26.1
“You look a bit down,” a voice said.
Gilda looked to one side, and saw a blue unicorn slide into the seat next to her.
“Yeah…” she said, going back to her drink. “I just can’t connect with Dash.”
“Well, that’s hardly surprising…” the blue unicorn said. “I mean, she’s not Looping this time.”
Gilda’s head snapped around. “What?”
“Oh, don’t try and cover it up…” the unicorn winked. “You’re not bad as actors go, but my special talent is half about misdirection. I’m Trixie Lulamoon, by the way. I was actually one of the newbies until you showed up.”
She shrugged. “Besides, you hardly look like a local. Ponyville does grow on you if you give it time, but…”
Trixie held up a hoof. The red stallion running the bar slid over a glass of something fizzy and apple scented.
“…you’re not a regular,” she finished. “Actually, on that front, how are you finding it here?”
The griffin tried to assimilate everything that had just happened. “Er… not half bad, actually. Best drink I’ve had in a while, anyway.”
Trixie nodded. “Hear that, Mac?”
The stallion nodded.
“This is kinda a new thing – a few centuries old,” Trixie said, then winced. “Sorry, that was probably a bit tactless of me.”
“You think?” Gilda shook her head again. “This whole thing is difficult to cope with.”
“Well, you’ll always be welcome here.”
“Stop makin’ promises for me, Trixie,” Mac said amiably, “or you’ll make one ah wouldn’t have made mahself… one day.”
“Not today, though,” Trixie shot back. “Anyway, Mac’s kind of doing this to help loopers like you – ones who just need a bit of relaxation, you can talk to him about anything. He’s really in demand when loopers from other worlds come in, ‘cause they’re usually from places a lot more, well, violent than our own.”
“I wouldn’t mind that…” Gilda said, ruefully. “A bit of excitement, I mean.”
Trixie’s eyes lit up. “Really? You like excitement? Loud bangs, adrenaline, intense risk?”
Gilda nodded, almost against her will. “Yeah, that does sound pretty good right now…”
“Trixie will give you excitement!” With a flash, a hat and cape materialized on the blue unicorn. “Come on, let’s go!”
“Go where?” Gilda asked, reasonably.
“That’s not the important bit! It’s the journey, not the destination.” Trixie paused. “Though at this point I think the destination should probably be King Sombra’s treasury.”
Shining Armor and Princess Cadence walked warily into the palace of the Crystal Empire, on the look out for the evil being who had once taken it over.
“Dear,” Cadence asked after a moment, “why are there so many suits of armour lying around ripped to bits?”
“No idea,” Shining admitted. “They look like they got ripped to bits… and that one seems to have been struck by lightning.”
“Should we wait for your sister and her friends?” Cadence shrugged. “I don’t know how dangerous this might be…”
“No,” Shining replied after a moment. “If worst comes to worst, we can always teleport out.”
They both heard the singing at the same moment.
Shining built a charge on his horn. Cadence, still thinking a little like a pegasus, took off to be ready to ambush whoever might attack her husband.
“…with a snail if you slow to a crawl,” two drunken voices shouted. “But the hedgehog-”
“Wait,” Shining said, squinting. “Isn’t that… hey!”
The singing stopped.
“You, the blue unicorn,” Shining continued, “Aren’t you Trixie? Twilight’s friend?”
“I am indeed,” Trixie replied, bowing deeply. Her hat fell off. “I am indeed Trixie Lulamoon. Queen Trixie!”
“Pardon?” Shining asked, looking at Cadence for any kind of support she might be able to give. She shrugged helplessly, lowering herself slowly to the floor.
Her companion pointed at the battered crown on top of Trixie’s head. “See? She’s queen ‘cause she beat up the king. That’s how it works,” she added with the assurance of the deeply sloshed, and looked owlishly at the empty bottle she was carrying in her right foreleg. “Hey, your majesty?”
No response.
“That’s you,” the griffin added, elbowing Trixie, who gave a start.
“Yes! Me. What was it, lord high… thingy… Gilda?”
“We ran out of spoils of victory again.”
Trixie looked downcast. “Maybe one of these times we’ll get our spoils of victory out of the building before drinking it all.”
Cadence plucked the bottle out of Gilda’s grip. “This is one of the bottles from the royal reserve, down in the dungeons.”
Shining gaped. “You mean… they really did defeat Sombra?”
“It was so cool,” Gilda said, with gestures. “Trix went kind of glowy and then grew wings, and then magicked him so hard it collapsed a wall on him.”
“Wings?” Shining and Cadence exchanged a glance.
“Hey, you want this?” Trixie asked, pulling the Crystal Heart out of her fallen hat. “I don’t want it, but it’s shiny.”
Cadence’ eyes widened.
“Sure,” Shining said quickly. “And in return, we’ll do all the admin and paperwork associated with your position.”
“What?” Trixie blinked, then snatched the crown off her head. “Paperwork, ew. I didn’t know it came with paperwork. You want it, Gilda?”
“No chance!” Gilda warded Trixie off.
“Ah well.” Trixie drop-kicked the crown into the distance. “Shall we go get some more spoils of war?”
“Sounds good!”
Trixie wrapped them both in magic, and they vanished.
Shining looked at where they’d been for a moment. “…well, that sorted itself out.”
“Trixiiie?” Gilda moaned through a blinding headache, “Why did we do this again?”
“Because you need to learn awesome on your own!” Trixie said, then winced. Flaring her horn, she applied an anti-hangover spell, which took the edge off. “Dash is pretty cool, yeah, but you can’t define yourself around her. You need to be your own, er, griffin.”
She winked. “Besides, now you have a cool story to tell her.”
26.1 omake (Stainless Steel Fox)
(This one may or may not slot in perfectly, but it would have to go here if it did.)
"Hey Gilda! I heard about the way you beat on King Sombra. Awesome!" Rainbow Dash called out.
The bleary eyed griffon just groaned and pulled the cloud she was lying in around and over herself, trying to escape the rays of Celestia's sun and the overly cheery voice of her best friend, though right now she was thinking equicidal thoughts about her. The groan was a mistake, as it was a signal for the pain in various parts of her body to spawn hundreds of lesser pains which then moved out and took apartments in new parts of her body. Nomadic buffalo photons stampeded down her optic nerve and headbutted her brain, intensifying the Rainboom class headache that was already there. Her mouth tasted like a graveyard which had been used by a rave venue by the incontinent... she was hung-over, no, she was HUNG-OVER. Gahhh, Even thinking in capital letters hurt, and so did the tips of her feathers, that shouldn't even be possible!
Griffons had the constitution of a buffalo, or rather buffaloes had the constitution of a griffon, but she and Trixie had drunk about half a cellar of King Sombra's private reserve. Crystal berry wine was sweet, fragrant with a wonderful undertone of honeysuckle and chocolate, and had a kick like an earth-pony on steroids, and that was before it had a thousand years to mature and increase in potency in a high magic environment. So it wasn't just a hang-over, it was a magic hang-over, and even Trixie's magic had only served to ease the pain.
A vial flumped in the cloud beside her. "Here, drink up! This is a little something Apple Bloom whipped up."
"uuuhh. Is it poison? Something quick and painless would go down well right now." At least Dash was being slightly quieter.
"Uh huh, hang-over cure. Guaranteed to move that thunderhead of a hang-over, or your thunderhead cheerfully refunded."
Gilda snatched it up and popped the cork with a claw-tip, then gulped it down. There was no way it could make her condition worse, at any rate. It fizzed over her tongue in a peculiar way, and then she felt as if some-pony had stuck a hose in her mouth and turned it on full blast, and water was shooting out of every pore in her body. She swelled up like a balloon and popped, and when she recovered, the pain was gone. In fact, she was ready to fight dragons.
"Whoa! Now that is what I call a cure! Who is this Apple Bloom, anyway?"
"Earth-pony looper. Kid sister of my friend Applejack. She's been learning Zebra potion magic for… a lot of loops, so she knows what she's doing. She makes them for Mac's Cafe Equestrian. Twilight is taking one to Trixie."
"Huh? You're Awake?" Gilda did a double take.
"Yep, not every-pony Wakes at the start of a loop, sometimes it doesn't happen till much later, though it's pretty rare. Gotta admit, you and Trixie teaming up? Never have figured it, but it makes a lot of sense."
"You're not mad?" Gilda asked, shocked at the warmth she heard in Dash's voice.
Rainbow Dash shrugged, shaking her head. "Having other friends doesn't make your best friendship less... best. I'd be pretty hypocritical if I got mad over you being friends with other ponies."
Gilda chuckled. "I never thought I'd hear Rainbow Dash use the word 'hypocritical'."
Dash joined in. "Yeah... Blame it on the time I looped into a world where Daring Doo was real. I know because I was her. Heh, if ever a loop taught me that being an athelete and an egg-head weren't mutually exclusive that was the one. That pony was in Twilight's league, but bucked flank like us..."
She saw Gilda's face fall slightly. "Hey, buck up, you'll get your own awesome adventures now that you're loopy. What I was saying is friendship isn't a limited thing. The more you have, the more you get, and the more you can share. Speaking of sharing, I was looking you up to share some awesome with you. How'd you like to learn how to do a Sonic Rainboom?"
"You're serious?" Gilda's eyes widened.
"No I'm Rainbow Dash... sorry Hogwarts joke... oh pony-feathers, we've got a lot of catching up to do. Time for a pop-corn memory session with Apple Bloom's way-back machine after this. It can read a person's memories and play them back like a movie. It'll prepare you if you ever end up in the same places, which seems likely."
"I thought you said she was all about potions?"
"That's just a sideline, she's been looping for a long time, and it turns out her talent is putting together really cool tech. She's been in lots of fused loops where things are pretty much science fiction, and learned how to use it. Hmmm... I think we'll start you on an X-Wing, it's robust and fairly easy to get the hang of... that's if you want to learn how to pilot a space fighter. Or maybe a giant robot. Or we can get her to fit you with thruster boots and an atmosphere containment harness and the two of us can take a trip around the moon..."
"Whoa!" Gilda's feathers were toinging out a bit. "I... ahh..."
Rainbow Dash face-hooved. "Nice going Rainbow Crash! Sorry Gilda, I'm doing it again. You need to adjust to the loops at your pace, not be forced into anything you aren't ready for. It's just... I have so many cool things I want to share with you, and I want to do it right now! Look, for the rest of this loop, you set the pace. You want to learn how to do a Sonic Rainboom? Fine. Want to try and get into the Wonderbolts Academy with me? We can do that. Want to just spend the time playing cloudball, surfing the air-currents and kicking back on a cloud while listening to rocking tunes? I'm good with that too."
"That last one sounds real good..." Gilda said, watching for any sign of disappointment in her friend's eyes. There was none, only concern for her friend, and she remembered Twilight's words. Then she made a decision. "But learning a Sonic Rainboom sounds good too."
Dash punched the air with a hoof. "Yes! We are going to have so much fun!"
26.2
“Twilight, you need to go and retrieve the Element of Magic from-”
Twilight closed her eyes and concentrated. With a flash of light, her Magic tiara rematerialized on her brow. “Done. What now?”
Celestia blinked. “Since when could you do that?”
“It’s been a while.” Twilight shrugged. “You were saying?”
“Oh, nothing.” Celestia got a little smile on her face. “Excuse me, I need to go nail this mirror to the ceiling of a prison cell.”
26.3
The Mayor pointed. “Who is that masked figure?”
Dash followed her gaze, and grinned. “Oh, right, that’s the Mysterious Mare-Do-Well. I ran into her once.”
The silhouette spread wings and took off, flaring a horn to launch a bolt of ice almost directly at the crowd.
“Whoah!” Dash ducked along with the rest of them, and the bolt splashed off a shield made out of plants.
From inside the shield, a second figure emerged clad head-to-toe in bright forest green. The new pony spread wings and leapt into the air, trees growing from the rooftops as support.
“Hmm, that doesn’t seem right…” Dash said. She bent down next to the mayor. “That’s I Be Leaf. I’ve not seen her like this before…”
The blue pegasus tapped her chin. “Hang on a second. I’m gonna go have a look.”
She shot upwards, then returned to the ground. “Thought so.”
“What is it?” the mayor asked, worried.
“Well, I saw…” Dash counted them off. “Sir George the Dragon, a magic user who might have been Madam Magpie, and the Felicitous Fillies. I think Ponyville might have a superhero infestation. Nothing major, just a Crossover Event.”
A pony wearing a red and black outfit and carrying a boffer sword ran up a nearby wall, seemingly having an argument with itself. Another wearing clothes made like shimmering water rode past on a waterspout, and then a pair of gigantic wings blotted out the sun.
“Huh…” Dash blinked. “Maybe I was wrong. That looks like a Crisis Crossover. Everypony down!”
There was a bright flash, and all the battling costumed ponies vanished.
“What just happened?” Roseluck asked, looking around.
Dash shrugged. “I think that was a Cosmic Retcon. The whole storyline got too complicated, so it just stopped.”
“Well, that went well!” Dash said later. “The Mayor was certainly confused…”
“Yeah,” Applejack said, sourly, “but it woulda been good if you’d come up with a better superhero type for me. Ah had to be th’ Mare-Do-Well.”
“Hey, at least you could do all of it at once…” Dash shrugged. “And I think it’d be nice if we perhaps used all of these superhero identities in some other loop.”
“Well, I can certainly store the costumes until then,” Rarity said cheerfully. “Perhaps we could work out something for you?”
“Ah’d prefer if ah got to use these,” AJ replied, summoning her Ember Celica from a subspace pocket. “They ain’t used as often as ah’d like.”
Rarity’s eyes glittered. “One Punch? Hmmm…”
Twilight nodded. “Well, good to know it was funny. And yes, using those costumes again would be nice. Perhaps we could try the whole secret identity thing?”
“That sounds good,” Fluttershy said quietly.
“Speak for yourself!” Pinkie said, grinning. She hadn’t taken off her Deadpool-inspired costume yet, and all indications were that she’d just wear it for the rest of the Loop.
26.4
Rarity trotted into the cavern, wearing one of her best dresses. “Hello, mister dragon? I have a business proposition for you.”
The dragon growled.
“Here it is,” she said, nonchalantly sitting down on the edge of his hoard. “I take items from your hoard and enchant them, making them much more valuable. Then, I go and sell them, and you get gold and jewels equal to the value of the initial investment plus one half of the profits.”
“And why should I trust you, pony?” The huge beast sounded almost amused. “This is a transparent ploy to walk off with my most prized possessions.”
“No, not really…” Rarity shook her head. “You do insult me, sir. I assure you, this is no ploy.” She paused. “Really, must you be stuck in the First Diarchy era? You have to make your gold work for you.”
“I find it works quite well as a bed. Now, leave before I flame you out,” he said with finality.
Rarity examined a bracelet. “You know, this would look lovely on a mantelpiece…”
The dragon inhaled, then let out a jet of flame.
Lightning-quick, Rarity swept the top layer off her dress and flung it at the dragon’s mouth. “Solute!”
The gossamer-fabric quivered, then exploded into at least thirty tonnes of salty water. Dragon’s fire met instant wave, and the whole cavern filled with pleasant sea-scent and steam.
“Ah, lovely,” Rarity said, sniffing the air. “Oh, are you alright?”
The dragon coughed. “Some of that went up the wrong way!”
“Oh, I am sorry.” She shrugged. “But, well, it proves my bona fides, does it not?”
There was a silence.
“…you said two thirds, didn’t you?”
“For shame!” Rarity kicked the floor. “I am an artisan, not a day labourer! One third.”
“That is robbery!” Snarls echoed in the confined of the cave, though the effect was spoiled by a cough. “Sixty percent.”
“Forty-five.”
“Fifty, then, curse you.”
Rarity smiled broadly. “It’s a deal.”
The dragon grumbled something about banditry by another name.
“Oh, hush,” the unicorn replied. “It’s not as though you’re the only person around here with jewellery, you know.”
26.5
“And who do you have for us to listen to?” Cheerilee asked, after everyone was done applauding Granny Smith’s story.
“Well,” Scootaloo said, and paused. “Does it just have to be a parent or whatever?”
Cheerilee considered. “It can be a close family friend, if that’s what you mean.”
“I more meant… biological. But that’s fine.” Scootaloo poked her head out the window. “It’s okay! Come on in!”
In a blur of multicoloured light, Rainbow Dash skidded to a stop in the classroom.
Well, almost to a stop.
“I’m okay!” she shouted from inside the pile of books, to general laughter. “Er… little help here, squirt?”
Scootaloo and several other fillies and colts dug her out of the collapsed bookcase.
“Right,” Dash said, preening self-importantly and trying to look like that hadn’t happened, “basically, I’m really, really fast.”
There was a long pause.
“Hey, Dash?” Scootaloo stage-whispered.
“Yeah?”
“Little more than that?”
“Okay, whatever.” Dash blew her mane out of her eyes. “So, how about I tell you mini-ponies the story of how I got my cutie mark?”
As stories went, it was a pretty good one. Not quite as good as Granny Smith’s tale of the founding of Ponyville – every pony in the room could relate to that, whereas only the pegasi had some sense of just how insanely hard a Rainboom was – but Dash told it well, and there were some gasps when she described Fluttershy’s fateful fall. (Though, of course, it was fairly obvious that the pegasus was going to survive. After all, she was a common sight around town.)
“Did you really break the sound barrier?” Silver Spoon asked, after Dash had finished. “That’s awesome!”
Diamond didn’t join in the general approval, but given how nasty she could be Scootaloo considered it good enough that she had stopped trying to undermine the Crusaders.
“Wait a second,” Diamond said, frowning.
Scootaloo felt like rolling her eyes. Spoke too soon.
“Are you Scootaloo’s sister or something? If you’re so good at flying, how come she’s so terrible at it?”
“Yeah, I am,” Dash said, so matter-of-factly and coming so close on the heels of the accusation that tears started in Scootaloo’s eyes. “We didn’t have the same parents, but she’s still my little sis. And who cares about being bad at flying?”
Coming from a pony who had just described herself as the most awesome flier in existence, this drew a collective jaw drop.
“…you know what I mean,” Dash added, blushing. “Anyway. Flying’s what I’m good at. Scoots is good at something else.”
She thought for a second. “Hey, I have this theory… Scoots? Want to help me test something?”
The younger pegasus looked up at her. “Let me guess. Terrifyingly dangerous, small chance of success, and pure awesome if it works.”
“You know me too well,” Dash replied, winking.
Scootaloo was still a little nervous, but… well, Dash was old enough and experienced enough that this was at least partly an act. (After all, a crazy and awesome older sister was worth major kudos.)
“Alright. I trust you.”
“I take it baaaaack!” Scootaloo shouted, looking down at the ground miles below.
Dash grinned. “Hey, this is totally safe.”
Scootaloo held on tighter to Dash’s rainbow mane.
“…look,” the elder pony said, in a much more serious voice. “You are basically my sister. I meant what I said. And I will save you if this doesn’t work.”
Scootaloo gulped.
“…okay.” Closing her eyes, she jumped.
For a moment, she felt completely weightless. Then, as she accelerated, air resistance began to bite.
Crudcrudcrudcrud! What did Dash say? Air magic, right. Air magic. Reaching out with her weak but well controlled air magic, Scootaloo began shaping the air stream around her to reduce the air resistance. Another thought hit her, and she began flapping her small wings as fast as she could.
“You’re doing fine!” Dash shouted, easily keeping pace. Scootaloo felt vaguely insulted that her mentor was actually doing this while lying on her back.
Halfway to the ground, Scootaloo was feeling overwhelmed.
She was nearly as fast as she had to be, but somehow getting that little extra speed was beyond her. It was the kind of thing you needed full pegasus wings and strong pegasus magic for, not her half-developed adolescent version.
The air she was shaping was useful, cutting through the atmosphere like a knife, but-
Wait!
Like a knife. Or like a well designed fighter aircraft.
Ideas clicked into place. Scootaloo reached out to her magic and twisted – taking the friction and using it to heat the air, rather than minimizing it.
Another thought, and she funnelled that air through the main body of her wind cone, which began to flatten and develop distinctive wings. A slight alteration made it begin to spin.
Thank you, Lockheed-Martin! Scootaloo thought, in the strange euphoria of an epiphany.
Hot air contacted cold, and-
WOOSH.
Every child from the school, even Diamond Tiara, started cheering as the curtain of flame spread across the sky.
A rainbow one formed behind it, and then Dash’s streak of multicoloured light caught up with a white one trailed by orange flame.
“What the buck did you just do?” Dash asked, laughing hysterically as she kept pace with Scootaloo.
“I think I just made a Blackbird out of weather magic,” Scootaloo replied in a distracted tone. “Hey, it’s about to fall apart ‘cause I can’t work out how to make it stop accelerating. Catch me?”
“Always,” Dash promised, and, true to her word, plucked the filly out of the air as her fragile air-construct collapsed.
“Huh…” Scootaloo said, dazed, and stared at her flank again.
What was there was a kind of faded, gaseous aircraft-shape made from sonic boom shock clouds. It wasn’t the only cutie mark she’d had, not by a long chalk, but this one was… different, if only in that she’d managed it without any kind of artificial assistance.
Applebloom hadn’t stopped laughing since Scootaloo had landed, except to point out between giggles that it was so typically Scootaloo to have no idea how to keep an aircraft in one piece.
Scootaloo had tried to protest, but the engineer-filly had reminded her of at least three separate planes that had simply fallen to bits around her thanks to overzealous straining of the airframe.
Sweetie Belle came to Scootaloo’s rescue. “Hey, ‘bloom? You do realize she’s completely stolen the show this time around?”
Applebloom stopped laughing. “Aw… shucks.”
“So,” Sweetie added, determined to get them all back to normal, “you going to repeat this way of getting your cutie mark?”
“No!” Scootaloo replied, eyes twitching. “Not without at least two different kinds of safety gear.”
“What, a helmet and shinpads?” ‘bloom snarked.
Scootaloo considered it. “I was thinking more along the lines of the world’s biggest trampoline and a Pinkie Promise not to get hurt.”
“…actually, that might do it,” Applebloom admitted.
“Hey, this gives me an idea for a song!” Sweetie said.
Grateful for the return to normalcy, both of the others threw pillows at her.
“…she did what?” Twilight asked. “No, I did hear you. I just didn’t believe you were that irresponsible.”
Dash looked down. “Sorry, ‘twi. I was going to ascend to save her if I had to.”
“I don’t doubt it.” Twilight tried a smile. “Just… careful, okay? Not everypony is as tough as you.”
The pegasus nodded.
Then her eyes widened, and she kicked the wall. “Oh, buck! I should have lent her my Element!”
“Would that have worked?” Twilight asked, more to herself than anything. “I would have thought the cutie mark had to be established… oh, well.”
Getting out a notebook, she wrote something in it. “You know this is one of the first times any Crusader has got a cutie mark based entirely off of in-loop actions? I mean, they’ve got ones before, but usually either when not Awake or when in a Loop somehow different to normal.”
“Or they’ve made it a loop different to normal by building an aircraft or something…” Dash muttered. “Which is more or less what happened anyway.”
“True, true…” Twilight acknowledged. “Okay, I think this one’s going to be a friendship lesson. By the end of the week, please.”
The pegasus groaned. “Not again!”
“Well, you have been a bit crazy these last few loops… perhaps you need to let some steam off…” Twilight frowned. “Wonder when the next giant robot loop is?”
26.6
“So,” Spike said, lying back in the warm sunlight of a new Loop’s second day, “what should we do this time?”
“Not sure, really…” Rarity replied, trotting over with a huge towel. She laid it down next to him, making sure it completely covered the grass, then flopped down on it. Obligingly, Spike raised an arm and pulled the edge of the towel under his side.
“Hmmm…” the dragon pondered for a moment. “Fancy a world tour?”
“That might be nice.”
“Really?” Spike said, grinning. “I’d only suggested it for a bit of a laugh – are you sure it’s fine?”
“Yeah.” Rarity winked. “Just give me a day or so to set the shop up.”
“Ready?” Spike checked.
“Of course.” The unicorn nodded down the road. “Come on – Manehattan awaits!”
“Out of curiosity,” Spike said, as they got going – Loopers could travel light with the best of them, using their subspace pockets to hold luggage easily – “how did you get the shop set up?”
“Oh, I blagged an EMH off of Twilight. You know, the virtual doctor things from the Star Trek place. No AI,” she shrugged, “but it should be quite sufficient with a little reprogramming.”
“Hello?” the stallion said, looking nervous. “This is the Carousel Boutique, right?”
With a flash, a unicorn mare appeared in front of him. Her face was composed, and she wasn’t quite focusing on him.
“Please state the nature of your fashion disaster.”
“Er… well, I’m getting married tomorrow, and I don’t have a tuxedo-”
The unicorn vanished. There was a shuffling sound from the back room, and then she reappeared in another flash of light.
In her hooves was a neatly packaged suit.
“Price noted on the package. Please leave your details and feedback.”
Feeling quite thoroughly creeped out, the stallion left his name, address and the money and left as fast as he could.
The suit fitted perfectly.
26.7
“What is the meaning of this?” Blueblood said, looking down at a rather scruffy earth pony stallion. “Where is your ticket?”
“I told you, I don’t have one,” the stallion replied. “Look, I never expected to need one, but-”
“But me no buts!” Blueblood shook his head. “This is an invitation only event, and I do not intend to see the wedding of my cousin and her fiancé marred by any old nag off the street!”
“Look, Blueblood, it’s me!” The stallion’s eyes pleaded. “I don’t know where my horn went, but it’s me. Shining Armor.”
“Tosh!” Blueblood turned up his nose. “Captain Armor is a unicorn of great distinction and rather good breeding. You are some earth pony with a similar cutie mark, trying to con your way into the palace. Guards!”
“What’s going on?” Cadence’s voice came from the direction of the grounds. “Is it Shiny? He’s ever so late, the sun’s gone down.”
“It’s me, Cadence!” the stallion shouted, before Blueblood threw a silencing spell at him.
Cadence flew over the last fence in the way with a little fluttering hop and slowed to a stop, eyes wide. “Oh!”
“Please, cousin,” Blueblood’s tone softened. “I’m sorry all this hassle is affecting your wedding day, but this is just some tramp who tried to get into the palace under false pretences. Once this is sorted out, then I can see if I can find the Captain. I should have tried sooner.”
“No,” Cadence said, her voice hitching and close to tears. “You’re wrong, cousin.”
Her eyes met those of the stallion. “This is Shining Armor. I’d know him anywhere.”
Blueblood’s reaction to that was, perhaps fortunately, composed of a coughing fit rather than words.
“What happened to you, love?” she asked softly.
Shining tried to speak, but no sound came out. After a moment, Cadence snapped the thread of Blueblood’s silence spell and he started in on the explanation.
“It’s a curse,” he said, his clear voice carrying. “By night one way, by day another; this shall be the norm. Until you find true love’s first kiss; then, take love’s true form.”
“Oh, Shining…” Cadence looked at him for a second longer, then darted forwards and kissed him.
All the spectators covered their eyes against the blinding flash of light.
“…huh,” Shining said after a moment, looking down the barrel of his body. “I don’t remember the wings from before.”
Cadence sniffed. “You were always a prince in my eyes.”
“…plagarists,” Trixie muttered, as the moonlit wedding finally got under way.
“Oh, hush,” Twilight said, eating some popcorn. “So what if they stole the plot of Shrek?”
26.8 (Masterweaver)
Twilight had a BRILLIANT plan this loop. She'd filled her friends in on it, arranged various spell matrices in the Everfree, and just managed to get back in time for the summer sun celebration. On cue, Nightmare Moon appeared, looking down at the crowd of ponies and going into her speech.
"And now, the night! Will last! Forever!"
Twilight smirked internally, opening her mouth--
"I wouldn't be doing that mate."
Twilight blinked.
A strange brown stallion, mane and beard tied up in dreadlocks and beads, swaggered forward. He was wearing a roughshod sort of jacket and a ratty old tricorn, eyeing Nightmare Moon lazily. The goddess of the night gazed down at him dismissively.
"And who are you to oppose me?"
"Oh, nonono. Not opposing the night thing, really. I'm just a humble sailor, stumbled into port for the Summer.... set thing."
"...We're landlocked."
"See, that's the problem. I'm completely lost." The stallion waved around vaguely, half stumbling. "Sailor, use the stars to navigate. Love those things, by the way, great lil' pinpricks of light in the sky."
"Twilight," Rainbow whispered, "should we do something?"
The unicorn shook her head slightly. "I want to see how this goes..."
"Ah! So you admit the virtue of the night!" Nightmare Moon stamped a hoof. "Thank you, noble sailor. Now then--"'
"But you see the problem is... if it's night here, then what's it out at sea?" The stallion held up a hoof. "Not. Not night. Thing of it is, if you're out at sea and it's day, you're completely lost. Less you find land. But that only ensures you're a little less lost, less you find a map. You need a lot more equipment when it's not night, then when it's night. You see? I love the eternal night, but put it here, land locked, and when I get out to port I'm not going to be able to see the stars, lass."
Nightmare Moon blinked. "I... see thy reasoning, I suppose. Still--"
"Here's an idea. Let's make eternal night mobile." By now, the stallion had somehow stumbled onto the stage. "You and me, and all us night lovers, we go round the sea. And all the day lovers stay here, on dry land, and grow things. Then, when we get hungry, we walk up, take what we can, and sail off."
"Thou refers to piracy!"
The stallion considered her words. "Hmm. Yes, I think that is the right word."
"Why would we engage in such acts against those whom we wish respect from?!"
"Why wouldn't you? I mean, isn't that what you're doing now?"
Nightmare Moon looked genuinely shocked. "No!"
"Wait, so you're not asking for tribute?"
"No! Of course not!"
"Ah, sorry then. I think I misinterpreted things." He sighed. "Carry on with your hostile takeover, by all means."
Twilight tried hard to keep her face straight.
Nightmare Moon gave the stallion a long, strange look.
He tilted his head.
She snorted, and turned back to the now quite bemused ponies. "As we were saying, the night will last forever--"
"You know, I just realized something."
The alicorn growled, whirling on him. "What?!"
"I think, maybe, the night lasts forever anyway. I mean, the moon keeps moving, and the sun keeps moving, and really the only difference is which is in the sky. So keeping the moon where it is sort of seems redundant to me. Of course, I'm just a very lost sailor. Could be wrong."
"No," Twilight offered politely, "I'm pretty sure you're right." She got a brown hoof wave.
"So what I'm thinking is, keeping night here means that everybody else in the world, they end up not getting night. That doesn't seem fair to me."
Nightmare Moon stared at him as if he was insane.
"Show of hands! Sorry. Show of hooves, who here thinks that the night is too wonderful to keep locked on one place?"
Everypony in the hall shot up a hoof, Pinkie flipping over so all of hers could dangle upward. Nightmare Moon choked.
"Now, see, all these ponies love night so much, they want to share it... with the world. So, back to my original suggestion. Keep the eternal night, but keep it moving. Savvy?"
The black alicorn stared at him. "But... that's just the same thing as what there was before!"
"Is it?" He blinked, glanced up at the sky, and turned back to her. "I hadn't noticed."
Even Twilight wasn't sure if the stallion was being sarcastic.
Nightmare Moon held up a hoof, trying to formulate an argument, but her mouth merely opened and shut in confusion. Finally, staring out at the crowd, she released a frustrated scream. "FINE! Moving eternal night it is! But we're going to be watching closely and if we don't see proper respect for the night, we are going to stick Celestia back in the sun!" With a flash of her horn, she was gone, and a moment later Celestia stepped onto the stage slightly confused.
"Ah.... hum. Well. That was... not... expected..."
"I rarely am, love."
Twilight facehooved. Okay, time to host an intervention. Her horn glowed, teleporting the stallion and herself into the library; she had to figure out what the hay was going on.
"...so this is your first time outside your home loop?"
"I suppose it is." Jack shrugged. "Leastways, this don't look like anywhere in the Caribbean. I take it you've never heard of Davy Jones?"
"No. Well, welcome to Equestria, enjoy your stay, and if you do anything to destabilize or threaten the world I teleport you straight to the moon." Twilight smirked. "Other then that, you're pretty much free to do whatever, mister..."
"Sparrow Jack." He blinked and shook his head. "No, wait. Jack Sparrow. Captain. Captain Jack Sparrow."
"A pleasure to meet you captain. Oh, since it is your first time out of your loop, you'll need the Welcome to the multiverse speech. Oh I'm so excited, this is my frist time giving it!"
Jack Sparrow suddenly felt a sinking feeling.
26.9 (Masterweaver)
Twilight woke up over a dead mouse. And realized part of it was in her.... beak?
Okay so... owl, apparently. Alright, sure. Loop memories... this was still Equestria. Heck, she was in the Everfree forest...
A suspicion rose up in her mind and she took to wing, headed for Ponyville.
"Ah swear if you make any sort of pun Ah will punt you."
Rarity scoffed. "My word, Applejack, do I look like the sort of feline that would make light of another's situation? I am a refined lady."
The farmdog nodded, managing a wry smile. "Ah guess ya are... should be on the lookout fer Rainbow though. Wait a minute, if we're the pets this loop, then Rainbow--"
"Yeah, yeah, laugh it up." Rainbow let out an irritated sigh. Twilight was a short distance away, hooting with laughter and rolling on the ground.
"Now, now," Fluttershy tried, "It's not nice of you to laugh at Rainbow's expense Twi. After all, it... hee... she can't help that she's... hee hee... so slow!" The rabbit tried and failed to hold back her own giggles.
Dash looked between her two friends. Eventually, she just rolled her eyes and pulled back into her shell. "Wake me up when Angel comes round to feed us."
Pinkie looked in the mirror.
"...well. Bright pink gator. This is one for the record books."
"Are you sure you want to do this?" the bearer of Kindness asked his pet tortoise.
Rainbow Dash nodded, snapping the goggles over her eyes and checking the straps on her prismatic shell.
Tank let out a sigh, double checking the machinery once again before finally nodding. "Alright then. Tortoise take off in ten." He backed off, ready to catch her with his magic should anything go wrong.
Blades started to whirl, cutting the air with a powerful rumble as the various propellers attached to Dash kicked into gear. Soon enough, the only thing holding her to the ground were the metal struts clinging to the contraption. Tank took a breath, lighting his horn and sliding them away slowly.
As soon as she was free, Rainbow bolted into the air, spiraling and twirling on her magitech glider jet copter thing and letting out a scream of pure joy. Rainbow Dash, fastest tortoise on the ground, was now once again the fastest thing in the air.
The air over Ponyville, anyway. Even Tank's mechanical brilliance wasn't quite enough to give her supersonic speed. Yet.
She'd painted the contraption blue with yellow bolts, much to Tank's amusement. And by Celestia she was going to ensure that she made it.
"Ah thought Ah was the pet in this relationship," Applejack grumbled to herself. But she couldn't help but smile as Winona emerged from a pile of apples and tumbled down to her paws. "Come on, ya klutz, ya still need to get to the other trees."
Winona didn't understand her, of course--well, she didn't understand what Applejack was saying, but the way she pointed toward the rest of the orchard with an orange paw communicated her intent clearly enough. "Oh come on, you silly mutt, I'm dog tired! Maybe I should go see if anypony's willing to lend a hoof." Her face scrunched up. "On second thought, no, that would be GROSS. I'll just ask for their help."
Applejack let out a whuffling chuckle. "No wonder you got Laughter. That sounds like a right fine idea, girl, let's go corral us some ponies." Winona bounced up, beginning to walk off before Applejack bit down on her tail. "AFTER you get all these apples into buckets, girl!"
"Ow! Hey! Down dog!" Winona turned around. "What is it? What's wrong?"
The orange mutt sighed, pointing at the apples.
"....you want to play fetch?"
Applejack facepawed.
Gummy....
Gummy was a strange one. Everypony in Ponyville knew this. Yes, he gave freely, and often exactly what was needed. Heck, he was even the bearer of generosity! And yet....
Some said it was his eyes. Some said it was his vacant expression. Some said it was the way the earth pony moved so silently, you couldn't hear his hoofsteps on hard cobble. Some, quietly, blamed the genetic quirk that prevented him from growing teeth and made the rare sound of his voice an oddity, though they would never say it out loud.
All in all, something was... off about that pony. How did he know what you needed? Why did he crop up when you needed him, and just as suddenly disappear? Where did he get the stuff he gave, what was his job anyway? Yes, he hung out with his "friends," but... he would smile, frown, and never open his mouth. Never even to eat! Although, given the tooth thing maybe he was just embarrassed.
Strangest of all was his hot-pink alligator. She couldn't talk. No. She sang. And danced, but any animal could do that. The toothy grin almost permanent on her face was somehow heartwarming and endearing and not at all predatory. On occasion she even played with young foals; even stranger, if the parents got worried and tried to stop her she would nod and walk away, calmly, as if she understood.
They were an odd pair, Gummy and Pinkie Pie, and nopony really quite understood them.
Opalescence smiled gratefully as Rarity brought up the appropriate gems. "Thank you, darling. You've quite a good taste, I wish I could make you an outfit." She sighed. "If only you didn't have such long fur... Ah, well. Back to pleasing the idiots in Canterlot."
"Should I take offense to that?"
The white unicorn turned to the brown pegasus walking in through the boutique door. "You're not in Canterlot anymore, you're not an idiot at all, and I doubt princess Philomena would disagree with my assessment of the nobles... so I'm going to say no. Why are you here, Owly?"
"Just warning you there's going to be a storm Tuesday." The pegasus shrugged. "I wasn't aware if you had any important meetings, but I know that impressions are important."
Opalescence nodded at him thankfully. "I'll be sure to have a day in then. Thanks for the heads up."
"Part of Honesty is facts, and I felt I would be denying my element if I left you uninformed."
That got a mild chuckle out of her. "Honestly, you try too hard. You don't see me casting spells left and right. By the way, could you tell Peewee his phoenix has been sneaking over here?"
"Certainly. Has there been any issues?"
"Well, no, not exactly." The unicorn shuddered. "It's just.... I... I think I spotted him making out with Rarity!"
The pegasus raised a thick eyebrow. "Truly?"
"I don't know what she sees in him--purple and green feathers, so gauche! And apart from that, she's a cat and he's a bird." Opal shuddered. "Still, I guess I can't actually stop them without spaying her. Not going to do that. Angel gets really aggressive about things like that."
"Mmm, yes. Cloudsdale culture can do that. Very well, I'll try to get Peewee to reign Spike in, but I doubt he'll do it." Owly shook his head. "That young dragon.... why did I EVER hatch him?"
"You wanted an intellectual challenge and didn't actually expect your methods to work," Opal deadpanned.
"Ah, yes. Hmm. Oh, have you seen Twilight anywhere? She's been missing for a couple of days."
Opal shrugged. "No clue. Go see if Angel knows anything. The only owl I understand is you." She grinned. "Actually, aren't you up a little early? It's not even evening yet!"
"Oh har de har har. One week of all nighters and you never live it down."
Fluttershy looked up.
"....so. Let me see if I understand this. You wanted to see if the alicornification spell worked on an owl."
"Yep."
"And now...." She gestured. "You're an owlbear."
Twilight rubbed one of her antlers awkwardly. "Yep."
"...How. How does this even make sense?!"
"Um... I'm still part owl?" The violet giant giggled awkwardly and cringed. "I can fix this, I think. I just need a few things."
Fluttershy sighed, tugging at her long ears. "I'll go see if I can sneak something from Angel for you. What is it you need?"
26.10 (misterq)
Twilight woke up in a comfortable bedroom and waited until the memories hit. She was human this loop, and very young. Her name was Tai Lee and she was just about to start fourth grade at Ponneville Magical Elementary School along with her friends, Jacqueline Apple-Smyth, Bonnie Dash, Felicia Shai, Rarity Belle, and... and...
"Oh no."
Mina Diane 'Pinkie' Pie woke up on a train with a huge grin on her face. Her parents were drilling experts working for BP who had recently transferred to the London division. That meant that she was going to Hogwarts! On one hand she was going to miss all her friends, but on the other hand, she had never had a solo Hogwarts loop before. Also she had hands again now. They always made her giggle. Like five tiny legs on the end of a longer leg.
Neville opened a compartment of a train only to see a strange girl with light red hair giggling while wiggling her fingers. Mustering up what courage he had, he attempted to get her attention, "Um, hello. My name is Neville. Have.. have you seen a toad around here? He may answer to the name, Trevor. I'm afraid mine seems to have run away."
The girl whirled her head towards him and grinned in a wide, and somewhat disturbing manner, "Hi Neville! My name is Pinkie Pie. Actually it's Mina Diane Pie, but everyone just calls me Pinkie Pie. Don't worry about your toad. Gummy and I will help you look!"
"Um, thank you," the young wizards was having second thoughts about asking this girl for help.
"No problem!" Pinkie said and whipped out a small alligator from somewhere, and held it in both hands, "Gummy, find Trevor!"
The alligator just sat there in her grip, only slowly wagging his tail.
"This way!" The girl jumped up and ran out of the compartment. Neville followed cautiously and with growing dread.
Godric Gryffindor had created the sorting hat with more than a few secrets. One of them was a result of him trying to figure out a way of dealing with children who were advanced enough to have trained their minds to be unreadable by said hat. The quickest way he solved this problem was to make the hat automatically sort anyone who it couldn't read into his house. In addition to getting talented children who had been skilled in controlling their own minds, this little feature would result, over the years, in Gryffindor getting a half-giant boy who would otherwise gone to Hufflepuff, and a werewolf who would have been a shoo-in for Ravenclaw.
So when Pinkie Pie put on the sorting hat, it just yelled out 'Gryffindor' and automatically rebooted itself from the sugar mind-induced magical blue screen of death. She quickly ran down and sat next to Neville at the table. They had found Trevor in minutes. After Pinkie introduced the terrified toad to her alligator, she had declared herself and Neville to be best friends in Hogwarts, whether the boy wanted to be or not. Then, she had proceeded to buy and eat most of the candy that was left on the snack cart. Neville had a feeling it was going to be a very long, very interesting year.
"You have to calm down," Applejack told Twilight, "I'm sure Pinkie is going to be fine on her lonesome."
Twilight looked over her remaining awakened friends who were all gathered together at the school library, "I'm not worried about that. Do you remember what happened the last time Pinkie had a solo loop?"
Applejack answered, "She turned out just fine. Grew wings and a horn, if I recall correctly."
Rarity paled, "I don't think that is what Twilight is getting at. The last time Pinkie was left alone, she became the chaos goddess of joy and celebration for the entire galaxy. And then there was the time the non-awake version of her became an alicorn princess."
"And now she is all alone in the corrupt an nasty English wizarding world," Fluttershy spoke up, "It's not nearly as horrible as that loop's universe, but it is still pretty bad."
Rainbow Dash asked with slight confusion, "So wait. You're saying that we don't have to go save Pinkie from the English magical world. We have to go save the English magical world from Pinkie?"
Twilight nodded as vigorously as an eleven year old girl could, "Yes. Although it may already be too late."
Pinkie Pie sat in a small corner of the bathroom with her arms wrapped around her legs. Her long hair was over her eyes and she was trying not to cry. Of course, she realized that she now had the emotional stability of an eleven year old girl. So when Ron Weasely told her that she was extremely annoying and that no one wanted to come to her far too frequent parties, it had hurt far, far more than it should.
Sure, she could go all alicorn party goddess on this loop, but she had the feeling that would end it immediately, and she was kind of enjoying learning human magic.
So when she heard the sound of the bathroom door locking and looked up into the face of an angry troll, she knew she had to take care of this Pinkie Pie style.
Harry Potter and Ron quickly unlocked the door after racing back up the stairs to the second floor bathroom. It took them a while to realize that they locked the troll in with their classmate and hoped that the fact that there was no screaming didn't mean that something horrible had happened.
All their preconceived notions vanished when the door opened. Inside, they beheld a party.
Balloons and streamers were everywhere. A large partially eaten feast was prepared to one side and a massive banner proclaimed in large letters 'Welcome to Hogwarts, Mr. Troll'.
On the other side of the large bathroom, was a large smelly troll who was currently using his club to play a giant magically reinforced game of whack-a-mole. Idly, Harry noticed that that one of the moles popping up resembled a certain potion professor. It was also worth double the points according to the increasing floating numbers designating the troll's score. Pinkie Pie was using pom-poms to cheer him on.
Then she noticed the two boys.
"See? Not everyone thinks my super fun parties are annoying. Isn't that right, Mister Thok?"
The troll, Mr. Thok apparently, nodded and gave a happy grunting noise as he clobbered the Snape-looking whack-a-mole with a club slam that shook the floor a little.
It turns out that fear and awe of an insistent little girl that could control trolls could also be basis for a lasting friendship.
Twilight was just about ready to teleport the gang over to England on a rescue mission when an owl holding an alligator holding a letter appeared outside her window. The girl slowly and cautiously let them into her room. The very familiar alligator opened its mouth and dropped the letter on her bed before the two flew into her bathroom and closed the door. Soon, there was a sound of her bathtub being filled with water.
"So what does it say?" Applejack tore Twilight's attention back towards the envelope.
Twilight carefully picked up the letter, opened it, and began to read.
"Hello, friends! This is Pinkie Pie! Hopefully you are all 'awake' and bright-eyed and bushy-tailed, not that we actually have tails anymore, bushy or otherwise, although I'm working on that. I don't know if you all want to come and rescue me from the spooky haunted super magic castle, but I am having tons of fun here learning magic. Most of it even works for me. Well, some of it does.
I'm no expert, but the fact that I still have earth pony magic and chaos goddess magic running through me, somehow, makes the normal magic I'm trying to learn act all kooky strange. The way I understand it is that it isn't like plugging a DC device into a wall socket with no converter, but more like prying open the battery case and stuffing it full of waldorf salad, hot lava, and magical amulets; then hoping for the best.
Half the time, my spells work just fine. A quarter of the time, they work, but are either way too powerful or barely powerful enough. And the last quarter of the time, strange things happen. The professors are still trying to figure out how I turned a regular feather into a giant angry unkillable purple tentacle plant that was also on fire.
They say that that part of the castle will be safe in another few days or so. A week at most.
Our transfiguration teacher turned into a human from being a cat, but then lied and said 'no' when I asked if she was a moon cat. I don't know who her magical girl is, but I will find out soon. She was also unhappy that when she turned her desk into a piggy, only I was quick enough to be able to ride it out of the room and into the hallway.
Oh, in other news. I threw a party for a Mr. Thok, who is a giant troll. After some translation from Rubeus Hagrid, who is a vary large hairy man that lives alone in a wooden shed not far from where we kids go to school; Principal Dumbledore just decided to extract Mr. Thok's memories and then threw them into a big bowl. Then he tried to play apple-bobbing, but with memories instead of apples. Then he got really mad and chased Professor Quirrell out of the school.
Ron, who is a boy in my house and my new friend, asked me to not have so many parties. I happily agreed. Then I met with his brothers, who are twins and love pranks of all sorts. We came up with so many good ideas. So many. I'll try to record some of the good ones so you can see them, Dashie.
Ron was upset at me when he thought that Gummy ate his missing rat, Scabbers. But I told him that Gummy has no teeth and that I would get him another pet that is much better than his old rat. I'm mixing up several batches of polyjuice potion right now. Not sure what I'll get when I mix bits of every magical animal I can find together and then feed it to the giant freshwater squid, but it has got to be better than a boring old rat, right?
Don't worry, the ingredients were super easy to get with the Potions teacher in the hospital. They say something shredded his mind real bad. I have no idea what it was, but I think it tried to get me too because right before he collapsed all twitchy and foamy at the mouth, I had a brief headache. I think it was some kind of invisible mind ghost, but I laughed at it and it hasn't bothered me since.
Actually those last parts happened around Halloween, which is three months from now. And I think Gummy should now be done with his bath. In ending, hope everything is fine with all of you. Don't come 'rescue' me. I'll write you guys another letter when a good time to go visit would be.
Toodles,
Pinkie Pie."
When Twilight finished talking, the owl swooped out of the bathroom carrying the newly cleaned alligator. The alligator opened his mouth and a giant red swirling portal formed in front of the two animals, closing quickly once the two flew inside.
For a moment, no one spoke. Then Applejack stood up and calmly put her hat on her head, "See. I told you she was fine. Everything is fine. I'm going to go home now and pretend really hard that magical Pinkie Pie is farther than only half the world away. Goodnight, all."