pieces,” added Share, putting a foreleg around Renae. “A quick round trip to spend time with my new sister wouldn’t harm a thing. And then I most certainly would help with any other lists that needed checking off.”

“Same here,” Ponyjack cut in, “Ah found Primo’s list after Ah finished mine, weren’t a lot left and Ah got some of it done before the other Dash got me thrown in the sty.”

Rad chuckled sheepishly.

“And what about your list, darling?” Share asked Twilight.

Twilight cringed, her ears flopping straight down.

“We’re fine,” Spike answered.

“We’re far from fine,” Twilight argued. “We were barely half way through the list!”

“For the second time!” Spike groaned.

“Double-checking is important!”

“We double-checked last night. Today was double-checking the double-checks!”

“See?” Primo insisted. “We can go, then come back and everything will work out here while you’re off in their world taking care of Sunset.”

“Which you can do, correct?” asked Renae. “You know how to help Sunset?”

Twilight looked to the visiting friends, easily distinguishable from the native ponies for the first time due to the matching expressions of worry, and sighed. “Judging by what Pin—Shindy said, how Sunset was was going crazy and dangerous—“

“You know,” Rad cut in, during a slowly descending hover, “Shindy didn’t exactly get it all right. Sunset never said that, ‘buck it, I’m out’ part. Whatever that means.”

“Well paraphrasing is magic,” complained Shindy.

Rad looked to her left to see a Pinkie face right in hers, well above the ground. “Whaa!” she let out, flapping back away from the sudden appearance, only to bump into something fuzzy behind her. Turning, she got a repeat.

“Hay, Dashie number two! I mean, Rad!”

“Gah!” she shouted. “Where’d you two come from?”

““The Castle!”” they answered her gleefully while unstrapping their harnesses.

“How’d you get here so …?” Rad trailed off, looking up.

Above the Pinkies, their harnesses were attached to long cables extending to a pair of parachutes caught in the tall train station sign. A small collision in the distance took her attention to a hang-glider saying hello to a tree.

“So what did Sunset say?” Twilight asked, getting the conversation back on track as train whistles began sounding off in the distance.

“A lot, actually,” Jackie answered. “Girl was mumbling quite a bit, and with what that magic did to her voice it was none too easy to understand her. She was definitely telling us she had to get away because she was too dangerous to be around, then something like thawing her third chick’s blight, or some such?”

“Thaumaturgical blight?”

The visiting members of the group thought that over and gave each other looks. “That sounds right, I think,” offered Butterfly.

Twilight sighed, lowering her head.

“What does that mean?” Renae asked as the southbound train appeared from out of a tunnel.

“I’ll tell you on the train,” was the answer as Twilight lined up to the side of a train car door.

Once the doors opened, ponies, and rare other creatures, departed the train, leaving it empty, as the northbound train arrived on another track. As soon as the flow ended, Twilight’s group of five pairs of twins and a dragon boarded their train. There was too much commotion for any questioning stares to be directed their way.

On the northbound track, mixed in with a small collection of other ponies stood a trio of fillies, waiting for the larger boarding mob to die down.

“I hope you’re right about this, Scoot. Rarity might not like me having to close the shop early to make the train.”

“I’m telling you there’s two of them! And they’re in Canterlot!” answered the pegasus, starting off away from the platform.

“So we’re going to the castle? We’ll find two Rarities there?”

“And two Rainbow Dashes!”

“Ah don’t think they’re at the castle.”

The pegasus and unicorn fillies turned to their earth pony friend to see her pointing at the southbound train where a pair of rainbow-colored manes could be seen through the windows as it started to pull away.

“Rainbow Dash and Rainbow Dash! Two of them!” squeed Scootaloo. “I told you, I told you!”

“They’re getting away!” squeaked Sweetie Belle.

Come on!” yelled Apple Bloom.

They sped along the platform, quickly realizing that the train was speeding along faster than they were.

“Nooooo!” cried Scootaloo.

“They’re heading back to town? We could have just stayed there!” Sweetie dismayed.

“So we get another ticket back?” asked Apple Bloom.

Scootaloo looked up, a look of surprise washing over her face and turning to delight. “I think I have a better idea.”

The other two fillies turned to where Scootaloo was looking.

“Define ‘better’, because Ah’ve tried that before and it weren’t good,” Apple Bloom warned upon seeing a hang glider in a tree.


*** 

 ***


“Thaumaturgical blight,” Twilight began her explanation from inside the train car, as they all chose seats for the long journey back, “is a fairly broad term to describe any situation where magic corrupts a creature or object. It is most often associated in cases where a creature comes into contact with certain kinds of dark magic or spells.”

“Like a curse?” asked Rad.

“Not a curse, so much as a trap or evil entity or energy hiding within the magic. However, another possibility is simply taking on a very large fount of untamed magic all at once that overwhelms whoever comes into contact with it. Neither the pony, or other creature, nor the magic may have had any ill intentions, but the sudden rush of power can cause instabilities or trauma that twists the desires of those affected.”

“That sounds like Gloriosa Daisy,” Renae pointed out. “She only wanted to protect her camp, but using all our geodes completely changed her into a monster.”

“The spa comment didn’t help matters none either,” added Jackie, getting a look from Renae.

“And Midnight Sparkle,” Butterfly gasped. “Poor Twily had nightmares for a long time about her.”

Twilight nodded, thinking over the conversations she’d had with her counterpart and Sunset about the mentioned events. “If Sunset absorbed a super concentrated blast of magic that she was unprepared for, she was likely overwhelmed.”

“What about when Sunset turned into that angel thing?” asked Rad. “That was a big blast of magic.”

“Sunset was ready for that, so she was already actively trying to absorb it. Also, it wasn’t untamed magic, it was friendship magic. It came from you girls. That’s what it can look like when concentrated and applied correctly. Something she wouldn’t have been able to do if she and all of you weren’t so close.  And even then, it was impressive, Celestia was ecstatic when she I told her about it."

The alien girls all shared smiles with each other, reflecting on their strong bonds.

"Normally," Twilight quietly considered, "ponies can't do things like that without powerfuls relics of some sort."

“So, our magic angelized Sunset, but this magic is making her evil?” asked Rad. “Is that what happened the first time?”

Twilight shook her head, “At the Fall Formal, the magic from my crown amplified Sunset’s desires to control Equestria and that’s what caused her demon form then. While the element of magic mostly contains harmonized magic, it’s normally keyed to only be used by me and it wasn’t meant to be used in a different universe. It couldn't harmonize with your world. Effectively, she confused it long enough to temporarily corrupt its magic. This time, we know Sunset’s not the same pony she used to be, but it may be that this sudden rush of power triggered some latent fear of repeating her past mistakes. And once Sunset realized what the magic turned her into physically, that fear grew, creating a sort of feedback loop. In a way it’s all in her head. But if she doesn’t realize this and overcome her fears, she may lose herself to her original desire to dethrone Princess Celestia or just plain lash out and conquer something.”

“She could become evil again?” asked Spike, getting gasps from the rest of the group.

“Considering it’s Sunset, and what’s she’s been through already, it’s unlikely to become permanent. The real issue is how much damage will occur before she comes to her senses.”

“But she already said tom-mat-loogie-call blight. If she knows what’s going on, can’t she fix it herself?”

“Fear and guilt can go a long way. Like Luna and the Tantabus.”

The visiting part of the group all traded confused looks, while the native Equestrians let out ‘ahs’ of understanding.

“So this will be easy!” cheered Primo. “They just need to do with Sunset what we did with Luna.”

“But this time they won’t all just be dreaming,” Ponyjack pointed out.

“Still say they’ve got nothing to worry about!”

“Of course we don’t!” agreed Shindy with a cheer. “Just look at the tags! We’re a comedy. No dark, death, drama, horror, sad, thriller, or tragedy up there. Not even porn, which is kind of a missed opportunity considering there’s two of most of us in a small, enclosed compartment with an indeterminate number of hours to kill.”

Ten faces stared blankly back at her while Peachie slapped a hoof to her forehead, then another one on Shindy's.

“What?” Shindy defended. “A mind can go places.” She scratched at her ear with a hind leg. “Got a bunch doing that right now.”

Swiftly, Peachie shook a colorful collection of Nana pills up out of her tail, pulled Shindy’s mane back to get her to open her mouth, and let the pills fall in.

“Ooooh,” Shindy squealed, “lemon, lime, licorice, and lentil.”

Peachie jumped between Shindy and the rest of the group. “Hehe, just ignore her, she’s okay, really! Everything’s fine here. Nothing’s exploding!”

Several members of the group considered asking them questions.

None decided it was a good idea.

“So … what do we do?” Butterfly asked Twilight instead.

“Once we find her,” Twilight continued, “since she’s not actually an evil villain, or even angry at anything, I suppose there’s three options. Ideally, we’ll be able to talk her down. If we get her to realize she’s not becoming a she-demon again she could snap out of it.”

“That’s it?” asked Renae. “She’ll even transform back to normal?”

“That …,” Twilight cringed, “might not happen right away. But at least she’ll stop being destructive.”

“Will we have to rainbow cannon blast her?” asked Rad.

“You guys do that too?” asked Primo.

“Yeah we do! Sunset the first time, the three Dazzlings, Gloriosa, the Memory Stone. There’s a list,” Rad bragged.

“Well we have a list too! Nightmare Moon, Discord, Tirek, the Pony of Shadows.”

“That’s it? Ha! We did six to your four.”

“What?! Hay! We did plenty of other awesome things without rainbow cannons! And did you say one of yours was a stone? You can’t count a stone!”

“Okay, fine, five to four, and we also did other awesome things, and we did it all in less than two years! How long did it take you?”

“Uh—“

“Rainbows!” Twilight called. “It’s not a competition!”

”Like just telling them that’ll work,” grunted Ponyjack while Jackie nodded.

“Why didn't you rainbow her already?” Primo pressed her counterpart.

“Because she flew away!” Rad protested.

“I thought you were fast.”

“I am, but we had the fires to put out and we couldn't use the pond water because it was still boiling. It took a while!”

“By the time it was safe, Sunset was gone,” sniffed Butterfly. Posey brought her into a hug.

“So what if she doesn’t turn back to normal after we talk her down, and what are the other options if that doesn’t work?” asked Renae.

Twilight turned back to her. “Talking her down is just the start. The main issue is that buildup of magic. Eventually she may be able to absorb it safely, if not we may need to siphon that out of her. If we can get her to cooperate, perhaps a modified version of Twily’s magic stealing device can work. A friendship magic ‘rainbow cannon blast’ might work too. Harmonize the magic she gained.”

“And the second option?”

“Well, that’s also the second option," Twilight cringed, "just without her being cooperative.”

“But she’s really powerful right now,” Shindy reminded them. “She flies, moves things with her mind, boils ponds, and flings fireballs and explodes stuff. Even when she’s not trying to!”

“Which is why option one is what we’re hoping for. Assuming she’s calmed down since yesterday.”

“And option three?” asked Jackie.

“If worse comes to worse, maybe we can hit her in the back of the head?”

Eleven surprised faces gasped at her.

“Rendering her unconscious could snap her out of it. And even if it doesn’t, we could have time to siphon that excess magic before she wakes up.”

“No fair!” cried Primo. “We never get to just knock out the bad guys.”

“We slugged a bunch of changelings at the wedding,” Ponyjack offered.

“I feel so awful about that now,” sighed Posey. “I wonder if we’ve made friends with any of them since.” She gasped, “Or even apologized! I don’t remember apologizing to any of them about that. Was Ocellus one of them? We'll need to apologize next time we see her.”

“I’m not suggesting we attack Sunset!” Twilight clarified. “Depending on how much power she has in her right now, a simple sucker punch might be the best option. If she’s being violent she’d want us to keep her from hurting anything, and she’s likely going to have a pretty nasty headache after this, regardless. It’s Plan C, okay?”

“If we can find something that won’t burn or melt when we try to hit her with it,” Shindy mused. "Or get her to cool off first."

Spike raised an important point, “Sounds like Plan C might just make her angry.”

“Right,” Twilight admitted, “Plan C might not be a good idea.”

“Alright,” Jackie piped up. “Find her, then talk her down. If that don’t work, hit her with a rainbow or one of Twiliy’s thingamajigs."

Primo laughed. "So after all that, you didn't even need to come to our world! You just need to find her and point the rainbow in her direction!"

"Except we can't do 'the rainbow' without her," argued Butterfly. "At least we're not sure we can."

"Your Twilight doesn't start them?"

"It's a group thing."

"Speaking of Twily," Renae interrupted, levitating Sunset’s correspondence journal out of her saddlebags. “We should tell her about the plan. She has the journal’s twin.”

“That’s perfect!” Twilight cheered. “Let me write to her.”

Renae levitated the journal closer to Twilight who lit her horn. Half the aura around the journal changed from blue to purple. Twilight brought the journal to her, but the blue aura stayed around one half, flickering but not going out.

“Oof!”

Everyone looked over to find Renae collapsed on the train floor having been pulled off her bench, apparently by the floating book.

“Rarit—Renae! Sorry.” Twilight moved the book to the side to get it out of the way and was surprised to see Renae slide along toward it, away from Jackie who was already trying to help her up.

“Eeek!”

Reaching up, Renae gave her horn a flick to shut it off and rested on the floor in embarrassment.

The two native horn owners flinched at the action then stared for a moment, eventually shooting each other a quick glance.

Twilight cleared her throat. “Um, don’t worry, Renae, I, uh, used to have the same problem.”

“Well,” added Share, moving to help her twin, “you’ve only been a pony for a few hours and skipped magic kindergarten. Why don’t we move to the end of the car and I’ll help you learn how to use your horn correctly.”

“Still no porn tag, folks,” Shindy called out, already popping another Nana pill in her mouth.

Ignoring Shindy, and watching the Rarities long enough to make sure Renae was okay, Twilight turned to the journal, conjured a quill and ink bottle, and wrote a message.



Hello? This is Twilight Sparkle from Equestria. Our friends have let me know the situation with Sunset. We’re on the train heading back to the portal but it will be awhile before we arrive. How are things on your side?
\



And they waited.

And waited.

The Rainbow Dashes tapped their hooves impatiently, turned to each other with a grin, and sneakily traded name tags.

“Hey, Rarities,” Shindy called out, watching the unicorns quietly levitating and releasing small objects, “while we’re waiting, I have a question. Do all unicorn horns taste the same as Renae’s?”

All three horned ponies, and Posey, blushed brightly.

The Rainbows were suddenly no longer bored.

Peachie passed out bags of popcorn. Ponyjack set about showing Jackie how to eat the tiny kernels with hooves.

“H-how,” Share started, “how does she know …?”

“I tried blowing hers when we first got here!”

“You doused my—her horn?!”

“So you po—unicorns don’t call it a horn job?” asked Primo, apparently.

The Applejacks read the room, or more importantly Share and Renae’s faces, and decided to keep out of the proceedings.

Ignoring the Rainbows, Share leaned in and whispered to Renae, “You weren’t channeling magic at the time were you?”

“Sorry, dear,” Renae replied, “doing what?”

“Was your horn lit?”

“No, I hadn’t learned how to do that yet.”

Share relaxed. “That’s good.”

“What’s that matter?” asked Shindy, surprising the Rarities by suddenly being only inches away from them.

Calming herself, and her mane, down, Share addressed Shindy directly in a haughty tone, “Ladies do not talk about such things!”

“We’re not ladies, we’re ponies!”

“We are pony ladies! Unicorn gentlemares!”

Shindy looked down and up at herself. “I'm neither of those things! Can't you tell me?”

“S-Such things are not for polite conversations.”

Rad snickered, “How about un-polite conversations? I’d like to know what this is about.”

Share looked to Twilight, Twilight tilted her head back toward Share. Posey discretely hid behind her mane. Share shook her head.

Twilight sighed, blushing brighter, and spoke in a lecturer’s, safe, unemotional, and un-embarrassing monotone, “The act of dousing the horn is—“ Twilight looked down at a wide-eyed Spike, conjured a very thick set of earmuffs, and wrapped them around his ear fins.

“Aww,” he complained.

“—supposed to feel pleasurable to both parties and is considered a … ‘private’ activity.”

Renae blushed brighter. “But it didn’t feel at all …. It was just slimy.”

“Channeling some kinds of magic is required; lighting the horn,” Twilight continued in her monotone. “Hence the term, dousing.  This also causes a transfer of magic from the …,” Twilight paused.  "The unicorn receiving to the … initiating pony."

“And how do you know this?” asked Rad suspiciously.

“I … read about … things.”

Posey nodded slightly, an act that Butterfly noticed. They looked at each other and blushed harder, turning to observe the most fascinating floor they’ve ever encountered.

Together the Fluttershies leaned in and whispered gently through their manes, ““Would you like to trade sometime?””

They blushed more and nodded to each other.

“And do they all taste the same?” Shindy asked again.

“Every pony horn has a unique … f-flavor,” Twilight answered in that same, but now faltering monotone.

““Neat!”” cheered the Pinkies, one through a mouthful of popcorn.

Shindy looked to Twilight with a big, expectant smile and was met by a furled brow. “I don’t know and I’m not letting you taste it,” Twilight told her firmly.

“Aww.” Disappointed but accepting of the answer, Shindy joined her twin, taking some popcorn of her own.

Snickering in the corner preceded a question from Primo, “You waiting for Flash to tell you your flavor?”

Twilight squeaked, her feathers rustling. “Of course not! I …, wait; how do you know about Flash?”

“Uh,” Primo pointed at her twin, “she told me.”

Twilight peered at the pair. “Who’s captain of the Wonderbolts?”

“Um … Captain Wondrous Bolt?”

Rad groaned. “That didn’t last long.”

Twilight looked down to their name tags. “Keep it up and I’ll just name you ‘Thing one’ and ‘Thing two’.”

The Rainbows looked at each other. “”Who gets to be ‘Thing one’?”"

“Don’t make me randomly change your cutie marks to make identifying you easier.”

The Rainbow wearing Rad’s name tag began to retort, “You can’t—"

“Starlight taught me.”

"Rad" quickly grabbed "Primo’s" name tag off her chest—

“Ow!”

—and swapped it with their other, properly renaming herself back to Primo and deciding it best to not try that again.

As this was finishing up, a still blushing Share whispered to Renae, after making sure both Pinkies were far away, “I don’t suppose Shindy said what our horn tastes like?”

Owning better ears than Share realized, Shindy answered from across the car. “It was delicious! A flowery powdered sugar, with a hint of mint, and a touch of lavender!”

“That’s private!” Share shouted aghast.

“”Not anymore,”” snickered the Rainbows.

Share grumbled under her blush but eventually smiled and whispered to herself, “Sounds rather refined.”

Peachie giggled, "You could always lick each other's horns."

"See?" Shindy added. "A mind can go places."

The Rarities looked at each other but quickly looked away when they noticed their blushes were growing. They then made a show of going back to magic practice to keep their own minds from going places.

In the silence that followed, Twilight looked to the journal and frowned at the lack of response. Outside the windows it was easy to see Ponyville off in the distance as the train continued its slow descent down around the mountain, occasionally weaving in and out of tunnels.

“Suppose now’s a good a time as any to bring it up,” Jackie spoke again. “Ah don’t mean to pry, but that boy’s been missing you.”

“Still?” Twilight startled. “I thought he would have moved on by now.”

“Think he tried to. Asked Sunset out once.”

“And … how did that go?”

Renae chuckled coyly, happy for the subject change, “Sunset has had other interests of late.”

“So … he’s still single?”

“Perhaps only until he notices how Muffins has been watching him.”

“You mean Derpy? The mailmare?”

“ ‘Mailmare’?” Renae tilted her head.

“Nevermind. I know who you’re talking about.”

“Oh!” Shindy popped in. “Lyra and Sweetie Drops also hang around him a lot.”

Renae shook her head. “It’s not Flash those two are interested in like that. They simply haven’t been honest with themselves. Isn’t that right, Jackie?”

Jackie’s eyes went wide and she choked on a popcorn kernel. A quick slap on the back from her counterpart cleared her airway, but not her blush. “W-what’s that now?”

“You always seem to know when people aren’t being honest. You’ve seen what’s happening here don’t you?”

“U-uh, uh, ah,” Jackie sputtered, her eyes darting around the train car.

“You okay, sugarcube?” the other Applejack saved her, though it wasn’t until Jackie noticed the solemn expression on Twilight’s face that she realized the question wasn’t directed at her.

“Yeah,” Twilight answered flatly, her eyes falling to the floor. “I’ve known since the beginning it would never work out. I’m sure Flash and Derpy would be a cute couple. I can’t risk using the portal too much after all.”

“Why not?” asked Butterfly.

Still watching the floor, Twilight responded in a flat tone, “Overuse of the portal has the potential to destabilize the universes and cause them to blend and collapse.”

“Mind saying that again?” asked Jackie as a host of concerned faces turned toward Twilight.

“I'd visit more often if I could,” she continued in her flat tone. “It would be so easy to do so if not for stability concerns. After all, anytime I’m in my private study, where the portal is, it would actually be easier to visit CHS than get to my own bathroom. Teleporting with a full bladder isn't a good idea. It’s not fair to Flash if I can only visit once in a while. Why else would I have broken it off so quickly?”

“I thought it was because we all thought the portal couldn’t be opened for thirty moons,” Butterfly offered. "Until the sirens showed up."

“Nah, it’s because the two of them have nothing in common,” was Rad’s guess. “I mean a rocker and an egghead?”

"But you call Sunset an egghead and a rocker all the time."

"Because she's a rocking egghead."

Renae shook her head. “I’m sorry to say I thought you two had no chemistry together. Like the two of you were trying to force an attraction.”

“Exactly!” Shindy chimed in. “It’s all because the studio forced the author to fill in another bullet point for better marketability among preteen girls last minute in production.”

Peachie sprinkled an assortment of Nana pills into Shindy’s bag of popcorn.

Twilight looked up at her friends, a cringe in her eyes. “I guess we really weren’t meant to be.”

Share quickly walked up to her and put a foreleg around her shoulder. “It’s alright, darling. You’ll find somepony someday. Perhaps one actually living in this universe.”

“Ah don’t want to be insensitive to anyone’s love-lives,” Jackie cut in calmly before getting a much more urgent tone of voice, “but just what was that whole bit about universes collapsing!?”

Twilight froze. Her eyes widening and ears snapping straight up being the only movement.

After a few seconds of waiting, Jackie whispered to her pony counterpart, “Ah take it the ears raising like corn stalks is a bad thing?”

“More the eyes Ah’m worried about,” Ponyjack replied.

“Eeyup, that deer in the headlights look ain’t settling me at all.”

“What are headlights?”

“Twilight?” Share gave her a gentle shake, getting her to blink and look around, counting each of her visiting friends with a hoof.

“Heh, ha, it’s fine, it’s fine,” Twilight chuckled as her ear twitched.

Leaning back toward her counterpart, Ponyjack whispered a warning, “Fast ear twitches ain’t good either. ‘Specially for Twi.”

“I’m sure everything is okay! There’s only five of you … all at once, and all seven of us are going right back through, and then Spike and I are coming back here, but that’s still only fourteen uses in a few hours.

“Um,” Butterfly squeaked, “I’ve been through three times already. I’m sorry.”

“Sixteen! Okay! Still not all that many. It’s not like I’ve used it much myself, and I always keep it off. Sunset’s only made two trips back here and Starlight made just one to your world. Spike! You’ve never been through without me have you?”

Twilight turned to Spike to see the young dragon still wrapped up in the earmuffs and taking a nap.

“Of course you haven’t! And we’re still just over thirty uses since the Fall Formal! That’s not too many for, for however long it’s been.”

“Twi,” Jackie called her in an even tone, “there something you’re not telling us?”

Twilight looked back at her friends with a sheepish cringe. “Yes?”

“And that is?”

“I never expected all of you to ever show up at once!” Twilight rushed an excuse.

“Did we break something?” asked Rad.

“Oh no, not at all,” Twi reassured her, a warble to her voice. “It's why Celestia wanted only me to cross over the first time.  You see …" she paused before rushing the rest out, "it’s just that every use of the portal further destabilizes the boundary between our worlds is all.”

“”WHAT?!”” eight voices yelled out, accompanied by two eeps. Spike snorted in his sleep.
> Girl Talk and the Fate of the Multiverse (Part 2)
> --------------------------------------------------------------------------

“It's why Celestia wanted only me to cross over the first time.  You see …" Twilight paused before rushing the rest out, "it’s just that every use of the portal further destabilizes the boundary between our worlds is all.”

“”WHAT?!”” eight voices yelled out, accompanied by two eeps. Spike snorted in his sleep.

“Just a little each time!”

“How much is a little?” asked Jackie. “And didn’t you also say something about blending?”

“I did, but it’s okay.”

“How is blending two worlds and destabilizing them okay?” asked Rad.

“Because Star Swirl the Bearded knew it was a problem when he created this portal and put in measures to counteract the stability issues! It’s not the first portal he made, you see, and he learned from his prototypes. This won’t be like the older ones!”

“What happened with the older ones?” asked Renae.

The five native ponies, aside from Twilight, traded looks of recognition. “Oh dear, not again,” creaked Share.

“It’s okay this time!” Twilight tried again. “Star Swirl fixed that issue with this portal. That’s why it opens every thirty moons. Each time it opens on its own it does so when the cosmos of each universe are in full alignment, allowing the portal to do a little tidying up of amalgamations and quantum instabilities.”

"Huh?" Primo quirked her head. "Can you try that again in Equestrian and not Egghead?"

Twilight rolled her eyes. "This portal unbreaks things every thirty moons."

There was a rush of relieved sighs all around.

“We’re speaking ‘Equestrian’ right now?” asked Rad.

"But what about in between those thirty moons?" Jackie pressed on. "Why are you looking so jittery?"

"Uh," Twilight croaked, beginning to visibly sweat. "There's a tiny, tiny chance that forcing the portal open before the Battle of the Bands may have broken that feature."

“”WHAT?!”” ten voices yelled out this time. Spike rolled over in his sleep.

“Slight chance!” Twilight insisted. “I worked with my counterpart to design some monitoring equipment to chart the instabilities as they occur so we can be better informed as to how many uses is too many and if I broke anything!”

Twilight gave a twitchy laugh, looking over her friends’ various expressions of disbelief and worry.

“What did you mean by ‘blending’ earlier?” Jackie repeated her question.

“There was another portal to another world we all went through,” Ponyjack answered. “Didn’t change into humanes or nothing, stayed as ponies, but it was a mighty different world. There was another Celestia and Luna there. Didn’t meet other us’es there’ but saw a poster of them, so we know they was there.”

“It was like opposite world!” Peachie announced. “Celestia and Luna were evil!”

“It was very dark,” added Posey.

“The portal ended up exploding,” added Primo, “and our world started to merge with that one.”

“It gave us a terrible fright,” Share shared. “But it did all work out in the end.”

“That was Star Swirl’s first portal,” Twilight took over, “It had been overused in the past and damaged. This portal was designed to not cause those problems.”

“But there’s a chance it will now?” Jackie pressed.

“I won’t be able to confirm that, one way or another, until thirty moons after we first met at that Fall Formal.”

“Our first Spring in college,” Renae commented.

“So what kinds of things could happen?” Jackie’s tone deepened.

Ears flopping down, Twilight sighed. “With the old portal, the first signs the worlds were beginning to blend were that cooks in one world ended up making the same dishes on the same days as their counterparts. A book borrowed from one world would cause one to vanish in the other.”

Jackie turned to her counterpart, who looked back to her with a concerned eyebrow above the other, before turning back to Twilight. “If the worlds blend too much, could a person die because their counterpart died?”

There were surprised looks, and Ponyjack put a pastern over Jackie’s foreleg. “Ah’m not sure Ah like where this is going.”

Instead of replying, Jackie waited for an answer.

“Well,” Twilight began, “I haven’t seen that case before, nor did Star Swirl or Celestia mention that ever happening in the past. I can’t believe that would be an early sign of the universes beginning to blend, but …,” she paused, “if the worlds ever become blended to a significant degree, that’s not outside the realm of possibility.”

Jackie shut her eyes tightly.

After a moment, she turned back to her counterpart. “We both lost our Ma, but my Pa is still alive.”

Ponyjack drew back, sitting up with a gasp and Jackie put a foreleg over her back before finishing, “And my Grand Pear died over two years ago.”

There were gasps all around and Ponyjack put a hoof over her heart before she and her counterpart turned back to Twilight.

“No!” Twilight jumped up from her bench. “Girls, it took years for anything to really show up before. And this portal correctly zeroed out any irregularities that may have previously existed between our worlds when it last opened on its own during your Fall Formal. It’s only the uses since the sirens showed up that have had any impact on them, and each use only has a slight effect.” Twilight addressed Jackie and then Ponyjack in turn. “Your father, and your grandfather won’t be affected. Sixteen uses in one day could be rough, and we certainly won’t want to be using the portal again for a while after this, but they will be okay. I promise.”

“”You’re sure?”” the Applejacks asked, leaning into each other.

“I promise. At worst—worst—we may be reaching the level of cooks making the same meals in both worlds, but I can’t see how we’d be beyond that already.”

The Applejacks looked at each other in relief and gave each other a hug. “You’ll tell me about him, right?” asked Ponyjack.

“Of course Ah will,” Jackie replied, giving her counterpart soothing pats on the back. “Ah wanted to save it as a surprise for later till Ah heard about the world blending. Was hoping to invite you over.”

Rad watched the Applejacks a moment with a concerned expression. “So, if she-demon Shimmer had sent all her zombie students through the mirror that time, what would have happened?”

“I don’t really know how many uses the portal can handle but I don't think our universes would have survived all of the students crossing at once,” Twilight answered grimly.

“Sunset would feel so awful if she broke our universes,” commented Butterfly.

“And now that we’ve used it thirty times, is the school going to start serving hay at lunch?” asked Shindy.

“They don’t already?” asked Primo. “What kind of school doesn’t serve hay?”

“We humanes don’t eat hay,” Renae explained.

“What, fish and worms then? Are you like griffons or something?”

“Wait!” Rad cut in. “What about the magic that’s been showing up in our world? Is that the worlds being unstable? Will we stop being able to pony up after the thirty moons? Will our geodes will still work?”

“ ‘Pony up’?” asked Primo.

Twilight shook her head, returning to her bench. “The changing magic concentration and potency seem to be a separate issue. That’s not having any impact on stability on a universe level according to Twily’s scans, at least not anymore.  We’ve already fixed the original leak from the Friendship Games. Instead, it looks to be that trace amounts of Equestrian magic have been revitalizing the formerly unusable magic native to your world.”

“If Twily’s been keeping track of this, why didn’t she stop the five of us from using the portal together?” asked Jackie, a rough edge coming back to her voice.

With a cringe, Twilight turned back to the Applejacks. “I never told her using the portal contributed to the destabilization of our worlds.”

”Why wouldn’t you tell her that?!”

“I never thought it would be a problem.”

“”How could it not be a problem?”” the Applejacks yelled back.

Twilight sat up straighter before answering. “Because the portal can only be opened from this side and it’s located in my private study. Only a few ponies have access to it. I only set up the remote trigger recently and it requires Sunset’s journal. I thought she’d be the only one using it. And a few uses over two years wouldn’t have any noticeable effect.

“"Unlikely or not—"" the Applejacks started before Jackie nodded to her twin.

"—you still should have said something," Ponyjack continued.

"Why’d you leave something this important to chance?” Jackie finished.

“Because Sunset’s family misses her,” Twilight called back, perhaps a little rougher than intended, before sighing. “I’ve been trying to get her to reconcile with them, but she keeps making excuses. I didn’t want this to become another one. And I didn’t want to put Twily in an awkward position by asking her not to tell Sunset.”

The Applejacks mulled this over, a bit of wind taken out of their anger. ““But you’ll tell her now?””

“Twily or Sunset?”

The Applejacks answered with a glare.

“Both of them,” Twilight voiced their answer. “I’ll tell them both.”

”Like you should have before,” Jackie insisted.

“I’m sorry, Applejack. Both of you,” Twilight turned to her other friends. “And the rest of you as well. I should have made sure you all knew.”

The others all nodded back at her with varying degrees of forgiving smiles and pardons. Except for Peachie who seemed to be sweating.

“Peachie?” Twilight addressed her. “Are you alright?”

She gulped. A large bulge appearing in her throat before she coughed. “Habanero flavored popcorn,” she choked out.

The Fluttershies gave Peachie suspicious looks.

“You have habanero too?!” cried Shindy. “You only gave me jalapeño.”

While Shindy fired a still cold can of whipped cream into Peachie’s mouth to help soothe her throat, Primo called out an, “Anyway!” hoping to shift off to less dramatic—or 'Pinkie'—topics. The others all turned to her. The pause that followed made it clear that Primo hadn’t actually had a topic in mind when she spoke up.

“So …,” Rad attempted to help out her counterpart while still fishing for a topic herself. “How about … that … Zephyr Breeze? Exactly how does a pony get a five-o’clock shadow anyway? Or any kind of facial hair through fur? And how do you shave it without getting the fur too?”

The sudden random topic succeed in derailing the tension so well her friends’ trains of thought took time to find their tracks again.

Twilight frowned again at the silent correspondence journal. The Applejacks turned to each other and had their own conversation.

“Zephyr has clippers for that,” Poesy answered finally. “Cuts just the stiffer hair stubble and leaves the soft fur behind. I think there’s some magic involved. And that’s not a five-o’clock shadow. He thinks the stubble makes him look masculine so he only shaves once a month. It takes that long to get past the stubble stage.”

“Heh, masculine, right,” laughed Primo. “My Dad has to shave twice daily to keep the whiskers away.”

“I can’t imagine having to shave every day on top of everything else I have to do before greeting the public,” Share commented. “So happy I’m not a stallion. Not that we mares don’t have our own necessities to think about.”

“I know what you mean, darling,” Renae chimed in. “We may not have to shave our faces, but there’s so much else to consider for maintaining the feminine form. Shaving our legs for instance.”

Share, Posey, and Primo reacted with disgust. Twilight commented thoughtfully, “I was wondering about that. My legs start to feel scratchy at the end of my visits.” Peachie started into a new bag of popcorn. The sudden activities pulled the Applejacks out of their conversation to see what was going on.

“You shave your legs?” Share cried with a shiver. “I just can’t imagine.”

“Wait! What are you even shaving?” asked Primo. “Daring mentioned humanes don’t have fur.”

“We grow hair on our legs,” Renae answered. “It can be a struggle to keep smooth with all of life’s other daily chores.”

Share looked down at her legs incredulously. “You don’t like having fur?”

“What? Oh, this fur is fine. I quite like how soft it is.” Renae brought her forelegs up to her cheeks and rubbed them gently with a giggle. “Back home, however, it’s the same kind of hair beards are made out of. Quite unappealing.”

Share shivered at the image in her mind.

“I guess that makes sense,” Primo agreed. “I could do without heat week. One awful week every year.”

“Two for us earth ponies,” Ponyjack added.

Primo snickered, “It’s why there’s so many of you.”

“Hay, that’s tribalist,” Ponyjack complained with a blush.

“Twelve for us,” countered Butterfly.

“TWELVE?!” shouted six ponies.

“How do you get any work done?” Asked Ponyjack.

“Now I’m glad I never stayed longer than three nights at a time,” breathed Twilight before turning thoughtful. “Come to think of it, your world did seem to have a larger population.”

“That’s what I was saying,” claimed Primo.

“How does your society even function?” added Share.

“I guess you have a lot of those kinds of parties?” suggested Peachie.

“Oh my,” squeaked Posey.

“Um,” Butterfly restated as soft as her blush was loud, “we don’t actually go into estrus or, um, heat. We have menstrual cycles, and periods. But the cramps can be pretty bad at times.”

Six surprised ponies turned into three confused ponies with the remaining two nodding in understanding.

“Like elephant shrews?” asked Posey.

“Shrews?” questioned Share.

“Elephants?” Primo focused on instead.

“Some bats do it too,” Posey added. “Like the free-tailed bats.”

“But Daring Do said humanes don’t have tails.”

“No tails either?!” Share cried.

“You read Daring Do too?!” Rad perked up. “Awesome!”

“You know her too?! Alright!”

“We were in her first movie!”

“There’s a movie?! Did Daring play herself or was it an actress?”

“Huh? You mean A.K. Yearling, right? She was on set for a bit. I got her autograph, but she just wanted to see how the sets matched her books. She didn’t do a cameo or anything.”

“She didn’t play herself? Well, that makes sense. She wants to keep her privacy.”

“She can’t play herself, she’s just the author.”

Primo blinked in surprise before settling into a cocky grin. “So, you don’t know, do you?”

Sensing a competition had started, Rad set into a challenging glare. “Of course I know …. Know what?”

Primo casually shined a forehoof on her fur. “You’ve never been on a Daring Do adventure.”

“I was in the movie!”

“Maybe, but I was in the real thing. Twice!”

“There is no real thing. It’s fiction! Awesome fiction, but still.”

Primo just smiled, letting the smug blare out of her.

“You can’t be saying she’s real in this world are you?” Rad blinked, looking to Twilight. “Is she?”

“Twice,” Primo repeated.

“Ohmygosh, Ohmygosh, Ohmygosh!” Rad pranced on her bench until her excited wing flapping raised her into the air, her hooves continuing to dance on nothing. “Is she real in our world too? What about Mount Vehoovius? Cirrostrata?”

“Ahem!” Twilight cut in. “Our Daring Do values her privacy so I don’t think we should be talking about this.”

“I win this round.” Primo declared.

““Here we go,”” the Applejacks rolled their eyes and turned back to each other to pick up their own conversation where it left off.

“What?!” Rad’s wings stopped and she flopped back onto her bench. “Well you may know someone who’s super awesome, but I am super awesome! And I can prove it!”

“Heh! You’re on!”

“Whoa!” cried Twilight. “We have more important things going on here right now!”

“Yeah, but can we do anything about them while in this train?” countered Rad.

“Well ….”

“And it’s going to be a while until you all get to Ponyville,” Primo explained.

“True.”

““So?”” the Rainbows asked, leaning in toward Twilight.

Twilight groaned and turned to look at the journal still sitting silently on her own bench. “Fine,” she relented.

“”YES!””

“BUT!”

“Flank,” Rad answered, getting strange looks her way. “Ask Scootaloo about it later.”

Twilight grumbled and continued, addressing Primo specifically, “You know where the train station it. You know where the portal is. And you know when this train is scheduled to arrive.”

“Yes, yes, and yes,” Primo agreed.

“Then you better make sure to meet up with us when the rest of us get to town.”

““Yes, ma’am!”” the Rainbows saluted.

“Okay, Rad,” Primo turned to her counterpart, “what do you say about a speed test?”

“I say, ‘about time’!”

Primo shot out a forehoof which Rad bumped with one of hers excitedly before the two of them opened the nearest windows and flew off.

The remaining ponies in the train car listened as their excited shouts faded into the distance when, suddenly, there was a loud bang on the roof, followed by another, then a scraping sound sliding toward the end of the car, some screaming, a thud, another bang not on the roof, and finally, loud groaning.

“What was that?” Spike shouted, something finally waking him up.

“Ah don’t know, but those screams sounded familiar,” Ponyjack called out while rushing to the door at the end of the car. Her counterpart and both Rarities followed up behind them, not taking time to voice their agreements.

Sliding open the door leading to the next car, the four mares stared at three fillies in a heap against the next door. Pieces of a broken hang glider were strewn about and falling off the train.

““Apple Bloom!”” the Applejacks shouted.

““Sweetie!”” the Rarities gasped.

The two fillies in question and their pegasus friend looked up to them, ears down at the tone of shouts, but eyes wide once they realized their double-vision wasn’t a product of the harrowing flight or the resulting crash.

“Two Applejacks?!” shouted Apple Bloom.

“Two Rarities?!” gasped Sweetie Bell.

“Two Rainbow Dashes?!” hoped Scootaloo.

““What in the Sam Hill do you think you’re doing?!”” the Applejacks admonished.

““Did you just—?! You could have gotten hurt!”” joined in the Rarities.

Apple Bloom and Sweetie cringed under the double weight of the double scolding.

“Scootaloo?!” Twilight added, bringing up the rear, just when Scootaloo was beginning to think she had gotten off the hook.

“Uh, hay, Twilight,” Scootaloo squeaked. “Just dropping in?”

The five mares all shook their heads disapprovingly at the trio, but when a bend in the tracks started turning the train, Twilight was quick to teleport them all back inside their car in a flash of purple.

“Ho—Jumping jackrabbits!” Jackie shouted.

“What just happened?!” Renae followed up.

“Just a teleport,” Ponyjack explained in a calming tone.

“Happens all the time around our Twilight,” Share followed up. “You get used to it.”

Jackie and Renae glanced at each other, expressions still surprised, before realizing they’d seen stranger things and shrugged.

The young pony pile unpiled themselves and stood up in front of the adults, sheepish expressions on all of their faces. Apple Bloom and Sweetie kept switching between their twin elder sisters.

Mere seconds later those expressions turned to excitement as they chanted together, bouncing on their hooves, “”I have another sister! I have another sister!””

“Where’s mine?!” joined in Scootaloo.

Twilight sighed and walked to a train window, pointing a hoof up and toward the south.

Scootaloo trotted up, wings buzzing, and followed Twilight’s hoof.

In the distance were two rainbow tails.

Her face lit up and she pressed it into the glass with a squee.

That squee was cut off once she realized the tails were far outpacing the train, with no indication of coming back.

“Nooooooooooo!”
> Homes and Interrogations (Part 3)
> --------------------------------------------------------------------------

“So now that you know the elements of good wing control,” Primo wrapped up her flight lecture, “let’s see a Buccaneer Blitz!”

Rad gave her counterpart a midair salute with a forehoof and shot into the sky while performing a vertical scissor roll. Primo gained some altitude herself to watch as Rad reached her target.

Now above the clouds, Rad allowed her ascent to taper off, looping around with a backflip and locking the angle of her wings for a powerful flap to launch herself back down.

Keeping her wing angles in mind, Rad continued to flap, adjusting as necessary in her descent.

Her speed increased dramatically.

She pulled up, changing her straight dive into a curl.

The wind rushed through her feathers. Rad made a slight adjustment to a wing that felt off. She would need to ask Primo about that.

She could see the bright-green ground, Primo, and the train tracks growing closer.

Faster now, even as she continued to level out.

Ahead of her stood the tree they had picked as a marker, the wind beginning to sting her eyes.

Might have been best to hold on to that uniformed pony’s goggles.

Too late now; that tree took up much of her field of view.

A 630 degree630 degrees is 90 degrees short of 2 full rotations barrel-roll to the left, ending with her wings straight out and perpendicular to the ground.

She pulled “up,” swerving around the right side of the tree.

Made a full, horizontal, loop only by angling her wings, kicking the tree as she passed.

Then completed the loop, facing the opposite direction.

Finishing with another 630 degree barrel-roll to her right, crisscrossing with her path of approach.

And kept her speed up the whole way.

“Whoooo!” she cheered.

“Yeah!” Primo congratulated her, giving a high-speed hoofbump as she passed.

Rad repeated the trick around Primo a few times, though without kicking her, as she allowed her speed to bleed off.

Finally, she pulled back and flapped hard, braking to a hover.

“Nice!” Primo gave her evaluation. “Your left wing was a little off though. I think you have a bent primary.”

“Yeah, I felt that.”

“I’ll show you how to preen once we get to my place.”

“Preen? Wait, your place?”

“Up there,” she pointed to the south, “over Ponyville, drifting between ‘Shy and AJ’s places.”

Rad peered into the distance following her twin’s hoof. “You live in the clouds?”

“Yeah, it’s the one with the rainbow waterfalls.”

“What? Rainbow waterfalls?”

“Yeah,” Primo repeated matter of factly. “Above the wisps. It’s a rainbow seed runoff cloud hollowed out and sculpted into a house.”

“Rainbow runoff seed, I, what? How does—?”

“Race you there!” Primo called out while starting off.

“Wait!” Rad shouted, getting her to stop. “Aren’t we going to do a rainboom next?”

“Rainboom?” Primo smirked. “Sorry, I’m not Pinkie. I don’t carry giant slingshots in my mane.”

Rad blushed. “How’d you find out about that?!”

“Scoot told me,” Primo chuckled. “Couldn’t get your speed up, huh?”

“Oh come on! I’ve had these wings for just a few hours, and I kept that rainboom going long enough to cover the whole town, several times!”

Primo put a hoof to her chin. “And you did just pull off a top quality Buccaneer Blitz.”

“First try!” Rad insisted.

Primo considered that.

“Come on!” Rad pressed. “You know how much I want this.”

“Hrmm, I guess I do, huh?” Primo nodded. “Alright. Let’s do it!”

“YES!” Rad pumped her hoof.

“Here’s what we’ll do. Fly a bit behind me and stay in my slipstream so you’ll have less resistance. That’ll make it easier for your first try.”

“Hey! You don’t need to coddle me!”

“Hay! Rainbooms are hard—not for me anymore—but they used to be. Once you pull one off with help, you can try another without the assist. And the slingshot was kinda overkill for our wings!”

Rad blew some hair out of her face. “Fine,” she grumbled.

“Okay. Stay in my slipstream, we’ll start off with a down swoop like the Buccaneer Blitz, but we’ll start higher, with less of a decline, and instead of hitting the attack, keep flapping to keep your speed increasing. The rainboom isn’t technically complicated, the only things you really need are speed and stability, but you need so much of both that I’m the only one able to pull them off in all of Equestria.”

“And me.”

“We’ll see,” Primo smirked.

“Yeah,” Rad flew her muzzle closer to Primo’s and challenged her with her eyes, “we will!”

“Sure, sure. Just remember stability is hardest right before the rainboom breaks, and once that happens you’ll suddenly be going a lot faster.”

“I remember!”

“Also, if you come up short and fail, you’ll get flung the opposite direction, so be sure you’re not trying to rainboom up until you know what you’re doing!”

“What? Flung the opposite direction? By what?”

“Wind resistance. It’s like a rubber band at those speeds or something. Ask Twilight.”

“Uh.”

"She gave a lecture on it once at Wonderbolt Academy. Not sure the specifics though, I fell asleep. But don't tell her that! I completely got away without her knowing that time. Ready?”

Rad instantly snapped out of her confusion over the workings of the world for the more important competition, “You bet I am!”

Primo gave her twin one last “heh,” of a laugh and shot straight up. Rad followed her just as the southbound train for Ponyville rounded a corner catching up with them.

Neither of them saw the orange and purple face in one of the windows turn ecstatic upon seeing them, only to fade as they left her behind.


*** 

 ***


“Now it makes sense why you were having so much trouble with your magic!” Sweetie giggled at her new older sister from another world.

“But not anymore!” Renae cheered, pulling four bits from her saddlebags and holding them aloft. She pointed to each one in turn and counted, “One, two, three, four!” With each count, the bit Renae was pointing to lost its blue glow and fell to the floor of the train. Renae’s horn even properly lost its glow upon dropping the fourth bit.

“Splendid, darling,” Share cheered, pulling Renae into a hug, which Sweetie joined in on with a squeaky squeal.

Toward the middle of the car, a lone pegasus filly watched a pair of rainbow-colored tails swoop down from a high altitude and zoom off into the distance. “Two Rainbow Dashes! Two Rainbow Dashes!” she continued chanting.

Across from her, two Fluttershys with stern faces nodded, resolutely to each other, and walked stoically to the next bench where two Pinkies excitedly compared pastries they had stored in their manes, passing them back and forth and taking sample licks and bites.

““Ahem,”” the Fluttershies announced themselves and politely waited.

Once it was clear no one heard them, they shot each other a glance and rolled their eyes. ““Ahem,”” they didn’t wait to be ignored again. ““Ahem!””

“Oh hay, Fluttershies!” Peachie greeted them with Shindy waving back while finishing a triple frosted ice-cream bagel with whipped-cream and a cherry on top.

“Hey, Fluttershies!” Shindy caught up after chomping off half the treat and passing the rest to her twin to finish. “Mmm, that’s good!”

The Fluttershies looked at each other, keeping their faces stern and nodding toward the other a few times before speaking together. ““Um. D-did you want me to—? Oh! You did? Oh my. I thought you were going to, but I will if you want. Oh you will? Are you sure? Did you want to do it together? It would be rude to talk at the same time, right? Oh, wait! The"“—

Butterfly said “coin” while Posey said “bit.”

The Fluttershies nodded with a smile and Posey trotted up to the Rarities to borrow back one bit to flip. Butterfly remained waiting for her with a smile, while the Pinkies compared a random pair of muffins. Butterfly pointedly declined a third muffin they offered her.

Once Posey returned with a bit in her mouth, she flipped it in the air and it landed tails up. “Oh! That’s me.” Posey cleared her throat and the Fluttershies set their faces stern again, before facing Peachie.

“Peachie Pie,” she addressed her in a mother’s serious tone, “You brought Butterfly to the castle, right?”

“Yep!” Peachie popped forward gleefully. “Gave the new pony a pony ride!”

“And you also told her that you’d been through the portal before, right?”

Peachie opened her mouth and froze. A moment later she blinked a few times as a cringe began to form. “Umm … well ….”

It was then that an explosion of sound and rainbow light flashed in the southern distance, quickly spreading out and over the train.

“SONIC RAINBOOM!” Scootaloo shouted in glee, jumping almost high enough to bop her head against the ceiling.

The moment she returned to her window, she pressed her face flush against it and watched intently. “I think they’re both gonna do them together! Come on, come on, come on, come on!” she followed up with a chant, focusing the tiny blue object behind the rainbow trail.

The other ponies in the train car also took up windows.

“You can do it, Rad!” Spike was the first to join Scootaloo’s chant, the other ponies following after.

Seconds passed. They all watched the rainbow trail speed ahead of the blue object and curl in a slow, slightly downward spiral.

The initial ring of light had nearly faded.

And they continued to watch.

The very air seemed to hang.

And then it snapped.

Suddenly that blue object reversed direction as it was flung back by an invisible force.

“…yyaaaaaaaaaaAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAaaaaaaaa…!” screamed Rad as she whizzed past the train windows in an uncontrollable aerial tumble.

Scootaloo gasped, pressing her face into the window to watch the visiting twin of her mentor tumble out of sight.

A scant moment later, there was a distinct thud loud enough for all of Rad’s audience to cringe.

““Ooh, that’s gotta sting,”” commented the Applejacks.

“Especially in the pride,” agreed Spike.

““I hope she hit something soft,”” the Fluttershies added.

“Nothing's soft at that speed,” Apple Bloom pointed out.

“It’s okay!” Scootaloo insisted. “She’ll get there! She’s a Rainbow Dash! She has to!”

A rumbling sensation preceded a flash as Primo’s rainbow trail also passed by the train, presumably to Rad’s aid.

Twilight smiled. “There. Primo will make sure Rad’s okay.”


*** 

 ***


“Bwahahahahaha!” Primo clutched her stomach, barely remaining aloft. Not far from her, Rad lay wedged in a tangle of bushes, her tail and the rump attached to it were all that were visible.

“Arugh!” Rad tried to follow that statement with one that contained words but all that came up were stray leaves.

“Warned you,” Primo guffawed.

“I was doing fine till I couldn’t see anything but your rainbow butt light in my face.”

Primo stopped still, even forgetting to flap for a moment after that statement. She collapsed on the ground and let out a reply. “Phfffffff! Hahaha! ‘Rainbow butt light’! I’ll have to remember that one!”

There was rustling as Rad tried to free herself from the shrubbery, managing only to lodge herself deeper till it was only her tail showing.

“Oh, hay, let me help you there,” Primo called before grabbing Rad’s tail in her mouth.

“Whoa! W-what are you doing?!”

“Wifding uu out of dere,” Primo replied through her teeth, flying higher to pull her double out of the green prison.

Once free, a disheveled Rad flapped her own wings, pulling away, turning, and snapping her tail free of Primo’s dental grasp before addressing her twin, “We’re doing it again!”

Primo gained a bit more altitude and looked back to the train. “You should rest up a bit before another attempt, and I don’t think we have time. I don’t want you getting hurt.”

“It’s now or never! You heard Twi. Once we’re back to town, we’re going through the portal and can’t come back until college or ever.”

“Yeah, that bites, but you did already manage a rainboom today, even if it was—”

“With help!” Rad finished for her. “I need to do one from scratch.”

“But we need to be at the station when the train arrives in Ponyville, and there’s other cool stuff we can do instead.”

“But the Rainboom is your signature stunt!”

“The Sonic Rainboom is one of my signature stunts. I have more. Being a Wonderbolt isn’t just for the title you know.”

Rad didn’t grace that with a reply and simply shot upward, gaining altitude for another attempt.

Primo watched with a groan. “So this is why Twilight gives me that look all the time.” Sighing, she took off after Rad, calling out to her, “We still need to fix those feathers!”


*** 

 ***


Twilight quickly lit her horn, grabbing Scootaloo’s hind legs whose front dangled out the now opened train window to get a better look at the Rainbow Dashes climbing into the sky.

“They're gonna try again! They're gonna try again!”

As she and Spike struggled to keep the fanfilly from going splat, elsewhere in the train, the other occupants had returned to their conversations.

The three members of the Apple families across dimensional barriers were locked into tear-filled revelations of family members lost on only one side of the portal. Apple Bloom was in the middle of their three pony hug.

Several benches over, the Fluttershies decided to try confronting Peachie Pie again.

Though it was necessary to unmask her disguise first.

Sitting on the bench the Pinkies had been on before now only contained Shindy reading a recipe notebook book made of old style parchment, rather than machine processed paper.

The next bench over contained a pink pony with a full beard beard and mustache. This facial hair was pink and very curly.

On closer inspection, it was really just a mane pulled forward to cover the pony’s face.

Such a trick wouldn’t work on a Fluttershy.

They were quite familiar with it.

“Peachie,” Posey addressed the obvious Pinkie Pie in disguise.

“Peachie?” she replied in a deep voice. “I don’t know of any ‘Peachie’. My name is … uh, Kumquat. Kumquat Soufflé.”

“Kumquats are orange,” Posey deadpanned.

Kumquat gasped, “How dare you, good madam? I’ll have you know I’ve been dyed this color against my will! There I was in the trenches, fighting off an army of parasprites dipped in paint! I fought bravely but my trombone was bent beyond recognition!”

Posey slapped a hoof to her face.

“Pinkie!” asserted Butterfly.

“What?!” Shindy called out.

“”The other one!”” the Fluttershies called back.

“Oh! Okay, never mind.”

The Fluttershies turned to each other. ““We do know it’s this one, right?””

They looked back at the pink pony with “facial hair” then at each other and spoke at the same time.


“You should go check with the other one.”
“I’ll should go check with the other one.”


They nodded and Butterfly trotted up to Shindy, leaving Posey behind who sat beside the other pink one and spoke in her usual calm, gentle tone.

“We know it’s you, Peachie. Or at least we know you’re one of our two Pinkie Pies. So please talk to me. We’re worried about what Twilight said earlier. Have you been through the portal?”

Peachie sighed and let go of her mane. The mustache and beard returned to their normal mass of head curls. “How’d you know it was me?”

Posey rolled her eyes and was about to answer when, again, a ring of sound and rainbow light exploded out from outside the train.

“SONIC RAINBOOM!” Scootaloo again shouted in glee, nearly falling out the open window before Spike and Twilight pulled her back in with a thump as the younger two flopped onto the bench.

Scootaloo immediately returned to her window, which Twilight’s magic had already closed, and zeroed in on the blue blur without the rainbow trail behind it. “Come on, come on, come on, come on!”

The other ponies turned to watch, cheering on their friend.

Seconds passed. Some noticed that this time it seemed the two blue specs had been flying side-by-side rather than one in front of the other.

The initial ring of light had nearly faded.

And they continued to watch.

The very air seemed to hang.

Till a second ring of sound and rainbow light exploded out from behind their other distant blue friend.

“DOUBLE RAINBOOM!” Scootaloo screamed. “IT’S A DOUBLE RAINBOOM! A DOUBLE RAINBOOM! WHOOO-HOOO!”

Cheers and whistles erupted in the train car. The native ponies stomping their hooves on the floor or benches, while the visitors either pronked in place or sat and clapped.

Outside, the pair of rainbow trails spun and twirled together, turning this way and that, chasing each other and making designs. At one point, they turned north and zoomed just above the train tracks, flying by the train, rocketing up into the sky, and making a full arch back toward the south.

Scootaloo’s eyes misted up as a look of profound contentment washed over her face. “Double Rainboom all the way across the sky.”


*** 

 ***


“YYEAAAAAAAAAAAAAHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHH!”

“YOU DID IT!”

“WHOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO!”

“AWESOME!”

“HA-HAAA!”

“HOO-AH”

The two Rainbows shouted back and forth between bouts of laughter and pulling tricks, writing rainbows in the sky.

They had buzzed the train where their friends were slowly making their way toward Ponyville. They had made two magic rainbows in the sky more vibrant than any optical or liquid rainbow could match. They set off south to the town, showing just how much faster than a train they both were. They raced each other till they hit the town limits and pulled up to avoid property damage.

Each would later claim she won.

They drew their rainbow trails all the way up past the clouds, wrapped around them, and back down, tying the clouds into a rainbow net. They wrote their names and nicknames in the sky.

Rad won, but Primo called cheating so Rad added two exclamation points to make the number of characters even.

Both would later claim to be the winner of that competition as well.

Dropping below the clouds, they found themselves above Ponyville and happily drew a twin spiral all around, centered above Twilight’s palace.

Ponies all over town stopped what they were doing to look up and watch.

They played tag.

Rainbow laser tag in the sky.

Ponies watched as the two flew around like ping-pong balls if ping-pong balls played tag.

Finally, the rainboom became too difficult to keep up, the strain on their wings becoming more and more strenuous, and Primo took the lead—after some difficulty getting it back from Rad that she would never admit—and shot up to her cloud house over southern Ponyville where they both collapsed on her front stratus.

“… That—”
“…… was—”
““……… awesome!””


*** 

 ***


Scootaloo’s buzzing wings nearly turned the train car into a wind tunnel as she watched the Rainbows rainbow the sky like colorful toilet parchment in trees on Nightmare Night.

The other ponies and dragon watched the display with smiles on their faces ranging from simple congratulations for their friend, to the depths of spectacular inspiration.

““Idea!”” the Rarities singsonged. Renae took out the sketchbook she had borrowed from Share’s Ponyville boutique as well as a pair of pencils and they began furiously sketching designs.

The Applejacks watched in awe until they came to a horrible realization. ““Y’all know they’re gonna be insufferable after this, right?””

Twilight, working with Spike to keep Scootaloo from merging or phasing through the train window from sheer determination, answered back, “We’ll be hearing about it for months on both sides of the portal.”

“You think Rad’ll have much energy left to help look for Sunset after all that?” asked Spike.

“Absolutely not,” Twilight shook her head. “Unless her geode helps even when she’s tired.”

“Oooh! I’ll bake her a super energy-filled box of scones to keep her stay running fast before you all go through the portal,” Peachie offered, pronking in excitement.

"And I can bake another in the school kitchen after we go through!" Shindy added.

As the other ponies all continued the rapid conversations, Posey and Butterfly again came up alongside Peachie Pie.

““Ahem,”” they attempted to interrogate her for a third time.

“Meep,” Peachie squeaked, freezing in mid-pronk.

Butterfly did a double-take at Peachie’s lack of contact with the floor—given her lack of wings—but Posey simply got behind Peachie, bit the end of her tail—only to find a squeaky toy for Gummy and had to try again—then dragged her away from the rest of the group.

Now with privacy, and Peachie falling back to the floor in a pile, the Fluttershies each lay down beside Peachie and laid a gentle forehoof over hers.

““Please, Peachie. Tell us. Have you been through the portal or not?””

Peachie slumped further. “Yeah,” she relented.

““It’s okay, Peachie.””

“But—“

““You didn’t know.””

“I just wanted to deliver the cake.”

““What cake?””

“To celebrate the one year anniversary of Sunset Shimmer not being evil anymore.”

Posey turned a questioning eye to Butterfly who tilted her head and looked at the window Shindy had been watching the Rainbows through.

She had just enough time to realize that Shindy was no longer there when—

“Hiya!”

—she was surprised by Shindy appearing between her and Posey. “”Eep!””

“I wondered where that cake came from,” Shindy commented while stroking her chin fur.

“Pin—Shindy,” Butterfly addressed her, “I thought you made that cake for Sunset.”

“Nah, I was about to make one just like it, but then I just found this mysterious cake on the sidewalk outside the school one day and I was like, ‘yay! Free cake’! And it was decorated for the party and everything; and sooo good too!”

“I was hoping you’d like it!” Peachie cheered. “I make them for all our reformed villains. I even send them to Tirek in Taurtarus. His say something different though. With our reformed villains like Sunset and Starlight and Discord and Fizzlepop and Luna, the cakes say stuff like, ‘Happy X years of being our friend instead of a horrible evil villain bent on world domination or whatever it was you were trying to do while you were not nice,’ while Tirek’s say, ‘Happy another year in jail for still being a mean-ol’ evilpants instead of a nice guy! Let us know if you ever want to be friends and we can hang out everyday and do all sorts of fun things all the time!’ “

“That’s so nice of you,” cheered Shindy. “I do the same for ours!”

The Fluttershies blinked. “There’s so much about that statement that I’m not sure where to begin,” Posey sorted through her thoughts.

“Tartarus?” asked Butterfly.

“Um, yeah. How did you get into Tartarus?”

“How do we do anything we do?” Shindy replied, giving Peachie a knowing smirk with a side of giggles, both of which were returned.

Posey opened her mouth to reply but was cut off by Peachie, “You should probably leave it at that."

“Shindy,” Butterfly took over, “so, you found that cake just sitting outside and you took it for our party?”

“Yeah, why not?”Shindy shrugged.

“You weren’t worried about it?”

“Why would I be worried about cake? It’s not like it was on the ground, it was on a cart! And it was even Sunset’s favorite. Strawberry angel food with royal icing and topped with oats. The lettering was made with drizzled hot fudge! I mean, come on! What’s that saying Applejack uses? Don’t look a gift horse in the mouth?”

Butterfly’s eyes widened and a worried cringe grew on her face.

“What does ‘gift horse’ mean?” asked Posey.

“I bet they mean Santa Hooves!” Peachie suggested.

“Um,” Butterfly smiled nervously, eyes flicking between the two native equines in their group of four.

“He works for Aurora, Bori, and Alice, the secret Gift Givers of the Grove.”

“Uh, sure. That’s it,” Butterfly chuckled.

“Why would we look him in the mouth? Does he need a dentist? I could refer him to Minuette, she’s great!”

“Uh, well …,” Butterfly cleared her throat, “so you’ve only been through the portal twice. We’ll just tell Twilight to add two to the total uses and I’m sure that won’t make a big deal.”

“Well … twice for that cake.”

The fluttershies’s ears drooped. “”How many cakes?””

“Just that one!”

The Fluttershies let out a relieved sigh.

“But I also sent three cupcakes for those sirens and one pie for their Twily!”

“”Oh dear. So, you used the portal six times?””

“… Eight.”

“What were the other two for?” asked Shindy. “I don’t remember any other surprise sidewalk pastries.”

“Oh! I tripped.”

““You tripped?”” asked the Fluttershies.

“Yeah. I was about to go through with Sunset’s cake but I tripped and fell into the portal without it, then decided to walk around and explore for a while, came back through to get the cake, then a third time to deliver it, then a fourth to come home. Is eight times too many?”

The Fluttershies sighed and looked to each other, then to Twilight. Since the rainboom show had ended, Scootaloo was no longer at risk of passing through the window and Twilight had been free to return to her bench and stare worriedly at Sunset’s silent journal. “”We’ll have to ask..””

Seeing the expression on Peachie's face drop, the Fluttershies stepped up to her for a hug. Peachie smiled brightly, and added a giggle when Shindy joined in.

Ending the hug, the Fluttershies smiled to the Pinkies and nodded at each other before walking up to Twilight.

Peachie wiped a pastern across her forehead and relaxed, thinking to herself, "At least they didn't ask what happened on that walk I took."

Shindy gave her an inquisitive look but Peachie fed her another Nana pill before she could say anything.

Crossing the distance to Twilight, the Fluttershies let their own relieved sighs, ""It could have been worse.""

As if noticing the eyes on her, or perhaps hearing a set of well used famous last words, Twilight looked up. “Oh! Fluttershies, I just remembered something Primo told me when she scouted Ponyville earlier.” Twilight stood up and addressed all the visitors. “Butterfly, Shindy, Jackie, Renae …”

Twilight waited a moment for her friends to listen up. Butterfly and Shindy were already alert, Jackie broke from another interdenominational family hug and tapped Renae to get her attention away from an intricate drawing.

“Thank you. When Primo investigated Rad’s rainboom—“

“WHOOO!”

“Thank you, Scootaloo—she noticed that Flutt—Posey’s animals seemed to be patrolling her land with torches? Do any of you know what that’s about?”

“What?!” Posey shrieked in horror.

“Oh my goodness!” Butterfly squeaked in equal horror. “I forgot about that.”


*** 

 ***


“So, what do you think?”

“This is awesome, and so totally crazy!” Rad answered while pronking on the slightly bouncy floor of Primo’s cloud foyer. “This is all made from clouds? But this floor isn’t as bouncy as your, er, lawn. How does that work?”

“Different types of clouds and different bonding magic. You’d have to ask ‘Shy’s dad, he worked in the factory. Or ask Twi. I bet she’d know.”

“Huh. In our world ‘Shy’s dad worked in a cotton mill not as a … carpenter? Cloudenter?"

“Hang on a sec, I’m gonna go see Tank while I’m here.”

“Tank? You have a tank? Wait! You mean ‘Tank’? Tortoise Tank?”

“Yeah, you too? That’s awesome! Come on!”

“What’s he like in your world? Is he like a fire-breathing rock monster or golem? Can he fly? He’s gotta fly in a cloud house!”

Primo chucked, opening a door with a pet flap cut into it, “He can fly.”

Rad followed her into the room, preparing herself to see something out of those old, black and white, Neighpanese giant turtle movies, and saw before her a pet bed and … a tortoise shell with a propeller on top.

“That’s the same as he looks in my world!”

“Really? Cool!” Primo called back.

“Well, except the propeller. I don’t get it, Spike the dog is a dragon here. Why’s Tank still a tortoise?”

“Would you want him to be anything else?”

“Heh,” Rad laughed with a small smile, “guess not. Tank’s already cool.”

“You hear that, Tank?” Primo called out, giving Tank’s shell a pair of taps.

Tank’s head slowly emerged from his shell and looked from Rainbow Dash to Rainbow Dash.

Slowly.

He peered closely at Primo and smiled.

Slowly.

He peered closely at Rad.

Slowly.

He closed his eyes.

He opened his eyes.

That might have been a blink.

The Rainbows stood there, forcing themselves to remain patient, a learned and calming skill for the tortoise owners. Primo stroked his shell.

Eventually Tank licked the side of Primo’s face and got a giggle out of her.

That giggle was quickly squashed and replaced with a cough and a more low key chuckle.

Rad smirked at her twin, holding the expression until she was sure Primo saw it, then joined the two of them. “Hey there, pony-world Tank. Nice to meet you.”

Tank closed his eyes.

Tank opened his eyes.

That was definitely a blink.

Then he hid back inside his shell.

“Aw,” Rad complained. “Guess we confused him, or I smell different or something. ‘Shy—er—Butterfly mentioned the same thing with Posey’s animals.”

“That or he’s still getting adjusted to Spring. He was hibernating not too long ago. Still takes a lotta naps during the day if nothing’s going on. Come on, I’ll show you my Daring Do collection!”

“Yeah!”

In the next room over, Rad gawked. “Whoa. It’s so clean.”

The bedroom, while far from spotless, was clear of laundry—clean or dirty—on the floor and other surfaces, nor were there trophies, books, toys, or dirty dishes spread around. There were some bed stands, a bookcase, and posters on the wall, but everything was filed, more or less, into what seemed like their proper places.

“Yeah,” Primo called back, “kinda have to be in a cloud house. Put the wrong thing on the floor and it’ll end up in the basement if you’re lucky, or smashed on the ground waaay below if you’re not.  And they drift too.”

“There’s a basement?”

“It’s an under-hang for storage.”

“But, wait,” Rad closed her eyes and scratched her head a moment, “you have a bed. How’s that not falling through the floor?”

“It’s made of clouds.”

“And the rugs?”

“Clouds.”

“The bedstand?”

“Clouds.”

“The posters?”

“Parchment, but hung with cloud tacks.”

“Are the books and lamp made out of clouds?!”

“No, but the bookcase and bedstands have solid cloud tops.”

“Solid clouds?”

“Yep! Even Big MacIntosh could stand on them. They’re expensive though. And probably wouldn’t last long with him on there. The water would get squeezed out and they’d snap.”

“This is crazy.”

Primo looked around her bedroom. “Why? Are clouds really thin in your world?”

“Clouds are just water vapor in my world!”

“Your world really needs to improve their cloud factories.”

“ ‘Cloud factories’,” Rad repeated, jaw not quite wanting to stay closed. "Where you turn clouds into houses?"

“No. Where clouds are made and sculpted.”

Rad blinked a few times. “Huh. You make your own clouds. Cool. Wait. What about a bathroom?”

“Oh, it’s down the hall.”

“No, I mean, how does it work?”

“How does what work? It’s a bathroom. You use it and flush.”

“But where do you flush it to?”

“The storage tank in the basement.”

“Okay, but what about when it’s full?”

“The sewage service dumps it into a cloud cart to bring it to a treatment plant every week.”

“Sewage service, fine, but what about the sinks and shower? Where do you get the clean water?”

Primo blinked at her blankly. “I live in a cloud. There’s water. If the place starts to shrink, I just rain a regular cloud on the attic.

“But—“

“Condensers run all the way from the attic to pipes in the bathroom and kitchen.”

“You have a cloud kitchen. Wait. Is there a stove and stuff?”

“I have a solar hearth.”

“Fridge and freezer?”

“You mean an icebox? Yeah.”

“What about a microwave?”

“A what?”

“Ha!” Rad shouted her victory.

“What’s a microwave?”

“It’s what lets you take a frozen pizza out of the freezer and cook it in two minutes!”

“No way! That’s awesome!”

“It’s not just awesome, it’s a way of life!”

“No kidding! That would change everything! Or it would if I wasn’t so close to Pinkie and Applejack, and have a ton of meals at the Academy and Twi’s palace all the time.” Primo thought for a moment. “Actually, I can’t remember the last time I even used my kitchen." She cringed. “I think I might need to clean out the icebox.”

Rad stood there, still a bit amazed by the revelations of cloud-based living, but snapped out of it, remembering why they had come into Primo’s bedroom to begin with. “You said Daring Do collection?”

“Oh, right. And show you how to preen.”

Rad looked to her wings. “You know, I don’t think it matters. I’ll lose these when I go through the portal, and they grow back when I pony-up on the other side. I think I get all new feathers each time. So I say we spend our time doing more important things.”

“In that case, I have an idea.”

“Another competition?!” Rad cheered, getting into an action-ready stance.

“Sort of,” Primo smiled devilishly. “It’s something I know we’ve both been thinking about since we first saw each other.”

“Yes! You’re on.”

Primo copied Rad’s stance.

Rushed forward.

And kissed her full on the lips.


*** 

 ***


“I’m so sorry, Posey. You need to talk to your animals right away,” said Butterfly.

“Oh, no, what’s wrong?” Posey cried.

“I think I gave them the wrong idea. They realized I wasn’t you and maybe they thought I was dangerous. They ran me out of your cottage.”

Posey gasped. “What happened then?”

“I got chased into this really scary forest—“

““You went in the Everfree?!”” multiple voices yelled out.

Butterfly meeped and ducked behind her mane. “Was that bad?”

“That’s a dangerous place if you don’t know the right paths!” Posey walked up to Butterfly and patted her mane to soothe her. “It’s a good thing it was during the day. Most of the more dangerous animals there are nocturnal. How did you get out?”

Butterfly smiled at Posey’s touch and took a steadying breath. “Well, I got chased by a lot of these giant wolves that were made of trees.”

“Timberwolves?!” cried Ponyjack.

“Oh is that what they’re called? That seems fitting. Well, I ran and flew as fast as I could, then Rad did that rainboom. That startled them, and me really, but I turned toward it and made it back to town. They were right behind me but Rad scared them off and I saw these ponies in spacesuits—“

““Spacesuits?!”” came another yell from many voices.

“I’ve always wanted to go to space,” commented Peachie.

“Me too!” added Shindy. “I even called NASA with some ideas, but they said a super massive giant honkingly big party canon wasn’t a safe option and turned down my blueprints. I bet it didn’t help that they were actually pinkprints and drawn with glitter pens. Colored markers would have been more professional.”

Butterfly put a foreleg around Shindy’s withers. “Or hazmat suits maybe? They were by the stream, so maybe they were diving suits? But I flew around them fast, so I didn’t get a good look, and made it to Twi’s palace where Jackie and Renae were, and then we helped Rad escape the hospital.”

“Escape the hospital?” Twilight queried.

“She crashed into it and we were worried they might dissect her if your government realized she wasn’t a pony.”

“W-what, why—?“

“Sunset,” Renae joined in, “poor dear, got hurt in our world not long after the Fall Formal and we decided it might be prudent to—“

“Get her out of the hospital so the scientists wouldn’t dissect her like they do with aliens in all the movies!” Shindy rushed.

Butterfly nodded. “So, um, when Rad got in the hospital here, well, by then things had gotten a bit crazy, so maybe we weren’t thinking with clear heads.”

“Thankfully, we had figured out you were all in the big city on the mountain and got on the train,” Jackie finished.

The native ponies looked around with varying degrees of shock and confusion while the visitors were more on the side of embarrassment.

“Well,” said Twilight, “I’m pretty sure things have calmed down since then, and we’ll smooth out any wrinkles left over once we get you all back to your world.” She turned to the three fillies. “Do any of you know about the spacesuits?”

Sweetie shook her head, “I was working at the boutique.”

“Ah was on the farm,” added Apple Bloom.

“I helped Rainbow, uh, Rad—such an awesome name!—pull off her first of now TWO rainbooms, and then I went to brag about it to Apple Bloom and Sweetie Belle and brought them to the train station!” Scootaloo gushed.

“Ah thought they looked more like hazmat suits,” Jackie offered.

“Next stop, Ponyville,” came an announcement. “Home of Princess Twilight Sparkle, the Princess of Friendship.”

Twilight blushed. “They don’t say that when I’m not actually on the train, right?”

Posey hummed from behind her mane. Share giggled quietly. Ponyjack nodded. “Every time!” cheered Peachie.

“Mayor Mare said it would increase tourism,” explained Ponyjack.

“Great,” Twilight deadpanned right before a thump hit the side of the train.

They all turned to see a Rainbow Dash splat flat against one of the train windows.

“RAINBOW DASH!” cried Scootaloo, rushing up to open the window.

Rainbow poured in, falling on the floor, and eventually rolling over to reveal her name tag, still stuck to her even after the successful rainboom, the failed rainboom, and getting tossed into an unsuspecting bush at near rainboom speeds.

The Canterlot Royal Treasury buys only the best furclips after all.

“RAD!” Scootaloo shouted down at the panting pegasus. “You did another rainboom and without the slingshot!”

“H-hey, squirt,” Rad breathed. “I did. How’d you get here?”

“You okay, Rad?” asked Twilight.

““Wow,”” giggled the Pinkies, “”you look like you’ve been working hard! What you been doing after that rainboom?””

Rad blushed and there was another thump as Primo grabbed the open window and quickly pulled herself inside. “Uh, nothing?” Rad squeaked.

Primo gave Rad a glance, scoffed, and trotted off to a bench.

Twilight tilted her head. “Everything okay, Rainbows?”

“Yeah! Everything’s fine!” insisted Rad.

“Yep,” Primo grumped from her bench. Following that up with a mutter too quiet for the others to hear, “ ‘You’re a horse’. Yeah, well, you look in a mirror lately?”

“O…kay?” Twilight responded as the train began to slow down. “Well, now that we’re all together and back in Ponyville, it’s just a short trot to the palace and we can get on to helping Sunset.”

“And we’ll walk with you to send you off, darlings,” Share added.

The other native ponies, besides Primo, joined in with their own affirmations and hugs.

“Ah’m sure things will be right as rain from here on out,” Ponyjack told her counterpart in a tight hug.

The train doors opened up and the group stepped onto the platform.

“Aaaahhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhh!” a mare screamed, running past them onto the train, stopping only briefly, while still running in place, to show her ticket to the conductor. “Run for your lives!”

Several more ponies arrived in her wake.

Dumbfounded, the group stepped off to the side to let them pass, then turned in the direction of the center of town.

Ponies were running in every direction.

Homes and businesses were slamming closed their doors and shutters.

“They’re everywhere!” came another shout as a stallion dived into a bush.

They all slowly looked to Twilight who sighed.

“Figures.”




> MEANWHILE: S.M.I.L.E. You Got Doughnuts
> --------------------------------------------------------------------------

11:50am

“I can’t find Trixie anywhere, just some tracks left by her caravan. I followed them for a while, but it looks like she left town fast.”

“And the flower trio seem to have vanished as well.”

While waiting the hour for their train to Canterlot, Special Agents Heartstrings and Sweetie Drops had split up again to tend to some investigations, and a late brunch on the go, before rendezvousing back a short distance away from the Ponyville train station.

Agent Sweetie Drops pulled a watch out of her poofy clown mane and noted they had about ten minutes before their train was set to arrive.

“Did you get through to Hidequarters?” Agent Heartstrings asked her.

Drops shook her head. “Too far for communicators, horse code flashes are too conspicuous, and I tried the landline, but it was busy.”

“Busy?”

“They only have one hard line that can be reached from Ponyville. You think they’d establish more now that there’s a princess, an international university with quite a bit of political clout, and all of F.R.O.W.N. living here. But apparently it’s too hard to hide the cables between here and Canterlot.”

Heartstrings tilted her head. “They don’t work on magic?”

“Too easy to detect, so somepony figured out how to talk through cables, but you have to bury them where nopony’s going to look.”

“Talking through cables? Weird.”

To the south a train whistle blared.

“Time to go!” Drops called, starting her way toward the station.

Heartstrings followed after her. “Did you manage to find who caused that second rainboom?”

“No. Could have been the real Rainbow Dash or an impostor, but it looked like it came from in Canterlot. She, or whoever it was, landed just a minute ago somewhere near Sweet Apple Acres, but we don’t have time to check and get on the train. Hopefully Agent Diablo will keep watch.”


*** *** ***


“So what’s the plan, boss?” Heartstrings asked after noting the lack of passengers in their train car and picking a bench to sit on.

Drops looked back to her and rolled her eyes. “Lyra, you’re a businessmare. Act professional.”

Heartstrings looked down at her prim business suit disguise. “I am,” she argued.

Drops chuckled. “You’ll have to act like a normal pony while you’re in disguise or everypony will know who you are. Good to practice now while we’re alone.”

“I’m normal!”

“Only when Pinkie is in the room for comparison, but I was referring to how you sit.”

Heartstrings stuck out her tongue but shifted from her usual pose to lay herself down into a more standard pony lounge.

“So, what is the plan?” she asked more seriously.

“We’ll report to S.M.I.L.E. operatives in Canterlot and request some backup. We can’t keep track of all five known impostors with just the two of us.”

“Who we calling?”

“Agent Mane. Con Mane.”

“That’s a new one for me.”

“Big guy, a bit gruff on the outside but actually very sweet. Works as a baker for a cover.”

“S.M.I.L.E. must really like sweets. First you and your candy store, now a baker too?”

Drops paused a moment. “Huh. Now that you mention it, I was recruited not long after I got my cutie mark. And we do have a lot of confectioners for field agents. I always thought it was the unassuming cover, but the hidequarter heads do have us exercise our ‘official’ talents in the kitchens fairly often.”

“Your bon bons are pretty good.”

Both agents broke into giggles which were cut off by an explosion of sound and rainbow light.

“What?! Again?!” shouted Drops, heading for the window.

“Was that another rainboom?”

Through the windows, sure enough, was a ring of rainbow light and a rainbow trail starting from Ponyville and streaking overhead toward them.

A moment later, it passed by, heading directly for Canterlot.

“You think that was the real Rainbow Dash or Pseudo Dash?” asked Heartstrings.

“Or A Pseudo Dash. Could be more than one. But it was probably the real one making a quick round trip from Canterlot trying to find out what made the first one today. She has an ego to protect after all.”

“So F.R.O.W.N. might know of the impostors now.”

“Well, if that was the real Dash, she missed the fake one because she’s on the train ahead of us, so they might know something’s up, but not what,” Drops speculated. “No way of knowing until we do some investigating in Canterlot.”

Heartstrings hummed in agreement. “In the meantime, we’re all stuck in our respective trains.”

“Yep.”

“So, how do you want to pass the time?” Heartstrings asked and waited for Drops to look over and find a familiar smirk. “Clown Catcher wants to catch her clown.”


*** *** ***


“Eakkkkkkkkkkkkkk!” Heartstrings screamed, noticing movement over the shoulder of the best friend in her lap.

Outside the train windows were a pair of dark creatures matching speed with the train and just … staring back at them.

“What?!” cried Drops, turning her head.

For an answer, Heartstrings simply pushed and Drops tumbled, falling to the floor of the train on her back.

“Oh, they’ve seen us!” one of the creatures gasped right before the two of them flew away.

Drops flipped back onto her hooves and got to her partner’s side. “What were those?” she whispered.

“Don’t ask me! You’re the monster hunter! Were they changelings?”

“I didn’t get a good look but I don’t think they were changelings. Niriks without the fire maybe? Didn’t think they had wings though.”

“You think they’re with the impostors we’ve been following or something else?”

Drops inched up to the window and looked out at various angles. “If they are then they probably know we’re following them.”

Heartstrings cringed and went to a window on the opposite side of the train. “If that’s the case, what do we do?”

“If our cover’s been blown we’ll need new disguises.”


*** *** ***


Fresh from the the Will of Iron Costume Shop, a magenta unicorn with a violet mane and a catcher’s mitt cutie mark, and a white earth pony in a yellow summer hat and glasses with a boat for a cutie mark trotted out of Canterlot’s largest shopping district.

“Did we have to dye my horn too?” Heartstrings grumbled.

“How many unicorns do you know with a horn that doesn’t match their fur?” Drops answered.

“It’s sticky!” Heartstrings tapped her hoof against it a few times.

Drop pulled down on her summer hat to keep it from escaping her curly mane. “It’ll dry faster if you channel some magic.”

Heartstrings lit her horn and cringed. “It feels weird and I look like Amethyst.”

“Didn’t you used to have a crush on her?”

“What?! Of course not, we’re practically twins. That'd be like Moondancer having a crush on Twilight.” Heartstrings tapped her chin. "Actually …."

Drops smirked and stepped up to the plate, “Are you sure that’s not why you chose purple and rose?”

“She’s magenta and violet.”

“Ha!” Home run.

“T-that doesn’t mean anything.”

Drops giggled and led her partner on, speaking in a Trottingham accent, “By the way, if anypony asks, my name is Bon Voyage and I’m here on holiday.”

“Uh, oh, uh,” Heartstrings hummed. “And I’m, Star Catcher?”

“That works. Backstory?”

“Oh! I’m an astronomer here to use the new observatory to track a recently discovered comet. You and I met on the train and hit it off.”

“New observatory?”

“It was mentioned in the Ancient Aliens magazine last month.”

“Of course,” Drops giggled. “Good work. But, you know, calling yourself Star means you’re still thinking of Amethyst,” she teased.

Though it was hard to tell through the dyed fur, Heartstrings blushed. “H-hay, look! Joe’s Doughnuts! How about a snack?”

“Saved by the doughnut,” Drops giggled.

“Lemon Hearts used to bring us here all the time. Spike loved the place, I think one of his first words was doughnut. He was still in diapers.”

“Cute.” Approaching the shop, Drops switched back to her Trottingham accent. “I believe a snack would indeed hit the spot right now.”

“You ever been here before?”

“Oh, a few times, dear.”

Heading straight for the counter, the two agents took neighboring stools and looked over the shop’s offerings. Heartstrings perked up when Doughnut Joe himself appeared and was about to greet him when she recalled she was in disguise.

“Excuse me, sir?” Drops called instead, getting his attention and pointing to her partner. “Might I make a special order for my new friend here?”

“Why of course you can, ladies,” Joe called back, trotting up to them.

“I would like a pair of ginger curd doughnuts.”

“Ah, a Manechester staple. You lass here on holiday?”

“Oh, I get around. I suppose you could say I’m everywhere and I’m nowhere.”

There was a slight pause. Joe flicked his eyes over the two agents before Drops continued. “And would you be a dear and draw a smile on each?”

Joe nodded. “I’ll get right on that. Might be a while though since I’ll have to bake them from scratch.”

“In that case, we’ll go freshen up. Take your time.”

Joe began trotting off and called back, “See you girls in a bit.”

Once Joe had gone into the back, Drops nodded to Heartstrings. “That was a long train ride after all,” she giggled shyly, getting up to head for the bathroom. “Shall we?”

Heartstrings tilted her head. “I went before I got on the train and I think I see a cruller on display with my name on it.”

Drops looked around the shop, seeing close to a dozen customers, and cleared her throat, nodding toward the bathroom. “Yes, but the fresh order I made will be well worth the wait, I assure you.”

“I bet! Love fresh doughnuts! But, I really want that cruller while we wait.”

A cashier overheard the conversation and trotted over. “Which one were you looking at?”

“Second from the bottom with the chocolate glaze and—“

“Actually,” Drops cut her off, “I believe we ought to head for the mares’ room first.”

“But I want the cruller before the fresh doughnuts. Can’t have a cold treat after a fresh one. That’ll just make the cold one feel like a let down.”

“We could heat it up for you, miss,” encouraged the cashier.

“Yes, see?” Drops pressed. “She’ll heat it up and you can order it after we powder our muzzles.”

“But my stomach’s more empty than my bladder is full.”

“Star Catcher,” Drops tried not to hiss, “I need you in the bathroom.”

Heartstrings tilted her head. “Why would you need me in the …,” she trailed off as a blush formed.

Drops slapped a forehoof to her face. Then, getting a look around the dining room and seeing more than a few ponies looking back at her, developed a matching blush. “It was a long train ride,” she announced and trotted off to the restroom room.

Heartstrings looked around and chuckled nervously at the staring ponies, including the cashier who frowned back at her, and quickly followed after her partner.

Once in the bathroom Heartstrings leaned in and whispered, “Sorry. I never thought you’d want to—“

But Drops bit Heartstrings’s tail and began dragging her to a far stall before she was able to finish. “Whoa! Where did this come from? The fur color, the doughnuts? I thought they gave you gas.”

By the far wall, Drops spit out her partner’s tail and gagged, “Bleagh! The dye’s still got that ‘fresh’ taste to it.”

Drops then turned and pushed on two of the bathroom’s wall tiles, causing a third to flip up, revealing a light. She placed her eye in front of the light and a moment later a piece of the floor lowered in tiers, forming into a staircase.

Heartstrings watched the floor fall away, looked to Drops, then the staircase, then Drops, then the staircase.

“Oh.”

Drops rolled her eyes and started down. "And doughnuts do not give me gas."

Heartstrings sheepishly followed her.

As they descended to the secret lower floor, lights came on and the staircase returned to normal.

“So, is this S.M.I.L.E.’s Canterlot hidequarters?”

“No, that’s been shuttered … as far as I know at least … since the bugbear escaped. This is just a meeting place.”

“We’re going to call Agent Mane from here?”

“Already have. He was upstairs.”

Heartstrings perked up her ears in surprise. “Wait! Wait, wait, wait!” she gushed.

“What am I waiting for?”

“No way! Doughnut Joe is a S.M.I.L.E. agent?”

With a grin, Drops simply nodded.

Heartstrings gasped and jumped on her hooves, repeatedly pronking in place. “That’s amazing! All those years at PCSGU and I never knew. Think he’ll give us free doughnuts since we’re fellow agents? They’re so good!”

“Glad you like them,” came a boisterous voice.

Heartstrings trotted around the corner out of the hallway and into a sizable conference room. The familiar Joe stood by with a cart of doughnuts and coffee. “Doughnut Joe!” she cheered. “It’s been a while.”

Joe looked back at her with a smile. “Sure has, Amethyst. Good to see you again. But when did you become an agent?”

Drops chuckled, getting Heartstrings to blush.

“It’s Lyra, actually,” Heartstrings explained. “Lyra Heartstrings. Agent Heartstrings. I’m in disguise.”

“Lyra! Ah, yes. You’re normally green, like a light pistachio, used to hang out with Twinkleshine’s group and our new princess. How’s Spike?”

“He seems to be his usual cheerful self, really busy too with being ambassador to the dragon lands, working with Twilight’s school, and, well, everything else Twilight needs.”

“The usual, eh?”

“Pretty much.”

Joe then turned to the also disguised Drops. “So that makes you Agent Drops?” Drops nodded. “Heard you got your best friend recruited a while back. How’d you pull that off with the bigwigs?”

Drops chuckled, “It’s a long story. I’ll have to fill you in sometime.”

“Eeee!” Lyra cheered, getting a look at the doughnut cart. “You brought your new Super Sprinkles! Come on, Drops, you have to try these, there’s so much flavor in them!”

Drops cantered over, still chuckling, “I know. Thanks to Joe’s cover, anytime we had to trade info we’d just make a large order for an excuse for him to come to hidequarters. But sometimes we actually just wanted the food.”

“And the National Dessert Competition is an excellent excuse to travel Equestria every few months,” Joe added.

“Yeah,” agreed Heartstrings, lifting a doughnut in her magic, “Pinkie told me about teaming up with you right before the royal wedding.”

Joe nodded. “That was a close one, actually. Almost outed me for all of F.R.O.W.N.”

“What happened?”

“Well, Pinkie and I had crossed paths in baking competitions before and she found out my S.M.I.L.E. connections so we had to RefDef her.”

“Whoa! Did the Reflection Deflection actually work on Pinkie?”

“It seemed to block her memories correctly then. But when we met before the wedding, she somehow revealed the whole thing. Thankfully the rest of F.R.O.W.N. just thought she was imagining it. Residual images I suppose.”

Eyeing a doughnut for herself, Drops added, “Thank Celestia for the phrase, ‘Just Pinkie being Pinkie’.”

Once Drops had picked a doughnut, and as Heartstrings started in on the second to be captured in her magic, Joe decided to start business. “So, are you two here about the Ponyville trouble or is this just a social call? Another wedding to announce? I cater!”

The other two agents choked.

“P-Ponyville,” Drops stuttered, working her food down. “We have reason to believe there may have been some sort of Changeling operation there. Though possibly not expressly sanctioned by Chrysalis. Possibly even unplanned.”

“That’s not what I heard. Changelings, yeah, but not the rest.”

“What have you heard?” asked Heartstrings. “And, come to think about it, how have you heard?”

“I’m the Canterlot relay this month so I’m handling all emergency communications in and out of the city. I received a telegraph over the landline, had to be maybe five or six hours ago, about changelings replacing Yellow Daisy with a request for backup and an immediate search party. I.D. was Agent Diablo.”

“Angel,” breathed Heartstrings. “That’s why the line was busy. Wait, did you say six hours ago?”

Drops groaned, “He didn’t hang up after the message. Can’t get through on that line till he does.”

“I’m surprised Ponyville still only has one line,” said Joe.

“Yes, we’ll put in a request for more later. Right now we need to update your intel. We made out five suspected changelings, all disguised as the Flower Rangers. They’ve been going around town looking for the real Rangers. Apparently they were unaware they’re here in Canterlot today, so they grabbed the train ahead of ours. They’ve all been in Canterlot now for about two hours. It’s unknown if there are more, but it’s possible Scootaloo was also copied, judging by a half overheard conversation.”

Joe frowned. “That’s not good. The Flower Rangers are all spread out right now setting up for some political events this week. Security has been raised due to some feuding ambassadors staying at the castle. Adding changelings to that mix is a recipe for disaster.”

Heartstrings’s ears flopped down. “So, what do we do?”

“We contact Agent Spear,” Joe answered. “He’s our ‘undercover liaison’ at the castle.”

“Can we call him using a communicator or those cable lines?” asked Heartstrings.

“No,” Joe shook his head. “The undercover part means all non-S.M.I.L.E. agents think he’s just Private Pointy Spear of the royal guard and he needs to keep his cover intact. They have him on guard right now so there’s no way for him to get privacy.”

“I’m disguised as a tourist,” offered Drops. “I could just ‘get lost’ and require a guard’s help finding my way.”

Suddenly a voice in a dark corner of the room spoke up, “That won’t be necessary.”

The three agents turned and saw only a vague outline hidden in the darkness.

“Ah, there you are, Agent Shiwa,” Joe greeted the figure.

Agent Shiwa stepped into the light, revealing a four-legged creature that was clearly no pony, though it was hard to tell what it was instead through its black, full body, furtight suit. The creature had long, floppy ears, a large snout with prominent nostrils, and a thin tail with a tuft of fur at the end.

Strapped to its back was what appeared to be a sheathed sword.

“Let me introduce you,” Joe continued as the creature pushed back its hood revealing her kindly, wizened face. “Shiwa’s cover is Mulia Mild, another baker, but she’s secretly one of our best kuneighichi operatives.”

“Oh you’re too kind, Joe,” charmed Shiwa. “And these two are Agents Drops and Heartstrings?”

“How do you—?” began Heartstrings.

“Trained as an infiltrator and spy, dear. I get around.”

“Speaking of which,” Joe cut in, “how’d it go with Le Grand? You catch that bounty?”

Shiwa clicked her tongue. “Afraid not. I lost that snidely scoundrel at Whiplash Cove. And then I was ordered to help oversee security here until he showed up again. But that’s a tale for another debriefing.”

Drops stepped forward. “You said that it won’t be necessary to meet with Agent Spear?”

“Yes, because I just have. Or at least I was there for a while and saw what he saw.”

“Did you tell him about the changelings?!” Heartstrings asked.

“Luckily I didn’t have to. They already showed up.”

There were gasps all around before Shiwa continued.

“But, turns out they aren’t changelings.. Heard it direct from Princess Twilight herself, though she doesn’t know I was there.”

“So what are they?”

“Friends, apparently, just through a teleportation mishap from what I was able to gather. A portal she has in her palace.”

Heartstrings glanced at Drops with a wide grin. “What kind of portal?”

“All I heard them call it was ‘the portal’. But it leads to another world apparently”—Heartstrings squealed—“My guess is it’s a Star Swirl leftover.”

Joe grunted, “Great, another one.”

“Seemed the portal was old news to them all. It just wasn’t expected they’d be showing up today, but now there’s two of each of the Flower Rangers except Purple Rose. No duplicate for Green Fern either. They exist, but they didn’t make the trip here.”

“So, we’re in the clear?” asked Joe. “Nothing to worry about?”

“For us there isn’t, but F.R.O.W.N., and their duplicates, are all heading to Ponyville to return their guests. There’s trouble in their world.”

“But what about the ambassadors?”

“Purple Rose and Green Fern won’t be back in time, but the others should just make it so long are there are no delays. There shouldn’t be. I followed them until they got on their train. So long as nothing goes wrong in Ponyville, everything will be fine.”

The other three agents in the room traded looks.

“Um, Joe,” began Heartstrings, “just how many agents responded to Diablo’s backup and search party requests?”

The look on his face was all the answer they needed.
> An Offensive Defense or A Defensive Offense?
> --------------------------------------------------------------------------

“Huurrrgh!”

PANT

“Nguugh!”

PANT

PANT

“Aarugh! This is why Trixie never carries all her supplies at once!” shrieked Trixie, still hooked to her caravan. “But after this, once Sparkle awards Trixie with her shiny and sparklin—glimmering medal, Trixie will politely and demurely request a massive storage chamber for her supplies in the royal palace! It took hours for Trixie to drag this all the way back to Ponyville! Why did that secret cave have to be so far away? And why were all those batponies in there?! So what if your ancestors carved it out? That's Trixie's secret stash cave!”

Trixie made another attempt to walk forward but her heavier-every-step-of-the-way caravan was still stuck on something.

“TRIXIE IS A MAGICIAN, NOT A PACK MULE!” she screamed before collapsing to give her legs a rest.

A disgruntled retort grabbed her attention and she looked to the side to see a pack of mules each carrying a large bundle of supplies on their backs to parts unknown from parts unknown.

“N-not that being a pack mule is a bad thing!” she quickly followed up, remembering a friendship lesson she recited to her students as a substitute.

Trixie grumbled, stood, and unhooked herself to get a better look at the problem.

One of the wheels was in a small ditch caused by wear and tear on the old, uneven road. She lit her horn, and the wheel, and lifted.

“Ngggpphhh!”

PANT

Success!

Standing over the now freed caravan, Trixie smiled proudly until it rolled back into the ditch.

“Trixie needs an intermission,” she groaned, resting her head on the side of her caravan. "Stupid wheels."

“That was awesome!” a voice cheered a short distance away.

Instinctively, Trixie picked up her head and adjusted her magician’s cap, ready to address her surprise audience and receive their praise. But the voice was joined by another slower, yet still awed voice. “I know! All those rainbooms. Two at once even. How’d Rainbow Dash make a copy of herself?”

Momentarily disappointed that the voices weren’t watching her, Trixie let her features drop, but two points stood out to her.

1) Two Rainbow Dashes? The evil queen’s changelings were starting their attack!

2) Those voices were familiar.

She turned around and there they were: The Buckball player and the pudgy one. But more importantly, Ponyville‘s first Trixie fans!

“Ah-ha!” she called out to them. “Astute and avid fans of Trrrrrixie, the Great and Powerful!”

Surprised, Snips and Snails turned from the last visible evidence of the faded rainbooms in the sky to face her.

“Today is the day,” Trixie continued with a dramatic swish of her cape, “when the two of you will serve Trixie for the greater good!”

“Uh, hi, Trixie,” Snips uttered. “We’re doing what?”

“Saving Ponyville and getting Trixie a medal!” She motioned for them to get closer and used her magic to swap out her caravan's single-pony yoke for a double-pony version, decorated with her and Starlight’s cutie marks. “Let’s get you two hooked up and Trixie will explain on the way!”

Snips and Snails looked at each other.

More words passed between them in that one glance than existed in the thoughts Snails had that month.

That may be a low bar but still, none of those words were good.


*** 

 ***


“Calm down, everypony!” Twilight addressed the random ponies running amok in random trails throughout the town.

After getting the Cutie Mark Crusaders to agree to staying inside the train station for safety, and to try and reason with the ponies there, the others had left, and had gotten far enough to see that the problem wasn’t improving as they continued. No pony would stop when questioned while the train—a means of escape—was so close. So they tried a little further in.

But if speaking and consoling weren’t working. Perhaps Luna’s lessons would.

“EVERYPONY STOP!”

The screaming and galloping were replaced with startled gasps and the sound of many hooves screeching to a halt on packed dirt streets.

The Canterlot Royal Voice did have its applications after all.

“That’s better,” Twilight smiled. “Now that we’re all calm—“

“THERE’S A WHOLE SQUAD OF THEM!” a stallion shouted.

“SQUAD?!” answered a mare. “THAT’S NEARLY A PLATOON!”

And the townsponies's amoks ran anew.

“What?!” Twilight gasped. “That usually works better than that!”

Spike cleared his throat. “Maybe it’s because there’s two of all the ponies standing next to you?”

Twilight sheepishly looked at the five pairs of mares traveling with her. “… Right."

"But two of each of us is a good thing, yes?" asked Share.

A collection of silent faces turned toward the Pinkie Pies. One was standing on the other for a better view but was struggling to free her hoof from the other's mane.

"Well, I suppose exceptions exist," Renae concluded.

"Eek," Posey squeaked, dodging a sizable drop of viscous, white fluid. She looked up and squinted at the bird who dropped it. "Raymond?"

Butterfly followed her gaze then ducked, covering under her mane, when she got a good look at the bird. "Robert, maybe?"

"Are you sure? They can be hard to tell apart sometimes."

"You probably shouldn't tell them that."

Shadows passed by them and the group of ponies turned to track at least a dozen birds flying behind the initial pigeon.

The Rarities gasped, ""Duck and cover!"" and dived to the side under some bushes.

"If only I could use my diamond shields here," Renae followed up as the birds completed their flyby.

However, no additional ‘bombs’ were dropped.

The confused group watched the birds fly off. "Do they need to 'reload' or something?" suggested Ponyjack.

"I'm so sorry," cried Butterfly. "I didn't realize I had scared them so badly."

“It’s okay, Butterfly,” said Posey, “we’ll calm them down.”

“But why are they attacking everyone?” asked Jackie.

“STOP RIGHT THERE!”

The group turned to see a collection of ponies in black. Black blazers, black ties, black sunglasses, black hats, black shoes, black suitcases, black watches.

The lead stallion, in a fedora hat as opposed to the others’ derby hats, continued. “You are to surrender peacefully and turn in your leader!”

“ ‘Our leader’?!” gasped Shindy. “THEY KNOW WE’RE ALIENS! RUN FOR IT!”

She turned and ran but her tail was held fast by a purple glow. She got some distance but sprung back into place, her tail coiling up and dropping a few party hats and a rubber chicken.

“These ponies are my friends!” Twilight countered.

“Those ponies,” Fedora responded, “are un-defected changelings still working for Queen Chrysalis.”

“What?!” Twilight gasped. “What evidence do you have to suggest that?”

“*COUGH*twoofthem*COUGH*,” Spike coughed.

Twilight blushed sheepishly.

“Wait,” perked up Primo, pointing at the similarly-suited ponies accosting them, “we’re the changelings?”

“It looks like they did their shopping from inside a hive,” Share added before gasping. “Oh dear, that wasn’t speciesist was it?”

“What’s a changeling?” asked Rad.

“Some ponies called me that earlier,” said Jackie. “The ones in hazmat suits.”

Twilight took a step forward, stood to her full height, spread out her wings, and declared, “I am Princess Twilight Sparkle of Equestria and I vouch for these friends. They do not work for Chrysalis, nor are they a danger to anycreature here.”

“And how can we be sure you’re not Chrysalis yourself?” Fedora countered.

“Of course she’s not Sparkle!” shouted another voice to the side. All heads turned to see a familiar mare in a cap and cape standing dramatically on a nearby hill. “The real Sparkle has gone to Canterlot to do some thing or whatever there!”

Trixie then pointed to Twilight. “This impostor here doesn’t even look right! Look at her! The muzzle's too small, the eyes are too twitchy, the horn’s too big, and the belly’s too fat.”

Twilight looked down at her stomach, noticed everypony else was too, and blushed. “Hay!” she protested. "I'm a growing alicorn! S-some weight gain is expected."

Trixie ignored her and continued, “Clearly these Chrysalis changelings have nefarious plans to carry out while they believed Ponyville was underprotected. But they didn’t know The Great and Powerful Trixie was here! And this village is protected under her now!”

Trixie pointed to Twilight again. “Trixie bets you thought Trixie ran away. Didn’t you, Chrysalis?”

“I’m not Chrysalis and I thought you were going to the Crystal Empire with Starlight to visit Sunburst.”

“EXACTLY! You thought Trixie hadn’t been turned away because they’re off reminiscing over a special anniversary from their foalhood without her!” Trixie blinked and looked over her audience. “TRIXIE ISN’T BITTER!”

“I didn’t say—“

“Enough talk! Trixie protects this town … NOW!”

With that she turned to her caravan and the two boys still harnessed to it. “Hit it!”

"Was that the signal?" asked Snails.

"Just push the button!"

Snips looked back inside the opened front door of the caravan, lit his horn, and there was a click. Trixie’s caravan wasn’t sporting its normal flat roof this time, but rather a tiered pyramid. A panel on the new roof opened up and a small rocket shot out of it with a high-pitched whistle.

Up it went, while the gathered ponies just stared in confusion. A few of Twilight’s group even exchanged shrugs with the ponies in black.

Trixie lit her horn and the rocket changed directions to head directly for Twilight.

“Trixie?!” Twilight gasped. “What are you doing?”

“Protecting the town from Chrysalis’s plot!”

“What,” asked Peachie, “is she going to sit on us?”

With the rocket still approaching, Twilight lit her own horn and put up a shield between it and her group.

Just before hitting, the rocket exploded into a kaleidoscope of sparks in the shape of Trixie’s face which all bounced off the shield in various directions.

“Yipe! Ow! Ow! Ow!” screamed a stallion in black, rushing off with his hindquarters smoldering when a ricocheted spark landed on him. He sighed in relief after extinguishing himself in a water trough.

“Hrmm,” Trixie hummed. “So changeling queens can cast spells other than levitation and their changeling things.”

After rolling her eyes, Twilight shouted back, “I am not a changeling queen!”

Her claim went unheeded as Trixie had simply galloped back toward her caravan, jumped between the boys and shut the door behind her. A moment later her head reappeared out a side window. “Well let’s see how long you can keep it up!”

She lit her horn and several more panels opened on the roof, each producing another rocket.

All the rockets glowed the same color as Trixie’s horn and zeroed in on Twilight’s group and the ponies in black.

“Get behind me!” Twilight shouted and her group huddled up. A few of the ponies in black did as well.

Twilight put up a dome shield around them.

The rockets fanned out in all directions before turning back toward her, exploding into colorful showers of sparks of varying shapes.

Seeing this, the ponies in black not in Twilight’s shield dove for cover.

When the sparks hit, they all bounced off, pelting everything in the area.

“Trixie! This is—!”

She stopped when more panels opened on the roof of Trixie’s caravan and more glowing rockets launched out in a steady stream.

Twilight looked around seeing the results of the tiny sparks landing on random flammable surfaces.

“RUN!” she cried, dropping her shield and turning tail.

Twilight’s group followed her. The ponies in black scattered. Ponyville citizens who had been watching screamed and ran amok once again.

Trixie cackled.

Fedora and some of his group attempted to stalk up to Trixie’s caravan, but a few fireworks aimed their way sent them running.

Trixie cackled louder.

“You two,” she called to Snips and Snails between cackles, “FOLLOW THE FAKE SPARKLE! Wah-ha-ha-ha!”

Snips and Snails grunted, pulling the caravan forward as more rockets launched. “At least there’s wheels this time,” Snips groaned.

Ahead of them Twilight’s group galloped on, dodging rockets and firework sparks.

“Your Trixie’s insane!” yelled Rad.

“Yours isn’t?” countered Primo.

“Eh, yeah, you got a point.”

They continued running with Trixie’s fireworks not far behind.

At an outdoor cafe they passed, a calm Octavia took a sip of her tea as rockets whizzed around. “Well that confirms it,” she sighed. “I really should have remained in bed after that chat with 'Pinkie' today.” She put down her tea, stood up, put a few bits on the table, and ran away from the commotion screaming.

Elsewhere, Cheerilee heard the explosions from home and was glad to have already sealed up her shutters. She continued feeding her cats.

Deep underground, a trio of ponies in hazmat suits congratulated themselves for warning the town of the approaching horror, and that the day’s freak-outs had been confirmed as not overreacted false alarms again.

Escaping the ordeal, Amethyst and Cloudchaser brought Dinky into Sugarcube Corner at the behest of the Cakes for shelter. Mr. Cake turned to his wife. “Well, at least it’s not as bad as the last time Pinkie went off her meds.”

Rounding past the marketplace, Peachie got an idea. “I know where we can go to hide!”

“Where?!” answered Twilight.

“Ponyville Adjacent! I have a shortcut; follow me!”

She zipped ahead of the group and lifted a large rock next to a mud puddle.

Inside was a long slide and a label that read, “Emergency Ponyville to Ponyville Adjacent Escape Hatch! Use only in emergencies when it’s necessary to escape Ponyville and end up in Ponyville Adjacent. Bring candy!”

A moment later Trixie—still cackling—and her caravan emerged.

“Whoa!” Trixie commanded, pulling back on the reigns.

They stopped and Trixie looked around. There was no sign of the false Sparkle’s group.

There was, however, a pair of those ponies dressed in black.

She narrowed her eyes with a grin and lit her horn.

But nothing happened.

She poked her head out and looked at the roof of her caravan. All the panels had been opened.

The ponies in black noticed and turned, advancing on the caravan.

Trixie ducked inside and, after a moment of silence, motors started whirring. The pyramid rotated around, revealing the opposite side’s still-closed panels. With a soft click, multiple panels on the new side opened.

“Second volley!” Trixie shouted before cackling again as the first of the second wave of glowing rockets flew at the ponies in black, sending them running.

Trixie also noticed multiple citizens hiding from the ruckus, and she called out to them, still cackling.

“CITIZENS OF PONYVILLE! SEEK! REFUGE! HERE!”

A few rockets were sent to the sky, exploding as fireworks were meant to.

Her cackling increased.

The citizens of Ponyville sought refuge elsewhere.


*** 

 ***


“”Eeeeeeeeeekk!””

“”Ahhhhhhhhh!””

“”WHOOOOOA!””

“YAAAHHHHH!”

“”WAAAAAAA!””

“”WEEEEEEEEE!””

A collection of voices screamed—or cheered—their way down the steep, dark slide. A light appeared at the end of the long tunnel.

One by one they emerged into a large, underground cavern. The surprise and disorientation caused by the ordeal made it impossible for anyone to get out of the way of the next oncoming member.

A pile of nine dizzy ponies and one greener than usual dragon moaned while two pink ponies giggled from within the pile.

“I can’t see!”

“I can’t move!”

“Whose hoof is that?”

“Who’s asking?”

“I’d rather know whose tail is in my face!”

“Still depends on who’s asking.”

“I think it’s my tail.”

“Eeeeek!”

“Sorry, not my tail.”

“Why does this keep happening?!”

“Who smells like garlic?”

““We do!””

A series of purple flashes disentangled the tangle of ponies and dragon, leaving them splayed out in a circle.

It still took a minute for everycreature to stand and blink away the stars in their eyes. Native ponies recovered faster and helped out their foreign twins.

“Everypony okay?” asked Twilight.

There were a series of affirmations with varying degrees of warble in their voices.

“I’m okay too,” came a dull voice directly behind Twilight.

“Wahh!” Twilight turned with a shout to see an equally dull, gray mare greeting them. “Maud! Oh, it’s you. Don’t scare me like that.”

Maud closed her eyes.

Maud opened her eyes.

“Maud!” cheered Peachie.

“Maud? Maud!” joined in Shindy.

Both Pinkies rushed up to their sister, pulling her into a tight hug.

Maud was unphased by the double-strength Pinkie hug. Though she did smile slightly.

“Hello, Pinkies,” Maud greeted them after the hug before addressing the one to her left. “Welcome to Equestria, Shindy.”

“Eeeeeee!” Shindy squealed. “You’re exactly how I always imagined my sister from another world of magical ponies on the other side of a magical portal in the base of a statue outside my high school’s front lawn would be like!”

“I know, right?!” Peachie agreed.

A pair of Pinkie Pie name tags appeared on the ground in a purple flash. The Pinkies looked back to see Twilight and Spike passing out some other name tags that had come off in the pony pile.

Shindy turned back to Maud. “How’d you know I was me?”

“Maud Sense.”

Shindy gasped. “Do you hear the—“ she leaned in closer, “—oicesvay?”

“No,” Maud answered flatly. “Boulder does.”

Shindy blinked. “Wow. That explains a lot. Except for why he likes crackers so much.”

“They’re a flat bed sprinkled with sodium chloride.”

“Oooooh,” Shindy replied. “Another mystery solved!”

“Would you all like to come in?” Maud addressed her twelve guests, before heading toward a tent-like structure. “I just made tea. You’ll have to be quiet though, Mudbriar is still in bed.”

“Still?” asked Peachie. “But it’s almost evening.”

“Prevening?” offered Shindy before she and Peachie grabbed and put on their name tags.

“Yeah, that.”

One corner of Maud’s mouth curved up oh so slightly. “I rocked his world.”

Peachie adopted a sly grin. “Oh, ho. Tired him out did you?”

“Wore him down to the mantle,” Maud replied.

A blushing Twilight cleared her throat. “A-actually, we can’t stay. The whole town is going crazy.” She paused for a moment to sigh, “Again.”

Maud nodded. “They think you’re all working for Chrysalis.”

“Exactly!”

“And some think the sonic rainbooms were an attack.”

“That’s ridiculous!” Primo countered. “They were awesome and everypony knows I’m the only one who can pull them off!”

“And me!” Rad added.

“That’s the problem,” Maud explained. “Some think changelings copied Rainbow Dash to make them. Especially with all the damage from the one this morning.”

Rad scratched the back of her head sheepishly.

“So how do we fix this?” asked Ponyjack.

“If only I hadn’t scared those poor animals,” Butterfly fretted.

Posey frowned. “If only we could get to my place and talk to them. Show them I’m okay and you’re a friend. But I don’t know how we’d get past Trixie and those ponies in black.”

“Who were those ponies anyway?” asked Share.

“We should call them The Pibb,” suggested Spike.

“Pibb?”

“P. I. B.. Easier than saying ponies in black all the time.”

“Sounds like a soft drink,” mused Shindy. “There were a few unicorns in the group. I wonder if their horns taste like cherries. Should we call the leader Mr. Pibb or keep with Fedora?”

“Hrmm,” Peachie chimed in, “Mr. Pibb is cuter, but Fedora is more descriptive. Anyway, I don’t know who they are, but I know a shortcut from here to Fluttershy’s place. I have a bunch so I can visit Maud at any moment!”

One of Maud’s eyebrows tilted slightly. “… We’ve noticed.” She turned to the Fluttershies. “Talking to the animals could help. I think The Pibb were using birds as scouts and a bunny was riding on one of The Pibb’s withers.”

“They’re taking orders from a rabbit?” asked Twilight.

“Maybe Angel will know about that,” hoped Posey.

“Okay.” Twilight began pacing. “The Fluttershies will talk to the animals to get their aid. The rest of us will go along the edge of town. Trixie and The Pibb won’t expect us to reappear behind them, so we can get the element of surprise on our side too.”

Nods, salutes, and voiced agreements responded. “Pinkies, lead the way,” Twilight finished up. “And thank you for the help, Maud.”

“And it was so great to meet you!” Shindy cheered, giving Maud another hug, which Peachie joined in on. “You’re now my fifth sister and my second oldest! Well, not my second oldest, that makes it sound like you’re not as old as the Maud in my world, but you’re actually older here which would make her the second oldest and you the oldest oldest, but you’re the second sister to become the oldest so you’re the second oldest, oldest oldest!”

“Pinkies!”

““Coming!””


*** *** ***


Eleven ponies and a dragon emerged from a tunnel hidden under another rock, nestled inside an unassuming group of trees.

They had to quickly duck behind those trees when a rocket passed nearby, exploding into a rock wall.

““She’s heeeeerrrrrree!”” the twin Pinkies droned.

“Ya think?” Primo retorted.

One of The Pibb pulled herself out of a nearby stream and ran away from a followup rocket.

““Yep!”” the Pinkies answered.

“Okay,” said Twilight, “change of plans. Fluttershies, you’re still going to speak with your animals. Somepony should go to help you. Applejacks? Pinkies?”

““Ya got it!””

““Roger that!””

“The rest of you come with me. We’ll keep an eye on things and hopefully keep them from escalating too far, and keep The Pibb and Trixie away from Fluttershy’s cottage.”

“Well, we better hurry,” called Rad. “The mad cackler is leaving.”

The others looked and noticed that the flashes of light, the whizzing of rockets, the explosions of fireworks, the screams, and the cackling were indeed quickly making way down a hilly road.

“Let’s go!” Twilight rushed after them.

““Good luck,”” the other team’s members called to them.


*** *** ***


“Run! She’s right behind us!”

Twilight’s team had been following the screams for a while. The Pibb were scattered. Running scared.

They even saw one of them riding one of the rockets.

And not by choice.

“Good thing she didn’t have that pyramid on her caravan when she tried to get revenge on you,” Spike commented. “She might not have even needed the Alicorn Amulet. You weren’t as good at shields back then.”

“Well she’s going to have to run out of rockets eventually,” Twilight replied.

“Most of the panels on that thing are open,” added Primo, coming back from an aerial reconnaissance flyby. “There’s only two left.”

“That makes things easy,” sighed Share. “We just have to wait her out.” Renae nodded.

“I say we speed up the process,” challenged Rad. “I’ll fly out there and have her shoot at me then fly straight up. Easy-peasy!”

“I’m not sure if—“ Twilight tried.

“Yeah,” added Primo, “her horn’s gotta have a range on it. I bet I’d find it faster.”

“You’re on!” Rad returned the challenge and the Rainbows took off.

“Hay!” Twilight shouted. “Get back here!” She lit her horn to try and grab onto them but they escaped.

Spike looked up at her. “Your horn has a range too.”

Twilight grumbled. “They surprised me and they’re really fast!”

The remaining three ponies and dragon crept forward to peer out between some trees and watched.

“Hey, Trixie!” Rad shouted rounding the left side of Trixie’s caravan. “Those guys are amateurs! How about a real target?”

“How about two real targets?!” Primo added from the right, with a slight scoff sent toward her twin.

“So you’ve finally stopped hiding from the Great and Powerful Trixie,” Trixie said from the window of her caravan.

“Hay! I wasn’t hiding!”

“Yeah! We just didn’t want you to burn down—”

“Save it for the courts!”

Trixie lit her horn. Two rockets emerged from the final two panels on her pyramid roof and shot off after the two Rainbow Dashes.

The Rainbows smirked at each other and shot straight up toward the clouds with the rockets following them, away from anything flammable.

“TEACUP!” Trixie shouted.

The Rainbows, confused, looked back down to Trixie and failed to notice that the clouds above them had turned into a shower of teacups.


"“Ow!
“"Ow!
“"Ow!
“"Ow!”"


There was hot tea in all the cups.

Pottery pelted the Rainbows and forced them to veer off to the side.

“Teacup! Teacup! Ha, ha, ha!” Trixie cackled.

Hidden back behind their trees, Twilight, Spike, and two Rarities shook their heads sadly. They really could have just waited it out. A rainstorm was scheduled for overnight so the weather team had been prepping the sky with clouds. Trixie had plenty to work with.

The Rainbows weaved, Trixie’s gaze followed, and so did the rockets and teacups.

Remembering their original plan of simply getting the rockets out of Trixie’s range, the Rainbows each picked a direction away from her and flew.

“SMOKE BOMB!”

Only to be pelted with smoke bombs instead, obscuring their vision.

Twilight and the rest watched on as Trixie loaded up a slingshot with smoke bomb after smoke bomb, guiding and igniting them remotely with her magic.

“Shouldn’t we be helping?” asked Renae.

“Nah,” answered Spike. “Those are her last two rockets after all.”

Twilight nodded. “Once she’s out of the dangerous stuff I can just go back to using shields.

The Rainbows coughed and wafted the air in front of them, trying to clear the smoke. Rad wished, again, that she had kept those goggles, especially after she and her twin collided in midair.

““Dooof!””

They bounced off each other and landed in twin heaps on the ground.

Trixie halted her cackling to cheer and used her magic to have the rockets orbit the pair tauntingly. “Take that, fake Rainbows! The Great and Powerful Trixie never fails!”

And then her rockets sputtered and fizzled, having been burning too long without being allowed to explode.

Trixie simply let them drop next to the Rainbows. She then levitated out a rope and tied them up together.

“I believe that’s our cue, darlings,” Share directed.

Twilight nodded, but before they could head in, a large group of The Pibb, who would prefer to call themselves Agents of S.M.I.L.E. if it wasn’t a secret organization, jumped out of various hiding places.

“Get her!” shouted Fedora.

Trixie rolled her eyes and lit her horn.

The Pibb got closer.

Trixie looked at the emptied roof of her caravan, then the approaching ponies in black.

“THIRD VOLLEY!” she screeched out.

The Pibb all scattered back into their hiding places.

Trixie smiled smugly to herself and lifted the Rainbow Dashes in her magic.

““Let us go!”” they yelled, struggling against the glowing rope.

“You two are going straight to the Donut Dunker to 'meet' the sheriff. Trixie got you! It took all of Trixie’s fireworks for the year, but Trixie got you!”

“All the rockets?” shouted one of The Pibb, poking his head out of a bush before calling out. “There’s no third volley!”

Trixie’s ears flopped down as The Pibb reemerged and rushed her. “Oh horse-apples.”

She dropped the Rainbows where they were with a thud, ducked back inside her caravan and slammed the window closed. A loud pop was heard and smoke exploded out from underneath the caravan, completely covering the area. The Pibb, Snips and Snails, and the Rainbows were all sent into coughing fits.

When the smoke cleared, the caravan’s front door was wide open and nopony was inside.

“To quote Shindy, ‘She’s gone’,” droned Renae while pointing further down the street. “ ‘Oh, wait. There she is’.”

Just shy of the crest of a hill galloped Trixie, away from the coughing Pibb.

“Hay!” shouted Snips between coughs. “Wait for us!”

“Yeah, wait for us!” parroted Snails as the two galloped after her, pulling the still smoking caravan with them.

The Pibb let them go and turned to the two Rainbows, still struggling with the rope.

“Hold it!” Twilight shouted.

A flash of purple teleported the three ponies and dragon next to the Rainbows. Renae startled back, looking around a moment before settling down and adopting a challenging pose similar to her twin’s.

“I don’t know who you ponies are, and maybe you think you’re doing the right thing, but I am the real Twilight Sparkle and these are my friends! If you give us a moment we can try to prove it to you.”

Fedora and his group stared down Twilight and hers.

It was matched in kind.

SCREEEEEE

Everycreature looked up to see a falcon soaring down toward Fedora with a group of other birds behind it.

Behind those birds flew a Fluttershy.

Another Fluttershy, two Applejacks, and two Pinkies galloped after them.

Fedora raised a hoof and the falcon landed on it, following up with a series of shorter, quieter screeches and chirps.

As the two were apparently conversing, Butterfly landed beside Twilight. “I’m sorry, it’s my fault after all. The animals called for help after I scared them. That’s why The Pibb are here.”

“But who are The Pibb?” asked Spike.

“We don’t know. None of the animals could say.” Butterfly looked at the falcon with Fedora. “Posey said she doesn’t know who that falcon is; never seen him before.”

Fedora nodded at the falcon and it flew back up to join the other birds circling the area. He then bowed respectfully at the princess, the other Pibb following his lead. “We apologize for the misunderstanding, your majesty. We’ll be going now that things have been cleared up and there is no threat to your village.”

“What?!” “That’s it?” “The fight’s over?” alternatively asked the Rainbows.

“Uh,” Twilight blinked, “Thank you, sir. And thank you for trying to help with the information you had. But who are you?”

Fedora tilted his head to another Pibb behind him who stepped forward, lifting a mirror out of her suitcase.

“You needn’t worry about that,” Fedora continued.

“Hay!” cried Peachie. “Can we call you Mr. Pibb?”

“Or Fedora?” countered Shindy.”

The Pinkies gasped, looking at each other for a moment before trying together, “”Or how about Mr. Fedora Pibb?””

Suddenly the mirror flashed.


*** *** ***


“To think swamp gas of all things could really do all that?” remarked Renae.

“Must have been from Froggy-Bottom Bog,” surmised Posey.

Spike scratched his scales. “And light reflected off the rings of Alicronus at just the right angle to ignite an underground gas main? Didn’t know Ponyville even had those.”

“It was right swell of those fellers to help with the cleanup,” Jackie added.

“And they helped calm down all the animals,” smiled Butterfly.

Ponyjack nodded. “Glad Princess Celestia wasn’t so busy with the ambassadors that she couldn’t get them sent out here.”

“Even if their uniforms were so bland,” Share criticized.

““But why do I have a craving for cherry soda?”” asked the Pinkies. ““You too? No way! And do you really, really want to wear a fedora, too?! Yeah! That’s so weird!””

“And why are we still tied up!” yelled Primo.

“We’ve been sitting here for like five minutes already!” Rad complained.

“Oh! Sorry!” Spike rushed, going over to bite the rope binding the double Rainbow.

Twilight absently watched the proceedings and mumbled to herself, “But Princess Celestia has been busy all day, and Ponyville doesn’t have any gas lines. And Alicronus shouldn’t be in alignment this time of year. Unless Luna redecorated last night.”

““Finally!”” cheered the Rainbows, stretching their wings and returning to the air.

“Just gotta get to the mirror portal now, right?” Rad followed that up, pointing to Twilight’s palace, not far away.

“Right behind you, RD, er, Ah mean R-A-D,” Jackie agreed, trotting after her.

“Come to think of it, why were we tied up to begin with?” pondered Primo before noticing her twin having too much of a lead on her and dropping the question to catch up.

Her friends resuming the trek to her palace snapped Twilight out of her thoughts and she followed along.

On the way, Spike noticed her expression. “Twily still hasn’t written back yet?”

Twi gasped and brought out Sunset’s journal in a rush, turning quickly to the last entry. Her expression dropped again seeing it was her own. “No, not yet.”

Renae dropped back within the group and walked close to them. “Twi, darling, I should tell you that we may have had a few, uh, boo-boos getting oriented in your palace.

“Oh, it’s okay. I remember what it was like when it was Spike and me learning your world. I understand.”

Renae giggled, “Why thank you, dear. I suppose it was just some knocked over bookcases—“

“Let me guess,” interrupted Spike, “that one was Rad.”

“Well, possibly a little of us all. The portal ejected us all quite rudely. Also we scratched up the hall's crystal floor a bit.”

“Oh, don’t worry about the crystal,” Twilight assured her, “it grows back eventually. It’s a living crystal tree. Very helpful when Ember turned my dining room into a meal rather than the meal itself. Also, for whenever Spike feels the need for a midnight snack.

Spike startled back. “H-how’d you know?”

“I can hear the nibbling some nights.”

“Sorry,” Spike cringed with a blush.

Clearing her throat, Renae continued, “We may have also dropped-your-armoire-down-a-flight-of-stairs?”

“You, wha—?” Twilight did a double take.

“Rad did that one!”

Hearing her nickname, Rad slowed to a hover so the conversing ponies would catch up with her.

“Why did Rad drop my wardrobe down the stairs?”

“Whoa, Whoa, Whoa,” Rad cut in. “I lost my grip trying to get it for Renae because she wouldn’t go anywhere naked." She then eyed Renae with a smirk. "Did you tell them about the stocking?”

Renae blushed. “We are not talking about the stocking!”

“I think we’re talking about the stocking.” Rad teased.

“What about the stocking?” Twilight asked.

“Nothing about the stocking!” Renae insisted while Rad lost her altitude from laughing too hard. “I cleaned much of what I could in the palace once I learned magic, but I couldn’t find a washing machine!”

“It’s okay, Renae. I’ll get ‘the stocking’ washed. But now I’m curious, what—“

“Well, you know what they say, ‘curiosity killed the cat’.”

“Heh,” Rad chuckled, “and Renae’s dignity!”

“Now, now, Rad,” chided Share, dropping back and hugging her flushed twin under a foreleg, “one shouldn’t pick on their friends too much. We want them to stay friends after all.”

Renae looked to her twin with a smile. “Of course we’ll always stay friends. The two of us as well. And I hope we’ll be able to return here some day, after we confirm that the portal is keeping the boundaries between our worlds healthy.”

Those words reminded the group of their impending separation. They stopped and looked at each other and the palace, now just a few steps away.

The Applejacks pulled each other into a hug.

“Take care of your pa,” said Ponyjack.

“And you take care of your Grand Pear Pear,” returned Jackie.

The Fluttershies also hugged. Bright smiles and only slight blushes this time.

“I’m glad your animals are alright now. I’m sorry I—“

“It’s okay, they understand," Posey cut off her twin, feeling confident she wouldn’t mind. "And we hope you can come back. I’ll show you around Sweet Feather, my animal sanctuary!”

“Oh, I’d love that!”

The Rainbows landed near each other and scratched the backs of their heads sheepishly. “Sorry about before,” said Rad.

“Nah, I get it. Don’t think I’d—“ she looked around to be sure everycreature else was out of earshot and spoke more quietly, “—be into a furless minotaur with no tail.”

“Heh, tell that to your Twilight.”

The Pinkies turned to each other, leaned in so their foreheads were touching, and spoke together.

““You know what I’m thinking—You know what I’m thinking!”” They winked. ““Well don’t let me stop you!””

They crushed each other into a tight hug, almost disappearing into their manes and tails.

““Oh! I was wondering where I put that banana cream and peanut butter and jelly pie! You too?! You know it! You mind if I—? Go right ahead!””

They each reached into the other’s manes, pulled out a pie, and started to eat.

Share, with Renae still under a foreleg, and watching the other pairs ahead of them, gave her twin a friendly nuzzle. “Perhaps we could keep in touch with that journal.”

Renae gasped and turned to Twilight. “Could we get more? I wouldn’t want to use up all of Sunset’s pages.”

Having been smiling upon seeing all the hugs, Twilight nodded. “I was just thinking about that.”

““Really?”” the Rarities squeed.

“It will take a while to enchant five more pairs of journals, and I won’t want to use the portal for some time after today, but I should be able to get them to you long before the thirty moon cycle starts over.”

Cheers and more hugs erupted among the group.

“You think Paws can write?” asked Spike. “I mean he’s a dog and has, well, paws. No horn either. Could he write with his mouth like ponies? But dogs can slobber a lot. He might need a waterproof journal.”

“Oh!” spoke up Renae. “Unlined for ours, please. We’ll be sharing designs as often as letters!”

Twilight giggled, “Seven pairs of journals. I think I’ll get a set with Twily too, and I’ll see what I can do about specifics.”

It was then, amid the cheers that the existing journal finally began to buzz and glow.

The chatter and cheers died down almost instantly. The Pinkies quickly swallowed what was left of their pies. Twilight hurriedly opened the book to watch as the newest entry filled in.

The writing was rushed, sloppy, had terrible spelling, and gave no indication of the author. It wasn't even adhering to the lines, instead being sprawled near the center of the page. Twilight did her best to read it out loud.





Glt || POurtAl
SUnSetS SenDInG ZOmblls threw!
the hOleSkOOe




> Something Sunny(?) This Way Comes
> --------------------------------------------------------------------------

“Git line, line pourtal?” Twilight attempted to translate the journal. “Get two lines portal? Get to portal? Sunset’s sending zombies through. The whole skoe—school?!”

Twilight’s face paled under its purple fur.

“”WHAT!?”” The Applejacks yelled back immediately.

“Sunset’s sending zombies through the portal?!” joined Primo. “Meaning for real zombies this time?”

“It’s a mind control spell thing!” answered Rad.

“Wasn’t that her old conquest of Equestria plan?” asked Spike.

“Oh, no! She’s gone evil again?” cried Butterfly, hugging Posey for support.

Renae leaned in to read the entry herself, “Did you say the whole school?”

“But you said the universes wouldn’t survive that!” gasped Share.

The sound of the palace doors being slammed open broke them free of the stunned surprise to see the Applejacks already entering Twilight’s palace. The rest of the group took notice with the Rainbows flying in at high speed and the other eight following further behind.

Peachie looked at the clock tower just before entering the palace. “Isn’t school over by now?”

Shindy would have scratched her chin if her hooves weren't busy galloping. “It was already explained that time moves faster in this world than ours so it might not be. Also, there’s after school clubs. So, either way, there will still be a bunch of people at the school.”

A few flights up, Shindy tripped and planted her muzzle into a step with a loud honk. Thankfully, Peachie caught her on the bounce back. A little dizzy, Shindy said, “Ponying up back home is one thing, but ponying up stairs isn’t anywhere near as magical.”

“I might be able to help,” Butterfly offered, unfolding her wings from a few steps below.

She took to the air, matched altitude, and swooped her forehooves under Shindy’s before lifting.

Feeling herself flying, Shindy giggled. “Oooh! It’s like having a butterfly for a hang-glider! Except hang-gliders don’t have vertical takeoffs.”

They quickly learned that butterflies, including the one present, weren’t adept at hauling freight when Butterfly’s attempt to continue up around the stairwell ended up going into the stairwell.

“Eeeek!”

Honk

Thud

“Could you just teleport us up there, darling?” Share requested of Twilight.

With a sheepish blush, Twilight rushed to the fallen duo and motioned for the others to get closer.

Once the group of eight were gathered, Twilight lit her horn, and in a purple flash later they had appeared outside her private study containing the portal.

Just in time for two Rainbows and two Applejacks to plow into them.

“Honestly! Again?” Renae groaned from near the bottom of the resulting pile.

Another purple flash later, they changed from conglomerated and confused to decentralized and dazed.

Primo was the first to shake off her swirling vision, her Wonderbolt training coming to her aid. She then tilted her head at the oddity of Twilight’s wardrobe, normally in her bedroom a few floors up, now standing along one wall, and a series of scrapes and grooves ground into the crystal floor.

She shrugged and was about to help the others get on their hooves when a shaky voice called out from within the study.

“H-help! Is anyone out there?! I’m not sure how to walk and I have an injured … an injured something here. Hello?”

Twilight snapped to attention. “Flash?!”

“Twilight?” the unseen voice yelled back. “Equestria Twilight?!”

As Twilight and crew got back onto their hooves, the visiting members of the group heard the familiar clop and thud sounds from when they were first learning to walk as ponies.

Before Twilight could do so herself, a mustard yellow hoof pushed open the doors from the inside, revealing a pegasus stallion. On his back was a purple creature covered with scales and fins.

It was gasping for breath.

Twilight lit her horn and opened the doors the rest of the way, startling Flash Sentry who fell onto his side while the purple creature tumbled to the floor with a wheeze.

The creature looked like an earth pony mare from the front with two legs ending in hooves and a purple mane pulled into twin pigtails. Her back half, however, appeared to belong to a seapony. Unlike a seapony, however, this creature had a cutie mark printed on her scales of a five-pointed star on top of a musical segno symbol.

It looked up at Twilight and croaked, “Water.”

“I got it!” cried Peachie, who zoomed in with a glass balanced on her hoof.

The creature zeroed in on the glass and its dying gasps halted in a moment of severe incredulousness. When the moment faded, the creature drank the water … or at least poured it in her mouth. It came splashing out the sides of her neck, through sets of gills.

One apparent “breath” later and the creature gasped again.

“I have another one!” called Shindy, arriving with another glass sticking out of her mane. “Oh, hey, Aria! Did you shrink? You look different.”

Aria Blaze saw Shindy and her eyes widened, flicking between her and Peachie. “T-two of’em?” she croaked. “Jus’et me die.”

Twilight gasped and lifted Aria in her magic then turned to the others. “I’ll be right back!” she announced before they both vanished in a purple flash.

The remaining girls and Spike then turned to the Flash on the floor. Jackie went up to him and held out a hoof while Ponyjack continued into the study with the Rainbows following her. Rad noticed Ponyjack flick a dial-shaped crystal by the door that lit up the dim room. Something they could have used when they had first arrived.

The others watched the three begin to explore the portal room but kept with Jackie and Flash.

“Take it easy there, Flash, Ah got you,” Jackie soothed. “But remember, you got four legs now. Don’t try to stand on less than three.”

He looked up. “Applejack?”

“Eeyup! But call me Jackie here to avoid confusion with there being two of all of us.”

Flash awkwardly hooked a pastern around Applejack’s and shakily got standing upright. He then looked around, taking in Applejack, the two Pinkies, Rarities, Fluttershies, and the purple scaly thing. “S-so it’s all real? I didn’t think you were all making it up, but, really? All of it?”

“Sure is. Alien world, magic, ponies, ponies that look just like us and have the same names. Whole shebang.”

He lifted a fore hoof to look at it, then put it back down. “Was that purple one Twilight, and am I naked?”

Shindy giggled, “Couldn’t keep it in your pants?”

Flash quickly crossed his hind legs as a blush formed on his cheeks.

“You’re fine, Flash,” Shindy followed up. “All the guys here just let it hang.”

Also blushing, Butterfly nodded. “We, we’ve seen a … lot today. Just, um, keep your tail down?”

“And I don’t think you can walk like that,” Peachie noted.

Ponyjack and the Rainbows returned from the portal room. “Ain’t no zombies in here! Nothing’s happening!” announced Ponyjack.

“Yeah, room’s empty!” Primo followed up.

“Empty?!” Flash yelled. “It was more than just me and Aria.” He tried to turn back but tripped over his hooves and just called from the floor. “Twilight? Wallflower?”

“I’m here!” Wallflower Blush called back, clearly standing beside a pile of debris.

“What the?” gasped Primo, jumping away from the green earth pony. “Where’d you come from? Were you there a second ago?”

Wallflower sighed, “Yeah, I was.”

“Where’s Twilight?” asked Flash.

Carefully, Wallflower pushed a few books away from the debris pile to show a purple unicorn with glasses lying on her side. “I think she might have hit her head coming in.”

“”Twily!”” multiple voices shouted.

The Fluttershies rushed in with the Rarities behind them. The Rarities used their magic to move books and other items away, while the Fluttershies carefully inspected their fallen friend. Starting with head and neck, they were relieved to feel no obvious injuries aside from a scratch on her glasses.

“Twily, can you hear me?” asked Butterfly.

“Nmhh,” Twily groaned. “Fluttershy?”

“That’s it, darling. We’re here. Take it slow,” Renae encouraged her.

Twily opened her eyes and lifted a hoof to her head with another groan. She then noticed her fur and took another look.

At her hoof.

At her foreleg.

At her reflection in the crystal floor.

“Wha—ahhhhhhh?! All my things are horse things!” She looked lower. “And they’re all on display!”

Share unfastened her gown with her magic and fit it around Twily, helping her to stand in the process.

“Oh, thank you,” Twily sighed in relief.

“I’m afraid it doesn't suit your colors well,” said Share, “but it should help you adjust to our world. I understand public nudity is not common where you’re from. I’d rather love to see that, actually.”

“I don’t suppose you have a suit, or just some pants somewhere?” asked Flash, still huddled where he fell.

Renae looked to him. “Not handy—or hoofy as it may be—but,” she looked at the dress she was wearing, “I’m more comfortable with my pony form now if you’d like this.”

Flash looked at the red dress with a thoughtful expression … and a blush. “Um. Maybe I’ll just stay here on the floor a while.”

“Oh!” Renae turned. “Wasn’t Wallflower here too?”

“Here,” said Wallflower.

“Ah, there you are!”

“I haven’t moved,” she deadpanned from right next to Renae.

“Right, sorry, dear. Uh, would you like this dress?”

Wallflower looked down at herself, then the other naked ponies in the room, then back at her new tail. “W-well … If I’m not going to stand out anymore here than back home, maybe I should just stay with this if nudity really is normal here?”

“It is, but let me know if you change your mind.”

Now fully dressed and standing, Twily shook her head and winced. “Wait. ‘Our world’?” She looked up, scanned the pony faces around her, and brought her hoof back to the bump on her head. “How hard did I land? Am I seeing double?”

With a giggle, Shindy got right up in front of her.

“No you’re not!” she singed.

“There’s two of us!” Peachie songed, joining her twin.

Twily took another look at the ponies around her. “Do I have a concussion or did the plan succeed?”

“It worked,” Rad informed her. “We all have twins now. Yours is off making sure Aria doesn’t die.”

“What?!”

“She couldn’t breathe,” Jackie answered.

Twily gasped, “They’re aquatic! That’s right. Is she okay?”

“Don’t worry,” said Spike, getting wide-eyed expressions from the newest three aliens in the room, “Twi looked like she had a plan. I’m sure she’s not just going to drop her in a bathtub and teleport her back here still in it.”

There was a loud whump from the hallway that vibrated throughout the floor.

“Gah! Easy there, Princess!” came Aria’s voice in a growl.

“Well excuse me for trying to keep you from asphyxiating!” Twi’s followed up with one of her own.

“Or maybe she did,” Spike finished.

“Twi?” Twily called.

“Twily?” Twi answered. “You’re here too?”

Twi trotted in carrying a bathtub filled with water and a grumpy Aria in her magic. She looked around, cringing at the mess in the room but noting that there seemed to be no emergencies at present.

“Whoa,” Twily commented. “You have wings, and you’re taller. And you’re soaked!”

With her mane and tail hanging limp and water dripping in her wake, Twi grumbled, giving Aria a dirty look, “I hadn’t noticed.”

She got a smirk in return.

Leaving the tub near the doorway, Twi let it drop to the floor again, jostling Aria, then ignored the resulting retort and addressed her twin, “What’s going on? We got a message from Sunset’s journal that she was sending zombies through!”

“That was us,” said Flash, awkwardly pulling himself back into the room from the hallway. Twi blushed, realizing she walked right past him after her return teleport. “The zombies I mean. Sunset hit the three of us with that mind control thing again and forced us through the portal.”

“Even Aria and Twily?”

“She didn’t do me,” Twily answered.

“Heh, phrasing,” Aria snorted.

“But you said three,” Twi asked Flash. “Who’s the third?”

“Um.”

“Gah!” Twi jumped back from the green earth pony who she could’ve sworn hadn’t been there a moment ago. “Who are you?!”

“Wallflower Blush,” Wallflower greeted her softly. “We’ve met before, but … you wouldn’t remember.”

Twi stared at her a moment before the name clicked. “Oh, the memory stone incident. Sunset’s been telling me about you since then! Nice to meet you. Even if it’s not the first time.”

With a blush, Wallflower gave the princess a small bow, but she was already turning back to Twily. “Then why are you here? And it’s just the four of you, right?”

“Yes,” Twily answered, “I tried to stop it but Sunset had them shove me through.”

“Sorry about that,” apologized Flash. “I tried to stop.”

“It’s okay. It’s mind control, nothing any of you could have done.”

“Speaking of which,” asked Rad, “how are you not still zombied right now?”

“Woke up soon as I got back in my real body,” Aria answered. “Feels nice. Bathtub sucks though. Gotta get back in an ocean. Actually get some swimming room.”

““Then the spell doesn’t work across the portal,”” the Twilights theorized.

“So, if you four were doing all that,” began Spike, “who wrote the message in the journal?”

Twily looked over at the green, scaly thing. “Are you Spike, uh, Claws?”

“Yup!”

“Oh, hello. Well, Paws wrote it.”

“Yes!” Claws cheered. “He can write! Though he’s got a lot to learn about spelling and chirography.” Seeing a few confused looks his way, he added, “What? I know big words too. And with all the letters I write, of course I’ve taken classes. You should see my calligraphy.”

“But the message said she was sending the whole school!” insisted Jackie. “What’s going on?”

“Well, she tried,” started Flash, turning to look at Aria, “but Aria, uh, scared them off.”

Aria smiled devilishly. “Baseball bat, megaphone, and a large vocabulary of profanities.”

“No kidding,” Twily cringed. “How many languages do you speak?”

“Fluently or just the profanity?”

“Never mind.”

“Wait,” Rad jumped in, addressing Aria, “You scared them off? Not Sunset?”

“It’s a gift.” Aria shined a hoof on her scales.

Ponyjack took a breath. “So, the magic turned Sunset evil and she tried to send the school through the portal as a zombie army, but the four of you stopped her and got sent over instead? And now, what? She’s chasing the students down?”

“Hay!” Aria growled. “First of all, she’s not evil, she’s confused! Magic’s messing with her head! She hates mind control magic and she’d never use it on anyone!”

“Ain’t you one of them evil, mind controlling sirens yourself? Why are you here?”

Aria glared at Ponyjack, pushing herself up off the rim of the bathtub and dripping water onto the floor. “She’s a f—“ Aria held her glare through the slight blush, “—friend, okay?”

“They’re also roommates now,” Shindy added.

Aria quickly ducked back into the water to breathe.

Forcing an indignant expression off her face, Twily turned away from Aria and coughed nervously. “I left the journal with Spi—Paws. We could ask.”

“On it!” Claws cheered, quill already in one claw and reaching for the journal with his other.

As the dragon flipped to the last entry and began to write, Flash spoke up, “I don’t know if she’d be going after the others. When we got to the school she was trying to get through the portal herself. Then she forced us to go through when we tried to stop her.”

“ ‘Trying’? If you didn't stop her, what did?” asked Twi.

“So, remember when she transformed back at the Fall Formal?” Flash answered, getting a lot of sighs and sad nods in return. “Remember how she got really … big?”

“She did get pretty tall,” Butterfly answered.

“Well—“

Flash stopped when the portal began to ripple and shimmer.

“The portal’s still active?!” Twi gasped.

Primo and Ponyjack glanced at each other. “We, probably should have turned it off, huh?” admitted Primo.

Suddenly, a large, coal-black hoof attached to a fire-red leg shot out of the portal.

There were gasps and screams in the room.

But nothing else happened.

They all watched as the leg shifted from side to side.

“Are you saying she can’t fit in the portal?” asked Twi.

“Her a▓s is too big,” Aria explained with a slight smirk.

“And that’s as far as she can get?” asked Renae.

“And in the other world right now, there’s just her back end sticking out of the other side?” asked Peachie.

“Like a plot sticking out of a barrel when apple bobbing gets too rowdy,” surmised Ponyjack.

A second hoof emerged from the portal and the two seemed to try and grip the floor to pull themselves forward without having any luck.

“Should we turn off the portal now?” asked Share.

Butterfly gasped and Posey answered for her, “but what if she gets stuck forever?!”

“Or cut in two,” added Shindy.

The wide-eyed Fluttershies bit their hooves in horror.

“Then do we pull her in?” asked Primo.

“Or push her out?” Rad finished.

“Hay!” Claws perked up. “Paws says that the rest of the school managed to escape!”

The Twilights turned to him. ““So it’s just Sunset near the portal now?””

“Then no one else is coming through!” Jackie cheered and the Applejacks leaned into each other in relief.

“But he also said she’s acting strange,” Claws followed up.

“Strange how?” asked Wallflower, startling a few who had forgotten she was standing next to them.

“He said she keeps talking to herself, and she was angry one moment then crying the next. There’s more but it’s hard to read his writing.”

“Let me see,” Twily requested. “I’ve seen him writing before. Not the strangest thing I’ve seen—which might be this room right now—but it’s up there.”

Claws brought the journal around to Twily, but before she could try reading it, the portal began to shake.

They all turned to watch as the forelegs retreated for a moment before what appeared to be a fiery missile launched out of it, crashing into various debris left scattered by the events earlier in the day.

Books, broken pieces of furniture, dust, ponies, and a dragon went flying toward the back and side walls.

Aria, still in the bathtub by the doors was outside the line of fire, but still had to duck to avoid shrapnel. “Hay!” she called once it stopped flying. “Is everyone alright in there? No one’s dead, right?”

After a moment of no sound aside from settling debris, Aria ducked again to take some deep breaths and leapt out of the tub. Hitting the floor, she headed for the closest pile large enough to hide at least one pony, using her tail as a single hind leg. “You better all be breathing,” she grumbled, “I don’t have the lung capacity for mouth-to-mouth.”

She shifted around some rubble, eventually noticing one pile that seemed to be breathing. Moving aside a chair cushion and half the chair it was meant for revealed a pink cutie mark. Aria quickly uncovered the rest of the pegasus.

“Yellow?” Aria called. “H-hay, Yellow, wake up.” Far too much time passed. “C-come on, Fluttershy.”

With a groan, Butterfly opened her eyes and Aria sagged in relief.

“Aria!” gasped Butterfly. “You do care!”

Aria recoiled on her tail as if the sudden blush on her face had stung her. “Gah! Jus—just help me find the others before I run out of oxygen.”

Butterfly gasped, looking around at the remains of the room and followed behind her, some groans beginning to sound out.

They worked, uncovering the others, some freeing themselves and joining the search.

“Ow, ow, owie!” Poking her head up from under a toppled over bookcase, Peachie turned to her twin. “What was that about this being a comedy?”

“I hope it wasn’t a mis-tag,” Shindy mumbled back.

“Is everypony alright?” Twi called, lighting her horn and casting a light wind spell to clear the air, funneling the dust and smaller settlements into the hallway.

“We’re okay!” Shindy responded.

“Aria got me out,” Butterfly added loud enough to be sure the others all heard her, watching the former siren fume with embarrassment on her way back to the bathtub.

“We’re good here!” Primo called, crawling out of a dismantled sofa, an annoyed Rad right behind her.

“Same here,” Ponyjack added while helping Flash to his hooves. Beside them, Jackie helped Renae into a clearing.

Share, Posey, and Claws signed off as well.

“Twily?” Twi called.

For a moment there was no reply, and then knocking was heard from under a larger pile in the center of the room.

The ponies and dragon closed in around it and began clearing the pile.

Once they’d removed the outer layer, they began to hear a deep growling sound.

They stopped.

The growling got louder as the pile grew larger.

“Um,” Peachie began, “Twily didn’t turn herself into the Saddle-Rager did she?”

Before anyone could attempt a reply, the pile broke apart as a large, crimson-red nightmare of an alicorn smashed her way out from within.

The monstrosity reared back onto her hind legs with a thunderous roar.

Her horn was gnarled and knotted. Wings leathery with holes strewn throughout; sharp talons at the end. Her mane and tail wild, waving and flickering like fire in the absence of any breeze and colored to match.

But everyone recognized the cutie mark.

It was Sunset’s.

At least, it was almost hers. The familiar two-toned sun symbol was clear, but the yellow portion had faded to a dull gray.

The girls, Flash, and Claws all looked up at her and backed away, Claws grabbing and pulling Flash after he tripped on his hooves.

Twi’s jaw dropped. It was hard to tell with her rearing, but it looked like Sunset was taller than Celestia. The wingspan seemed wider as well.

Sunset’s roar was cut off suddenly when it turned into a wince and she brought a hoof up to her neck, yelling in a booming voice. “Holy CRAP that hurt! Why’d that portal have to be so small?! Should have given that shrinking spell more time to work before coming through.”

They watched as Sunset tilted and rotated her head around until a loud crack popped out and Sunset sucked in a breath. “Oooh! Oh, that’s better.”

Still feeling her neck, Sunset wobbled, her eyes opened, revealing solid black sclera, and she flailed out her fore legs in a futile attempt to regain her balance, before belly-flopping hard onto the floor. The impact rumbled throughout the room and kicked up more dust. She lay there groaning a moment and brought a fore leg up to look at the hoof at the end. “Oh. Right.”

The others in the room just watched, looking from one to another silently.

Shindy leaned in toward Share and whispered, “Should we pretend we didn’t see any of that once she notices we’re here?”

“Heavens, yes!” Share hissed back.

And that’s when Sunset noticed them.

She looked directly at Share who drew back with a squeak. She then got her hooves under her and stood to her full height.

The others all craned their necks up and up to follow her.

Sunset began to laugh. A deep, dark, booming, pompous laugh that caused all the pony ears to turn back on instinct.

She looked around, the laugh fading as she noticed all the twins. “Whoa! Don’t see that everyday. And you’re all so tiny!” She chuckled, still booming, “Hi girls! I wondered where you all ran off to! I’ve been looking all over! But Equestria?! Wow! You even found all your counterparts! And you made name tags!”

A slight child-like glee entered the booming laugh as Sunset read the tags. “Let’s see: Peachie, Shindy, Share, Renae, Twi of course, oh, hi Flash, Jackie, Ponyjack, Butterfly, Posey, Primo, Rad, and then there’s Spike! But I guess we should call you Claws now since everyone—everypony—else is using nicknames.” Several of the ponies had waved back to her or cringed as their nicknames were called. “Ha! I like them, but aren’t we missing some?”

Sunset turned around and spotted the lone figure in a bathtub. “Aria! Why are you in—? Oh right! Sorry, I forgot you’d need water here. It’s a good thing you found some. I’d be so upset if I lost a friend.” Lighting her gnarled horn in a brilliant opal glow, the tub lifted into the air. “How about you to join the others?”

Aria held on as the tub shakily floated over to the line of ponies and crashed down hard enough to crack the crystal floor and bend the tub’s legs before Sunset let go. Some water splashed out onto the floor, as well as Twi and Renae, refreshing Twi’s wet mane and soaking Renae’s dress.

Renae nearly protested but thought better of it.

“There! Isn’t that better?” Sunset asked pleasantly, before her tone gained a hard edge through the smile that revealed so many very sharp teeth. “Make sure you get along now! Be friendly for a change!”

Twi pushed her mane back out of her face and was about to say something, but Sunset turned away again. “Now where’s cute, little Twily?”

Sunset scanned the room, a beam of light extending from her horn in a cone making everything it touched transparent.

She found her, head down and tail in the air under a collapsed stack of books and curled against a wall.

“Ha! Found you!” she cheered and all the objects in that area of the room lit in the same opal light, quickly lifted into the air, some objects striking the ceiling in their haste.

Twily smiled sheepishly as her cover vanished, but trying to wave just caused her to slide off the wall onto her side. “Uh, hey, Sunset. Are you o—”

“You’re a unicorn. I’ve been wondering about that.”

Sunset didn’t bother waiting for a reply and just floated the books and other objects away, letting them crash first into a wall and then the floor.

“Eek!”

The sudden noise grabbed Sunset’s attention. “Wallflower! There you are! I was afraid we’d lost you again!” The hard edge returned to her voice. “Don’t keep disappearing like that!”

“S-sorry,” she squeaked.

Sunset laughed, walking up toward Wallflower, just sitting near the corner of the room. “You’re an earth pony! That’s great! Fits your love of plants! Just wait until you try your new earth pony magic. I’m sure the native Applejack—Ponyjack—would love to show you how!”

Twily and Wallflower felt themselves being lifted in the opal glow of Sunset’s magic and they were set down with the others. Wallflower between the two Applejacks and Twily between Renae and Twi. The impact caused them to wince and grunt. The landing would have been softer if they had just been dropped. Thankfully, they had twice the number of legs to absorb the shock.

“Now then,” Sunset giggled, causing the others to cringe back at the awful sound, “we’re all such great friends. Aren’t we?”

The others looked back at her and traded glances between each other.

“Sunset?” Twi got her attention.

“Yes, Twi?”

“Are you okay?”

“Are you kidding?! I’m better than ‘okay’! I feel great!” Sunset laughed, tapping her hooves on the floor, sending vibrations through it. “The day has been such a rush! All the power! I actually grew w—“ she paused, pointing to her side and her wings jolted up.

“Wings! Twi, look! I kept my wings on this side! That means I’m an alicorn now! I’m actually an alicorn!” A few tears escaped her eyes, boiling away into mist almost immediately. “I have to show Princess Celestia!”

Turning, Sunset headed for the doors in an almost pronk-like gallop.

“Sunset, wait!” Twi called, but got no reaction. “Stop!” Twi slammed the doors shut with her magic.

There was deafening silence in the room after Sunset came to a halt just shy of the doors. The temperature seemed to increase as she slowly turned around, the tiny irises of her eyes glowing. “Stop? You don’t want me to show Princess Celestia my power? Why wouldn’t you want me to show Celestia my power?!”

With the final word, Sunset struck the floor with a hoof, creating cracks and a sizable imprint.

Twi took a calming breath and took a step forward. “Please calm down.”

“I am calm, I am calm, I am calm,” Sunset droned as if chanting. A chant that broke with her next words. “I was calm. I was happy! I am not anymore.”

“We’re your friends, Sunset.”

“I didn’t say you weren’t.”

“That’s good because we really should talk about what’s happened to you.”

“What’s happened to me is amazing. It should be shared across both worlds. I could spread friendship to every creature. I could end wars. All wars before they even start! I’ll make Celestia proud!”

“Not like this!” Twi countered. “This isn’t you!”

“This is better! I’m better! I learned friendship and it gave me this power! It’s not like before. I can control this! I can fix everything! Make up for it all!”

Smoke began rising near Sunset’s hooves. She looked down and saw books and other objects combust into flames near them. She jumped back to a clearing and shot a beam from her horn, totally destroying the flaming objects. “See? I have it under control! It’s all under control!”

“Sunset!” sobbed Butterfly. “You’re scaring us.”

Her face softening, Sunset took a few steps back. “I’m sorry, Butterfly. I don’t want to scare you. There’s no reason to be scared. I know my voice is a little loud now—I’m working on that—but it’s all okay. I’m fine. I am calm. I am calm.”

“Just look at yourself, Shimmer!” Aria shouted. “You’re not fine!”

Sunset looked down at herself, taking in her red colors, almost fire and blood for shades. Her wings red and black. Sunset’s breathing quickened, becoming shallow. “I’m not a MONSTER!” she roared at them, her mane flaring up like a wildfire, almost blinding her friends.

The others ducked back, some letting out surprised squeaks, yells, or screams.

“I’m sorry!” Sunset gasped, breathing still rapid.

“We know you’re not a monster!” urged Flash. “We never said you were. But something is clearly wrong right now. You need help.”

“Help? I don’t need help. It’s others I can help. With this power I can do anything!”

“It’s the power that’s the problem!” Twily shouted. “It’s affecting your mind too, not just your body.”

Movement caught Sunset’s eye and she looked down to see Wallflower stumbling forward. “Sunset, we—“ She reached out a hoof to Sunset’s foreleg, recoiling suddenly upon making contact. “Ahh!”

“Stay back!” Sunset jumped away. “You’ll get burned!”

Wallflower shook her hoof to cool it. “Will you never be able to touch anyone again, ever? Is that what you want?”

Sunset staggered back, her friends calling to her.

“It’s okay, Sunset.”

“We’re here.”

“We don’t want to lose you.”

“We can help.”

“Please let us.”

“Just one rainbow to the face should do it!”

“Aria!”

“What? It’s your thing! Don't think I've forgotten!”

"Sunset," Twily shuffled forward, "we want to help you the way you helped me. You remember? 'Take my hand'? Please come back to us."

Almost hyperventilating, Sunset looked down. The bright glow of her mane reflected back through the crystal floor illuminating the blood-red face, the eyes that would be black voids save for the tiny irises, teeth that could never belong to an herbivore.

Boiling tears streamed down her cheeks.

She collapsed in a heap. “Do it.”

There were gasps and cheers of elation as Twi took center place in front of Sunset and had the others join her.

All six sets of twins lined up, preparing for the familiar charge of the magic of friendship to run through them.

But Twi stopped and the others looked to her.

“Wallflower, Flash, Aria,” Twi called, getting their attentions, “why don’t you join us. You too, Claws.”

Twi stepped to the side to let them join the line. Claws quickly stood next to her.

“What?” Wallflower startled, trading a glance with Flash. “But we’re not magical.”

“Ah think all ponies are magical,” Jackie answered. “No horn or wings necessary.”

Seeing Twi and the others nod, Flash and Wallflower gingerly shambled up between Claws and Twily.

Twi then turned to Aria, watching from the bathtub. “You too.”

Aria shook her head. “I don’t think that would work. Blow something up, maybe, but nothing helpful. I can’t do that stuff. I used to be a siren, remember?”

“You’re Sunset’s friend too. The magic of friendship is in every creature, in any world.”

Aria hesitated, sinking into the water for a few deep, calming breaths. “You sure? I don’t exactly have a lot of harmony in me.”

“I’m sure it will be enough.”

Another breath later, Aria jumped out of the tub and hurried over. “Fine! But if something goes wrong I’m not taking the fall.”

Wallflower and Twily shifted over more to let her in. Wallflower placed her singed hoof on Aria’s wet scales, sighing at the coolness.

“Nothing will go wrong,” Twily assured her.

“Better not! That’s my f-friend there.”

“Our friend,” Wallflower corrected her with a smile.

With the friendship chain completed, Twi focused and the magic happened.

One by one they all lifted in the air and the charge built, culminating into rainbow ribbons that shot up from them all and combined into one before launching toward Sunset Shimmer.

There was a bright flash as it struck.

And when the flash cleared

Sunset was gone.
> Fight for Friendship
> --------------------------------------------------------------------------

“Where’d she go?!” gasped Twily.

“That’s not what happened at the Fall Formal!” Flash pointed out.

“She exploded like the Memory Stone?!” cried Wallflower.

“I knew it!” Aria shouted. “Why’d you make me join? We killed her!”

BAM

A loud impact was heard outside.

They all gasped and ran for the doors.

At least those who knew how to run in their current bodies ran. Three ponies were left behind.

Flash, Wallflower, and Twily glanced at each other and struggled to get their hooves walking.

Out in the hallway, the other thirteen rushed to the nearest windows and looked out.

In the ground not far from the palace was a shallow trench leading up to what appeared to be a crater. It was hard to tell with all the smoke and steam.

“We blew her sideways?” suggested Peachie.

They peered closer as the smoke cleared, revealing Sunset, still in her nightmare alicorn form.

“It didn’t work?!” Primo yelled. “The rainbows always work!”

In the crater, Sunset stood and teleported herself out to stand beside it on the grass that began fuming at the touch of her hooves.

She spread her wings and flapped, getting some altitude and began flying forward.

It wasn’t five yards before she planted her face into the dirt.

Twi’s eyes widened. “It didn’t work because she teleported away before the rainbow hit her!”

“Then what’s the crater all about?” asked Ponyjack.

“She hasn’t learned how to fly.”

"The instinct hasn't kicked in yet," Butterfly noted.

"She's a unicorn by birth," said Twi, "even with all that magic she might not have a flying instinct."

“Why that little …“ Aria growled. “After all that she’s just running away?! I did friendship magic for her and she dodged!? Soon as I get my hooves on her I’ll tear her a new one!”

She banged on the window. “Get back here, you coward and take my friendship like a—“

A wheeze cut her off and she turned back, bounding for the bathtub.

The others watched her go, her powerful tail easily propelling her forward and leaping over the newest ponies still in the portal room. Finally, she landed in the tub with a splash. A few glubs of aquatic breathing later, she popped her head up and shouted, “This sucks!”

Back outside, Sunset had cleaned herself off and was inspecting her wings more closely, giving them slow flaps and watching how they moved.

Rad saw this and opened her window. “We got to stop her!”

“Plan B it is!” Renae nodded resolutely. “We’re getting our friend back one way or another!”

“That’s right!” Jackie added. “We’ll hogtie her if we have to!”

Butterfly joined Rad on the windowsill. “Whatever it takes to save her!”

“We need a plan!” Twi insisted.

“I have one!” Rad answered. “Primo, you’re with me! The rest of you, keep her grounded!”

The Rainbows took off, flying high. Butterfly jumped out the window and swooped low, Posey following after her.

Shindy jumped onto Twi’s back. “Let’s go, Twi-Twi! Light that horn and zap us down there!”

Peachie, Jackie, Ponyjack, Renae, Share, and Claws, all huddled around Twi who looked out and saw the Fluttershies already orbiting Sunset with determined expressions.

“This is not a complete plan!” Twi groaned, but teleported them out of the palace anyway.

“What!? Hey! What about us?” complained Flash, just making it into the hallway.

“What happened? Where’d they go?” added Wallflower.

“Twi can teleport.” answered Twily.

“And they left us behind!” grumbled Aria from the bathtub.

“I suppose there’s not a lot we could do,” sighed Wallflower, continuing across toward the windows.

“We can barely even walk,” Twily agreed. “Flash, can you fly?”

“Fly?” he returned. “Why would I be able to fly?”

Wallflower and Twily glanced at each other, then back to Flash. “Have you even looked at yourself yet?” Twily asked.

“Haven’t really had a—“ Flash stopped, looking back at his sides. “—I have wings?!”

“That would be a no!” Aria shouted at them.

“How do I move them?”

“That would be a big no!”

Twily reached forward and touched one of Flash’s wings and they snapped open, giving her a face full of feathers. “Phfff!”

“Sorry!”

Wallflower reached the windows and jumped her forelegs up to grab the sill of the open one, pulling herself up to get a closer look. “Whoa,” she gasped.

Their wingless friends had surrounded Sunset to keep her from running, those with wings hovered above her to keep her from taking to the air, and the Rarities kept pelting Sunset’s horn with small rocks any time it lit up. The Rainbows, meanwhile, were high in the sky pushing clouds around.

Flash, having managed to get his wings folded, turned at the gasp and followed her to the open window. Twily followed beside him. Aria just blew bubbles in frustration when they walked out of sight.

“They’re all swarming her,” Flash observed.

“As much as the magic’s affecting her, Sunset’s still holding back,” Twily added.

“She doesn’t want to hurt her friends,” Wallflower noted.

While they watched, a gentle breeze blew in through their window and Flash took a breath, opening his wings. “Wow …. Did, did you two feel that?”

Twily and Wallflower glanced at each other with puzzled expressions. “Feel what?” Twily asked.

“The air is sparkling,” Flash breathed, jumping up to stand on the windowsill.

“Flash! What are you doing?!” Twily yelled.

“Helping Sunset stay Sunset,” he answered calmly before launching himself out of the window.

Wallflower and Twily tried to grab him but he slipped through their hooves

He fell like a rock.

Several stories down, his wings finally seemed to catch the air and his fall turned into a curved dive that eventually leveled out. There was a lot of wobbling, and multiple near hits as he passed trees and other obstacles, but he managed to cover the distance and joined the other winged ponies providing air cover over Sunset.

Twily and Wallflower stared, stunned at the sudden ability until loud scraping sounds behind them brought their attention back to the portal room.

Just in time to see the bathtub skid into view.

Aria hopped behind it, planted her fore hooves into the crystal floor and “kicked” with her tail. The resulting force ejected the tub from the portal room and into the hallway.

Wheezing, Aria jumped into the water. “I am not sitting this out!” she declared after a moment to breathe.

Twily looked at the tub, then back at the commotion outside. Specifically the lit horns any time magic was in use. She concentrated on the tub, remembering the feel of her telekinesis back home, and focused that feeling toward her head. She gave her horn a few taps when it refused to light and focused harder.

Finally, her horn sparked, flaring for a moment before beginning to hum and pulsate.

After a few shorts, the bathtub lurched and lifted as the glow of Twily’s horn stabilized.

“Whoa!” Aria jolted up. “Careful, Four-eyes! This is my oxygen supply here!”

"Then maybe you shouldn't call me Four-eyes," Twily retorted.

Carefully moving the tub down the hall, Twily and Wallflower walked after it, as fast as their hooves would cooperate.

It was only a few minutes until their nemesis appeared.

Stairs.

The three of them stared at the stairwell. Dread rising. Twily placed the tub back on the floor with a sigh.

“Hay, Four-eyes,” Aria broke the silence, “Think you can do a force-field?”

“Uh, maybe?” Twily answered.

“Good.”

With that, Aria leaned out and grabbed first Wallflower, then Twily’s tails with her mouth, pulling them into the tub one at a time.

“You’ve seen a luge, right?”


*** *** ***


“”… aaaaaaaaAAAAAAAAAAAAAAA!”” three voices yelled as a bathtub-shaped toboggan burst through the doors leading to the stairwell, skirted across the foyer, through the front doors, and outside.

Finally coming to a halt, Twily dispelled her shield and one girl dropped below the water line to take a breath while the other two coughed to clear water out of their airways and climbed out of the tub to do the same.

Aria recovered first and took in the battle. Not much had changed other than Sunset being more upset than before. That, and the Applejacks had a metal chain in their mouths laid over Sunset’s back to keep her and her wings down. The center of the chain was glowing red from the heat coming off her. Claws, being a dragon immune to heat, had grabbed onto Sunset’s long tail, though it didn’t seem to affect much as he was whipped all around.

Having landed belly up on the steps outside the palace, Wallflower got a better look at the Rainbows. They weren’t just moving clouds, they had been making them rain … into other clouds.

Wallflower rolled over, missing her hooves completely, rolling down the last of the stairs, and landing on the dirt pathway.

She gasped, her whole body freezing upon contact with the ground. Her eyes went wide, pupils dilating.

More focused on the fight, Twily got to her hooves and lifted the bathtub again, finding both easier than before, and headed after the others.

“Let me GO!” Sunset bellowed, trying to rear back.

The chain strained, the reddest links beginning to warp and stretch.

“No deal till you calm down and stop being an angry-pants!” answered Peachie.

“But none of you wear pants!” replied Shindy. “Seriously, didn’t see a single pair all day. Not even Fancy Pants had any! Skirts and dresses, sure, even a kilt! But no pants anywhere.”

“Shindy! Focus!” Twily called, joining the fray, setting the tub nearby.

“What? Oh, right!” Shindy turned back to Sunset and shook her tail. “Take this!”

With a squeak, a rubber chicken bounced off Sunset’s horn and landed on her muzzle where it slowly melted.

“Noooo! That was my replica Boneless Jr. MK-II I got at a Cheese Sandwich concert. He was a collector’s item!”

Sunset scraped the melting rubber off her face. “Gah! That smells!” Then tried to open her wings again, jumping back in the process.

The chain finally snapped.

“”GANGWAY! MOVE IT!”” the Rainbows shouted.

Flash, Twi, and the Fluttershies abandoned their aerial coverage, and the ground troops spread out, Renae tagging Sunset’s horn one last time to keep her from teleporting before diving behind a tree.

Aria ducked into her bathtub and Twily hid behind it.

Sunset looked up to see a fluffy ceiling descend on her, just before that ceiling exploded.  White mist expanded all around her.

Hissing, sizzling, and groaning could be heard as things cleared.

Sunset lay on her side. The fire in her mane and tail had gone out, leaving limp red and yellow hair. The two strips of chain were no longer red, and plenty of water remained on her, soaking her through without evaporating away.

Wallflower jumped forward, startling the others who hadn’t noticed she was there, and latched onto Sunset’s neck.

“”Pony pile!”” shouted the Pinkies, following suit, jumping onto Sunset, and grabbing her forelegs. Flash and the Fluttershies grabbed onto Sunset’s free wing. The Applejacks went for one of the chains and began looping it around her hindlegs.

Aria launched herself out of the bathtub. She and Twily crossed the distance and joined Wallflower.

The Rarities were ready with more projectiles in their magic, aiming for Sunset’s horn.

The Rainbows climbed for another drenched cloud should another water bomb become necessary.

Twi crouched in front of Sunset. “Please stop fighting us.”

Sunset opened her eyes, the pupils dimmed slightly from before.

“Stop. Fighting. Me!”

She struggled again, but all of her limbs were bound one way or another. She charged her horn only for a rock to bounce off it, disrupting her spell.

With a roar, Sunset’s mane and tail steamed then ignited again. The friends holding her jolted and felt the temperature rising again.

“Um,” squeaked Flash, “can we do that friendship magic while holding her down, because I think we really need to do it now.”

““Hold tight!”” announced the Rainbows with another cloud. Smaller than the last, but still bulging out.

Everyone braced themselves, eyes and ears closing as tightly as they were holding on to Sunset.

At the last second before impact, Twi noticed Sunset’s expression turn into a smirk.

The cloud hit.

When Twi, Claws, the Rarities, the Applejacks, and the Rainbows opened their eyes, they saw the rest were gone.

A loud crash rang out from within the Everfree Forest and the Rarities gasped. “”Why that sneaky little—she waited till we closed our eyes and teleported!””


*** *** ***


Landing with a crash, and jostling those holding on to her, Sunset grunted. Not her smoothest teleport, nor was the last, but it worked.

She looked around. A thickly wooded area. The Fluttershies, the Pinkies, Wallflower, Twily, Aria, and Flash were still on her.

Sunset bucked a tree behind her, shattering the bark and the chain around her hindlegs.

Two legs now free, she pushed with the wing underneath her, leaned back to get into a sitting position, and flailed her forelegs.

“”WEEEEEEEE~HOOOAAAAA!”” the Pinkies let out a cheer that wavered as their grip around Sunset’s remaining legs faltered. Sunset whipped her legs forward once more with all her strength and sent the Pinkies airborne.

“”WEEEEEEEEEEEEE?””

“”Pinkies!”” the Fluttershies shrieked, and took off after the still rising mares.

Sunset pointed a hoof at the Pinkies, then the top of Twi’s palace in the distance. They flashed the same color of her horn and disappeared.

The Fluttershies gasped, turning back to Sunset and separating so she couldn’t teleport them away as well.

Flash, still clamped to Sunset’s left wing, looked up. “She’s still heating up! Get more clouds and call the others!”

They nodded and turned away, Posey rushing toward the palace and Butterfly heading for the sky.

“Sunset, please stop!” pleaded Twily.

“You’re not thinking right, Shimmer,” Aria added.

“The Sunset we know would never do this,” agreed Wallflower.

Whatever words Sunset’s growl might have been about to turn into were cut off when a raining cloud descended around them.

The cloud pushed heavily on Sunset and Flash, causing Sunset to stumble and Flash to nearly lose his grip. Twily, Aria, and Wallflower were unaffected.

While it failed to explode, it did fit around her like a ring, cooling off Sunset and extinguishing her mane and tail.

They all looked up to a sheepish Butterfly. “I don’t know how to make them explode.”

Sunset rolled her eyes and teleported Butterfly away.

“Get. Off. Me!” Sunset then growled at her four remaining tagalongs, zapping the cloud several times with beams from her horn, evaporating it and starting small fires on the ground.

She twirled, bucking violently and shaking her head to dislodge her passengers.

Flash’s already loosened grip faltered and he slipped along the edge of her wing, getting caught by a sharp talon in the process. He landed beside a tree and held his foreleg close.

Wallflower was next, landing in the dirt.

“Stop! Sunset, please!” cried Twily before also getting ejected, landing near Flash.

Something snagged Sunset’s back left hoof and pulled her down.

Sunset looked back and saw a vine snaking its way around her leg. “What?” She looked around and saw Wallflower staring intensely at it, her hooves dug slightly in the ground.

“Well, look who’s a quick learner.“ Sunset stood on her other three legs and turned, only for a low branch to whip out and trip her.

She growled, using her magic to rip the branch off the tree and burn the vine, only for another vine to grab a different hoof.

“That’s it!” Sunset yelled, lifting Wallflower into the air, severing her connection with the plantlife.

Wallflower shrieked, dangling in Sunset’s grasp.

Sunset glared at her.

Wheezing took her attention away.

“This isn’t you,” Aria gasped, still dangling off Sunset’s neck, her gills pulsating.

“Let go. I’ll teleport you to water.”

“No.”

“You need to breathe.”

“You need to … look around.”

Sunset looked up from the gasping Aria.

The fires from Sunset’s attacks had started spreading.

Twily lay moaning on her side.

Flash tended to Twily despite his bleeding leg.

Wallflower hovered in Sunset’s grasp, pawing at her neck from the grip being too tight.

Sunset’s breathing grew shallow and rapid. She immediately lowered Wallflower and put out the flames. “G-girls? Flash?” her voice shrank to a whisper and the pitch black sclera of her eyes softened to a gray.

CRACK

Sunset collapsed.

Butterfly hovered over the fallen form, the ripped branch in her forelegs with a new crack in the middle.

“Um,” she squeaked. “Plan C?”
> The Magic of Friendship and Catalytic Goose Eggs
> --------------------------------------------------------------------------

“… apologized to the Rhinolophidae ambassador for being late and told him that, as the Princess of Friendship, I sometimes have to deal with some very important emergencies at short notice …”

Who’s that? Sounds so distant.

“… friendship problems or evil, world threatening creatures taller than most buildings are just some of the things that I’ve had to …”

Familiar though.

“… made sure he knew I wasn’t trying to downplay the gravity of his feud with the Hipposideridae caste …”

Twilight. My friend.

“How did he take it?”

Both of them.

Both of them?

“He sighed and just dismissed me saying that the arbitration had already been delayed as the other ambassador left. Apparently one of their ancestral caves was raided by a mad mare in a cape just a few hours earlier and she went to investigate.”

“So you can stay here a while?”

Why does my head hurt?

“It’s a three night delay. The others are still in Canterlot taking care of odds and ends but they will be coming back on the evening train tomorrow. As for me …” there was a tired sigh, “I need a nap. I’ve been up for nearly forty hours now and that long-distance teleport really didn’t help.”

“You do look pretty tired. Reminds me of when I get carried away on a research project. Spi—Paws or Sunset usually have to drag me away. I didn’t know ponies could get bags under their eyes too.”

“Bags? They feel like buckets! But please wake me immediately if there’s any change.”

“Of course. I’ll be sure …”


*** *** ***


“… about this design?”

“Uh. Well, the form is reminiscent of … Ah mean it conjures up images of …. Are you sure you want me to answer that question?”

“But of course. You’re the only one here …” the voice grew softer, “awake. And I was thinking these pony-derived designs would be wonderful gifts for dear Sunset after this is all over. I’d love to make a few for you as well, and … darling? You’ve not even looked.”

What’s going on?

“Of course Ah have.”

“Not at me, at the notebook.”

“What? Oh. Sorry. … Well now, those do look interesting.”

“I’ve been adapting some of the designs we’ve seen today, and some of Share’s, to be worn back home. Apparently Sunset mostly grew up in Canterlot but also in her mother’s more rural area so I’ve been trying some ‘country’ designs. A taste of home. I believe that’s your forte.”

“Suppose it depends on what type of country, but Ah like these. Look practical. Are those little horseshoe shapes on the buckles?”

Applejack? Rarity?

“Yes, a little embellishment for flair.”

“Well Ah don’t think Sunset’s going to give up her black jackets anytime soon, but some of these could fit the look.”

“And here’s some Share showed me that are popular in Equestria’s Appleloosa.”

“Ah like those. Would fit right in at a rodeo. My cousin Braeburn has duds a bit like those but these do have more, heh, flair.”

“Wonderful! I’d love to make them for you.”

“For me? But Sunset—“

I’m here. I think.

“Is getting plenty of designs as well, but I can’t neglect my best friend, now can I?”

“A-Ah, well, thank you, Rares. Um, Caramel Apple Girls to the end.”

“Oh, come here, you. A blush like that demands a hug.”

"Whoa now!"

"Oh! Dreadfully sorry about the horn, dear."

“That's alright, Rares. Must get awkward at times. How do …”


*** *** ***


“… these ponies hold books with their hooves?”

“Can you use your wings like fingers?”

Rainbow? Pinkie?

“How would that even work?”

“Well I don’t know. I’m not any more wingy than I am hor—“

“Yeah, we know.”

“Aw.”

There was a thud.

“Dang it. I’m not even five pages in and I’ve dropped it twice already. Daring hasn’t even shown up yet.”

“Why not put it on the floor and turn the pages with your nose? That’s how I read Peachie’s recipe book.”

“Oh. That’ll do.”

Where are they?

“Hey. Is it true that pegasuses”—

“Pegasi.”

—“fart helium?”

“Wait, what?”

“We’ve been here all day, and Ponyjack’s family really cooked up a great dinner for us, you have to know by now.”

“Uh. I haven’t really … my nose is on the other end, how would I know?”

“Just turn around real fast after.”

“Okay, I’m not Rarity, but still, why would I want to do that?”

“Why not? Mine are grassy and sweet. Like hayfed cake!”

“I really didn’t need to know that.”

“I bet Sunset can tell us … when she wakes up.”

They all sound so sad.

“I don’t get it. We hit her with the rainbow. A double-sized one! She should be fine.”

“It still left a honking goose egg on the back of her head.”

“Shh! If ‘Shy hears you she might start crying again.”

“Oh, sorry. And 'honking goose egg' might be an insensitive thing to say here.”

“Sunset’ll wake up soon though. Girl never stays down long.”

“I mean. Yeah. She has to wake up. Right?”

“Of course! Come on, it's only been …”


*** *** ***


“… all night. There's still no change?”

“No. I can’t believe I hit her.”

“You did what you had to.”

“But you said she was starting to come out of it.”

They’re closer now.

“After she saw that she was hurting us, yes. But you didn’t know that, and that might not have lasted anyway.

“Still, I should have—“

“Acted just as fast as you did so she couldn’t hurt anyone. And once she wakes up, that’s exactly what she’ll tell you.”

“… How’s your arm, er foreleg?”

They’re hurt?

“Looks worse than it is. The doc used some magic machine on the skin to seal it up. Won’t be a scar or anything. But they didn't want to do anything about the fur for a few days. Something about mixing magics.”

“That’s good, but does that mean you have to stay for a while? Twi's letting us stay as long as we want. We just can’t come back once we leave. We'll cover for you with school and your parents if you need to stay.”

Did I hurt them?

“Thanks, and I'm not sure. I’ll have to ask Twi about it when she wakes up. But I won’t have fur back home anyway so that shouldn’t be a problem. You think she …, that she wants to … talk?”

“Oh, I’m sure she does.”

“Really? It’s been so long, and she’s kind of … a horse”—

“Pony.”

—“and, well, she’s still cute of course, but not the same kind of cute?”

Why would I have hurt them?

“Well, we talked about you on the train a little bit.”

“You did?! What did she say?”

“Um … I’m not sure how …”


*** *** ***


“… was the pond?”

“Better than the bathtub, that’s for sure. Finally got to swim with my tail again.”

More friends.

“That’s nice. So, why do you look different than you did at the Battle of the Bands?”

“I’m a kelpie.”

So close I could touch them now.

“Isn’t that a dog?”

“A water kelpie, Floor Weed!”

“W-Wallflower.”

“Close enough. I’m not a siren anymore. All you need to know.”

“O-okay.”

If only they would get along better.

“…”

“…”

“You okay out of the water?”

“I got lungs, they just suck at gas diffusion. I can do air just fine if I stay calm.”

“Oh. …”

Why can’t I see them?

“She’ll pull through. Don’t worry.”

“Wha—oh, of course she will.”

“Hay! Get your hoof off me!”

“Sorry! I—it … looked liked you needed—“

“I don’t need anything!”

“You’re shaking.”

“…”

“…”

“Don’t tell anyone.”

“I won’t.”

I need to join them.

“…”

I need to wake up.


*** *** ***


“Ow.”

Sunset flinched when the pain struck again. Her head throbbed, but she pushed through it and opened her eyes.

Light assaulted her.

Closing them again, she debated letting them stay closed. But she had to wake up.

She opened an eye again, just a crack, and waited for the death rays to temper themselves. She didn’t count, but it took much too long before the wall of bright turned into a world. Or at least a room. A blurry room. One that hurt to look at. At least the bed was nice.

Some color had entered the room. Mostly blues and purples. Maybe some white and green?

“Sunset?”

“Nguh?”

“Sunset!”

“Wha?” Sunset opened her other eye.

A purple blur appeared above her, casting a shadow over her, and put what felt like a hoof on her shoulder. The dimmed light helped clear some of the blur, revealing familiar eyes and glasses. “Twilight?”

“Sunset! You’re okay!”

“Ugh … T—too loud.”

Sunset saw her friend’s blurry face smiling down at her and she forced a smile in return.

“SUNSET?!” another voice shouted, so loud and familiar that her vision turned pink even before the voice’s owner bounded into view. That owner gasped loudly, but Sunset noticed the gasp kept on growing.

In horror, she realized what that meant and covered her ears with her hooves.

As the inevitable scream began, Sunset realized she had made a grave mistake.

Her ears weren’t currently on the sides of her head.

“EVERYBODY! SUNSET’S AWAKE! SHE’S AWAKE! AWAKE I TELL YOU! A~W~A~K~E!!”

“Pinkie! Not so loud!” Twilight hissed rather loudly.

Sunset could only whimper. At least her ears had flattened on their own, but it didn’t help the throbbing.

“Oh, whoops,” Pinkie shifted to a whisper. “You think they heard me okay?”

Twilight leveled a glare at her.

Pinkie chuckled sheepishly. “I’ll go find out.”

After watching her zip away first, Twilight muttered, ”Probably heard her at least a mile away, in both worlds.”

Twilight turned back to Sunset and was about to speak when Pinkie returned in another zip to quickly give Sunset a surprisingly gentle hug before leaving in yet another zip.

Sunset had only just lifted a hoof to try and give Pinkie’s mane a pat by the time she noticed the pink blur had gone.

Instead, Sunset felt a hoof on her own mane and looked up to see the blurry purple face finally sharpen into a concerned frown.

“Why am I a pony?” Sunset weakly asked. “And … unless all that candlelight reading finally got to you, you’re not Princess Twi.”

Twilight’s eyebrows raised. “Oh. The glasses. Right, I’m Twily. Twi is sleeping—or probably not anymore though—Do you remember what happened?”

“My head hurts?”

“Oh, Twi put out some painkillers. Think you can swallow some? I can levitate you to a sitting position.”

“Sure.”

Twily’s aura covered Sunset and lifted her into the air. Feeling a little nauseous, Sunset closed her eyes until the movement stopped. A hoof behind her helped her stay upright. When she opened her eyes she saw two pills and a glass of water in the same aura. She took a breath and carefully channeled magic through her own horn and began to cover the pills in her own glow. She only faltered once before successfully getting them past her lips. But for the glass, she decided to play it safe and used her hooves, finishing the whole glass to wash them down.

“Thanks.”

Twily floated the empty glass to a table containing several pitchers, most of which were empty, and sat beside Sunset on the bed. “What’s the last thing you remember?”

Sunset thought for a while, eyes closed and almost appearing asleep, until her eyes shot open and a look of panic stamped onto her face.

“No, no, no, no,” Twily was quick to respond.

“I got hit! The building blew up! F-fires!”

“It’s okay! It’s over!”

“I turned into—“ Sunset gasped before her breathing turned shallow.

“No, Sunset, you’re okay. Sunset, look at me.” With no reaction, Twily gently turned Sunset’s head to face her. “Calm down.”

“I am calm,” she gasped immediately, despite her rapid breathing, before turning her eyes to Twily. “Did I hurt anyone.” It wasn’t intoned as a question.

“We’re all okay.”

“Did I!?”

Twily paused and that was all the answer Sunset needed as her eyes teared up. “Who?”

“We’ve all recovered.”

“Who?”

“Sunset—“

“Flash!” Sunset suddenly grabbed onto Twily’s hoof. “His leg! Aria couldn’t breathe! I was choking Wallflower! You—!”

“Sunset—!”

“I threw you into a tree!”

“We’re okay! All of us! We’re okay.” Slowly, Sunset’s features began to relax and Twilight repeated again, “We’re all okay. It’s over now.”

Sunset leaned in, pulling her into a hug.

Twily felt the fur on her back get wet and Sunset shook in her fore legs.

“I couldn’t stop her, Twilight. I tried. I tried so hard but she wouldn’t stop.”

“You kept her from doing much worse.”

“I wanted the friendship rainbow but she—“

“You held her back. We were all around you. You could have lashed out but you didn’t.”

“I choked Wallf—“

“You held on a little too tight, but you put her down as soon as you realized it.”

“I never wanted to be her again.”

“I know. I know what it’s like to have that whisper in your ear, and the yelling, the—the screaming. I never want to be Midnight again and I could have just as easily have been if I was hit instead.” Sunset only moaned as Twily continued, “You saved the day, you know.” Another moan. “We could have had to fight someone we couldn’t talk down. Someone who wanted all that power and didn’t care who got hurt.”

“The school’s going to hate me again.”

“They don’t. Paws has been talking to them. And we’ve been using your journal to message Principal Celestia—“

“Celestia!” Sunset cried.

“You’re a hero, Sunset! Again. She doesn’t think anything else. Neither of them.”

“Does—“ Sunset sobbed, “does she know?”

“Yes,” Twily answered, getting another sob, “Twi said she knows. And she’s proud of you.”

Sunset just held on tighter as Twily stroked her mane and back.

“First the Friendship Games where you managed to channel all our friends’ magic through you, turning into that angel, and saving me. Then all the other times you’ve saved the day with your empathy, your magic, your compassion, your wisdom. The way you keep us together as our de facto leader. And now.“ Sunset shivered. “How you took on an amount of untamed magic that would likely have made anyone else insane with power and kept it in check. All day long, since it started, your only thought was to keep the rest of us safe. The rest was all her and she barely got you to budge after an entire day of wearing you down. And even then you only changed to wanting to make up for your long past mistakes, and make your teacher proud by helping everyone you could.”

Under Twily's caresses, Sunset’s breathing gradually slowed and deepened, fading into quiet sleep.

BANG

“”Ahhhhh!””

Sunset’s eyes snapped open at the screams, seeing a pile of ponies spilling out of a doorway leading to a hall. “I didn’t do it!” yelled Pinkie, who popped her head into the room from above the pile.

“Sorry,” groaned Rarity from the bottom of the pile.

“Girls!” Sunset yelled and tried to rush out to them, only for Twily to hold her back.

“No,” Twily told her firmly. “You’re staying in bed!”

“But—”

“They’ll come to you,” Twily turned her head and eyed the eavesdroppers, “apparently.”

The ponies in the pile looked back sheepishly

“Terribly sorry, dears.” Rarity strained under Applejack’s weight, who in turn was waiting for Fluttershy and Rainbow Dash to untangle their wings and get off of her, “We came as soon as we heard”—Rarity shot Pinkie a glance—“but when we arrived, considering the conversation, we thought it best to wait patiently.”

“With your ears against the door,” Twily deadpanned.

“Well … yes … but can you blame us for wanting to know how our dear friend was faring? I assure you we intended to be polite and quiet. Unfortunately, it’s difficult to remain on two legs with pony hips without leaning considerably forward.”

Aria, balancing upright on just her tail and still in the hall with Pinkie, Flash, and Twi, laughed and bounded over the disassembling pile. “Meanwhile, I don’t even have any hind legs and I manage just fine.”

“You’re a native!” Rarity argued.

“A native who’s been in the wrong body for centuries.”

“It still gives you an advantage.”

“Oh, quit your bellyaching, Prissy, and haul that a▓s.”

Rarity gasped. “I’ll have you know my derriere does not require hauling!”

“Then why is it still on the floor?”

Glancing up, Rarity noticed the others had all returned to standing or hovering with Applejack holding out a hoof to help her up. “R-right.” With a blush, Rarity took the offer.

“Aria? Flash?” Sunset asked them. “Are you two okay?”

“We’re fine, Shimmer. You still gotta put up with me leaving dishes in the sink and taking all the hot water in the shower.”

Flash discreetly angled himself to hide the missing fur on his leg. “No problems here. All healed.”

“Wallflower?” Sunset called out.

“I’m okay too,” Wallflower’s voice replied, directing Sunset’s attention to the side.

“Really?” Sunset asked the smiling mare, paying close attention to her neck. “All of you? You’re all okay?”

“Oh, stop fussing,” Aria scoffed. “We’re fine. You’re the one who’s been through the wringer.”

“I’m fine. Just a headache.” Sunset replied, getting Fluttershy to squeak and hold onto Rainbow’s hovering tail for support, absently tugging her downward. “What happened at the end? Everything just went black.”

Twi stepped forward. “You stopped and—“

“I HIT YOU IN THE BACK OF THE HEAD WITH A TREE BRANCH!” Fluttershy sobbed. “I’M SO SORRY!”

Sunset blinked at her and felt the back of her head, wincing when she felt the bump. She then looked up to see an airborne Fluttershy rocketing toward her. She braced for impact and immediately found herself pressed flat against the mattress with the sobbing girl on her chest.

“I’m sorry, I’m sorry, I’m sorry!”

After a few breaths to settle her lungs and stomach, Sunset stroked Fluttershy’s mane. “Thank you,” she nuzzled into her ear. “I’m glad you stopped me. It’s what I needed.”

“Y-you’re sure?” Fluttershy murmured.

“I’m sure.” Sunset stroked her mane a few more times. “Are you okay?”

Fluttershy nodded, slowly getting up and drying her eyes with a small smile.

Satisfied, Sunset said, “What happened after that?”

“We rainbow-blasted you!” Rainbow exclaimed with a proud grin that turned into a playful smirk. “Again.”

Sunset returned her a bashful grimace. “So … all that magic’s gone now, right?”

“Actually,” Twi began, “you absorbed it.”

“What?!” Sunset’s eyes went wide. “No! No, no, get it out!”

“Sunset, it’s okay! It’s harmonized. It’s your magic now,” Twily calmed her with a hoof. “It’s safe. She’s gone.”

Sunset put her hoof over Twily’s and steadied herself with a deep breath. “That’s not going overpower my geode again, is it?”

“I think you’ll be okay,” Twi answered. “This should be completely internal magic, possibly not even accessible in the other world. You appear to have turned it into pure Equestrian-Harmony magic of some flavor.”

“I turned it? But the rainbow—“

“Seems to just have been a catalyst. You did the work, the rainbow just gave you a push.”

“But that was way too much power for one pony to take in all at once. Maybe not even Celestia.”

The Twilights smiled brightly and Twily took over. “We theorize that your transformation at the Friendship Games, itself an impressive feat, had a lasting effect.”

“But. But, still, I can’t hold that power. It’s going to dissipate eventually.” Sunset put a hoof to her horn, pressing on it slightly. “Why can’t I feel the surge?”

“You appear to have a much greater magic capacity now,” said Twi. “Likely ever since the Games. You just never noticed because you’ve been living in a world where most of the magic is dormant from stagnation.”

Sunset gaped at them as Twily continued. “This new sudden rush of magic may have overwhelmed you, but that, combined with a bit of friendship harmonic recalibration was all you needed.”

“N-needed for what?” Sunset breathed.

The Twilights glanced at each other, a glimmer of a smile flashed between them before they turned back for Twi to continue, “Oh, just giving you a larger thaumatic pool to draw from when using Equestrian magic. Again, you likely won’t even notice in the other world, but you’ll be stronger here from now on.”

Sunset leaned back and stared at the ceiling while the Twilights shared a smirk.

“Hooo-weee!” Applejack sang out with a playful smirk of her own. “That’s a lot of fancy words to just say we had to do the ol’ slap a villain with a friendship canon and make her see the error of her ways bit. No offense.”

The reply was automatic, “None t—“ Sunset stopped herself. “Ugh. Don’t start that again.”

“We’ll take offense from that for you,” said Aria. “Right, Wall Petal?”

“Uh, flower,” corrected Wallflower.

“Same thing.”

Taking advantage of everyone remembering she was in the room, Wallflower stepped up to Sunset’s bed and laid a bouquet of daisies beside her. “I grew these for you. Daisies mean innocence, purity, and new beginnings. I thought that would be fitting.”

Blushing, Sunset took the flowers into her fore legs and gave them a sniff. “They’re beautif—wait. You grew them? How long have I been out?”

“Almost a day.”

“You grew these in a day?”

“I was surprised too, but the seeds just … spoke to me? I’m not sure how to describe it.”

“Wow. I bet they taste delicious.”

“T-taste?”

“Why the new beginnings part though?”

“Uh ….”

Twi coughed.

Flash quickly stepped forward. “W-we want you to know how much we all care about you.”

There was a chorus of nods, shouts, cheers, and whooping in agreement from the whole room. They all gathered around the bed and took turns reaching out to her.

“Our friendship may have had a rocky start,” began Flash Sentry.

“But those trials only strengthened us,” added Rarity.

“We’re all better friends because of it,” cheered Pinkie Pie.

“We’ve weathered many a storm since then,” Applejack put in.

“And through it all, you’ve been the glue—uh—bond, that’s kept us together,” Twily covered quickly.

“You always look out for us,” Wallflower smiled.

“There’s no way you could ever hurt us,” Fluttershy added softly.

“And if you ever did, we’d just kick your literal tail!” Rainbow Dash mock-challenged.

“Bringing us all back together as friends again,” noted Twi.

“Yeah. All that. Ditto,” finished Aria Blaze.

Sunset looked around at them all, her bottom lip beginning to tremble. With a sniff, she gently laid down the daisies and brought her fore legs up to her eyes to wipe away the tears streaking down her cheeks. “Th-thank you, everypony.”

“Ahem.”

“And kelpie. I-I don’t know what to say.”

“Hug pile?” suggested Pinkie.

Sunset broke out into giggles. “Hug pile!”

Pinkie was the first to pronk onto the bed, glomping onto Sunset tightly. She was quickly joined by Fluttershy, Rarity, Applejack, and the Twilights. Flash, Wallflower, and Aria stood by until they were pulled in by Twi, Pinkie, and Twily respectively. Though Wallflower wasn’t sure how Pinkie managed to grab her from deep inside the hug pile.

Aria was the first to grow antsy. “How long are these things supposed to last?”

“Until the party starts!” shouted Pinkie, standing up on the bed and pushing back all the huggers around Sunset. There were multiple thuds as several members hit the floor.

“Oof.”

“Ow.”

“Pinkie!”

Sunset chuckled, “Of course you have a party planned. What’d you name this one?”

“It’s the Hi-My-Name-is-Pinkie-Pie-and-I’m-New-in-Town-Even-Though-I-Probably-Look-Just-Like-Someone-Else-You-Know-Who-is-Also-Named-Pinkie-Pie-But-I-Want-to-be-Your-Friend-Too Party! It was supposed to be yesterday but I put up a notice that it was delayed until Sunset Shimmer woke up. That’s you!”

“Wait!” Twi snapped her head up. “You didn’t actually advertise it with that name did you?”

“Hrmm,” Pinkie hummed, “You’re right, I should change it. How about we name it the, Hi-Our-Names-are-Pinkie-Pie-Applejack-Fluttershy-Rarity-Rainbow—“

“Pinkie!” Twi cut her off.

“I already said that.”

“How about something simpler?”

“Okay! How about the We-Just-Crossed-Dimensional-Barriers-To-Save-Our-Friend-And-Now-She’s-Safe-And-We’re-Hungry-So-Let’s-Have-a-Party party?”

Twi rolled her eyes.

“How about,” Sunset spoke up, “the Just-Because party?”

“Well, that would fit on the signs easier. And just think about how many times I could re-use them! I’ll go tell Mrs. Cake, but the party's all set to be right outside the palace and people will start showing up once we ring the bell-tower! Meet me in the foyer in sixty seconds!” Pinkie all but shrieked in excitement before zipping out of the room. The others all looked around at each other.

“Sixty seconds?” considered Rainbow. “There’s no way she can …. I gotta see this!” She shot out of the room as if trying to outpace Pinkie.

Fluttershy turned to Sunset. “Will you be okay for a Pinkie party?”

Sunset pushed the covers down and flexed her four legs before slowly sitting up. “I doubt I’ll make it in sixty seconds, but I’ll be there.”

“I’ll help you.”

“Me too,” added Wallflower. Flash and several others nodded and came closer.

“Whoa! Nope! I don’t need that much help,” Sunset protested with a lopsided grin. “I’ll take no more than two. The rest of you, go on.”

The group traded looks and eventually settled on the first two offers. Applejack and Rarity left together, with Aria and Flash following behind.

The Twilights watched them go. “We’ll catch up,” Twi called as the last of them headed through the doorway.

They glanced at each other, stifling a pair of giggles, before Twi placed the bouquet in one of the water pitchers.

“ ‘New beginnings’, huh?” mused Twily.

“Yeah. Might need to make a crown.”

Twily looked at the mattress, smiling coyly, and lifted out an amber-colored feather. “When do you think she’ll notice the wings?”

“HOLY FREAKING HORSEAPPLES! WHAT THE BUCKING TARTARUS!?”

“I’d say about now.”





~~~ F~I~N ~~~




> - - - - - - Epilogues - - - - - -
> --------------------------------------------------------------------------


> S.M.I.L.E.: It's the End of the World and You’re Late to the Pinkie Party
> --------------------------------------------------------------------------

“You sure you’re okay, Bonnie?”

“Y-yep! I’m okay. Why do y-you ask?”

“You’re still shaking for one, and you’re practically choking the life out of our cloud.”

Agent Drops looked up at her partner, then to the cloud fluff she was strangling in her hooves, then back to her partner, standing as if nothing was out of the ordinary. A glance over her other shoulder showed her the world passing rapidly underneath them just past the edge of their cloud.

That edge was much too close.

“I’ve never had the Cloudwalking spell cast on me before. How are you okay with this?”

Agent Heartstrings chuckled. Chuckled! Drops held in a retort. “Easy! Almost half my extended family are pegasi. I used the Cloudwalking spell to watch my cousin in the Best Young Fliers Competition a few years ago when Rainbow Dash pulled off that rainboom, and you know I visit family in Las Pegasus a lot.”

“But Las Pegasus has walkways for us ground ponies.”

“Just the tourist traps. Most of the real town is clouds only.”

Drops just muttered.

“Come on,” Heartstrings held a hoof out to her partner, “we’re almost there. Right, fellas?”

One of two pegasus S.M.I.L.E. couriers currently connected to a yoke and tied to the cloud waved a hoof. “Two minutes!”

“See?” Heartstrings smiled. “Almost time for action. Got to get ready, and that means standing up.”

Drops looked up. The hat she’d used as part of her disguise had long since blown away in the wind, and her once frizzy clown-like mane had de-poofed into long, curly locks that tangled about. Meanwhile, Heartstrings’s artificially purple mane and tail had gained only a few extra kinks. With a grumbled retort over the unfairness of the universe, Drops forced one hoof to let go of her stranglehold and gripp the offered pastern. As she continued to release the cloud, Heartstrings pulled her close, the cloud bouncing back into its hoof-crafted shape.

“Much better!” Heartstrings cheered. “But I don’t get it. You’re an expert at hang-gliding, parachuting, ballooning, and you’re working on a pilot’s license. It’s not like you’re afraid of heights. What’s with you and clouds?”

“I can control hang-gliders, parachutes, and aircraft.”

“What about hot-air balloons?”

“Hot-air balloons aren’t soft and lumpy, and don’t wobble like jello when you walk on them! Everything about this feels wrong.”

Heartstrings just laughed. “Special Agent Sweetie Drops, monster hunter, defeated by a lumpy cloud.”

Drops blushed.

“We’re here!” called a courier, beginning to slow the cloud.

Clearing her throat, Drops turned professional. “Check your harness.” Though she failed to hide a squeak in her voice.

The Special Agents secured straps, checked their gear, and stuffed their colorful manes into white caps matching the fluffy, white bodysuits they donned for the stealthy trip. Meanwhile, the couriers steadied the cloud and began lowering it from their travel height down to the standard cloud height, aiming to discreetly merge it with a local cloud near their target.

“In position.”

Lying flat, Drops, Heartstrings, and the couriers looked out over the four cardinal edges of the cloud with binoculars and scanned the town of Ponyville.

Drops lifted a hoof beside her muzzle and spoke to a communicator on her pastern. “This is Special Agent Sweetie Drops calling agents in the Ponyville region. Urgent message, please respond.”

“I see Trixie’s caravan,” Heartstrings called. “It’s … smoking? Doesn’t seem to be anypony around though.”

“There’s a crater and a trench just north of the palace,” the courier on the north edge observed.

The communicator beeped and a static-filled voice came through it, “This is Agent Steed. Go ahead, Agent Drops.”

“Do not impede Princess Sparkle and her crew. The ‘twins’ in her company are friendlies.”

“Roger that, Drops. That’s been confirmed by Agent Diablo already.”

Drops and Heartstrings traded a glance before Drops replied. “Good. What’s your status?”

“Cleanup in progress. S.M.I.L.E.’s involvement largely hidden, though one Trixie Lulamoon still needs to be Ref Def'd. Other than that we’re helping out with town efforts as part of our cover.”

“Trixie got involved after all?”

“Declared herself the substitute savior of Ponyville.”

Another glance was traded. This time with skeptical eyebrows.

“Uh. And what was the result?” Drops asked.

“Minor damages around town, no civilian injuries, and just some bruises and a minor burn injury on our … end.” There was some background chatter before the agent added more. “Agent Slowpoke will need tail extensions from the rocket fire.” More chatter. “I know that’s not your name and the pun was intended.”

“Wha—?”

“Don’t ask,” a different voice answered. “Just don’t ask.”

Heartstrings chuckled. “Did that sound like Agent Bravo to you?”

Drops smirked and let out a snerk but squashed it and continued her debriefing. “And what about the Princess and company?”

“They were all inside the palace for a while after fighting some monster.”

“Monster?”

“It looked like Nightmare Moon but red and had fire for hair.”

Heartstrings, Drops, and the two couriers turned to face each other. “And they won, right?” Drops asked.

“Yes. Turned her into a young alicorn. Identity unknown. Amber fur, red and yellow hair. Unconscious at last sighting.”

“Alicorn?“ asked a courier. “We’re up to six now?”

"Seven," the other courier added. "But we don't talk about you know who."

“Maybe the new alicorn has to do with that ‘trouble’ Agent Shiwa mentioned?” offered Heartstrings.

Drops returned to the communicator. “Then what?”

“Some time later, the Princess and what we can only assume are the other six members of F.R.O.W.N., including Green Fern, left in a hot-air balloon with Blue Begonia pulling them toward Canterlot at high speed. The unknown alicorn and ‘twins’ have unknown status.”

“Saw a balloon earlier,” confirmed a courier. “Occupants were unable to identify from our altitude.”

Heartstrings smiled. “If all of F.R.O.W.N. are going back to Canterlot, including Twilight, then the problem must be over. Their twins must have gone home.”

“Mission accomplished,” Drops relaxed.

“And the palace is empty,” Heartstrings all but squeed.

“Cannot confirm palace status,” the agent on the communicator replied.

“Anything more to report, Agent?” asked Drops.

“Not at this time.”

“Thank you. Drops signing off.”

After closing the communicator’s connection, Drops turned to the others on the cloud, first addressing the couriers. “The two of you are welcome to join the cleanup efforts or you can return home.” Then Heartstrings. “We can go clean off these disguises.”

“What about the portal?” Heartstrings rushed. “We have to check it out! You know. Confirm it for S.M.I.L.E. records.”

“Yeah, that’s what you want to do with the portal.”

“Of course, we would have to take a peek.”

“No,” Drops declared.

“Palace is empty.”

“Unconfirmed.”

“We brought our stealth gear.”

“Too risky.”

“It’s an active Starswirl relic. How much riskier can you get?”

Drops sighed, but thought that over. “Fine,” she droned.

Heartstrings pronked excitedly, the cloud’s fluffiness adding to the spring in her bounces. Drops rolled her eyes and turned to the couriers. “Your orders stand, but we’ll be making a drop. Wait till we’re inside, then retrieve our gear before you carry them out.”

“”Yes ma’am,”” they replied.

Drops then turned to her partner to see her already hooking her harness to the cloud grappling hook. She rolled her eyes again and hooked up beside her.

Heartstrings giggled. “Not only do we get to see this portal, but I’ve always wanted to storm a castle. Ready?”

Drops sighed but braced herself, “Ready.”

With a flash of her horn, Heartstrings ended the Cloudwalking spell and the pair fell through the lumpy floor. The couriers watched them descend down the transparent line right over the roof of the Palace of Friendship, their white caps and fluffy bodysuits making them appear as pony-shaped clouds.


*** *** ***


After taking off their white cloud suits and retaining only the black stealth suits underneath, Drops and Heartstrings crept through the hall, one floor below the attic. The couriers had pulled their gear and white suits back up with the lines before flying the cloud away. “So far so good,” Drops commented.

“So, where do you think a Princess of Friendship would store an ancient Starswirl relic leading to another world full of humanes?”

Drops considered the size of the palace.

Not so good.


*** *** ***


Room by room, floor by floor they searched until they heard voices and ducked into the next room.

“I need a nap. I’ve been up for nearly forty hours now and that long-distance teleport really didn’t help.”

“You do look pretty tired. Reminds me of when I get carried away on a research project. Spi—Paws or Sunset usually have to drag me away. I didn’t know ponies could get bags under their eyes too.”

“Bags? They feel like buckets! But please wake me immediately if there’s any change.”

“Of course. I’ll be sure to call as soon as there’s something to call about.”

Drops whispered to Heartstrings. “What are the odds Twilight is just talking to herself?”

“Very high, normally, but I think that’s actually two Twilights.”

“Oh! By the way,” a Twilight continued. “I moved your wardrobe back to your room, I don’t know where you normally keep it, but I cleaned it up. I just assumed you’d organize your clothes like I would.”

“By type first, then alphabetically by color, and then creation date?” another Twilight replied.

“Yes! Found the dates on the tags!”

The two Twilights giggled together.

“Yeah,” Heartstrings, “there’s two of them.”

“So the twins didn’t go home, and Purple Rose came back?” Drops whispered. “Does that mean all of them are here? We need to go.”

Disappointed, Heartstrings nodded an agreement and they attempted to leave, only for hoofsteps to sound out, heading for them. Drops checked the room they were in for hiding places and realized they were in the Princess’s bedroom. “She’s coming here!”

They dashed, looking for hiding spaces and the door opened a moment later revealing a purple alicorn. A very tired purple alicorn who nearly stumbled on her own hooves. She looked over at her wardrobe and chuckled. “Nah, let’s put you on the East wall, get more light in the mornings.”

Lighting her horn, the wardrobe lifted and she frowned. “Wow, I gotta sleep, that’s way heavier than it should be.”

She walked up to her bed and flopped onto it, falling asleep before her face hit the covers. The wardrobe, still in her magic, dropped to the floor in a heavy thud when the aura flickered out.

The two Secret Agents hiding inside did their best to not make any noise as they were jostled to its floorboard. Heartstrings didn’t quite manage it when her rump made contact with a set of pointy, royal shoes.

In the silence that followed, and in the complete absence of light, the agents waited. When some time passed without any evidence of activity, Heartstrings quietly removed the offending hoofwear and the two slowly and carefully fumbled for the door. It was Drops who eventually got it open, only for it to strike something, leaving only a tiny crack to peer out of. Doing just that revealed that the wardrobe had been left facing a wall in the corner of the room.

They looked at each other. Or tried to. There wasn’t much light.

Drops pushed harder, pressing back to try and move the wardrobe away from the wall, only for the back to hit another object that made a loud wobbling sound. “Can you lift the wardrobe with your magic?” she asked. “Move us to the side?”

“Not from inside it,” Heartstrings replied. “No leverage.”

Drops sighed, resting her forehead on the slightly opened door. “We can’t get out without making noise and getting spotted. We’re stuck while the princess is in the room.”

Said princess began to snore.


*** *** ***


“EVERYBODY! SUNSET’S AWAKE! SHE’S AWAKE! AWAKE I TELL YOU! A~W~A~K~E!!”

The wall-shaking, floor-rumbling shout, and the thud and grunt that suggested the Princess of Friendship had just face-planted out of bed also woke the two secret agents.

“Nugh, wha—Pink—Sunset?!” The Princess stuttered before a lopsided series of galloping hoofsteps sounded in the room, out the door, and down the hall.

“Ugh,” Heartstrings groaned, “about time. I gotta pee.”

“You’ll have to hold it till we’re out of the palace,” Drops warned her, getting another groan for a reply. “Help me push this open.”

Carefully they pushed, the wardrobe sliding backward and pressing into that wobbling object they heard before. Their care was for naught, however, when the thing toppled with a crash.

The agents winced, sighed, and pushed harder now that the damage was done. Finally free, they slid the wardrobe back against the wall and identified the offending object as an expensive-looking telescope. “That’s bad,” Drops pointed out, noticing the cracked lens, as Heartstrings levitated it back into convincing undisturbed pose. “We can’t fix that.”

“We could get a replacement,” Heartstrings smiled. “I know the model. It was advertised in last month’s Ancient Aliens magazine. The company is based in Canterlot. I wonder if Twilight’s a subscriber.”

“Then we’ll request funds from hidequarters once we’re out. If everypony’s gone after Pink Petunia, we should be able to get around. Let’s find that portal.”


*** *** ***


“What happened in here?” marveled Heartstrings.

Drops looked around what appeared to be the aftermath of a bomb blast in a private study. Books, furniture, and all sorts of dust and clutter were strewn about. Parts of the floor seemed to have been swept following the destruction, drawing a line clear of debris from the door to a large mirror with all manner of technical equipment connected to it. “Possibly a fight with a flaming red Nightmare Moon from another world?”

Heartstrings gasped, “You think that mirror is the portal?”

“Fits the description of one in Canterlot Castle’s hold. Supposedly destroyed a few years ago.”

“Eeeeeee!” Heartstrings squealed, rushing up to the mirror.

“Lyra!” Drops hissed before checking the hall again and closing the door.

“I gotta see! I gotta see! I gotta see! I gotta see!”

“No! No, no, no! We’re only here to confirm and catalog.”

“And we do that by going through!”

“We know nothing about the portal. What if it closes behind you?”

“You hide here until F.R.O.W.N. and their twins come back and eavesdrop any info you can on it. Once you know how it works, you can come after me!”

Drops sat down and crossed her forelegs with a frown.

“Oh, come on,” Heartstrings argued.

“It endangers the mission and you!”

“Do you know how long I’ve dreamed of this moment?” Heartstrings asked, the mirror’s surface now only a hoof’s length away.

“Since nine years ago when the series began?”

“That’s just the current series. I was a fan of the original too!”

“And you’re just going to hop through a mirror that might be a portal to a world that might have been the inspiration for that series without checking to be sure it’s safe first?”

“YES!”

“And leave me behind?” Drops put a hoof over her heart, her ears lowering toward the sides of her head.

“You can come too,” Heartstrings answered plainly.

“I am not—!” Drops snapped. “What if we both get stuck on the other side?”

“Seems like a nice place to live in the comics.”

“And I’m sure we’d instantly fit right in with no problems whatsoever.”

“Exactly.”

“That was sarcasm!” Drops yelled. “I happen to like the world I was born in.”

“Well, so do I. But, what could go wrong?”

“HOLY FREAKING HORSEAPPLES! WHAT THE BUCKING TARTARUS!?” an unknown, and perplexed voice shouted out from a lower floor.

“What was that?!” Heartstrings responded.

“Did you recognize the voice?” asked Drops.

“No. The unknown alicorn maybe?”

“If it’s alicorn-related we should check it out. Come on.” Drops slowly opened the door, and crept out after checking the hall.

Heartstrings watched her go then turned to the mirror.

“What could go wrong?”


*** *** ***


Hidden behind a potted plant, Drops watched a giggling pair of Twilight Sparkles, one with wings, one with glasses, trotting down a hallway toward Yellow Daisy, an unknown green earth pony mare, and an unknown amber alicorn. The alicorn appeared to be in a state of shock and trying to examine her wings, though they didn’t seem to want to cooperate. More than once she fumbled and slapped herself or the other mares with them.

Drops looked back. Heartstrings still hadn’t joined her. There was a very obvious conclusion to draw from that.

In the other direction, the alicorn had pulled the Twilights into a tight, tearful hug which they returned with large smiles, despite the amber wings in their faces.

Drops dropped her head against the potted plant then headed back the way she came.


*** *** ***


Halfway there a shadow spoke to her. “Drops?”

“Lyra?” Drops turned and her partner emerged from the shadow. “Lyra! I was afraid you’d gone to the other world and I’d never see you again!”

“Oh, I’d never leave you behind, Bonnie.”

“Really? You stayed for me?” Drops sniffed.

“Aw, come here.” Heartstrings pulled her in for a nuzzle. “It’s not like I just couldn’t figure out how to turn the thing on.”

Drops pulled away from the nuzzle and gave her partner a look. “It’s not?”

Heartstrings giggled, “Of course not. What kind of best friend do you take me for?”

Drops glared a moment longer, but her expression softened to a smile and she gave her friend a hug. “Then let’s go. There was talk about a party. We can mingle and get more insight on those twins. We’ll discard these bodysuits and use our Bon Voyage and Star Catcher backstories.”

Heartstrings watched her partner trot away happily. She then discreetly lit her horn and conjured a construct made of light the same color of her horn. She smiled brightly at the hand, softly giggling. “They have five fingers. Always thought it was four.”


*** 

 ***


In the shadow of a large bush, a sound of metal sliding against metal was heard before a boulder, looking not unlike painted Styrofoam, slowly lifted up on a hinge.

A pony wearing a hazmat suit popped its head up and looked around.

“Is it safe?” A mare’s voice called up from below.

“I can’t believe we forgot to stock the pantry!” came another mare’s voice below.

“It was your turn!”

“I did it last time!”

“Girls!” the mare at surface level called down to them before shushing herself and continuing at a lower volume. “The coast seems clear.”

Slowly, the three hazmat ponies crept out of the hole before they reached the edge of the protective shade of the bush. The lead pony jumped forward into a roll, landing her next to a tree opposite the town. She repeated this, tree to tree, bush to bush, with her companions following behind somewhat less successfully.

“OOF!” one of them grunted after rolling into her target tree. But on they traveled, creeping, dashing, rolling, crashing, and pratfalling their way to town to keep out of sight. It was almost time for Princess Celestia to lower the sun when they heard the unmistakable sounds of a Pinkie party.

“They’re having a party? So, we’re in the clear? Surely the changelings haven’t duped the whole town after we warned them all.”

“Could be. It’s just like Pinkie to throw a party after saving the town. And don’t call me Surely.”

“Or, Pinkie could be throwing the party for the changelings.”

“Not if they’re working for Chrysalis. Friendly ones, yeah. But if they were Thorax changelings they’d have said so.”

“But this ‘Pinkie’ herself could be a Chrysalis changeling.”

To the north a train whistle sounded. “The trains are still running. That’s good, right?”

They crept closer and saw the party out front the Palace of Friendship. Pinkie was there, very hard to miss as usual. They also saw Applejack, Rarity, Rainbow Dash, Fluttershy, and …

“Um. Does Twilight have a sister?”

“I don’t know. Why?”

“There’s two of them—“

“Wha—?“

“But only one’s an alicorn, the other is a unicorn in glasses. I can’t check the unicorn’s cutie mark, she’s got a dress on.”

“Why would a changeling need glasses? Can’t they just change their eyes to not need them?”

They kept approaching, hiding behind a bush not far from a set of food tables, and wishing they could eat the food through their hazmat suits.

“Who’s the redhead?”

“Unicorn with the yellow streaks?”

“Yeah.”

“Looks familiar. Think I saw her walking around with Twilight once before.”

“I like her dress. It’s a bit bunched up on her sides though.”

“She looks really happy.”

“Coast must be clear then.”

“Oh thank Celestia.”

“Wait! What’s that?!”

One hazmat pony pointed to the palace and the others turned to see a magenta unicorn with a violet mane and a white earth pony climbing out of a window, silently dropping to the ground.

“Why are they sneaking around the palace?”

“Is that Amethyst?”

“Who’s the other?”

“I don’t know, but her mane really needs a spa day. Maybe a week.”

“Get down, they’re coming this way!”

The three of them ducked as the pair of mares approached. The two of them nodded to each other and separated, the earth pony mingling while the unicorn stopped by the table nearest the trio to grab some treats.

The trio crept around the bush to another table and observed.

“Amethyst doesn’t like ginger snaps. That can’t be her. You don’t think ….”

“Oh no. Look left.”

To their left another magenta unicorn with a violet mane mingled through the crowd, heading for the food table. The trio huddled down and watched.

“I can’t take it anymore!” a hazmat pony whispered to another, grabbing and shaking her by the shoulders. “We have to warn them!”

Suddenly the table was bumped by the other side and they startled back.

“Oh, excuse me, dear,” they heard a Trottingham voice, “I believe I may have had a bit too much of the hard cider. Wonderful flavor.” The hazmat ponies looked up to see the white earth pony chatting with Amethyst, the one on the left. “I’m Bon Voyage, pleased to—oh my, you look just like my friend here. Would you two be related by chance?”

The two Amethysts finally noticed each other and looked themselves over. “We could be twins. Only our cutie marks are different,” marveled the one on the left. “I’m Amethyst Star.”

“Uh, St-Comet Catcher,” answered the other. “Wow, what a resemblance, huh?”

While Bon Voyage stepped to the side with a relieved expression, and the two near twins began a conversation, the hazmat trio glanced at each other with sheepish expressions, barely readable through the face-plates. “So,” said one of them.

“Um. No changelings?”

“I guess they’re gone now?”

“That’s what the party’s for?”

“We can ask Pinkie.”

“After we eat.” Two of them nodded to the last to speak and they all took off their helmets before heading to another food table.

Bon Voyage watched them out of the corner of her eyes. “Crisis averted.”

“Hay! She’s finally up!” a familiar, brash voice got her to turn around. “So, you’re Sunset, huh? You took our exploding clouds like a champ by the way.”

Before the addressed pony could reply, another very excited voice chimed in, “Sunny’s awake and Shindy’s got her first pony party going! WOO!”

Bon Voyage’s eyes widened seeing a dragon as well as five mares arrive who perfectly matched five other mares already enjoying the party. Bon quickly looked to the side to see the flower trio staring back at them, jaws gaping. “Oh no.”

“Ahhhhhhhhhhh!” one screamed.

“Changelings!” a second added. “The evil kind. I’m not speciesist!”

“Chrysalis is attacking!” the third finished up. “Run for your lives!”

They each grabbed a plate of food in their mouths and galloped the way they came.

All the other ponies in the party stopped and looked at the newcomers.

Two Rainbow Dashes, two Applejacks, two Rarities, two Fluttershies, and … two Pinkie Pies. Amethyst looked at Comet Catcher again.

The music shut off with a record scratch as DJ Pon-3 lifted her shades to get a better look.

Twi opened her mouth and took a breath to address the crowd, but the townsponies were screaming and running before she could start.

As the final panicked ponies left the party, Twi groaned, visibly deflating.

Sunset Shimmer came up to her side, new wings twitching under her dress. “You know. Maybe I don’t need a crown.”

Twi gave her a flat look then turned back to the vacated party area, screams still audible in the distance.

“I need coffee.”




> "Say Cheese" (Part 1 of the return)
> --------------------------------------------------------------------------

““CHEESE!””

Six twins, three other unduplicated ponies, a dragon, and a mildly annoyed kelpie huddled together a moment longer until the camera’s timer clicked and temporarily blinded them all with a quick flash. The kelpie was the first to regain her personal space once the two Pinkie Pies relaxed their near stranglehold on the group. The rest broke apart more gradually with smiles, laughter, and additional hugs.

“Well, if nothing else, it was at least nice to see you again,” Twi told her counterpart. “I just wish it had been under better circumstances.”

“Same here,” Twily answered, taking a quick glance at the mirror portal, temporarily relocated to a cleaner, and untraumatized room. “I’ll be sure to check the inter-dimentional harmony monitors as soon as I get back … now that I know why you wanted them built for.” Twi cringed but Twily continued. “I’ll be able to see the impact of all of us having crossed over at once, and how it changes with everyone’s return after me.”

“And if we’re lucky,” one of the Pinkies jumped in—literally, landing on Twily’s back— “things will be all stable like cake so we can jump through the mirror anytime we want and visit all our new friends—“

“—Instead of all wobbly like jello,” added the other Pinkie, matching her twin by jumping onto Twi’s back, “making the two dimensions likely to go all BOOM and BLOOEY or mix together first and then explode!”

That stopped the joyful merriment among the rest of the group as all eyes turned to the pink riders on their purple steeds.

Twily, hunkered down slightly from her sudden load, adjusted her glasses with her magic, “W-which is why I’m going to check first thing and before anyone else follows me over. Well, first thing after I test out this new correspondence journal.” She switched her magic from her glasses to her saddlebags and lifted out a book with two copies of her cutie mark on it. “Once I've confirmed it’s working across dimensions, I’m going straight to my lab!”

“A-and,” Twi added, “by all documents and evidence so far we are way, way away from any serious damages happening!”

The Applejacks returned her matching sets of flat looks.

Seeing this, Butterfly stepped forward. “So, um, so when are the rest of us returning?”

While putting away the correspondence journal, Twily answered. “I was thinking one more today after I have a chance to check the readings first, then no more than two each day so I can watch the trend with each arrival.”

“I call first!” declared the Pinkie on Twily’s back, presumably Shindy though neither were wearing their name tags. Twily instinctively swiveled her ears and ducked away from the loud noise from just above and behind her head. “I’ll have to prepare a ‘Welcome Back to our Home Planet’ party for each of you!”

“While that is a thoughtful idea,” Renae began, “I would suggest not labeling the signs as such.”

“And not all of us are actually from that world,” Aria added before nudging Sunset. “Right, Shimmer?”

Sunset flinched at the contact. “Uh, r-right.”

Shindy scratched her furry chin, still not past the novelty of the funny, fuzzy feeling. “How about ‘Welcome Back to the Planet of the Humanes’?”

“Again,” Renae began, “not the most discrete phrase to place on a sign given that the general public does not know about the portal to another world on the front lawn of a public high school.”

“Hrmm,” Shindy considered that before idly tapping her hind hooves against Twily’s side and clicking her tongue.

Twily took a few steps forward before coming to a stop with a surprised blink. She then rolled her eyes and sat down, letting her rider slide off her back.

The sudden return to the crystal floor didn’t phase Shindy at all. “So more ‘Just Because’ parties?”

“Why not?” Asked Rad. “We’ll know what they’re for. And that lets us be the ones to tell everyone who knows about the portal what the party is really for without, you know, messing with inter-dimensional security stuff for the people who don’t already know.”

Primo chuckled with a cocky grin and put a foreleg over her twin’s withers. “Not that it’s really necessary to remind anypony, er, humane how awesome we are!”

The others all gave them lopsided stares until Spike voiced what they were all thinking, “Except that never stops either of you.”

The Rainbows shrugged in unison.

Wings twitching slightly, Sunset looked around the group. “So I guess that means the other eight of us will have time to hang out in Equestria a while.”

Flash, Wallflower, and each pony pair aside from the Twilights and Pinkies nodded with some smiles appearing around.

“But don’t worry,” Twily announced, “once I analyze the readings I need, I’ll be sure to get all your current and missed schoolwork assignments sent through the journal.”

“Wait, what!?” cried Rad. “Schoolwork?!”

“I keep forgetting you’re all still in school,” Primo commented. “That’s just weird.”

“And as far as I’m concerned, I’m on vacation here! I’m not doing schoolwork now.”

Twily pointed a lecturing hoof at Rad. “But you’ll fall behind.”

“It’s only for another few days! And I’m not spending them trying to hold a pencil in my hooves! Again.”

“Why would you do that?” asked Ponyjack. “You should use your mouth.”

“What? Ew, no. And no school stuff. I plan to hang with the second most awesome pegasus there is and give these wings a workout!” Rad gave her wings an extra strong flap and unfolded them to their full span for emphasis.

“Hay!” Primo complained. “What do you mean ‘second’?”

“I won that last race.”

“I let you win that last race!”

“We’ll see.” Rad folded her forelegs and sent a smug grin down at her twin who quickly gained altitude to be higher than Rad.

Before their latest competition could take the pair to the ceiling, Renae stepped in. “I agree with Rad, actually. We’re only here for a short time and may not be able to return. We can catch up on our schoolwork later. I’m sure Principal Celestia”—

““ ‘Principal’?”” came several confused whispers.

—“will understand. And of course you and Sunset will organize enough group study sessions so we won’t let our grades suffer.”

Twily frowned and looked to her twin for support. Twi just shrugged. “I love study sessions and they are a wonderful bonding experience with friends.”

Twily’s ears drooped with a slight groan.

“Um,” Butterfly added, “Posey and I were hoping to have a book group and picnic with the local animals.”

Posey smiled. “I can also introduce you to Discord.”

“And me and Jackie planned on talking family,” Ponyjack announced. “And Wallflower wanted to spend more time on the farm to explore her earth pony magic. Whole fam’s gonna give her pointers.”

Wallflower, beside the pair of cowponies, ducked her head slightly. “Sorry, but it may be a once in a lifetime opportunity.”

“We had plans as well,” Share added, putting a foreleg around her twin. “We’ll be discussing fashion over tea! Make a few outfits.”

“I’m going swimming,” declared Aria.

Twily rolled her eyes at her. “You’re not even a student.”

“Yeah. And wouldn’t be doing any schoolwork if I was.” Aria then smirked when Twily’s expression dropped slightly more. “And you, Shimmer?” she asked, jolting the new alicorn again.

“Oh, um. Just going to catch up on a few things while I’m back,” Sunset offered, turning to look out a window. Aria gave her a deeper look, her smirk dropping.

“How about checking up on your family?” Jackie suggested.

Sunset’s ears perked up and her wings tightened against her sides. “F-family?”

“Might be your last chance for a while,” Ponyjack warned.

“Well. I’ll think about it.”

“Ah hope you do more than think about it,” Jackie suggested giving Twi a glance.

Ponyjack nodded. “It’s why Twi never told us about the universe exploding bit.“

Twi, again looked sheepishly back at them. “Sorry again.”

The two Applejacks looked to each other before coming up beside their princess friend. “S’all right, sugarcube,” said ponyjack as they patted her on the withers. “You had good intentions and nothing’s actually exploded.”

““Yet!”” the Pinkies cheered from the back of the room.

Everyone else did their best to try and ignore that as Twi continued. “W-well, whatever it is you all decide to do, please feel free to continue making yourselves at home in the castle if you want. As for me … I’m going back to bed to be rested for my duties in Canterlot tomorrow night. Calming everypony down after that changeling scare took way too long.” She then finished with a grumble, “Once I get back I’ll need to fish the flower trio out of their bunker and speak with them.”

After being attacked by a yawn, Twi gave her counterpart another hug goodbye and teleported out.

This left Flash with an outstretched hoof and a dejected expression as he stared at the spot the mare had just been.

Seeing this, Sunset tried to offer support with a wing over his withers. They both ended up on the floor after Flash was smacked in the head with her wing and Sunset lost her balance.

Twily giggled and went to their aid. Flash was still unsteady on his hooves and took some time to get standing, Sunset’s only trial was overcoming her embarrassment.

“You’ll be okay here?” Twily asked her.

“Of course,” Sunset assured her, taking a moment to get her wings folded right. “Just like old times.”

“Except with feathers?”

Sunset smiled back. “Yeah. And a lot less anger.”

“Glad to hear it. Write to me if you need anything. Paws still has your journal, and Claws has the pair to mine.”

They hugged and Twily turned, hugged a few more ponies, and approached the mirror with her friends wishing her well.


“Take care!”
“Bye Bye.”
“Good luck with the scienceing.”
“And no sending schoolwork!”
“Stay awesome!”
“Remember to tuck and roll when you come out the portal!”
“Yes, watch your head!”
“Do hope you can come back sometime, darling.”
“Au revoir.”
“Keep in touch!”
“Say hi to Paws for me!”
“See you soon, sugarcube!”
“See you in a few days!”
“See you in a few hours if the universes don’t explode and we die horrible deaths!”
““Shindy!””
“What?”


*** *** ***


Having been a mind-controlled “zombie” and promptly hitting her head upon exiting the portal the only other time she crossed dimensions before had denied Twily of the full experience of inter-dimensional travel.

Now, as the world—worlds?—swirled around her and she felt her body warp and reshape itself, she quickly wondered if preceding mind-altering magic or proceeding head trauma should be considered for any future uses of the portal. Or at the very least, she concluded she should not have had that extra serving at the Apple family’s farewell lunch.

Just when that lunch was submitting its final notice before disembarking her stomach, gravity returned and she was shot out of the swirling confusion and onto a hard concrete sidewalk.

“Oof! Ow.”

Twilight slowly got to all fours and readjusted her glasses, taking a moment to appreciate her fingers, then got to her feet, taking another moment to readjust to having only two of them again. Once just as steady on her feet as has been her usual—slight pigeon toed posture included—she pulled off the backpack that had been a set of saddlebags a moment ago and made her way to Canterlot High School’s front steps.

Sitting down, she took out the correspondence journal and began to write.



Have just arrived back at CHS. Do you read, Equestria?
Over




It was only a moment before the book began to glow and a reply began writing itself below her question.



Claws here. You’re coming in clear, Twily. Glad you’re home safe. I’ll watch the journal while Twi sleeps. Just let us know if you need anything.
\





:-)
Over and out




She smiled. One task down. Now to get to the lab.

“Twilight!” came a shout followed by some barks. She turned just in time to catch a purple puppy who excitedly licked both her cheeks.

“Whaa!” Twilight startled back a moment before holding the puppy out of tongue range and laughed. “Hi Spike. Miss me?”

“I did, Princess, but why are you here? I thought Twilight was coming back. Is she okay?”

“Spike, it’s me; Non-Princess Twilight.” She gestured to her glasses and ponytail.

“Pff," Spike scoffed. "Anyone can put on glasses and change a hairstyle, but you can’t fool me!”

Twilight paused. “Why do you think I’m the princess?”

Spike responded with a slight head-tilt and a flat look like the answer was obvious.

"You smell like horse."

Perhaps science could wait until after a shower.
> Seeking a Friend Before Leaving the World (Part 1)
> --------------------------------------------------------------------------

Flash Sentry was alone.

Not totally, some of the others were still leaving the room. The Rainbows were the first of course. Well, no. He sighed. The Twilights were the first.

Not since the Fall Formal dance had he had a real conversation with the Equestrian Twilight. Their interactions during the Battle of the Bands didn’t count. So when the dust had settled over this most recent magical adventure, he’d thought they could finally catch up and … figure out what kind of relationship they really had. But, just minutes ago, the Equestrian Twilight yawned and teleported away from him, and the other Twilight traveled through a portal to another world. Granted it was just back to their own world, but still. Hard to be farther apart than a different planet in an alternate universe.

Then, just when he thought that maybe he could explore this new pony world with a friend—or at least someone who was a few steps more than an acquaintance—the two Rainbows immediately challenged each other, again, and flew out a window together, followed by the others with otherworldly twins all pairing up and heading right for the door, all of them already having plans for the day. Even those without twins had plans.

Wallflower left with the Applejacks.

Aria, well, it was usually best to let her go where she wanted.

And Sunset …. She gave him some consoling after Twi left, and a wing smack to the back of the head, but then she was gone.

He looked around the room. Must have been an unused storeroom. Nothing around but the portal home, and the end of a Fluttershy tail on its way out the door. The last one to leave.

Sunset couldn’t have gotten far. Actually, she also knew how to do that teleport thing didn’t she? Flash rushed out of the room, stumbling a bit and using his wings for balance as he was still working on how to pony.

Once he was in the hall, he looked both ways and hovered up to get a better view above all the colorful heads and manes. No Sunset, but the others were all heading for the stairwell. Hoping Sunset did the same, Flash flew on, past the others and … there she was around the bend. She was slowly walking toward the stairs, head slightly down. Aria was off to her side and giving her a curious glance.

“Sunset!” he called. It was a few more steps before she reacted, giving him time to catch up and land, tripping and sliding to a halt.

“Flash? You okay?” she asked, coming to his aid while Aria kept on with a chuckle at his expense.

“U-yeah, yeah,” he stuttered, accepting her help and blushing brightly when he under corrected and fell into her side. “Ha, sorry.”

She took it in stride, giving him a gentle push back to standing.

“Uh,” he cleared his throat and hoped the blush would clear just as easily. “You have any plans for the day?”

Her eyes shifted and she responded after a pause. “Actually, yes. A quick stop in the library and then some things I wanted to take care of since I was … back. Like,” her eyes caught the Applejacks chatting on their way to the stairs, “family and such.”

“Oh, right,” said Flash, disappointment in his tone for a moment before his eyes widened and he jerked back. “Right! And you probably don’t want to show up after all this time with a random boy—er colt?—along for the ride.”

“Heh,” muttered Sunset darkly. “Especially since you’re not even a unicorn.”

Flash looked at Sunset’s horn, then at his wings. He opened his mouth but Sunset cut him off. “Don’t worry about it. It would be his problem, not ours. I’d make sure of it.” She took a breath. “Sorry if you wanted to hang out. I couldn’t really show you around anyway. All I know of Ponyville is this palace and how to get to the train station. I’m a city filly.”

“That’s alright, I’ll find something,” Flash said in a slightly too upbeat tone with matching smile.

Sunset took a glance toward the staircase then leaned in and whispered, “Maybe you can try to keep Aria out of trouble? It’s a small town but they do have a jail somewhere.”

With a cringe, Flash nodded but stopped and returned the whisper, “I thought she said she just wanted to swim.”

“That’s what she said,” Sunset answered.

“Right.” Flash nodded. “I’ll get on that.”

“Thanks.” Sunset started to smile but stopped. “Hopefully there aren’t any statues of Star Swirl around or they’ll end up decapitated.”

“The astronomer?”

“Sorcerer in this world. Same hat and beard though.”

“Oh. But, why—?”

“Long story. Just make sure his name doesn’t come up in conversation or it might not just be statues that lose their heads.”

Flash blinked back a nervous expression and gave a small nod before flying on, carefully descending the stairway.

He found her almost two floors lower, awkwardly side stepping down the stairs, having a single tail in place of two hind legs apparently making it difficult.

Not trusting himself to land on the stairs, he slowed and set down on the—literal in this case—landing a few steps below her. “Hey, Aria.”

She paused and gave him a smirk. “Hay, look. It’s the Flying Doucheman.”

A look of annoyance passed over Flash’s face before he shrugged it off. “Well, that’s an upgrade from what you usually call me at least.”

“Heh, speaking of ‘upgrades,’ nice schlong.”

“W-what?!” Flash took a step back, crossed his hind legs, and blushed furiously.

“Caught it when you flew overhead,” Aria laughed. “Equine benefits, right? Though you’re supposed to keep it in the sheath.”

“I, uh, h-how d-do I …?” Flash stuttered while trying to bend his head to get a look underneath himself, without giving Aria the same opportunity. The sounds of the others making their way down the stairs toward them spurred him on.

Hearing the same, Aria grinned evilly and took a look up the stairs. “Better hurry, big boy. Don’t want to scare those poor, innocent girls do ya?”

“I-I’m trying—wait!” Flash stood up and glared at Aria. “It is!”

“Pffff! Ha Haa!” Aria laughed. “Oh, the look on your face!”

“That’s not funny.”

“It was from my angle.” Aria hopped down the last of the steps and walked by on her two legs and tail. “In fact, it still is!”

She laughed some more until she stopped suddenly. For a second, all that came out was a squeak. She then bounded for a nearby door with a sign on it depicting silhouettes of a male and female pony.

Upon smashing the door open, Flash could see a sink, bathtub, and toilet all designed for ponies.

Initially heading for the toilet, Aria skidded to a stop and turned toward the sink, quickly turning it on and drinking from the tap.

The door closed behind her, and Flash stood awkwardly in the hall as all the pony pairs and Wallflower passed by. They all smiled or waved as they carried on their conversations. Flash returned the gestures as they proceeded to the next floor down.

A minute later, the door slammed open and a rather angry—angrier than usual—Aria walked out.

First time Flash had ever seen her with blushing scales though.

“How do scales blush?” he idly wondered. “How does fur blush for that matter?”

He realized his questions would have to wait when he recalled how bad a situation it was being approached by an angry Aria.

“Uh—“ he tried.

“Don’t make me laugh without water!”

“But I, I didn’t—“

“Don’t!”

“S-sorry?”

“So what’d you want?” she growled.

“Huh? Oh! Um,” Flash scratched the back of his head. “Did you want to hang out?”

Aria stared at him for a moment before sputtering out a laugh. “Pfff! With me? Really a glutton for punishment there. Shimmer got you trained, huh? Or is that just what you like?”

Flash could feel his skin—or was it his fur?—heat up in a blush. “I’m not—she’s not—we’re not like that!”

The mocking laughter just continued but stopped suddenly with a glare and a slow breath. “Told you not to make me laugh.”

“But I didn—“

“Yeah, yeah,” Aria waved him off. “Shimmer told you to be my warden, eh? Keep me out of trouble?”

“Uh, well.” Flash rubbed the back of his neck with a forehoof. “No?”

“Wow. You dated Shimmer and you’re this bad of a liar?” Flash tried to reply but she continued, “Meh. I’ll be fine. I’ll drop into a lake or something and just take a load off. It’s not like the beard who shall not be named is around.”

“Star—?”

Aria’s eyes practically shot a bullet through Flash’s face, stopping his heart for several beats.

“S-s-stars above, it’s a neat planet here, huh?”

“You really suck at lying, Doucheman.”

She didn’t wait for a reply. After taking another look at the stairs, she went back to the bathroom, took another drink, doused herself completely in water, and came back to the hallway. Flash gave her an odd look but she ignored it and hopped forward, landing on her belly and sliding forward, her wet scales making squeaks as they glided over the crystal floor and down the stairs.

Flash watched her go, flying after her as she even managed to curve along with the stairwell, kicking the walls with her tail and forelegs.

Seconds after she outpaced his line of sight, there was a thud. This was followed by what sounded like profanity in multiple languages.

Not knowing the languages himself, he had to guess the nature of the words by tone of voice alone but that tone left little ambiguity.

Upon reaching the foyer and seeing her face pressed into the front doors all but confirmed it.

Flash landed next to her and held out a hoof. She gave him a weak glare and stood on her own power. “The doors opened last time,” she gruffed before opening them with a kick from her tail. He followed her outside and she immediately turned and dived into the pond between the palace and what he was told was Twilight’s School of Friendship.

He looked down, seeing the ripples spread across the water. Another splash brought his attention up to see Aria breach the surface and shoot into the air, then splash back into the water. Another breach, sending her higher this time and diving after a few somersaults.

Again and again she repeated this, each time in a different place around the pond.

Was she … smiling?

“Woo!” she cried on the next launch into the air.

Flash’s jaw dropped. Aria's happy? That can happen? Was it the blow to the head? Did she need a doctor? A vet?

His wonderment was cut off by a jet of water to the face. “Bleublubough!”

“HA! Ha-ha-ha!” Aria laughed as he was blasted back. “Gotcha! And I can laugh at you all I want in here!”

Nope. She was fine.

“Careful!” she chided. “Gotta be on guard to watch over me! Don’t want to let Shimmer down, do ya?”

Standing up, Flash shook the water out of his mane, and eyed his attacker. She wasn’t even watching him, but looking around, taking in the school and the hills and waterfall behind it supplying the pond. Some ripples near her grabbed his attention.

She was wagging her tail.

It was subtle, but it was there. But why? She wasn’t swimming. She had her front half propped on the walkway to better converse.

Cute. Though saying so would be suicide.

“Where is ol’ Friendship NagNag is actually a horse pun. It doesn't just mean to annoy, it's also a term for a small riding horse (modern usage can also mean an old or worn out horse, but Aria would—likely—be using the older meaning). going anyway?” she asked, taking a look at the palace. “Train station? Her family’s in Canterlot right?”

“She said something about the library first,” Flash answered. “She seemed a bit down, actually.”

Aria’s tail stopped and she frowned. “You noticed too, huh?”

Flash looked up at the palace, guessing as to what floor they were on when they last spoke. “Yeah, she—“ Looking back down, Aria was gone. “Aria?”

He approached the pond carefully, expecting another water blast at any second.

Nothing. The water was still. Just a little rippling near where he last saw her. “Aria?”

He looked down, all through the pond from all along the walkway for several minutes.

“You got to come up for air eventual—oh wait. I guess you don’t.”

He never noticed the wet streaks in the grass leading back to the palace.


*** *** ***


Flash gave up searching for Aria after ten more minutes had passed on the clock tower. When Aria had things to do, no one got in her way. Except for those who really wish they hadn’t. And Sunset, who somehow always managed to survive.

So, the Twilights, Rainbows, Sunset, and Aria were all out. What next?

Pinkie Pie apparently.

While wandering the pony village aimlessly, he had spotted the pair bouncing on their tails into the back of what appeared to be a community center, complete with an outdoor theater.

He couldn’t have been more than half a minute behind them, but by the time he had gotten inside, the pair were already set up with a full drum kit each.

And playing to their hearts’ content.

If only they had picked the same song.

One Pinkie was playing a drum solo from one of the Rainbooms’ songs. He didn’t recognize the other.

““Oh, hiya, Flashy!”” they greeted him in unison while playing their mismatched scores. “Did you want to rock out with us? There are some guitars on the wall.”

Flash looked at the guitars on the wall and smiled. He then looked at his hooves and frowned. “Um—“

In a whirl of pink winds, Flash was spun around and became aware of sitting between the drum sets with a guitar cradled over his forelegs. The winds parted, returning to their drums as if nothing happened. The guitar shifted and Flash did his best to grip it.

It slipped left so he angled right. It slipped right so he angled left. It twisted and moved away so he leaned forward, forgetting that his “arms” were also legs at the moment.

The Pinkies watched on as the guitar became a helmet when Flash flopped onto the floor muzzle first.

This was followed by stereo rimshots.


*** *** ***


Well that wasn’t going to work. Even if he could play, or just hold, a guitar with hooves, keeping up with one Pinkie was hard enough with hands, let alone two of them.

He listened to them teach each other a couple songs then took his leave. One of the Pinkies was thoughtful enough to get a Ponyville map out of her tail for him and circled where all their friends lived and some “fun places” around town.

A quick mention on how he’d be able to get to all of them so easily with his wings was all it took for him to … remember he had wings.

So, with map in mouth—having failed to figure out any other way to travel with it—Flash took to the sky.

Far to the north he caught sight of the Rainbows, or rather blurs that were likely them and the distant rumbles of their rainbooms. Clearly he wouldn’t be joining them, but they had the right idea.

Flying was amazing!

The little town passed underneath him as he circled it, getting a better look of Equestrian Twilight’s palace and just enjoying the ability of self-powered flight in general.

He eventually found himself over a small forest of apple trees with a familiar set of ponies just beyond.

“Wuffower?” he noted, map still in his mouth, seeing her with two Applejacks before diving down.

Landing, he saw her staring intensely at a row of garden plants in a freshly dug plot. The Applejacks were nearby, one with an ear to the ground, her hat in her hoof to keep it clean.

The plants were gradually rising and coming into bloom, a few additional sprouts just beginning to poke out of the dirt. There were even hoof-shaped patches of grass in a line leading toward Wallflower.

The Applejack not listening to the ground quietly came up to him. “She’s been doing this all day. Darnedest thing.”

Taking a look to the side, Flash saw that the plot was much larger, more like a field than a garden. Every row was densely packed with fully grown plants of many shapes, colors, and sizes. “No kidding,” he agreed after putting the map into the frog of a hoof.

“Seems the earth ponies do this normally for quicker harvests, but not this fast.”

“Okay, Wallflower!” called the other Applejack. “You should stop there.”

“Already?” Wallflower called back, disappointment in her tone.

“Any more than this and it might take too long for the soil to recover. So much growing in so little time can sap the ground’s nutrients.”

“Right,” Wallflower nodded, “and you can teach me to know when to stop?”

“That’s our next lesson, and then it’s apple trees, sugarcube!”

Wallflower practically squealed in excitement, dancing her front hooves then bucking her hind legs out in a sort of half pronk as if practicing the apple-bucking to come.

Then she turned and blushed. “Oh hi, Flash. I didn’t see you.”

Flash chuckled and pointed up with his muzzle. “But I saw you, while flying by even.”

“Really?” Wallflower’s eyes widened. “Wow, that’s backwards. Whatever the memory stone did to me really seems to be wearing off. I don’t have to announce myself for people to notice I’m around anymore. Maybe it’s the pony magic. Can’t wait to tell Sunset.”

“That’s great, and it looks like you’re having fun.”

“I am!” she gushed. “This is so great! The nature, the magic, the clean air. What’s it like flying?”

“I’m still getting the hang of it so I haven’t been going very high, but it’s, well, also great! The wind through my hair, uh, and tail, and also feathers. Go anywhere I want, much faster than walking or driving. Don’t even need a driver’s or flier's license. I hope. Though I almost hit a tree once, and a pegasus hauling a cart with a piano in it.”

“Wow,” she smiled at him, though it faltered and she looked at her three friends. “But you can’t feel the plants?”

Flash looked down at the work Wallflower had grown and twisted his free forehoof into the ground a little before closing his eyes a moment in concentration. “I guess not?”

“It ain’t something pegasus ponies can do,” answered Ponyjack.

Wallflower looked at Flash’s wings, then her dirt-covered hooves and the plants she had grown. Her smile grew back in full. “I think we got the better deal,” she giggled.

““You got that right!”” the Applejacks agreed.

At that moment, an explosion of sound and rainbow light flashed in the distance, quickly followed by another. They all turned and watched the familiar rainbow trails race in the sky.

“To each their own, Ah suppose,” Jackie concluded and the group chuckled.

“So,” Flash began as the chuckling died down, “You have more to do here?”

“Oh yes!” Wallflower cheered. “So much to learn!”

Ponyjack nodded. “Once Apple Bloom gets out of school—won’t be an hour now—Jackie’s gonna tell us more about her Pa, and Grand Pear’s coming over too so she can spend some time with him.”

With a nod and smile, Wallflower continued. “And with the whole Apple Family busy with that, I’ll be harvesting apples for them with earth pony magic! I can’t wait!”

Flash hummed at that. “And can pegasus ponies do that too?”

“Sure,” said Ponyjack, “though pegasus magic doesn’t really help. Without practice, ya might spend more time hunting down the apples that miss the buckets than you will bringing any in.”

“Ah can attest to that,” chimed in Jackie. “And Ah even am an earth pony at the moment. Takes more than a minute, that’s for sure.”

Ponyjack chuckled. “Eeyup. Big Mac filled me in on that account.”

Jackie rolled her eyes. “Of course he did.”

Flash looked off at the large field of apple trees. “Well, enjoy,” he chuckled. “I guess I’m back to flying.” He put the map back in his mouth and waved.

“You might want to stop by Rarity’s and ask for some saddlebags,” Ponyjack suggested, pointing at the map. “Ah’d give you a set of mine, but they might be uncomfortable around your wings and she has all sorts at her place.”

“Just make sure they don’t give you nothing too fancy,” Jackie warned with a chuckle. “Might not be able to fly if it’s got frills and gems all over.”

“Oo?” Flash replied through the map. “Uoky. Anks, Mupledack.”


*** *** ***


Flash flew through the air, taking in the surroundings on his way to Rarity’s boutique.

Ponies watering their gardens. Hanging laundry out to dry (mostly hats and bedding). Apple Bloom dashing from the school toward her family’s orchard. Scootaloo being carried up and away by a pair of Dashes. A little forest just outside of town. What looked like Lyra and Sweetie Drops being chased out of a cave by an angry, torch and pitchfork-carrying pack of animals led by a small, white rabbit. A quaint marketplace with—

Wait, what?

Flash backtracked to the forest and scanned the ground through the trees. He circled a few times but was unable to find anything unusual.

“Nah,” he said with a chuckle.

Further investigating was cut off by dark smoke rising out of a pony building that looked much like a playground ride. It only took a few seconds for Flash to realize that he was looking at the Carousel Boutique. Pony Rarity’s home!

Diving again, adjusting once seeing the majority of the smoke exiting a side door, Flash landed and rushed forward.

“Raritys?!” he called. “You in here?”

Some coughing came from inside and a disheveled, white pony wearing an equally disheveled dress and a little soot trotted out. “Who?” she coughed, rubbing her eyes.

“It’s Flash. You okay?”

“Oh, Flash,” the Rarity replied, blinking a few more times. “Yes, we’re okay. Thank you for your concern. Just a little … culinary catastrophe. We’ll have it cleared out shortly.”

“Would you like any help?”

Her eyes cleared, the Rarity patted her mane back and smiled. “No need for that. We have the situation well in hand—hoof. Should only be a few minutes.”

At that moment, the other Rarity emerged with a smoking salad bowl in her magic. A quick gesture to the side tossed the offending kitchen failure into a trashcan. A blast from a fire extinguisher and the matter was settled.

“See?” the first Rarity cheered, though her light expression dropped a bit when she looked down at her dress and she sighed. “Now the cleanup. Was there anything you needed?”

“Uh,” Flash reached up to his mouth, but realized the map was gone. Must have dropped it after seeing the smoke leaving him with no more need for saddlebags. “I guess not.”

“Well, thank you for stopping by, sugarcube. Do take care.”

They waved goodbye and turned, the Rarity toward her twin, and Flash back to the sky. He did at least know where Fluttershy lived, having noticed her cottage earlier. Might as well try them next.

Though, something nagged at him.

“Did Rarity call me sugarcube?”


*** *** ***


He didn’t quite make it all the way to Fluttershy’s place.

A series of strange happenings took his attention and he landed to focus on them.

The first oddity was a pack of dogs in poker hats chasing what appeared to be a group of bipedal playing card creatures with mismatched antlers, and, well … mismatched everything else. They ran past Fluttershy’s cottage and out of sight.

He cautiously walked forward, and a few minutes later, the clouds in the sky parted and it was chaos.

Trumpets blared as vegetables flew with spaghetti wings and carried giant, flashing banners circling over and near Fluttershy’s cottage.

Another bipedal creature came up to him. Easily three times his height, he looked like the mismatched card creatures, but not a … card, and he was dressed like a janitor and wielding a plunger. Now up close, Flash could see the creature had, among other notable things, claws, a pair of wild yellow eyes with red pupils, and a sharp snaggletooth. He thought back to a biology class. Weren't ponies a prey species?

The janitor looked up at the chaos then down at Flash, gesturing with his claw. The dangerous sheen of sunlight glinting off the sharp talons was dulled only slightly by the plunger they were holding. “Have you ever seen anything more glorious? Go ahead, tell me what you think of my other self's latest piece. We've been trying my hardest to enjoy constructive criticism lately.”

Flash’s unblinking eyes shifted from the janitor to the sky just as a cabbage somehow blowing a trumpet flew by while a fish danced on its … head.

“Uhhh?”

"You're speechless! Delightful. In fact, you look almost moved to tears!" The creature tossed the plunger above, where it joined the vegetables with its own wings of toilet paper, then reached his claw toward Flash. "If you think this is great, I have so much more wondrous chaos to share!"

Flash immediately turned around and took wing.

Time to go home.


*** *** ***


The pony world was nice and all, but Flash was ready for home. He could admire it further in spirit listening to Sunset and the others tell about their adventures.

What was it Twilight—the CHS student—said? No more than two should return home each day? Twilight herself was the first today. Flash, and his sanity, could be the second, beating out Pinkie. He blinked. Did he really just put himself, Pinkie, and mentions of sanity in the same sentence?

He shook his head. All the more reason to go.

But what about Twilight—the pony princess one—? "Well, she likes reading. I’ll write her a letter,” he declared to the fluffy, white cloud he noticed moments before he flew into it.

FUMMPH

He hit with enough force to bury his head into the cloud but his butt hanging out. A bit of struggling and he was able to pop his head up-periscope above the surface. He coughed and a small bit of cloud fluff escaped to float away lazily. He watched it for a moment before looking around. Everything from where a humane waistline would be up to his neck was stuck in the cloud. He sighed, flopping his face into the cotton-like constraints.

He remained there a while, wondering what else could go wrong when a rising breeze suggested he was about to find out. The wind picked up and he looked to see that the cloud was moving and it wasn’t alone. Other clouds in the area were beginning to shift in the sky in what appeared to be curved winds, like an orbit. An orbit he was caught in.

As his cloud moved, it also began to spin. About a half rotation and Flash saw the cause.

A tornado?!

A rainbow-colored tornado?

And it was quickly getting closer.





> Don't Look Back … or Down
> --------------------------------------------------------------------------

Sunset stared with an intense, burning determination and considered the current state of Twi's study. Furniture reduced to dust and debris, scorch marks and dents in the shape of very large hooves, deep scratches and cracks in the crystal floor. And worst of all, the books. Burnt, ripped, shredded, and otherwise destroyed books from wall to wall.

It didn’t take knowing two Twilight Sparkles to know that destroying books was a serious offense. Twilight’s own books for that matter. From her personal study. A whole room full of them! And this Twilight is a princess! She could make book destruction a state crime—a capital offense—if she wanted to. Oh sure, she was being nice about it. All smiles and lighthearted titters. She never once brought it up. But anytime anypony mentioned it, Sunset could see a crack in the mask. The twinge in the eye, the twitch of the ear, the flick of her tail, the fluffed feathers.

In a world without digital backups, how many were rare pieces. One-of-a-kinds?

And it was all her fault. Again.

They had all already forgiven her. She knew that. They told her over and over. It wasn’t really her fault. It could have been any of them getting hit by that concentrated magic blast.

Sunset’s mind drifted for a moment, seeing a giant she-demon Fluttershy leading Greenpeace, P.E.T.A., and an army of animals, all of them with glowing eyes, up the steps of Congress, crushing any vehicle that wasn’t electric, or at least a hybrid.

Or if Pinkie had been hit—Sunset’s eyes snapped open and she quickly shook the image from her mind.

Okay, fine. She shouldn’t beat herself up over it, but she should still help clean!  Of course, she probably should be going to see her family, but—she pawed the floor nervously—did she really need to?

Refocusing on her target, twenty-five shelves up, Sunset squinted. Too far to read the title, but the card catalog in a library inside Twilight’s own castle certainly wouldn’t be wrong. The mare probably re-shelved the whole place on a set schedule for fun! So she knew it was the book she needed.




Overly Specific Texts, volume 85, Deluxe Edition
101 Spells for Cleaning and Restoring Ancient Crystal Cottages, Curiosities, and Castles
Now with 35 added Tome, Text, and Type Restoration Spells!
Foreword by Convenient Shortcut




Perfect.

She knew she could have just climbed a ladder or levitated the book down and be done with it. But—she looked back at the unfolded wings at her sides, spread, angled, and ready for flight—why not kill two birds with one stone?

Sunset blinked and her form faltered. Perhaps that wasn’t the best phrase for a winged creature to use. Didn’t she count as part bird now?

She’d figure that out later. For now, though, Sunset hadn’t had any chance to actually try using her new wings, and the library was so open, with nothing but a few tables and chairs between the distant, bookcase-lined walls. It was a quick process to levitate those out of the way.

Straightening up again, checking her wing angle, setting her posture, she leapt, flapping hard. The jump was perfect. Good form, good distance.

The flapping, however, left much to be desired. Sunset quickly veered off her intended path when her wings failed to keep their alignment. Ten shelves up and eight cases to the left she nearly skewered a book with her horn when she slammed into the bookcase.

And then crashed onto the floor tail first.

“… Ow.”

She stared up at the twenty-fifth shelf while rubbing her sore bottom. Twi was sleeping off the chaos of the past few days, Spike had a different kind of wing, the Rainbows were out flying who knew where—occasional high-altitude rainbooms providing the only clues—and the Fluttershies were having an animal picnic and book club meeting that she just didn't feel right interrupting. Finally, Flash only had his new pegasus instincts to go on without any real teachable knowledge. That meant no winged friends to ask for lessons. In addition, she had already checked for books on flight. Ironically Overly Specific Texts, volumes sixty four through eight dealt with that topic, but they were two shelves higher. Using levitation to grab those books to learn how to fly to her target right below them just felt wrong.

She was on her own.

But she had a plan!


*** *** ***


Sunset stared with an intense, burning determination from the staircase across the room.

Tall room, tall staircase. It was all in a tree after all. With the public access areas all in the trunk, many of the rooms were connected by stairs as much as doors. A lower floor of the library was even built into the roots of the tree below ground. Now the twenty-fifth shelf was dead ahead. All Sunset had to do was fly straight and keep her altitude level. No need to ascend.

She unfolded her wings, leveled and aligned them, took a few steps back, then ran forward launching herself over the edge of the stairs.

Perfect leap.

Until her left wing clipped the railing.

She spun around, twisted over, and landed with a thud.


*** *** ***


Sunset stared with an intense, burning determination and considered all the fun spells she could use on that railing. She needed to freshen up her magic skills too, after all. But no. She was trying to clean up her mess, not make Twi have to deal with more destruction. So the real solution was to shove those thoughts into a rage bottle in her mind and simply jump higher rather than farther. She could just let her initial altitude drop slightly in the journey across the room. Or better yet ….

Sunset perched herself atop the formerly offending railing and took a moment to steady herself before opening her wings again. She angled them, checked their alignment, bent her legs and lept, flapping mightily.

She did it! She was airborne.

And still rising.

Wait.

BONK

Even tall rooms have ceilings.

THUD


*** *** ***


Sunset stared with an intense, burning … she took a deep, calming breath but still shot a glare at the ceiling and then the floor. The same patch of floor she had crashed onto twice. The same patch of floor that now had a nice, cushy mattress placed on it.

Safety first.

Or safety eventually, at least. Sunset stretched her neck, popping the crick that developed there on the last fall.

Returning to the staircase railing, Sunset decided to forego the jump altogether. She unfolded her wings, aligned them and flapped from a standstill. Slow at first, feeling the air pass over her new feathers and down below her. Then faster, feeling the sensation of growing lighter as her new pegasus magic kicked in. Soon she began to lift, her hooves leaving the rail one-by-one until she was in a full hover.

The fact that the hovering was jittery was just a learning curve. Or so she told herself.  After a quick glance to the mattress below, she took a breath, and angled forward.

She looked back. Success! Five inches and counting!

She looked up. Plenty of clearance before the ceiling.

She looked forward.

That wasn’t the right bookcase. She had rotated to the left.

And she was still moving forward.

“Um, wait. Come on, wings, turn right!”

Her spin just continued and she huffed, resigning herself to wait out the full rotation till she could see the correct bookcase again.

Except she was still angled forward. She wasn’t spinning, she was orbiting.

Or was it spiraling?

A quick flash of railing approaching fast and she angled back sharply, finally managing to cross the room.

In reverse.

“Oh pony—!”

She made contact with the bookcase cutie mark first and bounced off in a tumble.

“… feathers,” she finished from the floor, just inches away from her safety mattress.

Sunset sat up with a growl and addressed first one wing then the other and back. “This is going to happen whether you like it or not! I am Sunset Shimmer and I don’t like to lose! Just ask Flim, Flam, and an overly-stuffed, obese parakeet plush toy! You two are a part of me now so you better start acting like it!”


*** *** ***


Sunset stared with an intense, burning rage, taking only a pair of quick glances away from her target to glare at her wings before launching herself off the railing again. This time with a low forward jump and hard but paced flaps.

She covered half the distance easily.

Faltered.

Recovered.

Aimed for her book.

It was right there.

Right in front of her.

Just a foreleg’s length away.

Wait. How does one stop?

BAM

“… Ow.”

To say Sunset met her goal would be putting it much more lightly than her muzzle would attest.

But she managed to grab the shelf and read the bindings of the books before her.




Overly Specific Texts, volume 64, Second Edition
How to fly
A beginner’s guide to the pegasus wing
Foreword by Lookout Below




Sunset blinked and looked to the left of the shelf, noticing the label indicating that the row number was “27.”

She grumbled, but took volumes 64 through 68 in her magic and began climbing down the two shelves to her target.

“Fine. A little brain damage never hurt anyone,” she scoured. “Just glad nopony saw that.”

A snort caused her to pause. A very familiar snort. “Good thing I’m not a pony, eh, Shimmer?”

This was followed up by sputtered laughter and another THUD after Sunset lost her grip on the twenty fifth shelf.

Aria’s chuckles continued, “Guess we should start calling you Phoenix Down.”
> … of a Feather
> --------------------------------------------------------------------------

“Nugh,” Sunset groaned, rolling onto her hooves before turning to her audience. She saw Aria standing with her back leaning against another bookcase and her forelegs casually crossed in front of her.

Absolutely not a natural pose for one whose back half was a fishtail.

Of course the smirk worn at the other end was one hundred percent natural.

“How long have you been there?”

Aria let her chuckling die down as she thought, looking and pointing around the room with a hoof as if counting. “Four,” she said.

“Four?” asked Sunset. “What? Crashes?! You watched me crash four times? I only crashed twice after I got the mattress.” She blew some mane out of her face. “You just stayed here and quietly watched the whole time?”

“Of course not,” Aria protested, pointing to a nearby table. Following the hoof, Sunset saw a table with two pitchers of water and a bag of popcorn sitting on it. “I left when you did. I figured if there was an intermission I’d get myself a snack for the second act.”

Aria dropped to all threes and headed for them. “Want some?” she asked. “Still warm.”

“You’re evil,” Sunset deadpanned.

“Heh. Good to know I still got it. And be grateful, stairs suck in this form.”

Sunset just watched as Aria took a drink from one of the pitchers. Or maybe she was just breathing as water splashed out her gills and onto the floor. Sunset raised an eyebrow. “You know, crystal floors are slippery when wet.”

Aria rolled her eyes. “You have four legs and ninety-degree hips. You don’t have far to fall.” She looked up at the bookcases and added with a smirk, “anymore.”

“Keep it up, Blaze,” warned Sunset, taking a seat at the table and collecting some popcorn in her magic.

“Hay, I knew I’d need to take some deep breaths after all the laughing I’d be doing watching you.”

“Ugh,” scoffed Sunset, “Why are we friends?”

“Don’t look at me. That was your idea.”

Thinking back, Sunset had to nod. “Granted. But why did you accept?”

“Meh,” Aria shrugged nonchalantly. “Got tired of trying to kill you.”

“K-kill?! Wait, what?” Sunset choked over a mouthful of popcorn, a second still in her magic.

Shock remained on Sunset’s face as Aria took another calm, slow gulp of water, drinking in Sunset’s expression as much as the dissolved oxygen before continuing. “Adagio gets a lot of plans. They got old.”

“But the others and you were going to try to—and you didn’t just because it ‘got old’?” Sunset rushed, dropping the popcorn from her magic. “And you’re just calmly saying it n—.” She paused, watching another little gulp of water flow from Aria’s gills. “You’re messing with me aren’t you?” she finished flatly.

Aria put down the pitcher and looked back to Sunset, but an upward twitch of her lip was her only answer.

“You’re the worst,” Sunset grunted, picking up her lost popcorn.

“That’s my line,” Aria chided her, “and I reserve it for Sonata.”

“Seriously,” Sunset tried again, “why’d you turn friendly—or occasionally, somewhat friendly at least?”

“Eh,” Aria shrugged, “You have a really nice couch to sleep on—”

“A gift from Rarity.”

“—And I get to sneak peeks at you when you walk around in those body towels.”

“W-what?”

“You walk around for like an hour after you shower before you get dressed.”

“I-it’s been hot lately, and … you’re still messing with me.”

The full smirk was back. “They’re really short on you.”

“Aria!”

“Not my fault you only have one big enough for your hair. And what’s the problem? We’re both naked right now.”

“I’m covered in fur!”

“I’m not.” Aria grinned evilly.

Sunset blinked and her eyes drifted from Aria’s face to her side, seeing the smooth scales that ran all the way down her length. She blushed.

“HA!” Aria barked a laugh, pointing at Sunset’s face. “I knew it! You’ve gone native! You actually let the bipeds corrupt you! And you haven’t even been there a decade yet!”

“C-corrupted?!

“What’s next, horse meat? I know a place you can get it cheap.”

Sunset recoiled with a gasp, face contorted in disgust. Aria just tilted her head as if waiting for an answer. After a moment, Sunset’s face changed into a smirk as she came up with one. “You ever eat sushi?”

“Phh, please,” Aria just rolled her eyes. “Like I don’t know that summer job you thought you've been sneaky about. Of course I’ve had sushi. Good stuff. What do you think we ate in this world? Before the siren bit happened.”

With a disappointed snort, Sunset let her head drop, propping it on a foreleg she planted on the table, and floated some popcorn into her mouth.

“You’re a few centuries too young to pull one on me, Downer,” Aria replied, sitting back in the next chair over and flopping her finned tail over the edge of the table like hindlegs.

“You’re not really going to call me that for now on are you?”

“What? I won’t call you Featherbrain. That’s hardly original.”

"You could just call me Sunset."

"Who do you think you're talking to here?" Aria scoffed.

Sunset just shook her head and shifted through the spell and flight books she took from the bookcase before her final crash.

“Hay, speaking of wings,” Aria pointed to Sunset’s left wing, “open ‘em up.”

Confused, Sunset looked at her wing and opened up the pair, careful to not smack the back of her chair with them. “Wha—gah!” was all Sunset got out before Aria darted forward, grabbed a feather in her mouth, and pulled it back with her. “What the hay?!”

Aria spat it out, aiming up, and let it drift down to the frog of her hoof. “If I send this through the portal, you think it’ll stay a feather or turn into a hunk of flesh?”

Sunset’s wings snapped closed as if protecting themselves from the very concept. “Aria, if I’m missing a patch of skin when I get home ….”

As Sunset trailed off, Aria stopped playing with the feather and looked up at her. “You said it,” she said quietly after a moment.

There was silence in the room as Sunset took a breath.

Home.

Wordlessly, they both turned to look out a nearby window. Sunset saw the familiar, colorful world of her younger years, dirt roads, a quaint marketplace, ponies walking and flying around, and in the far distance, a tall mountain with a castle and city built into it that held so many powerful memories. Less of the view was familiar to Aria, but it was still the same sky and pegasus-made clouds she used to see anytime she came above the water’s surface near a shore.

But was it still home?

“Guess you’re not sticking around here, eh?” Aria asked.

“A little while, but …. I guess I—“

“Went native?”

Sunset rolled her eyes at Aria, but the kelpie was still looking out the window. “How about you?” she asked her.

It was a while before Aria responded. “I miss the feel of sunning my scales on the rocks after a workout. Sleeping underwater and, you know, being able to breathe there. The freedom of just being able to swim anywhere I want. Like flying.” Aria glanced at the amber feather in her hoof then smirked at Sunset. “Guess you wouldn’t know about that yet.”

“Aria,” Sunset groaned, “Just when I think you’re getting introspective, you turn around to toss some shade.” Aria proudly leaned back in her chair, balancing the feather on her muzzle with her eyes closed as Sunset continued. “So … does that mean you’re staying here?”

“Pff,” Aria batted at the feather and wrinkled her nose. “You think I’m staying here in cutesy ponytown when you got that couch? Let me take a few laps around a nice big lake or something and I’ll be back at your place by the end of the week.”

“You sure? I talked to Twi. A bit of community service and she’ll get the charges against you dropped. You can start over with a clear record.”

“It’s not like I know anyp—one here.”

“You almost said an—“

“Shut it." Aria paused, eyes closing for a moment. "Besides, not like I have family anymore. All died a thousand years ago. Never even said goodbye when I left. Wonder what they think happened to me."

Sunset sucked in a slight gasp. "Aria, are you—"

"Hear you got fam. though."

"I—" Sunset froze. "Y-yeah. Dad and a half brother."

"Huh," Aria mused, watching Sunset's gaze drift downward, staring at nothing.

She waited and eventually Sunset's ears drooped. "So, you think Princess Purple can really smooth things out with Fat Princess?”

“F-fat?!” Sunset jumped forward in her chair. “Celestia isn’t fat!”

“Then how’d you know who I was talking about?” Aria adopted another smug expression, returning to look out the window.

“W-what other princess would you be talking about?”

“It’s funny though. How tall and skinny she is in one world, but don’t let her sit on you over here! Yikes!”

“Aria!”

“Principal Legs and Princess Rump!”

“Prin—pff.”

Aria casually turned back to Sunset to see her lips quivering and eyes twitching. Once Sunset noticed Aria was watching her she turned away and nonchalantly scratched her left cheek with her hoof. Aria grinned and went in for the kill. “It’s also funny how it’s apparently her little sister that’s all about the moon. I mean, really. Get the right angle of Celestia's backside and you got the moon right there!”

With an undignified snort, Sunset lost her private war. “Pfff—Ha, ha, ha! You’re awful!”

“Not wrong though.”

“S-stop! I-I can’t," Sunset forced out through her laughter. "There’s already enough jokes about her and cake!”

“Oh? Go on.”

“No, no, no! And don’t tell her I laughed!”

“As if! You’ll never catch me in this Canterlot.” Sunset was too busy wiping her eyes to answer or even look in Aria's direction, so Aria just smiled, without her usual smirk, all the way up to her eyes. She then stood from her chair before grabbing the feather and tucking it into her mane. “And you're not brooding and emo anymore, so my job’s done here. Seriously, that's my territory, pony.  I guess we’ll see what this feather turns into once it’s my turn to head back h—through the portal. Gonna go find a lake.”

Still laughing as she watched Aria hop up the stairs, Sunset took a deep breath, wiped her eyes again, and eventually settled down. "Maybe I will visit them," she sighed. "Sunburst at least."

Shortly after, she struggled through another attack of chuckles, “Then I’ll have to remember to buy some larger towels once I get back … home.”
> What's Up, Chuck?
> --------------------------------------------------------------------------

“And then I said, ‘if only I had some kind of party cannon that could decorate everything super fast’,” recited one Pinkie.

“You don’t have party cannons?!” exclaimed the other, reaching into her mane. “I have tons!”

Shindy watched her counterpart pull a tiny party cannon about the size of her hoof out of her mane. “Eeeeeeee!” she squealed. “That’s so adoracute! Shoot it, shoot it!”

Peachie giggled along and pressed the button on top and a small gust of confetti blew out onto the park grass with a squeak. “Ta-dah! I made it for a birthday party Fluttershy set up for a hamster. Didn’t want to knock the little guy off his wheel. I’ll show you how to make them.”

Shindy giggled her off. “No, it's okay. I made my own eventually. Really came in handy at the Friendship Games.”

“Ooh-ooh-ooh! What happened, what happened?!”

“That’s when Crystal Prep came and—oh hi, Miss Cheerilee!” Shindy waved as they passed by the cheerful pony.

Cheerilee, now slightly less cheerful, replied calmly, “Again? Pinkie you don’t have to call me ‘Miss’ ….” Looking up from the book she had been reading, she trailed off seeing a pair of Pinkies and blinked. “… Right. There's two of them now. Just smile and wave, Cheerilee. Just smile and wave.”


*** *** ***


“Oh and Twilight said you play the drums?”

“I do!”

“Me too!”

“You wana jam?”

“You know I do!”


*** *** ***


BOOM
BOOM

““Weeeeeeeeeeeee!””

SPLASH
SPLASH

““Again!””

BOOM
BOOM

““Whooooooooooo!””

SPLASH
SPLASH

““Again!””

BOOM
BOOM

““Hahahaha!””

SPLASH
SPLASH

““Again!””

BOOM
BOOM

““Look out below!””

SPLASH
SPLASH

““Again!””

A short distance away, a group of ponies watched the Pinkies shooting themselves out of party cannons and into the pond. More and more confetti covered the surface with each blast, making each splashdown more colorful than the last. It was a good thing they used biodegradable materials.


*** *** ***


“So what else do you do back home?” Peachie asked, wringing out the gallons of pond water still in her mane and tail.

“Oh, lots of things!” Shindy replied, working on her own post-pond situation. “I’m a cheerleader.”

“Oh so was I! I pommed so many 'om-poms at the Equestria Games!”

“I’m working on my macaroni macaroon Muenster mural in my spare time.”

“Oh, I did one of those!”

Manes and tails no longer weighing more than the ponies they were attached to, the pair collected the various objects that had fallen out of them in the wringing process and continued on their way.

“I love babysitting!” Shindy added.

“You mean foalsitting?”

“Yeah! I think? I babysit the Cake twins all the time! They’re so adorable!”

“Yeah! Particularly when they’re sleeping,” Peachie giggled.

“Especially when they’re sleeping,” Shindy agreed, their giggles turning to full laughter. “Eeee!” she squealed. “I would love to see them as little little ponies! They must be sooo cute with their tiny little pony ears and little tiny hoofsies!”

Peachie gasped, “OOH! I’ll introduce you! They’re my favorite little little ponies! Them—Oh, hi, Mr. Waddle,” Peachie greeted the elderly stallion as they neared the marketplace, “—and Flurry Heart.”

Shindy looked over as Mr. Waddle turned to reply to Peachie’s greeting. “Looking fit as a fiddle, Mr. Waddle,” Shindy added. “And you're wearing my favorite tie!”

“Uh …,” Mr. Waddle replied, squinting at the two pink ponies still trotting through town, eventually taking off his glasses and wiping them with his bow-tie. However, putting them back on didn’t merge the ponies into one Pinkie. “Well, it is Ponyville,” he mused to himself.

“He’s my English teacher,” Shindy told Peachie. “By the way, what’s a flurry heart?”

“What’s an english?”


*** *** ***


"Peekapony!" cheered Peachie, getting a laugh from Pound Cake. After chuckling herself, she covered her eyes with her hooves. "Where's Pinkie?"

Pound promptly pointed at Shindy playing the same game with Pumpkin Cake beside them.

"Um," said Shindy, "I think we're confusing them."

Peachie brought her hooves down and both Cake twins switched from pointing at Shindy to pointing at Peachie.

"Maybe we should try Patty-Cake?" Shindy offered.

"Good idea!" Peachie agreed. "I even have the perfect cupcakes for it!"


*** *** ***


“This bakery is amazing! It’s like the Sweet Shoppe back home but it smells so—” Shindy cut herself off with a big inhale “—do you bake with magic sugar?”

“We keep it next to the confectioner's!" exclaimed Peachie, pointing toward the kitchen behind the counter.

She then leaned in close to Shindy and whispered loudly in her ear, "It's an old earth pony technique. It's why so many of Equestria's great bakers are earth ponies like the Cakes and the Apples!"  Back to standing and speaking normally, for a Pinkie, Peachie continued. "I'll show you how it works. I bet you could even do it at home with your thingy thing!"

"My geode?"

"Yeah! Your magic thingy geode thing."

"Maybe. It does like to do things with candy. Oooohh!!  Maybe it's not the candy but the sugar in the candy! Maybe it can do more than just blow it up!"

"Only one way to find out!"

"Keep trying different things until something doesn't blow up?"

"Exactamundo!"

Shindy laughed. "That would be great if it works! I bet magic sugar could help bring up sales for Mister and Missus Cake back home!"

Peachie gasped. "You bake for the Cakes too?"

"Sometimes, but I mostly work at the diner. It pays more and the Sweet Shoppe doesn't get enough of business outside of the after-school crowd for them to need me there. I love working at the Sweet Shoppe! Baking sweets all the time, trying out new recipes, eating and selling delicious treats, seeing everybody smile when they smell that warm sugar and cinnamon! Not that I don’t like working at the diner. The customers still smile, we have ice cream, and the skates are fun!”

“Wait. Skates?”

“Yep! Part of the uniform!”

“Ooh! Maybe I should start using skates at work.”

“How would you bake with skates on your hooves?” Shindy paused and looked at her front hooves. “How do you bake with skates not on your hooves?”

“Let’s bake some treats after we eat and I’ll show you!”

“Let’s!”

As the pair giggled, Mrs Cake arrived with a platter on her back. “Here you go, Pinkies,” she said with a smile. “Thank you for playing with the twins, and we do have a free station in the back you can use when you’re done.”

““Thanks, Mrs Cake,”” the Pinkies cheered back, moving the platter of colorful treats onto their booth’s table.

Mrs Cake took it in stride and returned to the front counter. Who was she to say what was strange or normal anymore?


*** *** ***


“Hey! You know one thing that could make these even better?” asked Shindy, looking over their platters of freshly baked goodies spread around the kitchen.

“What? Candy toppings?”

“Yes, candy toppings!”

“I’ll get some!”

“No, wait!” Shindy cut off her twin and reached into her mane to pull out a collection of colorful Nana pills and started dropping them onto a few of the freshly frosted cupcakes.

“Um …,” Peachie began. “I’m not sure that’s a good idea.”

“Why not? They taste great!” Shindy popped one into her mouth. “You made some great recipes.”

“Thank you. But, uh, you’ve been having a lot of them. Have the voices really been that much trouble?”

“Sometimes. The rest of the time I just like candy.” Shindy ate another. “I’ve been eating them all day!”

“But they aren’t really candy, they’re pills just inside candy shells. I don’t think you should have too many, and we shouldn’t give them to anypony else either. Nana Pinkie said to be careful.”

“Well, okay,” Shindy considered before locking eyes on a few of her finished pastries made with magic, Equestrian sugar, specifically those topped with Nana pills. “But I already put some on these cupcakes so they have to be eaten. I’ll just take care of that now!”

With that, she tossed all her Nana cupcakes in the air and swallowed them down. “OOOOH! Yummie! So sparkly!”


*** *** ***


““WE’RE BAAAACK!”” shouted the Pinkies bounding through the doors of the Palace of Friendship’s throne room, each with baskets of goodies on their backs. ““And we have DESSERTS!””

“Great timing you two, I’m starving,” Spike called back, rushing into the room. “I mean,” he corrected with half a dragon fruit tart already in his mouth, “Twily wrote back. She’s ready for Shindy to go through the portal.”

The two Pinkies stopped and their large, toothy grins slowly reduced to small smiles. Together they placed all their goodies onto the map table and turned to each other, pulling themselves into a hug so tight Spike could feel his ribs bruising from proximity alone.

“Goodbye, Pinkie,” Shindy said.

“Don’t forget to write, Pinkie,” Peachie replied.

“Of course I won’t because I know you won’t, Pinkie.”

“You know it, Pinkie! You’ll hear about every new friend, all our parties, the new recipes I make. Everything!”

“Yeah, mine too!”

““We’ll write way more than Rainbow Dash!””

They giggled and began working their way to the temporary portal room. Spike followed along, having taken charge of one of the dessert baskets.

“Since we've done the 'So-You-Came-to-Our-World-to-Save-Your-Friend-and-Became-Our-Friends-and-Twins-in-the-Process-and-Now-You're-Going-Home-Again-and-We'll-Miss-You-but-We'll-Never-Forget-You' and the 'Thank-You-for-Becoming-Our-Friends-and-Family-and-Being-so-Wonderfully-Super-Nice-About-All-The-Trouble-We-Caused-All-Over-Two-Different-Towns-and-Nearly-Blowing-Up-Both-Our-Universes' parties already, and I have to get the 'Welcome Back to our Home Plan'—I mean—the 'just because' parties to welcome back everyone before they actually get there, be sure to say goodbye to Twi and Share and Ponyjack and Posey and Primo for me,” Shindy requested.

“Of course!” Peachie cheered. “And Mr. and Mrs. Cake and the twins and Mr. Waddle and Cheerilee—“

“—and Gummy and Lyra and Sweetie D—“

“—Bon Bon and Octavia and—“

“—Mr. Donkey and—“

“—Trixie and—“


*** *** ***


They were still adding to the list by the time they had arrived at the portal. Any more thorough and the list could have been used in place of Ponyvile’s next census. It was when the list began including Canterlot ponies that Spike ‘accidentally’ gave the ‘nudge’ that resulted in the talkative visitor falling into the portal.

Not far from the other end of the portal in the humane world, waiting for her pink friend to arrive, Twilight Sparkle read over a quickly written message in her new correspondence journal.



PLEASE TELL ME I GOT THE RIGHT ONE!
\



Confused, Twilight grabbed a pencil and was about to write back when the portal flashed.

“—eeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeee—oof!” A pink girl had arrived.

Pinkie looked up from the stack of yoga mats she had landed on. “Ooh! Cushy!”

Twilight chuckled back at her. “Yeah, I found out that landing face-down onto the sidewalk isn’t comfortable. I got them from the gym. Thought about getting a mattress from the nurse’s office, but a bed mattress randomly sitting on the sidewalk might have …,” She looked around and the cars and pedestrians passing by the school before continuing, “been too peculiar and attracted more attention. Anyway, welcome home, Pinkie.”

“But I like peculiar things!” the girl giggled before rolling over. Hiya, Twily-Twi-Twi-Twily!”

Smiling, Twilight held out her hand to help Pinkie up.

Pinkie looked at the hand with wide eyes, and then at her own. “Hands! We have hands!”

“Yes we—Wooah!” Twilight’s sentence was cut short when Pinkie grabbed her hand and pulled her down onto the mat, and into a hug, rather than try to stand.

“I mean hooves are surprisingly nimble for being just a thick, curved sheet of keratin, but there are things that are so much better with hands, like …,” she considered, “tickling!”

Suddenly, Twilight was released from the hug but recaptured in a tickle-hold.

“Pink—ah! Eek—ha a-haha, Pinkie!” Twilight struggled to free herself amid her laughter.

“Twilight?” Spike called, rushing to his mistress. “What’s going—oh.” Upon seeing her laughing struggles, he stopped and watched on, chuckling at the antics.

But Pinkie paused and looked up at him. “Spikey-Paws! Come’ere! Ehehe!”

Before the puppy could react, he was in Pinkie’s arms and receiving a delicate ear-scritching massage. “Hooves can’t do this!” Pinkie giggled.

Seizing the opportunity, Twilight retreated to a safe distance and breathed deeply.

Once calm, she recalled the latest message received in her journal. She looked at Pinkie and her eyes widened.

“Uh, Pinkie?”

“What’s up?” Pinkie returned as Spike’s eyes drifted closed under the scritching.

“Which Pinkie are you?”

“The one not in Equestria, silly.”

Twilight rolled her eyes. “Of course you are, currently, but are you the one who was born there or—“

“Ouch!” Pinkie suddenly put her hands to her head, leaving Spike to flop to the yoga mat with a surprised woof.

“Pinkie?” Twilight asked, approaching her friend. The Pink girl just remained there holding her head and blinking slowly. “Are you—?”

“It’s all so quiet,” Pinkie mumbled.

Looking around, Twilight spotted students chatting on the front steps, the gardener mowing the lawn, the usual traffic for the evening rush. It was by no means a traffic jam, but it was far from quiet. “What do you m—is your hair … deflating?”

With a slight squeal, Pinkie’s naturally discombobulated curls were losing more and more of their volume and curves. As the locks slowly straightened out and sputtered before hanging straight down, various objects fell from within.

Toys, candy, musical instruments, whip cream, a cell phone with multiple chargers, a rubber duckie, school books, clothing, a bag of sugar that was sparkling brightly, and all sorts of the various things the energetic girl was known for suddenly just having without notice. Spike looked up just in time for a ball and an eye-patch to land on his face. In that order.

Slowly, almost robotically, Pinkie stood, her hair now as straight as if freshly combed after being coated with a gallon of hair gel.

One final object fell. A small bag of pills.

Twilight watched, getting a good look at Pinkie’s face. It had fallen into a completely neutral expression. “Uh, P-Pinkie?”

“Hello …, Twilight,” Pinkie slowly droned in a flat, emotionless tone.

“Are you okay, Pinkie?” asked Spike.

“No …. I … feel … not … Pinkie.”

Pinkie turned and began walking away from the portal, her arms and legs making stiff motions. Twilight and Spike followed.

“I-is there anything we can do?” Twilight asked. “Bring you to the nurse?

“No …. I … know … what … I … must … do.”

Twilight and Spike glanced at each other. When they looked back up they saw Pinkie bending over with her face in a bush.

“BLEAAAAARUUUUUGGHHHHH!”

Spike and Twilight cringed and averted their eyes.

POP

Braving a look back at Pinkie, they saw that her hair had returned to its normal bouncy curls.

“Wheu!” Pinkie sighed, breathed deep, skipped back toward the portal, then began returning all the fallen objects back into her hair as if nothing had happened. All the items except for the little bag of pills which she threw like a softball into a distant trash can.

She then turns, ignoring the confused expressions on Twilight and Spike’s faces and addresses the readers directly.

“Winners don’t do drugs.”
> The Rainbow Road to Destruction
> --------------------------------------------------------------------------

The moment the portal stopped its shimmering after Twily had stepped through it, the hovering Rainbow Dashes each shot their counterpart a dangerous face full of challenge.

As one they declared their first contest, though the twins had differing ideas as to what it should be.

“Ghastly Gorge and back!” shouted Primo.
“Canterlot Castle and back!” overlapped Rad.

“Ghastly Gorge?” Rad countered, while Primo had her own question.
“Canterlot? Endurance test first?”

“Canterlot’s the only place I know how to get to outside town,” Rad explained.

“Oh right,” Primo realized. “Okay, to Canterlot!”

“Ha! First point to me!”

“What?! That doesn’t count!”

“Hurry up or my second point will be just as easy!” Rad goaded, launching herself out of the room and then the nearest window—pausing just a beat to make sure it was open—with Primo only a moment behind her.

The others in the room watched with grins, sighs, and/or eye-rolls spread among them as they grouped up to attend their own planned activities.

The Applejacks, having already sighed and eye-rolled earlier, gave each other flat looks which one of them shared with a passing Rarity. “Exploding universes is one thing. But if them Dashes are up to what Ah know they’re gonna be up to, these nice pony folk won’t want us back in the first place.”

It was just as they passed the second window on the way to the stairs when the first rainboom rattled the walls.


*** *** ***


The extra colorful pony world blitzed by as Rad bee-lined straight for Canterlot Castle. She was still in the lead but the new rainbow ring that exploded behind her, tinting the sky, meant Primo was finally about to provide a challenge.

Rad considered what the results of their first contest would be. Of course Primo would complain about Rad’s head start after losing—Rad knew because she would have done the same in her position. But worse, if Primo actually managed to win, she’d gloat about her victory despite the late start. That meant Rad had no choice: she had to win!

She poured on the speed.


*** *** ***


“Rad wasn’t kidding about the rainbow butt light,” Primo thought to herself, coming up behind Rad. Taking advantage of the reduced wind resistance by flying in Rad’s slipstream just wasn’t going to work if she was blinded by a light show.

She angled to the side a bit to get a better look, away from the bright stripe of colors. Rad wasn’t quite getting the wing motions right. Sure, they were effective, but not the best speed to effort ratio that Twilight had worked out on her super mathy charts. She’d tire herself out too soon. An easy win for a long distance. Or, she smirked, she could give her some in-flight flight lessons.

Relying on years of experience of owning her own wings, Primo closed in, beginning to come up alongside Rad only to get a face full of rainbow as Rad barrel-rolled back in front of her.

“Gah!” Primo shouted, banking away to restore her vision. She followed this up with a chuckle. “So, the newbie wants to play, huh?”


*** *** ***


Two Rainbow Dashes crashed down onto a castle balcony panting and wheezing. Hair and fur jutted out in random directions, feathers splayed misaligned with a couple escaped ones floating down around them. Both were on their sides unable to stand. One was sopping wet with a puddle spreading around her.

“I …,” Rad wheezed, before taking a deep breath and trying again. “I win.” She had raised a triumphant hoof with her declaration though it never got very high before allowing gravity to take over.

“You had a head start,” complained Primo.

“You just weren’t paying attention,” Rad countered.

“You played dirty!”

“You forced me into a lake!”

“I deserve a point for that, the way you tried to wrestle me in there, and you started it when you kicked me.”

“That was an accident!” Rad protested only to get a stare from Primo. “Fine, it wasn’t entirely an accident. But I still got here first.”

“You forced me into the train tunnels. I was going too fast to turn around and had to take the long way through.”

“And I had to climb straight up with all this water weight!” Rad plopped a hoof into her puddle. “I feel ten pounds heavier.”

“I did more rainbooms than you. The tunnels were too tight to keep my speed maxed. Had to re-rainboom up after the turns. A train nearly hit me.”

Rad gave out an exasperated groan. “Fine. So, point for getting here first.”

“Point per rainboom.”

“Point for the added water weight.”

“Point removed for personal foul.” Primo shot a hoof toward Rad

“And point removed for the forced water landing.” Rad returned a hoof of her own. “But point to me for coming up with the contest idea.”

“That one still doesn’t count, and—wait. The contest was Canterlot castle and back.”

The two pooped pegasai looked at each other, then at Twilight’s castle, in Ponyville, way in the distance.

“Point for being the first back on her hooves!” Primo breathed, having just gotten back to standing, before flopping back onto her haunches with a grunt. “How many points do we have so far?”

There was a moment of silence, followed by another as the twins did their calculations. Without her fingers, Rad used a wet hoof to make tally marks on the balcony but they ended up spreading and blending together.

Looking back at each other, they voiced a realization. ““We’re gonna need a ref.””

“Scoot?” asked Primo.

“When’s school end?”

“ ‘Nother hour or two I think.”

“Non-contact race to Twi’s then a shower?”

“And preening,” Primo agreed, looking at her wings.

“You won’t kiss me this time will you?”

Primo rolled her eyes. “Of course not, you tailless two-leg thing.”

Rad let out a snerk, which Primo returned, before they both burst out into chuckles.

The chuckles stopped when a voice cleared its throat, calling their attention upward.

“That’s a big pony,” remarked Rad.

“P-Princess Celestia!” shouted Primo returning to a stand and giving a salute.

“That’s pony Celestia?” asked Rad looking up at the rather tall, and bright creature, somehow still referred to as a pony. She noted that a group of palace guards and the blue-uniformed ponies had also come close. And why was her hair moving? Rad looked around for a fan.

Celestia smiled at the waterlogged visitor. “Ah, so you’re the Rainbow Dash from Starswirl’s portal. My guards alerted me to some … commotion around the castle.”

“Uh, yes, um, ma’am—Princess ma’am,” Rad replied, also getting to her hooves in a nervous rush. Detention’s bad enough from a principal. What would a princess version be like? She began to bow until she noted her counterpart’s salute and copied her.

With a chuckle, Celestia waved the Dashes down. “At ease, my little pony and welcome visitor.” Celestia turned and nodded to the ponies behind her, most of whom returned the nod and left. “I wanted to introduce myself. I’ve visited plenty of other worlds through Starswirl’s first portal, but you’re the first creature I’ve met from your world. I’ve heard I have a young counterpart there.”

“Yes, Princess ma’am,” Rad replied. “Well, I guess she’s in her thirties or forties.”

“That’s still quite young from my point of view,” Celestia chuckled. “And she’s a teacher?”

“Sort of. She’s the principal, though she used to be a teacher. Still subs sometimes when a teacher gets sick.”

“Good for her. I miss it myself. Are any of the others from your world in our Canterlot now?” Celestia’s eyes twinkled just slightly. “Or Sunset?”

“No, Princess ma’am,” Rad looked to her twin. “Just us. Having a race.”

“Twi, Spike, and us ponies will be here tomorrow though,” Primo offered before pointing at Rad. “These girls are going back home a couple at a time. Their Twilight already left.”

“And Sunset said she was going to catch up on stuff. Family, probably. And maybe learn how to use her wings.”

After a slight drop learning the other world’s Twilight had left, Celestia’s smile grew with the words family and wings. “I am very much hoping to see her do both soon.”

Primo looked to her twin. “Think we should help her on the wings part?”

“Nah,” Rad answered. “She’s an egghead like the Twilights. She won’t have any more trouble than your Twi did when she got hers.”

“No more trouble you say?” Primo chuckled at a few memories. Celestia politely covered her own chuckling with a hoof. “I got a few stories about that I think you’d enjoy. We can use those magic journals we’re getting for that once you’re back home.”

“Speaking of your new journals,” Celestia spoke up, putting her hoof back down, “The royal enchanter completed the remaining journals Twilight requested.” Her horn lit and a pair of saddlebags appeared between them. Opening one pocket, she showed off a pair of books with her and her sister’s cutie marks. “I’ve made a set for our counterparts as well. Could you be sure that the next of you to return to your world delivers them?”

“Of course, ma’am-Princess,” Rad assured her with another salute. “Pinkie’s heading out later today, I’ll let her know.”

“Thank you, Rainbow Dash. It would be good to be able to communicate with them even after you and your friends graduate.” Celestia paused and her bright expression softened while looking into the distance at Twilight’s castle. “We lost a pony in your world some time ago.”

“Lost?”

“She never returned from an exploration mission. We searched every thirty moons when the portal opened with no luck. Eventually we had to face the facts that she would not be returning. But now that we can, at least sparingly, make use of the portal outside of its schedule, and we’ll have so many contacts in your world, I would like to try again.”

Puffing out her chest, Rad saluted harder. “We’ll find her, Your Majesty ma’am!”

“All the information is already in the journal for my counterpart, along with a request that she or her sister coordinate the effort. Given how time works between our two worlds, you and your friends may not have been born yet when she entered the portal.”

“Oh,” Rad deflated a little. “That could make things difficult, Your Highness, ma’am. But I’m sure Twily and Sunset—”

“It’s alright, Rainbow Dash,” Celestia cut her off, laying a gentle hoof on her shoulder, ignoring the wet fur, “You needn't bring this to them. Just deliver these journals and let my counterpart and her sister come up with a plan.”

“You can count on it, Your Ma—“

“And you also needn’t be so formal with me,” Celestia’s smile returned.

“Oh! Uh, thanks … uh, lady?” When Rad turned and saw the stunned look Primo was giving her, Rad added with haste, “Calling adults by just their names like that feels weird and I don’t want detention.”

Taking note of the pony puddle and the reports of rainbow explosions in the train tunnels, Celestia bit back a mischievous smile. “Why would you think I’d give you detention?”

“Well, that’s usually what happens when the other Celestia wants to talk to me.”

Celestia peered at Rad. “Dare I ask why?”

Both Rainbows jerked their heads up in alarm. “Uh, we should go deliver these books, right?” Primo came to her twin’s rescue—and possibly, by extension, her own.

“Oh, right, yeah!” Rad agreed, watching how Primo directly flew into the straps of the saddlebags still hovering in Celestia’s magic. She tried to copy her, and her way of tightening the undercarriage strap by pinching it between some feathers, but just did a tumble until that same golden glow covered her and fastened the bags correctly while also applying a drying spell to her fur.

“Come on. I’ll teach you how to long distance glide. Not as awesome as rainbooms, but you’ll get to know your wings better!”

“Really? Cool!”

Now fully geared up, Primo turned and saluted her nation’s ruler again. “Thanks, Princess. We’ll make sure your doubles get these and we’ll find your missing pony.” She turned back to her twin after getting a return salute and called out while diving off the balcony. “Wings out and copy me, Rookie.”

Celestia watched them go, declining at an easy glide, the native Rainbow Dash giving pointers to the visitor.

She sighed, once alone, giving Twilight’s palace another look. “I haven’t given up, Sky’.”


*** *** ***


The Pinkies were nowhere to be found when the Rainbows returned to Twilight’s palace, though there was quite a large amount of confetti coating a nearby pond indicating where they had been. The Rainbows instead stashed the saddlebags filled with correspondence journals beside the portal and got cleaned up from their earlier adventure in “good” sportsponyship, or their version of it at least. They were just in time to recruit their referee.

““Yo, Scoot!”” the Rainbows called down from the roof of the Ponyville schoolhouse as the excited students exited in a rush to switch from school to play mode.

The young pegasus looked up at the edge of the roof to see two of her mentor grinning down at her. “Rainbow Dash and Rainbow Dash!” she squealed, her instant enthusiasm lifting her inches into the air.

““Got time to be our ref, Squirt?””

“Absolutely!” Scootaloo grinned, her eyes growing in size and emitting stars.

““Great—”” the Rainbow Dashes began to reply before Primo leaned forward, giving Rad a slight push back, “because we’ll need somepony to officially declare me the greatest pegasus of all time.”

“You mean me!” Rad challenged, sliding out from behind Primo’s hoof and taking to the air. “She’s picking me!”

Scootaloo blinked, fading out the stars, and the pupils of her giant eyes bounced from one Dash to the other. “Uh.”

Two fillies beside her traded awkward glances at each other. “This is great, Scootaloo,” Sweetie Belle popped in with a cheerful note.

“Yeah,” agreed Apple Bloom. “Now we all get to hang out with our doubled sisters today! Jackie’s going to tell us all about her Dad, and we’re teaching Wallflower more about earth pony magic!”

“I’ll be doing all sorts of things with Share and Renae once I finish my Home Ec homework!” Sweetie squeaked. “I bet they’ll love the dinner I cook tonight!”

This time it was Apple Bloom and Scootaloo that traded worried glances. “Heh,” Scootaloo chuckled nervously, “I bet there won’t even be any leftovers …” she shot Apple Bloom another look, “this time.”

“Uh, eeyup, “Apple Bloom agreed. “You’ll have no need to bring any leftovers around—have-fun-bye!”

Before Sweetie Belle could turn around to wish her friends a good time, Apple Bloom had already galloped off the playground and Scootaloo was practically climbing up the outer wall of the school to get to her de facto sisters. “Okay, bye!” Sweetie called out with a cheerful giggle before galloping toward her sister’s boutique.

With a snicker, the Rainbows swooped down from their perch on the school roof and scooped up Scootaloo on their way to their next proving ground.

“I got ya Scootaloo,” said one Dash, pulling her into her forehooves.

“No, I got her,” complained the other, pulling her back.

“I had her first!”

Scootaloo looked from one to the other as they juggled her back and forth, then to the sky and clouds all around them as they all flew off into the wild blue.

“Eeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeee!” she squealed the whole way.


*** *** ***


“Another point for Rad!” declared Scootaloo.

“Ha!” celebrated Rad. “Suck it Primo!”

“Do what? And I’m still in the lead!” Primo protested. “Right, Scootaloo?”

Scootaloo turned to her clipboard and started counting tallies. The little pegasus, still a bit giddy, danced on her haunches as the Rainbows landed beside her. Primo had carved out a judge’s booth from a nicely-sized cloud for Scootaloo to observe from, complete with majestic pillars on the sides all topped with likenesses of her own head.

She earned a point for that.

Rad, not wanting to get left behind, pushed the cloud all over the sky above Ponyville, anywhere Scootaloo wanted to go.

She earned a point for that.

Primo argued that she could have done it better and challenged Rad to a cloud-pushing race: move ten clouds each in the shortest time.

They tied.

So on and so forth.

For hours.

And now Scootaloo hooved out the afternoon’s results. “Forty five points for Rad—“

“HA!” Rad declared.

“—and Forty eight points for Primo!”

“HA-HA!” Primo declared right back.

“WHAT?!” Rad yelled.

“Three point lead!” Primo announced. “Who’s the pony?” She pointed to herself with a wing. “I’m the pony.”

“No, I’m the pony!” Rad countered before pausing with a blink. “Uh, lately! And I’m going to prove it!”

“That’s what we’ve been doing all day and I’m three points ahead of you,” Primo snickered.

“One more contest. Winner take all!”

“Oh, yeah? What you thinking?”

“Longest rainboom! First to lose their butt laser loses the contest!”

“It’s a butt laser now?”

“Lasers are more awesome just like my butt is awesome!”

“Flank?” asked Scootaloo.

“Not this time!”

There was a bit of silence as neither of the three knew how to respond to that. Finally, Rad’s determined expression went sheepish a moment. “Uh, sorry. Got a little sidetracked there. But my point stands!” She stamped a hoof onto the cloud to punctuate her point, though it merely wobbled a bit and the intended effect was lost.

“The point that your butt is awesome?”

“N-no, that wasn’t the point.”

“Lasers are awesome?”

“Not that one either!”

“But our butt is awesome!” Primo interjected.

“Well, yes,” Rad agreed.

“And so are lasers!”

“Yes—wait. You know what lasers are?”

“I’ll sneak you two into Twi’s lab later.”

““Awesome!”” Rad and Scootaloo perked up before Rad shook her head and got back on track. “The point is that I’m not losing and I’m going to prove it by keeping a rainboom going the longest!”

“You’re on!” Primo shouted, raising a hoof in the air toward Rad.

Rad cheered along with a hoof high in the air but paused when she noticed Primo seemed to be waiting for something. “Oh, right. Hoofbump,” she said, and bumped her hoof with Primo’s


*** *** ***


The contest might have just had a simple, “keep flying fast until you can’t keep flying fast no more,” objective, but it still needed some ground rules.

Scootaloo was the referee, and since she could only either follow them from the ground or watch from a cloud, and they had to keep away from town to avoid causing property damage, the Rainbows set up a quick race track using various clouds in an empty area.

No rainfall was scheduled for the week so the clouds were simply decorative anyway.

After beginning with a straightaway to reach initial rainboom speeds, the track started high and declined in a large, lopsided spiral with a steep climb at the end to return to the highest point. This would force the Rainbows to make turns at varying angles and to hold their rainbooms at a steep incline. In effect, the track was designed to make a continuous rainboom as difficult as possible.

Scootaloo’s judge’s cloud was placed just outside the middle of the spiral so she’d be able to keep track of each Dash, who were wearing scarves of different colors to more easily tell them apart.

Their name tags would never be readable at such speeds.

A red neckband for Rad and green for Primo. They both wanted blue of course. Blue ribbons are always the best. But after ten minutes of arguing, Scootaloo broke it up saying a blue neckband wouldn’t stand out on their blue fur anyway.

For added fun, Primo snuck out Twilight’s anemometer. Why not measure their wing power while they were at it? It was placed on one of the clouds near Scootaloo.

With that all out of the way, it was time to fly!

From her post, Scootaloo looked up and away at the Rainbows, both ready to jump off their starting cloud and rocket toward their track. “On your cutie marks!” she shouted and the Dashes crouched into launch position. “Get set!”

She paused with a giggle, keeping them in suspense for a moment.

“GO!”

They took off in a blur.

It was only a few seconds before they broke the rainboom threshold, in unison no less. The two rainbow rings exploded out from each pegasus and combined into a figure-eight as they expanded. Despite the distance from town and major land features, the rushing winds and sheer force of the boom echoed back at them from all directions. Trees shook, windows rattled, the flower trio jumped into their bunker’s bunker (because of course it had one).

The Rainbows reached the cloud marking the first curve of their track and turned into the spiral. They flew one above the other to avoid either one of them complaining that the other got the inside track and spun down together. Each turn a different angle, each rotation smaller than the previous, until the final turn and they climbed again to reach the top passing the anemometer on the way.



138



At the top, they turned back into the first curve of the spiral and started down again. At the bottom, they angled up and passed the anemometer a second time.



171



Primo began taking the lead after the final turns of the spiral started making Rad dizzy. All those sessions in the dizzitron helped Primo keep her equilibrium.

As any runner or pegasus racer would attest, running a marathon is much different than a sprint. To remain running for longer periods of time, one must pace themselves and not simply strive for the greatest speed.

At some point, the Rainbows forgot this and switched from marathon flying to sprinting, both trying to outpace the other. Again, in fact, because they had already tried multiple speed races before. Though those were all point to point races rather than endurance races, and none were around a spiral track.

Another loop around the track and a climb past the anemometer.



214



The track itself had begun to change at this point, the fluffy, white clouds warping and refusing to stay at their designated positions. The spiral wasn’t so lopsided anymore, the various forces of nature, such as they were in this magic world, began to balance it out.

The Rainbows took no notice, too focused on winning. They just kept circling around as the curves grew more uniform and easier to navigate while maintaining speed.



247





280





313



Scootaloo looked around, finally tearing her eyes off the awesome and onto the uh-oh as her own judge’s platform started getting sucked into the mix.



346



“Rainbow Dash?!” she called but to no avail as the two preoccupied pegasai were already into another lap around the spiral.

The closest trees to the track began bending and swaying. Dirt and debris in the area mixing into the wind.



379



“RAINBOW DASHES!” Scootaloo called again as her cloud warped, the cloud replicas of Rainbow Dash’s face stretched beyond recognition.



412



This time, as Primo rounded the middle ring of their spiral, she noticed an orange and purple thing wiz past them. “AAAaaaaahhhhhh!” it cried.

“Scootaloo?” she called out. She got a better look one more rotation down. “Scootaloo!”

Primo, who was in the lead, tried to pull to a stop only for Rad to smash into her. ““AAAaaaaahhhhhh!”” they copied Scootaloo as the winds flung them around, tumbling in circles until one circle was too sharp to contain their forward momentum and they escaped the vortex.



354



But without the two instigators, their pegasus-made, rainbow-colored tornado was no longer rooted, relatively, in place and drifted away from them.

Directly toward town.


*** *** ***


They stared into the bags—no—the buckets.

The dark, dented buckets hanging under Twilight’s tired eyes.

Tired, angry eyes.

Scootaloo was fine, the townsponies were fine. They weren’t happy but they were fine. The tornado didn’t cause all that much damage. Not really. Not like Tirek, Discord, or the parasprites had, but … well, there was some damage. In some places.

It was just in a meandering line from their starting point till … not the middle of town. No matter how many ponies said otherwise.

It wasn’t all that bad.

Town Hall is the middle of town and the tornado didn’t come that close to it. Only two windows were lost. And some roof tiles.

And the front doors.

And the doors weren’t even from the tornado but a sofa from Quills and Sofas getting slammed through them … by the tornado.

Still not that bad.

Twilight’s eyes spoke differently though.

So did the buckets under them.

They practically had their own handles etched into her fur.

A good thing really as they appeared to be filled with rocks.

Angry rocks.

Ask Maud how that could be possible.

Scootaloo actually had some fun when the tornado shot her cloud halfway to Canterlot at near rainboom speeds. It was then that she learned she could control it with her wings and air-scoot right back to town.

And right back into the tornado.

Just because she could control the cloud didn’t mean she had good aim. It wasn’t like she had a pilot’s license for clouds.

She ended up inside Town Hall.

Good thing the doors were gone.

But she was fine.

She landed on the sofa.

What was left of it anyway.

Just another day in Ponyville.

Except Twilight didn’t look happy.

The Palace of Friendship’s throne room didn’t seem so friendly under that stare. Twilight, Primo, and Spike all sat in their thrones while Rad stood next to her twin.

“Time to go home, Rad,” Twilight practically growled.

“What?! No way!” protested Rad. “Not fair and it’s Shindy’s turn anyway. She called first!”

Spike raised a claw, but Twilight cut off whatever he was going to say.

“Shindy can go tomorrow,” Twilight declared, laying her face in a hoof. “I thought two Pinkies would be the danger,” she muttered, “but it’s two Rainbows that end up smashing the town!”

“Not the whole town,” argued Primo.

“Close enough!” countered Twilight with a groan. “First all that setup in Canterlot. Then the panicking ponies here in town because of swamp gas or whatever those ponies in black said it was”—she shook a hoof in the air—“which still doesn’t make any sense. Then Sunset. Then back to Canterlot. Then back here. Then the party—which ended up with panicking ponies again! And now you two make a rainboom tornado?!”

“Well …,” Primo sheepishly scratched the back of her neck, “it’s not like we’d do that a second time.”

Twilight peered at the Rainbows. And it was like the buckets spilled their contents straight into their souls. “I slept twelve hours this week. Week! Rad’s going home so the town can be quiet and I can go stuff my head in a pillow in peace!”

Spike cleared his throat and leaned away defensively from Twilight. “Actually, Shindy’s already gone home.”

Twilight groaned. “And Twily didn’t want more than two returning in a single day.”

“The Pinkies left us all a bunch of goodies though,” Spike followed up, holding out a purple scone hoping it would have a calming effect. “See?”

A purple glow promptly appeared around the scone and it was only three bites until the whole thing met its preordained demise. But that only served to wake the beast.

“RUMUMuMUMUmUM,” growled Twilight’s stomach.

“I’ll go get dinner,” Spike offered, happy to have an excuse to leave the room.

After a sigh, Twilight accepted the current state of her life. “Thank you, Spike.” She looked to Rad. “Tomorrow. Early. Until then,” her eyes narrowed, “you two are going to make up for the mess.”

The Rainbows glanced at each other.

““Meaning?””


*** *** ***


Rad had wondered how ponies could build houses. Could they use hammers without hands? Apparently yes.

But how?

The answer gave her a headache.

Pony teeth are surprisingly strong. Not to mention their jaws and necks.

Still had a headache though.

It was a good hour before a construction worker showed her how they use bands to strap hammers to their wrists, or “pasterns” as the pony called them.

This freed up her mouth to pick up nails with.

Yay?

It was a delicate process.

Pony hammers had a magnetic strip on one side and had a small spike on another to make pilot holes for the nails, so it wasn’t always necessary to hold a nail in place to start it off.

Use the spike to make the pilot hole. Stick a nail on the magnetic strip. Slap the nail in the hole with the hammer. Then hammer as “normal.”

Neat. Could solve the whole smashing thumbs thing back home too. Picking up the nails was still a chore though. Good thing she had her tetanus shots up to date.

She bent down to pick up another nail and the sign on her back shifted. She signed, pushing it back into place.

Princess Twilight had decided that since Q&S had seen the brunt of the damages, both Rainbows would wear the brightest, most attention-grabbing, and humiliating advertisements possible draped over them while they did the work around town.

The thing depicted a pony lounging on a large, frilly, pink sofa on both sides.

Several balloons were tied to the top.

Happy faces and hearts were drawn on them.

They were ordered to work until sundown … and stay out of—more—trouble. It was a royal decree.

When she got serious, this Twilight really meant business! It was only Sunset, and sometimes Fluttershy of all people, who could get that scary back home. And maybe Rarity during a fashion emergency.

Rad looked at her wings, then the bright, blue, beautiful, inviting sky that she wouldn’t be flying in—unless it was while patching up a roof—and sighed.

“Well, it’s not all bad,” she told herself. “Contest is still on.”

They gave themselves a point for each fixed building.

She hammered faster.

“Let’s see Primo top this!”




*** *** ***




“—iiiieee-YA!”

Rainbow Dash tucked and rolled out of the portal, ending in the best karate stance she could imitate from her favorite action movies and gave herself a satisfied smirk. “I make this look good,” she thought to herself. “If only someone saw how awesome that was.”

“HEY RAINBOW DASH!”

“Wahhh!” Dash jumped away from the loud shriek behind her ear.

“Welcome back!” Pinkie cheered.

Of course it was Pinkie.

Dash stood upright and proudly strutted over to recover her cool factor. “Thanks, Pink. Nice landing hu—?!”

She was cut off by a large bag exiting the portal and slamming into her. “Oof!” she belted out before landing on a stack of yoga mats.

“Oooh! You brought goodies!” Pinkie cheered.

“Uh, yeah,” Dash coughed out before standing. She opened the bag and handed Pinkie a book decorated with balloons. “Here’s your journal thing to talk with Peachie.”

She took the book and cheered, taking a pencil out of her hair to doodle in it.

Once Dash brushed herself off, she put the bag down near Pinkie. “Take this for a sec.”

Dash took a few steps back, fished her geode out of her pocket, put it around her neck, and smiled when it flashed.

That smile turned into a smirk just before she took off in a blur. If Pinkie felt the rush of wind that whipped her curly hair all over, she gave no indication.

She did, however, poke around the bag and check out some of the other books.

Seconds later, Pinkie turned around to face the opposite way while reading one of the books.

Just in time for Dash to reappear with a skid.

“HA!” she cheered herself on. “All around the edge of town and back—” she checked her watch, “—in nine seconds flat! Let’s see Primo get those kinds of speeds!”

“So who’s Aurora Skies?” Pinkie asked calmly, face still in the book.

“Huh?” Dash checked the book. “Oh, that one’s for Principal Celestia,” she said, taking the book and putting it back in the bag. “She and Vice Principal Luna got journals too.”

“Neat!”

“So, we got a party inside to welcome the greatest pegasus of all time?”

Pinkie gasped. “Primo’s coming too?”

“What?!”

“I’ll have to change the banners and the invites! Bake a new cake! Tell her to give me ten minutes!”

“Pinkie!” Dash caught her before the party girl could rush into the school. “I mean me!”

“You’re not the greatest pegasus, Dashie,” Pinkie informed her.

“Not now! But I was!”

“Which of you got the most points?”

“Geh—! Uh,” Dash stuttered. “Doesn’t matter!” She pointed a thumb at the portal. “Next time that portal resets and the universes are safe from exploding, she’s coming here and we’re settling things for good!”

“Uh, huh,” Pinkie nodded slowly with a wink. “So why’d you come back so soon? Thought you’d want to keep your wingies longer.”

“Well,” Dash flicked her eyes to the side and felt a bead of sweat drop. “Uh, because, this way … I can be the one to tell everyone how amazing I—we were in the other world. You know, those who already know about Equestria and we don’t have to hide it from that is. We can make stuff up for those who don’t.”

“Yeah! You’re perfect for that!” Pinkie agreed.

“W-what?” Dash blinked, seeing Pinkie turn to head for the school. She picked up the bag and followed after. “What do you mean by that?”

“It’s one of your maaaaany talents,” Pinkie giggled.

“Pinkie!”

She giggled harder.




*** *** ***




Back in Equestria, a day later, Princess Celestia sat reading a newly proposed law when she was distracted by a buzzing.

Looking over, she saw her new correspondence journal vibrating and glowing.

She took a breath.

Then let out a small, hopeful smile.
> Two Introverts and the Oh So Humble Spirit of Chaos
> --------------------------------------------------------------------------

The sounds of nature surrounded two yellow ponies on a picnic blanket. In the distance, animals frolicked or rested in various states of recovery and rehabilitation.

“Thank you for teaching me how to make those flower sandwiches,” said Butterfly. “They were delicious. I especially liked the pink lily rolls. I hope horses and other creatures in my world will enjoy these recipes.”

“Did you try the hayburgers too?” asked Posey.

“Oh, no. I had already filled up on the sandwiches, but I tried the hayfries. I had a hayshake too, even some of the hay, um, salad.” While answering, Butterfly looked over the remaining foodstuffs on their picnic blanket left behind by their guests. “Hay is a much more versatile food than I ever realized.”

Moving to a hover, Posey began collecting dishes and putting away leftovers while answering. “Hay is an important part of a healthy diet for us and many creatures. We use it in lots of things: bread, pie crusts, garnish. Your species doesn’t eat it at all?”

“We can’t really digest it and I don’t think it would taste very good. Though I’ve never tried it before becoming a pony.”

“That’s right, you did mention being an omnivore.” Posey shuddered slightly. “Well, every species does have its own unique nutritional needs.”

“Speaking of every species,” Butterfly gushed while taking another look down their little hill at all the animal guests returning to their temporary homes, “Sweet Feather Sanctuary is just wonderful! I’ve always dreamed of working at such a place, and you actually designed this yourself!”

“Aww.” Posey blushed. “Why thank you. Sweet Feather’s always been a dream of mine as well.”

“And now you care for so many wonderful animals, and so well-cultured.” Butterfly paused as a thought came to her. “Did Harry come up with that honey porridge recipe himself?”

“He learned it while on vacation at the beach.” Noticing a confused expression on Butterfly’s face, Posey added, “I’m not sure how that makes sense either.” She giggled. “But some of the best things don’t make sense. You’ll see when Discord comes over later.”

“Oh, that’s right. You were going to introduce us. But not during our book club picnic?”

Posey shook her head with a smile. “Discord, um …, commands attention? Or, well, you’ll see. I thought it might be best for you to spend time with the animals first and then Discord separately. I invited him over for dinner instead. I thought we’d order out but he said he’d bring it.”

“Twi talked about Discord before. Sunset mentioned a legend about him too. Sounds a little scary. Do you really think I’ll like him?”

“Oh I think….” Posey’s head dropped a few degrees, her mane moving to cover a slightly rosy cheek. “Discord’s a wonderful person, very funny too. He has a scary past, but he’s become a great friend since he reformed.”

“I see.” Butterfly considered that. “Like Sunset, Wallflower, or Juniper. Or Aria … kinda. It’s scary sometimes but I love it when we can help people turn their lives around”

“Like healing a wounded animal,” Butterfly added.

“But it’s their heart that hurts.”

“And staying with them so they feel better.”

““And showing them every bit of kindness we can,”” they finished together.

The twins shared a smile, remembering how each of their circle of friends had grown over the years.

“That reminds me,” Butterfly began, thinking of one of her longest friendships, “where’s your Angel? I was hoping he’d be at the meeting so I could see what kind of books he’d like. Mine doesn’t know how to read but I’d like to try teaching him.”

“Oh!” Posey’s head and ears popped up before slowly sinking down as she spoke. “He likes mysteries, and uh, … thrillers, and, um, well, his collection is a little scary actually.”

“Ah, is that why he’s not here? Too scary for the other creatures and, um, us?”

“Actually, there are a couple members who share his interests so he usually shows up, but he said he had some things to take care of today.”

“Aww, that’s too bad.”

“I am surprised Robert didn’t show up though.”

“Eep.” Butterfly ducked to hide both a cringe and a blush.

“He and his older daughters have been delightful members.”

“Oh, it’s also too bad they’re not here,” said a sheepish Butterfly.

“Mm,” Posey nodded before turning and reaching for a box beside her, “but since we’re alone….” She stopped and looked around quickly to be sure of that fact before continuing softly, “It’s t-time for a little book share!”

“But we just had book club.”

“Yes, but these are titles I wanted to share with just you.” Posey looked around again while opening the box. “I got these from Rarity.” She blushed. “I already got her permission to pass them along. I didn’t mention to whom.”

After placing the opened box on the picnic blanket between the two of them, Posey seemed to lose the ability to keep her mane from hiding her face as Butterfly looked inside and scanned the titles on top.

Reined In, Lost Mares, Mastering Her Herd, Fifty Shades of Hay.

Butterfly’s mane flopped forward to match her twin’s almost as if it was commanded to. “U-uh, I, um, m-may have, r-r-read some of t-these already?”

Time passed.

Neither mare moved.

The wind blew through their manes revealing faces of a color more commonly seen on Pinkie Pie.

They risked a glance at each other.

And shied away immediately.

Tried again.

Then quickly stared at the picnic blanket away from the box.

Until, finally.

Snerk

"“Hehe.”"

"“Ha ha.”"

The twins giggled.

Softly at first, but eventually louder and more uncontrollably until they were holding their stomachs in laughter.


*** *** ***

*** *** ***


Meanwhile, in a secret, undisclosed meeting place, an angry bunny tightened his headband and stared down at his targets.

Two carrots tied at their stems dangled from each paw.

“We’re sorry!” Special Agent Heartstrings cried.

“We really thought they were changeling infiltrators!” Special Agent Sweetie Drops added.

“It was Bonnie’s idea!”

“What?!”

“It was!”

“Way to throw me under the cart, Lyra!”

“I said they were from another world, but noooo, it had to be changelings!”

“I was working with the evidence at hoof!”

“So was I!”

“You were working with comic books!”

“Based on real legends!”

“Those are myths!”

"Yeah!" Lyra smirked. "Like Nightmare Moon was a 'myth'!"

“But—!”

A loud clang rang out and the two agents turned to see that Special Agent Diablo had struck a gong with one of his carrot-chucks. A beat later, a platoon of animals popped up all around them: dogs, ducks, pigs, pigeons, even a kitten and more. Many carried pitchforks and torches.

The mares backed up a step.

“Bon Bon, I love you.”

“I love you too.”

They turned and ran.

The animals charged.


*** *** ***

*** *** ***


Meow, Meow-Meow-Meow, Meow, Meow-Meow-Meow, Meow-Meow, Meow-Meow, Meow, Meow-Meow-Meow!

""Eep!”” two red-faced Fluttershys bolted up from the book they had been reading together when Posey’s alarm clock struck five.

Immediately, Butterfly slammed the book closed and Posey fluttered over to shut off the alarm.

In the silence, they looked at each other and giggled through their rosy cheeks. Posey put the book back in the box, covered it securely, and slid it under her bed.

““Time to feed the animals,”” they told each other.

In the time since their giggle fit over the box of books, the two had cleaned up their picnic, relocated to Posey’s cottage and snuck away to read the latest gift from Rarity together. It was the first time either had shared this interest with any other creature. They never even told their respective Raritys that they actually read the gifted books.

The Raritys knew, of course, but they let their Fluttershys believe they didn’t.

Once the animals were taken care of, it was time for Discord’s dinner visit.

“So when is Discord coming?” asked Butterfly.

Posey giggled. “Discord doesn’t really pay attention to clocks other than his own, and those don’t really work like ours.”

“So how do we know when he’ll be here?”

“I’ll call him.”

“I thought you didn’t have phones.”

Posey paused and considered that. “I guess we don’t because I don’t know what phones are.”

“Another journal like Sunset’s then?”

“Close, I suppose. I am going to have Speedy deliver a letter.”

“A speedy delivery?”

“Oh, he’s very speedy.”

Butterfly followed Posey out the back door to a cozy garden. “Speedy?” Posey called, and Butterfly watched her poke around, looking on rocks and under leaves. “Oh there you are!”

Two eyes on stalks poked out from behind a potted plant. “Speedy is a snail?” asked Butterfly.

“Yes he is,” Posey confirmed. "Discord sent him to me."

“And he’s going to deliver a letter?”

“Snail mail.”

Butterfly opened her mouth to reply but found she had no words. She reminded herself she was currently a small, talking horse with wings in a magical world. Such a place was so full of wonders! “Hello, Speedy,” she greeted cheerfully.

Speedy slowly turned and blinked at her, then gave a slight bow with his eye-stalks.

“It’s nice to meet you too.”

Posey smiled at the pair. “Would you like to deliver a letter to Discord for me?”

Speedy slowly turned and blinked at her, then gave a slight bow with his eye-stalks.

“Thank you.”

While Speedy slowly inched his way out from behind the plant, Posey ducked under her left wing and pulled out a pencil and a sheet of parchment.

Butterfly tilted her head a moment then checked under her own wings. “Huh.” A small line of tiny feathers created a sort of little pocket there. “That’s handy, er, wing-y,” she mused.

Posey placed the parchment on a flat rock and put the pencil in her mouth with the point facing out.

“Hmmm,” she muttered to herself. “Which one should I try?”

Posey thought for a bit more before her eyes lit up and she began to write, seemingly trying to hold back some giggles. Once she was finished, she nodded to Butterfly who looked down and read the letter.

” ‘What do you get if you cross a cocker spaniel, a poodle, and a rooster’?”

Butterfly gave her twin a confused look but the only reply was a smile and a giggle before Posey tucked the pencil back under her wing and passed the letter to Speedy.

Speedy bit the edge of the letter and retreated into his shell, pulling the whole paper inside with him. Butterfly stared, thinking it was clearly larger than the shell even if wadded up, but the little snail managed just fine as Posey trotted to the other end of her yard to stand next to a small, patchwork-textured tree with a series of progressively larger clouds hovering just above it.

Following her over, Butterfly examined the spectacle. The tree was all the colors of the rainbow, and more, and was oddly shaped with some limbs even curling into spirals and what looked like tufts of fur sprouting where leaves would normally be. Words and images flashed through the largest cloud just above it.

Posey answered the confusion. “It’s a thought cloud. This is Discord’s new thinking tree.”

“Thinking tree ….”

“Isn’t it cute?”

It was, as far as Butterfly was concerned. However, she was still taking it all in when Posey picked up a stopwatch and called out to Speedy. “Are you ready, Speedy?”

Looking back to the little snail, they both saw him still inching his way toward them, hardly any closer than the plant he had started from. Not far away though was a white line drawn on the stone pathway. Speedy eventually lined himself up with it and bowed deeply.

“Okay,” Posey called. “On your mark.” Speedy didn’t move. “Get Set.” Speedy blinked. “Go!” Posey clicked the stopwatch.

Speedy … vibrated.

And then Butterfly could hear a sound. A familiar sound, but one she never thought she’d hear in this world of magic.

Tires grinding on pavement.

Suddenly, Speedy blazed forward, leaving a wake of pure air pressure behind him. Before she knew it, Speedy had passed them, and climbed up the trunk so fast he was airborne, shooting himself into the thought cloud of Discord’s thinking tree.

Speedy was gone.

“Yay,” Posey cheered softly, looking at the stop watch. “A new record.”

Butterfly blinked, did her best to get her jaw working, and then her brain. “… What ….”

Posey smiled, put the stopwatch away, and apparently wrote down the new time on a chart beside the tree.

As Posey trotted away, Butterfly continued to stare. At the tree, at the thought cloud, at the sizzling snail trail left behind from Speedy. “Well,” she eventually said to herself, “magic world.” She smiled and giggled. “I’ve just seen the strangest thing I’ll see in my life.”

“Now we just wait for Discord.”

Butterfly looked to Posey to see her simply sitting on a step leading to her cottage. “How long will that t—?”

“Cockerpoodledoo!” came a shout from behind her and she startled away with an eep.

A strange dog-like creature with yellow eyes had shot upward, apparently out from the thought cloud.

It had the cute, fluffy ears and tail of a cocker spaniel but the adorable, curly, woolly fur of a poodle.

It also had the beak and wings of a rooster?

“Cockerpoodledoo!” it crowed again.

Posey cheered delightedly. “Oh, Discord, you got it. And so adorable too!”

“Of course, my dear,” said the creature in a much deeper voice than befitted such levels of cute, “I always enjoy your jokes.”

“That’s Discord?” Butterfly chirped, watching the creature bob around and scratch at the ground with his taloned front legs, scratch behind his ears with his hind paws, and peck some left over chicken feed with his beak. After that he chased a frisbee that just appeared in a flash. Upon catching it in his beak it became a bone, which he promptly buried near the thinking tree.

Discord was wonderful!

As Discord’s antics continued, Butterfly giggled and began trotting toward her twin, but a bright flash brought her attention back.

Discord wasn’t a … ‘cockerpoodledoo’ anymore.

He was much taller for starters.

Gone was the fluffy and fuzzy creature and in its place was a being with a long snake-like body that Butterfly had to crane her neck up high to fully take in. An oddly bent goat hind leg; a dragon hind leg, a scaly, red tail with a tuft of white hair at the end; a thin, brown body; a blue pegasus wing; a dark bat wing, a lion’s foreleg; an eagle’s claw; a curved gray head with a horse-like black mane, white goatee, white eyebrows, pony ears; and finally two very mismatched horns. The eyes didn’t change in color but they were large and egg-shaped.

Oh.

O…kay? So, a snail delivering mail via drag race into a thinking tree’s thought clouds wasn’t the strangest thing she’d ever see in her life.

“Fluttershy!” the apparently real form of Discord cheered, twirling his tail’s tuft of fur like a helicopter to float over toward Posey—without using his wings. “It’s been too long.”

“It’s only been four days,” Posey answered.

“Much, much too long in my book. See?”

Discord held out a book that suddenly existed, with four days of a calendar sticking out of it like a bookmark. He was right, those four days were several times taller than the book. Taller than Discord even. The book promptly stopped existing a moment after Posey giggled at the gag.

“How have you been, my dear and what’s been going on lately?” A portable fan appeared, hovering in the air beside Discord and blew hard enough for Discord’s mane, goatee, eyebrows, ears, and even horns to flap wildly in the breeze it generated. As his feet began to slide he reached out and grabbed a streetlamp—also something that just happened to appear—to keep from being completely blown away. “I caught wind of some chaos happening in town not too long ago!” he yelled over the gust.

“I’ve been doing wonderfully,” Posey answered calmly, taking the whole thing in stride. “I’m surprised you didn’t come to town if you knew you’d find chaos here.”

The fan and streetlamp vanished and Discord suddenly stood … normally(?) in front of Posey. “Well I knew you were in Canterlot and I didn’t want to impose. It’s not like I was called over. Well, except by the Flower Trio, but you know how they are. A simple caterpillar family in their flower cart and they think the sky is falling!”

“Discord.” Posey adopted a slight scolding tone and her smile drooped. “They all had cat faces.”

“But they were caterpillars!”

“And they were falling from the sky.”

“They fell off their pillars.”

“What about their top hats?”

He shrugged nonchalantly. “I had just visited Rarity and was feeling fancy.”

Posey’s smile grew again and she laughed but cut herself off quickly. “Well…,” she paused to clear the laugh out of her throat. “For starters, Ponyville has some guests. One in particular I’d like to introduce you to.”

Following the hoof she pointed with, Discord turned to see Butterfly’s tilted head blinking at him. “This is Butterfly,” Posey finished.

Realizing she was now being looked at, Butterfly snapped to attention with a squeak. She grimaced and her eyes flicked a few times.

“Ah yes,” said Discord, “I was wondering about the imitator.”

“Imitator?” asked Posey. “I thought you just hadn’t noticed her. How did you know which one of us was, well, me?”

Discord scoffed. “As if I couldn’t recognize a simple transmogrification spell.” He leaned down toward Butterfly, or at least his top half did. Or … was he growing longer? While Discord’s legs and lower half remained in place, Butterfly saw his neck elongating and bending, growing lower to match her eye height for a closer inspection. “Let’s see here. Clearly not a changeling. I always get a faint cheese scent from their magic, unless the reformed changelings found a way to hide that. Is that you, Thorax?”

Butterfly blinked and looked from Discord to Posey and back. “Um—.”

“No, no, of course not,” Discord answered for her. “Even Thorax would try to sell the role, any changeling would, but you’ve just been standing there this whole time staring blankly and grimacing instead of smiling shyly like the real Fluttershy would. No, no, I was right before, you’re not a changeling. You’re not a golem or ponmunculus either. This is a direct spell with no clay or alchemy involved. A more standard come-to-life spell, perhaps? You’re not a doll are you?”

Again, Butterfly took a moment to ponder the question before opening her mouth. “I, uh—“

“No,” Discord said as he peered closer with a sudden magnifying glass in his paw, getting Butterfly to lean back, “thread-count’s much too low, and you're not plastic.” Posey came up close to Butterfly and smiled reassuringly, getting a weak smile in return right before Discord returned to his earlier, shorter-necked posture. “Ah ha! Once of ol’ Starswirl’s second-generation omnimorphic spells! I knew it looked familiar. The modern version just doesn’t have the same flare.”

Posey put a hoof to her chin in thought. “Oh, a Starswirl spell does make sense actually.”

“Yes,” Discord continued, “but now let’s see what this ‘Butterfly’ really looks like.”

He snapped his talons.

And everything was suddenly shorter.

“Oh my!” Posey called up to Butterfly. “Is this what you normally look like?”

Butterfly blinked, her vision a bit dazed, bringing back memories of Twi’s teleportation spell. When her vision cleared, she saw a new person had come to stand in between Discord and Posey. A biped creature with a vaguely cow-shaped head. It was much like the minotaur they had seen selling cardboard wings in Canterlot except this one had yellow fur and pink hair. It was also female and very well endowed. She was also naked and a mirror.

Wait, what?

Butterfly looked down, flushed a pink almost matching her hair, and wondered if she should be screaming.

She had just filled her lungs with her decision when Discord interrupted. “No, I believe that’s only half right.”

He snapped the fingers of his lion paw and the world grew taller again. Though not as tall as before.

After her vision had cleared once more, she saw the minotaur in the mirror had become her much more familiar, non-pony self.

She was quite relieved to see she was also fully clothed. She looked down and checked herself over. Everything seemed right, she even had her phone and pet treats in her skirt pockets.

“There,” the proud victory bow was clear in Discord’s voice, “completely dispelled.”

As the sudden relief washed over her, Butterfly’s knees gave out and she knelt on the soft grass.

“Are you okay, Butterfly?” Posey asked, coming up to her no longer identical twin’s side and putting a hoof on her shoulder.

“Yeah,” Butterfly breathed and idly patted Posey’s mane. “Just surprised, and this is what I normally look like.”

“Oh you’re a human … in Equestria,” Discord noted. “Not original, not by a long shot, but if the bandwagon’s been rolling this strong for eleven years, why not jump on?”

“Human?” asked Butterfly. “I’ve never heard of that. We call ourselves humanes.”

“Humanes?” Discord scratched his goatee. “Now that you mention it…,“ he looked over to the painting he was working on of a similar being but with peach-colored skin and blonde hair. “Humans don’t typically come in such bright colors, nor with such large eyes. I don’t suppose you’ve dyed yourself? Gotten some surgery?”

Butterfly looked herself over again, noting her skin and hair. “No, these are my natural colors.”

The painting was gone in a poof and Discord looked her over again while wearing glasses and wielding a spot-lamp. “Well, then. That’s a new one for me.”

Leaning back and becoming shyer by the second in Discord’s lamp and inspection, Posey decided to jump in. “Oh, my. I’m sorry, I’m being rude.” She pointed from one guest to the other then back. “Butterfly, this is Discord. Discord, Butterfly.”

“A pleasure,” Discord smiled, the glasses and lamp leaving existence. “Any friend of Fluttershy’s is a creature I intend to scrutinize heavily to determine their worthiness of her friendship.”

“Discord!” Posey chided him.

“I’m only being honest.” He grew a blonde ponytail and a southern accent. “Applejack says it’s a mite important. And she does it so often Ah reckon Ah can ignore it only so much.”

“Well,” Posey considered that, “It is important, and I am glad you look out for me, but I know how to take care of myself.” When it looked like Discord had a comment on that, Posey was quick to continue. “And it’s particularly unnecessary here because Butterfly is actually another me from another world.”

Discord’s eyes brightened and he took off his ponytail. It grew four legs and galloped away. “Ah! Another dimension’s Fluttershy! I had wondered. Don’t think I hadn’t noticed the resemblance. I take it ‘Butterfly’ is a nickname to avoid confusion?”

The two Fluttershys nodded. “I’ve been going by Posey since we met,” Posey clarified.

“But it would have been so wonderfully chaotic if you kept with Fluttershy for the both of you.”

Posey giggled, “It was. Sorry, Discord, but it was getting confusing with all the others.”

“Others?! More Fluttershys others?”

“Actually, all of us have a twin now. Rainbow, Rarity, Pinkie, Applejack, and Twilight.”

Discord recoiled with a shocked expression. “There’s two of Twilight now?” His face slowly turned from surprise to devilish grin. He reached up to stroke his beard, and his voice gained a deeper tone. “Interesting.”

“Twilight’s twin has already gone home.”

“Oh poo,” Discord mumbled, his smirk dropping to a frown as he tossed a book titled Pranks for the Purple Princess over his shoulder. It flew into Posey’s cottage and out a window. “So many wonderful ideas I just came up with out the window.”

After a sigh, he addressed the two-legged Fluttershy, “So how did you all come by our humble world?”

Butterfly, having been content to let Posey do all the talking, squeaked when it was clear it was her turn. “Oh, um, well—“ Posey reassured her with a wing hugged around her back and she continued with a more confident tone. “In our world, there’s this statue and walking through the base leads to a mirror in Twi’s palace.”

“Really?” A pointy, blue hat decorated with moons, stars, and jingly bells appeared on each of the Fluttershys’ heads.

Butterfly startled back and ducked while putting her hands up to feel what had just landed on her, but a quick glance at Posey just calmly reaching up and adjusting the hat to a better angle got her to settle down.

“Would that be a Starswirl mirror?” Discord asked.

The Fluttershys nodded, jingling their bells, ““Mm-hum.””

“You wouldn’t happen to know which one?”

The Fluttershys shook their heads, jangling their bells, ““Un-uh.””

“And it’s in Twilight’s palace?”

““Mm-hum,”” they jingled again.

“Well then, Butterfly,” Discord cheered, “being from a different dimension means we need to be properly introduced.”

The Fluttershys looked at each other. ““We just did that.””

Discord just laughed. “Oh, no, no, no. You just got to know my name, not my full character. So allow me to really introduce myself.”

He backed up a step and took a dramatic bow. “I am Discord, Ace of Absurd Antics—”

He snapped his fingers.

Suddenly there were fifty-four of him around the garden each sporting one of four different suits and many headdresses with varying numbers and crowns. Two jokers attempted to perform a stand-up comedy routine for the benefit of Posey’s animals. Some were playing poker with dogs. The rest were trying to pick each other up.

The original Discord flashed and he was wearing a gray business suit with a green undershirt, sporting a very thick, wide, black mustache and holding a small Equestrian flag on a stick.

“Baron of Bizarre Buffoonery.”

Another flash and they were all aboard a tiny red tugboat and riding waves of seltzer water. The door to the wheelhouse opened and several Discords squeezed out dressed as clowns.

“Captain of Clowning Around.”

The seltzer began to swirl rapidly, the water level dropping fast. A few of the clown Discords tied balloon animals around the Fluttershys causing them to float safely as the Seltzer and tugboat, Discords and all, circled around further and further below them.

A wide-eyed Butterfly turned to Posey, as well as she could while dangling from the balloon animals' strings, with a thousand questions in her eyes.

Posey flew over to her and gave her a hug with a foreleg as they descended. "Discord?" she called to the sinking ship. "Would you mind toning it down a little, please? She's new after all."

Once the seltzer, and all the flotsam, finished draining into a hole in the ground, a Discord in a janitor's uniform appeared with a plunger. Two plunges over the hole and the original Discord came out with his horns stuck in the plunger. He looked around as the balloon animals placed the Fluttershys safely on the freshly carbonated ground and popped out of existence. "But, it's not that much is it?" he asked the janitor.

The janitor simply shrugged and pulled his plunger off original Discord's horns. He turned to leave but was interrupted when a straight flush of card Discords stole the plunger and used it to force themselves down the hole to escape several angry dogs in various poker hats chasing them.

The dogs barked down the hole at their escaped game.

The janitor just retrieved his plunger and poofed away while original Discord rolled his eyes and reached down to pick up the hole and slip it into a pocket he didn't have before. "I told the deck not to cheat. It's not like I stacked them. I know it's always ruff cheating dogs, they're so into that pug life that I now fear those cards will be hounded furever."

From another pocket he produced some doggy treats and fed them to the dogs. They ate the treats and trotted away. "I stand corrected. They just rolled over. The right kibble makes anything pawsible."

"Oh, Discord," Posey laughed. " 'Pawsible'. Hehe."

"Are you quite sure I need to cut my introduction short?"

Posey worked to stifle her giggles. "Well, that's up to Butterfly."

They looked over to see Butterfly standing timidly and looking around at the leftovers of DIscord's introduction. A large anchor left behind from the sunken tugboat, the jokers getting booed off stage for their bad jokes, her shoes dislodging bubbles when they passed over the wet grass, which then floated into the air emitting random sounds as they popped.

Splat

Boink

Honk

Meow

"Butterfly?" Posey eased. "How are you holding up?"

Butterfly returned a weak smile and followed it with a thumbs up.

"I don't know what that means," answered Posey.

"I do!" cheered Discord. "It means she's good for my grand finale!"


*** *** ***

*** *** ***


Some miles away, Princess Celestia rushed out onto her balcony, drawn there by a loud clatter and explosions of psychedelic lights throughout the sky. From within the castle walls it was impossible to tell where the commotion had originated, but she looked to the south immediately.

It's always Ponyville, she thought to herself.

With a flash, Princess Luna appeared behind her and stumbled around until she thought to swipe the eyemask off her face with a hoof. "Sister! What is happening?!" she cried.

Up, in the sky, the clouds had parted and blaring trumpets, along with a multitude of banners being held aloft by winged vegetables, descended over the edge of the Everfree Forest. The banners all proudly displayed the name DISCORD, each in a different font and in cycling colors.

In smaller writing, each banner had one of many titles written on them:

Lord of the Ludicrous!
Monarch of Lost Marbles!
High-score holder of the downtown Hokey-Pokey contest!
Grand Poobah of Goofing Off!

And so on.

Celestia put a hoof to her face.

Luna leveled her brows and lit her horn, replacing the mask over her eyes. "I'm going back to bed."


*** *** ***

*** *** ***


Discord snapped his fingers and all was as it was before. No more Discord clones, no more seltzer-wet grass, no sky banners and trumpets. And, as the weather team would appreciate, even the clouds had been returned to their original positions.

Butterfly, having at some point fallen on her rump, stared on with her jaw hanging.

“In all,” Discord continued, “I am Discord, the humble Spirit of Chaos, for short.”

“Discord,” Posey got out while trying to stifle her giggles, “I bet the whole town saw that.”

“Oh?” he asked in a light tone. “When do you think the reviews will be in?”

Posey was too busy giggling to answer so Discord turned to Butterfly. “What about you, Butterfly? Ten out of ten?”

Butterfly just sat there, eyes wide and flicking, hands raised in front of her, unmoving. “Yoohoo, Butterfly,” Discord tried again while passing a paw back and forth before her face. “Foreign Fluttershy, hello?”

Posey looked over, her face turning to concern. “Butterfly?”

Discord snapped his fingers and his paw turned into an alarm clock. It ticked a few times before the 12 opened up to reveal a tiny rooster. It cleared its throat and crowed, “Hay, wake up!”

Butterfly’s eyes focused on the tiny rooster and her hands slowly came together into a weak clap. Then again and again with more force until she was giving him a polite standing ovation. “That was the most amazing thing I’ve ever seen, Discord!”

Posey relaxed with a sigh and joined in by stomping her forehooves on the ground. “Woo hoo.”

With a big smile, Discord nonchalantly polished his talons on a belt sander. “It’s good to know my talents can be appreciated by some ponies, and other creatures.”

Their applauding concluded, the Fluttershys stood together, still giggling softly. Butterfly put an arm around Posey and pulled her into a hug. Posey smiled and leaned in, but the angle caused Butterfly to squeak when Posey’s pony ear tickled her cheek. She pulled back and smiled upon noticing what tickled her.

“You know,” she said, “with all the adorable ponies around everywhere, there’s something that I’ve been dying to do ever since we all got here, but I just couldn’t.”

Posey looked at her. “What’s that?” Her ear twitched from being brushed against earlier.

Butterfly’s eyes zeroed in on the ear and then dropped to her hands. “Well, i-if you don’t mind,” she said as Discord watched on, pleasantly surprised to be confused.

“Of course not,” answered Posey. “We’re all friends here.”

“In that case ….” Butterfly bit her lip, knelt down, and brought her slightly curled fingers up to rest just behind Posey’s ears—that spot she knew cats loved so much—and started scritching.

“Oh. Ooh, that feels good,” Posey sighed. As Butterfly continued scritching and petting, Posey closed her eyes and leaned into the touch. “It really is nice being the pet.”

Butterfly cooed softly when Posey rested her head against her chest, completely missing the green color flushing through Discord. She got bolder and passed a hand down Posey’s back while still scritching an ear.

rrrrrrrrr

“Aww,” Butterfly whispered. “Equestrian ponies have such a cute purr. Equines in my world can’t do that.”

“Give me that,” gruffed Discord, plucking Posey away from Butterfly and holding her in his arms. “Get your own Fluttershy.”

“Um, but I—?” Butterfly blinked at him.

Ignoring her, Discord continued softly scritching and petting Posey in the same places Butterfly had. The green in him was replaced by a rosy red when Posey nuzzled against him.

“I, um,” Discord sputtered at the action and took his claw away.

Posey opened her eyes and looked up. Her eyes widened slightly for a moment before closing again. “It’s okay, Discord. That feels really good.”

Discord froze solid, though Posey didn’t seem to notice any temperature drop accompanying his new icy texture.

Butterfly watched on, noticing the two of them turning more and more red, despite the ice in Discord’s case. After a few seconds, she gasped, recalling the tamer books her Rarity had loaned her in the past and smiled, clasping her hands together in excitement.

Discord noticed the expression and the ice instantly broke away. “Dinner!” he called out and a dining table and three chairs suddenly appeared, one growing up right under Butterfly, putting her into a seating position on it. Discord quickly, yet gently, placed Posey on another chair and teleported onto the third. “T-that is why I’m here after all! I brought dinner!”

With a snap of his fingers an assortment of glowing napkins flew in, dancing and folding themselves into various shapes to the tune sung by a row of singing teabags.

“Oh! Y-you brought the ginseng,” said a red-faced Posey after clearing her throat.

Various tableware, utensils, pottery, covered trays, dancing candles, and other ornaments either popped into existence or flew in from parts unknown to reside on their table.

Three of the ginseng bags dropped themselves off in teacups by the three diners while the rest circled around the table for ambiance.

Butterfly noticed Discord and Posey avoiding looking at each other through their blushes. She tapped the teabag in her cup to get its attention then pointed at the other diners. It followed her finger, gasped happily, and rallied together with the other teabags, taking up strategic, serenading positions around Posey and Discord.

The blushes grew, but it wasn’t until the ginseng choir floated into the shape of a heart that Discord quickly snapped his fingers and replaced the ginseng with green tea instead.

Silence.

Posey retreated behind her mane. Discord inspected the butter tray … from inside it. Even the candles had stopped their dancing.

The pepper grinder sneezed.

“Bless you,” Butterfly returned. The grinder bowed in thanks and silence returned.

With the adventure seemingly over, and romance a non-starter, a slight, disappointed frown formed on Butterfly’s face with a sigh. Posey looked over, noting the expression and braved a glance at the tiny Discord who had just finished appraising the butter tray’s flavor. “Um …, Discord?”

“Yes?” Discord politely asked, the yellow of the butter tray around him failing to hide the blush.

Posey nodded toward Butterfly. “Could we make dinner a little more fun?”

He turned and saw the now hopeful smile on Butterfly’s face. “I think something could be arranged.”

With a snap of his fingers, he was full-sized and in his seat again and the whole dinette set was floating upside down over Posey’s garden.

Butterfly looked all around, seeing the table, chairs, dessert cart, and various other pieces more or less keeping together then watched Discord pour Posey a cup of tea with the liquid flowing up into the cup.

She looked at Posey, got a smile in return, and they gave a little cheer.

““Yay.””


*** *** ***

*** *** ***


“—oooooowwaaaaaa—oof!”

“Fluttershy!” cheered Pinkie, rushing over to pick up her dizzy friend from the stack of yoga mats she landed on.

Butterfly’s eyes were still spinning when Pinkie pulled her into a slightly more gentle than rib-crushing hug. “Shindy?” she croaked out.

“It’s Pinkie Pie now! We’re back home! We even have hands again!” Pinkie let go and Fluttershy stumbled back a step until her hands were grabbed and shook by Pinkie’s. “See? So much easier to bake with! Though I was getting the hang of hooves at the end there.”

Fluttershy smiled. “I know what you mean, but I’ve actually had hands for the past few days.”

“In Equestria? Really? How?”

“Discord turned me back into a humane when I met him.”

“Oh wow! Did you get to pet any ponies? Scritch any ears?  Braid any tails?”

“Oh, I did,” Fluttershy laughed. “They’re so cute I couldn’t help it.”

“Eeeeeeeeee! I know, I know,” Pinkie hopped in place.

Fluttershy turned around and sighed, giving the base of the Wondercolt statue a little wave. “Bye Posey. Bye Discord.”

“Aww. I know how you feel. I hope to see them all again soon, though I think I’d like it better if they came here next time.” Pinkie scratched her head. “Brain still itches sometimes.”

Pinkie then picked up the yoga mats and turned toward Canterlot High. “Come on! The others are all inside for your ‘Welcome Home’ party! Calling them ‘Just Because’ parties got boring. I wanted longer titles, but everyone said it was ‘Tee-Em-Eye’ so we compromised.”

With a giggle, Fluttershy followed Pinkie to the school, holding her new correspondence journal. She thought to herself that there would be plenty of adventures—she gave Pinkie a glance—and chaos, no matter which world she was on.


*** *** ***


Watching the girls enter the school from a short distance away was a tall man. Black hair, white goatee, white eyebrows, yellow eyes with red pupils, and gray skin showing anywhere his mismatched shoes and business suit of a different color for every limb did not cover.

“This is the world Starswirl sent the sirens to? That old fool got the wrong dimension entirely!" The man grumbled. "No wonder there’s been so much trouble. Humanes indeed. Jean-Luc would never have made such a mistake.”

He tossed a yellow ping-pong ball in a bush near the school and began walking toward the Wondercolt statue. “I’ll have to keep an eye on this place,” he said as the ball blinked, revealing a red pupil. "Hopefully it was just the sirens and not all the rest."

He vanished before entering the portal.




|




Here's an alternate/extended version of Discord's self-introduction scene

> "Green Hooves, Brown Thumbs?" A.K.A. "Not Quite Newton"
> --------------------------------------------------------------------------

“Feel anything yet?”

Taking another slow, deep breath, eyes already closed, Wallflower extended her arms out more and put her cheek against the hard bark. She could feel the rough texture on her cheek and hands, the calm breeze through her hair and skin, but nothing else. “No.”

With a sigh, she pulled back from her hug around the tree and faced Applejack. “I think the magic’s gone.”

“That’s a shame,” Applejack replied. “Ah saw what you was able to do back in Equestria. Flowers in hours. Even Ponyjack and the others were amazed. I’m guessing that’s not a common thing there either.”

Wallflower smiled wistfully. “It was amazing, like I was completely connected to nature. I hope I can go back there again someday. Maybe even find my pony counterpart. And hopefully not freak her out in the process. I wonder what she's like”

“Hopefully we’ll find out after those thirty months are up, Ah guess.”

“And I’ll just have to go back to gardening the old-fashioned way till then.” Wallflower’s smile grew at that. “The Gardening Club’s gotten bigger lately and we’re starting a beautification project with the town. We’ll be planting all along Main street!”

“Well that’s just swell. Ah wish Ah had the time to chip in, but it’s a busy season for the farm.”

“That’s okay, Sunset will be there once she gets back from Equestria, and I’m making friends with the other club members. Pinkie helped out earlier. She made rows of sprinkles pop to aerate the soil and to get seeds in easier.”

“Heh, good to find productive uses of her candy-exploding geode.”

Applejack blinked and put a hand on her own geode. “Huh. That kinda gives me an idea.” Wallflower turned to her as she took off the geode and gave Wallflower a considering look.

Wallflower tilted her head and watched, first the geode and then Applejack’s expression. Her eyes went wide. “Whoa, whoa, wait. You’re not suggesting I try using it? Isn’t that bad? That’s your magic. I remember what they did to Gloriosa Daisy.”

“You were there?”

“I was there.” Wallflower blushed.

“Memory stone?”

“Memory stone,” Wallflower cringed.

Applejack gave her a pat on the back. “It's all in the past … whatever it was in this case.”

“Thanks. But It’ll be the present too if that turns me into a—“ Wallflower quickly ducked and looked around. Spotting no one other than Big McIntosh at a great distance she leaned in and whispered, “she-demon.”

“Ah’m sure it’ll be fine if you just borrow a little, with permission. Tell ya what.”—Applejack held out her arm, palm up with the geode sitting in the center.—“We’ll both hold it while you try to use it. See what happens.”

“Shouldn’t we wait for Sunset or Twilight? Or Sunset and Twilight?”

“Ah believe it took Gloriosa weeks and all of the geodes to fall off her rocker. We should be fine.”

“Well, if you’re sure.”

Slowly, Wallflower raised her left hand above Applejack’s right and more slowly lowered it down to the palm holding the geode. She let out a slight squeak and paused once she made contact, but they managed to clasp their hands together with the geode in between.

She cracked an eye open, only just realizing she had shut them, and took a breath when a glance over her shoulder revealed a lack of wings, glowing hair, sudden thigh-high stockings and embarrassingly short skirt, and any other telltale she-demon signs.

Relieved, Wallflower put her free hand and forehead back on the tree, Applejack moved to stay beside her, watching in silence. Wallflower’s breathing slowed, shoulders dropping into a more relaxed pose.

Eventually, Applejack felt her geode hum slightly as soft light came from within their clasped hands and Wallflower gasped.

“I feel it! You named her ‘Ginni’!”

“Granny named her,” Applejack laughed. “She’s a Ginger Gold.”

“Applejack, I can feel all the trees around us. Not for very far, but, wow! It’s working!” Wallflower giggled and hugged Ginni with her free arm and Applejack copied her with her left. “Oh. It’s been a while since Ginni’s bloomed, huh?”

“Yeah, was already an old’n when Granny was a young’n. You think you can do anything?”

“I can try.”

Wallflower pressed tightly into Ginni and went still. After a moment Applejack could feel her geode buzzing slightly and glowing brighter. Slowly, Applejack began to feel the nature around her as she did in Equestria. Muted, and somewhat muddled in comparison, but it was there. She looked up as Ginni began to glow more brightly in her mind’s eye and she saw leaves grow and a few buds start to form.

“Ginni’s blooming, Wallflower! You’re doing it!”

Most of the blooms failed to change, one even withered, but a few actually grew, maturing into full apples right before her eyes.

Still marveling at the sudden ripe fruit on what was one of her oldest trees, Applejack heard and felt a thud beside her as Wallflower’s hand slipped out of hers. Turning, she saw Wallflower on the ground, eyes practically spinning as she let out a slight moan.

“Whoa, Nelly. You okay?” Applejack asked, dropping to kneel beside her.

“Um, yeah. Just got a little dizzy. It worked?”

“You bet. Looks like five apples ready to pick in not even a minute.”

Wallflower meekly put a fist in the air. “Y-yay.” She managed a bright smile though when she looked up and saw the freshly fruited branch. “Should we try them out?” She began to try and stand.

Applejack laughed, reaching out to help Wallflower up. “You didn’t get Sunset’s power too did ya? ‘Cause that’s what Ah was thinking.”

Now back on her feet and quickly recovering, Wallflower looked around. “Where do you keep your ladders?”

“We—“ Applejack stopped and looked at the geode in her hand, then to the new apples on Ginni. “Ladders?” she asked, putting her geode back around her neck. “In Equestria, they don’t need … ladders.”

Turning back to Ginni, she pressed her palm to her geode, lighting it up and gave Ginni a love-tap of a punch.

Ginni shook, rustling her leaves.

Geode still glowing, Applejack tried again but a little harder.

Ginni dropped a few leaves and the withered bloom onto them.

“Almost there,” Applejack announced, turning around and dropping to all fours. “Just have to do this the pony way.”

Applejack planted her hands into the ground and kicked out with both booted feet.

There was a loud crack as Ginni tilted. Worried something might have gone wrong, Applejack turned and looked up just in time to catch four of the five apples.

The girls cheered and Applejack passed two of the apples to Wallflower.

They both took a bite and savored their juicy, ripe, magic-rich apples. So full of flavor they seemed to sparkle on their taste buds.

And then Ginni fell over with a deafening crash.

They stared a moment, Applejack inches away from having taken another bite.

“You killed Ginni!” Wallflower cried.

Applejack solemnly walked up to Ginni, took off her hat, and put a hand on her trunk. “Sorry, old girl. May you rest in peace.”

Wallflower copied her as best she could without a hat.

“Well,” Applejack said after a moment of silence, and a blush, “Rarity could use another closet.”
> All My Darlings
> --------------------------------------------------------------------------

“Well I do believe you’ve outdone yourself again, Rarity,” cheered Rarity.

“And I believe you’ve outdone yourself as well, Rarity,” answered Rarity.

The two Raritys turned from their latest joint creation and giggled at each other. ““Oh, that will never get old!””

A nearby poneighquin proudly displayed an elaborate gown, as did many other poneighquins in the room and the Raritys themselves. Strewn about the floor and over various pieces of furniture were scraps of leftover fabric, spools of thread, sparkling gems, design sketches, and even a few dangerous-looking pincushions with multitudes of pins and needles stuck within them at haphazard angles.

It was a whirlwind of inspiration.

And a maid’s nightmare.

“Ooh, whose turn is it?” squealed Renae.

“It’s yours, darling,” Share answered, smoothing out her own dress. “The pinafore was our latest.”

Renae’s squeal turned giddy and she rushed up to stand between the poneighquin and a full-length mirror. She tapped her hooves excitedly on the floor as Share’s horn lit, her aura covering Renae’s outfit. The alien visitor expertly reared back to a bipedal stance, finding it much less difficult to keep her balance on her pony hips than before, and slipped her forehooves out of the sleeves of her current dress as it was raised from her.

With the front removed and placed on one of the few remaining naked poneighquins, she dropped to all fours again before lifting first one hind leg and the other to doff the stockings. The process repeated in reverse for the new gown. The two Rarities then worked together, fine-tuning every minute detail of the wear and balance of the gown and accessories on Renae’s pony person.

“Oh, I love it, darling,” Renae cried, smoothing back her mane in the mirror. She then turned around a few times to see the gown from multiple angles as Share orbited around her in the other direction to do the same.

“This is so much fun!” Share giggled before stopping suddenly. “Oh, wait, wait!” she called urgently, getting Renae to stop spinning and hold still. Share’s aura lit up a gem-encrusted bow at the base of Renae’s tail and straightened it out. She stepped back and caught Renae’s eyes. “It was lopsided.”

“Can’t have that,” Renae concurred.

“Might never have noticed wearing it myself.”

“If only all mirrors were three dimensional!”

“And all models so knowledgeable about their own dresses.”

“Yes, yes!” Renae agreed, but then sighed. “I just wish you could come visit us sometime too.”

“I know!” Share nodded. “I would love to see your world. All your fashions. All your trends. Make humane dresses with you.”

“And then help me get Rainbow Dash dressed properly in one before a dance.”

“I would gladly hold her down for you!”

They shared a laugh and hugged each other, carefully, so as to not wrinkle their creations.

“And Applejack,” Renae added. “Even without her geode it would take both of us to hold her down.” Her laugh cut short when she felt a blush creep onto her cheeks. “Speaking of dances,” she covered, breaking from the hug, “it’s too bad there’s no events scheduled for today. I would so love to go to a pony gala … although I’m afraid in this body, I'd have two left hooves."  She blinked and corrected herself, "Three, that is. At the least. We’re all dressed up with no place to show off.”

The blush hadn’t quite escaped Share’s notice, but she let it go. “Yes, sadly. Though it wouldn’t be the first time. We do have the events in Canterlot tomorrow but they have, also sadly, been trimmed down in scope following the postponement. We had so much pomp and circumstance planned.”

“The best kinds of circumstance always come with pomp.”

“Oh, of course.” Share paused to think. “It is a nice day out. We could have tea in the yard.”

“While advertising the new styles!”

“Exactly! I like the way you think!”

“Great minds, darling, great minds.”

Share smiled and began walking toward the kitchen. “What kind of tea would you like? Chamomile?” she asked, actively ignoring the inspiration room’s “organized chaos.”

Following behind her, and gleefully using her magic to tidy a few things on her way out for her host, Renae replied, “I was thinking fresh oat.”

“Really?” Share gave her a surprised look.

“Sunset mentioned that the teas I’ve prepared for her in my world, fresh oat in particular, just aren’t the same as what she’s been accustomed to growing up and she seemed quite disappointed. It got me curious; is the tea all that different or does our palate change going through the portal? The latter, I suspect, considering you eat flowers here. She once told me that smelling some kinds of flowers still makes her hungry.”

“Well, if it’s the tea, you should of course take some of mine home.”

“Wonderfully generous of you, dear, but I couldn’t.”

“I insist, darling.”

“Are you quite sure?”

“Absolutely!” Now in the kitchen, Share wasted no time in opening her cupboards and taking out all her tea-making supplies. “I mustn't have my newest friend and, in fact, dimensional twin go without quality tea. Our guests deserve the best we can offer them.”

“In that case, I would love to have a few samples.”

With the matter firmly decided, Share collected a few packets of various teas, even from her top shelf. “We shall make some fashionable saddlebags for you to take all these home in before it’s your turn to go. As well as your copy of our journal and as many outfits as we can fit of course!”

“That would be lovely,” Renae thanked her before musing. “I wonder if the outfits will change, and if the saddlebags will turn into a backpack or handbag on the other side. Twi was wearing a purple backpack when we first met her. I doubt that’s what she was wearing when she entered the portal.”

Filling a kettle with water, Share giggled. “I’m not quite sure what either of those are, but I’m sure we’ll make them stunning!”

Share then placed the kettle on a surprisingly modern-looking stove and flipped a switch. “I’ll set up the tea garden while it heats.”

“I’ll help,” offered Renae.

“Oh, it’s no bother, darling.” Share smiled back while opening a closet and a window with her aura. She hummed a slight tune as a glass table, two stools with velvet cushions, and a picnic basket floated out the window and were set up in the shade of a large tree near the building. “All done.”

Renae looked up to her own horn. “If only I could take the horn back with me too. It’s even more useful than my diamond shields.”

“Oh, I know. ‘Thanks’ to Discord, and a few other misadventures, I’ve been deprived of my horn on multiple occasions. I do know how to sew with just hooves, but it’s so much more time consuming. I don’t know how Miss Pommel does it.”

“Miss Pommel?”

“Coco Pommel. Miss Pommel is the professional name she uses for her fashion line. You don’t know her?”

Renae shook her head.

“That’s too bad, though she does live in Manehattan in my world. Perhaps you’ve just yet to cross paths in yours. And when you do, don’t let her slip away! She and Sassy Saddles are simply the best employees and great friends. They run my Manehattan and Canterlot boutiques respectively. Word of warning though, Sassy and I had a rough start together.”

“I met Sassy.” Renae blushed, recalling the memory. “She seemed nice.”

“Yes,” Share nodded, “once she learned that money and success aren’t everything. Also, you may have to save poor Coco from that thieving, Suri Polomare.” Share’s pleasant tone had darkened dangerously.

Renae tilted her head. “I believe there’s a Suri something at Crystal Prep, perhaps Coco is there as well.”

“Do try to find out, darling,” Share said, her tone lightening again. “You’ll have made a wonderful friend and co-designer.” She paused and her features darkened once more. “But don’t share anything with Suri! She’ll act like a friend until the very moment you turn your back!”

Renae blinked and took a small step away from her counterpart’s outburst. “I’ll keep that in mind. Perhaps Sunny Flare might know of them, or about any sewing clubs they might be in.”

Share smiled sweetly, her anger quickly forgotten with the acceptance of her warning. “I’m not sure who that is, but, while we’re on the topic of friends, that day you showed up in Canterlot had Sassy quite confused.”

“Oh dear. Would you please extend my apology?”

“Of course, and I already set her straight while you were all watching over Sunset, so she’s fine. Explained the whole situation.” Share paused. “Which actually made her more confused at first, but I believe there’s a full understanding now.”

“That is a relief. Please do still apologize for me though, darling.”

“The very next time I see her,” Share affirmed with a nod and a smile. “Actually, perhaps you could come with us.”

“To Canterlot? Again?”

“Think of it! The Twilights said they don’t want more than two of you otherworldly visitors going home each day. That means some of you will remain in Equestria at least a little while. Why not come to Canterlot with me so we can spend more time together? Otherwise you’ll just be here alone for the rest of your ‘ponycation’.”

“I can spend time with your Sweetie Belle. She seemed to like the idea.”

“She has schoolwork to take care of for the next few days. In Canterlot, you can apologize to Sassy yourself and I can show you around the palace if we have time.”

“The palace?!” Renae’s eyes lit up.

“The full tour. Not just that conference room. I’ll even show you the galleries. All the jewels, paintings, gems, statues, crowns, historic dresses. Wonders for inspiration.”

“Darling, I believe you have sold me on the idea.”

“Splendid!”

“But that brings to mind a question.”

“Yes?”

“Crowns?”

“Yes, Equestria is a diarchy. Or maybe a triarchy with Twilight now. Triumvirate maybe? And then there’s Cadance and Shining Armor …, but they are in the Crystal Empire.” Share tapped her chin. “Ask Twilight, she’ll know the correct terminology. She always does.”

“It’s about Twilight actually. You said crowns? Twilight has a crown?”

Share nodded. “She does.”

“But she doesn’t wear it?”

Share sighed. “She does not.”

“Whyever not? If I had a royal crown, I would never take it off. Why, I’d sleep in the thing!”

“I told her the same thing, darling. But she refuses! I’ve even heard that Celestia sleeps in hers but Twilight just won't believe it!”

“Just too humble, that one. She should embrace her princesshood!”

“Absolutely!” Share punctuated her agreement by stamping a hoof on a kitchen tile. After a sigh, she continued, “Ah well. She does at least wear it on formal occasions. Perhaps some day she'll wear it more regularly.”

“I would adore a chance to see her in her regalia.”

“She’ll be wearing it tomorrow while meeting with the ambassadors.”

“Oh, splendid!”

Share smiled. “And now that we have settled that,” her smile began to smirk as she continued, “what I really wanted to talk about was a theory Sassy had.”

“A theory?” Renae asked.

“Yes. About me, or rather you, and …,” Share halted for a moment as her smirk fully bloomed, “Applejack?”

Whiiiiiiieeee

“And the water is boiling,” Share announced, turning away from Renae’s blushing cheeks and walking, victoriously, toward the whistling kettle.

“A-ba-ba-I, uh,” Renae stuttered, “I haven’t the foggiest what you’re suggesting.”

“Oh come now.” Share shot back while levitating the kettle and adjusting the stove. “You must know you can’t hide it from me of all ponies.”

“Honestly, there’s nothing going on between Applejack and myself.” Renae could feel the blush heating her cheeks. “An-an, and Sassy thought I was you when she brought it up. What is going on between you and Applejack?”

While working with the kettle and herbs, Share simply looked back and her pristine white cheeks smiled. “Nothing,” she said with a giggle. “So, why are you blushing so brightly?”

“Really? Nothing?” Renae asked, embarrassment turning to surprise. “Are you certain?”

After replacing the kettle on the stove to steep and setting a timer, Share turned back and gave Renae a look of triumph. “Nothing at all. I believe Applejack was checking in on her refreshments table that day as much as she was on me. You were hoping for something else?”

Renae flinched back then slumped slightly after a pause. “Well ….”

“Yes, yes?” Share encouraged quickly trotting back to stand beside Renae, turning her ears forward with an eager expression.

“I suppose,” Renae began hesitantly, “I, I may have been?”

“Do tell, darling,” Share tittered, eyes and ears laser focused on Renae. “Everything!”

“I think I have grown closer to Applejack than the other girls in some ways. But we’re such opposites.”

“Always have been,” Share agreed.

“She has the farm, and she doesn’t know a thing about fashion.”

“Not one bit.”

“I have my career,” Renae insisted, “and I can’t stand being covered in mud.”

“Ughh, so many ruined outfits.”

“She has such a stubborn streak!”

“Almost like she has mule in her ancestry.”

“And we get into such fights sometimes.”

“All the time. In fact, one might say we bicker like an … ‘old married couple’?”

“ ‘Old m—’?” Renae’s ears drooped. “If our relationship is indeed heading in that direction, isn’t it a bad sign we’re bickering already?”

“But hasn’t your friendship always recovered after those fights?”

“Well … yes. Some fights it took longer than others, but we always recovered. The adversities sometimes even brought us closer together.”

“And despite your differences there are things you’ve greatly enjoyed doing together?”

“Oh, yes!” Renae gushed. “Our time together at Camp Everfree. Working together at Equestria Land—after the cursed cell phone incident was over. All that delightful glamping at the Starswirl Music Festival! We’ve even mused another trip, just the …,” she trailed off.

“Two of you?”

A blush was Renae’s only reply.

A delighted smile was Share’s.

“Perhaps there …” Renae paused. “Perhaps there has been something going on between us. The trip was even her idea.”

DING

With the timer having announced itself, Share brought Renae into another gentle hug. “Tea is ready, darling. Let’s relocate to the garden.”

Renae was lost in thought over the next few minutes while the pair got seated onto cushy stools with filled teacups at the ready.

“Oh my,” remarked Renae after her first sip of all-natural Equestrian tea, “this is quite different.”

“Is it?” asked Share.

“Well, not so much different as …” she took another sip, “whole? It’s hard to explain. It’s the same taste, but there’s more of it without being too strong. As if it’s only now that I can appreciate the full flavor.”

“I have plenty more teas you can sample before you go.”

“That would be wonderful, darling. And then I’ll try them again at home.” Renae took another sip, longer this time, and settled down.

“All relaxed now, dear?” Share asked.

Renae just smiled and nodded.

“Good. Now tell me more about you and Applejack.”

Renae choked on her tea.

“Oh, heavens,” Share exclaimed. “I hadn’t wanted that strong a reaction. Are you alright?”

“I’ll—“ Renae coughed. “I’ll be fine. This is just such a confusing topic. I never considered that Applejack might have an interest in me. Or that I might return those feelings. How is it in your world?”

“Applejack is one of my dearest friends, and we'll be the closest of friends forever, but I’ve never felt anything beyond friendship for her, and believe it’s the same in return,” answered Share. “I always thought she and Rainbow Dash could be an item some day, so long as they didn’t kill each other first with their competitiveness.”

“Yes! That’s what I thought. I always expected Applejack and Rainbow Dash to be the couple in our group. Them or Sunset and Twilight.”

“Oh?” Share’s eyes lit up with a sparkle.

Renae blinked. “Yes!” she jumped with a hopeful grin. “Let’s talk about them instead! I have so much evidence to gossip about!”

“And, gossip we shall!" Share beamed, to which a happy Renae nodded excitedly. "But not today!" Share laid down a decree, getting Renae to pout. "We have our journal for that. Right now I want to hear about you and Applejack. I’m just glad one Rarity might be seeing some romance in her life soon. My prospects have been quite limited I’m afraid.”

“None at all?”

“Limited, not absent,” Share clarified. “It’s complicated—especially the Spike situation—and we're talking—"

"Spike? The dog?" Renae asked, taken aback.

"D-dog? No!" Share gasped. "Dragon!"

Renae blinked. "Oh, right. I'm so used to dressing him in these little hats and adorable collars I had forgotten." She scrunched her brow in thought. "But, still. Isn't he a bit young and small?"

"He could live centuries long and grow as big as a mountain," Share explained.

Renae's eyes went wide. "But, but how would that … work?"

"Complicatedly, I'd imagine," Share enforced. "But we’re talking about your love life now. We can come back to mine later.”

Renae couldn’t help but return to her pout.

Seeing that, Share gave her a starting point. “What drew you two together? You said a ‘Camp’ Everfree?”

Renae thought back. “I was assigned to the same tent as Pinkie Pie, except she spent much of the first … several days chasing squirrels." She paused a moment, thinking it best to leave out that Pinkie was chasing squirrels with Spike and what he did with so many of the trees.

"Applejack was with Rainbow, but Rainbow decided to take laps around the whole camp. So, Applejack and I ended up unpacking and decorating our two tents in their absence. Normally Applejack doesn’t get into aesthetics like we do, but it was a woodsy, rustic theme. She loved it! We actually ended up spending a lot of the week together. All seven of us, truthfully—and Spike of course—but Applejack and I tended to be a little closer much of the time. That is, when she wasn’t off foraging for food instead of just eating the provided meals like the rest of us!”

Share giggled. “That does sound like her. You also mentioned ‘glamping’. What is that?”

“Glamping?” Renae asked, turning surprised eyes to her twin. “You don’t glamp in Equestria?”

“I’ve not heard of it.”

Renae gasped in horror. “Glamping is glamorous camping.”

“Ooh!" Share leaned forward, braving the faux pas of putting elbows on the table. "I’m listening, darling.”

“Applejack was against it at first. Because of course she was. But then I showed her my family’s deluxe camper.”

“Camper?”

Renae put a hoof to her chin a moment. “It’s a large vehicle, um … carriage? Yes, a carriage meant for living in over short trips with minimal setup between travel and living modes. Think of it as a big, lavish tent or small house on wheels. Bed bunks, kitchenette, battery for electricity, running water with a heater.”

Share gasped in delight. “I am definitely liking this ‘camper’ idea. Perhaps we could obtain something similar here by converting a covered wagon. Big Macintosh has been fixing one up, I could bring the idea to him. It would be wonderful for our next annual big sister/little sister camping—I mean glamping—trip to Winsome Falls! No need to bring a tent because the wagon will be the tent and all our supplies will be inside it! Let’s see those fly-ders try to mess with us next year!”

Renae raised an eyebrow. “Fly-ders? Yearly camping trips?”

“Fly-ders are horrid little flying spiders.” both Raritys shuddered, one from the memory, the other from the concept. “Myself, Applejack, Rainbow Dash, and our little sisters go camping each year. Sweetie Belle roped me into it once, but I eventually started enjoying … aspects of it. Not so much the nature part, but the quality time with Sweetie and our friends. Adding a ‘camper’ next year should really improve things even if we can’t copy all aspects you are accustomed to in your world. But never mind that. What do you plan on doing about your newly realized feelings for our cowpony friend?”

“Cowpo—?” Renae tilted her head. “Oh, we say cowgirl on our world.”

“And so how do you intend to proceed with your cowgirl?”

“M-my?” Renae started but faltered under the weight of her blush and cleared her throat. “I’m not sure I should do anything. I don’t want to risk harming the friendship we already have if trying anything more doesn’t work out.”

“Oh I don’t think that’s right at all.”

“No?”

“Come on, Rarity,” Share urged. “She’s honest Applejack. She wouldn’t want you to hide your feelings. I suspect she may already be wracked with guilt over hiding her own feelings for the same reason.”

“But we don’t know for sure if she has those feelings. I’m not even sure about my own yet.”

“You can always ask your Cadance for romantic advice with one of those 'phone' things you mentioned. She loves matchmaking even more than we do!”

Renae returned a slightly confused expression. “I'm not sure who Cadance is in your world, but in ours she's the principal of a rival school. I'm afraid I don't know her well enough for such personal questions. Twi has mentioned her though. Apparently they are close."

"If not Cadance, then Twilight, for friendship advice. Ours has always been there for us. She'll help you hold your friendship together while pursuing romance."

"No disrespect to our Twilight, but I suspect Sunset might be the better option. Our worlds and the people in them have many similarities, but we’re still quite different. Your Twilight is the Princess of Friendship. Ours is actually fairly new to friendship."

Share mulled that over. "It'd be quite amusing if Applejack here—Ponyjack—ended up with Rainbow and Jackie ended up with you."

Unable to shake the sheepish smile in her embarrassment, Renae cleared her throat. "Well, that would certainly prove that we are all different people in each world." She blinked. "Not to mention make any future visits between our worlds just a bit stranger than they would already be."

"Oh dear," popped Share. "I hadn't thought of that. And what if we got them mixed up? Or they mixed us up?" A stray thought brought a blush to her cheeks and she looked to Renae to see that a similar thought must have crossed hers.

Share quickly cleared her throat. "So Sunset is the one who might be the best help?"

Renae continued after a moment to get back on track. "Yes, and Sunset’s even an empath now.” She paused when a different thought came to mind. “Not that I’d ever ask her to invade Applejack’s mind without permission of course!”

Renae paused again, a hoof tapping her chin. After a moment she shook her head quickly. “No! No, it wouldn’t be right! And she’d never do it anyway," she laughed off the idea.

Share watched the mental war with an uncomfortable cringe, recognizing all too well the internal struggle, as Renae couldn't help but continue.

"Though I could give them a little push so they fall against each other during a Truth or Dare game at just the right moment, after just the right question …. But, how would I then get Sunset to reveal what she saw from Applejack?”

"Ahem," Share abruptly cleared her throat.

Renae looked over and grimaced sheepishly at the disapproving glare sent her way.

“But still," Share pressed through, sparing her twin further admonishment, "you have your friends, and you have me, even if we’ll only have the journal to keep in touch. If you can’t bring yourself to be direct with Applejack, then take it slow. Lay down clues, find reasons to spend time together." Share smirked. "Or don’t and spend time together anyway. The right smiles, a bit of body language. She’s a wise mare. If she does have those feelings she’ll get the hint before long and begin wooing you properly.”

Renae's blush returned at the suggestion of employing body language on Applejack, but an excited and squeaky shout hit her ears before she could reply.

“Raritys!”

““Sweetie Belle!”” the older sisters cheerfully called back.

Sweetie galloped up to the Raritys’ tea table, stood beside it, and spoke in a rush between pants. “I galloped—as fast as I could to get here—as soon as school got out so we can—spend the rest of the day—together!”

The Raritys giggled at the display, but Sweetie cut them off before either could respond. “Don’t tell me,” she pleaded. She looked the two of them over and eventually pointed at one. “Renae!”

Renae looked at the hoof pointed at her. “How did you know?”

“Your hindlegs are hanging off the front of the stool.”

“Isn’t that normal?” Renae looked at her hindlegs and then at Share’s to see her twin’s tucked underneath herself. “Oh.”

“Don’t worry, darling,” Share told her. “Some ponies often sit like that too. It’s just seen as a bit … eh, 'casual'.”

Sweetie began giggling at that, getting Renae to return a questioning look. “I thought you said it was fine. Should I sit differently?”

“It’s not that,” Sweetie answered. “It’s—“ she giggle-squeaked, “have you two Raritys really been saying ‘darling’ to each other?”

The Raritys looked at each other. “Maybe once or twice,” Share answered while Renae nodded.

Sweetie only giggled louder. “Sure, sure. I bet my cutie mark it’s been more than that.”

“Perhaps a little,” Renae began, “I can’t imagine it’s a big deal.”

“No, no, no.” Sweetie's eyes turned intense. “I said ‘I bet my cutie mark’ on it! So you know I mean it!”

The Raritys stopped and thought back. Renae attempted to count on her hoof before realizing that was a pointless idea and began tapping her chin instead.

“It doesn’t matter,” Sweetie cut them off. “What does matter is that I’M OUT OF SCHOOL!” she shouted eagerly.

“Of course, darling—”

“You said it again.”

Share paused. “Be that as it may, we remember. We promised. As soon as we finish our tea we’re all yours for the evening. Anything you want, your big sisters will be there, provided you also get your homework done.”

“YES!” Sweetie cheered, jumping into the air, horn sparking in delight. “I’ll get it done right now!”

With that, she zoomed into the house.

“Well,” Share remarked, “If she's that excited to do her homework, I should have you risk destroying the universes to cross dimensional boundaries more often. Or however it was Twilight put it.”

Still tapping her chin, Renae looked over. “And we’re sure we don’t say darling too much?”

“Of course not, dar—“ Share blinked. “I’m sure it’s only once in a while.”

“Rainbow Dash once suggested I start a Darling Jar.”

“And that would be?”

“A jar that I place a coin in every time I say darling.”

Share waved the idea off. “Oh, that’s just silly. If we need ‘Darling Jars,’ then that mare needs an ‘Awesome Jar’.”

“Precisely what I said—except I didn’t call her a mare, obviously. And even better, not five minutes passed when Applejack walked in and called me sugarcube.”

The twins laughed and Share added, "And a Sugarcube Jar for Applejack!"

"But I like when she calls me …," Renae began protesting, only to trail off upon seeing Share's grin.

"Oh, you've got it bad, don't you?" Share tittered.

"But, but, it's just cute, and—do you smell something burning?"

"Now, don't change the sub—" Share stopped with a sniff. Quickly, her eyes widened. "Oh, no. Don't tell me Sweetie's homework is home ec!"

They turned to face her kitchen and the black smoke rising out of an open window.

""Sweetie!"" they shouted, rushing for the door. ""Not again, darling!""


*** *** ***

*** *** ***


“—eeeeeaaakkk—phf!”

“Ah got ya, sugarcube,” came the gentle but sturdy wall that was Applejack. “Good thing you wrote us ahead.”

Rarity looked up to see herself in Applejack’s strong arms. The cowgirl had caught her trajectory direct from the Wonder Colt end of the portal.

She is quite adorable, isn’t she? And the muscles aren’t bad either. Rarity thought, absently kneading one of the biceps holding her. She blinked and blushed hard, suddenly realizing her realization, not to mention their position. “I, uh—“

With her newly restored, non-hooved legs still bent at the knees, and a heavy, gem-studded backpack weighing her down, Rarity lost her balance and pitched forward. Surprised, Applejack took a step back to brace herself, but forgot about the stack of yoga mats behind her and promptly tripped over the plan B.

They toppled over. Applejack’s back met the mats.

Rarity’s lips met Applejack’s.

“Mmmn?”

“Mmph!”

They stared at each other’s eyes, noting the different feel of the lips on their usual bodies.

Until Applejack had to breathe.

With a loud gasp, Applejack pushed, lifting Rarity up a few inches. They stared a moment longer before enough blood had returned to Rarity’s brain from her cheeks that she thought to stand.

She heard Applejack behind her slowly get her two feet under her and stand on the other side of the mats.

Still blushing hard, Rarity cleared her throat and slowly turned to face her friend who glanced over with a matching blush before they both looked away again.

Silence.

A moment later, Rarity cleared her voice. “So, er, Applejack?”

“Yes, sug—uh, Rarity?”

“We weren’t even horses this time.”

Surprised, Applejack looked over and saw Rarity looking back at her. The blush was still quite potent, but it was paired with a rather coy smile.

Applejack blinked. Blinked again, and let out a snicker. “Just can’t help ourselves, can we?”

Rarity let out a sputter that turned into a full blown giggle-fit, which Applejack joined her in.

A few laughs in and the sparkling backpack’s weight took her off balance again. “Eek!”

“Whoa there, sugarcube,” eased Applejack, quickly supporting her with one hand. “That’s one mighty fancy backpack. Looks more expensive than a sports car. Are those real gems?”

Rarity gasped and immediately struggled to get the bag off her back. “Oh my,” she uttered once she got a good look at it. “It worked! Yes! Those are real gems. This was a set of saddlebags I made with Share a few days ago.”

She rushed to open the bag and took out a lavish gown.

“Uh,” Applejack started, “Ah hope you weren’t planning to wear that yourself.”

It was clearly one of the gowns she and her twin had created, but it hadn’t been affected by the portal’s magic. It was a gown only a quadruped could wear, and not even a full-sized horse. “Oh nooo! All that work!” Rarity put a hand over her forehead. “All that fun, delightful work!”

“Aw, that’s too bad, Rares. Ah think?”

“Oh, well,” Rarity recovered while pulling out her correspondence journal. “I still have the designs. Maybe I’ll donate these to Fluttershy’s shelter. But I wonder why they didn’t change.”

“Maybe ‘cause you weren’t wearing them?”

“Wearing! That’s right!”

Rarity looked down at herself. "I didn't wear any of them as I was afraid I wouldn't get—" she gave a little cheer when she discovered her phone in her skirt pocket, "this back!" She wasted no time in turning it on and opening the camera app.

Applejack watched as Rarity began using it to check herself over at various angles and facial expressions. “Wonderful!” Rarity declared. “Everything’s back to what it should be. Not even my mane’s out of place.”

“Mane?” Applejack snickered. “You check your tail yet?”

Rarity twisted around to check her backside. “My tail! What happened to my beautiful t—“

To Rarity’s credit, she stopped herself before she noticed Applejack’s laughter.

To Applejack’s credit, she recognized the proper time to stop laughing before she was told. “Uh, it uh, was a real beautiful tail.”

Rarity smiled. “Good save, darling,” she said, giggling playfully.

“So, uh ...” Applejack idly adjusted her hat. “Welcome back to the planet of the humanes. Pinkie and the others are inside for your welcome home party.”

“Thank you. It’s sad to leave our new friends, but it is good to be back.” Rarity gave the portal a wistful look then bit her lip and looked away. “Have you any plans for Saturday?”

Applejack shuffled slightly on her feet before answering. “Ah was actually thinking about asking you the same thing.”

Rarity quickly turned to face Applejack. “You were?”

“Yes. You see, well, one of our trees, uh, died.”

"Oh!" Rarity placed a hand on Applejack’s arm. “I’m sorry to hear that.”

“Thanks,” Applejack replied, and Rarity distinctly noticed a little blush on those golden cheeks. “She’ll be missed, but Ginni was past her prime for a long while. Anyway, so, Ah had the wood. So, well, Ah built you a new closet, and was thinking Ah could put it in your room anytime you’re free.”

Rarity moved her hand to her chest. “And you thought of me. That's sweet of you. How long would it take to put in?”

“Ah reckon an hour or two. Ah still have all your measurements, and Ah know you wanted some work done in the corner near that window, so Ah already built most of it. Just couldn’t do all of it ‘cause then it wouldn’t fit in the door.”

Rarity drew back and put her hands on her hips. “You’re saying you have ‘my measurements’?”

Applejack’s eyes widened. “Your bedroom! You-your room measurements.”

“I’m just teasing, dear,” Rarity laughed. “It’s not like I don’t have your measurements on file still.”

The resulting blush most definitely did not escape Rarity’s notice. “Wha—oh, oh, right. For outfits. Of course you’d know what my measurements are.”

A hopeful smile grew on Rarity’s cheeks. “If the installation will only take a short time, what about the rest of your Saturday?”

“Oh, that’s right. You’re going to need to study up on what you missed from school. Twilight would be the better person to help you there, but Ah can help you through a few subjects just fine.”

“Well, there is that,” Rarity nodded. “I suppose we’ll all need some study sessions to catch up, but we can make those group study sessions. I was hoping that we could just spend some time together for fun.”

“With the girls?”

“Or, just the two of us?”

“Ah, well, Ah ...” Applejack played with her hat. “Okay. Ah’d like that.”

“Wonderful! So, let’s say you come over around one, install the closet, and spend time together till dinner. My treat of course.”

“You don’t have to do that, Rares. Ah made the closet as a gift.”

“And I’m treating you to dinner as thanks. I shan't take ‘no’ for an answer!”

“Well, in that case, it’s a d—“ Applejack swallowed, “d-dinner."

"Or, an evening?” Rarity suggested with a coy smile.

“Yes, Ah reckon that'll do 'er—it! Do it—do—be an evening.”

Applejack and Rarity smiled at their plans, with Rarity also smiling at Applejack's sheepish blush. They then headed for the school and the welcoming party inside, Applejack ending up carrying Rarity’s new gem-studded backpack once Rarity realized it was too much weight for her to wear comfortably.

Rarity looked forward to trying the Equestrian teas in her own world. Then sharing her favorites on Saturday.

With Applejack.

And using the journal to tell her twin all about it.
> Keeping a Friend After Leaving the World (Part 2)
> --------------------------------------------------------------------------

Flash pressed his face harder into his cushion, the world was still spinning.

Sure, he’d traded a lump of fluff in a volatile rage of winds for a spongy mattress in a crystal castle, but that didn’t erase what felt like an hour spent in the spin cycle!

Spike was kind enough to set him up in a quiet room while Twilight took care of the situation. Apparently the Rainbow Dashes were in big trouble. Flash didn’t get the details though, only that it had awoken a very unhappy purple princess.

Wait.

Twilight’s awake!

He picked his head up, groaned at the wobbling room, slid off the mattress, and … spent a few minutes getting on his hooves instead of his face again.

Once in the hallway, it was a matter of … actually, he had no idea where he was so he just wandered until he heard noises. Thankfully, keeping one eye closed helped with the spinning walls.

As the noises got louder, they became clearer. But why did they sound like a room full of teenage boys pigging out? Boys with suspiciously high pitch voices.

“*nom*Thank you,*nom*Spike,” the pig-outer said. “These hayburgers are*nom*really hitting the spot.*sluurrp*This is definitely*nom*not a salad day.”

Now that he was closer, that voice sounded very familiar.

Nah. Couldn’t be. He must still be dizzy.

“You’re welcome.” That was Spike’s voice, but who’s he talking to? “Salad just doesn’t cut it when you’re stressed. In times like this you gotta have something greasy and bad for you.”

“Spike,” whined the eating voice, after a slight burp. “I don’t need another reminder about watching my figure.*nom*Rarity gives me enough as it is.”

There was no mistaking that voice any longer. Flash turned the corner into a dining room.

“I just want to eat in peace where*nom*nopony’s gonna see me,” the voice continued on, muffled through food, as Flash’s eyes confirmed what his ears suggested.

She saw him just two bites later. Twilight Sparkle, royal Equestrian princess. Messy mane, kinked tail, frizzed fur, mouth stuffed. Her face turned bright red. Or was that just ketchup?

It was ketchup.

She had been in the process of wiping some of it off with her burger when she froze.

“F-Flash?” She swallowed then disappeared in his namesake.

The burger in her purple aura lost its glow and flopped onto the table.

That was twice she’d teleported away from him in one day. He let his head droop with a sigh.

“What? Oh, hi, Flash,” greeted Spike. “You, uh, okay there? Can I get you something?”

Flash looked down at the little dragon. Strange how that wasn’t strange anymore. Like talking dogs. “I’m fine, Spike. But I think I’ll go lie down again.”

“We got plenty of hayburgers if you want.”

“No, it’s alright, I’m just—oof!“ he grunted, falling back upon bumping into something.

“Oof!” came another grunt.

He looked over at the sudden reappearance of the Princess of Friendship, quickly picking herself up off the floor. “T-Twilight?”

The too large smile was the first thing he noticed, then the wide eyes and blush that wasn’t ketchup anymore. Her hair and fur were combed, though a few juts and loops were spread around. Behind her, not quite out of sight, Spike discreetly leaned in and plucked out the brush still clinging to her tail and hid it behind himself.

“Sorry!” she squeaked. “I thought you were still sleeping.” She held out a hoof. “We, uh, got to stop bumping into each other like this?”

With a blush of his own, he reached out and she helped him to stand. “I think that’s become our thing by now,” he answered.

They stood there on three hooves each, still holding out the fourth until Twilight noticed and put that one down as well, with a sheepish giggle, followed by Flash.

“Um,” Twilight attempted.

“So,” Flash tried.

“Either of you going to finish those hayburgers?” Spike succeeded.

That snapped them alert. “Spike,” Twilight rolled her eyes with a sigh before turning back to Flash. “Are you hungry?”

“What? O-oh, I’m fine. Thank you.”

“Yes!” Spike cheered, heading back to the greasy take-out boxes.

“Don’t eat all of them!” Twilight scolded him.

“Of course not. I’ll save you some.”

“Thank—I mean, you’ll get a stomach ache.”

“I’ll eat slow!”

“You never eat slow.” With no further reply from Spike, Twilight shook her head slowly then looked to Flash with a small smile. “Want to talk? Let’s go to the lounge, Spike can be a bit of a messy eater sometimes.”

Flash blinked and looked from Twilight to Spike. “Really,” he remarked simply.


*** *** ***


The walk through the halls was fairly quiet, only their blushes managed to communicate. Through the windows Flash noted they were on the ground floor. Around a few more corners and there was a cozy-looking room with a fireplace, carpet, and pony furniture. Lots of bookcases too. A door at the other end of the room appeared to lead toward the foyer.

“We use this as a sort of meeting place,” explained Twilight. “Less formal than the throne room. Especially with visitors.”

“Oh!” Throne room. Yet another reminder he was crushing on a princess. “Yes,” Flash agreed. “I bet.”

Twilight climbed onto a little sofa along one side of the room and gave a smile. Flash copied her in a neighboring sofa as best he could.

Flash glanced at Twilight and thought hard on what to say, absently biting his lower lip before looking away and taking in more of the room. On a second attempt he saw Twilight doing the same despite having much more familiarity with the room.

“SO!” she suddenly said, snapping her head up and startling him in the process. “How’s been … you? Heh,” she ended with an awkward giggle.

“Uh, the, um, band in. We have.” Flash stopped and shook his head. “Still playing in the band.”

“Yes! Sunset has been writing to me about that. Flash Drive. I don’t really know what that means but it sounds cute. She even wrote down the lyrics to some of your songs. I really liked—“

She stopped suddenly, her blush taking over her face.

“Liked?” Flash asked.

“…’ve in a Flash.”

“What was that?”

“Love in a Flash!” she blurted out quickly.

They returned to looking at the walls.

Flash cleared his throat. “I was t-thinking about you when I wrote that.”

“Eep,” Twilight squeaked. “Oh. Heheueh,” she finished up with a breathy giggle while twirling her mane in her magic.

Their blushes then returned to being the loudest things in the room.

Until Trixie found them.

The door slammed open and the caped inconvenience pranced in. “The Great and Powerful Trrrrrixie has returned for her medal!”

“Trixie?!” Twilight bolted out, reeling back. She would have fallen off her sofa if it wasn’t against the wall. Flash didn’t have that benefit. “What medal?”

“For saving Ponyville single-hoofedly!”

“What?!” Twilight called back while helping Flash back onto his sofa. “When was this? From what?”

“Two days ago in the battle against the changelings that looked like you and your friends and those mysterious ponies with no fashion sense.”

“Two days? But. Who? What?”

“Trixie used up all her fireworks in one grand performance to become—“ Trixie swished her cape, reared onto her hind legs, and lit her horn, sending colored sparks and streams of magic all around her for dramatic effect. “—The savior of Ponyvilletm!”

Dropping back down to four legs she followed up with a disclaimer. “For the most recent invasion at least. Some other ponies may need to step up if the next one occurs before Trixie has time to replenish her supplies.”

Twilight put a hoof to her face. “I don’t even know where to begin,” she said before pausing. “How’d you know I was here?”

“Your servant told Trixie while she was retrieving her frozen cinnamon nuts,” Trixie said while lifting a small bag out of a pocket in her cape. “And was quite generous in providing Trixie with a free hayburger.”

“Spike?! He’s not a servant.”

Trixie put a hoof to her chin and thought back to everything she knew about the dragon. “Are you sure?”

“Yes!”

“Butler?”

“He’s my Number One Assistant,” Twilight explained proudly.

Trixie tilted her head. “Those aren’t the same thing?”

“Of course not!”

“What’s the pay like?”

Twilight paused with her mouth open. “Uh … I give him an allowance? He normally just uses it for comics and junk food.”

“Sounds like he needs a raise.”

“I, I’ll take that under advisement—Wait, those are your cinnamon nuts? They’ve been in there for moons. You don’t live here. Why are you using our icebox and on nuts?”

“They were on sale, freezing them preserves the flavor, and Starlight gave Trixie permission.”

“Of course she did.” Twilight rolled her eyes.

“So about that medal.” Trixie puffed out her chest. “Some reimbursement for the fireworks would be nice as well. And a guest room in the palace when Trixie visits? Near Starlight’s room of course. And a storage chamber for stage supplies.”

“Trixie,” Twilight sighed and gestured to Flash, “We were in a bit of a serious talk here. Can’t this wait?”

“What’s more serious than Trixie’s latest royal medal that you shall bestow upon her?”

Twilight managed to keep herself from saying anything, but whether it was the blush or the clenched teeth that helped the most was unclear even to her.

Trixie, however, only noticed the blush, and the matched pattern on Flash’s face. “Oh?” She raised an eyebrow then wiggled both up and down a few times with a growing smirk on her lips. “Oh, Sparkle, you heart-breaker you.”

“Huh, what?” Twilight startled back.

“Say no more! Trixie knows all too well how delicate these matters can be for she has many such admirers.” She had taken a resolute stance, though her eyes flicked near the end. She then swished her cape and took a step back. “You have ten minutes!”

A flash of her horn, a spark and an explosion, and finally a cloud of smoke preceded her departure.

A moment of coughing followed.

“Ugh,” Twilight groaned. “Maybe I should teach her how to teleport but knowing her, she’d keep using the smoke bombs anyway.”

“Well,” said Flash, “that was Trixie alright.”

“Heh, same in your world?”

“Pretty similar. She’s been nicer lately though. Hangs out with Sunset and Wallflower a lot. Does a lot of magic shows in the gym with her assistants, Lavender and Fuchsia.”

The Princess of Friendship smiled. “Good to know she has friends.”

She then took a breath, crossing a hoof over her chest, and Flash noticed a change to a taller, more regal pose. “Flash,” she said in a calmer tone, “It’s great to see you again. The situation, as usual, has been unfortunate, but I’m glad you’ve come.”

Flash smiled shyly, blushing to match. “Yeah. It’s, uh, been a strange couple of days. But it was worth it to see you again.”

He pointed to her with a set of finger guns but looked down at his hooves realizing it was a worthless gesture. Twilight gave an odd look to how he pointed both forehooves at her and he chuckled sheepishly. “Uh. So,” he trailed off.

“How are you finding Equestria?” Twilight giggled, getting Flash to look up from his hooves. “Getting adjusted to your world was quite the experience. Just re-learning to walk was a chore.”

“Oh, oh, yes. I’m still having some trouble with that. Flying almost seems to be easier if I keep it slow.”

“Magic-fueled instinct. Suddenly becoming a pegasus as an adult rather than growing through foalhood must have effectively given you a subconscious cram-session. And then you had a trial by fire jumping out that window and joining the fight with Sunset.”

Flash nodded. “Yeah, but I couldn’t not help. Sunset means too much to m—us.”

“All of us. Including you of course,” Twilight gave him an encouraging smile.

“Well … yeah.”

“How have things been between you two?”

“Well … good. Better friends than we ever have been.”

“That’s wonderful!”

“Especially now that she means it. Now that she isn’t trying to be something else.”

“Something else?”

“Before the Fall formal,” Flash paused to think back. “I always felt something was off. I knew she wasn’t the sugary sweet person she pretended to be, and while she hid from me how she was mistreating the other students, I caught glimpses occasionally. It’s why I broke up with her. But it never felt like that was really her. I don’t think the Fall Formal changed her so much as made her realize she wasn’t being who she was supposed to be. Like how she is now.”

That got Twilight chuckling. “Or, in other words, Princess Celestia was right about her all along. It just took a few more years than expected.”

After her chuckling died down, she turned back to Flash. “But are you two only friends?”

Flash’s eyes widened for a moment before settling down. He gave a small smile. “I don’t think I’m the ‘real’ Sunset’s type.”

Twilight dropped her gaze a bit. “That’s too bad.”

Flash tilted his head. “But I thought maybe you and—“

“I’ve heard you might have an admirer?”

“What?!” Flash’s head and ears snapped up to attention.

“A certain blonde with a gray coat, uh, skin?”

Flash rolled his eyes. “You’ve been talking to Rarity. She’s been trying to ship us.”

“Her counterpart in this world is very nice. Brave too. Saved my life once. Possibly all of Equestria. I gave her a medal.”

There was a sudden thump from under a nearby table.

They both turned and leaned down, peering underneath to see a very familiar cape.

Twilight leveled her eyes and voice. “Trixie.”

The pony under the table squeaked. “Trixie isn’t eavesdropping! She tripped over the table while galloping through the smoke cloud and then had to hide before it faded!”

As Twilight groaned softly, Trixie rolled out and stood up, smoothing out her cape and hat with a flair only a professional showmare could embellish. “So what’s this about a different world, and another Trixie? Surely no other being can be more great and powerfuller than—”

A purple hoof abruptly pointed toward the door. Trixie followed that hoof to the face it was eventually connected to, read the expression, and bid a retreat.

She didn’t trip on the table this time, but the smoke cloud lasted just as long.

After their coughing fits died down, and they confirmed they were alone this time, Flash steadied himself. “Twilight,” he asked softly, “are you trying to get me to start dating someone else?”

Twilight let out a slow breath. “Flash. Other than as friends, I can’t see us having any lasting relationship. We live in different worlds. Not just because we have such different lives, but also literally. It’s not fair to you that I can’t visit, and I can’t take you away from your world to live here.”

Flash let that sink in. “Don’t I get a say in this?”

“Of course you do,” Twilight replied earnestly. “How do you feel?”

“Disappointed,” Flash sighed before sitting up, “and honestly a little angry.”

Twilight closed her eyes and nodded slightly, letting Flash continue.

“We’ve had so little time together, and there’s always been something in the way. I’m actually here in your world now, with the crisis already over, and I’m just going to go home tomorrow and that’ll be it?”

“I’m sorry, Flash. I thought when I left the first time, that would be the last time we’d ever see each other. By the time the portal opened again on its own you would have graduated and long since moved on. And even if we could use the portal without risks, I can’t give up my crown to live in your world, and I can’t expect you to give up your life to live here either.”

“So that’s it?” asked Flash. “It’s over? And we never even had a date.”

The room was filled with silence. No voices, no blushes, just words unsaid.

Eventually, Twilight picked up her head and looked over at Flash. “Would you like to come with me to Canterlot?”

“Canterlot?

“The one in my world. It’s where I grew up.”

“Like, as a date?

“My schedule is packed for tomorrow dealing with a pair of ornery ambassadors, and I’ll have a few things to take care of the next day, but we can spend a couple days together after that if you’d like. Just have some fun.”

Flash met her eyes and the hopeful smile under them.

Then there was a knocking at the door.

They paused. Twilight looked at the door then back to Flash.

“Hello? Twilight?” came Sunset’s voice.

“Sunset?” Twilight returned, still watching Flash. “Uh. Come in?” she said when Flash looked toward the door.

The door opened and Sunset walked in, though she was still looking back down the hall she came from. “The Equestrian Trixie seems just as, uh, interesting as the Pedestrian one. And maybe I should keep wearing a dress or something over my wings. I think the whole random alicorn thing kind of freaked her out. Although," she put a hoof to her chin, "knowing the other Trixie, maybe that's normal for her.”

She then turned and saw Flash. “Oh! I can come back later if I’m interrupting.”

“No it’s okay. What’s going on?”

“I was just hoping to borrow some bits for a train ticket. All my money’s in a savings account in Canterlot. I’ll pay you back when I return.”

That perked up Twilight. “So you’re going to visit your family?”

“Yeah,” Sunset gave a sheepish smile. “Celestia and Sunburst.”

“But not your Dad?”

Sunset gave a snort. “He can wait.” She then looked to Flash with a lighter expression and tone. “My half brother became a magic scholar in the Crystal Empire. He’s even the Royal Crystaller, apparently.”

“Oh,” Flash chimed in. “That … sounds impressive?”

“Yeah. He was just a little twerp when I left,” Sunset giggled for a moment before letting it fade into a sad sigh. “I wasn’t very nice to him.”

“I’m sure you two can amend things,” Twilight offered. “Starlight can help, she’s visiting him too.”

She quickly turned to Flash. “Your counterpart also lives in the Empire. He’s a royal guard.”

“Wow,” Flash chuckled. “A lot of royal stuff around here.”

Sunset smiled. “That’s just because you’re hanging out with a princess and two, uh, former students of our nation’s ruler.”

“Also,” Twilight added, “my brother is the former captain of Celestia’s guard and the current prince of the Crystal Empire.”

“That makes him your counterpart’s boss twice over,” Sunset kidded. “So you better be careful how you treat his sister.”

Flash and Twilight glanced at each other then quickly away.

Smile gone, Sunset looked between them. “Everything okay?”

“Oh, we’re fine,” Twilight answered and turned to Flash. “Would you like to meet your counterpart? I can get you a ticket to the Empire. He already knows about the portal. He was one of the guards when we met. You can ride out there with Sunset.”

Flash looked from one mare to the other and considered his options. “Wouldn’t that be difficult to do if I’m going to be staying in Canterlot for a few days?”

Twilight smiled brightly, which Flash returned.

“So,” Twilight began her plan, “We’ll all ride out to Canterlot tomorrow morning. I’ll arrange a suite for Flash in the palace while Sunset continues on to visit family.”

“Works for me,” Sunset smiled then added with a chuckle, “Now I’ll get out of your way.”

They waved as she left and turned back to each other, a little blush returning.

“I’ll work out a schedule for our, uh, date,” Twilight giggled. “DJ-PON3 will be doing a show the second night. We could go dancing.”

Flash looked to his hooves. “I might look out of place trying to dance as a pony.”

“You’ll be fine. I’ll teach you. I’m a great dancer.”

Flash thought back to the Fall Formal. “Really,” he remarked simply.




*** *** ***




“—AAAAaaugh!”

Flash landed face first onto a stack of yoga mats hard enough for them to skid along the walkway a bit.

It was a nice few days with Twilight, almost a week. He got to see her favorite childhood libraries, the doughnut shop where she replenished her study calories, her old dorm in the castle, Moondancer who practically lived there now, the princess counterpart of his principal, and just went for some peaceful walks. It wasn’t just Canterlot either. They returned to Ponyville in a hot air balloon and got another tour of Twilight’s little town.

He felt they’d be friends forever.

Just … nothing more than that.

It hurt, but he was ready to move on.

“Flash!” a girl’s voice cried, followed by a shadow moving over him and an arm coming to his side.

He held out his arm, accepting help in standing back on only two legs and looked to his helper. “Muffin?” she asked, showing him a basket that might have recently been full.

She was … cute. Really cute. Why hadn’t he ever noticed it before? “Uh, t-thanks,” he replied, taking one from the basket. “Have you been waiting for me?”

“Yep!” Such a cheerful voice. One eye was on him, the other flicked toward the portal. “Pinkie told us you’d be coming back today! I’m supposed to bring you in to your Welcome Back party. So, what was it like? Were you actually a pony?”

“A pegasus! I had wings!”

“Wow! Could you fly? Rainbow Dash has been talking about it non-stop.”

“Yeah. Did a lot of flying. No stunts or racing like Rainbow, but for fun.”

“That must have been amazing. You have to tell me everything!”

“I—“ Flash paused, a slow smile growing on his face. “I will. How about after the party?” A blush began to form along with the smile.

“Oh, I can’t tonight, sorry. I have to leave in an hour.”

“Maybe tomorrow?”

“Tomorrow works.” She nodded enthusiastically.

“Where are you going tonight?”

“Bulk is taking me out to the movies.” She blushed. “Third time this month.”

Flash’s face fell. “Bulk? Third time?”

“Yep! He’s really sweet.” She blushed harder. “It’s been great.”

“Well that’s, that’s just great.” He pointed a forehoof at her—blinked at his curled fingers—then switched to a friendly finger gun. He’d always wondered why Sunset sometimes does the same thing with her hands.

She giggled and started up the steps toward the school. “Come on, Flash. Your party’s inside.”

“Uh, I’ll be there in a sec,” he called.

Once she was inside, he dropped his head to sigh at the muffin in his hand. “Flash,” he chided himself, “you waited too long.”

He turned to give the portal another glance and smiled. “She looked happy though. I’ll find someone. You will too.”

As he turned to head up the steps of the school, and eventually his party, A noise behind him grabbed his attention. He turned but a force knocked him sideways and dragged into the bushes. “Whaa?! Hel—“

He tried to call out but a hand quickly covered his mouth.

Finally hidden away, he was pressed to the ground by the shoulders. He looked up at his assailant.

“Lyra?”

The girl had wide eyes and she bent down close, almost pushing his head into the ground with her forehead. “You were there!” she breathed. “They let you in.”

“Uh, I?”

“Did you see unicorns?” She squealed.

“Y-yes?”

The squealing increased.

He hoped it was happy squealing, but he couldn’t tell.

“I saw another me come out of the portal!” she continued.

“Wha—?”

“Before Twilight came back. It was me! She fell out of the portal, squealed at everyone around like I’m doing right now—“ she squealed more, “—then crawled back in!”

“Oh?”

“Was she a unicorn?”

“Uh ….” Flash thought back. While flying around town, didn’t he see two ponies being chased by a horde of cute animals? “Maybe? There was a unicorn that looked like you.”

“I knew it!” Lyra cheered. “I’m a unicorn!”

“Heh, y-yay,” Flash cheered awkwardly with her.

“HOW DO I GET THERE?!” She grabbed him by the collar. “The Rainbooms won't let me in!”

“Lyra!” another girl’s voice growled from above.

“Sweetie Drops!” Lyra called to her. “I’m a unicorn! Heheeeee—eek!”

Lyra’s cheer was cut off upon being doused by a spray bottle in Sweetie’s hand. “Down, girl. Let him go!”

“But, but, unicorns!”

“Yes, yes. But you’re practically burying our friend in the garden. Now come on.”

“Aw.”

Sweetie rolled her eyes. “You’re more like a cat than anything.” She turned to Flash. "She's been like this since Twilight got back."

“They talk about them, but never let me in!”

“Yes, yes.” Sweetie patted Lyra's hair.

Flash watched Sweetie Drops lead Lyra away toward the school. Lyra stared longingly until they got to the foot of the steps and pulled away, bolting for it.

And jumping through.

"Lyra!" Sweetie yelled at the portal, "get back here!"

Twilight might want to consider having the portal close quicker after being used.

“Well,” he said, “This could be a problem.”
> Sunset Makes Amends (Part 1 of 5)
> --------------------------------------------------------------------------

As ponies boarded the train, Sunset Shimmer stared down at the latest potential catastrophe set to befall Ponyville. “And you’ll be fine while we’re gone? You don’t want to come with us?”

“I’m only going to Canterlot if you drag me, and you know we bite,” Aria Blaze warned her.

Sunset’s foreleg flinched. “I remember. But hardly anypony you, uh, ‘tolerate’ will still be left in town after we leave. I know you like your private time, but still, won’t you get lone—?”

“I’ll be fine, Downer,” Aria groaned. “Don’t get your panties in a knot.”

“I’m not—“ Sunset stopped herself but not quick enough to cover her error.

“Pretty freeing isn’t it?” Aria added with a sway to her midsection.

“Aria,” Sunset sighed. “You sure you’re not coming?”

“Are you worried about me or the little pony town here?”

“Uh.” Sunset paused. “It can’t be both?”

“I thought so.” Aria rolled her eyes. “Fine. Give me the list.”

“Don’t start any fires,” Sunset recited.

“I’m not Sonata. And no jokes about my name!”

“Do be respectful of other people’s personal space.”

“I’m not Adagio.”

“No drunken bar fights.”

“Oh, come on! Just put me on a leash, why don’t you!”

“Aria—“

“Hooves are so much more satisfying than fists when they connect with a face. I gotta put them back to good use before I go.” Aria turned to the side and stomped a hoof on the walkway letting out a loud bang. “Right, Doucheman?”

Flash, following behind Twilight toward the train, paused and approached the pair instead while Twilight continued inside still reading over her revised checklist. “What’s right?”

“Nothing that needs an answer,” Sunset answered.

Aria ignored that and smirked. “Just thinking back a bit.” She leaned in. “The bar?”

Flash’s eyes went wide and flicked between Aria and Sunset a few times. “Uh, I, I, I didn’t know that was a bar!”

“Yeah,” Aria casually agreed. “It was really more of a strip joint.”

Sunset raised an eyebrow. Flash flushed red. Aria turned to Sunset. “He wussed out before the good stuff.”

“Wait,” Sunset held up a hoof. “Were you watching strippers or getting into a bar fight?”

“Heh,” Aria smirked. “It can’t be both?”

Sunset dropped her head with a sigh.

“The commotion got loverboy here to come back in to see what was going on.” Chuckling, Aria turned back to Flash. “How’d you like all those dancing girls running around? They never had a chance to get dressed.”

“I, uh,” Flash stammered, flicking his eyes to Sunset, then Twilight through a train window, “gotta go find a seat for the trip. H-heh.”

They watched him bound for the train, wings out for balance. Unfortunately, he forgot to fold them back in before climbing up the narrow steps and got rubber-banded back out and onto the ground when they connected with the frame. Aria let out a snerk as Flash righted himself and succeeded into the train.

She turned to Sunset. “You used to date that.”

“Hay! Stop that,” Sunset admonished her. “He’s a nice guy, really. And cute, and a good friend, and ….”

“And?”

Sunset sighed glumly. “And piggybacking off his popularity early on allowed old me a position of power ….”

“But now you have the wings for that.”

Apparently knowing they were being talked about, Sunset’s new wings ruffled under the dress and saddlebags the Raritys had gifted her. “And they’re staying under this dress.”

“Heh, finally got everything you ever wanted and you’re literally keeping it all undercover.”

“Yeah, well, my priorities have changed.” Sunset turned to the train and through the windows saw Flash, Twilight, Spike, both Raritys, and the Equestrian doubles of the other four friends that turned her life around. “For the better.”

“Yeah, yeah. You ponies and your friendship.”

“You’re welcome to join us anytime!” Pinkie shouted from her window.

Aria calmly raised a hoof toward her and smiled sweetly. “If I had fingers I’d be showing you my favorite right now.”

“Ooh! You have a favorite finger thingy? Does it do tricks?”

“Sure. It can—“

“Pinkie!” Sunset quickly cut between them. “Don’t encourage her when she gets like this.”

“But, it’s the only time she smiles,” Pinkie countered.

“A smiling Aria isn’t always a good thing,” Sunset warned.

Aria just smiled more.

Not unlike a shark.

Sunset hoped she was just being playful. It was hard to tell.

Finally, Aria traded the dangerous smile for a real one and a light punch to the shoulder. “Relax, Shimmer. I won’t even be in pony town after you go.”

“Ponyville.”

“That’s a stupid name and you know it.”

“And Pony Town is better?”

“I won’t be in any pony towns.” Aria explained before taking a breath. “I’m going to see if there are any kelpies left.”

Sunset gasped. “You think there might be more?”

“We were already an endangered species after the island sunk on us, and it’s been a thousand years. But …,” Aria looked away and continued slower, “maybe the three of us aren’t the last.”

“I could help.”

“Pff, how long can you hold your breath?”

“I can help with research.”

“I already checked with Bookhorse and Dragon Breath. They got nothing. So if other kelpies are out there they’re either hiding or never came to Equestria.”

“So then—?”

“East. Just going to check out what’s left of Coltlantis and go from there. So much of the old magic was tied to home, without that who knows what kelpies would even be now.”

Sunset took a step closer and tried to look Aria in the eyes, but she was making that difficult, scanning the eastern horizon but not really looking at anything. “That sounds like a long trip. You’ll be okay alone?”

“Meh. I swim fast. And underwater is great. It’s not like I’ll need shelter from the rain, just sleep wherever, whenever, and when I’m hungry I’ll eat the kelp and fish I find.”

There was a gasp from the train.

Aria groaned. “Oh come on, Yellow! Don’t tell me you make friends with fish too. Fish are food!”

“B-but not the intelligent fish, right?” Fluttershy pleaded.

“Sure. If they’re intelligent enough to swim faster than me.”

Fluttershy shrunk down from her window with a frown.

Aria turned back to Sunset. “So that’s me. Take a week I bet. What’s your plan?”

“A week?” Sunset asked. “That’s it?”

“Eh,” Aria shrugged. “I’ll be back.”

Sunset continued to watch Aria with a concerned expression for a moment before sighing and lifting a book out of her saddlebags. “I hope to finish reading at least one of these beginner’s flight books on the train. The girls and Spike will all have their royal duties once we arrive, so I think I’ll show Flash and Renae around the castle before I meet with Celestia.”

“When you’ll get your crown.”

“Cro—!” Sunset took a step back, eyes wide. “Oh, no, no, no. There’ll be no crown. Wings, okay sure, that happened, but no way I’m getting a crown.”

“Whatever you say,” Aria smirked with a mock curtsy, “Princess.”

With that, Aria hopped away with a chuckle, allowing Sunset a moment to look north toward the large castle and home of her mentor. Absently, a hoof reached up and patted her head, right where a crown would sit.

“ALL ABOARD!” shouted the conductor, startling Sunset into quickly planting her hoof back on the walkway.

Her wings twitched.


*** *** ***


Two chapters. That’s all she managed in the flight books. That and Lookout Below’s foreword, which provided much detail into the meaning behind the pony’s name and extensive medical bills. She had already been nervous over meeting with Celestia, and her attempt at light reading just gave her more things to be concerned about.

After every few paragraphs, if she managed that, she’d gone back to watching the slowly growing castle as their train approached. Now they were minutes away from the station.

What would she look like wearing her new crown?

Nope! No, no, no. She’d imagined that before. Lived that before. Not doing that again.

Sure, the odds of another crown of Equestrian origin, this one granted to her by Celestia herself, turning her into an evil monstrosity were slim to none—hopefully none—but still, it wasn’t like she was actually princess material to begin with. The wings might just be a fluke and Celestia would simply take them back. Give them to somepony else. More deserving.

She looked down to her sides. The Raritys had made the dress with thicker material and clasped under her barrel specifically to hide her wings, but there was still a slight bump.

Was there a counterspell for becoming an alicorn or would she need to prep for surgery? The Apple family provided them all with a large breakfast before leaving. That wasn’t ideal for such medical procedures right?

“Yo, Sunset Shimmer!”

“Wahh!”

Sunset ducked and her wings tried to open inside the dress but the material held and all they managed to do was push the dress upward.

It was like a turtle ducking into its shell.

And tumbling off a train bench.

“Whoa, sorry,” came Rainbow’s voice again. “Didn’t know you were that into your book.”

“I’m okay!” the Sunset-colored turtle insisted while her head tried to find the neck hole of her dress while upside down.

A couple of hooves came to her aid and she was soon looking at the concerned pegasus. “You know, I could teach you to fly much better than a book. I mean I hear you’re a big egghead but you haven’t turned a page in like ten minutes!”

“Y-you’ve been watching me?”

“You looked tense. Wing cramp? Twilight got those a lot right after she alicorned.”

“We’re making that a verb now?” asked Applejack, also coming to help Sunset up.

“Well if it happens enough it becomes a trend and language should adapt,” offered a Rarity.

“I don’t think it’s supposed to happen that often,” said Spike.

“But Sunset is the third in our lifetime,” countered Fluttershy.

“Third?” thought Sunset, getting back on the bench. “Right. Cadance. Somepony else I ought to apologize to.”

Fixing her mane, Sunset looked to Rainbow and Applejack. “Thanks. I was getting a little stuck in my head there.”

That jogged Twilight out of hers and she looked up from her flashcards. “Nervous about meeting with Celestia?” she asked with a smile. “You shouldn’t be. She’s been looking forward to seeing you again.”

Sunset returned her the best genuine smile she could fake.

At least that was one politician’s prerequisite she had mastered.

She then employed similar skills dodging additional questions until the train arrived and they all disembarked.

A joyful voice called out. “Welcome back to Canterlot, Princess!”

“W-what?!” Sunset startled back and turned to see a royal guard that had apparently been waiting for them, addressing Twilight.

Twilight! Right, right. She’s a princess. Not me. Nopony here knows I grew wings overnight … other than Celestia.

“Darling, are you alright?” asked Renae, identifiable by the “subtle,” but clearly designer dress, large hat and larger sunglasses that somehow equated to an I’m-Not-Rarity disguise. “You really are quite tense, aren’t you? Is there a spa around for you to get a wing massage?”

“Wing massage?”

“Rainbow mentioned wing cramps and I can see them twitching under your dress. We could always hide your horn and pass you off as a pegasus instead if you need to let them out for a stretch.”

“Ha!” Sunset shot out a quick, and hopefully not nervous-sounding laugh. “No, no, it’s been too long since I’ve had my unicorn magic, I don’t want to have to pretend I don’t have any now.”

“Well in that case,” Renae continued with a slight titter in her voice, “let’s head to our room in the castle so you can relax yourself without prying eyes.”

“Room?” Sunset’s eyes turned up to the castle, homing in on a specific window on one of the towers. “Did Twilight say which room?”

Renae’s aura brought out a small sheet of parchment. “She gave us a number and directions.”

Sunset quickly read over the information. “Oh,” she said, her tone deflated. She looked back to the castle but several towers over. “For the best,” she added to herself, eyes returning to the earlier window. “Must have been cleared out long ago.”

“What’s that?”

“Wh-oh nothing.”

“Well then, I shall collect my luggage and Flash, and give my twin a parting hug for the day.”

Sunset nodded. A minute later she was extra glad she did not switch her Not-An-Alicorn disguise from unicorn to pegasus when she saw just how much luggage needed to be moved.

At least she got to put her horn to work.


*** *** ***


Sunset’s other return to Canterlot, not all that long ago, had been fraught with a sense of urgency and dire purpose. It had been a straight line from the train, to Celestia, to a strict study session in the library, and then back through the portal. There had been no time to take anything in, no time to appreciate that sense of nostalgia, no time to chat and truly reconnect.

This time, the journey had no time limit and they could ease through it. That being said, just traveling from the station to the room Twilight had requested for them took much longer than it should have. And it wasn’t from the luggage that had to be hovered the whole way. The bulk of the delays were Renae becoming fascinated by tapestries, gold and gem encrusted architecture and decorations, stained-glass windows, and just being in a royal castle to begin with.

All the while, Sunset kept looking around at the familiar sites, remembering what hallway and door led to where, reliving beloved and painful memories from many rooms they passed, and looking out for staff members who might remember her.

The maids who clearly recognized her gave her a wide berth while smiling as pleasantly as they could. Some of the guards gave her stern looks, a glint of memories in their eyes. Sunset did her best to put as much cheer and apology into her smile as they passed, bowing respectfully when it seemed most appropriate.

One either off-duty or poorly trained guard who recognized Flash sparked a conversation over why Flash hadn’t told him he got transferred back to Canterlot again. As they explained the situation, it became clear that the guards were now aware of the visiting interdimensional twins, but hadn’t known that a Flash Sentry was among them.

When they finally got to the suite, seemingly a multi-room apartment, Flash and Renae spread out to inspect it while Sunset neatly put the luggage away. A thought occurred to her given the amount of luggage and all the twists and delays they took in their path to the room. She put a hoof to her horn and pressed on it a little.

“Huh. That was a lot easier it should have been.” She lifted up a few cases and called out. “Rarit—Renae, are these things empty?”

“Oh, no, dear,” Renae replied from another room. “I’ll be restocking Canterlot Carousel for Share while we’re here. That’s a new assortment we worked on together.”

“Hmm,” Sunset hummed, pressing on her horn again. Suddenly her eyes lit up with a small gasp. “Did you bring measuring tape?”

“Of course I did! It’s in the small, light beige case with the lily pattern and hand—hoofle?” Renae answered and Sunset turned for it. “What did you want to measure?”

Sunset stopped with a blush. “N-nothing?” The blush deepened when she noticed Flash had returned from another room who knows when. She promptly put the cases down. “Just curious how big my—our, uh, room is.”

“Royally big!” Renae giggled, trotting back into the main room.

Sunset’s eyes flicked to her horn and back. “Heh. ‘Royally,’ right.”

“To think our principal’s ‘twin’ lives here,” noted Flash.

“Yes,” Renae added in a tone of wonderment, “imagine living in a royal palace, servants to wait on you hand and—well hoof and hoof—, everyday looking over your kingdom while you display your crown and jewels proudly!”

“Heh,” Sunset choked on a laugh and looked between her friends. “Yeaaahh …,” she breathed out in a strained voice before recovering. “SO, what are your plans for the day, you two?”

“I don’t really have any plans until Twilight’s finished with her, um, royal schedule,” answered Flash. “We’ll be sightseeing after.”

“I will be working in the boutique with Sassy—and apologizing for all the confusion from earlier—hopefully finishing up early enough to observe the others. I do so wish to see Twilight in her crown and royal attire!” cheered Renae.

“Royal, again,” Sunset chuckled, “yes, everything’s so royal here in this big ol’ castle town of royalness.”

The stars in Renae’s eyes aided her reply. “Must have been so wonderful growing up in it.”

Sunset’s ears twitched and she gave Renae her best forced smile. “… great.”

“And you’re going to meet with Princess Celestia soon?” asked Flash.

Sunset blinked. “… yep.” Another blink. “Uh, I guess after Day Court ends. It’s ending early today so …,” she looked out the window, noting the sun’s position and gulped, “an hour? Or less?”

“Splendid!” Renae cheered. “We shall let you get to it! Now to figure out how to transport all these dresses to the boutique.”

“Where’s the boutique?” asked Flash.

Renae giggled with delight and pointed out the window at the now familiar building. So close to the castle she could count the dresses in the windows! “Tadah!” she sang gleefully.

“Wow,” remarked Flash, “I could fly down with a case or two. Would take less time than walking.”

He then turned and recalled just how many cases there were. “Oh, that’s going to take a few trips.”

Sunset looked at the building Renae was still gleaming at, then to the luggage, and finally up to her horn.

A pair of flashes of her aura later and the whole collection was sitting pretty beside the boutique’s front door.

“Oh my!” exclaimed Renae. “Sunset, was that you?” She looked to her own horn. “Can all unicorns do that or just alicorns?”

A flash of pride came over Sunset’s face before being slapped away by a blush. “Well, technically all unicorns can learn eventually but most … um, I’m uh ….”

“I understand, darling. You’re a magical prodigy.”

Letting out a thin smile, the blush deepened. “Don’t let it go to my head. Again.”

Renae gave her a hug and a chuckle. “Can’t have that, now can we?”

Pulling away, Renae adjusted her hat and nodded to her friends. “I should head down there before ponies wonder about the random cases sitting on the sidewalk.”

“I can help you out,” offered Flash.

“Oh, quite the gentle…stallion you are!” Renae beamed.

They soon found themselves teleported to their destination.


*** *** ***


Sunset paced in the pristine white hall. A small hall that the public normally didn’t have access to, intended rather for staff and ‘privileged’ individuals such as current and former students of The Princess of the Sun. A hall that acted as a side entrance to the throne room where Princess Celestia holds her Day Court.

The Day Court set to end in five minutes.

The few guards watched her curiously out of the corners of their eyes. They seemed to only know her by name and not reputation, which was a point in her favor. That and she apparently still had permission to be there.

“This is it, Sunset,” she mumbled to herself on the way down the hall, wary of the sharp ears of the guards. “All alicorns in Equestria are princesses, right? So she’s either going to give me a crown or take my wings away.”

Turning up the hall brought an additional thought. “Which one would be worse?” Each turn in her pacing added to the discussion.

“One option puts everything back to normal … once the spell or anesthesia runs its course. The other keeps me in Equestria as ruler of some town or city somewhere. And with the portal having limited uses, I won’t be able to see my friends more than a couple times a year at best.

“Then it’ll have to be the first option, right? Celestia wouldn’t give me a crown. Not after how I left, how I behaved in the last years here. She wouldn’t take me away from my friends and …”

She stopped. “Home?”

She lifted a hoof and looked down at it. “I don’t even know what home is anymore.

“Wait!” She put her hoof back on the floor with a snap then continued pacing. “What if she can’t unalicorn me? What if there is no counterspell and surgery would only do the wings, not the extra magic? Would Celestia consider me dangerous? I gave her plenty of reasons to think that. She could lock me up until she can drain the excess out of me. I never did serve a sentence for my attempted invasion and coup.

“Not to mention wrongful endangerment of minors via use of black magic.

“Theft of a magical relic.

“From a princess!

“A general bad attitude.

“And that’s putting it mildly.

“They said I was forgiven, but if the public finds out there’s another alicorn, they’ll want to know everything about her. That won’t go over well. Celestia might have to lock me away just to put them at ease.”

For the next few turns up and down the hall Sunset remained silent, if one were to ignore the shifting facial expressions.

Finally, the bell of a clock sounded, signaling the end of Day Court and Sunset backpedaled to the side door of the throne room to sit on her haunches staring into her oncoming future or lack of one.

A few minutes and flashes of her horn later and she was looking at the castle through a northbound train’s window.

“Or,” she groaned in defeat, “I can catch her on the way back. It’s not like Sunburst can arrest me.”

She blinked. “But Cadance could.”
> Princesses
> --------------------------------------------------------------------------

Another flight book chapter, a nap in the sleeping cabin, some more reading there, another nap after that, and it occurred to Sunset she didn’t know how far away the Crystal Empire was, only which train to take to get there. She had just left the sleeping cabin to ask a nearby pony when the conductor announced the upcoming stop.

She still hadn’t made much progress in the flight books and tossed and turned during her naps—the train ride and new appendages making it extra difficult to sleep—and seemed to recall a lack of light behind her compartment’s curtain at one point.

“How long were those naps?”

Yawning, she stepped onto the station and looked around.

“Wow,” she exclaimed, walking forward. “It’s like Twilight’s castle exploded and grew into a whole city. Being living crystal, I wonder if they’re related somehow. An ancestor connected through leylines maybe? But if the Tree of Harmony created her castle ….”

The old habits of a magic student were cut off when the Crystal Empire’s own crystal castle came into view. “Well, I guess I know where Cadance will be. I really should have asked Twilight if I’ve been officially pardoned throughout Equestria or if it was more like,” she adopted a lighter, sweeter tone, “ ‘oh it’s okay, Sunset. Of course we forgive you’.”

Back to her normal, or perhaps slightly grumpy tone she continued, “Well, the Canterlot guards didn’t arrest me, even though a few looked like they wanted to, and I’ve never assaulted any guards at this castle, so that’s good. But I did break and enter. And Cadance already had long-standing reasons to not like me.”

She thought back to a time of being Princess Celestia’s prized student—prized unicorn student—and along comes this bright pink alicorn with a pretty voice and elegant mane from a backwater village nopony ever heard of. And she wanted to be friends. Sunset sighed at the memories. Yeah, that was never going to happen. Not back then. And I had so much ‘fun’ letting her know it.

“I better start with Sunburst.”


*** *** ***


“Pfft,” Sunset held back a laugh looking up at the building Sunburst’s address led her to. Or more specifically, its large, and rather distinct crystal roofing. “Always did love those wizard hats. Did he find a house that looked like it fit him or did he actually commission a crystal architect to shape it?”

At least she’ll have something to ask him if the conversation gets awkward. Like if Sunburst asked “Where have you been?” Or “Aren’t you a criminal?” Or “Why were you so mean to me?”

She paused with her hoof inches from the door thinking over the importance of this meeting. Here she was trying to make right her past relationships. Reconnecting with a little brother should be the easy one, right? But what if it went horribly wrong? This could be a massive step backward instead of forward. It was like everything rested on this one moment.

With a groan of exasperation, Sunset knocked three times. And only the first was with her head.

Time passed. The bump on her head faded. She knocked again. Entirely with a hoof.

“Are you looking for Sunburst?” came a voice from a nearby home.

“Oh!” Sunset answered a shiny crystal pony. “Yes. Do you know where he is?”

Of course the answer was, “The castle.”


*** *** ***


Security was light in the Empire compared to Canterlot. Sunset was able to enter the castle unhindered and the guards she passed simply nodded at her. So far so good except she had no idea where in the castle to look. Does a royal crystaller have an office?

How would she find it if he did? Would she have to risk asking a guard or staff member? What were the odds she’d be able to get to Sunburst without first running into—

“Sunset Shimmer?”

Her.

The familiar, graceful voice stopped Sunset dead. Stealing her resolve, she turned to the pink princess. Her mane was still so elegant.

“Uh, h-hi, Cad—“Sunset stopped her awkward greeting and bowed low. “Hello, Your Highness.”

Cadance’s jaw dropped. “Sun…set? You’re being formal?”

Sunset returned to standing and caught sight of some guards in position around the edges of the room. “Princess Cadance, I … yes. Given our history and, well, I was in the neighborhood, that is, this side of the interdimensional portal—“

“Oh, I knew you were around.”

“You did?”

“I was expecting you later in the week though.”

“You were?”

“Twilight sent me a letter.”

"She did?" Sunset paused and took a breath. “Heh, of course she did.”

“But you don’t have to be so formal with me. We’re friends.”

Sunset blinked. “That’s, that’s not how I remember things.”

“I’m not surprised,” Cadance giggled. “But I’m actually happy to see you.” Sunset tilted her head with a confused expression. “Yes, I am,” Cadance answered the unspoken question. “I’ve heard about your change of heart. Heard quite a bit actually. And now I get to see it with my own eyes.”

“You heard from Twilight?”

“A little."  Cadance gave a sly smile. "But mostly from somepony else.”

“C-Celestia?”

“Seems just about every time we visit each other lately.”

“W-what does she say?”

“She gushes about every new adventure you have in the other world. Twilight’s not exactly closed-lipped either you see. Twilight’s proud of her friends, and Celestia’s proud of her ‘daughters’.”

“Daughters!?” Sunset squeaked out a yell.

“Shhhh,” Cadance shushed her gently before turning to look over her back. There was a soft cooing and she turned sideways to show off the foal safety saddle she was wearing and the little, pink bundle sleeping in it. “I was often quite jealous of Celestia with her students until I got little Flurry Heart here.”

Sunset held her breath with a blush as the foal settled back down. She couldn’t help but smile at the little sleeping face. “Celestia really talks about me?”

“A lot,” Cadance gave her little one a smile. “And I know exactly how she feels. All the good you’ve done, all the lessons you’ve learned. And lately, she’s been using the early days she spent with you and Twilight as a way to pass on a sort of ‘parenting’ advice.”

With a cringe, Sunset looked away. “Me and Twilight? The wrong and right then. Mistakes do have a lot of teaching potential.”

“ ‘Mistakes’? Really? I think you’d be surprised,” Cadance grinned and peered at Sunset’s dress. “After all I believe Twilight’s letter mentioned something about wings?”

Sunset’s wings bulged out against her dress.

Cadance gasped excitedly and rushed as loudly as she could with a sleeping foal on her back, “Show me show me!”

“But.” Sunset looked around. They were still in a part of the castle open to the public. While none of the public were currently around, anypony could walk in at any point.

Catching on, Cadance walked forward and lit her horn. A flash later and Sunset was aware of being several floors higher in a hall devoid of other ponies. She gave Cadance a blush and a sheepish smile before unfastening the dress and unfolding her amber wings.

Renae was right, it did feel good to let them out.

With a slight squeal, Cadance walked around Sunset. “They’re lovely.”

“They don’t look any different than normal pegasus wings,” Sunset countered, glancing at Cadance’s more impressive pair.

“But they look good on you. They’ll also change as you get taller.”

“Tall—? Oh right.” Sunset thought back to when they had met, when Sunset had been taller by a hair. That was a change to consider.

“You could use a preening though. Keeping them in that dress is ruffling your feathers the wrong way.”

Cadance poked a few feathers with a hoof, getting Sunset to flinch slightly from the alien feeling. “I can teach you if you want. You should know how before your coronation.”

“My cor—?! Sunset stumbled back. “Ha, ha, no, no. That’s not going to happen. Pretty sure Celestia’s just going to take these back.”

“Take them back? Your wings?”

“These have to be a fluke. You know who I was.”

“I’ve also heard a lot about who you are now.”

“But I can’t—!“ Sunset cut off her reflexive shout and started over at a lower volume to not wake the foal. “But I can’t be a princess. Even being an alicorn can’t be right. I haven’t earned it. I was just smacked in the face with a massive load of magic and then the back of the head with a tree branch. Something got screwed up in between.”

“You really think that’s all this is? What, you got the wings squished out of you? Feathers and all?”

“Maybe not literally, but it makes more sense than me just suddenly being worthy.”

“I don’t know much about the …,” Cadance paused, “alicorning process, if that’s the right word, or even a word at all, but I’m sure Harmony knows what it’s doing. And I know the good you’ve accomplished.”

Sunset sighed and lifted up a wing to examine it. “But an alicorn princess, really?”

“I thought you wanted to be a princess.”

“What I really wanted,” Sunset groaned, dropping her head and wings low, “was that mark of power, to back up what I believed I deserved and to prove it to Celestia. And everypony else. But now I know what it really means to have power—both magical and political—it’s a serious responsibility.”

“I recall you saying you wanted that too. That you were ready and could handle it all.”

Sunset chuckled darkly, “My ego was bigger than the moon.”

“Are you saying the Almighty Sunset Shimmer can’t handle the pressure of being a princess?”

“Appealing to my ego isn’t going to rile me up like it used to. I’m better than that now.”

“Oh, you say you’re better? Isn’t that invoking an ego?”

“In this case it’s being realistic. I’m less full of myself. That’s better. But the power and responsibility that comes with being an alicorn and a princess should only go to those who are truly qualified.”

Cadance gave Sunset a challenging smile. “Then let’s be ‘realistic.’ You’ve been educated by a princess and lived in the palace. You know how it works.”

“I also ran away before finishing the curriculum and I never paid as much attention to the rules, regulations, and decorum parts.”

“But it’s not like Celestia would just drop a crown on your head and tell you to take over Manehattan without help and whatever guidance you needed.”

Sunset looked back up. “It would be nice to finish my studies here.”

“And you know of the responsibilities and dangers of power. You’re intelligent and always empathetic and understanding of those around you.”

“Y-you can’t know that. That’s not the person I was when you knew me.”

“I told you, ponies talk, including princess ponies.”

As Sunset blushed from the reminder, Cadance continued. “Frankly, Sunset, what I’ve heard and everything you said just now proves that you are more worthy of a crown than I was when this thing”—she pointed to her horn—“popped out of my head.”

Cadance chuckled at a still skeptical Sunset. “You remember when we met. You were the one who got me through economics—even if Celestia forced you to do it—grumbling the whole time. I didn’t know anything about politics. I thought all ponies needed was more love and there’d magically be peace and happiness everywhere. It was months before I could even just fix my mane without giving myself a headache from bashing my horn with the brush. And learning even the simplest magics was one disaster after another.”

That got Sunset chuckling along.

“What?” Cadance asked.

“Nothing.”

“Really, what are you remembering?”

“The pancakes.”

“Augh, still?” Cadance groaned. “I really thought I could skip the spatula and just flip them with telekinesis. I had been getting good with it. They shouldn’t have gone flying everywhere.”

“Muh-hum,” Sunset nodded, holding back a laugh.

“You could have helped with the cleanup or at least told me I had a pancake impaled on my horn.”

“I could have.”

“I wondered why I felt so warm. I thought I was going into heat out of season.”

“Phfff—*cough*—you don’t say.”

“I met with Celestia right after that.”

“I know.”

“And you knew I would then too, didn’t you?”

“It’s why I said nothing.”

“She said nothing either.”

“She couldn’t.”

“Because the ambassadors were already in the room when I got there late from cleaning the kitchen.”

“I heard.”

“It was ten minutes into the meeting when it finally ripped and flopped onto the table, right onto a list of their proposed tariffs.”

“Is that why we started exporting pancake batter to Saddle Arabia?”

It was hard to tell with her pink fur, but Sunset caught the blush as Cadance paused. “Yes.” Cadance fussed with some hairs near her horn as if remembering where some crumbs had gotten stuck. “I still wonder if they thought it was a fashion statement or a protest of their rather one-sided suggestions.”

“And is Equestria still exporting batter to them?”

“More than ever.”

“Well, unconventional, but you got valuable experience in trade negotiations.”

“I was mortified.”

“Made bank for the country though.” Sunset adopted a haughty tone. “A princess must care for her people above all.”

As Sunset returned to her laughter, Cadance leaned in. “Something you understand and have done quite a bit of yourself.”

Sunset’s laughter died out as the notion crept in. She stared down at one of her new wings.

Cadance put a hoof on her shoulder. “I don’t think it’s a fluke. You’ve proven yourself, Sunset.”

A shimmering set of eyes turned up to her and she pulled Sunset into a hug.

After a time, Sunset pulled back and dried her eyes with the fur on her pastern. “F-fine,” she cleared her throat. “The wings aren’t a fluke.” She gave Cadance a smirk. “If a backwater pegasus like you could be worthy of ascension all those years ago, then of course I’m worthy now.”

Giggling, Cadance flicked Sunset’s horn with a hoof. “With a tone like that, be careful you don’t relapse.”

A hoof went to Sunset’s horn to stop the throbbing. “It’s a constant struggle,” she laughed.

“One I think Celestia would love to hear about. From the source this time.”

“I was supposed to meet her before coming here,” Sunset sighed

“You were worried she’d take your wings.”

“Or make me a princess.”

“You felt frightened of one and undeserving of the other.”

“I was afraid of both. Becoming a princess would take me away from my friends so soon after I learned how to have friends, and I have things I still want to do in the other world.”

“I’m sure Celestia won’t push you into something like that if you don’t want it. Maybe she’ll have a royal assignment for you in that other place.”

“What, annexing the humane world like the Crystal Empire?”

“Well. Maybe not that. But I wouldn’t mind chipping in some troops if you need an invasion force.”

Momentarily shocked, Sunset’s wings flared out to match her expression but she quickly recovered with a chuckle. “I wish I would have been friends with you years ago. I’m sorry for all the trouble I caused you.”

“Aww,” Cadance sighed. “But if you were the type of pony who would have befriended me, you never would have left and made your current friends.”

Sunset thought that over. “You’re right. You’re not worth it.”

“Hay!”

The pair lost themselves in laughter, forming a friendship long overdue until some commotion came from Cadance’s saddle.

“Oh, sorry, Flurry Heart,” Cadance cooed over her shoulder as the bundled foal unwrapped herself. “Mommy didn’t mean to wake you.”

Once out of her swaddling, Flurry sat up, stretched out her wings, and yawned.

“Wow!” exclaimed Sunset. “That’s an impressive wingspan.”

“According to Celestia, it’s actually a little on the small side for alicorn foals. She told me Luna used to trip over hers a lot.”

“Really?” Sunset chuckled.

“But then Luna made a face and nodded her head toward Celestia, so I think maybe it was Celestia who used to trip a lot.”

“Ha, ha, ha. I can believe it with Celestia’s wings.”

“Tia’ti,” burbled Flurry before another yawn.

“Yes, sweetie, Celestia has pretty wings. Do you want to meet your Auntie Sunset? She has pretty wings too.”

“Bbpbbpbbbbpp bpppppp.”

“Was that a no?” asked Sunset.

Cadance giggled. “That’s an ‘I’ll do it after I finish my nap’.”

Sure enough, after another yawn, Flurry settled back down and Cadance tucked her blanket back around her.

“She’s adorable,” Sunset whispered. “Good job, ‘Mom’.”

“Thank you. It seems Sunburst and Starlight really tuckered her out.”

“Sunburst and Starlight Glimmer?”

“Yes. They were foalsitting. I had just picked her up from them when I found you.”

“That’s great. I was hoping to see them while I was here.”

“I thought as much. I can take you to them. It’s great that you’re taking the time to visit your friends and family.”

“Family?” Sunset gave a surprised reply. “You know Sunburst is my brother?”

“The royal crystaller and Flurry’s most frequent foalsitter? We of course did a full background check.”

"Does he know—"

"Where you've been?" Cadance finished, getting Sunset to hold a breath while she awaited the answer. "I doubt it." Sunset released the breath. "The portal isn't an official state secret, but it is located inside a princess's castle, the owner of which—my beloved sister-in-law—still refuses to hire castle guards. It's a security issue I'm not willing to risk spreading to the wrong ears.  If Twilight's not talking about it, then I'm not. I hope her friends are doing the same."

"So, nothing about me or the portal?"

"I mentioned, offhoof, I knew you while we were both Celestia's students, but nothing more than that. I didn't think it was my place."

Sunset mulled that over with a nod. “But you knew I was his sister and you still hired him?”

“Well …," Cadance smirked, "by the time we found that out, Flurry was too attached to fire him, so our hooves were tied.”

“Thanks a lot, Candy Flank,” Sunset scoffed playfully.

Cadance smiled sweetly. “You’re welcome, Flamebrain.”

As Sunset was led to her next destination, the pair trading old insults but with a new playful tone, she smiled at Cadance. Just like old times.

But as new friends.
> Reconnecting
> --------------------------------------------------------------------------

Sunset waved goodbye to Cadance and the still sleeping Flurry Heart before turning to the door they led her to. A good friend and a long separated relative lay beyond. Things had gone well with Cadance. There shouldn’t be anything to worry about here, right?

She double-checked her dress to make sure it was hiding her wings again, took a deep breath, and knocked.

“Come in!” came Starlight Glimmer’s cheerful voice. Sunset smiled brightly.

She then opened the doors to see the remains of a warzone.

Clothes, toys, books, furniture, toys, stuffed animals, decorations, and toys were strewn all about.

Apparently alicorn foalsitting was a contact sport.

Along the walls of the room were half filled bookcases and cabinets clearly meant to house all the various things currently strewn about the floor. A table stood by one side of the room and additional doorways led to similar rooms. Starlight was busy levitating groups of assembled items into containers and filling up the cabinets and bookcases while a unicorn stallion painstakingly sorted out mismatched piles of objects for her to put away.

He had a coat just a few shades lighter than Sunset’s own and familiar white-tipped hooves. He was also—Sunset held back a snicker—wearing a magician’s cape. Little brother still hadn’t grown out of the cape phase. Though with the time difference between the worlds, he might not be the younger one anymore given the scraggly beard.

Neither pony had looked up, too busy cleaning what appeared to be one, or possibly several, game-rooms. So Sunset watched until the stallion turned around for another pile and saw her standing there. “Sunburst?” she asked.

“Yes?” he returned before peering a little closer. “Do I know you?”

That got Starlight to pause and look up. “Sunset?”

“Sunset?!” Sunburst repeated. “Sunset Shimmer?”

Chuckling, Sunset stepped into the room, but the laughter died when Sunburst stumbled away from her, putting the table between them.

“W-what are you doing here?” Sunburst squeaked. “Starlight, be careful. Keep your distance!”

“Sunburst?” Starlight questioned, putting down a pile of stuffed animals. “This is Sunset, a friend of mine.”

“Friend?!” Sunburst gasped. “She’s a friend? She doesn’t have friends! How could she be a friend?”

“We met a while back, through Twilight.” Starlight turned to Sunset. “How do you know Sunburst?”

Shaken by the reaction, Sunset looked between the pair and took a step away from Sunburst. “I, I’m his sister.”

“Half-sister,” Sunburst corrected.

“You’re related?” asked Starlight. “How did I not know this?”

“She lived in Canterlot.”

“I know she lived in—Wait. If you two are siblings, why did you live in Sire’s Hollow near me?”

“Mom doesn’t like the city … among other things there.”

“Starlight?” Sunset cut in. “You lived in Sire’s Hollow?”

“Yes, Sunburst and I grew up together.”

“You did? Wait. He’s ‘the guy’?”

“My foalhood friend? Yes.”

“Sunburst!” Big sister stomped a hoof. “You got your cutie mark and just walked out of your best friend’s life like that?”

“You walked out of mine first,” Sunburst accused.

“Sounds like you're happy I did.”

“Yes!”

“Sunburst!” Starlight admonished him.

“She’s scary!” Sunburst defended.

“My friend is not scary!”

“I used to be,” Sunset confirmed.

“See?” Sunburst pointed a hoof at Sunset. “She admits it!”

“But she’s not scary now!” Starlight pleaded. “Sure she’s done bad things in the past, but she’s sorry about them. Just like me really.” She blinked and looked to Sunset then Sunburst. “Wait. What is it with you and evil mares anyway?”

“Have you met his parents?” offered Sunset.

“Hay!” complained Sunburst.

“I’m including our Dad in that. Not a mare, but he's got the bulk of the evil. All your mom had was being an overly peppy perfectionist.”

“My Mom is not a peppy perfection …,” Sunburst trailed off as if his brain had just caught up with his mouth.

“More like a control freak,” suggested Starlight.

“But that only started after she left,” Sunburst pointed at Sunset. “And then the divorce.”

“Divorce?” asked Sunset. “They weren’t even married.”

“Mom put her hoof down after you left.”

“Clearly that didn’t go over well.”

Sunburst lowered his hoof and groaned out a sigh. “Didn’t even make it to their anniversary.”

““Ouch,”” remarked Sunset and Starlight.

The depressing turn put an end to the shouting.

Sunset resolved herself and stepped forward. “Sunbur—“

Squeak–squeek-squeee…

Her hoof kicked a pile of squeaky plush dolls. Lighting her horn, she lifted the pile and set them aside, but when she turned back to Sunburst with her horn’s aura not yet faded, he flinched and covered his head.

“Please no more magic swirlies!” he cried.

“Magic swirlies?” asked Starlight, getting a guilty cringe from Sunset.

“It would always take Mom forever to brush out the knots.”

“Is that why Sunset is ‘scary’?”

“Mom really attacked those knots.”

Starlight gave him a flat look.

“Mane and tail!”

“I’m sure Sunset isn’t going to give you any ‘magic swirlies’.”

When Sunburst looked like he had something to add, Sunset cut him off. “Or any of the other things I used to do when I didn’t want you around.”

“What the hay is a magic swirly anyway?”

“I’d rather not relive those memories any more than I already am,” Sunburst answered looking at Sunset.

“Same,” Sunset sullenly agreed.

In the silence that followed, Starlight looked back and forth between the two suns seemingly incapable of looking at each other. “Well isn’t this … wonderful?” she tried to laugh. “Two long lost siblings—“

“Half,” Sunburst reminded her.

“—uh, finally meeting again. Heheh, yay?”

“What are you even doing here?” Sunburst asked. “How are you here? You’ve been missing for years.”

“Well, first, I came to apologize,” Sunset answered.

“For the swirlies?”

“For all of it. I had actually forgotten about the swirlies.”

“How could you forget about the swirlies?!”

“Well, I guess stuff like the fire flower were more … memorable?”

“Fire flower?” asked Starlight.

“A giant sunflower that spits fireballs!” exclaimed Sunburst.

“It was to be a home security sentry,” Sunset explained. “A lot of my spells have a fire theme.”

“She’s a pyromaniac!”

“In my defense, Sunburst unexpectedly visited when I was still working out the kinks.”

“It grew legs and chased me around the yard!”

“It was supposed to grow legs and chase intruders until they leave the property.”

“I was not an intruder!”

“I may have neglected to tell it that.”

“I had already been there for two days!”

“I may have neglected on purpose.”

“It burnt my tail off!”

“I apologized.”

“Dad made you!”

Sunset sighed. “Yeah, he did. But I really am sorry.”

“Were you sorry then?”

“I’m sorry now. And I mean that.”

“So,” Starlight began, “why were you making a fire-breathing, mobile, flower-based home sentry?”

“School project,” Sunset said simply.

“Did Celestia ask you to do that?”

“Independent project for extra credit.”

“I thought you got excellent grades.”

“I did. It was really more for fun when I got bored.”

Sunburst pointed to Sunset again and whispered to Starlight, “Pyro.”

“I had already constructed a flamegate spell and firewalker rune in my spare time.”

“See?” Sunburst whispered again.

“Uh, but,” Sunset cleared her throat. “I really did come here to apologize for all of that, and much more. I know I wasn’t very nice to you. I guess I scared you more than I realized. I know I was wrong and was in the wrong for a long time. Whenever our parents forced us together I often took my frustrations out on you and I never should have.”

She looked him in the eyes. “Sunburst. I know you have no reason to forgive me, but even if you never do, I’m sorry, for all of it.”

Starlight came up beside her and hooked a foreleg over her withers. Sunset returned a quick, friendly nuzzle before they separated.

They waited, watching Sunburst for any reaction. His eyes focused and unfocused as if looking between Sunset and his memories of her. Starlight gave Sunset a large, toothy grin that did none of the soothing it was intended to.

Tentatively, Sunset stepped closer and sat by the table Sunburst remained standing behind. “Sooooo …,” she awkwardly drawled. “You two foalsit Flurry Heart.”

“Yeah!” Starlight overly cheered. “Mostly just Sunburst, he is the royal crystaller after all, but I came over about a week ago for a visit. It was Sunburst’s idea! It’s the anniversary of when he got his cutie mark and he wanted to change my bad memory of it to a good one. Isn’t he so thoughtful?!”

“And then I showed up,” Sunset sighed. “I’m sorry. I really should have visited Celestia first.” Standing up, she turned to leave, glanced sadly at Sunburst, and addressed Starlight. “Maybe I’ll see you later.”

“What?!” Starlight gasped. “No, no. You don’t have to go. I mean it’s not every day you get to visit from the other world.”

“ ‘Other world’?” asked Sunburst.

Starlight’s eyes widened. “YES! There’s a portal to another world completely different from Equis! Right, Sunset?!”

“Well—wahhh!” Sunset faltered when Starlight’s aura lit up her hooves and pulled her back. “Uh. Yes? Star Swirl made—”

“Star Swirl the Bearded?” perked Sunburst.

“Ha-ha!” Starlight cheered, her trap sprung. “What other Star Swirls are there?”

“Several, actually, but none who—“

“Doesn’t matter!” Starlight cut him off. “Sunset, tell him all about Star Swirl—the Bearded’s—rare. Antique. Magical. Portal!”

Sunset gave Starlight a quisitive glance before turning to Sunburst to see wide, attentive eyes. The kind of expression that often accompanied the furious writing down of notes during a lecture. “Oh,” she let out. “Oh! Uh, yes! Of course.”


*** *** ***


It was more than an hour later when Starlight had finished cleaning the game rooms, and ran out of popcorn, but the siblings were still at it.

“So how high do these ‘airplanes’ fly?” asked Sunburst.

“I think most commercial passenger flights go about six or seven miles high, but some specialized planes can get to fifteen,” answered Sunset.

Sunburst crunched some numbers in his notebook before dropping his quill in surprise. “And all that’s without magic of any kind?”

“Yep. I think that one was using hydrogen fuels, but I haven’t really studied aircraft technology much.”

“And batteries in that world are just chemical reactions? No runes or crystals?”

Sunset let out a laugh. “Oh, you’d flip if I could show you my phone.”

“The long distance communication devices. You own one?”

“Many also play games, store and process data, and calculate faster than any abacus. Plus contain full libraries of knowledge. Everybody has at least one. Either in their homes or a mobile one they keep in a pocket.”

“A pocket!?”

“Most people our age find it difficult to get by without them.”

“So, anypony can just ‘call’ anypony else at any time? Instant communication across the whole world?”

“As long as they pay their monthly bills.”

SLUUUUuuuurrrrrrrrrrp

The two looked over at a sheepish Starlight, straw in her mouth and an apparently empty beverage in her aura. “Oops,” she giggled.

“Oh, Starlight,” Sunburst began. “I’m sorry. I got carried away and left you out again, didn’t I?”

That just increased the giggles. “Don’t worry. I’m actually enjoying this. I’m happy you two are getting along.”

“We are!?” Sunburst squeaked, turning back to Sunset and flinching. “Oh, I, I guess we are.”

“So is she still ‘scary’?”

“Well, I guess not. You really encountered this Memory Stone and defeated the Sirens?”

“Well, not alone. I had help,” explained Sunset.

“Your friends. You have friends.”

“Amazing friends,” Sunset smiled. “Even befriended one of the Sirens with hopes the other two will follow.”

“That’s … really impressive.”

“Well, you might not think that if you actually met Aria. You could say she’s an acquired taste. And no one's allowed to let her know Star Swirl is back from Limbo.”

“We’ll keep that in mind. And we might want to add Stygian and the others to that,” noted Starlight before switching to a cheer. “Twilight’s going to be so happy you two are friends now!”

Sunset chuckled. “You’ll be getting more brownie points for helping us patch things up.” She then looked to Sunburst. “I hope.” She reached out a hoof. “Can you forgive me?”

Sunburst looked at the hoof and seemed to consider it for a moment. “You’ve been through a lot, and it seems like you really have changed. Yes.” He smiled, reaching out to bump the hoof. “I forgive you, Sunset.”

Sunset’s eyes lit up and she gasped excitedly, but she had no way to exhale once Starlight hugged her around the neck with a squeal. “I can’t wait to tell Twilight!”

“Uh, Starlight?” Sunburst began, seeing Sunset’s panicked face. “I just got my sister back, I don’t really want to have to rush her to the hospital.”

“Oh!” Starlight squeaked and let go of Sunset, letting her exhale and refill her lungs. “Sorry. Too much time around Pinkie.”

“N-no problem,” Sunset answered. As Sunset recovered, Starlight noticed some odd rustling through the sides of Sunset’s dress. Catching the question on her expression, Sunset was quick to start another topic. “So, Sunburst. Since I left before you got your cutie mark, I’ve never actually seen it. Stars, like on your cape?”

“Oh, no. Not like the cape itself, but the clasp. An orange sun with stars and sun rays.” He turned sideways and briefly lifted his cape to show it off.

“And you got it while performing magic. Definitely a great mark for you. I bet the sun rays are a metaphor for spreading knowledge. And stars—“

“Are often ideograms indicative of magical talent,” he recited.

“My brother the magic scholar!” Sunset beamed, giving her hooves a few happy claps.

Sunburst’s ears drooped and he opened his mouth, but Sunset was already continuing.

“But no wizard’s hat to top your cape?” Sunset giggled. “I saw the roof of your house.”

“Oh,” Sunburst blushed. “That.”

“Is that why you moved in there or did you actually get it custom sculpted?”

“Well, I came to the Empire pretty early after Princess Cadance took over and bought a house for sale near the library.”

“Ooh, that’s a lucky find.”

“Many of the Crystal ponies were still sorting through their memories after Sombra’s curse was lifted. I found a few ponies who were making repairs and was fascinated with the crystal work they were doing. I asked if I could get one of them to make a wizard’s hat out of crystal. They said they would be happy to but it would take a while. I showed them my house and headed out for another day of study. I had meant just a small figurine, but when I got home, the whole roof had been changed. I asked what happened and they said they were crystal carpenters. What else were they supposed to do?”

“Haha, and it fits you so well. But why don’t you wear a hat to go with your cape?”

“Well, I have one, but I thought adding it to the cape was a bit over the top.”

Sunset giggled. “Have you met Trixie Lulamoon?”

“I have! She’s a good friend of ours, but meeting her confirmed my hypothesis.”

The three laughed but Starlight pipped in a comment, “Careful not to let her hear that.”

“Oh she’ll be fine,” said Sunset. “I don’t know much about the one in this world but the one in m—the other world thrives on being over the top. I think she’d take it as a compliment.”

Sunburst and Starlight looked at each other and nodded. “That’s Trixie alright,” concluded Starlight to more laughter.

“I’m so happy this worked out,” Sunset sighed in relief. “I was so worried I’d screw something up or I’d be turned away. I actually delayed talking to Celestia and tried to slip past Cadance for fear of being arrested.”

“But you’ve been pardoned,” said Starlight.

“I know that now, thanks to Cadance. Before though, I got it in my head that maybe Twilight or Celestia forgot to make it official.”

“So now that you don’t have to worry about getting thrown in jail, how long are you staying in Equestria?”

“Not sure yet. I’ve cleared things in the other world so I don’t have to go back right away, but talking to Celestia is the only thing left I had planned to do here. I’ll probably head back after that.”

“You already talked with Dad?” asked Sunburst.

“Don’t really see the point.” Sunset shrugged. “He’d either be too busy to talk or just plain wouldn’t want to see me.”

“Actually.” Sunburst paused, getting the mares to look over to see a concerned expression. “Things for all of us were a bit more complicated than you seem to realize. Things weren’t so great after you left.”

“What do you mean?” asked Sunset. “You and Stellar Flare were living in Sire’s Hollow and neither of you really liked me anyway. And Dad had more time for work whenever I was seen and not heard. I thought you would have preferred me gone.”

With a guilty expression, Sunburst nodded. “I’m sorry to say that was my first reaction. But Dad took it hard.”

Sunset raised a skeptical eyebrow. “You sure? I expected it would take years for Dad to even notice I was gone unless he looked up my school records to make sure my grades were still performing to expectations, or if …,” Sunset finished with a groan. “Please don’t say Celestia told him.”

Sunburst said nothing.

Sunset put a hoof to her face. “But she knew we weren’t speaking to each other.”

“You were still a ‘missing’ pony. An underaged one at that and Celestia was your teacher. I don’t think she had a choice. EEA policy, of course.”

“Ugh, why hadn’t I considered—no, I think I just didn’t care to consider that.” Sunset groaned. “Alright, what did I miss?”

With a sigh, Sunburst settled down to tell the tale. Starlight shifted closer to his side. “I didn’t know you were gone until after I got my cutie mark and Mom and I moved in with Dad in Canterlot so I could attend PCSGU. That’s when Mom began insisting they get married so we could be a ‘proper family’. It took a while but Dad eventually gave in.”

“Except that didn’t last long,” Sunset recalled.

“Right. Things were rocky from the start. Dad always seemed preoccupied and kept to his work.”

“Well, that’s no different than before. You just never lived with him full time.”

“Perhaps, but Mom seemed to think something was different. She went out of her way to always fix things and make sure to, and I quote, ‘address problems before they are problems’.”

“That’s still no different than what I remember.”

“But this was much more than usual. She obsessed over everything! She made schedules for all of us daily and diagrams for the decorators even down to flower arrangements and fruit baskets! She redid every room and—“

“Whoa. She redecorated the whole house? My house?”

“Well, it wasn’t really yours anymore?”

Sunset snorted. “Would I even recognize the place if I went back? My Mom actually worked on the original blueprints. It was her design.”

“Well … none of us changed your room.”

Starlight patted Sunset’s hoof in sympathy when she cringed.

“So,” Sunburst continued, “things weren’t going well between them, and I decided to move into the dorms for my sophomore year which likely didn’t help. I think they mostly stayed together for my sake. Then, after the divorce happened, Mom moved back to Sire’s Hollow.”

“I remember that,” said Starlight. “She joined the Sire’s Hollow Development Committee not long after.”

Sunburst turned to her with a sad expression. “I’m really sorry for not keeping in touch with you.”

“It’s in the past,” Starlight assured him, “and we’re back to being friends again.”

They smiled at each other as Sunset watched, noting their expressions with a bit of intrigue.

“Thank you, Starlight.” Sunburst smiled a moment longer before continuing his story. “After that, I really only saw Dad when he visited the school on his rounds, rarely a personal visit. He was always formal and seemed only concerned with my grades.”

“That sounds right,” said Sunset. “All Dad cared about were my achievements.”

“Same here. And I had none.”

“None? But you’re a—“

“Sure,” Sunburst cut her off, “I’m a scholar, but just a scholar. Dad wanted a mage. He wanted you. I have knowledge, but not much power. Worse, I couldn’t do anything under the pressure and ended up just sticking to the books when my magic wasn’t up to his standards. I couldn’t measure up to you. I stopped trying. In the end, I just don’t think he liked me that much.”

“What?” exclaimed Sunset. “Of course he liked you. Your Mom’s a unicorn. If anything, he expected much more from you than me.”

“More? You were Princess Celestia’s personal student! How could I compete with that?”

“Welcome to my world, little brother. The one I left behind.”

“And that’s why you left?”

Sunset just gave a laugh that decayed to a sigh. “Far from it. Dad had long stopped being something I’d even thought about. He may have pushed me for greater achievements, but I wanted power. And I didn’t do it for him. I left because I felt Celestia was holding me back from what I deserved. As much as I’d like to say otherwise, I was the problem, not him, no matter how much my therapist suggests otherwise.”

“You have a therapist?” asked Sunburst.

“Long story.” Sunset grunted a laugh before looking back to him. “But at least one of us finished school.”

“Actually …,” Sunburst returned a sheepish cringe.

“Oh no. What happened?”

“With all the pressure, I just dropped out. I worked as a librarian until the Crystal Empire returned and moved here.” Sunburst’s dour expression suddenly brightened. “And it’s been great! First, the library here has so much knowledge that has been lost to Equestria for so long and I’m working to preserve and duplicate the the unique tomes and scrolls I find, then I reconnected with Starlight, became Royal Crystaller, met all five princesses directly, and was invited to continue my studies through correspondence courses by Princess Celestia herself! I haven’t graduated yet, but I will!

Giggling, Starlight pulled him into a hug and Sunset brightened into a smile. “That’s great!” cheered Sunset. “And forget Dad. You don’t need to be his grand archmage. Be the pony you want to be. And it sounds like you’re already doing that. Who cares if it isn’t totally”—Sunset chuckled.

““ ‘By the book’?”” Sunburst and Sunset said together.

“Not by Dad’s book for sure,” Sunset finished up. “And somepony needs to preserve magic. How else will future generations learn? And it’s the scholars who are the groundwork in advancing most spellcraft. Now you can perfect my fire flower for me.”

Sunburst backed away. “I am not going anywhere near that spell!”

“Aww, why not?” Sunset laughed. “I’m sure there’s a copy in my room somewhere.”

“I bet there’s a lot of spells in your room I don’t want to go near.”

“Yep,” Sunset affirmed.

After a bit of time while the laughter between the three of them died down, Sunburst dried an eye and cleared his throat. “You know, you should talk to Dad. He’s turned over a new leaf too.”

“Dad? I find that hard to believe.”

Starlight giggled. “It’s true, and all thanks to Twilight and her students.”

“Twilight again?” Sunset giggled. “Not to cast doubt on her motivational skills but I’ll believe it when I see it. He may be the only one who owes me an apology instead of the other way around, but I’m not exactly interested in looking for one right now especially with the risk of getting a shouting match instead.”

Sunburst reached out to Sunset, putting a hoof on one of hers. “Consider it. I’ve been trading letters with him lately. He’s got a long way to go, but I really think he’d like to see you.”

Sunset put another hoof out, holding Sunburst’s between hers and sighed, lowering her head to the table. “Celestia is next,” she simply said. “After that … I’ll consider it.”

Starlight added a hoof to the pile. “Would you like us to go with you if you do?”

“Yes,” nodded Sunburst, “We can go with you if you want.”

Sunset smiled at them, lit her horn, and teleported the table across the room. Starlight and Sunburst sat up taller just in time for Sunset to take both of them into a hug. “Thank you, but that’s something I’d have to do one-on-one.”

They tightened the hug and Starlight felt something shift along Sunset’s side. “Sunset, are you alright?”

“Huh?” Sunset answered, pulling back and following Starlight’s eyes. “Oh! Uh, right.”

“Don’t ‘uh right’ me,” Starlight copied. “Are you hurt?” she asked, using her magic to unfasten the dress.

“S-Starlight,” Sunset squeaked, taking a couple steps back. “I should explain—“

With the dress unfastened, Starlight lifted it up. One of Sunset’s wings clipped the edge of the dress and she flinched, the pair opening on reflex.

She stood there, wings at full spread. Sunburst and Starlight’s jaws dropped.

“Um,” Sunset smiled sheepishly, “It’s been a busy week.”
> Home
> --------------------------------------------------------------------------

Sunset remained another day in the Crystal Empire before boarding a train back to Canterlot. During the visit, she had stayed with her friends, Starlight and Cadance, as well as her brother, filling them in on the past week’s events, including what led to the new wings. So many questions were asked. Some from an excited scholar, others from an ecstatic, and possibly jealous, friend. But there was plenty of time left over to just enjoy being together and catch up. She even helped foalsit little Flurry Heart.

“Alicorn foals,” Sunset more than once thought to herself while looking at the wings stuffed in her dress, “another thing to consider.”

It was nice though. She gained a family member. It had been a long time since she had any. Of course her friends had been her family for years now, but being able to say brother—and not with an annoyed groan—was wonderful. Add to that how Cadance kept trying to get Flurry to say “Auntie Sunny,” and Sunset couldn’t help but smile most of the day, even when crashing into walls while trying to fly with her “niece.”

She gave herself another smile and looked at the beginner’s flight books. Two chapters. That was all she had left to read in the last book, having had a much easier time concentrating with so much weight lifted from her withers. The more restful sleep certainly helped as well. She turned to her train window and took a breath seeing the castle come into view. It was time to see Celestia.

No more running away.


*** *** ***


She arrived just in time to help Renae pack up for her return trip to Ponyville and eventually the portal. The others, except Flash and Twilight, were also returning now that their political duties were complete. She waved goodbye and faced the castle again, eyes going back to the window of her old room for a quick moment.

Having asked a guard who knew her, she learned there was still half an hour before Celestia had any free time, so she made an appointment and sat in front of that imposing, white door leading to the throne room and willed her heart to stop racing.

“Okay, Sunset,” she whispered to herself to not bother the guards, “you can do this … this time. There’s no need to be nervous. I won’t be arrested. She won’t take my wings or force me to remain in Equestria away from my friends. So what if I’m an alicorn now? That won’t matter once I’m in the other world, and I can only visit sparingly, so she won’t see me as a danger and the public will never know about me.

“Even better,” she continued, “Celestia wouldn’t want me to be nervous around her. We’ve been so close and, even though I clearly tested her patience a lot and took our relationship for granted, I think we were friends for a lot of my time here. If only I could have kept my head out of my plot long enough to understand that back then.”

She chuckled to herself. “This isn’t even the first time I’ve seen her since becoming a …,” her ears dropped, “traitor to the throne”—she brightened up again, ears perking straight up—“I already came back once and we made up during the Memory Stone incident.”

Another chuckle tickled her. “Thanks, Wallflower. Blessing in disguise I suppose.”

But then there was a sudden drop in her expression. “Though back then we barely talked. We made up but never chatted, never got caught up on life events, never really reconnected. That’s going to be today. That’s going to be just a few minutes from now!”

Sunset stood up and began pacing again in a small, pony-length circle in front of the beautiful, sparkling door of doom.

A few rotations shy of becoming dizzy she stopped and planted herself down with a triumphant hoof raised in the air. “NO!” she nearly shouted, getting a few guards looking her way. “It’s fine. It will be fine. Just be her friend. Just like old times, but the way it should have been!”

She closed her eyes and smiled.

Just then, the clock tower rang, signifying the end of whatever Celestia had been doing instead of her usual Day Court that day and the time Sunset’s meeting with her was scheduled for. Sunset squeaked and jumped forward, tripping onto her face, only quickly realizing she had been facing away from the door and at a blank wall.

She heard the the door open behind her and the Marshal of the Court’s voice call out, “Announcing Miss Sunset Shimmer, former student”—

Sunset scrambled to stand and get presentable using a collection of telekinetic winds to quickly fix her mane and tail. She turned and, with a sly smile, unfastened her dress just as the announcement finished.

She galloped through, all traces of worry gone, now just happy to be with her favorite teacher again. There, standing in all her regal glory before the dais was Princess Celestia looking back at her with a warm smile growing on her face.

Be her friend, Sunset ran through her mind again.

“Yo, Celestia!” she cheered, opening her wings, flinging the dress away in the process, and striking a showmare’s pose she imagined the Equestrian Trixie might frequently sport. “Bam! Who’s got a horn and two shiny new wings?” She pointed to herself with her wingtips. “This mare!”

Celestia seemed taken aback at the dramatic display and Sunset afforded herself just a touch of the old pride at having stunned her mentor—in a good, fun way—when she noticed Celestia had shifted to look past her. Sunset’s heart pounded, having only just now come to wonder why there had been an announcer. She turned and looked down the throne room to see easily fifty ponies all in fancy clothes, fancy for Canterlot clothes, just staring at her, or more specifically her horn and wings.

“Oh horse apples.”


*** *** ***


“I’m so sorry!” Sunset rushed, now ushered to a secure meeting room away from the commencement party for the latest graduating class of Princess Celestia’s School for Gifted Unicorns. “The guard told me you had an opening in your schedule. I made an appointment and everything!”

“It’s alright, Sunset,” Celestia eased her with that soothing voice Sunset could never forget. “The guard may have thought you had a presentation. Other students have done so.”

“﻿‘Presentation’ is right! I should have made sure he knew I meant an appointment in private. There’s going to be an uproar if ponies know there’s another alicorn around! It’ll be in all the papers! My name was announced! They’ll find my history, they’ll know what I did. What I tried to do.”

“Twilight is attending as an alumna. The other world’s Flash Sentry is her guest. I’m sure they’ll handle the situation.”

“Maybe it’ll all go down as a prank. I don’t want to cause any more trouble for you! I’ve done enough already.”

“Sunset,” Celestia stroked Sunset’s mane with a hoof, “Twilight will have everything under control. I’ve given her worse tasks and this will give her more experience dealing with the nobles.” Celestia paused and seemed to consider her words. “Though I suspect she’d prefer to fight Discord again.”

“Is there anything we can do to help?”

“Of course there is.” Celestia smiled. “We can stay here to give her room to work, and finally catch up together.”

“That’s it?”

“Twilight knows where we are if she needs us. Now,” Celestia stepped back, “show me those wings.”

It took a moment as Sunset thought over the situation, and her expression shifted a few times between worried and apologetic before settling on a smile when she looked up to Celestia’s face. She stood tall, gave her wings a good flap before spreading them wide, and beamed happily at her mentor.

Celestia smiled down at her. She took a breath, blinking an eye before bringing a hoof to it.

Sunset took a step forward. “Celestia?”

“I’m so proud of you, my ever-enthusiastic student. I always knew you could do it.”

Sunset’s eyes shimmered, beading up with tears. “You did?”

“Always.” Celestia walked up to Sunset and wrapped one of her own wings around her student’s.

Sunset leaned into the hug and let the years she spent away flow from her eyes.

She lost track of time, but distinctly noticed multiple drops of moisture fall onto her before there was a knock on the door.

Celestia stiffened and took a moment before soothing Sunset’s mane down, taking a step to the side and clearing her throat. “Yes? Enter please,” she said, giving a smile down at Sunset drying her own eyes.

A guard opened the door and saluted. “Your Highness, Princess Twilight sent me to inform you both that ‘everything is under control’.”

A motion caught Sunset’s eye. “Did your ear just twitch?”

The guard looked from Celestia to Sunset, did a double-take at the new alicorn, and considered it a good idea to answer. “Yes, uh, Your H—ma’am?” Celestia smiled at the reaction.

“Did you twitch your ear because that’s what Twilight’s did when she gave you that message?”

”Accuracy is important.”

Sunset and Celestia traded a worried glance between them.


*** *** ***


It turned out Twilight did have everything under control. The students were laughing and enjoying themselves and the parents not wearing the fanciest of clothes were as well. This left only those fanciest adults looking as if somepony had dropped a dead rat on their dinner table, but that was the normal expression for many nobles anyway.

The only things that stood out were the way Twilight’s mane was frazzled and, of course, her usual dance steps being mirrored by Flash and a small collection of giggling students. It seemed the dance itself was enough to command attention away from the memory of Sunset’s earlier display.

Celestia and Sunset retreated from the secret alcove high above the throne room where they had observed the odd dance party and teleported back to the meeting room.

“Do you often sneakily watch over Twilight like that?” Sunset asked.

“Hmm,” Celestia tapped her chin as a mock display of indecision. “If I said yes, would you keep it a secret?”

Sunset put a hoof over her mouth and failed to hold back a snicker that Celestia joined in on.

Once that was passed, Sunset steadied herself with a breath. “So, you know what happened?” She lifted a wing. “Twilight sent you a letter?”

“She did, and I couldn’t be prouder how you handled yourself. That much raw magic would have corrupted anypony.”

A small smile and a blush flashed on Sunset’s face for a moment. “But I’m still not sure how I woke up with wings. I thought it was a spell that triggered the ascension.” Her bright expression soured a bit. “I actually found it in the forbidden section of the archives before I went to the other world.”

“Yes, Sunset,” Celestia softly confirmed. “There is a spell, but it will fail silently when cast if the proper conditions are not met.”

“So, if you had cast it on me when I … well ‘demanded’ it—“

“The spell would have failed.”

Sunset dropped her head. “That would not have gone well for my ego at the time. Or my temper.”

“Exactly why I refused.”

After a sigh, Sunset looked back up. “What conditions does the spell need?”

“Perhaps the biggest condition is that the spell must be cast specifically on a pony’s spirit or astral form, and most ponies do not have one strong enough for the spell to resonate with.”

“Astral form?” Sunset considered. “Twilight told me that she got her wings after meeting with you in—“

“The astral plane. I felt it when she entered and it was then that I knew she was ready. An exceptional astral form is necessary to enter there, where the spell is most likely to work.”

“And it was the feedback from completing Star Swirl’s spell that sent her there?”

“In a way.” Celestia reached out and smoothed out a few errant feathers on one of Sunset’s wings. “As an alicorn, you will eventually be able to see both the strength and potential of the astral forms in other ponies. I could see Twilight’s grow stronger over time, especially after she moved to Ponyville. Once hers was strong enough, she was…” Celestia paused to consider her words. “Invited to the astral plane.”

“ ‘Invited’? The astral plane passes out invitations through spontaneous equine combustion?”

“I’ve never actually seen it happen myself. I've only greeted the ponies after they arrived. It did sound that way listening to Twilight’s friends giving their accounts. Sadly there were no credible witnesses of Cadance’s ‘invitation’. Luna and I, and of course Flurry Heart, were alicorns from birth.”

“And me?”

“Similar to Twilight according to her letter.”

“So I exploded when they rainbow’d me this time and they never said anything?”

Celestia giggled. “Perhaps they didn’t want to overwhelm you, thinking the wings were a big enough surprise.”

“No kidding,” chuckled Sunset, looking at her wings again. “Why don’t I remember being in the astral plane?”

“You were unconscious when I found you.” Celestia sighed. “And I had such a wonderful ballad ready.”

Sunset reached up and felt the tiny remainder of the lump from Fluttershy’s tree branch. “Must have hit me hard to knock out even my astral form.”

“That did worry me. I was not aware that could happen.”

“But you cast the spell on me anyway?”

“Actually, I only sent you back to the physical plane. You were already an alicorn when I found you.”

“But how?”

“I don’t know, but the spell isn’t the only way for a pony to become an alicorn. Luna and I were the last in a long line of native alicorns from our village. There were legends on how we came to be, but nopony really knew. Only that it was tied to ‘our strong spirits’. With how strong your astral form was at the time, it may have been spontaneous or granted by forces ponykind does not yet understand.”

“It was that strong? Wait. If you can see a pony’s astral form, then you knew how strong—or weak—mine was when we met?”

“It’s part of how I choose my students,” Celestia answered. “You and Twilight both had great potential from the beginning.”

“What determines the strength of an astral form? Does it have to do with magical ability? I’m sure Starlight would like to know.”

“Even I don’t know what factors are involved. Star Swirl was trying to study them with me, but we never got any clear answers. We do know that they have nothing to do with a pony’s magic and all pony tribes have them in equal measure.”

“But if mine and Twilight’s got stronger over time does it have to do with friendship? Have you checked Pinkie?”

“All of Twilight’s friends have a strong astral form. Not strong enough for the astral plane though, and I didn’t see Pinkie Pie’s as particularly stronger than the others. Fluttershy’s is the strongest among them.”

“Kindness?” Sunset thought out loud. “A connection to nature or harmony? The Tree of Harmony? Is prophecy involved?”

“Now you’re coming closer to what Star Swirl and I could determine.” After a thought, Celestia permitted herself to roll her eyes. “Astral forms are quite rare among the nobles. Greed and pride seem to be severe detriments.”

“The Twilights said I absorbed all that magic and made it my own after the rainbow hit me and that’s when the astral plane, uh, invited me in but also that my transformation at the Friendship Games likely played a part.”

“I agree, Sunset. I remember how yours had changed when you visited to research the Memory Stone. I was surprised you didn’t immediately get invited then. It was a struggle to not tell you, but I wanted to surprise you when it happened. The events this week may have simply pushed you over the line.”

“This week was just a ‘push’ huh?” Sunset chuckled before looking away in thought. She hummed and tapped her chin.

“I know that look,” smiled Celestia. “Somepony is looking to do another study project.”

Smiling, Sunset put her hoof back down. “It would be nice to study Equestrian magic as it is in Equestria again. In the other world it’s been like starting from scratch.”

“You are always welcome to continue your studies with me.”

“Really?!” Sunset brightened up and beamed at her teacher, wings extending in excitement. “You’d let me do that?”

“Of course.” Celestia reached a foreleg over Sunset’s shoulder. “I’d be delighted to have you back here. I still have your room set up for you.”

“My room?”

In a flash of Celestia’s horn, the two were teleported to a familiar hall, looking at a familiar door still sporting Sunset’s cutie mark.

“I—I thought you would have cleaned it out by now.”

“I would have if I hadn’t expected you to return someday.”

Sunset turned a pair of watering eyes toward Celestia.

“And you did,” Celestia continued.

“I’m—I’m sorry it took so long,” Sunset choked while drying her eyes.

“Hopefully not so long that you’ve forgotten the combination,” smiled Celestia.

Sunset turned back to the door and blinked the remaining tears away before lighting her horn. A moment later there was a click as the door’s latch opened. She steadied herself and pushed it open with a hoof.

The room before them was a studious one. Bed, desk, bookshelves, kitchenette, and many various awards, study materials, and projects both finished and left in progress neatly spread around.

“I’ve had Squeaky Clean come up here to dust every other moon and the library books have long since been returned—I didn't want you to incur any late fees—but otherwise the room is untouched,” explained Celestia.

Warrrk, came an excited, avian call.

“Oh! And some creature heard you were here today.”

Sunset looked up to see a fiery, red creature dive directly for her. “Philo—!“ was all she got out before being tackled. “Gah!”

Warrrrrk!

“Would you—get—eahhh!”

Schreee!

As the alicorn and phoenix wrestled around the room, Celestia calmly chuckled and headed for the kitchenette to make some tea. Two cups and a saucer were prepared on a dining table by the time Sunset flopped to the floor defeated with the phoenix chirping in victory from atop her head.

“She missed you,” chuckled Celestia, sitting by the table in front of a cup. A flighty little chirp confirmed her statement.

“Uguu,” groaned Sunset from the floor. “I missed you too, Philomena.” Whether it was to answer her or gloat was uncertain, but Philomena happily bounced on Sunset’s head as she tried to stand. “Alright, alright! You win!”

Chirrp twe-twe-tweet, Philomena giggled while hopping to the saucer of tea.

“Featherbrain,” Sunset retorted, pulling herself up to her own cup and sticking out her tongue at her assailant. Philomena just shrugged her wings in reply and dug out an amber feather that got lodged into hers. “Hay! That’s mine.” Philomena blew on the feather sending it back toward Sunset who glared as it fluttered to the table. “Pest.”

Philomena blew a raspberry then lapped up some tea from the saucer.

Sunset fumed for a moment before letting out a chuckle. “I really don’t know why, but I think I actually did miss you.”

Wurrk?

“A little.”

Twit

“Oh yeah? Same to you, buddy!” Sunset replied with a smile.

“Wonderful!” Celestia cheered. “Philomena was so depressed after you left she almost molted early.”

“Is that so?” asked Sunset, looking over just in time to catch a brief blush from the phoenix.

Chuirrp! Philomena claimed proudly, tilting her head up.

“Heh. Faker.”

The blush returned.

“I see you still know some way to sneak in my room on your own.”

Philomena bobbed her head.

“Philomena,” Celestia began, “Sunset and I were just discussing the possibility of her resuming her studies here.”

Rceeaaly? Philomena hopped excitedly before freezing and trying to cover with a dismissive chirp.

“Too late, you old bird,” Sunset laughed. “The jig is up.”

Blushing again, Philomena squeaked and flew up to the ceiling and around some bookcases out of sight. Sunset gave chase but returned a moment later rolling her eyes. “Still can’t figure out how she keeps getting in and out of here.”

“It’s an old castle,” Celestia chuckled. “She knows many hiding spots and passages.”

“And I spent weeks one semester fortifying the walls and windows trying to keep her out.”

“But now you two can be friends.”

“We’ll see,” Sunset snickered.

“So, about that offer,” began Celestia after a sip of tea.

Sunset’s aura, having begun levitating her teacup, faltered and lowered the cup back to the table. She thought for a time. “I do want to continue my studies with you. Magic, diplomacy, even friendship—though Twilight’s taken over my lessons there—but I don’t know if I can. The portal can only be used sparingly and we don’t know how many uses we can get out of it, or if it will still repair the boundary between the worlds every thirty moons or not.” She closed her eyes. “I have to make a … a definitive choice.”

“And you’ll have my support in whatever you choose,” Celestia encouraged her.

Sunset pictured her apartment back in the humane world, the school there, all the new adventures, and most of all her friends and how much they meant to her. She then opened her eyes to look around her old dorm room and mentor and thought back on her life before the portal. “Princess Celestia?” she creaked, a tear forming in one of her eyes.

“Yes, my little pony?”

“I, I don’t think this is home anymore.”

Celestia stood and walked up to Sunset, pulling her into a nuzzle with a foreleg. “I understand, Sunset, and I’ll always be here for you anytime you visit.”

Sunset turned and buried her face into Celestia’s soft coat. “I’m sorry.”

“Don’t be,” Celestia patted Sunset’s mane. “If this is what you need to do then I’ll be with you in your heart. And as for your studies …,” she gently pulled away and lit her horn, summoning a large textbook that flopped onto the table with a heavy thud, “I’ve commissioned another correspondence journal for us. This one also includes a number of worksheets for lessons I had yet to give you.”

Sunset gasped happily and refreshed the hug. “Thank you so much, Celestia!”

“You are welcome, my enthusiastic student. Though, perhaps you should also thank the royal enchanter. He really had his hooves full the past few days with these.”

“I’ll be sure to stop by before I go.”

Waarrk

Sunset felt something land on her head after the loud, self-pronouncement of Philomena’s return. She reached up expecting to playfully swat the pesky bird only for her hoof to collide with a metallic object and send it rolling onto the table.

A crown.

“If you had chosen to stay,” Celestia explained.

Similar to Twilight’s new crown, after returning the Element of Magic to the Tree of Harmony, but with six rounded peaks rather than Twilight’s five points and her own cutie mark in the center.

“You really were going to make me a princess?” Sunset gaped at the crown, taking in its details.

“After a few more diplomacy lessons,” Celestia answered.

“Princess of what?”

“That would have been up to you. Twilight and Cadance needed time to understand their parts as well.”

“But since I’m not staying?”

Ciirp? squeaked Philomena.

“A royal ambassador perhaps?” Celestia suggested.

“An ambassador?”

“If your new world’s government ever becomes aware of us, I can’t think of any other pony whom I’d rather have representing us.”

“After some more diplomacy lessons though, right?”

Celestia patted the new correspondence book. “They’re already in here.”

Sunset gave her a sly smile. “You knew I’d choose to go back.”

An equally sly raised eyebrow greeted her. “Did I?”

Wrrak! Philomena shouted and picked up Sunset’s crown with her talons. Wrrk-turp.

“You don’t want me to leave?”

For an answer, Philomena tossed the crown at Sunset, hooking it around her horn.

“Gah!” Sunset steadied it with a hoof, then levitated it a few hooves away to get a better look.

“You can at least try it on,” Celestia suggested, conjuring a mirror.

Slowly, Sunset levitated the crown above her head and paused. “This isn’t magical is it?”

“Not in the least. It’s just gold,” Celestia assured her.

With a relieved sigh, Sunset aligned the crown and—Philomena jumped up and quickly drove it into place.

“Hay!”

Wrrrk

Ignoring Philomena’s impatient retort, Sunset turned to the mirror. It … felt right. Not all of the crown’s peaks were visible, but a small adjustment to her manestyle would fix that. Just when her eyes began to shimmer, Philomena jumped in front of her, head bumping up into her chin.

“Would you knock it off?”

Raak wii

“Are you trying to make me stay or go?”

Cuuurp, Philomena slowly whistled, ducking her head.

“Aw. You actually did miss me. Didn’t you, Pest? What, nopony else fought back against your pranks?”

Philomena nodded.

“Really? That’s why? You really are a pest.”

Wriik?!

“But at least you’re a cute one.”

Philomena blew a raspberry at Sunset’s reflection in the mirror.

“Sort of.”

Celestia laughed at the pair. “It feels good to see you two getting along.”

“Yeah,” Sunset agreed. “A lot of things feel better now that I’m not so angry and self-centered all the time. Philomena?”

Churp?

“I promise we’ll spend some time together before I go, uh, home.”

Cheii-cuirup?

“Play some pranks on Princess Luna maybe? I haven’t made her mad yet.”

Waarrrkk! Philomena cheered, taking to the air and circling around Sunset.

“Thought you might like that.”

After a loop, Philomena flew off again to wherever her secret entry point to Sunset’s room was.

Once alone, Sunset leaned in and whispered to Celestia, “Imagine her, Pinkie Pie and Discord together.”

Celestia’s eyes widened. “Let’s not joke about such things, Sunset.”

After enjoying the moment with a bit of laughter, Sunset turned back to the mirror and eventually removed the crown to hold it in her hooves. “So what happens to this now that I’m not staying?”

“I suppose a royal ambassador would have just as much reason to wear a crown as a princess would,” suggested Celestia with a sly smile.

“Is that an official title?”

“It is now.”

Looking at the mirror and the crown together, a question came to mind. “Celestia? Why did you show me the portal?”

Celestia’s eyes softened and she drew back a bit. “Before Star Swirl disappeared into Limbo, he revealed the portal to me saying he had some projects in play with his counterpart in that world, but he never got a chance to tell me what they were.”

“You think he was referring to the Sirens and Memory Stone?”

“Quite possibly, but it seemed there was more to it than that. After we lost him, I began sending small expeditions through the portal every thirty moons to investigate but never found anything. That world’s Star Swirl had apparently gone missing around the same time ours had.”

Celestia paused to sip her tea but Sunset noticed the teacup wobbled slightly in her aura. “A close friend of mine entered the portal and never came back. We’ve never been able to find her.”

“You wanted me to join the expeditions?”

Celestia nodded.

“Tell me about her. I’ll find her,” Sunset perked up at the task.

“Thank you, Sunset, but I’ve already contacted my own counterpart. As an adult native of that world, and one in the education system, she is better equipped for such a search.”

“Oh.” Sunset’s features drooped.

“But I never would have had the opportunity to ask her if not for your actions.”

“Well, there’s that at least. So I suppose you don’t actually need me there anymore now that Star Swirl is back?”

“Unfortunately, Star Swirl and I haven’t always seen eye-to-eye.“ Celestia sighed. “Particularly where his portals are concerned. While I’ve asked him about these projects, I’m not convinced he’s telling me the whole truth.”

“Star Swirl—“

“Isn’t always the easiest pony to get along with. I may be the ruler of Equestria, but I was also his student. I still find it difficult getting information out of him.”

“So, you don’t know what all these ‘projects’ may be?”

“He assured me that everything is safe, but you’ve already had to face multiple incidents. I don’t know if they are related. You and your friends would be best to carefully search out anything else from Equestria that’s been in that world longer than you have.”

Sunset thought that over. “The image!”

“Image?”

“The image I saw in the portal when you first showed it to me. I saw myself as an alicorn complete with a crown that looked like yours. After the Fall Formal I convinced myself it had been just my imagination or ambition getting the best of me, but was it actually real? Did something show me that image?”

“That was my fear as well.”

“And why you tried to keep me away from it after that.”

“Yes.”

“Well, now I’m definitely going back,” Sunset announced, looking at her new crown. “That pony I saw was what the old me would have turned into if not for Twilight and our friends. I remember her face. She was evil. If there’s any chance something created that image, then I have to find it and …. Well,” she paused, “ideally, reform and make friends with it, or failing that, kick its plot!”

“Thank you, Sunset,” Celestia smiled. “I hope I am just worrying too much, but I’m glad I’ll have you there just in case.”

“You can count on me.”

“I know I can.”

Celestia and Sunset smiled at each other, quietly reliving memories until Celestia perked her head up suddenly. Sunset watched a moment before a realization made her think to read a clock standing by a wall. She gasped excitedly. Seeing the excited face, Celestia chuckled, “Your balcony?”

Sunset nodded and the pair left for the room’s balcony to see the sun low in the sky.

Standing beside her mentor, Sunset watched Celestia’s horn glow brightly as she lifted into the air. Out in the sky, the sun began to speed toward the horizon and finally set below, turning the sky dark. She knew elsewhere in the castle, likely on another balcony, Princess Luna was doing the same as the stars began to shine and the moon rose to take the place of the sun.

It was only when Celestia’s hooves touched back down that Sunset felt the tears on her cheeks. Celestia’s expression grew concerned but Sunset was quick to explain. “I’ve missed that so much. Every time, since the very first day I left, I couldn’t help but think of you when the sun set.”

Wordlessly, Celestia pulled Sunset into another hug.

Eventually, Celestia smirked and asked, “But not when the sun rises?”

Sunset broke out in laughter. “You know I rarely ever get up that early.”

“Yes, I remember now,” Celestia playfully mocked. “Your enthusiasm does have its limits in the mornings.”

“On the few sunrises I’ve seen in the other world, yes, I thought of you then too. And speaking of. If it’s alright, I’d like to stay the night and watch you raise the sun tomorrow.”

“You will always be welcome to do so, Sunset. But it’ll be on you to wake up in time,” Celestia chided playfully.

“I’m sure The Pest won’t let me oversleep.”

“And speaking of her,” Celestia began, pulling back from the hug. “A warning. If you and Philomena go through with pranking my sister, be sure it’s after she’s had her coffee. Never before.”

Giggling, Sunset started back inside. “I’ll remember that. I already know her counterpart is not someone to mess with … too much.”

“Sounds like a story I’d love to hear.”

“If you have time, I’d love to trade tales from the past few years.”

“I made sure to leave plenty of openings in my schedule for the next few days when word reached me you were here." Celestia raised her wings and adopted an excited smirk. "We could even go for a flight. See if your new wings can outpace the guards.”

Flexing her wings, Sunset returned the smile. "I may need some pointers, but I'm ready for the challenge."

Back at their teacups, Sunset paused for a moment and her expression turned serious. “But I suppose there’s one more thing we ought to talk about first.”

“Yes, Sunset?”

Sunset let out a groan. “Dad.”

Celestia stiffened before nodding. “Have you already talked with the rest of your family?”

“Yes. Sunburst and—" she smiled, “—even Cadance.”

Celestia beamed. “And things went well with them?”

“Yes, with both.”

“I’m so glad to hear that.”

“But now I have to decide if I will talk to him before I head back home and, despite what Sunburst and Starlight told me, I just can’t see how that could end up being a good idea.”

“You of all ponies know that ponies change.”

“Yes, but has he? Has he really?”

Celestia nodded and gave a kind smile. “I haven’t had much opportunity to speak with him lately, but there is a clear difference.”

“Are we talking astral forms again?”

Celestia chuckled, “There’s been a change to that too, though not much. I was referring to policy adjustments he’s proposed lately and a general improvement in personality.”

“First time for everything it seems,” Sunset mumbled.

“Sunset, I cannot tell you if talking to your father is a good thing to do or not, but perhaps you should ask yourself if it’s—“

“The right thing to do,” Sunset groaned, flopping her muzzle onto the table. “I knew you’d say that!”

“Not what you wanted to hear?”

“No,” came Sunset’s muffled reply.

“But what you needed to hear?”

“Yes,” Sunset sighed into the table. “I’ll stop by before I head back to Ponyville.”

Celestia finished her tea with a smile. “And Sunset?”

Sunset grunted in reply.

“Thank you for not calling me by my title.”

Sunset sat up and looked over with a smile. “I was thinking you’d want me to treat you as a friend now that—” she looked to her wings.

“And I will always be your friend.”

“Something I never really understood before, but I’ll never forget that now.”

Wraaaakk

A sudden avian weight crashed down on Sunset’s head. “You again?!” she grunted. Philomena tittered and jumped off Sunset’s head only to grab her tail instead. “What? Hay!”

Philomena tugged Sunset’s tail toward the door, pulling the rest of the pony along. Rarr-Waa, she chirped between tugs.

“You want to prank her now?”

Wraaak

“Has she had her coffee yet?”

Raaak

“Was that a yes?”

Raaaak

“That better be a yes,”

Celestia giggled as her once again student was dragged out of the room.
> Awkward Returns
> --------------------------------------------------------------------------

“Whoa, whoa, whoa!”

Scraaak

“I’m trying!”

Wrcak

“Give me a break! These wings are new!”

Wrrccaak!

“What did you call me!?”

“She said watch out for that tree!”

“Wahhhhh!”

Pranking Princess Luna did not go well.

The castle chef had recently suggested she switch to decaf over concerns about her high caffeine intake. Combined with a stressful week and the Princess of the Night was not in the mood.

At least the long escape had given Sunset an opportunity to put into practice what she had learned from the flight books.

“Watch your left wing! Tilt it back!”

On the third loop of the castle, Princess Celestia had joined them. But instead of trying to appease her sister, she flew alongside and gave Sunset flying advice.

She always did love being a teacher.

The experience was equal parts invaluable and horrifying.

Once the chase was over, Sunset and Philomena retreated to safety for the rest of the night until they were sure Luna had gone to sleep. The next day and night in Canterlot Castle were spent more leisurely. Sunset had more time to reconnect with Celestia—and the winged pest—and even enjoyed an evening flight together just for fun. Sunset got to watch Celestia set and raise the sun again, apologize to Luna, who was back on her preferred blend, and it was time to say goodbye.

She fixed her dress back in place over her wings, got a larger set of saddlebags, as her new correspondence journal/textbook wouldn’t fit in the set she got from the Raritys, and headed out.

But she had one more pony to visit before returning to Ponyville and the portal.


*** *** ***


“They still need to work on their lighting,” was Sunset’s first thought walking into the familiar, dark, and foreboding foyer. “At least there’s a bit more color now though.” She looked over at the new decorations. Clearly not Rarity-grade, but perhaps somepony took inspiration from her work throughout Ponyville? “Something changed, I guess. Foal-steps in the right direction. Now to see if I can still find his office.”

She slipped past the receptionist, proceeded down the utilitarian hallway from memory, and came to the familiar office door. Though, there was a new decoration here too. A photograph was affixed to the door depicting a group of creatures. An earth pony, a yak, a dragon, a griffin, hippogryph, and one creature she’d never seen before. Some pony/ladybug hybrid?

She took a breath to steady herself and thought back. Cadance, Sunburst, Celestia, even Philomena. She’d weathered the storm, now for the tornado.

She knocked on the door and the reply was almost immediate. “Enter,” came the stern voice she remembered, or was it softer now?

One last reading of the door’s nameplate to be sure it was the right office and she opened it.



EEA Chairpony – Chancellor Neighsay



“Hay, Dad.”


*** *** ***


A day later, wearing just her saddlebags and a hat to hide her horn, Sunset touched down on one of the balconies of Twilight’s castle and shook out her wings. “Ugh, too much luggage,” she complained, taking a look at her bulging saddlebags. Her new correspondence journal, the flight books, the dress the Raritys made to hide her wings, and her crown all weighed her down, but she wanted to put her flying ability to the test under a load. She only had herself to blame for the ache, but also the achievement of managing the laden trip without much incident.

Finding a shady place to relax, she opened one side of the saddlebags and took out the newest treasures, photos given to her by her father. One of herself and her parents from her sixth birthday, another of Sunburst and Stellar Flare from some happy moment they’d shared, and one rare photo of the siblings together albeit one in which she looked like she had just eaten a sour lemon being made to sit so close to “The Twerp.”

During the meeting in her father’s office there had been yelling, tears, hugs, and ultimately a lighter heart for both of them. The stallion was still stern, still ridged, but more open and caring. He actually had changed. So had the house, she later found out. Sunburst was right about Stellar Flare’s redecorating. No remodeling though, that was good. Mom’s original intent for the design was still there. And Sunset’s bedroom had been left untouched.

Sleeping in that bed was strange after all that time away. It had been used only a hoofful of times since she’d become Celestia’s personal student. Just being in the room with how she left it was a bit unnerving, but it felt right to stay close to Dad instead of returning to her castle dorm for the night.

And, as a bonus, she found her latest draft of the Fire Flower spell which she immediately mailed to Sunburst. Being a reformed villain and a royal alicorn ambassador didn’t mean she couldn’t still mess with her little brother a bit, right?

She smiled and put the photos back in the saddlebags then took off the hat and added that as well. She didn’t need to pretend she wasn’t an alicorn anymore.

It was a quick teleport to Twilight’s library to return the borrowed books, then to the portal room to drop off her saddlebags for the trip home. But she instead turned for the door. She couldn’t leave without saying goodbye.

“S’up.”

“Waah!” Sunset startled back. By the window was a half-filled bookcase, a towel rack holding several towels in multiple degrees of wetness, and a bed table beside a … bathtub? “Aria?”

“Took you long enough.” The kelpie pushed herself up over the rim of the tub to examine her. “Where’s the crown?”

“Wait. What are you doing here? Weren’t you off on a journey to find your people?”

“Found some. Got back. Make with the crown already, you royal anus.”

“You found more kelpies?”

Aria rolled her eyes. “There was a Coltlantis museum near where I used to live. Run by mermares and such. Kelpies migrated or something after we left. Live with the zebras now. Weird. Did you get a scepter too?”

“A scepter?”

“Ugh. The thing a prissy princess carries so everyone ‘cept-her has to do the work.”

Sunset put a hoof to her face. “That’s not—never mind. You found out you’re not the last of your people and you just came back to lounge in a bathtub?”

“Told you I’d be back. Would have been out in the pond, but wanted to make sure you didn’t sneak off without me.”

“You were waiting for me?”

“Pff,” Aria laughed, casually drying a hoof and using it to turn the page of a book on the bed table. “Just didn’t want the Pink One to do her party thing on me. If we go back together, she’ll be focused on you and I can slip out without her trying to, ugh, hug me. And you ponies need waterproof books.”

Sunset just stood blinking a moment. “You’re afraid of a hug?”

Aria shot her a glare.

“Right, right. Not afraid," Sunset kidded, "of course not.”

Aria raised a hoof toward her. “What do you know; That’s twice now I missed having fingers. Who’d-a-thunk?”

“Hahah,” snickered Sunset, walking up to her ornery friend. “Cool, calm, collected Aria.” In the tub, Aria failed to hide a blush. Sunset continued with a softer voice, “Just don’t forget you can always talk to me about anything, anytime.”

Aria shifted a bit in the tub and opened her mouth a few times as if to speak. “Hay,” she began after a pause and Sunset leaned in. “Did you know Equestria has video games now?”

“Wait what?” Sunset back-stepped at the change of topic. “Wait really?” She perked her ears up.

“Yeah, but they suck. Like arcade games from the 70’s and no Space Invaders or Shark Attack. I mean, if you gotta go retro, bring the goods, right?”

Sunset’s ears drooped at the diversionary tactic but she adopted a slow smile. “Yeah. So how about we do some rounds when we get home? Compare scores and … talk?”

While Aria had stiffened at the word home, for a moment there was no other reaction, just blandly turning another page in her book. “Yeah,” she eventually said. “We can do that.”

Smiling, and braving the water that soaked her fur, Sunset hooked a foreleg around Aria and hugged her as well as she could with the bathtub in the way. Aria gave a halfhearted, annoyed groan, but there was definitely a blush as Sunset pulled back. “Sorry,” Sunset giggled, “Didn’t mean to scare you.”

Aria returned a flat look and splashed water in her direction, losing to a smile afterward that Sunset returned.

“Oh, by the way,” Aria said, “your bird’s here.”

“Bird?”

“Yeah. Red, about as tall as a pony, likes to stand on heads, hates water,” Aria finished with a smirk.

“Philomena?”

Aria put a hoof to her lips and whistled loud.

Warrrrk

In shot the phoenix from the window, giving the bathing kelpie plenty of space and landing on Sunset’s head. “Really?” she deadpanned up at the bird.

Wark

“Does Celestia know you’re here?”

… Wr-rk?

“Well I hope so.”

Aria pointed a hoof at the phoenix and clicked her tongue. Philomena returned the gesture with a wing. Sunset’s ears dropped. “Don’t tell me you two made friends.”

“Game recognizes game.”

Wrrak, Philomena agreed.

“What?” asked Aria. “I thought you wanted me to make friends.”

“Maybe I should have been more specific.”

“Too late for that.”

Wark!

Sighing, Sunset bobbed her head, and the phoenix standing on it. “Could you go tell Twilight I’m here? Spike too.”

Wark! Philomena called, launching off Sunset and easily opening the hoof-shaped doorknob with her talons to get into the hall.

Once alone, Sunset turned to Aria. “I did include ‘don’t start any fires’ on the list.”

“Talk to the bird.”

“Aria ….”

“Relax, Downer. The ponies had other things to keep them on their toes yesterday.”

A raised eyebrow was all Sunset had time for before Twilight’s familiar teleport brought her, Spike, and Philomena into the room. “Sunset!” Twilight cheered.

“Twilight! Spike!” grinned Sunset as Philomena perched on her back. “Thanks for the distraction back in Canterlot. That could have been bad.”

“I’m happy I could help.”

“Nice dance moves, by the way.”

“Thank you! Always makes a statement!”

Spike laughed, “That’s certainly true.”

“Did Flash go home yet?” asked Sunset.

Twilight’s smile softened a bit. “Yeah, yesterday.” Then, with a groan, “And that’s when Lyra came through!”

“Lyra? You mean—“ Sunset pointed at the portal, “that Lyra?”

“Yeah, galloped all over town. I’ll fill you in later.” Twilight looked over to Aria. “You could have stopped her. You were right here.”

“I could have,” Aria agreed. “But watching her was more fun.”

As Twilight groaned, Spike walked up and addressed Sunset. “I heard you got a crown.”

Smiling, Sunset turned and levitated it out of her saddlebags. “Yes, take a look.”

“Oh sure,” complained Aria, “show the dragon.”

Dragon, kelpie, and pony looked closer as the crown floated between them.

“Sweet duds, Princess,” commented Aria.

“Oh, I’m not a princess.”

“Huh? What gives?”

“I turned it down and Celestia will be making me a royal ambassador to Pedestria instead,” Sunset explained, while putting the crown on.

“NICE! Diplomatic immunity!” Aria shouted. “We can get some real fun going with that!”

Sunset’s eyes widened but she shook off the thought. “Nope! I’ll be a representative of Equestria and I will make Celestia proud!”

“Pff,” scoffed Aria, “teacher’s pet.”

“That’s the bird.” Sunset pointed to the phoenix on her back.

Warrk

“But you got this sweet deal and you’re not going to use it? And your new magic’s not going to work there either?”

“Nope. There’s just not enough active magic in that world to support our own. If there’s any difference in my abilities there it’ll be barely noticeable.”

“Oh lame! After everything you went through, you ought to get something!”

“I did,” Sunset smiled. “I got my family back.”

Aria’s eyes softened. “Yeah, I guess that’s something. So, we’re going back now?”

“Yeah, everything’s done that I needed to do. Including things I didn’t think I needed to do. And it’s good to know that Equestria can survive two Pinkie Pies.”

“HA!” Twilight barked a laugh. “Two Pinkies. That’s easy.”

“One’s enough” Aria grumbled, jumping out of the bathtub and hopping over to the portal. “And is the Pink One waiting for us?”

Sunset opened her mouth to answer, but paused with a smirk. “Nope. It’ll be a surprise.”

“Good. How do you turn this thing on?”

Possibly thinking over the past annoyances and messes left by the kelpie, Twilight was quick to teleport to the portal and demonstrate the process. “And remember,” she concluded with the portal active, “once opened, the portal will stay open for five minutes before closing on its own. However, once used, it will only allow additional uses from the same side until shut down and reopened. This way we can avoid further Lyra occurrences.”

Nodding, Aria stuck her hoof into the portal. After a moment, she brought it back out and stared at it, and then down at the rest of herself. She shuddered slightly. Sunset came up to her side and put a foreleg over her shoulder. “Anytime you want to come back, just let me know. We can still spare a few uses.”

Aria put her hoof over Sunset’s for a moment, held back a breath, and hopped into the portal.

“Is she okay?” asked Twilight.

“She will be,” answered Sunset. “She’ll have plenty of friends with her, despite what she might call them.” When she got a curious expression as a reply, she added, “I lied. I had Celestia send word ahead that I’d be coming back about now so they’re all waiting for us.”

Just then there was a thud from the portal as a pink shadow seemed to slam into it and slowly slide down.

“Surprise,” chuckled Sunset. “Looks like the one-way traffic idea is working. Aria must have dodged her pink hug of doom.”

Once the pink shadow retreated, Twilight walked up to Sunset. “Your turn?”

“Yeah,” she answered, taking Twilight and Spike into a hug. “But I do have a message for Starlight,” she added after pulling back. “Tell her I want to know when she plans on making me an aunt.”

“Huh?” Spike tilted his head, missing Twilight’s snicker.

“Don’t worry, Spike. I think she’ll get it,” giggled Twilight.

“Philomena?” Sunset looked back to the bird using her as a perch. “It was strangely nice seeing you again.”

Wuuk

“But stay out of my room, Pest.”

Wararrrk Philomena took wing and circled while continuing to chirp.

“Um, sorry, but I don’t understand Phoenixese as well as you think I do.”

Wak, Philomena called in a clearly annoyed tone and landed on the floor in front of Sunset. As the others watched, she shifted and blushed before stepping forward to wrap her wings around Sunset’s forelegs.

“Awe,” Sunset hugged back with her own wings. “I’ll miss you too.”

Watching, Twilight and Spike smiled at the display.

Seeming to have had enough, Philomena pulled back and flew up to perch on some furniture.

“I’ll be sure to visit so long as it’s safe,” Sunset told the three of them, putting on her saddlebags and straightening out her crown. “Can’t wait to find out what the girls think of this. Rarity’s gonna flip!”

“You know,” Twilight chuckled, “when we met I was the one just getting used to having a crown and wings.”

Standing next to the portal, Sunset looked back. “And next time we can go out flying together.”

“Me too!” added Spike.

Waaark!

“We’ll look forward to it,” Twilight agreed.

Sunset smiled and walked through the portal.




*** *** ***




Not long before, on the other end of the portal, seven high school girls, a boy, and a dog waited on the lawn in front of the Wondercolt statue. Most were spread around a picnic blanket topped with assorted sandwiches, desserts, a tea set, and other drinks.

“Anything yet?” asked Rainbow Dash, absently playing hackysack.

“Nope,” Twilight Sparkle answered, adjusting her glasses and checking her laptop. No shift in energy. They haven’t activated the portal yet.”

“Do you think we should send a message?” asked Rarity, hooking an arm around Applejack’s.

“The message said Sunset hadn’t even left for Ponyville yet at the time,” Applejack replied. “She had to make an estimate she’d be here at four.”

“Yeah,” agreed Pinkie Pie, balancing a doughnut on her nose. “And with all the wackydoodle ways time wibblely-works there and here and here and there when you put them together with the portal in the middle … uh, what was the question?”

“It was how long do we have to wait before Sunset gets here?” answered Spike. “I wanna go for walkies!”

“And Pinkie just pointed out Sunset would have had to make a difficult estimate,” finished Flash Sentry.

Nearby, Wallflower Blush walked around the yard touching the grass every so often. Her other hand was clasped with one of Fluttershy’s with the girl’s magic geode between their palms. “The soil's a bit low on nutrients here. I’ll have to remember to add some compost to the garden after her welcome back party. Did the message say anything about Aria?”

Behind her, Fluttershy quietly smiled as one of the few girls shyer than her touched the ground near a wilting flower and made it stand tall and healthy again. “Posey wrote she went on a journey to find other kelpies. I hope she finds some.”

“Ah'm still confused by this kelpie thing,” said Applejack, blushing when Rarity snuggled closer. "A-Ah thought she was a siren."

“She said she’s normally a water kelpie,” explained Wallflower. “One of several aquatic horses in their world, like sea ponies.”

“Huh,” Applejack wondered before shrugging. “I guess a horse is a horse of course, of course, unless you're in Equestria.”

“And Sunset turned into, what was it again?” asked Rainbow.

“An alicorn,” answered Flash.

“Like a majestic, winged unicorn,” added Rarity.

“Or a horny pegasus!” offered Pinkie, getting groans from the others gathered. “What?”

“We’ve had enough horn jokes, darling.” Rarity put two fingertips of her free hand over the middle of her forehead. “Oddly enough I actually miss mine. Can’t imagine what it's been like for Sunset in our world.”

“Severe horn envy.”

““Pinkie!”” the others yelled.

“What?”

Rolling her eyes, Rarity reached for a cup of tea. While bringing it up to take a sip, a circular device beside Twilight began to beep softly.

“Portal’s open?!” Rainbow rushed.

A confused expression on her face, Twilight picked up the device and slowly waved it around, the beeping varying in volume and tempo. “No, that’s not the portal, that’s—“ a loud beep rang out when Twilight pointed the device at Rarity’s cup. “Rarity, what’s in that?”

“Oh, one of the new teas I got from Share. It’s delightful! It did taste better in Equestria, but it’s still better than most teas I’ve ever had in our world. It has this sparkling quality to it.”

“But there’s magic in it!”

“Yes, I know dear,” Rarity calmly agreed before taking a sip. “I suspect that’s what makes it sparkle so.”

Twilight made an adjustment to the device and multiple lights lit up as the beeping increased. “Did you girls bring back anything else that was magical?”

Flash, Applejack, Wallflower, and Fluttershy all said no or shook their heads.

Nearby, a yellow ping-pong ball with a red pupil blinked and skittered behind a bush on tiny legs, having been much more nosy than an eye had any right to be.

“I brought all our magic books over,” said Rainbow. “A pair for Principal Celestia and Vice Principal Luna too. You know, to write to all our ponies.”

“I doubt it’s magical, but you traded hats with Ponyjack,” Rarity pointed out.

“You noticed?” asked Applejack. “We thought it would be a fun way to stay connected.”

“Of course I noticed, darling. A lovely idea.”

“I brought magic sugar!” cheered Pinkie, pointing to all the desserts on the picnic blanket.

Twilight pointed her device at the goodies from Pinkie’s picnic basket and got a series of high-frequency beeps. “I was wondering what those readings have been about,” Twilight mumbled before letting out an exasperated shout. “We’ve all been eating magic desserts for the past week!”

“Yeah! Just like we did in Equestria. No biggie, and they taste so good! So sparkly.”

“Um,” Fluttershy began, her and Wallflower having come back to the blanket when the voices raised, “is that a bad thing?”

“Well,” Twilight considered, relaxing a bit, “it is just sugar and tea, and we did all have the same stuff in Equestria. Twi and I already determined that the amount of magic in our world isn’t affecting the boundary between our worlds, just uses of the portal is doing that. So, I guess not. After all, Pinkie couldn’t have brought more than a couple of bags with her.”

“Just one actually,” Pinkie confirmed. “But I also brought the recipe! I made like ten pounds of it using my geode already!”

"Ten pounds of magic sugar?"

"It would have been more but it I had to figure out a bunch of things, oh and I blew up the first few batches and the teacher got mad so I did some at home instead and Mom and Limey got mad when batch four blew up, but then I perfected the process with Mrs. Cake's help! Now I can magicise more sugar anytime I want! You know, after I finish cleaning the kitchens I blew up. There's one left. And I have detention for it."

"I did hear there had been trouble in the HomeEc wing," Rarity commented. “The fire alarm went off twice, didn’t it?”

"Um, Pinkie," Rainbow spoke up, "those voices you kept hearing in Equestria, did they ever tell you to burn things?"

"Some.” Pinkie gasped. “How'd you know?"

Fluttershy eeped. "Oh no, Pinkie. Do you still hear them?"

Pinkie used her fingertips to clear out her ears then cupped her hands over them. She closed her eyes and sat serenely with her legs in the lotus position. The others all flinched from the oddity of the sight, so different than Pinkie’s normal oddities, and then flinched again when Pinkie suddenly opened her eyes and shouted, "Nope!" There was a sigh of relief that Pinkie cut short with her next statement. "Just the normal ones."

"The 'normal' voices?'' asked Flash.

“Yep!” Pinkie gleefully answered before putting a couple of magic sugar cookies in her mouth.

Deciding there were more important, and hopefully less disturbing, things to discuss, Twilight got back on track. “I think I’ll have to research the food made with your sugar, but—“

Pinkie grabbed an assortment of desserts and held them out in front of Twilight. “Help yourself!”

“I-I mean scientifically.”

“Ooh! Science has a sweet tooth! Now why don’t they ever teach that in school?”

“They do in a way. The culinary arts are a form of chemistry … that I’ve never been able to grasp, but we’re getting off topic. Being that it’s still just magical books and food items that we’ve brought back with us and we’ve not been influencing our world itself, then—“

"Actually,” Applejack cut her off with an uneasy look toward Wallflower. “Me and Wally have been running my geode on some of our trees. They look so much healthier now! We’re gonna get a lot more apples this year. Maybe double next year with how well they're producing already!”

Twilight pointed her device at a Sweet Apple Acres apple pie on their blanket getting more beeps in return.

“U-um,” Wallflower waved weakly. Once she had Twilight’s attention, she pointed at a small garden around a hoof-shaped statue on the front lawn. “There’s also that.” Everyone turned to see an impressive collection of lush, green, healthy bushes and glorious flowers so bright they seemed to sparkle. Twilight turned her device to the display and got the highest level of beeping so far. Angling the device around the school’s front lawn also returned beeping, even some distance away from the garden. “I kind of used a bit of magic directly on the soil too. For the grass.”

"It looks so pretty," Fluttershy gushed softly. "It's been a lot of fun helping Wallflower around town, especially here and at the park. The animals have been so thankful."

"Squirrels have been gifting me nuts all week."

"How thoughtful of them," Fluttershy beamed.

Twilight gave the screen of her device another look. “You’ve been doing this ‘around town’?”

"Is that bad?" squeaked Wallflower.

For a moment, the only reply was a low groan. “I think I’ll have to run these readings by Twi and Sunset. No more magic unless there’s an emergency until then, okay?”

Disappointed sighs came from the group but they all nodded.

“Hey,” perked up Rainbow with an eager expression. “You think being in Equestria and eating all this magic food will power us up anymore?”

Applejack raised an eyebrow. “You mean like instead of ponying up, we’ll horseup?”

Everyone turned as one to Twilight. “Uh ….” Twilight picked up her device, pointed it at herself, and adjusted some knobs and dials causing the beeping to change in pitch and frequency. Finally, when the beeps turned into a steady tone, she checked the screen and—“Neep!”—flinched back.

With an exasperated groan, Twilight announced her findings. “Enough of this and we’ll be ponying up if we just sneeze together!”

“Acchooo!” exclaimed Pinkie.

The others all turned to see her checking her head for pony ears. “Nope,” she said simply.

“Darn,” tisked Rainbow.

“Maybe if we all do it together!” suggested Pinkie.

“Yeah! How do we make ourselves sneeze?”

“I was being facetious!” cried Twilight.

“So we can’t sneeze out ponytails?” asked Pinkie.

“No, but,” Twilight sighed. “When I got back from Equestria, I checked my magic level and I found that it was considerably higher than before our trip there. However, that level had—“ she shot the desserts a look, “—been dropping back down. But now it’s up again! Not to post portal travel numbers, but I imagine that could happen with enough of that sugar.”

“But they’re so good!” whined Pinkie, picking up a small stack of cookies.

“Put the cookies down, Pinkie.”

Pinkie looked at the cookies in her hand, easily four inches worth stacked on top of each other. They slowly made their way closer to her mouth, almost like she wasn’t trying to stop them.

“Pinkie,” Twilight warned.

“But, but,” the cookies came closer.

“We don’t know what this much magic will do to us over time.”

“If it’s in sugar form it’ll make me happy.”

“Drop the cookies!”

“I’m trying!”

“No you’re not!”

“You’re right! The cookies are calling me!”

Pinkie ate the cookies.

“Pinkie!”

“I ate the cookies.”

Twilight frowned and focused on the deserts. Each began to glow in her aura and float away from the bottomless pit of Pinkie’s stomach and near the more responsible pair of Applejack and Rarity.

“Twilight!” Pinkie whined.

“Too much sugar!”

“But magic sugar is so good and not even fattening!”

“No?” Rarity perked up, eyeing the desserts that were now much easier to reach.

“Rarity!” Twilight chided.

“But they’re not fattening!”

“Maybe not the sugar, sugarcube,” Applejack began, “but what about the butter and other ingredients?”

Rarity let out a breath. “Thank you, darling. My resolve was weakening.”  She giggled, “ ‘Sugarcube’,” while giving Applejack’s arm a squeeze, then took a sip of her tea.

“Rarity!” Twilight slapped a palm over her forehead.

“Yes?” Rarity paused and Twilight pointed to the teacup with the hand that left a red mark on her head. “Oh! The tea. Yes, of course. Such a pity.

Sighing, she poured the rest onto the lawn a bit away from the blanket.

“Rarity!” Twilight groaned again.

“What now?”

“The ground already has enough magic in it!”

“Sorry,” Wallflower apologized sheepishly.

“No, it’s … fine,” Twilight forced past an eye twitch. “These magic readings shouldn’t be all that bad, not really. Not yet at least. But it’s a good thing it’s just been us and not anyone else who’s been having magic food.”

“It is?” Pinkie giggled, with an awkward warble in her voice.

“Pinkie,” Twilight focused on her, “how many people have been eating your magic sugar goodies?”

“Um. You want the list of people who came to all our welcome back parties?”

“You’ve been feeding the school magic at the parties?”

“Well, not the first two. Didn’t have the magictization process down yet and I wanted to save the bag I brought with me.”

“But at least we know about magic,” said Flash. “Just about all of us at CHS have been hit with at least a little magic already, not just the seven of you.”

“Eight,” added Spike. “I’m here too.”

“Sorry, Spike. I can’t believe I forgot the talking dog.”

“Oh, it’s fine. I’ll just pee on your leg later.”

“Spike!” admonished Twilight.

“Kidding.”

“I’m with Flash,” announced Rainbow. “Everyone here knows about magic. If there’s a problem we just tell Principal Celestia and make an announcement over the intercom or something.”

Begrudgingly, Twilight nodded. “Right, it could be worse, but at least it’s been kept to just the school, and apparently the park’s flora.”

Applejack turned her head away. Pinkie whistled in a way that might have been intended to be innocently.

Twilight dropped her face into her palm. “Applejack? Let me guess. You’ve already sold some magic apples?”

Applejack coughed. “Uh, just a few. We’d only magic’d the older and less producing trees so far, but we have actually gotten a yield out of them already. Maybe a bushel or two were sold.”

“Isn’t a bushel about a hundred apples?”

“About.”

Slowly, the flat look Twilight was giving Applejack rotated to the still whistling Pinkie. “And you, Pinkie? How much magic sugar have you sold?”

“None!” Pinkie exclaimed resolutely. “Not a single granule!”

“What about foods made with magic sugar?” The whistling resumed. “Pinkie? How much?”

“Thaaaaat’s a little hard to answer.”

“Why?”

“Well.” Pinkie swallowed. “Remember how I said I perfected the sugar magical-magicing process with help from Mrs. Cake?”

“Are you telling me that The Sweet Shoppe has been selling your magic sugar goods?”

“That would explain why those doughnuts we picked up yesterday were so much better than usual,” noted Rainbow.

“And why there was such a line to the register,” added Fluttershy.

“Pinkie,” Twilight groaned.

“Yes?” Pinkie answered.

“Pinkie,” Twilight repeated.

“Y-yes?”

“Has the FDA approved the sale of magic sugar baked goods?”

“Uh … y-yes?”

“No they haven’t!”

“Oops.”

“Call Mrs. Cake and have her stop using the magic sugar. Sunset, Twi, and I need to make sure it’s safe.”

“Right away!” Pinkie saluted, taking out her phone.

“Applejack, you too.”

“Ah’ll fill the family in once Ah get home. But it’ll be okay, right?”

Twilight thought back to her own history. “We already know that too much magic can cause, uh—“

“She-demons?” offered Rainbow.

“Yes, ugh, she-demons,” Twilight shivered. “But that takes a lot of magic. Small amounts like this shouldn’t cause harm without a catalyst to enable people to tap into that magic.”

“Like your geodes!” Wallflower pointed out. “I’ve had plenty of the magic apples and Pinkie’s desserts, but I still can’t feel nature without holding onto Fluttershy or Applejack’s.”

“So we’re okay?” asked Applejack again.

“I think we should still be fine,” Twilight finally allowed herself a smile and Applejack took a calming breath.

Rarity gave Applejack a comforting squeeze. “Everything will work out, darling.”

“Thanks, sugarcube.”

“And with that, while we wait on Pinkie and Sunset, I need to excuse myself for a moment.”

“Too much tea?” joked Rainbow as Rarity was standing.

Caught off guard by the ghastly gag, Rarity stumbled and fell into Applejack’s arms. “Oh, my,” Rarity giggled. “Je suis tombé dans les pommes.”

“Uh, Ah don’t speak Fancy.”

“I know you don’t, dear,” Rarity giggled again, getting to her feet successfully this time and walking toward the school.

Applejack watched Rarity with a blush until she entered the school and quickly got up and grabbed Fluttershy.

“Oh, wah, Applejack?” Fluttershy wobbled as much as her legs while being led away from the group.

“You gotta help me, Fluttershy!” Applejack quietly exclaimed.

“What’s wrong?”

“Y-you’re closer to Rarity than the rest of us, right?”

“Um, maybe I used to be, but I think that’s you now, isn’t it?”

“That’s the thing. I don’t know what we are anymore. It’s like she’s hanging all over me! She brushed my hair three times just today!”

“It was so cute seeing her wear your hat while brushing it at lunch. It looks really shiny and smooth now. I don’t think I’ve ever seen it so silky.”

“My hair has never looked so good!” Applejack squeaked.

“And,” Fluttershy paused, “that’s a good thing, right?”

“Ah-but-uh,” Applejack stuttered. “Yes! Ah happen to like it, but that’s not the point!”

“Is she making you dress fancy or use makeup you don’t want to? Like before we go on stage or dance?”

“No, just little things like the hair and ironing my clothes.”

“She ironed your clothes?”

“Got caught in the rain while on our last d—evenin—study session! Put ‘em in the wash and pressed ‘em and everything while we ….” She blushed almost as red as her family name.

“Yes?”

“Uh, played dress-up and hung around in our s-skivvies?”

The mental image was too much for Fluttershy and she let out a giggle.

Applejack grabbed her shoulders and brought her closer. “She even came over to brush my hair and iron my clothes before school today! What do I do with this?!”

Startled, Fluttershy took a moment to think and noticed something peculiar. She sniffed the air. “Are you wearing perfume?”

“Um, Ah—just a little?”

“Did Rarity do that?”

“N-no. It’s something Ma used to wear. Ah thought Rares might like it.”

Smiling brightly, Fluttershy put a hand on one of Applejack’s arms. “It’s lovely, Applejack, and I’m sure ‘Rares’ feels the same way.”

“But, what do Ah do with her?”

“I think you’re doing just fine and we’ll all support you two.”

“ ‘Support us’? What, what do you mean?”

Before Fluttershy could get her giggle to die down enough to answer, out of the corner of her eye she noticed Rarity had returned and turned to smile at her.

But the face that she saw chilled her blood.

That face could kill at thirty paces.

Fluttershy took a step away from Applejack, getting out of her arms, and meekly waved. Instantly Rarity switched to a bright smile.

“Hehe-he,” Fluttershy gave a pained chuckle. “G-good luck.”

Applejack scratched the side of her head in confusion watching Fluttershy grab Rainbow and pull her down to the picnic blanket with her like she was a shield, muttering something about “territory.”

She didn’t have much time to think it over before Twilight’s laptop beeped. “They just opened the portal!” she announced.

Excitedly, everyone not already at the picnic blanket got seated back around it.

Rarity claimed Applejack’s arm with her own, getting a blush from the taller girl and an “Eep” from Fluttershy when their eyes met.

Pinkie set out a few yoga mats should Sunset trip on her way out of the portal and reached for a doughnut which floated out of her grasp in Twilight’s aura.

“And thus ends our little group’s mission to the pony planet,” lamented Rarity.

“I hope we can go back some time,” wished Wallflower.

“I didn’t even get to go,” complained Spike. “I bet as a dragon I could chase squirrels up any tree!”

“I wish I got to talk more with Twi,” Twilight mused. “Imagine all the magical and scientific projects she, I, and Sunset could have worked on!”

The others all traded apprehensive looks.

“We’ll miss ‘em alright,” said Applejack. “But it is good to be home and that things can calm down and get back to normal.”

As the others nodded in agreement, in the distance another pair of girls were leaving the school grounds. Once the pair noticed them, one tried to run over but was held back by the other. “They look like they’re waiting for something. I think they’re going to open the portal again,” Lyra gushed to her best friend.

“You’re not jumping in there again,” came the stern reply as Sweetie Drops dragged Lyra away.

Pinkie Pie giggled seeing the display. “That Lyra really gets excited about the portal, huh? It’s like she can’t help but run to it every time it opens.”

Suddenly, the portal rippled and a purple girl shot through. “Weahh!” she yelled, awkwardly coming to a landing on her hands and knees atop the yoga mats.

“Aria!” Wallflower smiled.

“Aria!” Pinkie cheered, jumping to her feet and rushing the girl with both arms locked in her atomic tackle-hug position.

“The hay!?” Aria Blaze yelled before deftly ducking and rolling to the side causing Pinkie to miss and tumble into the portal where she was slapped against the side like a bug on a windshield.

““Pinkie!”” The others cried.

“Heh,” Aria laughed as Pinkie slid down what was effectively a glass wall. “Bookhorse made the portal one-way each time it opens now. You can’t get in.”

Pinkie rolled back from the portal and raised a hand. “Seems effective,” she groaned.

“And Shimmer told me we’d be alone here,” Aria grumped.

“We didn’t know you’d be here,” explained Twilight.

“Then you won’t mind if I bug off then,” Aria answered, hooking a thumb down the sidewalk.

“You don’t have to leave,” protested Wallflower, shifting over on the blanket. “You can sit here.”

Aria looked down the sidewalk. “Or I could just go.”

”You could,” Wallflower agreed. “But it would be nice if you stayed. I think Sunset would like to see you here with us.”

Looking between her two options again, Aria growled and sat beside Wallflower. “Fine, but you owe me.”

”Owe you what?”

”I don’t know!” Aria argued, picking up a cookie. “Something!”

”Um, Aria,” warned Twilight.

”Yeah, Four-Eyes?”

”There’s magic sugar in that.”

”Magic? You mean earth pony sugar?”

”Yes. Pinkie found a way to make it here.”

”Nice!” Aria took a big bite out of the cookie and swallowed it down. “Best part about being on the surface. Their sugar is like a fat-blocker. You can actually tone up with it.”

”Really?” Rarity gasped, eyeing the treats again.

”Easy there, Rares,” Applejack steadied her.

”But, we’re worried about what effects magic foods could have on us in this world,” Twilight explained.

”Meh,” Aria shrugged her off, taking a doughnut. “You worry; more for me.”

The others all watched her happily—a strange state for the normally grumpy girl—eating the delicious, and apparently healthy, treats, and turned to look at Twilight, pleadingly.

“Oh, fine!” she relented, and everyone grabbed a treat or two. “But just a little! Once Sunset gets back we can study all this magic we brought back with us and get everything back to normal.”

It was then that the portal rippled again. “N 'ere she fin'lly is!” cheered Rainbow through a mouthful of cupcake.

Aria quickly felt around her left hair tie and pulled out an amber feather. She shrugged before tucking it back in and watching the portal with interest.

But the rippling increased more than it had before and shone with a yellow light.

Along with a rush of wind, their friend shot out of the portal but didn’t make a landing. Instead, the gathered girls, boy, and dog tilted their heads upward, each holding up a hand or paw to block out the shining light that hadn’t dissipated once the portal settled down.

Above them, wearing a crown, a backpack, and the clothes she had from before, they saw Sunset’s familiar red and yellow hair flowing in a non-existent breeze behind a long, glowing horn all hovering with the aid of sparkling yellow wings of pure light. She looked down at herself in confusion.

“So much for normal,” Aria laughed.

From within her hair, Pinkie retrieved a pair of sunglasses and put them on to dim the lights. “Eh, what’s ‘normal’ anyway?”