If then, What now?

by The P Co

Rating: teen
Tags: Dark, Alternate Universe, Main 6, My Little Pony: Friendship is Magic, Other, Adventure, Twilight Sparkle
Length: 8479

Twilight has heard the phrase 'if you knew then, what you knew now, what would you do differently?', well now that phrase comes to be a reality as she breaks a cycle of cruel testing and does life differently.

'She was supposed to die! The lightning and fire we sent should have killed her! Why didn't she DIE?!?' the Spirits of Harmony panicked, their testee having escaped.

"Well, Spirits," Batman began, "You either die a hero or live long enough to see yourself become a villain," he paused, switching flash-cards to his next statement, "Twilight is about to start living by the classic phrase 'if you knew then, what you knew now, what would you do differently?' and she's going to do a lot of things differently" the dark knight explained, before gliding away with his cape.

For 3 years, Twilight Sparkle has been being watched, and the past 3 years have happened to her over and over again, literally 100 times.

Luckily, Twilight had been inching towards an escape from this nightmarish circle, and after 300 years of testing and failing, she had awoken.

Now she will become Twilight 'The Most Dangerously-Genre-Savvy Mare in Equestria' Sparkle, with the future laid out in front of her, she's going to do things differently.

She's going to do things right, and wrong, she'll be a beacon of power, the likes of which have never been seen before.

Published 2014-01-27 13:00:04 UTC
Last updated 2014-01-31 13:51:49 UTC

Prologue: Not this time.

-Canterlot, Equestria, 1000 AN-

Twilight Sparkle, student of Princess Celestia, laid on her favorite reading spot, reading Ye Olde Myths ande Legendes.

"And Celestia took over Luna's job, I know this story," she said, standing up and closing the book, levitating it into her saddlebags.

She brought the Amulet of Chaotic Protection up to eye-level, since Discord, at this point in time, was still sealed away, the golden Mobius strip was now stone.

She held it tightly, it would be useful.

"Spirits of Harmony," she started, looking up at the sky.

The memories of what had happened over the past three years stayed fresh in her mind, she could still here the ruffling of feathers, the laughter of her own voice with her friends, the glittering of the gems that were the Elements of Harmony, the gold of the regalia that Celestia wore and those that held the Elements.

"You've tried this many times, and I've failed each and every time, but not this time." she started off on a slow trot, gradually speeding up.

The wind started whipping past her as she galloped as fast as she could, wishing that she had spent some more time in PE, because she was already starting to run out of breath.

First stop, the library.

-A minute later-

Twilight skidded to a halt, stopping in time to gently open the door and trot inside.

"Hey Twilight, did you change your mind about going to Moondancer's birthday party?" Spike asked, just now finishing wrapping yellow ribbon around a red-wrapper present box.

"No, now Spike, I need you to find a book, I'm going to say look for... Surprisingly Easy Spells of Great Usefulness, by... a paladin," Twilight instructed, levitating down several books and looking at the titles.

"Um, okay," Spike agreed, somewhat confused by this sudden urgency, but nevertheless doing as commanded.

"No, no, no, no no no no no, SPIKE, did you find it?" the lavender unicorn called out.

"YEAH, it's over here!" the little purple dragon called down from on top of a precariously built ladder.

Twilight grabbed the book while Spike still held onto it, though she took the care to gently set him down before opening the tiny book.

"Let's see, magic stain, perfect, magic scan, excellent, Truthful Finder? amazing, these are very useful," she read, memorizing the aforementioned spells as well as a 'Bag of Holding', a 'Spellbook of Knowing', and an enchantment called 'Immutable'

"I don't get it, why do you need them? Like, what makes you think paladins wrote up spells? What're they for?" Spike asked, a bit confused at this development.

"Paladins, Spike, are a combination of the honor of a knight and the holiness of a cleric or a bishop. Knights are revered for their discipline, but still desire simpler methods, clerics and bishops are encouraged to use mortal ingenuity and holy ability to craft useful magics, together, they are known for creating things that are very simple, yet surprisingly useful," Twilight explained, preparing a teleportation.

"So why do you need them?" Spike persisted, still a bit confused.

"Well you see, Spike, magic stain and magic scan are literacy spells, I can use my magic to write and read words, the truth finder will direct me to occurrences of phrases and words, and it says here that there's this thing called a Bag of Holding, and as long as the item you wish to put into it can fit past the mouth, it will hold anything, and this thing called a Spellbook of Knowing works the same way, but with spells instead of items and 'fitting on a single page' rather than 'fitting past the mouth', now then Spike, stay here for a minute, I need to go get some more things before I enact my plan." Twilight cast the magic to make the bag and spellbook,

She recorded the convenience spells and 'immutable' enchantment in the book, then teleported away.

"I'll go with it, but I don't like it," Spike felt that the whole situation was... 'off'.

As 'off' as Twilight would allow a situation to be.

-Canterlot Castle, Royal Guard wing, Commanding Officers' Offices-

Shining Armor wiped a bit of sweat from his brow, even with the window open, the room was hot and the summer didn't allow him to stay comfortable, at least his chair was made of a soft, breathable material.

*CR-VASH* the magical sound of a teleportation was amplified by the silence of the room, from the flash of violet light came his little sister.

"Twily! Hey, nice to see you," he greeted, immediately putting down his quill and walking around the desk to his sibling, anything to at least temporarily relieve himself of having to do paperwork.

"Shiny, listen, I know we don't get to talk very often, but I have this thing, it's like an adventure, and I need your help," Twilight chose to be direct, something that she often felt could only be done with her brother.

"Oh, I see, like a 'Knight and Mage' story, eh? Or is it just dangerous, either way I'll come with you." Shining nudged his little sister's side, though Twilight jumped at the touch. He really wanted to escape the paperwork.

'Funny,' she thought, 'At first, I thought I'd never get used to having wings, now I think it'll be hard to get used to not having them.' her sides felt naked, more naked than normal.

"Do you still have that halberd? The one the blacksmith made you after you retrieved ivory mythril from that evil dragon's lair?" Twilight recalled his joyously telling her about that conquest, even a month after it happened.

"Yeah, I didn't just throw it away," he joked, "So I'm guessing this is an adventure for the both of us?" he gave a little smile, hoping she'd say yes, as he really wanted to get away from all of this paperwork.

"No, I need the halberd, if you'd give it to me?" she wasn't sure if he'd so easily let go of the treasure.

"Oh, okay then, here." he telekinetically grabbed the doors of a miniature armory box, opening it to reveal a small set of weapons.

Now, none of the weapons themselves were small, but the number of weapons was small, for an armory.

Inside of the cage was the weapons that the Royal Blacksmith had made for him, he had Rarity-level luck in finding ores of rare metals, and was allowed to keep them because he was the head of the Royal Guard, his only military superior being the General.

Inside the cage was, among a pair of mossy turquoise daggers, a blacker-than-black great axe, a pale gold-colored sword, and a rust-red hammer, an ivory colored halberd.

The foot-wide concave axe-blade, eight inch long slightly curved scythe, and six inch spearhead were mounted on a two-inch thick fifty- inch long pole of merinta wood, famed for its above-average strength and excellent malleability.

Another halberd was hung up next to it, but this one was a nice shade of red, red adamantium.

Where as ivory mythril was light as a feather, hard as an elder dragon's scale, could be beaten like copper and polished like glass, conduct electricity like salt water, and be enchanted like mahogany, but it paled (even more than it already was) in comparison to red adamantium.

Red adamantium was heavy as steel, but as hard as uru (this stuff Thor's hammer is made of), could be beaten like gold and polished like diamonds, conduct electricity like aluminum, and be enchanted like silverwood (the most magically receptive wood in the mage world).

"Go on, take it, I have this new one." Shining ran a hoof over the red halberd and telekinetically floated the white one to his sister.

Twilight took the weapon, enchanting it with the 'immutable' spell, which made it immune to any damage or inhibitors of a non-mechanical type, which meant acids, burning (which was still a threat with metal weapons), and magical breaking spells would do nothing. Satisfied with its state, she fit it into the Bag of Holding.

"Thanks Shiny, I have to go soon, but I'll write to you, okay? And plus I'm only going to be in Ponyville, so you could visit me if you ever had a day off," she offered, hugging the stallion with every ounce of her strength.

"Twily, you're acting kinda strange, is everything ok?" as a big brother, it was his right, nay, his duty, to know and put a stop to anything that troubled his little sister.

"If I do things right..." she trailed off, looking at the floor, then back to her BBBFF's eyes, "Everything will be just fine," Twilight couldn't help but feel like she had ironically echoed herself, as that was exactly what she said the day she was crowned a princess.

And look how that turned out...

"Well, listen, if you have anything at all that's wrong, don't be afraid to tell me, I swear that I'll never make you feel bad or worse about your problems," he assured, putting a hoof to her chest in emphasis.

Twilight looked down as his hoof, then back up to his eyes.

"Pinkie Pie promise?" she requested, it was the only thing that felt right.

"What? What's that?" Shining had a reason to be confused, he had never heard of this thing before.

"You go like this: Cross my heart and hope to fly, stick a cupcake in my eye," the lavender mare recited as she went through the motions.

"Okay then," the white stallion repeated the words and did the motions.

Twilight smiled, it was a wide, bright, genuine smile, the first she had had in months prior to the current day.

"Thanks, BBBFF," Twilight hugged her brother again and stepped back to teleport away.

"What was that promise all about? Where'd you learn it?" Shining found the procedure a bit weird, to be honest.

"A friend taught me it, maybe you'll meet her some day," the stripe-maned mare looked down, her mind was filling with fear, what if this added preparation backfired, and she ended up getting hurt, maybe even dying?

The mage wanted her possibly-last-words to her brother to be better than 'maybe you'll meet her some day'.

"Shiny, one last thing," she said, her horn still flared up with magic.

"Yeah?" he replied, tilting his head.

"I love you." not wanting to risk saying anything else, she teleported away.

"Oooooookay then?" the knight was confused, was familial love not already implied to be true?

Too bad for him, he had paperwork to get back to.

-Meanwhile, with Spike-

Spike stood there, twiddling his thumbs, waiting for Twilight to return.

*KR-WHYOOM* the mare-in-question appeared in a bright flash of violet light.

"Spike, take a letter," she commanded, levitating over a quill and parchment.

"Okay, ready." Spike put the nib of the quill to the scroll.

"Dear Princess Celestia, it has come to my attention that the Summer Sun Celebration is tomorrow, and I wish to look over the preparations in the chosen town this year, Ponyville, I am sure that you, being you, can make this official. I await your response, Twilight Sparkle," she dictated, looking as close to the sun as she could.

"Alright, s'that all?" Spike still had the quill ready.

"Yes, send it," she replied.

Spike breathed a plume of green flame onto the rolled-up scroll, sending it to Celestia.

Twilight looked straight at Spike, waiting for his response.

In ten seconds flat, the little dragon belched up the response letter.

"Ah, let's see," Twilight read the letter

To my Faithful Student

Okay, sure, do that, the guards in the airfield will fly you there, have fun,

OH, and make some friends.

Signed, Princess Celestia

Twilight smiled, this was going to be easy.

-A few minutes later-

Twilight and Spike were sitting in the sky-carriage, waiting to arrive in Ponyville.

"So Twilight, looks like you 'lucked out', the princess has you staying in a library," Spike resisted the urge to gag, for somebody who's lived with the most book-loving mare in all of Equestria for literally all of his life, he didn't like books.

It was kinda odd, though, how Twilight had managed to take care of him at age five, he was sixteen at this point, the legal age of consent in Equestria.

"Yeah, I knew that already, and the Golden Oaks library will be more than sufficient for my stay in Ponyville," Twilight assured.

"How'd you know its name?" Spike didn't remember telling her that piece of information yet.

"Oh, I've looked at a map of the town before, the only library there is the Golden Oaks," the lavender mare answered, pulling out a small piece of paper and magically staining it with a letter to the princess.

"Oh, makes sense," the purple dragon accepted the rather flimsy answer, he didn't have any reason to not believe her, so why doubt it?

Twilight was busy writing her letter, fixing words here and there, until she finally had down what she wanted to say.

Another advantage of the magic stain spell, in addition to writing without limit and as fast as one can think the words, was that she could change the color of the words as well.

Dear Celestia,

Thanks for letting me do this, I know that this Summer Sun Celebration is very important.

Very important, the fate of Equestria may even hang in the balance if the event doesn't go off without a hitch.

Don't worry though, me and my future friends will be there to save the day if anything bad happens.

By the way, I know something that only the oldest books would say...

I know what you did to Luna. It was terrible, and you should be ashamed of yourself, the Elements of Harmony will not be treated like toys in the hooves of me and my friends, and I KNOW that you know that they can be used to purify a pony, not just banish them away. How irresponsible are you? I can understand why you would just send the plucky heroines in to save the day, rather than, oh I don't know, using some of the INFINITE DEITY SUN MAGIC to fix things? Luna is more competent than you are, and a lot more friendly too, you're the one who needs to make some friends, not me. I'm out of space on the paper, so I'll end this off here. Bye, Twilight

And that was all she wrote.

Author's Note

SO, chapter 1 done, great, awesome, Twilight is on her way.

This story is going to proceed through each and every episode of the show, from (not counting this prologue) S1E01 to S4E26

I hope you all enjoyed it, and I hope some of you found the hidden message.

Here's to being awesome, P1 signing off.

*bzhoo~*

Season 1, Episode 1: The Elements of Harmony, Part 1

Twilight rolled up the letter and gave it to Spike to send. The little dragon breathed a plume of green flame onto the note, causing it to fly away in a cloud of magical ashes.

The chariot jostled a bit as it made contact with the ground, the guards trying to land as smoothly as possible.

It was time to go through with this, Twilight's mind was racing, she jumped out of chariot and looked around at the familiar set of buildings.

"Thank you sirs, you may leave if you desire, here, take this and get yourself something pretty," Twilight thanked, levitating a few bits into the pegasi's under-armor pockets.

The two stallions looked at their body-plates, then back to Twilight, smiling as they started to take off again, back towards Canterlot.

The two purple sorta-siblings set off down the street.

"Alright, first on the li-" Spike was cut off by a particularly loud *CLOP* from Twilight's hooves on the ground.

"Food, food for the celebration, I wrote the list Spike, I know what's on it," Twilight clarified, sounding a lot harsher than she would have wanted to.

Her amethyst eyes saw Pinkie Pie up the road.

"Geez, okay, Miss Snappy-pants." Spike could feel the edginess in her voice.

Twilight realized that she had just sounded a bit like a quick-witted, on-her-period jerk, "I'm sorry Spike, I shouldn't be saying things like that, especially to you. You're my Number One Assistant, and you've been with me since day one, I really appreciate you and I should be treating you better." she nuzzled his cheek and smiled at him.

Spike stared into her amethyst eyes.

Twilight stared back into his emerald eyes.

"Who are you and what have you done with Twilight?" he demanded, brandishing his claws at the obvious imposter.

"I am Twilight, I'm me, just... I felt like I should be a better pony," 'And a bit more bad too, who knows, maybe I have to fifty-fifty for the Spirits to accept me,' she spoke and though.

"Well then, okay," Spike could get behind this idea, if it meant he possibly could sleep longer in the morning.

Twilight turned to continue down the road, and nearly bumped into Pinkie Pie.

The pink-on-pink-on-blue mare looked at her expectantly.

"Hi, my name is Twilight Sparkle, you must be Pinkie Pie, if the description matches, I've heard so many good things about you, you must be good, if you're the master of ceremonies for the Summer Sun Celebrations," Twilight felt it strange, she was imitating the gossiping speech of somepony from Canterlot...

Except she was from Canterlot, but somehow voluntary isolation kept her from burning her niceness away to the fire that was poshness. She had to go off of what Rarity said and how the few other Canterlotians she had met sounded like.

"Yeah, I am, HI! My name's Pinkie Pie, oh wait you knew that already, um, wait a second, are you new in town?" Pinkie asked the strange lavender mare who claimed to have heard of her.

"Yes, I just arrived about a minute ago," Twilight answered, feeling the rush of wind as her old-but-now-new friend zoomed off to prepare a welcoming party, "And she must be going off to prepare a welcoming party."

"Dude, that's creepy, I felt like, some sort of extremely brief dramatic irony or something, or was it a Gilligan's cut?" Spike was weirded out, not by Pinkie Pie, but probably because Twilight had just repeated exactly what the narrative said.

"Probably the latter, come on Spike, we need to check on that food," Twilight levitated the little dragon onto her back and teleported to Sweet Apple Acres.

-Meanwhile, at Sweet Apple Acres-

Applejack was about to start chain-bucking several trees, a difficult, but amazing technique that required great acrobatic and athletic skill.

*K-WOWM* unfortunately a bright flash of light distracted her and she was thrown off, slamming her side into the tree.

Twilight appeared and immediately looked around for Applejack, she found the orange farmer lying on her side on the ground, groaning in pain.

Judging from the scrapes on both her skin and the bark of the tree, Twilight guessed that AJ had taken a nasty spill, and it was probably her fault.

"Oh dear Luna, I'm so sorry, here, let me help y-" her offered hoof was slapped away by Applejack's stubbornness and not-yet-solved hatred for getting help.

"Ah'm fine, ah'm fine, don't you worry 'bout me," Applejack said, standing up on her own, but nearly falling.

She had just taken the equivalent of a tree bucking her in the side as hard as she bucked trees in their sides, a sort of 'Soviet Bearussia' joke taken in a painful direction.

"Um, wait, I saw something else in that book, hmm, 'Cure Moderate Wounds'," Twilight cast, the brightly colored healing magic covering her old-but-now-new friend's whole body.

Applejack gave a sigh of relief, one of her ribs had broken a bit and was pressing into her lung, which had been preventing her from breathing properly.

"Thanks, pardner, ah gotta say, ah've never seen yer face 'round these parts, y'all here for the reunion?" the blonde-maned mare asked.

It was a legitimate question, the Apple family was the largest family in the world, so it was possible that one of her kin had popped out a lavender unicorn.

"No, I'm not part of the Apple family, my name is Twilight Sparkle and I'm here to check on the food for the Summer Sun Celebration, and eat some if possible, but I can't stay for too long," Twilight looked forward to enjoying the various treats prepared by the Apples, and thanked Discord that she knew not to eat too much pie.

Applejack rang the 'vittles bell', "SOUPS ON, EVERYPONY!" she shouted, Twilight decided to join her shout, providing a strange sort of harmony between their voices, as they were an octave apart.

The unicorn was pulled over to a massive table, and was introduced to all of the Apples over the course of fifteen seconds.

"And my immediate family, this is Big Macintosh."

"Eeyup."

"Apple Bloom."

"Nice ta meet ya."

"And the Grand Matriarch of the Apple Family, Grraaaannny Smith," Applejack made sure to put emphasis on the 'granny' to punctuate her point of 'grand matriarch'

"Well, it's nice to meet you all, so, is it time to eat now? I still have to check the food," Twilight looked at the mouth watering spread, "And it would be a noble sacrifice, if something was poisoned, and I was the one to take the fall," her voice was gushing so much sarcasm that the possibility of being offended was drowned in it.

"Well, you should try one of each then. Who knows? Might be the opposite'a poison," Applejack shot back, catching the joke immediately.

"Well I'm looking forward to testing that, I know from experience that Apple family apples are the best in the world." Twilight licked her lips in anticipation.

Then the call to actually eat was made, and the lavender mare enjoyed every minute of it.

-Some time later-

"Well ya better head off now, ah suppose," Applejack said to the departing Twilight, having thoroughly enjoyed the friendly mare's company.

"Yeah, I wish I could stay longer, really I do, but I have responsibilities that need taking care of," Twilight responded, breaking from a walk into a trot, Spike sitting on her back.

Applejack smiled, well there was quite a pony, not only was she a great friend, she was diligent, just like Applejack herself.

-A couple of minutes later-

Twilight trotted through town, looking up into the sky for Rainbow Dash.

"RAINBOW DASH, RAAAAINBOW DAAAASH!" she called out into the sky, wishing she still had her wings so she could look closer.

"WATCH OOOOOOUUUUT!" the raspy voice shouted, a few seconds away from crashing into a hapless merchant's cart.

Twilight jumped backwards and moved the cart away from the incoming pony.

*PFOOOM* came the loud crash, the green clad merchant looked at the mage and mouthed a 'thank you' for her saving his cabbages.

"No problem, here, Rainbow Dash, let me help you up." fortunately for the both of them, Rainbow Dash was more inclined to receiving help than her sorta--halfway-almost-kinda-rival.

"Thanks, say, what's your name?" the spectrum-maned pegasus asked.

"'Cure Light Wounds', my name's Twilight, you must be Rainbow Dash," the stripe-maned unicorn greeted.

"Yeah, the one and only, what was your first clue, the rainbow mane?" Dash asked, not sure of the validity of this possible fan.

"Well, everypony knows Rainbow Dash, fastest flier in Equestria, I'd say you could do a Sonic Rainboom, heck you might have done one before, I saw one in the sky when I was five," she remembered the event clearly, it was the story of her cutie mark, after all.

"I was three when I did it, yeah I know, I was quite the badass little foal back then," the daredevil took in the praise like the desert would take in water.

"I agree, so badass, I think I know why even the Wonderbolts wouldn't accept you." Twilight gave a mischievous smile.

"You know why the Wonderbolts haven't noticed me? C'mon, tell me, tell me tell me tell me." the cyan mare got really close to Twilight's face.

"You make them look bad," Twilight started, waiting for the immediate response.

"What?!" the reaction was expected, especially with so little explanation.

"What I mean is, in comparison to you, Rainbow, the Wonderbolts look bad, you're above them, they wouldn't accept you because if you were on the team, you'd be so much more amazing than the rest of them that ponies would call you the Wonderbolt, rather than a Wonderbolt," Twilight explained.

"You really think so?" Dash shivered a few times and looked at her with excited, expectant eyes.

"If you keep working hard, then you'll be better than them for sure, you're gonna be the best one day, Dashie." Twilight put a reassuring hoof on the Pegasus's shoulder.

"Thanks, you just made my day- no, my whole week- no, I think you just brightened up my whole year," the daredevil thanked, flying off to go clear the clouds.

"You're welcome, friend," the mage said in a sorta-goodbye fashion, waving at the departing pegasus.

"I don't get it, Twilight, you're acting really weird, how'd you know all that stuff?"

"I studied abroad once, you were too young to remember, I came to Ponyville and met a few ponies, I heard about Rainbow at that time," Twilight excused.

"Meh, makes sense," Spike would rather have to talk about watching his diet than be talking about studying.

The pair made their way down the street, their next destination coming up soon.

-Soon thereafter-

Twilight walked into the Town Hall, looking at the various decorations set up.

"Wow, beautiful," Spike drooled, hearts in his eyes at the sight of Rarity.

"Well, I think she'd be lucky to have you, I know I am," Twilight assured, giggling at Spike's sudden blush.

The two trotted up to the white fashionista. watching her hum and look from ribbon to ribbon for a few moments.

"Hello, my name is Twilight Sparkle, you must be Rar-" Twilight was cut off by a gentle hoof pressing her lips closed.

"Please, not now darling, I'm 'in the zone', as it were," the indigo-maned unicorn dismissed, wrapping a ribbon around a pillar, "Perfect, now then, what were you on about?" she asked, maintaining an air of grace and calm in the face of this odd pair.

"My name is Twilight Sparkle, you must be Rarity, in charge of the decorations, which I must say look beautiful, I couldn't help but overhear some ponies talking about your fashion skills, and I have connections in Canterlot, seeing as how I'm from there, I was going t-"

"YOU'RE FROM CANTERLOT?" was all Rarity could manage in a sudden burst of giddiness, the sheer amount of giddiness was comparable to a schoolfilly.

"Yes, trust me, everypony there is a-" she covered Spike's ears, "-either a pompous jackass or egotistical bitch, depends on the gender, and the tiny few that aren't are hard to find, I only know one, a stallion named Fancy Pants," Twilight revealed, remembering the pony who was like if her brother had went into business rather than military.

"Oh my, you must know so many ponies, tell me all about the city," Rarity insisted, hugging Twilight too close for comfort.

Twilight teleported out of Rarity's hold, putting Spike in her place, "I'd like you to meet Spike, he's quite the gentlecolt of a young man and knows even more than I do about the populace of Canterlot." total bro-move Twilight, total bro-move, or is it sis-move, either way it was super-cool.

"Ooooh yes, I suppose that I do," Spike put on his fancy voice, and it was working like a charm.

It was surprising, really, not surprising that it was working well, but surprising that it was working at all, up until just now with Rarity, the voice had a 0% success rate.

"Right, well I'll leave you two to it, I have to get on my way doing the manager stuff," Twilight dismissed herself, teleporting a good distance away.

Spike and Rarity didn't notice, they were too enraptured in gossiping about the latest gossip scandal in the capitol.

-One teleportation later-

Twilight was trotting the path out of Ponyville, the path led up to Fluttershy's cottage, she could have just teleported, but she needed to save her magical energy for something big.

*chirp chirp chirp chirp chiiiiiiirp* came the singing of several birds, the lavender unicorn knew she was close to her friend.

"Ha-ah-ah-ah-AAAAAAH~," came the singing of Fluttershy, Twilight had never really noticed before, but with her mind clear of having to do the celebration management, she did notice.

Fluttershy's singing voice was practically angelic, the mage even considered making a portal to heaven to compare her friend to the angels' choir.

"Very good, but, um, you," Fluttershy pointed to one of the bird, "Could you please try to, um, reel it in a little bit, if you don't mind," she requested, getting a nod in response, "Okay, thank you."

"Um, hello," Twilight greeted, staying quiet.

"Hmm? Oh, hello, what are you doing here?" Fluttershy greeted, internally thanking this unicorn for being quiet.

"I'm here to check on the bird choir for the Summer Sun Celebration, could you please have them sing again?" Twilight asked, giving a friendly smile.

"Oh, of course, I was just about to start again, actually. Okay little friends, from the top, a one, a two, a one two three four-" the singing started out after that.

Fluttershy, in the fear of disappointing an audience, sang as beautifully as she could.

Twilight could feel tears of 'i witnessed beauty' forming in her eyes, and when the butter-yellow pegasus switched from the original tune to Bethooven's numbers, the lavender unicorn couldn't stop them from pouring.

It was gorgeous, amazing, magnificent, a masterpiece, many other such words that Twilight knew, but could not bring to mind at the moment.

"So what did you think?" the rose-maned mare asked.

"I... I..." Twilight's eyes sprayed a few more tears as she hugged Fluttershy close.

The mage was caught up in quiet sobs, and the motherly pegasus felt a little awkward, but she returned the hug.

"Fluttershy, that was... I can't think of the words right now to describe how amazing that was. I swear, from now on, I will protect you, if you ever have any problem, just come to me and I'll help you fix it, come, walk with me," Twilight half-sobbed-half-praised, keeping the hug going for a few more seconds and then breaking it, gesturing for the other pony to follow her.

"I... okay," Fluttershy felt something that she rarely felt, good about herself, some self-worth, a bit of self-respect, and maybe even a little bit of self-confidence.

The pair trotted down the path, talking like old friends, and for one of them, that statement was true.

-An hour or so later-

Twilight purposely took the longest possible path without making it seem like she was lost, just so she could talk with Fluttershy longer. The two had spent a depressingly small amount of time together in the last cycle.

"So mommy said that it was okay for me to live on the ground, which meant that daddy agreed as well, since even though mommy is loud and forceful, she still talks with daddy about decisions, even though he's a doormat," Fluttershy reminisced the story of how she came to Ponyville, she loved her parents just as much now as she did when she was little.

However, Twilight noticed that 'little' didn't exclusively apply to 'young', the average pony was 3'0" tall, Fluttershy was 2'10" tall and quite a bit thinner than normal.

"Ah, there's my house," Twilight said at about a fifty hooves from the library.

"Oh, well I guess I can paraphrase the next part, so my parents agreed that I could live on the ground, but I needed to finish schooling, so I went through and graduated high school, went to college, and got a four-year degree in veterinary practices, and I actually just moved here in January, so far so good I guess, and I've gotten to spend time with my old friend Rainbow Dash, have you met her?" Fluttershy paraphrased, by the time she finished talking, they were in front of Twilight's front door.

"Yes, and she's a good egg and a great pony. Sorry, but I have to get my things unpacked, I just got here today and am going to be staying for a while, goodbye friend," the mage politely dismissed, opening the door and trotting inside, leaving Fluttershy to trot or fly home.

*creeeeaaaaa-click* went the door as it closed, Twilight breathed a sigh of relief, so far so good.

Now all she had to do was deal with the party.

"Well, today was boring, now where's that light switch?" she said in mock exasperation, wanting the party-goers to feel as special as possible.

*click-RANDOM PARTY NOISES* "SURPRIIIIISE!" confetti burst forth from all around, surprising that none got on Twilight, dozens of ponies packed into the foyer of the library starting having fun.

"HI! It's ME, PINKIE PIE, I threw this party just for you! Were you surprised? Huh? Were ya were ya were ya?" the pink master of ceremonies jumped into sight, nearly pressing muzzles with Twilight.

"A little, I was expecting a party, but nothing like this," Twilight lied, she hadn't been surprised at all, but being friendly was something she needed to do, and enjoying a good thing for its base value was something she needed to do a hell of a lot more.

"WOW, I've never had anypony expect one of my parties before! Say, are you... psychic?" Pinkie asked, her tone going low.

"Um, yes," Twilight admitted.

She couldn't do full-on telepathy and crazy shit like that, but she could do basic arcane-based psychoanalysis like Sense Motive, Detect Evil, Magical Insight, and so on.

"Wow, cool! Anyways, enjoy the party!" Pinkie bounced off to tend to some of the other guests.

Twilight sighed in relief and trotted over to the refreshment table, making triple sure that she was pouring a cup of strawberry soda instead of hot sauce, that same mistake last time had cost her two weeks without her sense of taste.

Her amethyst eyes scanned the room whilst she gulped down the sweet, fizzy liquid, she saw Rarity and Spike, still talking, or rather Spike talking and Rarity listening intently, occasionally responding with a brief word or phrase.

The mage took this opportunity of aloneness to get upstairs and quickly magic-stain up a few plans.

She couldn't interfere with her friends' proving themselves, so any thoughts of that went straight away.

What she did want to do was be prepared in case anything different happened, and that meant being capable of doing as many things as possible and utilizing spells in different ways.

Using the Finder spell, she recorded several useful battle spells, including Prismatic Blast, the other 'Cure Wounds' spells, several elemental spells.

One spell stood out above all the others, though, it was simply titled 'Magic Missile', described as 'a silver ball of magical light, while it only carries 1-4 Newpons of explosive force, it is incredibly easy to do, some can even invoke it at will'.

Twilight recorded the spell, and cast it, she summoned over a thousand tiny balls of silver light. Each carried a small, but significant enough force to do plenty of damage, especially if, say, a hundred of them hit at the same time.

Dismissing the massive wall of collectivized death, Twilight went about recording more spells, and found something interesting...

A few references to books, one called the 'Necronomicon', one called the 'Book of Celestia', one called the 'Diary of the Bastard Paladin'

The Diary of the Bastard Paladin sounded like the best place to start, so she used the Finder spell to locate it.

"Let the Spirit of Truth uncover what is shrouded in myth, I want to find something, Control-F, Diary of the Bastard Paladin," she recited, the requested book suddenly letting off a bright yellow glow.

She grabbed it and looked at the cover, it featured a gray stallion's face and six symbols around him, a sand colored starburst, a crown with a crest of gold on it, a black shield smattered with stars and a crescent moon, a brown-framed pair of 3D glasses, a green-framed pair of mirrored glasses, and an emerald horseshoe all in a loose circle, each held a name under it.

Arch-Star, Golden Crest, Evening Warden, Shift Perspective, Mirror Eyes, Emerald Embrace, the six paladins of a single blood, a tale of the blessed mortal.

Within the cover was the Table of Contents, which read:

Arcana, Goddess of Magic, my beginning.
Celestia, Princess of the Sun my authority.
Luna, Princess of the Moon, my loss.
Discord, God of Chaos, my realization.
Chrysalis, Queen of the Changelings, my present.

Twilight scanned her way through the book, and was surprised to find that it had been published this year, by none other than a knight named 'Golden Crest the 51st', the paladin was posing as his own descendent!

Apparently this stallion had cheated his way into agelessness, changing from deity to deity whenever he felt he needed to, within a thousand years he had racked up five thousand more years of life!

Still though, the book provided important information on the deities involved, including special holy magics that only paladins were told about.

"Well I guess that rule just got broken," the mage said as she recorded several holy spells in her Spellbook of Knowing.

She hoped that these spells would be unnecessary, and that they would work.

-An hour or so later-

Once everything she needed and/or wanted was recorded, Twilight decided to test one of the more powerful spells out, Empowering Polymorph.

*ZAP-crrrreeeekelllll-kzshhhhk* the sound of rending flesh filled the room as magic consumed the mage's body, twisting and turning it into something else.

When the light faded, Twilight looked into the mirror, and found herself to be an almost perfect Rainbow Dash clone were it not for her squared-off manecut.

"Hmm, well, this is interesting," she pondered, even her voice had changed.

This presented a problem, how could she change back if she didn't have a horn with which to do magic?

Twilight looked at the spell again and found a small statement written there, "You can't die if you're not really you"

"Ah, I see, so I guess this means that, in order to change back, I need to... kill myself..." well this was awkward.

Suddenly the door that led downstairs opened up, Spike stood there with a lampshade on his head.

"HEY TWILI-oh, hey Rainbow Dash, what are you doing up here? Where's Twilight?" Spike looked at the cyan pegasus, then at the books strewn around.

"Oh, uh, she left... dude," the lavender-unicorn-but-in-the-form-of-a-cyan-pegasus answered, trying to copy the mannerisms of her friend.

"No, she didn't, nopony saw her leave, and she wouldn't leave with books strewn everywhere, she'd have a fit if that happened," Spike knew Twilight too well.

"Alright, plan B, I cast a spell that polymorphed me into Rainbow Dash," she admitted.

"But how can you cast spells if you're Rainbow Dash?" he argued.

"I wasn't Rainbow Dash prior to casting the spell," she explained.

"Hey, who's casting a spell that involves me?" Rainbow Dash said as she flew into the room, seeing a copy of herself, "Wow, damn, now I see what all those ponies were on about, I am a hot piece of flank," the speedster praised herself unabashedly.

"Rainbow Dash, it's me, Twilight, I cast a spell and I turned into you for some reason," Twilight explained, easily getting into a hover at eye-level.

"That sounds like something I might accidentally do if I was an awesome magic-pony like you, hold on, how are you doing that?" the real spectrum-maned mare asked, pointing to the fake one's wings.

"What do you mean? I could cast spells with a horn, but I can't do it now," Twilight answered.

"No I mean how are you flying? You can't possibly know how to fly." great, the one time Rainbow gets inquisitive is the one time the answer is a metaphysical horror waiting to be unleashed.

"It... I just... it just came to me," Twilight lied, she didn't want her friend or her assistant to know that she had, for almost a whole year, been an alicorn.

Luckily Dash bought it and flew out of the room, leaving the transformed Twilight and Spike alone.

"Say, y'know, if you'd allow it, I'd like for us to be... like... drinking buddies," Spike offered, unaware that the Dash that left was the real one.

"Spike! I don't want to hear anything more about you and Rainbow Dash being 'drinking buddies', now if you'll excuse me, I need to go kill myself to disable the magic and change back," Twilight rebuked, angry and a bit shocked that Spike had seriously offered such a thing.

"Well, I mean, I wanted to try out adult stuff, and... wait DON'T DO IT!" he cried out to the pegasus, who was currently way up high in the sky.

Rainbow-but-actually-Twilight nosedived down from the stratosphere, straight into a large cloud, the force of going about five hundred miles per hour into a crash snapped her neck.

Magical light encapsulated her body, fixing the break and turning her back into Twilight...

... a hundred feet above the ground...

... with no wings to stop from dying as herself.

"Shit, um... FEATHER FALL!" she shouted the incantation part of the spell, casting the magic part in less than a second.

The rushing wind calmed to a gentle breeze as she fell ten times slower, landing with little-to-no problem.

"Phew, alright, let's see." she looked up into the sky, finding it to be dusk, it was time to go to the celebration.

Teleporting back into the library, Twilight saw Spike's worried expression turn to disbelief, so she gestured for him to walk with her.

Trotting with the dragon on her back, Twilight explained how the polymorph thing worked, Spike accepted the explanations at their base form, not wanting to be sent to sleep by the boringness of a lecture. Then she explained the prophecy of Nightmare Moon.

Not long after she finished, as the pair neared the Town Hall, they were joined by the other five.

"Oh, hello everypony," Twilight greeted her familiar friends.

"Howdy Twilight, ah gotta say, it's good luck seein' you again, last of the family headed on home about an hour ago," Applejack informed, her trot light and a bit springy from the residual excitement of the Apple Family Reunion.

"Well, my little Spikey told me all about how wonderful a place Canterlot is, I must say it's amazing that you're the princess's personal protégé, it's an intricate honor," Rarity sighed, her eyes were still all dreamy from the imaginings of living in the capitol.

"Princess's student eh? Sounds like we're dealing with a big-shot here." Rainbow swooped in closer to nudge the lavender unicorn in the side playfully.

"Wow, I'd throw a party for that, but it already happened, oh well... WAIT! Maybe I can find some other neat-o thing to party for, you can't have too much party!" Pinkie excitedly cheered, bouncing extra high in the air while she was talking.

"Oh goodness, I hope nothing bad happens," Fluttershy worried, concerned for the safety of everypony.

"Trust me, if the book 'Predictions and Prophecies' I've been reading turn out false, then we have nothing to worry about," Twilight revealed.

Nopony said a word, the gravity of the situation had been amplified several times by the mage's statement, luckily they had reached the Town Hall and entered.

A band was playing, filling the air with a soft ambience of music, everypony was quietly chatting with one another, the group of six split up as soon as possible to go mingle, Twilight and Spike were left alone.

"So, do you have any ideas about how to deal with Nightmare Moon when she comes up?" the little dragon asked, looking up at the tapestries.

"Yes, as a matter of fact, I do, but besides that, drink this," Twilight said as she levitated a potion up to Spike's lips.

Spike drank it without question, he knew that Twilight wouldn't try to hurt him, so he drank the sweet and sour liquid, it had a bitter and salty aftertaste, like he had eaten a green apple coated in poison.

"Okay, now what? And why did that taste like poison?" he asked once all of it was gone.

"That should give you poison powers, and make you stronger and more dexterous, it'll take too long for the Nightmare Moon plan, but I have plans for the future as well and I need you to be ready as soon as possible. Now the Nightmare Moon plan, we simply wait," Twilight explained, watching the balcony up high for several seconds.

"FILLIES, AND GENTLECOLTS!" Mayor Mare started, spurring Twilight into action.

Spike was removed from her back, she levitated herself up into the air, shrouded from sight by the lack of light, since all of it had gone to the balcony.

A special spell was prepared, she wasn't going to let Nightmare Moon get the upper hoof this time, no...

... Not this time...

"... PRINCESS, CELESTIA!" Mayor Mare announced, the curtains snapping open to reveal...

Nothing, absolutely nothing, but Twilight knew that already.

Suddenly, Nightmare Moon's starry clouds appeared, storming all around and sending off icicles and bolts of lightning, this was new.

Still, the mage remained level-headed, her holy moon spell prepared in its entirety.

"HAHAHAHAHAAAAA, HAHHAHAHAHAAAAA!" Nightmare Moon laughed, showing off her fangs and fear-inspiring aura.

"VOID BLAST!" Twilight shouted, and *BZHOOOOOOOOOM* went the spell, launching a light-consuming blast of black energy right at the lunar tyrant.

It hit straight on, "Oh, oh We are so, so, very, very, very much unharmed," the black alicorn said melodramatically, "Nice try you foal, but We invented that spell, We are immune to it and all spells like it," she sneered, shooting black lightning at the lavender unicorn.

Twilight cast out a pair of silver shields, followed by a beam of holy sun magic, which had much more effectiveness than its dark counterpart.

"GAAAAAH! *huff* Nice try, but if Celestia herself couldn't defeat me with a few laser beams, what makes you think that you can defeat me with one?" the turquoise-eyed demoness laughed, suppressing the urge to wince at the burn mark just below her throat.

Twilight simply casted Magic Missile, in a Macross Missile Massacre barrage.

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Nightmare Moon was breathing heavy, she hadn't expected resistance like this! "Very well then, I have other, more important matters to attend to, goodbye my little ponies, you should remember this day, for it was your LAST! Farewell, and remember, the stars will always be watching," Nightmare Moon dismissed herself.

She let out a peal of laughter and flew away in the form of a starry cloud of blue smoke.

Twilight ceased her levitation, picked Spike up, and started galloping away to the library.

-A few minutes later-

Twilight arrived at the library, loudly throwing the doors open with her magic, she skid to a halt inside and immediately started up the Finder spell, checking off the list in her mind.

Bag of Holding? Check.

Halberd? Check.

Spellbook of Knowing? Check.

All of the spells in the Spellbook of Knowing? Check.

"HEY!" Rainbow Dash hastily interrupted Twilight's thoughts.

My friends? Check.

"What in tarnation was that all about?"

Check.

"Dear Celestia darling, I can't believe you had the gall to attack that monster."

Check.

"Wow, she was all like 'AHAHAHAHAAAAA' and you were like 'Nuh-uh' and you did that awesome black laser beam, but she was all like 'HAHA, I'm immune to that' and you were like 'Well then, SUN BEAM' and she was like 'Ow, that hurt but Celestia did it too and I'm still alive' and then you made all of those little balls of light, and they were like 'washoom-shoom-shoom-shoom' and she was like 'Okay, I give up but I'm gonna say that I got other things to do', and then she left, and then you left, and you ran to the library, and we got here, and then I started dramatizing everything that happened, and here we are." Pinkie had said all of that in one breath.

Check.

"That was... scary," Fluttershy said nearly inaudibly, shrinking down into a little ball.

Aaaawwwwwwww. Check.

"Alright, I have everything I need, now I just need to go find Nightmare Moon, and I know exactly where to go-"

-Scene Transition-

"-, the Everfree Forest," she said as the light of the teleportation faded away, depositing them all at the mouth of the forest.

"Whoa whoa whoa, don't you know how dangerous that is?" Rainbow Dash rebuked, getting in the mage's way.

"I need to do this-" Twilight knew she had to convince her friends to come with her on their own, "-alone." there, that should do it

"No way sista, if you go in there, we're coming with you, can't let you have all the fun, am I right?" Pinkie looked to the other four ponies.

"Right." came the collective response.

"Alright then, come on," Twilight said with much more enthusiasm than before, proudly leading the group into the forest.

It was dark, Twilight cast a light spell.

It was time to do some serious bidness shiznit mothafucka whatchu know?

Author's Note

Okay, more of my headcanon, FFFIIIIIIRRREEEE

*boom*

At the start of the series, Twilight is 20, Spike is 15, Rainbow is 18, Rarity and AJ are 19, Pinkie is 21, and Fluttershy is 22. By season 2, they all had a 1-year age up, even if not shown, so now they're a bit older. By season 3, another 1-year age up, but not another 1-year age up until after the end of season 4

(/headcanon)

So, Twilight pretty much had a 'standard brony reaction' to Fluttershy, don't worry about it, it's not a bad thing.

Magic Missile, motherfucker, ability to do, like, a thousand of them, each doing 1d4 damage, Macross Missile Massacre FTW.

I hate putting stories on hold, but I just have too many ideas and I need to write them down or I'll eventually forget them, so watch out for my next stories, which I'll alternate working on this, one of them, and the other one. Look out for:

MLP: Shining Friendships.
MLP: Young Blood.