A small white mouse sniffed at the air, searching for his morning meal. He scurried up a wayward branch that had fallen to the forest floor, climbing to its edge and standing, he sniffed again.
Suddenly, a strong gust of wind surged past his tiny frame, nearly sending him flying off of his branch. Only barely managing to catch himself, the little mouse quickly scurried down the branch to the relative safety of the forest floor. He paused for only a moment, wondering if perhaps it had been a bird’s failed attempt to capture him that had caused the sudden wind. It was then that the wind returned, and the tiny mouse bore witness to a most peculiar sight.
The wind surged into the small forest clearing from all directions, culminating in a miniature tornado that shook the trees nearby violently. Slowly, the wind began to coalesce into a whirlwind of colors ranging from bright white to darkest black.
The little mouse looked on, transfixed by the strange event that he couldn’t hope to understand. And then, without warning, the whirlwind slowed to a crawl. The polychromatic tornado flowed like liquid, and a silhouette of deep black appeared in its center.
The little mouse’s eyes widened as the shadowy figure finally emerged from the colorful wind… and then promptly emptied the contents of its stomach all over the ground.
The colorful wind vanished then, and the mouse, shrugging a little mousy shrug, returned to foraging for food. After all, he was just mouse, and dealing with whatever had come from the color tornado certainly wasn’t his problem.
The shadowy figure dry-heaved several more times before gaining its bearings, and was quick to sit down in the shade of the nearest tree. Silence descended upon the forest then, and the shadowy figure simply took in its surroundings for the moment.
It coughed weakly, sputtering its first words in this new and strange world.
“Oh, you have got to be kidding. I’ve got throw-up on my shoes!”
Standing back up, the shadowy figure was revealed as a stray beam of sunlight pierced the tree canopy. She practically glowed in the sunlight; her hair flowed around her in an ethereal rainbow of colors, her large feathery white wings extended outwards, her long alabaster horn ended in a sharp point above her head, and the white t-shirt and white jeans she wore also added to the whole ‘angelic’ look that she had going on.
She brushed off her jeans, frowning slightly as she took in her surroundings, “Am I in a forest?”
She turned slightly to check behind her, and got a face full of feathers for her trouble.
“Oh! Plegh! Urgh! I got a feather in my mouth! Gross!” She blanched, and pushed the wayward wing that was totally just a part of her costume and not at all a newly acquired limb away from her.
Unfortunately, she caught a wave of air with her wing and ended up spinning herself in a circle before falling to the ground in a heap.
Grumbling, she quickly righted herself and fluttered her wings in agitation, the action only managing to make her more flustered than she already was.
It was then that a stray lock of her hair floated down in front of her face, ignoring the fact that it seemed to be blowing in some kind of invisible breeze, she quickly tried to brush it away. The fact that it bent around her hand and remained resolutely in place was not helping her quickly deteriorating mood.
“Just what is going on here!?” she yelled, placing a hand on her forehead and accidently bumping the large white horn that rested there.
Her eye began to twitch, and she started looking between the horn, the wings, the hair, and then back at the horn again because there was a giant freaking horn growing out of her head!
She paused, closing her eyes to think as she pinched the bridge of her nose. Sighing heavily, she began thinking back to what exactly she had been doing before ending up in a forest with all new limbs, hair, and a horn.
She had been at a convention with her little sister, she remembered. They had dressed up together as characters from a show that she liked, My Little Pony… and she had been wearing little plastic white wings… and a fake horn…
Suddenly, the pieces fell into place. Her eyes widened in realization, there was only one way to know for sure. Slowly she looked down at her hip, and there, stitched right into the fabric of her jeans, was the Cutie Mark of Princess Celestia.
She poked at her hip, not quite sure what she was seeing was real. Tracing the outline of the familiar mark with her finger, she sighed, “This… isn’t real. It’s not; it can’t be… can it?”
She turned her head to look at the large feathery appendages on her back, and then she crossed her eyes to look at the long pointy horn on her head. It all seemed very real, not dreamlike even a little.
“Okay…” she said slowly, glancing around the small clearing she found herself in.
“If this isn’t a dream then… what is it?” she left the question open-ended, expecting the forest around her to answer. It remained quiet, eerily so.
Frowning, she unconsciously shifted closer to the small beam of light in the center of the clearing. The new additions to her body aside, being stranded in the middle of a dark and foreboding forest didn’t sound particularly appealing to her.
“Where am I?” she whispered, her eyes flickering from one shadow between the trees to the next.
Without warning, a patch of briars began rustling. She took a step back, “Oh no…”
The rustling grew more intense; whatever was out there was just beyond her vision. She gulped, this was it. She imagined it was an angry bear, or maybe some kind of big cat that had been stalking her from the shadows…
And then it pounced. It surged forward with all its momentum, claws outstretched, sharp teeth bared and ready to tear her apart. Already sensing its triumph, the beast let a terrifying roar…
“Rawr!”
She blinked, confused that she was still breathing. Slowly, she cracked open one eye, and there, batting at her shoes with little paws, was some kind of baby lion-bat-scorpion thing.
She blinked again, “What?”
The little furry kitten monster flipped on its back in response to her confusion and let out a little mewl, still entranced by the ends of her shoelaces. It batted at them in what was an undoubtedly adorable way.
Whatever fear she had harbored seconds ago evaporated and now she was just annoyed. She lifted her foot and gently nudged the little fur ball away from her. It grabbed ahold of her shoe and started playfully cooing in little kitty sounds.
She frowned, shaking her leg, “No, stop. You’re not cute. Urgh, of course I get this and not a bear…”
It didn’t seem to get the message, and began happily snapping at her shoe.
“Let go of my shoe,” she said firmly, but the little creature just mewled in the way baby kittens did and looked at her with big expressive eyes that just screamed ‘cuddle me’.
She sighed loudly, only growing more frustrated, “I have a little sister, so the eye thing doesn’t work. Now let go! These shoes cost like seventy dollars!”
The kitten beast let out a defiant meow and gripped her shoes tighter, and as if to add insult to injury, it started chewing on her shoelace.
“No! Stop that! You’re going to ruin it!”
Perhaps it was the stress of being dropped in a random forest with no knowledge as to her location, or the strange new additions to her body that she didn’t ask for, or the fact that nothing was making any sense at all and this little abomination of nature was ruining her expensive shoes… but in that moment, she had had enough.
“I said… LET GO!”
She kicked her leg out faster than the blink of an eye, and with the force of semi-truck behind it. There was sickening crunch, and the sound of wood splintering as she was sprayed with a liquid that was most certainly not water. Suddenly the forest seemed especially quiet, and she couldn’t help but stare. She was as still as a statue, wondering for the life of her what had just happened.
“It… It exploded…” she said finally.
A smattering of crimson covered the entire side of a tree bent cleanly at a forty-five degree angle a few yards in front of her, and a dent the size of bowling all rested in its center.
Slowly, almost mechanically, she approached the tree. She was covered in red droplets and splotches from the force of the impact, but she didn’t even register her ruined appearance. She was too busy staring at the deep depression in the tree, and what had caused it.
Gulping, she reached forward and grabbed the only thing that had stayed solid from the impact. She then began the agonizingly slow process of extracting it from the dent. There was a disgusting sucking sound as she pulled it free from what remained of the creature that she accidently sandwiched against the tree.
She scrunched up her face in a mix of disgust and anguish as she lifted the item she had excavated… It was a shoe.
It was her shoe, specifically.
She shook it daintily and several bits of something she’d rather not think about fell away.
“First vomit and now this… I… I think I’m going to be sick.”
Frowning in disgust, she unceremoniously dropped the shoe to the ground and slipped it on. Luckily, there didn’t seem to be any residue inside the shoe.
That thought alone almost made her vomit.
She took a deep breath, “Okay… whew… deep breaths… that was absolutely not my fault.”
She looked down at her leg, appraising the fact that the limb felt no worse for wear despite the fact that it had nearly cut a tree in half from the sheer force behind it.
“Huh, that’s… well that’s… I don’t even…” she floundered for a few more moments before deciding it was time to leave her little clearing. It had started to stink.
She’d only managed a single step forward when the tree in front of her was literally tossed aside, roots and all. She didn’t have time to ruminate on that though, because a giant lion-bat-scorpion was looking at her like she had just murdered its cub or something.
“Oh…”
The positively gigantic creature had a manic gleam in its eye, tinted with what she could only guess was uncontrollable rage. Its claws were as long as her forearm and digging into the ground, its mouth was open and filled with teeth like daggers, and its tail had stinger on it that looked like it could puncture through a solid brick wall.
She gulped, and started speaking in her best soothing, calm voice, “Now, this isn’t what it looks like…”
She took a very slow step backwards, the beast bristled.
“And I know you’re probably angry right now…”
It sunk its claws even deeper into the ground.
“But there’s absolutely no way I’m outrunning you so I might as well say that your brat ruined my shoe,” she’d barely finished when the beast let out a terrible roar that made the ground shake and cut off any further discussion.
She took her chances and ran as fast she could into the densely crowded trees of the forest. That the beast didn’t slow down in the slightest as it careened after her through tree trunk after tree trunk didn’t help her desperate mood.
Swerving right, she jumped over a fallen log and ducked behind another tree just in time to avoid a swipe by the beast’s claws.
She started screaming. Maybe it was a waste of lung capacity to scream at the top of one’s lungs as they performed an adrenaline fueled sprint for their life, but at that particular moment she could not have cared any less.
Still screaming bloody murder, she ducked left and narrowly avoided the scorpion tail by sheer luck alone. Involuntarily, she began smiling like a maniac completely unsure as to why she was doing it. She certainly wasn’t happy at the moment. Nevertheless, she just kept on smiling and screaming as she ran, aiming ever so slightly for what looked like a break in the trees.
As she neared the break, she realized what she was seeing was sunlight! She might actually make it! Quickly discarding the thought that the beast behind her would actually have an easier time chasing her in an open area, she instead focused on the light. It was so close… she was nearly there!
Suddenly, her foot caught. Her momentum stalled, and all at once she tripped forward. She fell in what felt like slow motion, her adrenaline making every second seem far too long. She brought up her hands to break her fall, not that it would do her any good, and wondered in the span of seconds if this was where she was going to die.
“No…”
She hit the ground and pushed herself up, hoping against hope that she could still make it. It was in that moment that the beast’s mouth closed around her, and the next thing she knew she was staring at the top of the inside of its mouth.
She didn’t try to move, she didn’t even try to fight. It had closed its mouth around her entire top half and down to her stomach in a single bite… but she wasn’t dead.
There was the feeling of shaking, as the beast no doubt shook its head trying to separate her top and bottom halves… but it wasn’t working.
Where there should’ve been teeth like knives shearing her in two, there was only a feeling of gentle pressure in small points, almost like acupuncture. And where there should’ve been pressure enough to crush her bones into dust, there was only a slight squeeze. She was… uncomfortable at best.
The shock of her situation began to fade, and a fire began to burn within her. All the frustration, all the questions, all the problems boiled down into an internal inferno that likes of which she had never experienced before.
“You dare? You dare!?” She yelled with white hot fury, and with strength she didn’t know she had, she punched the roof of the lion’s mouth. And then she punched it again. And again, and again, all the while screaming at the top of her lungs as she did so.
“Are you mad I killed your cub!? Well at least you’ll be with him again soon huh!? Do you hear me!? I’m going to punch everything!”
She punched and punched until she was blinded by saliva and blood and any number of other things.
Her anger at being eaten and chewed on building, she reared back and surged forward with her fist, delivering a punch so strong she felt her teeth quake. Nothing moved, the beast’s chewing had ceased, and it was no longer thrashing around.
She held her breath, her entire arm literally buried in the roof of lion-bat-scorpion’s mouth.
Then, it fell. The monster slumped to the ground and she retracted her arm. Ever so slowly, she squirmed downwards on its tongue until she could get her hands under its teeth, and pushed up, shimming her way out of its mouth and onto the forest floor.
She gasped, taking in breath after breath of fresh air. Then, she promptly turned on her side and threw-up all over the ground.
Rolling back over, she screamed. She screamed long and hard just for the hell of it.
Finally, after minutes of screaming in release, she sat up and saw her handiwork. The lion-bat-scorpion was dead, with blood dribbling from its mouth in the gallons.
She looked at her arm, soaked stark crimson, and then looked down at the rest of herself. Her t-shirt was soaked in saliva and torn in multiple places while her pants weren’t faring much better. Her wings ached and the feathers themselves were matted with blood and spit. Her hair, miraculously, was entirely untouched. She chalked it up to its ethereal ‘constantly blowing in a non-existent breeze’ quality.
But despite all that, she was alive. Slowly getting to her feet, she stood over the fallen creature that she had killed with her bare hands.
“I enjoyed that. I really, really enjoyed that. Thank you, truly… no, that’s alright, you don’t have to get up. I’ll just show myself out.”
Turning towards the break in the trees, she walked confidently onward towards the bright sunlight. Never, ever had she been so sure of anything in her life before. For the first time in what felt like forever, she was taking control completely. Nothing could stop her now. She was going to walk out of this forest and take the world by storm.
She smiled and shielded her eyes as she walked out into the sunlight, laughing happily as she thought about how her little sister was going to react to her having wings and a horn, “Hah! All our troubles are over little sister! Oh I can’t wait to see the smile on her face when…”
Her voice petered out, and the smile she wore faded.
Standing directly in front of her was a sight that was too familiar. A castle in ruins, separated from the dark foreboding forest by a deep chasm. A small rickety wooden bridge served as the only way to cross the gap. A large monster with the body of a lion, the wings of a bat, and the tail of a scorpion; a manticore… even her appearance…
She looked down at her hip, and saw that familiar Cutie Mark once again. This time the sudden realization she had was not one of confusion, for she had finally realized where she was.
“I’m… in Equestria… as Celestia,” she whispered, the implications draining into her mind.
She sunk to her knees, a sudden fatigue overtaking her.
“I’m all alone…”
***
She sat still beneath a large tree, facing the Castle of the Royal Pony Sisters in the distance. Her eyes were sunken, and deep dark circles formed just beneath them. It had been two days and she had yet to eat, sleep, or even breathe…
It had become something of a challenge really, stagnating beneath the tree as she was. Errant thoughts bubbled up and urged her to move, to break her silence, to do something, but she ignored them time and again.
She mused briefly that it was entirely possible that she had gone insane. Sitting beneath that tree as she was, staring at nothing all hours of the day, every day.
The monotony had been a refreshing reprieve from all the emotions she had experienced two days ago.
That’s why it came as such a surprise when a little white mouse scurried right into her field of vision. It seemed familiar somehow, but she couldn’t place it.
Her memories had been growing rather fuzzy in her stagnation and sleep deprivation. What need did she have for sleep though, truly? If she was really a human version of Princess Celestia, then it didn’t matter at all whether or not she slept.
Her eyes followed the little mouse with startling focus, narrowing and widening near imperceptibly as she followed his path along the ground.
She wondered idly how the little mouse could be so oblivious to her; she was by far the most dangerous thing in the forest. At least, she was fairly certain she was. And even still, he ignored her. She had killed a manticore with nothing but determination and her fists! So how then, could that little white mouse ignore her!?
She let out a long, slow hiss of breath. The air she exhaled was stale, having waited in her lungs for two days to be released. The little mouse rose onto his hind legs at the sound, and she leaned forward barely an inch, her magenta eyes boring into him.
He fell back to the ground, and continued his scavenging.
Her eye twitched, he was still ignoring her.
A spark, ever so small and unsightly, gently erupted from the tip of her horn and a tiny golden ember floated down to the ground. Where it landed, the earth liquefied beneath it, and it sunk out of sight instantly. Neither she, nor the mouse seemed to notice.
A scowl formed on her lips, and her mind oozed with contempt for the little mouse. It couldn’t ignore her like this, nothing could. The baby manticore had ignored her, the mother manticore had ignored her too… she hated being ignored.
“Look at me…” she whispered, so quiet that the words died just past her lips.
The mouse didn’t turn his head, but his ear flickered.
“Look at me…” she said again, louder this time.
The mouse stood on his hind legs again, and swiveled his head. His eyes passed right over her.
“Do you know who I am? Do you have any idea?” she said, her voice gaining strength.
The mouse dropped back down and began nibbling on some small morsel. She felt a fire ignite within her, the same one she had felt two days ago. It was warm, and she began to have another thought, this one not directed at the mouse.
“Do I know who I am?”
The question hung in the air, and she paused. Surely she knew who she was. How could she not? She searched her memories, and managed to find a picture of a young girl, no more than ten with a woman that looked to be about her age. The woman looked so familiar…
Suddenly the heat within her began to cool, and she was left with a gnawing frozen emptiness in its place. She panicked, and quickly threw the mental picture away. Slowly, the fire began to burn again. It was growing brighter this time.
She wanted the heat, the burning light within her that shooed away the cold. She began to discard other memories, meaningless things that she had no use for, and the fire steadily began to grow brighter.
As more memories faded into the flames she redirected her attention back on the mouse. It hadn’t even bothered to look up from its meal. It would ignore her no longer.
“Look at me!” she screamed, and the mouse finally did.
He stood up on his hind legs, his little black eyes focusing on the figure sitting beneath the gnarled tree, and just for a fleeting second, he had the overwhelming urge to flee as far away from the strange creature as possible.
This feeling lasted only a moment though, for the mouse burst into flames before he could act on his instinct. Fur fizzled away into nothing, flesh charred and burned away in an instant, blood was vaporized, and bone was turned to ash all in the course of a single moment.
All the while, the figure beneath the tree watched. She grinned; it was sick thing, a smile twisted and different than it had been in a time purposely forgotten by its wearer. Pride and power had taken over now, and the figure beneath the tree, which had just two days before been a loving big sister, became something else entirely.
“Celestia huh? Immortal, powerful, charming, absolutely in control… Nothing can ignore her. I can do that. I can be that. I am Celestia.”
It was mid-afternoon when the final bell chimed at Ponyville’s Schoolhouse, signaling the end of the school day. Colts and fillies rushed out of the classroom with smiles on their faces and heavy saddlebags doing very little to weigh them down as they scrambled out of the school yard. At least, that’s what most of the young ponies were doing.
Three fillies slowly trudged out the front door of the schoolhouse, their cherry colored teacher just behind them with a stern look on her face.
“You girls should know better than to bring a bee’s nest into class! Or anywhere at all for that matter!” she scolded them.
One of three fillies, a pegasus, fluttered her tiny wings in agitation.
“But Miss Cherilee! It wasn’t our fault that Diamond Tiara and Silver Spoon got stung! They were poking the nest!”
Cherilee leveled a stern gaze at the filly, “Scootaloo that is beside the point. There should not have been a hive there for them to poke in the first place.”
Scootaloo sagged, “But we were trying to get our beekeeping Cutie Marks!”
Cherilee raised a questioning brow, and Scootaloo gave her a wide smile in response. Thinking quickly, Scootaloo not so gently used a hoof to elbow the unicorn filly next to her, whispering, “Back me up Sweetie Belle!”
Sweetie Belle smiled wide as well, “We didn’t mean for anypony to get stung, honest!”
Cherilee looked between the two fillies with a suspicious glare, but quickly relented with a sigh, “Alright, but please girls, try to keep the crusading out of the classroom next time?”
The three fillies nodded firmly, saying in unison, “We will Miss Cherilee!”
Shaking her head, Cherilee gently ushered them towards the front gate, “Okay girls, I’ll see you all tomorrow then.”
“See you tomorrow!” the three echoed as they quickly trotted down the dirt road that led to the rest of Ponyville.
They walked in silence for a few minutes before the only earth pony of their party let out a sigh, “Ah can’t believe ya two yahoos got away with that fib.”
Scootaloo simply rolled her eyes and fluttered herself forward, turning around backwards to look at her friend as they walked, “Oh come on Applebloom! That was an awesome prank! It was pretty much on the same level as one of Rainbow Dash’s pranks if I do say so myself.”
Applebloom shook her head good-naturedly, “Yeah well, those two fillies may be rotten, but a beehive in the desk? Seems just a bit mean if ya ask me.”
Sweetie Belle shrugged, “I don’t know. Diamond Tiara and Silver Spoon are always so mean to everypony anyway. Maybe they’ll think twice next time before they call somepony names?”
“Yeah right, I bet those two are just gonna be meaner,” said Scootaloo, as she continued to expertly walk backwards directly into somepony.
Bouncing of the ponies behind, Scootaloo let out a startled whinny and fell face first onto the ground. Sweetie Belle and Applebloom hid their giggling as Scootaloo sat up and rubbed her sore muzzle.
“Hey! What’s the big idea?” she said, annoyed at the strange stallion.
The pony before them quickly turned around, revealing a large contraption that made his head look suspiciously like a large mechanical spider with monocles on the tips of its legs.
Sweetie Belle’s eyes widened and she opened her mouth and sucked in a large breath, only for Applebloom to shut her mouth with a hoof before she could start screaming. A muffled sound very much like a filly screaming into her pillow emanated from Sweetie Belle for several seconds.
Applebloom wore a nonplussed look as she kept her hoof firmly clamped over her friend’s mouth and addressed the strange pony, “Sorry fer bumpin’ into ya mister. What is that yer wearin’? Some kind of hat?”
The strange pony nodded exuberantly as one of the mechanical tendrils on his head shot forward to peer directly at Applebloom. The magnifying glass at its end carried the image of its user’s eye as he looked her over and spoke, “Why yes! It’s an invention of mine you see! Oh, but never mind that, I must ask, what are you fillies doing so close to the Everfree forest? It’s very dangerous around here!”
Applebloom shared a confused glace with Scootaloo, to which the pegasus simply shrugged.
“Uh, mister? The Everfree forest is over that way…” she said, pointing a hoof to her side at the looming forest in the distance, “We were walkin’ home from school, but yer kinda blockin’ the road.”
The stallion frowned, following her hoof to the forest and then to the soft dirt path that he stood on. The mechanical arms on his head moved back and forth in front of his eyes as he observed the ground.
“Hmm… peculiar. I must have miscalculated my distance to the forest due to the increased magnification of my I.M.S.” he walked around in a circle before accidently stumbling off the road and into the grass where he lay belly-up with a hoof to his chin, “Very peculiar indeed.”
Scootaloo stifled her giggling as Applebloom gently removed her hoof from Sweetie Belle’s mouth. Sweetie Belle glared at her.
“You good now?” asked Applebloom, ignoring the glare.
Sweetie Belle wore a disappointed frown as she spoke, “Yeah, I guess. I never get to scream in terror anymore…”
Applebloom rolled her eyes before approaching the downed stallion.
“Mister? You okay? You took a bit of a tumble there…”
The stallion popped up just as quickly as he had fallen, “Ah yes! I am indeed! It takes more than a few falls to keep Doctor Discovery down!”
“Yeah I bet…” whispered Scootaloo under her breath. Sweetie Belle held in a giggle.
“Yer a doctor?” asked Applebloom curiously.
“Indeed I am little filly! Well uh… mostly. Technically speaking that is,” he said in his slightly nasally sounding voice.
Before Applebloom could question his strange response Scootaloo jumped in front of her, “What’s that thing on your head?”
Doctor Discovery brightened instantly, “Curious are you? Well then, let me elucidate the origins of the I.M.S.!”
Sweetie Belle put a hoof to her chin, “What’s the Imiss?”
Doctor Discovery shook his head quickly, “No, the I.M.S.! It’s an acronym for one of my inventions! The Investigative Magnification Spectacles or I.M.S. for short lets me analyze things that are too small or too far away while keeping my hooves free!”
The doctor sighed as one of the mechanical appendages on his hat suddenly broke off and fell to the ground.
“Although… It would seem that my fall has rendered it rather… defective.”
“It looks broken to me,” said Scootaloo with a frown.
“That’s what defective… Oh never mind,” he said sadly, “I suppose it’s just fate giving me another sign that I’m wrong about this whole venture.”
Applebloom raised a questioning brow, “What adventure? And what were you doin’ out here anyway?”
Doctor Discovery let out a long sigh, “Oh well, I suppose I might as well tell you,” he said, straightening up and clearing his throat as if he were about to give a presentation, “Two days ago my instruments outside the Everfree forest detected some kind of strange magical phenomena that carried the same thaumatological energy signature as Princess Celestia. Naturally, I, Doctor Discovery, had to investigate! So I packed up my things in Canterlot and took the first train to Ponyville!”
The doctor let out a heavy sigh then, “But it seems that my colleagues back at the Magical Science Center were right. It’s been two days and I’ve found nothing. Not even a trace of the signature! Maybe they were right… maybe I am a laughing stock…”
It was then that Doctor Discovery broke down into tears. Scootaloo had long since tuned out Doctor Discovery, and was currently balancing the fallen mechanical arm on her muzzle while Sweetie Belle smelled a flower by the side of the road.
Applebloom face hoofed, “Girls! We’ve got a cryin’ stallion on our hooves and yer smellin’ flowers?”
Sweetie Belle had a sheepish look on her face. Scootaloo quickly tossed the mechanical appendage back to where she found it, “Uh, smelling flowers. Right, that’s what I was doing.”
Applebloom sighed before turning back to the sobbing doctor.
“So uh… Doctor Discovery was it? Yer not gonna let a few bullies back at the Magic Scientifics Center get ya down are ya? Ah’m sure that the uh…”
“S-Signature…” said Doctor Discovery miserably.
“Yeah that!” said Applebloom happily, before correcting herself and going back to her reassuring voice, “Ah’m sure that the signature thingy is out there somewhere. And even if it ain’t, it’s not like yer go home a complete failure.”
Scootaloo nodded, “Yeah, you’ll be fine. It’s not like those egghead ponies would kick you out because you wasted their time with something completely ridiculous.”
Sweetie Belle joined in, “Yep! I mean, at least you don’t always go off on wild goose chases that only waste everypony’s time right?”
Doctor Discovery looked up at the three fillies briefly, and they all smiled wide at him. He immediately broke down into heavier sobs.
“Y-You’re r-r-right! I’m a failure! All I do is waste the Center’s time and m-m-money-y-y on these ridiculous goose chases! I’m going to be kicked out of the Center for sure!” he bawled, flopping to the ground in tears.
Applebloom turned to her fellow crusaders, “Ah uh… Ah don’t think we helped him.”
“You think?” said Scootaloo.
“Was it something we said?” asked Sweetie Belle.
Applebloom sighed, “Alright girls. Let’s come up with a plan B; huddle up.”
The three fillies quickly huddled together and started hastily exchanging ideas while Doctor Discovery sobbed behind them.
After a few seconds and several very loud whispers, the crusaders separated and trotted up to the doctor.
He wiped a few tears away as they approached him, “I am terribly sorry about that, but the stresses of a scientist such as I do occasionally get the better of me,” picking up his ruined invention and its pieces he said, “I should go.”
“Now hold on a minute doc!” yelled Applebloom, jumping to stand in his way, “Ah may not know anythin’ about yer signatures and important adventures,”
Doctor Discovery frowned, “But I just told you…”
“But Ah do know that if anypony can help ya find yer magic signature it’d be Twilight!” she finished, pointing in the direction of Ponyville’s resident librarian and Princess.
“Yeah! Twilight knows all kinds of stuff, I bet she can fix your freaky hat too!” agreed Scootaloo, fluttering to Applebloom’s side.
Doctor Discovery’s eyes bulged, “T-Twilight? You mean the Twilight Sparkle? The Princess!?”
Sweetie Belle hopped up from behind the doctor, “Yep! That’s her! She helps us learn new stuff all the time! I bet she’d be happy to help you find whatever it was you were looking for!”
Doctor Discovery wheezed, “Oh… Oh my… You three fillies can actually get me a meeting with Princess Twilight!?”
The Crusaders nodded in unison.
“That’s… absolutely the best thing ever!” yelled Doctor Discovery happily as he scooped up the three fillies and gave them a bone-crushing hug.
“Ugh, yer welcome doc… Now can ya put us down?” croaked Applebloom.
The doctor quickly released the three fillies from the hug, “Ha! Terribly sorry! But I’m just so excited! To think, I’m actually going to meet Princess Twilight!”
Scootaloo rolled her eyes and started walking, “Yeah, yeah you’re excited we get it, sheesh!”
Sweetie Belle giggled as she followed close behind Scootaloo. Applebloom waved the doctor to follow them, “Come on doc! Ponyville loves meetin’ new ponies.”
Sweetie Belle and Scootaloo broke into snickers at Applebloom’s words, but the doctor paid them no mind. Simply nodding, he happily followed them towards the local library.
Unbeknownst to them, was that a small, near imperceptible light had emerged from the trees not too far away. And ever so slowly, that light was beginning to grow…
***
In the Ponyville Schoolhouse, Miss Cherilee sat at her desk idly munching on a daisy sandwich while she looked over her students assignments for the day. She scanned each page with a delicate eye, looking for any mistakes.
“Hmm… Let’s see… Oh, Blossom’s doing well,” she muttered, happily inscribing an ‘A’ on the filly’s paper. Humming tunelessly, Cherilee began the slow going process of grading.
“A… A… Oh, a C? I’ll have to speak to Button about that…” said Cherilee, taking a bite of her sandwich and moving to the next paper.
Cherilee clucked her tongue in distaste as she looked over the next paper in the stack, “Oh Diamond… What am I going to do with you?”
Sighing, she expertly printed a D plus on the filly’s paper and moved on quickly. She never took joy in giving one of her students a low grade, but no matter how hard she tried some students just didn’t put in the effort she wished they would.
Her sour mood was quickly forgotten though as she came upon the next paper in her stack, or papers seeing as how the three assignments were stuck together. She let a little smile cross her face as she looked over Applebloom’s, Scootaloo’s, and Sweetie Belle’s papers, carefully minding the sticky honey that marred them.
“Beekeepers… how do you girls come up with these ideas?” she said, marking down the girls respective grades.
Cherilee sighed good-naturedly and moved on to the next paper, and the next, and the next after that. Before long, she had finished her sandwich and made a sizable dent in the number of papers she had left to grade.
As she looked over the next assignment though, she found her mind starting to wander. As much as she loved teaching, the end of the day was by far her least favorite. She found herself thinking about home, and how a hot cup of tea and a good book sounded particularly appealing at that moment.
Focusing back on the paper, she realized she’d been reading the same paragraph for the last few minutes. Frowning, she let out yawn and glanced at the clock and then at the remaining papers in her turn-in basket.
“Mm… Well, I guess it wouldn’t hurt if I didn’t finish today,” she let out small chuckle, “And I suppose no homework tomorrow would be welcome surprise for everypony.”
Decision made, Cherilee packed up her things into her saddlebag and made for the door. After all, what harm was there in leaving the rest of the work for tomorrow? The papers weren’t going anywhere.
Stepping out into the late afternoon sun, Cherilee smiled as a gentle breeze blew past her. It was refreshing; she couldn’t remember the last time she’d gotten home before the sun had already set.
Smiling contently, she locked the schoolhouse door behind her and was about to make for home, when something strange caught her eye.
It was just a glimmer really, but she turned all the same to see what it was. Squinting, she could just barely make out a light coming from the trees across the field from the schoolhouse. It was hardly noticeable, especially in the late afternoon. But there was something about it…
Cherilee took a few steps forward and stopped at the edge of the tall grass field that separated the schoolhouse from the outskirts of the Everfree Forest.
“What is that…?” she muttered under her breath, wondering silently if perhaps she’d spotted some kind of far off campsite.
She watched the light, and after a moment, realized what was so strange about it. It was moving.
Cherilee stood still, simply watching the light as it danced among the trees in the distance. She wasn’t a stranger to weird occurrences in the town of Ponyville, but this seemed different somehow. More subtle, like a little mystery spectacle just for her.
Suddenly, the light stopped moving. It remained still, hovering in the air like a little miniature sun.
Cherilee turned her head to the side slightly, wondering why the light had stopped. The way it was hovering now, completely still, just looking at her.
A shiver ran up her spine without warning, and the fur on the back of her neck stood on end. But for the life of her she couldn’t understand why, and then the light began to move again.
Cherilee watched, entranced, as the light began to grow larger, brighter, and closer. It felt eerily quiet, and yet at the same time she was never more aware of the sounds around her. The autumn winds blowing through the grass, the trees, even her own mane. She recognized her heightened awareness as adrenaline, but couldn’t understand why she was feeling the way she did. What she did know, however, was that she no longer wanted to be near the light.
She took a step back, and the light tree line.
All at once, she was paralyzed and blinded as the light expanded outward. She blinked as fast as she could, trying to clear the dark spots from her vision to see what was happening.
The trees and grass nearest the light began to sag and wilt, turning from yellow to brown to black in seconds and spreading ever outwards. Cherilee was left unawares, her distorted vision preventing her from seeing the great white winged figure that had emerged from the forest enwreathed in light and flame.
She caught glimpses only, of the grass beneath her wilted into blackened ash, of the light that encompassed everything in front of her, but not the figure drawing closer.
Cherilee felt heat on her coat and buried her eyes in the crux of her front leg, blinking rapidly and trying to restore her vision. The moment she felt she could see well enough to run, she brought her head up, but when she looked forward again, she saw only a hand reach out to meet her.
It clasped around her neck before she could let out a scream. She fought to keep breathing as she was lifted into the air, kicking her hooves at whatever had grabbed her. She kept her eyes shut tight; the overwhelming light in front of her threatening to blind her if she stared at it for too long. The sting of flames bit at her hooves and she quickly relented in her efforts to break free. It was then that her captor spoke.
“Well, now that is a surprise. You look so familiar and yet…”
Cherilee opened her eyes against her better judgment, and what she saw was a creature unlike any she had ever seen before. Its mane billowed in all directions and was of every color, wisps of flame danced around its horn like a firecracker, and its gigantic white wings more than doubled her length. All this was prevalent in Cherilee’s mind, but what feature stood out most were two sunken magenta eyes that peered at her with something akin to indifference or perhaps something else entirely.
“What…” Cherilee sputtered, trying to speak through the iron grip the creature held her in.
Before she could speak anymore, the grip around her throat tightened, and the creature looked at her with annoyance.
“Do not interrupt me.”
Cherilee sputtered, and closed her eyes once more. She was unable to continue looking at the blinding creature that held her any longer.
“And yet… I can’t help but feel disappointed. Don’t you recognize me my little pony?”
It clicked then, in Cherilee’s mind. She recognized the voice, even if she’d only heard it on precious few occasions, she could never forget the voice of Princess Celestia herself.
Suddenly the grip around her throat loosened, and Cherilee fell to the ground in a heap gasping for breath. The creature moved past her, walking on only two legs. Cherilee curled her own legs closer to herself, the heinous burn marks on them causing her to cry.
“Oh, don’t fret my little one. Your burns will heal; consider them… for now, a reminder. A Princess is not to be interrupted, such is a lesson I think many will be learning soon.”
Cherilee found the strength to look at the creature again, only to watch as a fire surged from its horn and followed the direction it threw its hand.
“No!” she screamed as the flames met the schoolhouse, encompassing it entirely in fire.
Cherilee stumbled forward, falling short as the pain in her legs became unbearable. She lifted her head from the ground, and could only watch in silence as the schoolhouse burned.
“A fitting punishment, I should think. There is something cleansing about fire isn’t there? How it can wipe away the old with only the tiniest of sparks,” the creature said, without remorse.
It turned to her, and Cherilee could not find the words to describe her terror. And then, just as quickly, it turned away from her and began to walk back towards Ponyville.
Cherilee watched it go from her place on the ground, unable to find words. For all the pain she felt though, as she watched it walk towards Ponyville she couldn’t help but cry out after it.
“No! No, please! Don’t hurt them! No! No… please… don’t hurt them…”
Her cries fell on deaf ears, and finally Cherilee lapsed into blissful unconsciousness.
