The Reunion 8 Event.

It started at the 8th reunion. Every year, the ponies who had been taught by Cheerilee came together and chatted about how their lives had progressed. Equestrian schooling doesn’t typically extend very far past elementary school, since most ponies simply take up the trade determined by their special talent. As such, even now, at the 8th reunion of their graduation from mandatory schooling, the ponies were still young mares and colts.

The three mares who founded the company known as the “Cutie Mark Crusaders,” now a national institution whose purpose is helping young fillies and colts discover their talents, were hanging out. They stayed close after school, though they did have less free time, since they were in the process of building their lives. Scootaloo had been the first of the trio to find hers. They had been in the Everfree forest, trying to get some sort of forestry cutie mark, none of them could remember anymore what it was, but the wagon that Apple Bloom and Sweetie Belle rode in got detached and Scootaloo didn’t realize until she was already far away. While rushing through the woods in search of her friends, she sped faster than she ever had before. That was when she truly realized how much she loved going fast, something she’d never really been able to accomplish beforehand. By the time she found her friends, a flaming scooter wheel was emblazoned on her flank.

Sweetie Belle’s story was equally impressive. She was trying to help her sister with some menial chore when she broke into song. At that moment, a musical director had been passing by and immediately requested Sweetie to preform in his next show. The unicorn obliged and, during the climax, realized how much she enjoyed letting her vocal chords ring, enchanting the audience, and simply bringing joy to the faces of others with her singing. At that moment, a silver bell with a note stem on top appeared in a flash of glory on her flank. That was said to be the best show the troupe had ever preformed. She had moved on from that particular troupe, but was still involved in musicals.

Apple Bloom was, like the rest of her family members, the last in her class to get her cutie mark. She’d been dejected when Sweetie Belle got her cutie mark, leaving the yellow earth pony filly as the only remaining member of her class without one. Her friends were supportive but she still needed something to cheer her up. She eventually took up wood carving. Her reasoning was that it was therapeutic, and found herself making beautiful works of art. While she recognized that she was good at wood carving, she still didn’t feel like it was her special talent. She began to experiment with other things. She remodeled her room, she made a few tweaks to her sister’s gala dress that Rarity had apparently overlooked, and she completely redid the Cutie Mark Crusader clubhouse, adding another floor and making the whole thing look objectively better. It was then, when she was looking at her work, that she realized she could do this with anything. After that moment, it seemed like everything she touched looked better than it did beforehand. It was around that time that an apple flower appeared on her flank. She didn’t really know what this meant at first, so for a few weeks she simply tried everything relating to flowers until, eventually, she realized that her special talent was generally beautifying anything. At first she was unhappy, after all, what use was beautification on a farm, but she slowly started to accept it and took up carpentry.

“Hey girls, how have you been?” came a voice that, for years the trio had dreaded. They turned toward the smiling pink mare walking their way, flanked by her silver, spectacled partner and cream colored, purple-maned fillyfriend.

“Hey Diamond Tiara” Sweetie Belle waved, “hey Silver Spoon, hey Alula.” The mares waved in response. The girls had gotten over their differences a while ago and, after quite a few apologies, had worked up the courage to actually become friends with each other. Sweetie Belle looked at her two friends and decided to start. “I’ve been good, still with Trixie’s Traveling Theater, we found some help while on the road, I actually invited one of our new actors, she should be here soon…”

“Sorry I’m late Diamond!” came a voice from behind them. Puzzled, Apple Bloom, Scootaloo, Diamond Tiara, and Silver Spoon looked toward the voice to see Alula flying in their direction.

“Alula?” the pink mare exclaimed, “then who’s…” she looked at the Alula standing next to her, who grinned and giggled before exploding in a green light. Standing in the spot where the Pegasus had been was a light blue unicorn mare with a sandy brown mane with a magenta streak in it and gold colored eyes.

The other five mares looked very confused but Sweetie Belle simply went over to the unicorn and hugged her. “Girls, this is the actress I was talking about, we call her Nova.” She smiled “she’s a changeling, in case you couldn’t tell.”

Diamond Tiara looked offended, “I knew something was up with Lulu, how dare you impersonate her you-“ but she was cut off by the very same mare she was defending.

“Woah you got my mane just right! And even my wings! What’s it like being able to transform? Can I try?” Diamond Tiara smiled at this and shook her head.

Sweetie Belle stopped Alula’s stream of questions with a hoof, “now now, Nova’s not great with our language yet so don’t ask her too much at once, she’s used to just reading lines, speaking of which, what do we say when we meet new ponies Nova?” She asked her friend, smiling.

“N-nice to meet you” the changeling managed, with a visible but unidentifiable accent. She turned to Diamond “Sorry for being the loved one, you are really love.”

The gathered mares smiled at Nova’s attempts. Scootaloo frowned, “but why do you need a changeling to preform your shows?” she asked in the least offensive way she could manage.

Sweetie Belle smiled “they make great actors, they can look like anyone and the praise feeds their need for love. They don’t make great villains though, I’ve pretty much perfected my maniacal laugh at this point.”

They all tried to imagine the adorable unicorn mare as an evil villain, failed at doing so, and broke down laughing at the prospect. Sweetie puffed out her cheeks “hey! I can be evil if I want!” This caused even more laughter, even among Sweetie and Nova, the latter of whom didn’t quite understand the joke.

Scootaloo was the first to stand back up after rolling on the ground laughing. “Alright, Sweetie Belle showed her surprise, now it’s my turn!” She grinned and shot into the air, climbing higher and higher. It wasn’t hard for the ponies below to guess what she was attempting, after all, Scootaloo had been admiring Rainbow Dash for years, it was no surprise that she would attempt her own version of a sonic rainboom, though Nova and Alula weren’t as well acquainted with the Pegasus, so they merely looked up in fascination. Once she was high enough, the orange Pegasus shot downward, increasing her speed and gradually building a cone around her, but the next part was what astonished them. Instead of breaking through the cone, Scootaloo turned upward, causing it to dissipate and fail to create the “boom,” however, Scootaloo was able to make a purple streak appear behind her for a few seconds. The Pegasus was clearly trying to draw something in the sky using her trail, but it dissipated too quickly and they couldn’t figure out what it was. Still, the attempted rainboom was very impressive, especially for a Pegasus who, for longer than most other pegasi, was incapable of flight.

Scootaloo descended near the gathering with a dejected look on her face. “I was trying to draw my cutie mark, guess I’ll have to keep trying” she sighed and, as she landed, was immediately ambushed by Sweetie Belle and Apple Bloom, who threw her into a group hug. “Well, I appreciate the affection but- urp- you’re kind of… strangling me.”

Apple Bloom and Sweetie Belle let go and smiled sheepishly. “It was still amazing!” Sweetie Belle exclaimed. “Who’d have thought you could make the rainbow trail without the rainboom!”

Scootaloo smiled, “well, it’ll be better once I can actually do the boom.”

The friends continued chatting for the rest of the gathering. There were no more big surprises, though Apple Bloom was practicing martial arts, Silver Spoon proved herself to be the strongest of the group, after working all day with a smithing hammer, and Diamond Tiara and Alula denied allegations that they were getting married any time soon. Eventually, the other members of the class had gone home, save Snips, Snails, Pip, Twist, and the aforementioned seven. It was around the time Silver Spoon decided to head home that it happened. A tall figure emerged from the woods. It appeared to be a pony but its hind legs were significantly shorter than its forelegs and it had a hat covering its face. It looked at the eleven assembled ponies and nodded, before chanting under its breath. At this point, a few of the ponies had started to notice the dark figure. Twist, the ever spunky young confectioner, trotted up to it and tried conversing, after all, she got much better at it after losing her lisp.

“Hi, what’s your name?” no response, “are you from around here?” no response, “excuse me what are you—“ Twist was cut off when a circle appeared around her feet and started glowing. “Wh-what’s happening?” she panicked.

“Twist!” The others yelled. The circle disappeared and Twist turned toward them with a cold look in her eyes, which had turned from their normal light pink to dark purple. Quietly, she started chanting the same words the figure was chanting. All of a sudden, the circles appeared under the feet of each of the assembled ponies.

“What’s going on?!” Snips yelled before his eyes turned the same color as Twist’s.

“I’m scared” Snails whimpered before he too fell under the spell.

Gradually, all the ponies’ eyes turned purple. Once its goal was accomplished, the figure held out a hoof and the ponies nodded and began to chant. Gradually, they all disappeared. All of them save one. The light blue “unicorn” kept chanting the nonsense words she didn’t understand. The figure merely looked at her and walked away. Relieved that she was alone, Nova changed her eye color back to the gold it had been before. She bit her lip, she had no idea what had just happened, so she did what her changeling instincts told her to do, she asked someone of authority. Sweetie Belle’s stories had told her of two individuals who likely knew enough about strange magic to help, though she didn’t know how to get to the hut owned by the zebra known as “Zecora,” so she instead trotted into town in the direction of Golden Oaks Library.

Nova arrived at the door of the large oak tree that made up the library. She rapped on the door three times with her hoof and waited. Almost immediately she heard “I’m comin’ I’m comin’” in a young male voice. The stage actress was surprised to see a small purple dragon open the door with a tired expression on his face.

“You are Twilight Sparkle?” she asked, utterly confused. Sweetie Belle hadn’t mentioned that Twilight was a baby dragon.

The dragon gave her a look and called up the stairs, “Twilight, you have a visitor, some unicorn” he yawned and addressed Nova. “She’ll be right out, come in and sit down.”

Nova complied and sat on one of the cushions in the living area of the library, waiting for the real Twilight Sparkle to appear.

“I’m sorry, I was actually getting ready for bed, what is it you needed ma’am?” Twilight asked, descending the stairs.

Nova smiled and was about to speak when she noticed something about this mare. She had both wings and a horn. Her eyes nearly jumped out of her head and she hastily bowed before the alicorn.

“Uh… excuse me?” Twilight asked, visibly uncomfortable with the display of subordination.

Nova, still on the floor, managed, “you royal?”

Twilight smiled, realizing that a language barrier existed. Her horn lit up magenta and Nova began to hear a voice in her head.

“Sorry about this” it said “I just feel it would be easier for you to speak in your own language. Please think in order to communicate, and please don’t bow, I’m not very comfortable with it.”

Nova’s jaw dropped open and she hastily sat up. “You’re Twilight Sparkle correct?”

“Yes” the voice replied.

“I need help” she explained, and relayed the events that had just transpired, with the strange spell and the disappearances of her newfound friends.

Twilight frowned, “that sounds odd, I’ve never heard of earth ponies and pegasi using magic of that caliber before, normally if they want to use magic it exhausts them after only a few seconds of using a simple levitation spell, how in Equestria did you escape?” she asked mentally. “And how did you change your eye color like that?”

In response, Nova transformed into Twilight herself and smiled before changing back into her preferred pony form. Twilight merely nodded. Changelings as a species had been pardoned several years ago by Princess Celestia with the condition that the queen live with Twilight in the library for a year, alongside one of the friendliest members of Ponyville next to Pinkie Pie. Eventually the two had moved out and found their own place and changelings became a regular part of society, though they did still occasionally experience some discrimination.

“I think it would be a good idea to relay this story to Zecora, if anyone knows about magic that can be performed by non-unicorns it’s her.” Twilight led Nova out of the library and off in the direction of Zecora’s hut.

“So” Twilight continued, “tell me a bit about yourself, you only really told me about what happened. I don’t know any changelings very well so I’d love to hear how you grew up and everything.” Twilight’s eyes sparkled at the idea of learning about the mysterious insect-like race.

Nova blushed, “well, you ponies know about bee colonies right? Our hive is a bit like that, though not all the drones are male. In fact, changelings are encouraged to get in relationships and feed off each other’s love. Changeling love isn’t very tasty so we don’t like to do it, but if we have to it’s nice to have a staple. I’m number 934, though when I left the hive to join Trixie’s Traveling Theater I had to use a name, so I chose Nova, since it’s close to the word for nine. When I was there, I met Sweetie Belle, who invited me to the reunion.” Nova stopped mentally communicating and walked in silence for a while.

Twilight looked over to her, a bit disappointed at having obtained so little information about changeling society, though she did learn that they could make family units. They were arriving at Zecora’s hut though, so Twilight didn’t push the issue. Instead she knocked on the hut’s flap and waited for the zebra to open it.

“Ah, it is Twilight I see, but this other pony is new to me,” said a zebra, who Nova presumed was Zecora, looking outside the tent flap.

“Hi Zecora, we have a problem and we need your knowledge to figure out what to do.” Twilight explained, “oh and this is Nova, she’s a changeling who’s friends with Sweetie Belle.”

“A changeling is a rare sight indeed, please come in, the way I will lead.”

Twilight and Nova entered Zecora’s hut and Twilight relayed the story to the wise zebra. Zecora mostly sat there, listening and drinking tea. As the story went on her expression became more thoughtful.

“It sounds like they were using dimensional spells, tell me Nova, do you know what the chant they were saying spells?” Zecora asked.

Nova looked confused and turned to Twilight.

“Do you remember what they were chanting?” The lavender alicorn translated.

Nova nodded and repeated a few of the words but stumbled over the complicated verbal patterns. “Uh, I know, but can’t say right.” Nova explained.

Twilight nodded, “just having trouble with pronunciation then, alright we can figure it out, for now, Zecora, do you have any idea why this might have happened?”

Zecora scratched her chin with a hoof and replied “Perhaps the question should not be why the young ones are gone, but what we can do to make them return.”

“That doesn’t really rhyme…” Twilight began but shook her head, deciding it wasn’t very important at the moment. “Right, I’ll research what happened to them, come along Nova, we have to figure out what the words they were chanting were.” They bid the zebra shaman goodbye and returned to the library, where Twilight brought Nova to a room in her basement, where she hooked her up to a strange machine and put a hat that looked like a strainer with wires sticking out of it on her head.

Nova looked at Twilight curiously, “what—“

“Ok, now, think back to what they were chanting, I want to get all the data down, no need to say what it was, this machine will pick up your brainwaves.” Twilight explained.

Nova was confused but she nodded anyway. She thought back to the creepy chanting, the words that stole her new friends from her and whisked them away to somewhere unknown. She repeated them in her head while Twilight looked at the data streaming out of the machine and nodded thoughtfully. The whole process took only a few moments, after which Twilight ordered Nova to stop.

“I think I know what kind of spell they were casting, it should be in one of the books in the library. I’ll do some research, for now, how about you explore Ponyville? We’ll meet up tomorrow and see what we can do.” She noticed Nova staring at her, looking apprehensive. Twilight smiled, “don’t worry, we do this kind of thing all the time, I’m sure we’ll have them back within the week. Oh and you can sleep at the library tonight.”

Nova nodded, reassured but still uneasy, and left the library. She wandered through the town, glancing at landmarks but overall too distressed to really enjoy anything. After a bit of wandering, she sighed and returned to the library. Nova certainly liked Ponyville, after all, it was where Sweetie Belle grew up, so it must be a good place, but she couldn’t really get her mind off of what happened.

“Back so soon?” Twilight asked, as Nova trotted in through her door, “I’m sorry I haven’t made much progress, I’ll tell you more in the morning, Spike can show you where to sleep tonight.”

“Spike?” Nova asked. As if to answer her question, the purple baby dragon from earlier walked into the room.

“I’m Spike, here let me show you where to sleep” he said, leading her up the stairs into a room next to Twilight’s. “The library has a bunch of rooms, not that we need more than one, so Twilight accepts guests pretty often. Sorry if stuff’s not up to your standards.” He yawned, “now if you’ll excuse me, I have a bed of my own to get to.”

Nova watched Spike shuffle away, mumbling under his breath about having to make breakfast for three in the morning, and entered her own room. It was sparsely furnished, by nature of being a guest room, but Nova was used to this kind of thing. Actors don’t usually make a lot of money and changelings don’t ask for it, so she was pretty used to sleeping on the ground, so even having a bed was a blessing for Nova. She trotted over to it, sniffed the sheets, and climbed under the covers. What followed was her least favorite part of her nightly routine. As Nova began to relax, her form started to change, until her blue unicorn persona faded and a disgusting, black and green insect-like creature sat in her spot. Nova shivered, refusing to look at her own body, as she closed her eyes and went to sleep.