Chapter 3

Earlier today, the lack of stress really got to me. How odd is that? A lack of stress causing stress. Can I really not just let go? Do I need something to worry about?

Twilight tapped her pen against the page and sighed.

All I have right now are questions. How do I fit in? How do I relax? Can I relax?

“More questions.” And none of them had answers she could think of. “Why?” She snorted and closed the journal. Worrying about it isn’t going to help me understand it. All around her, her friends were enjoying the idle time after the sun had gone down while a fire crackled cheerfully in the fireplace. A long day of enjoying the sun, playing games, and walking the beachfront had been wonderful.

Of course, it wouldn’t have been complete without Applejack and Rainbow Dash daring each other to try the water and stand the chill wind. At least until Rarity called them out on their tomfoolery and called an end to the day’s fun.

Upstairs, she could hear Applejack running the shower in fits and spurts to conserve the propane that gave them hot water. In the common area, Rainbow Dash, hair still dripping from her shower, and Fluttershy were playing a game of Go Fish while Rarity and Pinkie Pie were talking about the Spring Fling.

And here I am, worrying about stress.

“‘Jungle Fever?’ Pinkie Pie, have you ever even been to a jungle?”

“Depends. Does Applejack’s back forty count?”

“That’s a forest.” Rarity bopped Pinkie lightly on the shoulder with her pen. “I suppose we could have a Forest Faire. You know... medieval dress, formal gowns and noble finery. Knights and maidens, princes and princesses.”

“Oooh! What about pony princesses?” Pinkie’s eyes flicked to Twilight, watching them from the kitchen table. “Or, well, another one.”

“Well, maybe. I don’t think she’s going to be able to make it, though.” Rarity shot a glance over her shoulder. “Would you like to join us, Twilight? We’re trying to decide on a theme for the Spring Fling.”

“It sounds like you have a good choice already. I’m not really a history buff, you know. I’m a scientist, at heart.”

“You know, I don’t think CHS has ever had a science themed dance before, but we could do a science theme.” Rarity turned over another page in her notebook. “Why don’t you come over here and we can talk science.”

The notebook under her hand, the one she had filled with speculation and unscientific thoughts on magic, itched at her mind. Heat blossomed in her cheeks. Fears over her mentors and peers finding out about her secret studies wormed their way forward, taunting her with imaginary laughter.

Rarity’s eyes, meeting hers, stayed steady even as Twilight’s cheeks must have been turning red.

Why did I want to study it in the first place? The diary, a safe place where she could be frank and honest and not worry about what others thought, might have the answer somewhere amid the scribbles, formulae and diagrams. She opened it again and stared at the first page.

“Oh, come over here, Twilight. We’ve only got a few days before we have to get back to the same-old-same-old back at school.”

“It’s the same for you, maybe... but I’m still new. I’m just worried that—”

“Vacation, darling. Worry later, come tell us about laboratories, lab coats, and mad scientists.”

“You do know that Halloween is over, right?” Twilight bit her lip as soon as the sarcastic comment left her mouth, and looked at her notebook again, then pushed it away. “Sorry.”

“Don’t be.” Rarity jerked a thumb at Rainbow Dash. “She’ll give you a run for your money where snark is concerned.”

Rainbow looked up, smirked, and nodded. “You’re not so shabby yourself, Rares.”

“I do try to keep my tongue civil, Rainbow Dash. Not that there aren’t times a good bit of wit is appropriate.” Rarity turned her attention back to Twilight. “So, tell us, what gets you in a tizzy when you’re doing experiments?”

Magic. Twilight stuffed the thought far into the back of her mind. “Actually... Star Swirl was a great scientist, you know. I like your idea of something medieval, Rarity, and Star Swirl is widely credited with the beginning of the Enlightenment Era. We could...” Twilight shrugged. Not many other people shared her fascination with the ancient astronomer. “It’s a silly idea.”

“Not at all! Come, come! Tell us all about Star Swirl.”

It’s strange, relying on intuition and feelings to guide my research. But if it hadn’t been for those intuitions, I wouldn’t have discovered, well, magic. Add to that the doppelganger in those videos, and it was more than enough to cast suspicion on that school, CHS. So why do I keep relying on supposition and intuition to make discoveries? I can’t even repeat half of the experiments.

Twilight tapped her finger on the old entry, near the very front of her journal. Formulae and diagrams covered the preceding pages, growing sparser and sparser the closer to the present day she got. None of her calculations or readings from the cobbled together magitometer seemed to fit anything she experienced later.

She flipped towards the present, going over each page quick enough to only glimpse the hackneyed theories and embarrassingly unscientific ramblings about magic. It wasn’t until she got to her journal entry the day after she had met her friends that she began to understand what it was that drove the feelings in her heart.

“I was lonely,” she whispered.

“I know that feeling,” Fluttershy said from the towel next to her. “I was lonely at Cloudsdale Elementary until Rainbow Dash stood up for me.”

“I had my brother, though. And my parents. And my foalsitter, too. I shouldn’t have been lonely. I had other people who cared for me in my life.”

“So did I. That didn’t stop me from feeling lonely at school, where none of those other people were.”

“That’s... but I had my books! I had my studies and my teachers. I had lots to do to keep my mind occupied.” Until you found something else. Twilight flipped back a page to the still photo of the six girls clustered up on the brightly lit dance floor.

“Oh? Then why did you feel lonely?” Fluttershy placed another iridescent shell open-side up on her towel and sifted through the others collected in the hem of her skirt. “You must have been lonely for a reason.”

“I... don’t know.”

Fluttershy smiled. “It is a difficult question.” She picked up a thin, round file and began rasping a small hole into the rough back of a shell. “Take your time.”

Page after page of notes, and a few more clipped out photographs passed by underneath her fingers. She began to get an impression of what she had been like so long ago: isolated, shy, and going insane—if the ramblings were anything to go by. And the crossed out, scribbled over conspiracy theories.

Those, she skipped over quickly. That had been a dark month for her. Too many internet boards had cock-eyed explanations for the strange goings on at the school, ranging from ‘something in the water’ type theories to ‘alien invasion averted’ theories.

Too many of them found their way into her notebook alongside the musings on magic as another fundamental force of the universe. Too many theories, not enough answers, and the fear of someone discovering her writings. Despite the fear, she found determination in the pages from months ago, a dogged desire to know.

Pages later, she still had no idea why she had been lonely.

Twilight shrugged. “I don’t know. It doesn’t make sense. It’s not like I all of a sudden had something go missing from my life.” She blinked and flipped back to a still photo cropped and taped to a notebook page—her, looking like an idiot with a book in her mouth. Hurriedly, she flipped back to the first photograph. “Maybe I did. But not me.”

“You mean pony Twilight, when she left us.” Fluttershy studied the small hole, puffed on it, then picked up another shell, delicate pink, and looked up at Twilight. “That makes sense. I mean, if we all have a connection to our other selves...” She began rasping at the shell, her lips pursed.

Twilight returned to perusing the notebook, skimming ahead, through theories growing more and more insane by the page, and notes from experiments with light, a busted seismometer, and the discovery of the rainbow of light.

Fluttershy put the pink shell down, and picked out another shell with a prominently iridescent blue lining. “But maybe there’s more. You said something about feeling that way after you saw the videos of us.” She set the file to the shell’s back, then paused. “Didn’t you?”

Twilight flipped backwards again, to the second page and the picture of the six girls. All of them were smiling and hugging one another. It hung in the darkness when she closed her eyes, her fingers splayed out over the photo. “I was...” Another memory bulled its way forward.

Twilight stared at the computer screen, the WhoTube video paused with herface center frame. All around her were five other girls, the blue skinned girl with the blue wings was flying even, with her wingspan spread wide at that perfect moment before a downsweep.

“Am I on drugs? Were those mushrooms in tonight’s pasta... special?” She rewound the video to the beginning and started it over, watching the girls snuggle close again for the photo.

Six other videos, all from different angles, were paused on different tabs of her browser, each one showing the same scene. “It looks so... real.” Even down to the way the wings worked and the way the plumage was arranged. Even down to the minute detail of the ears betraying the moods of the six girls.

They were all happy.

And she was in the center. Happy. Smiling.

Twilight frowned and pressed a hand to the unfamiliar pang in her chest.

The memory passed, as vivid as it was disturbing. The pang was still there, hurting just as much. Her fingers curled into a fist over her heart, as if to hold back the pain.

Fluttershy was staring at her, a hand held out partway. Her eyes flicked to Twilight’s, and she drew back the hand. “Are you okay?”

“I’m...” Twilight looked up from her notebook to where, further down the beach, her other friends were engaged in a furious game of badminton. Applejack and Rarity were facing off against Pinkie Pie and Rainbow Dash. She couldn’t make out the banter over the sound of the waves and wind, but she did hear the laughter that followed each point scored.

They were still happy. The twist in her chest tightened, and she bit back a whimper. She was still...

“I was jealous. You were all so happy, and I was, too. But that wasn’t me in those videos. I wanted to know what that felt like. What could make me smile like that. I’m not jealous anymore. I’m worried, I guess. What if, what if I can’t—” Nothing came after the ‘if.’ Vague fears danced on the tip of her tongue until she sighed and closed her mouth. “Never mind.”

“It’s okay, you know. You’re safe here, and...” Fluttershy brushed her fingers against Twilight’s elbow, then settled on the back of her clenched fist. The warm fingers, dusted with bits of iridescent shell, squeezed gently. “I can imagine what it felt like, standing on the outside and looking in. I used to do that.”

“I didn’t know that.” How much more don’t I know? How much more did she know that I don’t? “I”m sorry.” Twilight leaned back, looking up into the sky.

Fluttershy pulled Twilight’s hand down and cupped it in both of hers. “I’m doing much better now.” She teased open the clenched fingers. “I realized that I was happier being included. Even if it was just a small group of girls that I was friends with, being with them has helped me.”

“But what about her? Isn’t—” Twilight cut herself off, embarrassed.

“Who says we can’t have more than one of you as a friend?” Fluttershy reached down and scooped up the seven shells she’d drilled holes into. “It’s true, she helped us see one another as friends again. But we had become friends all on our own before she arrived.” She held out the shells, and placed them one at a time on Twilight’s palm.

“I heard something of that from Sunset while she was working out just what the sirens were up to.” Twilight was surprised to see the shells were all the colors of the magic they shared. Even the red of Sunset Shimmer. “What’s this for?”

“Friendship bracelets. It was Pinkie’s idea. Something to remember this vacation by. It’s our first with you, after all.”

Twilight let her eyes rove over the beach, to the house and the makeshift badminton court set up with string in the sand. Rarity and Pinkie Pie were sitting by the sidelines while Applejack and Rainbow shot the birdie back and forth in a furious exchange. “I-I just met you all, and I...” She swallowed, looking down at the creamy yellow hands cradling her violet. I love all of you. She swallowed again, this time against a lump growing bigger in her throat. Why?

“It won’t be the last, I’m sure.”

“But I hardly know any of you at all.” Twilight looked away, but didn’t draw her hand back.

“No, I understand. We would like to get to know you, if you’ll let us. And maybe you’ll see us the same way we see you. As a friend.” Fluttershy glanced at the notebook, closed on Twilight’s lap. “We want to hear what you have to say.”

“Wait, wait... a dragon?” Twilight bent to pick up another shell, a tiny thing the shade of Rarity’s hair, and handed it to Fluttershy. “I think you said it before, but... what? Spike is a dragon?”

“Well, so he said.” Fluttershy smiled and bent forward to pick up a faint pink shell laying on the sand. “But I stopped questioning things after he started talking.”

“Spike can talk?” None of the videos had shown her dog, Spike, ever talking. Or, well, pony Twilight’s dog, dragon... whatever. “I suppose I should stop wondering if it was really real, too... I mean, I did have wings, and a... was it a tail?” She pulled a strand of her waist length hair around flipped it back and forth. “I still don’t know why Rarity wants me to wear my hair loose like this. It’s so much neater in a bun. And I don’t get any of it in my face.”

“I think Rarity likes it because, well, it does look really nice on you. I do like the bun, too. You looked more...” Fluttershy ducked behind her curtain of hair. “More like you, I guess. Pony Twilight wore her hair down, too.”

“Should I wear it down?” Twilight gathered her hair up and bundled it up at the nape of her neck, then let it fall.

“You should wear it how you like.” Fluttershy reached up behind her neck and grimaced, then pulled out a pair of elastic bands. Her hair drooped and fell flatter, losing some of the curl at the tip. “If you want, we can make you look like old you again.”

“Maybe.” Twilight touched the proffered hair bands. “What about yours? I love your hair the way it was.”

“I have more back at the house.” Fluttershy shook her head, letting her hair out more. “What’ll it be? Pony Twilight or you?”

“Can we call her something other than ‘Pony Twilight?’ It just sounds weird. Like you’re referring to me, but as a pony. And was she really a pony? I mean really?” Twilight shook her head, trying to ignore the fluttering queasiness in her stomach. “It just sounds so strange. I mean, I’ve ridden ponies as a little girl and while they were smart, they weren’t... people.”

Fluttershy eyed her, face passive. Wind carried the sound of laughter and the whistle and whack of rackets to them as they walked on.

“I’m sorry. I didn’t mean—” Twilight hesitated, then put a hand on Fluttershy’s shoulder. “I’m not very good at talking to friends.”

“I know what you meant.” The smile returned to Fluttershy’s face. She deftly wrapped her hair into a ponytail and settled back in next to Twilight. “I’m not upset. It’s like my bunny, Angel. He’s smart, but I can’t talk to him like I can other people.”

“Right. That’s what I meant.” Fluttershy’s shoulder was loose under her hand, and warm. The light pink locks of hair brushed lightly back and forth against her wrist. “I mean, is... other Twilight a four legged equine? With wings? Or a bipedal humanoid with wings?”

“You know, I never really questioned that. When a dog talks to you and tells you that everything that one of Pinkie’s hunches suggested is true...” Fluttershy reached up to pull Twilight’s hand off her shoulder, then twined their fingers together.

Twilight blushed hotly, but didn’t let go. Walking hand in hand with her friend felt natural, and the close contact was easing the tension in her shoulders. Thoughts of what others might say flicked through her mind, and she dismissed all of them. Romance novels flicked through her mind, and she coughed. She pushed them away, too.

Fluttershy smiled at her, then continued: “Questioning whether or not the girl you knew as a human is actually a pony is... well, it’s not as important, somehow.”

“And now? Is it important now that I’m here? Because it kind of is, to me. I think.” Twilight stopped and scrubbed her face with her free hand, unwilling to let go with the other. “Isn’t it? I mean, it’s me, but she’s also not me, and she’s your friend, too, and what am I?” What’s important? Is it important? Should I know? “I just don’t know.”

“You’re our friend.” Fluttershy’s grip tightened. “As for her... it bothers you, doesn’t it? Not knowing who she is or what she is. Or even what she means to us?” Fluttershy drew Twilight away from the surf, leading her with a gentle tug. She sat, facing the ocean, and tugged once more. “It’s okay to be bothered by it, you know.”

“Do you still worry about her?” Twilight followed her down awkwardly, unwilling to let go of her hold on Fluttershy’s hand.

“Sometimes. I wish we knew what happened that prevented her from being able to come here, but I feel like I would know if something really bad happened to her.” She squeezed again, lifting their clasped hands. “I just feel like we have a connection. All of us.”

Twilight blushed, loosening her hold. “I’m sorry. I’ve never held hands with anyone before.” Her blush deepened. “Does it bother you?”

“No. Does it bother you?”

Does it bother me? She looked at their hands, her heart thumping. “It’s just that, in the movies—” She swallowed, hard.

“We’re not dating, Twilight. We’re friends. Can’t friends hold hands when they need to feel close?” Fluttershy looked into her eyes, then untwined her fingers. “Friends can, you know. It doesn’t need to mean that we’re in love with each other. It means...” she shrugged. “It means whatever you want it to mean. Just between us.”

Twilight drew in a deep breath, then dropped her hands into her lap. “I know.”

She looked back up the beach to where her other friends were all sitting down after a game. Rainbow Dash and Rarity were sitting together, and Rarity would occasionally point out over the water. Applejack was sitting with Pinkie, looking over something on a towel between them.

When she turned her attention back to Fluttershy, the other girl was watching her closely. “What?”

“Sometimes, it’s hard to remember that you’re not her, even though she hasn’t been around for almost six months. But... you are you, and the more time I spend around you, the easier it gets to see the differences.”

“I thought she was an exact copy, though.” Twilight pushed her feet down against the wet sand, then lifted away to look at the identical impressions her sandals left in the wet sand. “She’s me.”

“No, she’s not you.” Fluttershy leaned forward and pointed at the imprints. “They aren’t the same.” She traced a finger around the edges of the inside of the soles. “Sure, they’re mirror images. but are you your reflection?”

“Only in bad horror movies.” Twilight smiled, trying to put a bit of mirth she didn’t feel behind it.

“Rainbow Dash made me watch that one once.” Fluttershy giggled. “But even in that movie they only look the same.” She dug under the sand and pulled out a twisted, tiny little shell. “Underneath the surface, they’re different.”

Twilight dug under the other imprint, but found only more sand. “It just takes a little more effort to tell them apart.” She flicked the sand off her fingers and leaned back. “I think I understand a little more. But she acts like me.”

“Really? I didn’t think you were prone to carrying books in your mouth.” Fluttershy’s eyebrow rose.

“No, but—”

“Twilight, you’re not her.”

“I know that.” The photograph in her notebook, six girls smiling and hugging for the camera, came back to her mind and touched off a pang in her heart. Why is it so hard for me to accept it?

“Maybe... you saw how close we were in the short time that we knew her.” Fluttershy shook her head and looked up at the sky. Her hand closed over Twilight’s again, fingers stroking her palm gently. “You said you were jealous of her and the closeness we shared. I think you’re trying to find ways to show us that you are her.” She squeezed. “I feel close to you, Twilight.”

“But why? You’ve known me barely a month.”

“Do I need a reason? Sure, it started because I thought you were Twilight.” She tightened her grip. “But the more I, and we, came to know you, the more important you became to us. You... fit.” She shrugged. “It’s like—” She shook her head. “It’s like you were meant to be with us. You. Not her.”

“Meant to be? You mean, like destiny? I don’t believe in that.”

“Not destiny. Not that way.” Fluttershy fell silent again, and sighed. “I’m not explaining it all that well.”

“Try? I want to understand. Please.”

Fluttershy frowned. “Are you—” She nodded to Twilight’s pleading look. “Okay.” She fell silent for long enough that Twilight wasn’t certain she was going to continue. Then, haltingly, she said: “When she left us, and we started to fall apart again, it felt like we were a puzzle that was missing the most important piece. Not even Sunset Shimmer fit that space. Not exactly.”

“Am I just a puzzle piece, then?”

“That’s not what I meant.” Fluttershy frowned, her hold on Twilight’s hand tightening. “I don’t know how to explain it. But...” She nodded to their friends. “You get along with us easily, when you’re not worrying about why you fit in.” She grinned, squeezing Twilight’s hand again. “It’s natural for you, when you let it be.”

“I don’t know why it is. Did she—”

“We don’t want you to try to be her, Twilight.” Fluttershy’s grip on her hand tightened briefly. “We want to get to know who you are and, unlike her, we have time to get to know you properly. Don’t try to rush it.”