The Magic of Animosity

She could hear voices, multiple voices, all around her.  She couldn’t see a thing, though…oh, wait, it’s because her eyes are shut.  She didn’t have the motivation to open them though, so she decided to continue lying quietly on what felt like a bed.  She wondered what the ponies around her were talking about.  What had happened, exactly?  She couldn’t really rememb-

“OW!” screamed Twilight.

Finally getting the strength to open her eyes, Twilight’s first sight was a sharp shard of glass being held in a pair of tongs right in front of her face.  Apparently, the pain she just felt was from a doctor pulling said glass out.

“Ah!  You’re awake, Twilight Sparkle,” the doctor began.  The voices in the room died down, and the several ponies that were there with Twilight turned to look at her.  Twilight turned her head slightly to get a better look at them, but not too much, as it hurt her neck to do so.

“How’re ya doing?” a pony nurse asked Twilight.

“I’m…ugh, well enough, I guess,” Twilight replied, feeling a throb in her head and the cuts lining her face and neck.  She suddenly remembered the fight that went on in the Sheriff’s office, and the black figures, and Braeburn and Paula getting hurt and attacked.  “Where’s Paula?!” Twilight jerked up into a sit on the bed, ignoring the intense pain she felt when she did; “How’s Braeburn?  What happened to the black goop things?  Did they get away with the black box?”

“…So you did meet the same things as Trixie did,” a voice spoke in the corner of the room.  Everyone turned around to look at the caped blue unicorn sitting up against the wall.  Her head was staring up at the ceiling, but she was looking at Twilight from the corner of her eyes.  “We all heard the whole story from the yellow stallion with the southern drawl earlier, but I wanted to hear it from you before I believed it.”  Mentioning Braeburn, Trixie motioned over to Twilight’s right; the purple pony turned and saw a lump from under a couple of blankets on the bed.

Relieved that Braeburn was alright, Twilight collapsed back into the bed, some of the metaphorical weight on her shoulders lifted.  Twilight brought her attention back to Trixie.  “So you were attacked by them, too?”

“Yes, the Great and Powerful Trixie was, but she made quick work of the creature, and without getting a scratch on herself,” Trixie smiled crudely and added, “unlike you, apparently.”

Twilight was not going to let Trixie belittle the turmoil she and her friends had just faced.  She was getting extremely sick of Trixie’s attitude, and the mocking of what happened to her and the others at the Sheriff’s office made something snap, ever so slightly, in Twilight’s head.  Trying not to speak through gritted teeth, but instead talking in a very cold tone, Twilight asked the unicorn, “Oh, really?  Now tell me, just how many of them did you face?”

Trixie seemed afraid to answer the question.  “Um, just one…”

“Just one?”  Twilight smiled to herself sarcastically.  “Just one…” she silently stared down at her covers for several seconds, then began to speak again, “Well…Braeburn, Paula and I were ambushed by a massive blob that turned into four.  What kind of an…‘entrance’ did your attacker make?”

“‘Entrance’?” Trixie asked.  “Well, I guess we saw it bubbling out from the ground.”

“Ah, I see,” Twilight replied, still using the same sad, matter-of-factly tone of voice, “When our attacker entered, the floor exploded and sent everything—including us and many large splinters of wood—flying across the entire room.  Perhaps you may have noticed Braeburn’s injury, or maybe you were wondering why my face appears as if it were thrown through a glass window?” Twilight gave Trixie a small smile of resentment.  Trixie didn’t say another word after that.

“So now we’re getting attacked by something from underground, plus we’re still trapped within the walls around the city?” a random colt asked.

“I…I don’t know,” Twilight replied, wincing as her head throbbed hard, but she appeared to regain warmth in her voice.  It was hard for her to think clearly, and she wasn’t sure she was in her right mind right now.  “If anything, I’d say they were coming up here in search for something.”

“Th’ black box from Princess Celestia?” Braeburn asked from his bed.  Twilight turned back to look at the yellow stallion who had just popped out from under the blanket.  He seemed fine, just very drained of stamina.  “Before we started fighting them, they’d completely ignored us n’ were searchin’ for something around the office.  Since they left righ’ after finding it, I’d say that was their target in th’ first place.”

“I couldn’t agree more, though this raises the question of why one went for Trixie, who I can only assume was a fair distance from the Sheriff’s office…?”  Twilight glanced at Trixie for confirmation, and the other magical pony looked back apprehensively.  After a few moments, Trixie responded.

“Yes, I was on the town’s outskirts,” she stated softly.

“Hmm…” Twilight was deep in thought.  Then she turned to the Appleloosians in the room with her.  “Have there been any other reported attacks?”

“Ah don’t think so,” one of them replied.

Twilight frowned slightly at her bed sheets.  “They only attacked twice, and one of the locations had exactly what they were looking for.  If that’s the case, shouldn’t they have only attacked the one place where they thought the box was?  Why bother randomly attacking some random pony outside of town?”

“The Great and Powerful Trixie is not ‘some random pony’,” Trixie said in offense, “She performs amazing and mesmerizing acts of magic and wonder for all the commoners to witness in awe!”  She spoke highly of herself while pouting in the corner of the room, still taken aback by Twilight’s attitude earlier.

Twilight rolled her eyes at Trixie’s comment and continued to think about these perplexing questions.  But then inspiration came to her, in the form of Trixie’s previous backlash, no less.

“Trixie!” Twilight outburst at the other unicorn in the room.  Trixie jumped from this, partially afraid that Twilight was going to attack her or something.  “Did you ever perform any magic after Appleloosa was surrounded, and before you were attacked?”

Trixie thought for a moment.  “Actually, I guess I did.  Whilst attempting to break a hole in the wall, Trixie did perform a single spell; just the one, though.”

“That’s all it takes,” Twilight replied, speaking as she began to delve back into her thoughts; she started to make an outline of what has probably happened in these past few hours…

Assuming these ‘things’ arrived in Appleloosa at the same time the black walls did, that means that they had the chance of seeing Trixie perform magic in an attempt to destroy the wall.  They saw her as a threat, and attempted to eliminate her before their initial attack on the Sheriff’s office.  Despite failing with Trixie, they went ahead with the plan, perhaps thinking they could get it done before Trixie reached the Sheriff’s, seeing as how she was so far away.  Never having seen me perform magic, they mustn’t have seen me as a threat.  After I had used magic, though, they once again went to kill the unicorn using it.  They see magic as a threat to their plan.  But what plan is that, exactly…?

“You okay, Twi?” Braeburn asked Twilight, who had her eyes closed and was muttering to herself.

…Okay, think, Twilight: timeline of events.  The Princess has me bring a black box to Appleloosa—to Sheriff Silverstar, to be exact.  I arrive, the Sheriff said he’d be gone but should have been back by then.  A dark cloud appears above town and entraps it.  Trixie uses magic to destroy the wall, fails, and is attacked by black figures.  Finally, more of them appear in the Sheriff’s office and take the black box…

“…Doctor,” Twilight came out of her trance to ask the question, “am I fit to leave yet?”

“Leave?!” the doctor exclaimed, “You’re severely banged up!  Heck, you were attacked only an hour and a half ago!”

“Wait, I’ve been out that long!?” Twilight exclaimed back, “There’s no time to sit around!  It was one thing when Appleloosa’s biggest problem was being caged in by some unknown force, but now that ‘force’ is attacking us, and we have to fight back!”

“We can fight back on our own, Twilight,” Braeburn replied, concerned for the unicorn, “We don’t need yer assistance.”

“Yes, leave that to the Great and Powerful Trixie.”  Trixie got up from the floor and whisked around Twilight’s bed, her ego apparently recovered.  “Besides, you earth-ponies don’t stand a chance against these things without my help.”

“Wha’s that supposed to mean?” Braeburn asked in offense.

“Well, in all honesty, the only thing that keeps all of you simpletons from being completely destroyed by these shadows is the magic of a unicorn—you can kick them all you want, but it will do you no good,” Trixie replied arrogantly; she was right though, and had learned this firsthand during her battle with her own copy.

Braeburn thought hard for a moment about what Trixie said, though he had a scowl on his face from her insult.  Then Braeburn got up and out of the bed, groaning slightly as he stood as firmly as he could on all four hooves.  “If that’s the case, then I guess we don’t have much of a choice.  Trixie, was it?  You and Twilight Sparkle are going to have to team up and stop this menace!”

“Wait, WHAT?!” both unicorns shouted at the same time.

“I saw myself what Twi’s capable of, and adding another unicorn into the mix will surely give you guys the upper hand,” Braeburn continued, unaware of how much the two despised each other.

“The Great and Powerful Trixie will not-”

“Oh for crying out loud,” Twilight interrupted, “will you stop it with the third person already?  It’s getting really, really annoying.”

“Don’t interrupt Trixie when she is speaking!”

“As if you have anything important to say!”

Trixie’s eye twitched.  “TWILIGHT SPARKLE!  I have had just about ENOUGH of you!”

“Oh, so I’m wasting your time?!”

The other ponies in the room looked back and forth between the two unicorns as they continued to chew each other out.  Braeburn had had enough of this nonsense.  “Quiet, both o’ you!  What in tarnation is wrong with ya?  Appleloosa needs the BOTH of you to get over yer own little issues between each other and fix this mess!  Remember the whole ‘town is trapped’ thing goin’ on righ’ now?”

Twilight and Trixie stared down at the ground in shame.

“So what are we supposed to do?” Trixie asked.

“That’s up to you an’ Twi,” Braeburn replied.  “Since both the Sheriff, and my sis’re gone right now,” Braeburn’s eyes looked distant as he said this, “I’m basically in charge of town; I give both you and Twilight complete freedom t’ do as you see fit in Appleloosa, if it means fixin’ this problem and savin’ my sis.”

“You mean the two of us have to agree on a plan?” Twilight asked hesitantly, afraid of the answer she might receive.

“Twi, you still need to get some rest, so this Trixie girl here is gonna be doing most of the legwork, but it’s your teamwork that’ll help solve this whole ordeal.  I suggest you two warm up to each other and devise some kinda plan.”  He waved out the crowd in the room, and crawled back into bed after they left; he too needed to rest his body after what happened.  “If either of you need any assistance from Appleloosa, it’ll be as simple as askin’.”  He lowered both his head and his tone when he said to Twilight, “Twilight, please—save my sister.”

“Don’t worry,” Twilight assured, “Trixie and I will get to the bottom of this!”  Trixie made a very loud and clear ‘tch’, accompanied by a rolling of her eyes.

Twilight turned her attention to the azure unicorn, pointing a scolding hoof at her.  “And YOU had better get an attitude adjustment, and fast—you’re helping, whether you like it or not.”

“Trixie will certainly comply, but only because she has to.”

Twilight ignored that last statement for the sake of saving time.  “So then, what’s the first thing we should do?  We sure don’t have much to go on, and I don’t know how much longer that doc expects me to stay in here, but I’m leaving no later than an hour from now."

Braeburn acknowledged to the two unicorns, "Well then, Trixie, I suppose you should just patrol Appleloosa’s streets until Twi's fit enough to leave, and you can make sure no more of those shadow-blob-things show up again.”

"Ugh," Twilight interjected.  "Can we please stop calling them this thing and that; 'shadow', 'blob', and 'goop' are kinda getting old."

"What, you want to name them?" Trixie asked judgmentally.

"Beats what we're calling them right now," Twilight replied.

"Pray tell, what would we call these black, evil pony-imposters?"

"Hm..." Twilight pondered for a moment.  "How about…’Odium’?”

“Odi-what?” Braeburn asked immediately.

Twilight elaborated, “If I’m not mistaken, it’s Latin for ‘hatred’.  I know how everypony says ‘hate is a strong word’, but I’m feeling some pret-ty strong negative feelings for them.”

“Takes a bit of effort to say, don’t you think?”  Trixie once again felt that this was just Twilight trying to show off her vast knowledge of trivial facts, but even Trixie knew that now wasn’t the time to start up an argument, so she let it slide.  This time.  “Whatever floats your boat, Twilight Sparkle.  If you seriously want to call them ‘Latin Hate’, be my guest—I’ll even play along.”

“Fine by me,” Twilight replied, “just get out there.  And why not try mingling with the citizens while you’re out?” Twilight said encouragingly to Trixie as the capped unicorn made her way out the door.  “Instead of focusing on making everyone you meet adore and worship you, perhaps you could try and make some actual friends!”

Trixie rolled her eyes again at the comment, not that Twilight could see from behind her.

Trixie was lying up against the base of the clock tower, watching the different ponies that walked by; despite trying to go about daily life, everyone looked nervous, and they were always looking up at the sky.  After having walked for five minutes, Trixie gave up and decided to sit back and relax.  It’s not like anything is going to happen anyways, she thought.  Every once in a while, a pony may glance up at her and stare for a few seconds—the caped, capped, dark-blue unicorn certainly did stand out from all the country-folk of Appleloosa.  Not wanting to make any more eye contact with gazers, Trixie pulled down the rim of her hat to the point where she could only see the dirt ground right in front of her.  She was considering taking a nap, when out of nowhere a pony walked up to her and spoke to her.

Trixie could barely see the hooves of the mare standing in front of her.  “Excuse me?” the other pony asked hesitantly.

Trixie considered whether to acknowledge her, or to just pretend to be asleep to spare herself the trouble of small-talk.  On a whim, though, Trixie lifted the rim of her hat and looked to the mare asking for her?  “Yes?  What do you want of the Great and Powerful Trixie?”

“Well…I heard that you and Twilight Sparkle are working together to save Appleloosa?”

“More or less,” Trixie replied in a bored drone, unaware of the irony in her statement.

“Well…” the mare began again, “I have this here, for the both of you.”  Turning to her side, Trixie only now noticed the saddlebags on either side of her.  The mare took off the bags and set them on the ground for Trixie.  “I’ve been hearing a lot about you two in town, and that you’re planning on going down that hole in the Sheriff’s office, so—”

The unicorn was taken aback by the last part of that sentence.  “We’re going to WHAT?  Terribly sorry, but Trixie believes you are mistaken.  We have no current plans to go down into such a place.”

“Oh…” the mare seemed somewhat disappointed.  “Well, you could still make good use of the stuff I packed in those bags, whether you do go in or not.  I put in some food and basic supplies, so it would be pretty useful in a cave like that, I think.”

“Um, well, thanks,” Trixie finally said, wanting the awkward encounter to end as soon as possible.  She gave a nod and a small smile to the mare before taking the bags, which made the mare look pretty happy with herself, and she gave a large grin back to Trixie before going off on her own way.

Ugh…hurry up, Twilight Sparkle, Trixie thought to herself.