Trixie Has A Problem

Chapters

Chapter 1
Chapter 2
Chapter 3
Chapter 4
Chapter 5
Chapter 6
Chapter 7

Chapter 1

The library clock struck ten - that is, ten o’clock in the morning - as Twilight Sparkle swigged and finished her third cup of coffee. Unaware or rather unfazed by the fact that almost every other person in Ponyville were still lying in their beds snoozing at this point, the librarian continued to sift through books and their corresponding papers at the dinner table in the foyer as she enjoyed a bite of toast in between each tome’s examination. It was Sunday, and although everybody else would be out and about enjoying their day off in a short while, Twilight had planned to sort through the backlog of book borrowing she had let build up in the past week due to chipping in and helping Applejack with the construction of a new ranch for the farm.

Twilight held the remains of the last piece of toast in her mouth and huffed as she clutched a release form in one hand, scouring the table for its corresponding book with no success. Adding it to the growing pile besides her, she let out a grunt of disapproval, thinking ahead to the tedium of chasing down all of the missing entries around the town.

“Maybe Spike can do it… it’ll sure get things done faster,” she mumbled and convinced herself, not wanting to move away from the comfort of her chair, nor the small, organized book fortress she had constructed around herself.

On cue, the floorboards of the stairs began to let out gentle creaks, descending with care one by one from the very top. Upon reaching the bottom, a soft padding replaced the sound, growing closer to Twilight. Her ear twitched as one of the pads faltered into an audible groan, followed by a sharp gasp of anger, before the careful movements continued all the way up to the welcome mat at the front door.

“Good thing you’re going out, Spike, I have a job for you,” Twilight chirped without breaking her concentration, feigning ignorance as her assistant hung his head and heaved a sigh, though she was fully aware that a large black cloud had just formed above his head.

“Twiliiiight!” Spike whined and flung his arms skyward. “You know that I go to the spa to relax on Sundays! RE-LAX!”

“Only to relax? So you’ve finally given up on Rarity?” Pairing another form with its book, Twilight smirked as she poked a little fun at Spike, she didn’t even need to look to know that his light, rounded face had begun to glow red with a mixture of embarrassment and irritation. He opened his mouth to retort, only to realise that either yes or no would yield further teasing.

“What is it?” he asked begrudgingly, shoving his hands into his pockets and kicking at the floor mat before shuffling over to Twilight.

“Take this pile of papers with you, all you have to do is look at the names on the top and ask them for the books they need to return when you see them.” Twilight just being able to point out the key information, Spike swiped the papers from the table and made his way over to the door once more, pounding the floor with each step like a rebellious teenager, though not quite there yet in age, it was certainly coming through. Turning the handle and cracking the door open, he paused and glanced back under his steep frown.

“Sure thing,” he growled. His viewpoint changing, Spike found himself being swept along as the door flung wide open, and before even being able to register what was happening, he was flattened against the wall with a loud crash and a yelp.

“Twilight!” a shrill voice cried, barging its way into the Library. Peering over her reading glasses, Twilight made a slow, drawn out glance over to the door, looking upon a familiar witch dressed in dark blue trousers, an azure waistcoat overlapping a cuffed white shirt, and a token purple hat and cape decorated with scattered stars.

The edge of her mouth wrinkling into a smirk, Twilight looked back down at the book in her hands and slipped her fingers in between the cover and its first page, sliding it open to observe the full title.

“How far did you get this time?” she teased at her magical acquaintance who was standing in the doorway with a look of deep, penetrating horror on her face. Twilight had seen this look too many times in the past few days since their incident with the evil amulet that had passed a mere week before to be bothered by it. Trixie had attempted with astounding perseverance to travel beyond the boundaries of Ponyville four times since the duel, and four times she had returned to the Library with a problem for the librarian to fix. It was kind of adorable, actually, Twilight thought to herself. Trixie’s mouth hung open without words as she was interrupted, scrunching her face up to help swallow her embarrassment and speak once more.

“Th-the ‘Now Leaving’ sign of the next town… but that is not important!” she squealed, a few wavers and cracks sneaking their way into her trembling speech. Rolling her eyes with a grin, Twilight closed the tome and laid it on the desk, waving her hand to beckon Trixie over. Stepping into the Library, she moved with surprising urgency over to the table, adopting a stance that came as a shock even to Twilight. Her posture had always been proud and pronounced, no matter what, on and off stage, even with the past few problems she’d ran back with, nothing had daunted Trixie’s flamboyancy. Nothing until now at least, as the quaking witch stood with her legs bent inwards, hands together, twiddling her thumbs, bearing a never-before-seen look of innocent fear in her enlarged pupils.

“Oh no, Trixie, what in the world is the matter?” Sensing that Trixie was truly terrified, Twilight realised it was no longer a good idea to make jokes and laugh, instead wrangling a spare chair with a flick of her finger and gesturing for her friend to take a seat. An unexpected feeling came across Twilight as she described Trixie as her friend in her head, it wasn’t wrong per se, it was just odd to think that when it came down to it, there was something more than a simple acquaintanceship between the two.

Even when sat, Trixie was unable to control her shaking to the point that Twilight could not stand to see it, reaching over and taking her friend’s hands in her own for reassurance. Trixie’s frown did not bend into a smile as Twilight had hoped, but she did calm down a significant amount and ceased chattering the chair legs against the hardwood floor.

“Take it nice and easy, and tell me what happened from the very beginning,” – Twilight slid her fingers in between Trixie’s and began performing a gentle rubbing motion to help set her at ease – “we have all day, okay?”

“Well…” – Trixie started, Twilight having no idea what she was about to get into – “Tr-Trixie thinks she woke up at about eight, and had a couple of blackberries for breakfast.”

“Not thaaat far back- Wait, all you had to eat was a few berries?”

“Little black ones, they didn’t really taste that good, or fill Trixie up at all.” Throwing her head down, Twilight sighed and stifled a giggle as Trixie frowned down at her stomach, it grumbling back up at her. The librarian recomposed herself, took a sharp breath, and looked back up at a perplexed, silent Trixie.

“What I meant was what happened to you to make you so scared?” Twilight having clarified, Trixie looked away to the ceiling and gawped as she fast-forwarded in her mind.

“Well…” – She began once more – “Trixie left Ponyville pretty early so Trixie could get to the next town before dinner time and try and drum up a crowd and earn some money for food today but when Trixie got into the town there was already a performer there, a magician like Trixie but clearly not as talented, so she was about to start her own show when Trixie went up to her and asked her who she was, she refused to tell Trixie and told Trixie to stay around for the show to find out and then asked Trixie who she was, so Trixie told her that she was the Great and Powerful Trixie but then she scoffed at Trixie and called Trixie a nobody, so Trixie –”

Stopping before revealing her stupidity, Trixie bit her own lip to silence herself as Twilight raised a single eyebrow and gave a subtle pout, leaning back and withdrawing her comforting grasp to fold her arms.

“So Trixie what?” She glowered at the showgirl who had withdrawn into her seat under the powerful, judgemental gaze of Twilight Sparkle.

“T-Trixie might have p-pushed her, quite gently.” Trixie’s feeble voice grew quieter the more she said whilst Twilight rolled her eyes.

“Oh Trixie… so what did she do?”

“That callous bi- witch cackled at Trixie, laughed right in her face, Twilight! She told Trixie she was nothing, and that nobody would miss her if she were to disappear… then she said maybe that wouldn’t be such a bad idea and cast some kind of spell on Trixie!” Throwing away her fear for a moment, Trixie found enthusiasm from somewhere and had risen out of her seat, planted her hands on Twilight’s knees, and was invading the librarian’s very personal space whilst looking her dead in the eyes, hoping she would believe her.

Twilight’s brow levelled out as she wiggled her pinkie, tugging Trixie backwards and out of her face. Looking up and down, she could see absolutely nothing wrong with Trixie’s body, and nothing in their interactions had suggested adverse effects of any kind in her speech or mind, nothing drastically out of the ordinary for Trixie anyway. In the last few days, it had been all sorts ranging from scaly skin to green hair. For the most part, they were self-inflicted problems Trixie had caused practicing her magic behind bushes and in ditches that she could not fix herself.

“Sooo, what kind of spell is it?” Twilight queried, certain that Trixie had overreacted to the apparent empty insults of this mystery magician, especially if the unknown showgirl possessed a magic level anything like Trixie’s. Twilight opened her mouth to say this, but clamped her jaw shut after thinking about it. As she finished looking Trixie over, Twilight stood up and waited for a response that never came.

“What is it then?” Growing impatient, Twilight snapped and folded her arms. She was about to yell when she realised that Trixie was looking up at her hat, her lip fumbling, which in turn made her realise Trixie had not removed it when she had entered, yet had taken off her cape and laid it on the back of the chair.

Her hands quivering, Trixie took a good long while to lift them up towards the rim of her wizard’s hat. Reaching about half way, she gasped and nearly jumped out of her skin as she felt Twilight’s gentle grip around her wrists.

“Let me,” speaking softer than any angel, even Fluttershy herself, Twilight gave a demure smile and Trixie returned a timid nod. Taking hold of the brim, the librarian lifted with the utmost care, not knowing whatever might lie beneath, it might have been some sort of sensitive throbbing, or perhaps even some shy magical familiar tethered to Trixie that was hiding.

“Oh!” Twilight shrieked and tossed the hat away upon fully removing it, Trixie’s face exposing her reaction to someone finally having seen as it turned and radiated an even brighter shade of red. It was odd that she hadn’t noticed before, Twilight thought to herself in her brief moment of shock, that Trixie’s ears were not where they should have been, on the sides of her head beneath the hat, helping to hold it up. Rather, two long, furry blue ovals, rounded into points at the tip unfurled themselves, reaching high above Trixie’s luscious silvery hair, one giving a twitch as they stood with prominence atop her head.

Author's Note

First fic, be gentle x.x.

Chapter 2

Some indiscernible amount of time passed as Twilight stared at first with a blank expression, trying not to look at Trixie’s new adornments, mouth hanging open in disbelief. Betraying invisible wires tugged the edges of her forming grin wide open, making her snort before she slapped a hand over the bottom of her face. She had seen transformation spells before, a wide variety in fact and of many different stages, and she knew that a single pair of cow or pony ears should not have been this funny or surprising, but something about Trixie’s demeanour and the fact that it had happened to her was causing a swelling hilarity inside to try and burst out. Under the impression that the spell was a mere prank, Twilight felt there was no present danger, and began to lose her composure.

“O-o okay, oh gosh I’m so sorry! S-so,” she stumbled across her words, attempting to continue whilst doing a poor job of trying not to laugh. She should have felt worse when Trixie’s red faced expression grew sadder with each passing stifled giggle, but part of Trixie’s sadness manifested itself with her new ears lowering and pinning back, forcing Twilight to clutch at her stomach and sides as she could not contain herself anymore.

Trixie stood and took the humiliating response for as long as it lasted, rolling her eyes and playing over and over with her fingers like a blushing child, wishing what was happening was not as she waited for Twilight to cease bending over the table. Making an enormous effort to stand up straight, Twilight wiped away a few tears from her rosy red cheeks, coloured by straining so hard, and let out a long sigh of incredible satisfaction.

“I am so sorry, Trixie, you just really caught me off guard with that.” A few remaining snorts weaselled their way out as Twilight finished her merry little session. It was a wonder that she did not start another one as Trixie’s face now resembled a fresh ripened tomato.

“W-will you help me or not?” Trixie managed to hold onto her resolve long enough to keep her voice as stern as possible, but no matter how hard she tried, she could not hold back the welling between her eyes. By no means was she weak willed or a wimp, she had to be strong to be able to perform on stage in front of strangers the way she did, but being laughed at in such a derisive manner like this by one of the only people she had ever considered to be more than a nobody to her had stung deep.

Remaining unaware for only a moment more, Twilight removed her hands from her sides and lifted her head, meeting a quivering lip and two rapidly falling shining streams with her glance, at this point all of the remaining joy in Twilight evaporated, the empty space filling with guilt and sympathy. Without saying anything, she reached out and pulled the whimpering showgirl into a remorseful embrace, clutching at and burying Trixie’s head into her shoulder.

“Of course,” whispered Twilight with regret, “I am really sorry, you’re scared and the last thing you need is to be humiliated like--”

An unexpected high pitched squeal silenced the librarian’s gentle words as she comforted Trixie. Twilight looked down with a jolt to see what the matter was and was irked for a moment by the sight of Trixie’s face buried in her chest.

“Wah-what are you doing?!” Twilight shrieked, finding a moment to ponder if Trixie’s state of panic was inciting irrational behaviour. Unable to assist, having never encountered this intimate scenario ever before, Twilight watched with a troubled expression as Trixie took a moment to withdraw herself, gasping for air upon success.

“Twilight?!” Trixie wailed, angling her neck up at the librarian with a look of confusion, seeing that Twilight too possessed the same expression, only from higher up. Trixie found herself standing a full foot lower than before and as she clutched in desperation at Twilight’s hips, fear coursing back into her, the sound of a diminishing magical chime resounded, and Trixie dropped another foot in height, levelling with Twilight’s abdomen.

“T-Twilight!”

“Okay, okay, calm down! It’ll be fine!” Twilight frowned and gritted her teeth in panic as she held onto Trixie’s disproportionate arms, her clothes hanging loose as her shrunken body entered the main stage of the transformation process. Although she spoke with a diction that should have been reassuring, the tone of Twilight’s speech only made Trixie more hysterical.

Trixie let out excruciating whines for help as her dark blue trousers ripped apart at the seams, her thighs swelling and lengthening into long hind legs with a bright azure shade of fur rising from the skin all over her body to match her ears. Twilight stood frozen, grasping at her friend’s hands as the fingers began to stick together against Trixie’s will. No matter how hard she tried tugging them apart, they refused to yield as thick webbing bound them together, pulled them tight, and withdrew them into her palm. Pupils dilating, Trixie watched the mess in Twilight’s hands amalgamate into one mass and expand into what appeared to be hardened hooves.

“Twilight! Twilight! Aahhh!” Trixie screamed over and over, tears spilling from her eyes as she moaned, her now exposed white panties splitting open as her rear end bloated into two large, thick flanks. Turning her head to witness the beast she was becoming, Trixie’s mouth hung open in shock as a small lump rose from the base of her spine, thick locks of silvery hair encompassing the additional appendage as it extended into the air and far behind her, creating a long, impressive tail. It wiggled back and forth a few times as Trixie focused on it before she threw her terror-stricken glance back onto Twilight.

“Twilight plehehease! Help me! Help me!”

“Trixie listen to me, look at me! Listen!” – Twilight managed to overcome her knee-jerk reaction of alarm and clutched at Trixie’s front hooves, holding her steady to make sure that what she was saying was being taken in – “You’re going to be fine Trixie, it’s happening, you’re transforming and when it’s over you’ll be a pony, okay? But that’s it, you’ll be fine! I promise, Trixie, I promise!”

Twilight’s sterner demeanour offered mild comfort as a helpless Trixie trembled, tears staining the bright blue fur on her cheeks. Her waistcoat and shirt loosened further and hung without use as Trixie’s substantial breasts deflated and disappeared, flattening against her curving body.

“Please Twilight, ple--” Choking through her sobbing, Trixie’s speech trailed off, her whimpers growing into long groans as her eyes crossed, focusing on her nose and lips which appeared to be escaping from her face. Jamming her eyes shut to try and pretend that this all wasn’t happening, something inside of her head began to strain without relent, a throbbing sensation increased in intensity with each passing moment until Trixie opened her eyes and could see that a long, rounded shaft had grown from the centre of her forehead, swirling a few inches into the air above.

Heart pounding at unhealthy levels, body still shaking without control, Trixie pulled her new mouth open to try and speak, but instead let out a quaking squeal. Pausing in surprise and glancing down at her new short snout, she tried to cry for help once more, but again let out a whine. Twilight bit her lip and stood dumb-founded knowing that Trixie was about to enter a whole new level of fear as her repeated cries for help developed from loud squeaks into quivering wails until in the end, all Trixie could do was whinny.

Looking up and letting out a few more obnoxious neighs to affirm that she could no longer speak, Trixie clambered across the floor with her new legs like a new-born foal and lumbered into Twilight’s waist, soaking her dark blue sweater vest and white buttoned undershirt right through with the rivers pouring from her eyes. Dropping to her knees, Twilight took the terrified pony’s head in her hands and held it steady, beginning to take deep breaths to calm herself down, as well as Trixie.

“Shhh, shhh, it’s okay! T-take it easy, Trixie, please.” Gesturing up and down with her hand, Twilight managed to take command of Trixie’s shuddering with long, deep breaths and gentle, relieving words. “I’m not going to let anything happen to you, okay? There are thousands of books in this library and it shouldn’t take very long to find a way to get you back to normal.”

Twilight did not even realise that she had started stroking the side of Trixie’s face, and neither had Trixie, it seemed that both were mindlessly enjoying the soothing comfort that one another brought with the act as they both returned to as tranquil a state as could be. Bringing her closer, Twilight nestled Trixie’s head in her shoulder and wrapped her arms around the pony’s neck.

“I’m not going to let anything happen to you, Trixie, and you know that. You’re my number one priority right now and you will be until you’re completely you again, do you hear me?” reducing her voice to a soft whisper, Twilight leant back and looked into Trixie’s drenched eyes, the pony had withdrawn her fright as much as she could and had ceased quaking on the spot. She returned a feeble nod and gave a weak smile as she tried to wipe away the globules from her wet coat, unable to due to her large front legs and blundering, uncoordinated hooves. Reaching over to the table, Twilight procured a few tissues from a small box and paused, gesturing to make sure it was okay before Trixie accepted the assistance, albeit with reluctance, and Twilight began to wipe down her wet cheeks with gentle rubs.

“There, now just try and sit on your rump,” Twilight giggled, “if you can. I’m going to take a look around for a book on transformation, I’m sure it won’t take more than a few minutes to find a way to fix this.” As Twilight stood up and put a finger to her top lip, thinking of where in the T section to begin searching, Trixie turned back on herself and focused on her flanks, it took a lot of concentration, but she managed to lower her back end to the ground, with the finesse of a wonderbolt guiding in a commercial cargo aircraft.

After much consideration, Twilight stepped up to a collection of shelves on the far wall and put her finger to the spine of a pristine old tome. Discerning it as the incorrect volume she was looking for, she slid her hand across several more books in the line-up before stopping once again, peeling it out of its well-positioned spot and turning it over.

“Aha! Transformation: The Art of the Animagi! If this doesn’t have the answer, I have no idea what possibly could,” Twilight cheered with delight, turning to see Trixie’s expression take on a graver tone in response to her last passing comment. “Haha, ahh, but I’m sure if it doesn’t, there’s always more we can do.”

Sitting back down on the floor beside her now pony friend, Twilight flipped the leather bound hardcover open straight to the contents, skimming the subtitles with her pinkie all the way to the bottom before flipping over to the next thick page. Before she found it herself, Trixie lunged across Twilight’s lap to point with her enormous hooves at number twenty-one, entitled ‘Field & Farm’. Letting out a rippling squeal, Trixie glanced back and forth between the page and Twilight before noticing the librarian grinning down at her.

Without saying anything, Twilight took the leaves of the book between her fingers and flicked straight to page twenty one. Intricate diagrams and artistic pictures of various cattle and livestock greeted the two witches, both scanning the page for a reversal process of some sort.

“A lot of magic users wrongly assume you can just dispel transformation magic, but that only works on illusion magic, which is just a cloak over the target thing,” Twilight recited to herself as though she were back in school, still searching. “I can’t feel any kind of energy coming from you though, so this isn’t just an illusion, you must have been physically altered into this form.”

Trixie’s ears lowered themselves and she let out a quiet whimper, taking the information in as more bad news. Noticing in her peripheral vision, Twilight kept her focus on the page and patted her friend on the neck for solace.

“Don’t worry, it’s not like you can’t reverse this stuff, though something that this is worrying me about is that the witch who did this to you isn’t just a performer who uses illusions.” Whilst Trixie could sympathize with Twilight’s concerns, it wasn’t exactly at the top of her list at the moment. “Aha! Here we are,” Twilight announced victoriously, “as with most transformations, one simply requires a concrete visualization of the intended final form, then channel through that form into the target.”

Rising from her position, Twilight took the channelling stance as shown within the pages of the book as Trixie bumbled to her hooves, legs wobbling as she was still appropriating to her four-legged form. For the first time, Trixie held herself steady in a standing position and let a smile spread across her snout, hopeful that her time as a beast was soon to be over. With the open book in one hand, Twilight clenched her other tight as an aura of purple ether washed across it like a swirling river and began to build in intensity, glowing brighter.

Biting her teeth with furious concentration, Twilight envisioned her own body in her mind and held it there, then made a conscious effort to remove the clouds of her thoughts racing around to bring clarity to the visualization. Extending her index and middle finger, the ebbing pool of energy in her palm bolted forth in a stream and drowned Trixie in a swelling bubble of magic. The display lasted for as long as Twilight could keep it up, she had only a vague idea of how long it would take for the process to complete, but knew that she had to pour her vigour into it if it were to succeed.

After a long release of pure will, Twilight opened and flexed her fingers, dissipating the excess energy into the air. Panting, she gave a brief wave, brushing away the mild cloud of ethereal mist obscuring her friend, and gawped at the result.

“Oh, oh no,” Twilight gasped. In response, Trixie let out a whinny of confusion, then another of fear before blundering over to the nearest mirror and falling back onto her haunches, ears pinning back once more. Grimacing, Trixie let out the whines of a pup as Twilight stood behind her, putting her hand on the back of her head.

“We can try again Trixie, maybe I didn’t get enough clarity for the spell.” Drawing her pitiful gaze from her reflection up to Twilight, Trixie gave a slow blink and nodded, caressing her luscious mane against the librarian’s open palm. Remaining in front of the mirror, Twilight assumed the stance once more, this time putting a little less power into it, wondering to herself that she may have overcharged the spell. As the tame glowing light surrounding Trixie disappeared into the air once again, Twilight didn’t need the smoke to clear to know that she was still sitting at her feet as a pony, and the sight of herself in the mirror once more as an animal only made Trixie feel worse.

Unsure whether or not to try again, Twilight decided against another attempt, at the risk of Trixie bursting into tears and entering another uncontrollable state of panic. Twilight took a few steps from Trixie and faced away, fingers to her forehead trying in desperation to think of something else to attempt. She knew that the only book in her library that should have held the answer was the one that they had already been through as there weren’t many reports, tomes, dissertations, or really anything else of research value to study in the field of transformation.

The only other thing she could think of to do was to travel to the Royal Canterlot Academy where there were entire building-sized sections dedicated to the most specific fields of magic, there would be a wing on transformation, and separate chambers for each class of animals, objects, and entities. It just didn’t seem possible or even fair to put Trixie under the stress of getting to the train station, let alone navigating the bustling highways and byways of Canterlot in a form that she was still only like a new-born in.

What about a letter to the princess? Twilight thought to herself, but dismissed it with haste soon after, waving her hand as though it were a tangible waft of smoke and pacing a few steps. It may have been a matter of importance to safeguard Trixie and help her get back to normal, but Twilight could admit to herself that it was hardly a reason to interrupt the important and unyielding schedule of Princess Celestia, a last resort, perhaps, but not one of the first options on her list of solutions.

Whilst thinking about people to go to for help, a familiar thought cropped up from the distant reaches of Twilight’s memory, she was surprised with herself that she hadn’t thought of it sooner considering that this was always a trustable source she always went to first, after herself of course.

“Maybe Zecora,” Twilight mumbled, though Trixie was too busy sobbing at herself in the mirror to hear. Taking note of Trixie’s negative state of being and mind, the librarian figured it best she travel alone into the Everfree Forest in hopes of getting the answers she needed. She knew that Zecora wasn’t a witch, but the druid’s knowledge always seemed to plug the gaps that her own left open.

“Trixie,” Twilight called, “I’m going to go to a good friend of mine to see if I can find any more information on this.” Trixie’s ears pricked up and she pulled her body around to pay closer attention. Twilight picked up her dark purple satchel, already pre-packed with notebooks and stationary for any work or research that needed to be done outside of her home and hooked it around her neck.

“I need you to stay here.” Kneeling down, Twilight felt what she was saying wasn’t necessary, as she knew Trixie would be too fearful to leave the safety of the library, but did so just in case. “You’ll be safe here, make yourself comfortable and I’ll be back before you know it.” Letting out a squeak and nodding, Trixie sat on her flanks besides the table and kept her gaze pinned on Twilight as she opened the hefty oak door to leave. Noticing the desperate pony staring at her as she put a foot outside, Twilight paused and furrowed her brow, returning Trixie’s fixed look with a tender smile.

“You’re going to be fine, Trixie,” she breathed with confidence, and as Twilight let the door close with a silent click of the lock behind her, Trixie took a deep breath in through her nostrils, and exhaled as much of her worry away as she could. Curious, the pony decided to take a look around the library, as much as she could from her new height at least.

Planting her two front hooves on the floor, Trixie kept her eyes on them and focused to stop her legs trembling so much, then made a valiant effort to elevate her back end. She grit her teeth harder and harder as her hind legs shook without conceding, the strain became too much to bear, and she collapsed flat on her face.

Letting out a nicker of derision, the faint anger filling Trixie only fuelled her determination. Pulling her front end back up for another go, she forced her rear back into the air again, this time tensing the muscles across her body tight and firm to hold it up. Keeping herself in this position, Trixie breathed hard, taking in the feeling of her form as it was so she could understand how to balance it, and then eased her way into the next step, learning how to walk.

Trixie dared to destabilize herself and raised her front left leg, giving a couple of jolts back and forth as she compensated for the lack of support at her front end. With her hoof up in the air near her snout, her lip quivered as she drifted it back down to the floor, levitating it about above where she wanted it to go. The manoeuvre came easier to perform than Trixie had expected it to, though the hardest part came next, bringing her hind legs up to follow. Her front two limbs operated in a similar vain to the way that her human arms had done, for the most part, but her back legs were a new sensation entirely.

It almost felt like winding them up as a spring might do, or retracting the different parts into one another like a frame, Trixie thought, as she raised her back right leg all the way up to her abdomen. Taking care once again, she relieved the tension in her leg and let it drop a few inches forward from where it had been. Heaving an exhausted sigh, Trixie could not believe the amount of effort she had to put it in to keep her movement going, bent on not remaining helpless however, she forced her way across the room, finding herself in the open kitchen besides the stairs.

All of a sudden, Trixie’s new, larger stomach growled up at her with a powerful roar, she had almost forgotten that she had not had very much to eat for breakfast, though her rumbling belly was not about to let it slip her mind. Scanning the surfaces and open air cupboards at her eye level, Trixie could not see anything that took her fancy. It was odd, she found, that despite being in a state of near starvation, her appetite seemed to be refusing to accept human food.

Must be the transformation, she thought to herself, though was unsure of what to do to settle her yearning for a meal. At that precise moment, a captivating aroma carried on a soft breeze brushed across Trixie’s snout, and she could not help but breathe it all in, letting her eyelids fall as though she had been seduced, following the scent blind to its source. Clambering after the fragrance, Trixie stopped as she fell down right onto her jaw again, her blue cheeks turning a light shade of pink in embarrassment as she opened her eyes to find herself at the back door leading out into Twilight’s garden, snout nestled in the bed of thick grass filling the fenced space.

Lifting herself up and touch testing the new, softer ground a few times, Trixie wandered out into the enclosure and let out a warm, pleasured breath, her heart fluttering as the grass spread beneath her hooves, an enchanting feeling of freshness rippling through her. Glancing around to see if anyone was watching, Trixie realised that it did not matter if people saw her sink to her animal instincts and chow down, because it would look normal in her current form. The human part of her grimaced at the thought of what she was about to do, but the pony part of her whinnied with glee as she lowered her neck to the ground. Unable to reach far enough, she gave a gentle bend in her two front legs, keeping her back end raised.

Trixie released a drawn out pant of lustful desire as her elongated, wider, and much thicker tongue rolled from her mouth, titillating her taste buds as it grazed the verdant turf. Her human mind tried to shake her into sense with fury, but Trixie did not listen, she was too enraptured by how good the thing she had always walked over without thought actually tasted. Her already pink cheeks became a lighter shade of red as she closed her jaw, ripping a section of the lawn up and keeping it on her tongue.

Grinding the silky strands between her new wholly vegetarian teeth, Trixie smiled and closed her eyes, focusing on the astounding flavour of such a simple thing. It must be the transformation, she thought, still enjoying the experience, There’s no way grass tastes this good, not to a human, no way…

Trixie’s head lurched back and she almost choked on her food, spitting it out as a strong, thick material bound itself around her muzzle.

“Gotcha, ya lil’ scamp!”

Author's Note

British author, British spellings, just in case you were wondering

Chapter 3

Twilight had always been a quicker walker than most, never finding time to slow and enjoy a journey for any of its aspects, but her haste was unrivalled even by Rainbow Dash at present because of the urgency of the situation. Strolling at speed past several townsfolk, Twilight left a steady string of frowns and pouts in her wake as she was enveloped by deep thought, rejecting the smiles and waves of passers-by.

Most of her thoughts hinged on what else she could have tried in terms of magic to help Trixie. Perhaps I’d given up too easily, she quibbled in silence. Amongst the mess of recollections to certain tomes that may have been of more help, or the locations of scrolls scattered about the Library that could have held the key, a simple, loud question continued to resound without relent. Twilight tried her best not to think about it, as she knew what her answer to it would be and thus did not feel the need to respond. But no matter how much she beat it down dwelling on magic, it continued to call loud and clear.

Why had she, with such haste, abandoned her entire day to help Trixie? Going out of her way at a moment’s notice to aid the poor showgirl?

“Okay, it’s obvious,” she mumbled with anger to herself in response to her own mind, passing the final hay-thatched house on the border of the town, entering the rolling fields of green lining Ponyville’s edge, “Trixie needed my help, there’s absolutely no way she could possibly have done anything to resolve her condition by herself as a pony. Something awful could have happened to her if she hadn’t gotten to me in time.”

But what about the cruel and unforgivable things she has done to you, your friends, and the people of Ponyville? Her subconscious heaved back in retaliation. Taking pause as the dirt path thinned, small forests of lush grass spilling across it from the surrounding meadows, Twilight groped at a reason to justify her selfless and benevolent nature.

“I…” – She knelt down, her attention drawn for a split second by a lustrous, newly opened azure syringa as she plucked it from the ground – “Nobody deserves this kind of fate, especially not Trixie. She’s not an evildoer who needs to be punished. She made a mistake, everyone does, just on… different scales.”

Resuming her trek, Twilight examined the flower in her hands without thought, continuing to deliberate as she passed between two unwelcoming crooked trees, their jagged branches entwining to form a dark gateway into the Everfree Forest. The beaten path began to fade into an almost invisible leafy trail, Twilight only noticing just before she put her foot into a bright blue patch of poison joke.

“Aha” – She grinned, waggling her finger – “I don’t think so!” Skirting around the patch, she noticed that the impish flowers had sprung up in enormous batches all over the forest floor, quite unusual for late spring, she thought.

As the worn grass dissipated into an untouched bed, Twilight knew that she was getting close to Zecora’s hut. A familiar tree and a fallen log here and there marked the way, the forest-dwelling druid assisting with a couple of tied up bioluminescent leaves tagged to the foliage that only one who knew to look for them would see.

After a short time, the oasis of the forest presented itself, a calm, colourful clearing bereft of unnatural darkness and chilling loneliness, centred by a living Everfree tree, crafted with tender attention and care so as not to upset the spirit residing within. Seeing the door hanging ajar, Twilight stepped up and gave a soft knock. Without a response, she let out a call and entered with caution, calling again as she crossed the threshold and observed a familiar black cauldron simmering away to itself without a master to mind it.

“Zecora?” Twilight hailed again with volume to determine whether or not the druid was in the house, or even nearby for that matter. Yielding again no reply, the witch examined the room, finding that the back door was wide open, and a hangar beside it missing its basket and sickle. She must be out harvesting, Twilight thought. With no time to spare, she decided it be best to go out and look for Zecora, as Trixie was urgent for a cure.

A flutter tripped across Twilight’s heart as she dared to leave into the deep forest out back of the hut, away from the safety of the grove behind her. Zecora lived and made her way in this forest because she knew of all, or as much as could be known, that inhabited it, as well as what to do when facing a problem. Twilight, however, knew very little about the mystical plants, bugs, and other monstrous cretins that crept about the insidious enclave, and should not have forgone common sense as she had done now.

If the poison joke was anything to scale the severity of the Everfree Forest’s condition by, it being on the very rim, not a soul would ever think about trespassing into the glade owned by the shadows themselves. As Twilight pushed deeper on the path she had chosen, selected by the trail of fresh mushroom stems that even she could tell had seen the sharpened blade of a gathering tool, memories of all of the most horrific tales Zecora had told her during her visits came to the forefront of her mind, resounding over and over with the clarity of water, just so she could understand the seriousness of the situation she was putting herself in.

Zecora had spun tales of living ivy that tangled transgressors beyond aid, shrubbery masquerading as stone that would add tired travellers to its surface and fungi that transmuted flesh itself into flower until it had consumed a being to completion. None of this was helping Twilight to keep her resolve firm, her progression slowing to a crawl as she watched out for all of these things and much more. The shriek of a large owl sat watching in the canopy of the trees above petrified her, freezing Twilight to the spot as she clutched at the trunk of a tree, one of a scattered few that was barren of thorns.

“So, you would take up the life of a slug?” a voice whispered, Twilight attempting to let out a scream that the residents of Ponyville would have heard, but felt a soft palm clamp across her mouth to silence her. Trembling on the spot with a whimper, a dark hand threaded between the witch’s arm and side to give a gentle push to a small, camouflaged blob of slime, making it scurry away into the grass below.

“Or perhaps you’d rather be a bug?” Zecora chuckled, steadying her young friend with another quiet whisper. Delighted that she wasn’t being held hostage by an artful rogue, Twilight swivelled to give the druid a hug, part of it for greeting, the other for comfort. Putting a finger to her mouth, Zecora indicated silence to be necessary as she took Twilight’s hand with her own and led the witch back through the trees to her hut, a more suitable location to talk.

Entering and gesturing to a table, Zecora shut the back door and moved to check up on the swirling green vortex inside the cauldron, dropping her basket of severed mushroom heads on the table as Twilight seated herself as implied, breathing away the mild worry that her journey into the forest had caused.

“So, young Twilight, what brings you all this way to me? A kind visit, or does something vex thee?” Zecora queried, taking the wooden ladle resting within the large kettle and giving gentle stirs to the mixture.

“I’m sorry Zecora, I’m afraid it’s not good news, I desperately need your help with something.”

“Hm? A problem you say? Then out with it, without delay!” Zecora demanded, dropping the ladle into the bubbling pot. She was still on edge as a result of the amulet incident that had not long passed, and even though Twilight had already visited a few days ago as a pleasant social call to put her mind at ease, Zecora seemed always prepared for the worst.

“It’s about Trixie,” Twilight began.

“Ugh! That wretch! Causing more strife? Shouldn’t she concern herself with her own life?” Jumping to an easy conclusion, Zecora had already whipped her dark shawl and gnarled staff from their resting place from in between a few of her cultural masks and was ready to race back to Ponyville, Twilight jumping from her chair to stop her.

“No Zecora, it’s not like that!” she cried.

“It is not? Then what?”

“It’s Trixie… she’s the one who needs help,” Twilight muttered, Zecora taking on an expression of utter confusion in response. Placing her belongings back where they had been, Zecora returned to the table and took a seat, Twilight joining her now that things had been cleared up.

“Please forgive me, that was abrupt, I will listen, and promise not to disrupt.” Turning for a moment to check on the stew in the pot beside her, Zecora took a mushroom from her basket and threw it in, then returned her attention to Twilight.

“She’s been transformed into a pony, and according to Trixie, a performing witch like herself is the culprit.” Twilight fumbled with her thumbs and fingers as she explained the situation, certain that though Zecora was eager to offer help to whomever required it, the druid could not at present comprehend why in Equestria Twilight would want to help Trixie.

“An issue of magic? How tragic. But why have you come here? Spells are not what I revere,” Zecora asked, gripping her chin in contemplation.

“I know, Zecora, I’m sorry, I just don’t know who else to turn to. Things haven’t really gotten worse to the point I need to contact the Princesses, and you’re so experienced and knowledgeable that there must be something you can think of.” Cocking her head and smirking a little, Zecora basked for a moment in Twilight’s generous compliment before putting her mind to what was being asked of her.

“Hmm,” Zecora pondered, “Perhaps there is a way, something to set the change astray. Though, it requires sacrifice, usually, an amount of blood would suffice.” Zecora gave her friend a stern and genuine gaze as Twilight withdrew and shivered, taking on a grim expression at the prospect of somehow having to explain to Trixie that she needed to take some of her blood, let alone even do it. Unable to keep her composure, Zecora’s pursed lips faltered into a grin and she stifled a giggle.

“But that is tough, a lock of hair should be enough,” she finished, Twilight returning a nervous smile.

“That’ll be easy, I’m sure Trixie won’t mind. In fact, I’ll go and bring her here. It’ll save going back and forth so much. I’d have brought her this time but she was so scared Zecora…”

“I understand your concern, now hurry, we shall see what we can learn.” With that, Twilight had already straightened her satchel and was at the door.

“I won’t be long!” Twilight called, scurrying away into the enclave. As Zecora stood at the entrance, watching the witch disappear into the woods, a measure of dread rested at the back of her mind. Like with many of the inhabitants of the Everfree Forest, she thought, some throes of magic are unforgiving and unyielding in their curses. The druid frowned and cast the doubt aside, returning to her cauldron, certain that Trixie was not a victim of such a hex.

Author's Note

This chapter was quite tough, sorry if the quality slipped a little, it certainly won't in future chapters!

Chapter 4

“Would ya quit ya bellyachin’? And stop clamberin’ all over the place, I got those rags offa ya back at that treehouse, so ya’ve no excuse to be blunderin’ about!” the man yelled as he tugged Trixie along by a thick, tight rope wrapped around and digging into her snout. She thrashed and screamed as much and as hard as she could and had been doing so ever since she’d been kidnapped from the library. Many townsfolk raised eyebrows but did not even stop to question the ruckus, all they saw were a dishevelled man and a disobedient unicorn trying to make their way along the road, stopping every so often as he wore himself out pulling Trixie along.

“If ya don’t play nice, I’ll trim ya legs and throw ya in a cart if I have to, don’t think I won’t,” he growled, huffing as he crouched down face to face with Trixie who had planted her flanks on the floor, splaying her legs out to make it as difficult as possible to be moved. Her ears pinned back and she quivered, unsure of what to do. Whining and whinnying as loud as she could did not concern other people, and neither did it bring Twilight running to save her. Facing such a stern threat, Trixie winced and submitted with reluctance to the man’s demands, raising to her hooves and doing her best to keep up with him, fearful that he might tug and throw her off of her balance. She wasn’t an expert at walking as a four-legged creature just yet, but the stranger didn’t care, he was in a hurry, but for what Trixie had no clue.

She felt a deep, swelling anxiety that grew with each step she took away from the town, her eyes bubbling with a few gentle tears as they reached the edge of Ponyville and carried on into the fields, the path lined with a long, worn fence. Trixie’s desperation was clear as she steeled herself, trying to formulate a way to use the surroundings, anything at all to distract or subdue her abductor long enough to make a getaway and gallop back to the safety of Twilight’s home. She considered head-butting him against the fence and following up with a kick to buy some time, playing up again so he’d stop to tell her off, then smacking him in the face with her hooves, or even whimpering like a dog in an attempt to appeal to his humanity. None of these ideas seemed plausible at all, she thought to herself. She just didn’t have the necessary control over her own body to pull any of it off, nor did the man seem to have any shred of mercy in his cold, entombed heart.

“C’mon ya mongrel.” He tugged viciously as Trixie’s thoughts slowed her for a brief moment. She collapsed to the floor again at the unexpected yank and the man’s patience had been tested for the last time. Without indication, he ripped some of the loose, rotten wood from an adjacent fence post and beat her over the head with it, a crackle sounding as a fissure splintered through Trixie’s horn. The unicorn let out a terrifying wail of agony and slammed the floor with her hooves, unable to take the punishment. Her horn exploded with the purple ether she had always manipulated as a human and threw the man into the fence and down into a muddy ditch between the path and the field.

Realising she had a chance at freedom, Trixie flung herself up and turned to flee, but the immense throbbing pain emanating from her forehead was just as strong as her will to survive. Her front legs buckled as she clamped her teeth together, gritting them to try and bear the torment. Trotting a few steps, she was forced to stop as the sensation crippled her, bringing her down to her knees once more.

A sharp twinge rippled through Trixie’s body as something snapped shut around her horn, squeezing the already sensitive extension, and her legs gave way beneath her. She tried to use the waves of pulsating anguish to release another burst from her horn, but a few sparks popping and whizzing around it was all she could muster.

“You lil’ monster, I oughta let you cark it, but since we’re so close to the ladies farm up the way, ya’ll be worth more alive than dead, an’ I think I can ‘andle ya crap for a lil’ bit longer.” The man, his clothes drenched with soggy muck, grasped the bondage and gave a pull, crushing Trixie’s snout with it as he pulled her to her hooves. She had given up by this point, too distracted by the shock of the breakage in her horn to have any semblance of clear thought. With a whimper, a few tears rolled onto her blue furry cheeks, she thought at her worst that she was cruel, but Trixie could not comprehend or believe that someone could be as malevolent as this stranger was to her. She may have been just a unicorn, but he had beaten her, she was in agony, and he didn’t care at all.

Lumbering along, her head hung low as she dragged her hooves through the dirt path that became more sodden and filthy the farther she travelled it, and despite his short fuse, the man mustered enough endurance to lug Trixie all the way to their destination.

“Bloody finally, this place sure is out the back o’ Bourke,” he grumbled, resting against a gated entrance at the side of the path which lead out onto a long, wide dirt trail. Having stopped, Trixie looked up to see where they were and observed that the dirt track stretched away from them, winding through rolling fields that were filled to the brim with trees laden with shining crimson apples and at the very end, a bright red farmhouse sat on the highest of the surrounding hills, two barns and a small sectioned garden encompassing it.

“Howdy, how can ah help ya there?” a voice that Trixie found just a smidgen familiar called as its owner, a stocky, young female farmhand with a thick southern accent, had noticed the two resting at the gate and moved over to greet them, clutching a heavy basket of fresh picked apples under an arm as she leant against the fence. “Oh, it’s y’all again, how’ve you been, Slick?”

“Depends, ‘ow do I look?” Presenting himself with a gesture across his body, his clothes caked in hardening soil, Slick smirked and raised an eyebrow as the girl giggled in response. “Haha, I’m dandy, Applejack. Though I had a struggle gettin’ this one ‘ere to play ball.”

“Ah’d think so, y’all got yerself a unicorn there, least ya got that magic lock on it.” Applejack gave Slick’s clothes another look and let out another snicker. “Though not soon enough by the look of things.”

“You got that right. This one’s a cheeky dipstick, encha?” Slick smiled and ruffled Trixie’s mane, avoiding her horn so that she did not yelp whilst his piercing leer commanded her compliance. Looking back up at him, the unicorn grumbled and grimaced at his false innocence, though wanted to let out a whimper as a plea for help, seeing Applejack had bought into his ruse.

“So,” he continued, “I saw the advert on the board back in town, got yerself a brand new ranch, ey? Lookin’ to fill it with some new animals too? Well, maybe ol’ Slick can help you out with that.” Applejack let a quiet snort out in response to this, grinning as though she had heard this kind of smooth talking a thousand times.

“How much is y’alls’ ‘help’ gonna dent ma pockets?” Gritting her teeth through her smile and lowering her eyelids, Applejack leant in closer to Slick as they conversed. It wasn’t a sign of affection, not from either party, but it was just a body language custom for these kinds of people to appear happy whilst knowing in full that the other was doing their best to rip them off.

Trixie pivoted her head to look back along the road towards Ponyville, ignoring the two country folk as they exchanged ludicrous offers, and began to fill with a glimmer of hope as a brand new idea formed in her head. Sooner or later, Twilight was going to return to the library and notice that she was gone and then set about getting everybody she knew involved in a search with desperate haste. It wouldn’t be long before she was rescued, Trixie was sure of it, after all, Applejack was one of Twilight’s closest friends, and though Trixie only knew this in passing, she knew that it must be about to pay off and be her saviour.

“Y’all are crazy! Five hundred bits?” Applejack cried.

“It’s a unicorn AJ, had to catch her in the Everfree myself! Ya think I’m gonna take a pittance for her? Not to mention there’s the cost of the magic lock as well… and I know exactly why you’ve got yerself into this business too! There’s a lot of snob wallers in Canterlot with deep enough pockets to shell out for horse, especially unicorn, so don’t think I won’t trek over there and make myself a small fortune an’ cut you out of it.” Laying a stroke across Applejacks hand, Slick’s forked tongue did it’s best to persuade her, but she refused to have any of it.

“Ya might be able to charm the skin offa snake, an’ ah might be a lil’ bit thick, but ah am not a complete fool, y’all can ferget it.”

“Four fifty and I’m scammin’ myself,” he butted in hastily, despite his short rant, in actuality Slick dreaded attempting to haul Trixie on to the big city to sell her. With the slyest smirk she had ever let creep across her face, Applejack could tell that her freelance friend was frantic about something to be rid of the unicorn. Withdrawing from the fence, she turned and took a few slow steps away.

“Hmm, I don’t know.”

“Four fourty.”

“Done!” Before she could even think of backing out, Slick had grasped and shook Applejack’s hand, sealing the deal with a verbal contract, and threw the rope imprisoning Trixie into her free palm.

“I’ll be in the bar in town when yer ready to come and cough up,” he cackled, taking to the road and shooting out of sight as fast as he could. When it came to trading big money with big prices, folks didn’t hand it over straight away. Nobody except the elites of Canterlot would carry that kind of coin out and about on their person. Knowing this was the case, Applejack had about a week to get back to Slick with the money, because as something that she had not revealed to him, the new ranch had taken most of the bits out of her and her family’s savings. It didn’t matter, she thought to herself, as they were about to move on a large herd of cattle through the barn, and there were already big business offers flying their way for a stake of the goods.

“C’mon then lil’ missy.” Applejack gave a tender tug on the rope and garnered Trixie’s attention, the unicorn looking up with a face of utter dread and torment. She did not expect her treatment to improve, she was just an animal to people now, and the thought of this horrible truth began to get to her again, her eyes welling and body weakening as she let out a whimper.

“Ohh?” The farm girl responded in a most unexpected way. “What’s wrong sugarcube?” Applejack’s entire demeanour shifted, she bent a knee to come to level with Trixie and put a soothing hand to the unicorn’s neck, giving gentle circular rubs as she ruffled her mane. Trixie was flabbergasted for a moment, distracted by how sincere someone was finally being to her, as well as by the pleasing feeling of being petted, even if it was a patronising experience.

“Was that mean ol’ dirtbag treatin’ ya somethin’ awful?” Applejack smiled, cocking her head and laying her hand onto Trixie’s snout. Continuing to stroke her, she slipped the makeshift muzzle off and gasped at the sight of the grooves hard worn into Trixie’s skin. The unicorn was presented with her best opportunity yet and played her role as the terrified little pony with perfection, scuffling into Applejack’s arms and nuzzling her whilst letting out helpless whines and squeaks, the cowgirl heaping buckets of sympathy out as the two embraced.

“Ya sure are a friendly lil’ girl, aren’t ya?” Tickling Trixie’s chin, Applejack rose to her legs and beckoned the unicorn along as Trixie followed, with pleasure, by her side as they traipsed across the rough, hardened driveway towards the farmhouse. It wasn’t long before they had gotten to the second fence surrounding the home, entered through it, and stopped just beside the front door as Applejack went inside to inform her brother, Big Macintosh, of their newest purchase. Trixie raised her eyebrow at being referred to as a ‘purchase’, but forced herself to shake the feeling off, remembering for the time being what she was.

After a short conversation indoors that Trixie was unable to hear, being forced to wait outside with Winona who had begun to grow increasingly fascinated with the strange pony with a spike on its forehead, Applejack and Big Mac both left the house and stood before Trixie.

“It’s a mighty shame,” Applejack griped, flicking her cowboy hat up with the tip of her finger.

“Now AJ, we can’t afford to drop a single number from the herd, we need to make as much as we can on our first season’s sales to secure ourselves for future ones.” With a surprising amount of business intellect about his words, Big Mac solidified his stance on a matter unknown to Trixie, who was sitting on her flanks in front of the two, looking back and forth between them with an expression of pure curiosity. “She’s a unicorn too, that zing in her will fetch a real nice sum, s’not every day one gets dumped on yer doorstep fer such a good price.”

“Yeah yeah okay… well if yer so certain, y’all can help me get her loaded in the barn, then we can get started.” With reluctance, Applejack gave in to her brother. It was clear to Trixie that something was wrong, the farm girl seemed to be arguing to keep her out of the barn, and now that she had given up and agreed to put her in there, a sickening pit opened wide in her stomach.

“Eeyup.” He replied, grabbing a large metal bucket from behind the door and heading over to the barn’s fence gate, taking Trixie by the mane in quite a rough manner and pulling her over to it. It was not cruel, in particular, but very firm, it was clear to Trixie that Big Macintosh would not stand for any trouble from anything, and so lowered her ears, obeying the oversized farm worker’s dominating strength as he led her up to the barn doors, pushed them open with one hand, and took her inside.

The interior of the barn was quite a lot bigger than Trixie could at first see from the outside, extending long into the distance with rows and rows of horses and ponies of all different breeds and colours penned up in small squares lining the sides, sealed off from each other by racks of metal bars and crude wooden panelling. In fact, it seemed less like a barn and more like a warehouse of some kind, Trixie’s hooves clopping against a brand new hard stone floor as she gazed up at the aged eaves and beams that still remained from the obvious conversion that the building had undergone.

Applejack followed in behind them, whistling a few times to rouse the animals as she overtook and headed straight down the central lane towards the end where a large, uncluttered, hay-spattered space opened out into one of the most luscious fields Trixie had ever seen, tended to with such care and affection that it would make a perfect grounds for raising animals of any kind on.

“In you go,” Big Mac interrupted Trixie’s drifting mind, licking her lips to clean it of the drool that had formed from her little animalistic daydream. Her heart began to race again as she saw him indicating for her to enter one of the small pens, and she began to wonder if she should try and make a break for it. The Apple family did not seem like they would beat her if they caught her, least of all Applejack, but the fearfulness from what had happened with Slick earlier had taken stronger than her will to flee, and with her ears pinned down behind her head, Trixie crept low to the ground into the stall with her tail between her legs.

The narrow metal gate slammed shut behind Trixie, nearly catching the tip of her tail, and she began to panic, struggling to move about in her makeshift cage with her wide body, still unable to gauge its size as she caught her snout a few times in the crossbars and in the end, banging her fractured horn against one of the metal rods. She shrieked as it throbbed again, grinding her teeth in distress at the snapshot feeling of the separate chinks in her hardened forehead member scraping against one another like a broken bone grating on itself. Her cry was not heard, as a machine that Trixie’s fellow equines seemed to find familiar started up, gears screeching against one another whilst sections of metal panelling lowering from the roof into the central passageway met the floor. With this creating a lane of new temporary cells, the animals entered a mild frenzy, Applejack taking control of the short craze with authoritative yells of gibberish and whistles from the far end.

The gates of those whose booths were in the central lanes opened and Big Macintosh strolled down behind each of them, using a prong to force their inhabitants into the provisional confinements whilst an automated system locked them in as he continued on to the next. With caution and concentration, Trixie put her two front hooves to the lowest bars and elevated herself above the pen to see the process unfolding, though not knowing what in the world was going on, she felt lucky that she was not in one of the middle lanes for whatever reason it might be. With the centre filled, Big Mac returned to the far end with his sister and Trixie pushed herself higher up, climbing to the next bar and then the next to get a better view.

Trixie threw herself from her perched position and withdrew into the smallest corner of her prison with her pupils dilated, her heart thumping and her body convulsing with tears not of sadness, but of absolute dread erupting from her eyes as a bang echoed through the barn, riling the horses again. They however, were only afraid because of the noise. They did not have the sentient understanding that Trixie did when she saw the occupant of the first cell to be seen to hit the floor, lifeless, as Macintosh tied a rope around its neck and dragged it away.

Chapter 5

With an end to the problem in sight, Twilight’s pace was much more sedate as she passed through the gateway of woven branches, entering back out into the world from the forest. Her mind was calmer and preoccupied with more trivial things for a change, such as how she was going to convince Trixie to leave the safety of the library to get to Zecora’s hut, or even after that, getting her to go into the dark forest in the first place.

Twilight let out a nervous giggle, hopeful that Trixie’s physical condition had not somehow worsened in her absence. The worst possible thing that she could imagine had happened was that Trixie might have undergone a complete physical and mental transformation, changing her to completion into an animalistic pony. Her uneasy grin broke down to a deadened pout at this thought, worried what effect a psychological change such as that might have on Trixie when she would return to her human self.

“Maybe she’ll fall in love with grass,” Twilight murmured, “she certainly wouldn’t starve on the road if it came to that.” She let out another uneasy chuckle.

The short jaunt from the outer fields into town took no time at all, Twilight sighing as her home revealed itself from around the corner of a neighbouring house. She reached into her satchel for her keys as she approached, it was not normal for her to lock the library, but under the circumstances a little extra caution was in order. Twilight eased the door open and paused for a moment at the sight of the torn purple and blue rags that Trixie had burst out of, continuing on into the ground floor and picking them up as she went, laying them on the table laden with all of the work she was supposed to be doing. Immediately she perished the thought, not having to even consider whether or not Trixie was more important.

“Trixie, I’m back!” Twilight’s voice echoed without hindrance around the empty, silent bookshelves. After a few seconds without a response of any kind, she called again, moving with a building curiosity to check a few of the open rooms around her. The workings of a tightening on her heart mustered when the second response did not come, a sense of panic that she managed to keep in check, sure that Trixie must have just fallen asleep somewhere. Twilight raced up the staircase to the next level, throwing open the door of each room with more strength every time that she found one of them empty. Soon she came to the last door, her own bedroom. Gripping the handle, she stopped and bit her lip hard.

“Please, be here” she whispered. Her body was reluctant to turn the knob as a mounting sense of panic filled her. She needed Trixie to be sprawled across her bed, she did not care that it would be ruined by the incoherent clambering of an inept animal and its natural filthiness, Twilight just needed Trixie to be lay there. As the door left its frame, the fraction of hope that Zecora had given Twilight evaporated, the librarian stood, staring at her well-made, empty bed as she let out a gasp of pure disbelief.

The wooden steps of the library stairs were wrenched from each of their frames as Twilight tore down them, flipping over almost anything she could find in the foyer that was big enough for a pony to conceal itself beneath, the tables lining the room, behind the curtains of the windows, under the surfaces of the open kitchen. It was then that Twilight halted, feeling a soft breeze across her face. Looking up, she noticed the back door hanging ajar, and raced to it, looking all around the back garden for a sign of Trixie. The gate of the fence protecting her small portion of greenery clanged against its own wooden frame, and as Twilight’s attention was drawn, she saw the remainder of torn garments piled on the dirt path exiting her property.

Gazing out into Ponyville’s town centre, Twilight trembled, she feared that her suspicions of Trixie becoming a full animal had been realised, and that in the pony’s dumb innocence, she had wandered without intelligent thought out into the world. Any number of things could have happened to her, Trixie could have found her way back into the vast Everfree Forest where unicorns dwelled in their natural habitat, or she could have taken to the streets and scared the citizens, causing them to have had her captured and taken away by some form of animal control. Knowing that time was of the essence, Twilight ran towards the town hall, understanding that the longer she took to find Trixie, the farther away she could be reaching.

“Excuse me, have you seen a blue unicorn around here?” Twilight stopped and quizzed the first person that crossed her path. The closest option to begin her search lay with the townspeople, as it would make sense to check with them first before doing something drastic like organising a search of the entire woodland bordering the village.

“Uhh, no sorry, why? What’s wrong Twilight?” the short, blonde girl dressed in a grey uniform with a mailbag secured around her shoulder responded.

“Oh, it’s… I have to go! Sorry!” With the mildest form of ill manners, Twilight left the mail girl standing and rushed to the next person, repeating her question. Man after woman, nobody had any recollection of an azure unicorn anywhere about the place, a few whom Twilight asked scoffed at the idea, grasping the shoulders of their children with worry at the suggestion of a dangerous creature like a unicorn gallivanting about. There had been incidents in the past and whilst unicorns were known to be more placid animals, everybody believed that much caution was required in the presence of one. They had magic, and although they could never use it to the degree and complexity that a human could, when startled they were able to do terrible things with bursts of frantic energy, spawned from a shock or sudden terror.

After Roseluck, Daisy, Cheerilee, Golden, Merryweather, and even, in her desperation, Apple Bloom and the gang, Twilight clutched at the hair that lay on her shoulder as it became frazzled, she was running out of people to ask. At that moment, a familiar friend in black tracks and blue tank top bolted passed, a few mere seconds passing before the same flash of a person returned, having noticed Twilight’s obvious distress.

“Woah, hey, Twilight, what’s goin’ on? Are you stressing about a letter or something again?” Rainbow asked, laying a friendly hand on Twilight’s shoulder as she joked.

“No, Rainbow,” Twilight muttered back, “this is serious, really serious.”

“Oh,” the athlete replied, “what’s up?”

“Please, please, please tell me that you saw a blue unicorn this morning, only an hour ago or so, anywhere around town at all?” It was quite clear to Rainbow now that Twilight was not, in fact, messing around, as she was captured by a pair of enlarged amethyst pupils that were brimming with dread. “Come on, you must have! You jog every day all around town! Please Rainbow Dash!” Twilight’s voice wavered as she pleaded with her friend. Taking a breath and removing the clutching hands of a hysterical librarian from her wrists, Rainbow put her own on Twilight’s shoulders to help calm her down.

“Okay, chill out. This is obviously important,” she began, Twilight giving a sharp breath of positive hope, “now I haven’t seen any unicorn around, but if it’s this serious, I’ll help you find it, okay?” The same breath left Twilight as fast as it had entered her, but not without use, as now there was now someone to help.

“Okay… I’ve been asking everyone in most of Ponyville, but the only place I haven’t gotten to yet is the south of the town.”

“South of the town, got it,” Rainbow confirmed, posing to set off for the few streets a short run away.

“Rainbow,” Twilight paused, drawing back her friend’s attention, “thank you… so much.” With a stern nod of determination, Rainbow Dash disappeared into the nearby avenue, off to make short work of her task.

As Twilight watched her vanish behind the town tavern, she felt herself glued to the spot. With Rainbow finishing the only thing she could think of to do, she could not figure out how else to go about searching for Trixie. She wanted to seat herself at the outside tables of the building beside her, waiting with bated breath for her friend to return with good news, but did not think she would be able to rest, not until she knew that her unicorn was okay. With reluctance, Twilight moved over to and pulled back one of the aged, wooden chairs nestled beneath a parasol table out, planting herself on it as she rested her elbows, supporting her head with her hands trying to think of what else could be done.

Her thoughts fell away from how to find Trixie, and found themselves on the more worrying subject of what might be happening to her at that very moment. Twilight did not possess much knowledge on unicorns, though she knew that some were kept as helpful pets by a few witches and wizards, even if most would not dare to tangle with such a creature in an attempt to tame them. She had heard a handful of stories involving close calls where a budding witch would attempt to snag herself a magical pet, only to be transformed into an apple and almost devoured by the very thing they had set out to make their loyal companion, saved at the last moment by a friend. That was another thing Twilight knew, when dealing with a unicorn, always bring somebody with you.

“Somethin’ on ya mind, young lady?” a heavy foreign voice pulled Twilight out of her mess of thoughts, drawing her eyes behind her chair to a man sat beside the tavern door, filth ridden ranch boots resting on the table as he rocked back in his seat. Kicking his heels together to break some more of the hard caked mud from his shoes, he moved them to the side so he could see Twilight, smirking at the sight of her unkempt appearance, “Wow,” he continued, “what’s a doll like yerself carryin’ the world on her shoulders for?”

“Well,” she whimpered, ignoring the passing flirt, “have you seen a unicorn, a blue one? Anywhere nearby at all, sir?”

“Hm,” the stranger grunted, pausing with an air of contemplation about him, “you a witch?”

“Yes?” Twilight shook her head, at first being baffled by such a response to her question, but soon recalling the obvious connection between the two things. “Why? Could you answer my question please?” she beseeched.

“I reckon I might have seen somethin’.” he grinned beneath his cowboy hat as he saw Twilight’s face fill up with glee. Sensing a clear opportunity, he was not afraid to take advantage, as Twilight had by this point revealed herself to be a hapless social fool, and though the man was not aware of the vast vaults of knowledge resting inside her head, it would not have mattered, as to him a fool was still a fool. “Yeah, though I can’t exactly remember where.”

“Please try! Please!” Twilight could not contain herself, leaping out of her chair only to be sat down by the stranger, his firm hand on her shoulder. Sitting beside her, Twilight stifled a grimace of disapproval as he barged into her very personal space, folding an arm around her to make matters worse.

“I’m havin’ trouble thinkin’, though I figure it might help to have some ‘incentive’?” his fork tongue waggled in Twilight’s ear as she clutched to her newfound hope. She told herself that she had to endure the unpleasant experience, as it could be the saviour that she had been looking for, no matter how revolting and embarrassing it might be. Placing her hand on the bag of bits she kept tied to her belt, Twilight grumbled as she considered the offer.

“And how much ‘incentive’ are you going to need?” She loosened the string sealing the bag and tickled a few of the coin faces with her finger tips.

“How much have ya got?”

“T-twenty,” Twilight wavered. She was lying, and he knew it. Remaining silent, he gave a short grunt as he remained in his encompassing position, smiling whilst she could not stop herself trembling, partly from the excitement of telling a lie, and partly because she was afraid that he might stand up and walk away himself, leaving her no closer to finding Trixie. He would not do that however, as he knew that Twilight would crack sooner than his patience would run out. Heaving a sigh, she removed the pouch and dropped the whole bag on the table, wincing at her loss as he grasped it, feeling the weight. She heard a quiet, dark chuckling from the back of his throat, breathing easy upon the removal of his body from hers.

“That uhh, orchard place down the way, saw a blue pony there this morning,” he snickered, heading into the tavern.

“W-what? Wait, was it a unicorn or a pony?” Twilight called after him, but he had withdrawn into the thick, rowdy atmosphere of the bar, irretrievable to somebody such as herself. Turning in the direction of the farm, Twilight put a foot forward and froze. It occurred to her in that moment what the Apples had begun doing with horses and ponies at their farm, and stood speechless, motionless whilst her hands shook without control.

“Twilight!” Rainbow called, halting with a grind along the soil as she skirted the building. She put a hand up to lay on her friends shoulder, then fell forward and almost face first into the ground. Recovering and glancing up with a shock gasp, she caught a glimpse of Twilight disappearing around the corner as the librarian bolted away towards Applejack’s farm at a speed faster than Rainbow Dash could ever have hoped to achieve in her life.

Chapter 6

As the last of the equines from the central lane hit the ground, Big Macintosh wheezed, the weight of the creature expunging a cloud of dust from its landing. The barn’s far exit filled with a mist of dead grass, and the farmhand tied another rope around the muzzle, pulling it from the cradle and away into the draining room.

Applejack dropped another of the iron levers in the corner, lowering panels of wood into the maze of animal pens. They slid into the mess of metal bars and hewn beams, creating a pathway for the next row of ponies and horses to move into the main row. Whilst the other animals had all, by this point, settled, happy to be moved about as they were, Trixie kept herself crushed deep against the corner of her pen, whimpering like a puppy.

The gate of her cage lifted, her ears pricking up as she heard Applejack begin her run down the lane, banging on the back of the cells with a rusty metal pipe to rouse and force the inhabitants into the centre. Trixie kept herself silent and low hoping that by some miracle the farm-girl would miss her and lock her up by accident. She had no such luck however, her bright blue coat and luscious silvery mane indicating her position from ten miles, with a clang and a sharp prod from the gnarled end of the pipe, Trixie budged her way across the floor and into the next holding block.

“Ready AJ?” Big Macintosh called, his voice reverberating throughout the enlarged building. Trixie noticed an odd pause from Applejack, before, she had always responded with immediacy, returning to the end to begin putting the lane through, but this time she had stopped. The unicorn dared a glance out from beneath the hooves clasped over her face, and found Applejack gazing back at her. The cowgirl was unsure of what she was doing, she had put down a great number of animals for this venture, and she had seen the faces of every one of them during and just before she had done so, but something bothered her about Trixie’s.

“I,” Applejack began, choking on her own breath. Her eye faltered with a twitch and her brow furrowed, revealing her reluctance to carry on. As Trixie continued her pathetic leer, Applejack could not put down the thought that continued to beat on her mind anymore, this unicorn trembling before her was not a normal animal. She was no witch, and, despite the amount of time she had spent around Twilight, did not garner much magical knowledge, but Applejack knew that something was very wrong, it was a deep gut feeling that she refused to ignore.

“Applejack?” her brother queried again, concern layering his deep, calming voice. Without thought, Macintosh raised the crank and sealed the final selection of animals into what would be their last prisons, moving away from the controls to see what had entrapped his sister. When he reached her, he gave a sigh, dropping one of his titanic palms onto her shoulder. “Applejack.” He groaned, giving her a gentle shake, “Fer the last time, AJ, it’s just an-”

“But it’s not, Macintosh,” Applejack snapped her brother's words up, throwing his palm off of her collar, “there’s somethin’ wrong with this one. Ah know it.”

“Jus’ cus’ ya like it doesn’t mean somethin’s wrong with it, now come on back up and let’s finish this load.” Macintosh could see that his words had no meaning or effect on Applejack, but grunted and left her side anyway, insistent with his manner that they continue so that he could rest soon. For the first time since she had been a little girl on her own parents’ ranch, Applejack blinked a tear away from her eye and shook her head, grasping the droplet in her coarse leather gloves and disposing of it to the air.

“Ah’m so sorry, sugarcube,” she whispered beneath her breath, unwilling to remove her clutches from Trixie’s fencing as the pony’s eyes widened, realising that her last chance had just disappeared with Applejack forcing herself away from the unicorn’s pen and beginning the long walk back towards the barn's exit. Leaping up from the floor, Trixie lumbered around on her hooves, throwing her legs over the barriers surrounding her and whinnying as loud and intrusively as she could, begging for mercy from the farm workers.

Big Macintosh threw his eyes up and waved his head, all he could see was another animal becoming frantic in its final throes, and knew that his soft-hearted sibling would at least try to talk him out of putting the pony through the line once more. It did not come as Macintosh had expected it though, whilst Trixie wailed at the back of the barn, Applejack gave the sombre tip of her hat and reached down to the floor, wielding the bolt gun as her brother brought the newest of the batch into the last cage that it would see alive.

The carcasses were dragged away by the large, brute of a man, and moments later he would return, his sister pulling a lever, the remaining animals siphoning forward towards inevitability as the gates slammed shut behind them. Although it took the workers two thirds of an hour to sift through ten ponies, to Trixie, the time skipped by much too fast. Each time the pen in front of her opened, she would back against the bars behind her, having to be prodded, and even on occasion hit on the flank to comply, though reluctant.

Eventually, it came down to the last three horses, Trixie being one of them on the very end of the line. Her heart outlined itself in her chest as it beat against her ribs with frightened fervour, her entire body quaked against the anchors of her hooves and her horn throbbed once more with the waves of anguish she had suffered at the hands of Slick. The stress of the situation intensified each of these deep-rooted, instinctive emotions, forcing Trixie into an animalistic foetal position as she rocked back and forth, letting out high whimpers.

From her low vantage point, Trixie hid and watched the last two horses trotting into the final pen, then moments later sliding out of it across the ground on the other side. It was now her turn.

Big Macintosh threw the frayed rope onto a pile of old potato sacks beneath the barn controls, thinking that their job was done. For a moment, Applejack remained silent and rested the bolt gun on a desk strewn with sales papers, sitting in an old ranch chair as she kicked one of the low levers to bring the vast machine into a standby mode. She knew that they had not seen to the azure unicorn, and hoped that her brother’s absent mindedness would prevent him from realising the same.

Applejack took a shattered fountain pen wedged between the slats of the table and withdrew a fresh contract from the makeshift pigeon holes at the back of the desk, scrawling a rough receipt of payment for the acquisition she had made from Slick for later. As Macintosh tidied away some of the business papers onto the shelf above the table, chance had him glance down with curiosity and spot Unicorn in large scribbled handwriting. At that, he gave a short grunt, turned, and wielded a fresh length of rope from a nearby hook.

“We fergot one AJ,” Macintosh said in his usual tender tone, flipping one very important lever up on the control box beside him. In response, Applejack’s anger filtered out through her hand, crunching the receipt up and reducing it to the size of a pea in her visceral grip. Without words, she stood and took the gun from the desk, keeping her hat and head down. The two workers approached the third pen from the end and paused, looking down at the pony lying on its side, sniffling and whimpering to itself. Trixie gasped as she felt the rope fasten around her snout, alleviating her head from the floor to return the leers of her owners.

“If y’all don’t come along by your own accord, ah’ll drag ya into it,” Macintosh demanded, his face stern and hard. Trixie shifted her pitiful eyes to Applejack for any semblance of a saving grace, but the farm-girl said nothing, instead taking one sniffle and moving back to the end of the line. Trixie ascended to her hooves just before Macintosh pulled on her bondage and began to drag herself forward, ears down, head amongst her hooves, tail pinned deep between her legs. As she entered the pen, she felt the slaughtering cradle fit around her limbs, her body hoisting a few inches from the ground whilst Applejack reloaded the bolt gun.

The cold steel of the barrels end was exemplified by the pure terror, Trixie feeling the jolting sting of it as she lay limp in the embrace of death. Closing her eyes, she felt it necessary to concede. She let out a final whine of sorrow, laced with the disappointment she had for Twilight. Trixie was sure that Twilight had done the best she could, and did not harbour any hatred towards her for failing to rescue her, but still, Trixie was mortified that it had come to this.

Within the blink of an eye, this quelled emotion surfaced in its entirety. Her mind spun as the basis of her entire being, her subconscious, shifted its approach to the situation. Her rows of flat teeth ground against each other like the plates of the world as her sadness bubbled up into an unreserved fury. To her brain, flight had not worked, so now it was time at last to try the other approach.

Applejack screamed and dropped the gun into the pen as the bolt shot from it, penetrating the floor beside Trixie’s hovering hooves. She delivered a fierce curled punch to the unicorn’s horn and in the ripples of terrific pain, Trixie released her viciously clamped maw from Applejack’s forearm, holding it with her free hand as she cried in agony at the deep indentations in her flesh. The unmitigated swaths of anguish served only to intensify Trixie’s enraged state as she thrashed about, snarling and wailing with fury until the ribbons holding the cradle snapped and let her down to the floor.

With no barricade to prevent her movement, Trixie fled from the slaughtering cage and made for the wide open barn door. Whilst adrenaline continued to pump through her veins, her anger had subsided, the short burst served only to escape Trixie from immediate danger, and now it was up to her alone to take the opportunity and flee. The unicorn growled and yelped as she tumbled again to the floor, her uncooperative body failing her as she plunged into the masses of flat, dry hay covering the ground.

Trixie howled in denial as the fingers of rough, leathered hands entrenched themselves into her flanks and pulled her up to her legs again, she felt her back end nestle between Macintosh’s thighs as his dominating arms climbed across her body, clamping around her neck to keep her still and steady. The unicorn choked and coughed as the air refused to move through her throat, tears of suffocation draining from her tightening eyes.

“AJ! The bolter!” Macintosh yelled as he stubbornly clung onto the mare. Applejack’s own rush of energy allowed her to disregard her crushed arm for the time being, she ripped the bolt gun from the ground and forced the metal rod back into its chamber, approaching her brother and the pony with a trembling clutch on the weapon. With efficiency that would make a trained elite marksman blush, she emptied the powder chamber, whipped a fresh load into it, cocked the bar, and pulled back the hammer.

Taking aim, Applejack paused for a fleeting moment. Her brother screamed at her to pull the trigger, but her humanity prevented it, her senses were deadened, all she could see was Trixie shivering with true horror in Macintosh’s hands, begging with just her eyes for mercy. As the beast of a farm worker shifted focus to his sister again, Trixie abused the lull of his power and slipped from his grasp, bent down on her front legs, and in a flash of full control, launched her back legs up into the air. Free of Macintosh’s imprisoning grasp, Trixie leapt forward towards the freedom that the open door before her promised.

Her chin met the hard marble floor, a twinge in her front right leg snapping beneath her as she galloped. In a rolling heap, Trixie collapsed and ground to a halt along her side, ceasing all movement for a moment as the feeling of what had happened caught up with her. Behind, Applejack looked over her brother as he lay on the ground, his hands planted between his thighs, muffling curses into the floor. With no more hesitation, she retrieved her double barrel shotgun from the shelves and loaded it with a pair of shells. The intimidating, very real weapon loaded, Applejack raised it, locking the iron sights onto the battered unicorn.

Helpless, Trixie wriggled away and towards the corner of the barn. She knew that crawling out towards the field would be useless, in fact she knew that whatever she did would be useless. Unable to walk, the unicorn wept in silence, staring at the floor as she awaited execution.

“Applejack! NO!” a light voice screeched, but Applejack had already pulled the trigger. In a mist of dark smoke, the farm girl heaved, wanting to vomit as Twilight threw herself into the firing line, wrapping herself around Trixie.

Author's Note

At the risk of spoiling the ending cliffhanger for this chapter, I'd like to make it absolutely clear to future readers that this is a TEEN, DARK, story, not GRIMDARK, just DARK.

Chapter 7

Crimson rivers stained the deep purple of the librarian’s skirt as she held onto the unicorn, her body clasped around the pony in an embrace of selfless heroism. A salty fluid ran across Trixie’s face from above, running through her dishevelled chest and down her bruised legs, mingling with the fluid of her own weeping wounds.

“It’s Trixie…” Twilight let out a mute whisper, clutching the pony tighter into her shoulder. The clanging beats of a firearm resounded as the barrel of the shotgun dropped to the floor, Applejack’s limp hands reflecting her own petrification. Her face was white, a sliver of bile choking itself up into her mouth as she took a step back against the pen’s wooden panels.

“What?” a tiny breath escaped from Applejack. With her right hand raised behind herself, Twilight lifted her head and glanced back at her friend, her cheeks sodden with tears. Her expression shifted from despair into agony as she contemplated what might have transpired if she had been even a step too late, crumpling her brows together at the sickening thought.

“It’s TRIXIE!” she screamed, the harsh features of her enraged face outlined by the glow of lilac ether from her hand. Applejack twisted her head back and forth in disbelief, unable to comprehend what she was being told. She gazed with her jaw hanging open at Twilight through the weak, pulsating hemisphere that had been conjured in a fraction of a moment by the witch. Fourteen shards of the buckshot pellets had left the weapon’s barrel, twelve of them now spread across the floor amongst the hay, turned to nothing but harmless silver dust.

The ethereal shield flickered and dimmed, Twilight wincing as she lost concentration long enough for it to dissolve into the air. A fragment had pierced clean her hand, it quivered and she ground her teeth together harder, her pupils trembling at the sight and sense of the bloody carnage worsening by the second at the end of her limb. No longer bound by fear, understanding that her friend had saved her own life from her stupidity, Applejack’s senses returned to her, pushing her over to Twilight. Tearing the base of her orange cheque shirt up without a second thought, she grasped the librarian’s shredded palm and bound it, almost crushing it as she applied pressure to stem the tide.

“Ah’m… ah’m so sorry Twah.” Applejack’s ability to contend with tough situations was being tested to its limits. It was required for quick thinking and urgent action in dire circumstances on the farm, should her brother or, heaven forbid, her little sister ever get themselves into trouble. But at present, this moment was far and above either of those things, she had taken a point blank shot at her dearest friend with a shotgun. Bubbles formed in the eyes of the farm girl as she continued to grip Twilight’s palm, her mask of courage on the brink of faltering as her lip quaked.

With a huff and a grunt to ease the searing anguish, Twilight relinquished herself from Applejack’s grip, fighting the numb feeling in her traumatized tendons to curl her fingers up and grasp the makeshift bandage on her own. The scowl aimed towards her farm friend lightened as the intensity of the moment between them dissipated, Twilight nestling Trixie in close beneath her other arm.

A demure whimper croaked from the pony, Twilight breaking her locked stare with Applejack to see what was wrong. Dragging her head from its hanging position, Trixie looked upon the librarian with tarnished, glazed eyes, though they seemed lazy, Twilight could read pain and fear into them. Trixie let her jaw drop, rivulets of her own tears trickling around her snout, collecting beneath it in a grubby pool as another wavering whine escaped from her.

The unicorn attempted to lift her front left leg up, her frame trembling without the support, her mouth and tongue shaking as they failed to even form the breath for a few more squeaks of mercy. Rescinding her embrace, Twilight slipped the hoof of her helpless friend into her free, undamaged palm. A short breath of shock passed between her lips as a foreign source of the scarlet fluid leaked away, congregating into rivers and streams in the few and far between wrinkles and creases on the witch’s hand.

“T-Trixie,” Twilight murmured and turned her head, refusing to believe what she had seen. Amongst the blue fur on the front end of Trixie’s leg, an unforgiving shard of metal had pierced through the centre of the ankle, plunging itself out from either side. Far above it, where her limb joined to her breast, a torn, bloody crater lined a short segment on her side, the long open strip dribbling down her rounded body, her bright azure fur turning a deep, fluid red.

“Help her Applejack!” Twilight demanded, pushing her curled up, torn palm against Applejack’s shoulder. “You must know how to! You take care of animals too!”

“W-what? Well, yeah ah do, but when they’ve got cuts and bruises, not impalements an’ bullet wounds!”

“You must do something for those!” An uneasy break in the tense, brief exchange sent a crackle of fear down the Twilight’s spine. She did not even have to ask again, she could see the answer in Applejack’s eyes as they expanded, her expression altering with a near-unnoticeable precision to that of honest misfortune. Twilight grimaced and turned back to Trixie, the unicorn sniffling with a shiver, her butchered leg still raised, the agony being too much to bear to let it rest on the floor.

“No,” Twilight growled.

“Sugarcube… Ah’m not sayin’ we ain’t gonna help her, not even a little, b… b-but… when a pony goes l-… gets like this…”

“NO!” A wave of ether erupted from Twilight’s body, her screech echoing as it passed without harm through all it touched, Applejack recoiled at the sensation, feeling it brim with fury and desperation. She didn’t know why, but she suspected that her closest of friends had developed a deeper need to help the poor unicorn far past it being a simple matter of aid. Applejack’s innocent suspicions proved truer as Twilight wrapped her body around Trixie’s, letting out whispers of reassurance into the pony’s ears that all would be done to ensure that she was safeguarded and returned to normal, that everything would be fine, and that her wounds and injuries would be fixed sooner than she knew it.

As Twilight laid her free hand across the war-zone of Trixie’s devastated leg, her magic washing over it to provide as much relief from the intensity as possible, the witch gave soft, calming strokes along the pony’s mane and neck, their foreheads pressed together as she continued to murmur apologies and promises.

Applejack rose to her feet and stood back, holding her chin with contemplation. At first she considered a consultation with Fluttershy, the girl took care of a variety of animals with unrivalled expertise, but Applejack soon quashed the idea. Fluttershy was a gentle soul who fed and cared for the basic needs of her companions, her skills were not likely to be enough to deal with weeping wounds and dire injuries. There was also a question of how Fluttershy might feel about an animal that was in actuality a human.

“There’s only one thing ah can think of.” Applejack flicked her jaw with her finger, rubbing her cheek clean of tears as she thought on. “The vet, by the hospital.”

“Do they even treat things like this?” Anxious, Twilight’s voice tapered as she did not want to know the answer.

“Ah haven’t got a clue, but it’s the only thing ah can think of.” Taking a second to see to her brother, Macintosh, who had by this point pulled himself onto the chair, still in agonizing reverberations of pain, Applejack collected a ring of keys from the desk and returned to Twilight’s side. Her hands still quaking of their own mind, Applejack stalled the teary onset of her regret by offering her physical aid to Trixie.

“Come on, if we’re gonna help her, and y’all yerself fer that hand, we better git goin’ on to the hospital.” Of all that Applejack had said, Twilight now listened to and agreed with her, wincing at the sight of the bloody rag she clutched ever tighter in her right palm.

“How in Equestria are we going to get her there, Applejack?”

“There’s a trap n’ cart outside, ah’ll get the pony from the stable, and when he’s good to go, Macintosh’ll help y’all get–” Applejack took a pause, still not wanting to accept what Twilight had told her, “–Trixie… onto the wagon, then we’ll ride the two of ya there.” Heading out through the barn door, Twilight heard Applejack unlocking the waist-high stable doors outside before attempting to settle a rowdy trap pony.

Twilight’s heart hit the barn roof when Macintosh’s firm clutch found her shoulder, and though it had surprised her, there was an odd comfort to his presence. She looked up at his contorted face, framed with ruffled ginger hair, and saw that he was managing something of an assuring smile, though still doubled over and in clear masculine strife.

The brief respite from the traumatic moment, the magical pain relief of her own and her friends wounds, and what she believed to be the absolute assurance that a life had been saved all shattered back to nothing as Trixie hit Twilight’s arms with her full weight, her body crumpling and folding as though it was without the energy to carry on any longer. As Twilight held Trixie’s limp head in her arms, Applejack and Macintosh appeared at their side and lost no further time, the brother taking the paling pony and pulling it away from the wailing witch as the sister clamped her tight, holding her steady and still to let him lift Trixie into the cart unhindered by the hysterical librarian.

“SAVE HER!” she cried over and over through tears and whimpering, fighting the impossible clutches of Applejack’s unshakable strength. Twilight’s knees crunched into the ground as she lost her feet, feeling the deserved comfort of Applejack’s embrace as she was pulled in to a cushioned drop, her face resting on the broad, thick padded shoulders of the farmer.

“We will sugarcube, mark what ah say, Trixie’s jus’ fainted from the shock is all, she’ll be absolutely fine.” Applejack’s words did not convey the full certainty in her tone that they were meant to, and neither did they do much to calm Twilight down, but she pressed on regardless, lifting her friend by the waist away from the dirty floor and leading her over to the cart. The gnarled, unfixed wooden slats forming a makeshift step-up held Twilight’s weight with ease, Applejack and Macintosh jumping into the front end and taking hold of the leather reigns to encourage the trap onwards towards the town.

The rough road leading from the farm rocking and jolting the cart, the birds and cicada’s chirping amongst the foliage and fields, even the pleasant yet intrusive chuckle of young children playing hide and seek in the nearby apple orchards were deadened to the senses as Twilight sat alongside her helpless companion. As she put a few gentle strokes against the neck of the pony, Twilight gave her good hand to the open stifled wound below Trixie’s knee and began to channel a warm, tender energy to soothe the area, stopping on occasion as the feedback generated an awful twinge in her own leg, the synchronistic bond joining their perceptions for just a moment with each ebb.

Trixie remained still, her wild and unkempt coat and mane thick with dirt, stained scarlet and patched with salt. Her chest lifted very little with each breath, her lips curling with each as the expansions and retractions caused some slight pain inside of her somewhere, and though she was in tremendous strife, it was clear there was some fight left in Trixie to carry on.

Author's Note

I'm so sorry that it's been so long since an update, things got really out of hand for me, but hopefully we're back for good now. I know it's been a while and people won't mind much about this fic anymore,but for what it's worth, I am going to finish it and there'll be more after as well.

I hope the standard of this Chapter is acceptable and that you might like/still care enough to see what will come in the future, thank you everyone.