Exiled From Equestria

The quick scurry of a mouse running by Twilight’s head awakens her. She places her purple hoof on her head, trying to remember what had happened. Once she’s fully awake, she remembers.

“I’m... I’m banished from Equestria...” The unicorn sits in a wide, tall cave. One end seems to go on forever, slowly aiming upward to the surface. On the other side of Twilight, the cave disappears into a large pool of glowing green water. It is cold and wet, and the worst part in that she is all alone. Scared, frightened, and alone.

The only light is coming from glowing mushrooms on the walls, the pond water, and… my horn? Twilight trots up to the pool and stares at her reflection. She almost jumps at the sight of her horn lightly glowing red and purple. The dark magic… Discord has cursed me with dark magic, and it’s very slowly taking over… Twilight desperately grabs onto a spell of light and warmth. She casts this, pushing the dark magic to the back of her head. Her horn returns to normal.

“Ah heard it too, Midnight Blaze, but I keep tellin’ ya that we’re neva gonna find anypony down here.” Twilight turns around and sees the shadow of two ponies silhouetted by lantern light strolling down the cave. Unsure who they are or what they’re doing here, her face brightens up and she calls to them.

“Hello?”

“See? I told ya,” says the same voice. The two shapes come galloping over and stops inches away from crashing into Twilight. The light from the lantern brightens up the dark cave, other than the mysterious glowing water. “Hello there dear, how ya doin’? Whatcha name?”

“Oh, I’m Twilight. Twilight Sparkle,” she says to the orange pegasus pony with a blue, pink, and yellow shaggy mane. Her bangs fall over her emerald eyes, and she has to keep blowing the hair out of her face. She has a cutie mark of a shooting star. A confident smile rests on her face.

“Well good fa’ you, Miss Sparkle. I’m Shootin’ Star, and this here is my good friend Midnight Blaze,” Shooting Star says, pointing a hoof to a yellow unicorn who smiles and waves at the mention of her name. Her cutie mark bears the image of three blue, shining stars. “What is a nice pony like ya doin’ down here in this old cave?”

Twilight rubs the back of her neck with her hoof. “I don’t actually know. I was teleported here from Equestria–”

“Equestria?” Midnight Blaze exclaims, dropping the lantern in her mouth. Her midnight blue eyes (that match her frizzy cyan and blue mane) widen in surprise. “You’ve come all the way from there?”

“Well, yes, actually. Why?” Midnight Blaze and Shooting Star exchange glances.

“It’s just that... Equestria is on the other side of the world,” Midnight says while bending down to pick the lantern back up.

Twilight’s eyes fill with shock and fear. “The other side of the world?”

Shooting Star shakes her head disappointingly. “Yeah. Who teleported ya from that country ta this one here? They gots ta have some pretty powerful magic ta teleport this far.”

“Nightmare Moon.”

“The mare in the moon? But I thought she turned back into Princess Luna? Something to do with the Elements of Harmony?”

“Well, yes...” Twilight replies to Midnight. “But she turned into Nightmare Moon again and banished me from Equestria.”

Midnight Blaze turns to the other side of the cave. “If we want to get out of here before sundown, we better leave now.”

“Alright. Come on, Sparkle.” Shooting Star nudges Twilight forward. The purple unicorn stand up and joins the two ponies on the travel back to the surface.

“Um, not to be snooping, but what were you mares doing down here?” Twilight asks. Shooting Star laughs for a moment.

“We was lookin’ for gems. This is tha longest tunnel around, and certainly tha most jewel packed. We’ve been downs here fa hours.”

“I see,” Twilight says.

No pony says anything else for awhile as they trot along the tunnel. Shooting Star curiously turns her attention to Twilight’s star cutie mark and then to her horn. “Now ta mention it, isn’t you the bearer of them Element of Magic?”

“Yes.”

“The ones who defeated Nightmare Moon in tha first place?”

“Yes.”

Midnight Blaze stops and holds a hoof to Shooting Star’s mouth so that she can talk. “Can’t you just do that again?”

“I would if I had the element with me and was with my friends.”

“So then find ya element and ya friends, problem solved,” says Shooting Star.

The three mares start walking again. Twilight shakes her head in disappointment. “But they’re on the other side of the world.”

“Lets me get this straight,” Shooting Star takes a big breath of air. “Nightmare Moon banished ya here, and the only way ta defeat her is ta get backs to Equestria, plus, I’m assumin’ ya wanna go back to Equestria, so ya just have ta travel halfway across the world and then problem solved?”

“Pretty much.”

“But that’s not as easy as it sounds,” Midnight interrupts. “There’s deserts and forests and dragons and Ursas...”

By the time Midnight finishes her long list of dangers in the world, they reach the mouth of the cave. Midnight sets the lantern back where she found it before–at the mouth–while Twilight steps out and observes their surroundings. The sun is hanging not far from the mountain lines, casting an orangish glow on everything. They’re in a huge valley surrounded by tall mountains. The valley is flat and covered in grass, the mountains blanketed in trees and white snow. Up ahead, she could see a big town with many log cabins.

“Welcome ta Redwood.” Shooting Star positions herself in a way that reminds Twilight of Rainbow Dash, and then she spreads her wings and takes off into the sky. Midnight smiles as she does a bunch of flips in the air, then heads over to the town.

“There’s a path over there,” Midnight says, pointing to a dirt path on their left. They trot along it until they reach the town. Twilight can’t help but gallop into the first library she sees.

This library is made of logs, just like all the other buildings. There were two stories, each full of rows and rows of books. Twilight clapped her two front hooves and smiled in excitement. The librarian sitting behind the check-out counter chuckles.

“I don’t think I’ve ever seen anypony that excited about books before.”

Twilight turns to the earth pony. She is pale pink with sapphire hair pulled back in a ponytail and sparkling silver eyes to match her cutie mark of a silver bookmark. “It’s just that I’ve never been outside of Equestria before. There’s so much more to learn!”

“Equestria? You’ve come all the way from Equestria?” Her jaw drops in astonishment. Twilight blushes.

“Well, yes, but I didn’t actually travel here. I was teleported.”

“From across the world? Only alicorns have magic capable of spells like that.”

“Yeah, it’s a long story...” The purple unicorn prances to one of the dusty bookshelves. She uses her magic to pull out an emerald novel. With a puff of dust, the title is revealed as The History of Redwood. Twilight plunks the book onto a table and sits on a chair. She has only gotten to page 3 when Midnight Blaze and Shooting Star stroll in.

“Twilight, what is ya doins in here?” Shooting Star questions.

“Reading.” Her purple eyes stay glued to the small letters of the book.

Midnight Blaze sighs and turns to the librarian. “Silver Sky, do you have any maps?”

“Of Redwood?”

“Of za whole country here,” Shooting Star finishes. The mare hops of her swivel chair and strolls to the second story of the library. She returns to the counter with a large scroll in her mouth.

“So what’s up with your friend over there?” Silver Sky asks curiously while opening up the map and placing a heavy book on each end to keep it from rolling back up.

“What do you mean?”

“What is she doing here?” Silver inquires in response to Midnight.

“Enough chit-chat, no need fa that infos. Twilight Sparkles, ova here.” Shooting Star waves a hoof in her direction. That pony is greeted a few moments later to the map.

“What is ‘Trica’?” Twilight asks while scanning the map’s details.

“That’s this whole country. It’s only half as big as Equestria, but it’s still fairly populated,” Midnight Blaze replies. Twilight looks at the map funnily. “What?”

“Do you have any markets that sell saddlebags? I’ll need some for my long journey, but mine are much too far away to teleport.”

Shooting Star suddenly bursts out into giggles. “Twilight, you gots no moneys here. How ya gonna buy yaself supplies?”

“We’ll give her some.” Midnight says. Then she turns to the library windows by the front door, watching the sunset past the mountains. “And we have a cabin that you can stay in for tonight.”

“That’s very nice of you, but I can’t ask for–”

“It’s not a problem, Twilight, seriously. Shooting Star and I have enough gems to buy the things you need.”

Twilight opens her mouth to object further, but her stomach growls. She’s hungry and needs supplies and a place to sleep, even though she’d broke. It’s a generosity so kind it reminds her of Rarity.

So instead she says, “Thank you,” and trots off into the sunset with her two new friends.

***

Twilight’s friends shuffle through the busy city with their heads down. They all miss Twilight too much to bear it.

They had already gone to her room and packed their things. Now, with only five large suitcases being dragged along by their teeth and magic, they hop along a train back to Ponyville.

Applejack rests her right foreleg on the windowsill with her head on her hoof, watching the ocean pass by. “I can’t believe that Twilight is gone...”

“...when she didn’t even do anything wrong...” Rarity finishes, staring at the ground.

“It doesn’t even make any sense,” Fluttershy adds. “Why was Twilight framed?”

“For that matter, who framed her,” Rainbow Dash growls.

“And if Princess Celestia wasn’t killed by Twilight, then what happened to her?” Pinkie Pie asks.

The five friends chat for the next half hour, then night time is upon them once more, and they decide to sleep for the next seven hours.

The train stops early in the morning. They wouldn’t have woken up if it weren’t for the ruckus of other ponies gathering their items. It only takes minutes to grab their suitcases and hop off the train. Pinkie Pie is the last pony to hop off, and when she does, her suitcase falls on her, sending them both crashing onto the pavement. The train leaves. Fluttershy gives her a hoof to lift her up, but Pinkie just sighs and sits there with the suitcase placed on her back.

Rarity finally levitates her up with her magic. Pinkie’s knees are scraped and bloody. Applejack gives her a bandage from her first aid kit in her suitcase.

Not knowing where they were going, the five friends amble to the Golden Oak Library, Twilight’s home.

Rarity opens the door to the library. Everypony shuffles in, throwing their suitcases onto bookshelves carelessly, knocking down all the books there. It was loud. The books were ruined. It didn’t matter. Twilight was gone. All that mattered was finding her again.

“Twilight? How was the...” Spike trailed off once he ran down the stairs and instead saw five mares crying. He looked at the destroyed bookshelf, then ran up to them. “What’s wrong?”

“Spike...Twi...Twi...” Rarity rubs her eyes with her purple hooves and sniffles. “Twilight’s been banished from Equestria!” She breaks down into tears once more.

“What?” Spike’s eyes become so big that they look like they are about to fall out of his head. That’s when tears start rolling on his checks, too. “What happened?”

The friends told the whole story, how somepony framed Twilight, making it look like she murdered her mentor, how Princess Luna turned back into Nightmare Moon and sentenced her to exile, and that she could quite possibly be dead.

By the time the story is done, they've run out of tears. Spike dries his eyes with his tail and gets up to make breakfast—pancakes and orange juice—while the five friends hug each other for comfort.

"Ah just don't know what ta do...Ah've never been in a situation like this one," Applejack whispered.

Rarity dries her wet cheeks with her hooves. “If only really powerful unicorns like Twilight weren’t the only ponies with magic strong enough to perform teleportation spells. Then I’d just teleport us to Trica!”

“But even Twilight can’t teleport that far,” Fluttershy whispers. “She once told me that her teleportation only works for a half a mile distance, and even then, it takes so much effort.”

Rarity sighs. Pinkie Pie rubs her hoof back and forth on the ground in an attempt to distract her from her sadness. Rainbow Dash tears open her suitcase and starts throwing things on the floor from anger. Applejack trots up to the cyan pegasus and lays a calm hoof on her shoulder.

"Don't worry, Sugarcube. We'll find Twilight," Applejack soothes. Rainbow Dash snaps her head to her and glares.

"How? We don't know where in the world she is?" Tears well up in her eyes, but she won't let them spill. "What if she's dead?" All of Rainbow's anger fades into sadness. Applejack can't bear it; she grabs her friend and hugs her tight. Rainbow hugs back and lets the tears spill out.

"It's alright now, Sugarcube. We've got the magic a' friendship on our side, remember? We'll find her."

"But...but what if we don't?"

"Shh, Sugarcube. Don't say that; we will find her. We'll bring her back ta Ponyville, and Pinkie Pie will be throwin' a party, and everythin' will be better, ya hear?" Rainbow Dash can only nod in response. Then she sniffles and let's go of Applejack, flopping into a sitting position.

Just then, Spike calls throughout the library, "Breakfast!", and every pony gathers around where the baby dragon is setting down six plates with cups of orange juice on the table. On each of the four sides of the large table is two seats, equaling eight seats in all, which means enough for them all to sit in.

Spike is the first one to plunk into her seat, but Pinkie Pie is the first one to take a bite. She zooms over in a puff of pink dust and scarfs down the five pancakes with syrup and butter all at once. Everypony watches in confusion as she then takes a small sip of the orange juice and leans back against the chair, full and smiling.

“Pinkie, by eating that fast, you’ll get–”

“Hiccup!”

“Hiccups...” Rarity rolls her eyes. Rainbow Dash, glad for a distraction, face hoofs.

Once they all sit down and finish their breakfasts, Spike takes their empty plates and glasses to the sink and washes them off.

Everypony is quiet. Rarity lightly dabs the sides of her mouth with a napkin. Applejack burps, and even though she says excuse me, Rarity gives her a disgusted face.

The white unicorn puts down her cloth and sighs. "I don't even understand how this happened."

"Twilight is banished because she was f-r-a-m-e-d. FRAMED!" Pinkie Pie says each letter of the first 'framed' to make a bigger exaggeration of things.

"But by who?"

Just as soon as the white unicorn asks the question, a sudden burst of magical sounds interrupts from the middle of the hollow tree. The two earth ponies, two pegasi, one baby dragon, and one unicorn turn around to see none other than—

"Discord?" Rarity asks, surprised. Everypony gasps.

“Yes, yes? Now, I’ve missed out on a lot of chaos. What happened while I was dealing with Celestia?”

“Discord? Dealing with Princess Celestia? What–how–” Pinkie Pie stammers. Rarity puts a hoof to her forehead and faints, her chair falling with her and crashing on the ground. Applejack grits her teeth.

“What the hay are you doin’ here, Discord? Last we saw, you were trapped in stone!”

“Ah, my dear Applejack, yes, but I am here now, so let us not think about that, shall we?”

Rainbow Dash puts pieces together in her head. Twilight is framed for the death of Princess Celestia and Discord appears. Somehow, this doesn’t seem like it’s going to end well. “Why did you frame Twilight? None the less, what have you done to the princess?”

“Oh, framing Twilight is part of my secret plans, which are of course, a secret. As for your sun ruler, I would say she’s fine, but she’s really not,” the draconequus answers. Rainbow’s glare hardens. “But she’s still very much alive.”

Rarity’s eyes flutter open. She turns to Discord, Applejack, and Rainbow Dash. “She’s alive?”

“Well yes, but we don’t need the rest of Equestria knowing that, now, do we?”

Spike leaps out of his chair and charges at Discord. “Get your slimy paws out of my house!” Just as he is approaching Discord, the spirit of chaos puts out a leg to trip him. Spike falls on his face. Fluttershy helps him up.

“So how did Luna react? Tell me: where is your other unicorn friend?”

“Her name is Twilight,” Applejack says harshly.

“Why, yes. Come, don’t you want to fill ol’ Discord in on the info?”

“Sure, Discord, I’ll tell you,” Rainbow says deadpan. She flies up to him and screams in his ear, “THANKS TO YOU, TWILIGHT IS BANISHED FROM EQUESTRIA!”

A mischievous grin perches on his face. “Exiled? Perfect. That’s just what I needed to happen, but it wouldn’t be fun to just do it myself.” He snaps his fingers and a bowl of popcorn appears on his head. He takes a popped kernel from the bag and pops it into his mouth. Then he coughs out flames. Leave it to Discord to make no sense. “I must mention how the elements are out of your way while Twilight is gone.”

“We will bring Twilight back before ya get any thoughts about spreadin' chaos, ya monster!” Applejack shouts. Discord uses his tail to pick her up by the tail and lifts her high enough so that they are face-to-face. Her cowmare hat falls off.

“I am not spreading chaos quite yet. I'm waiting for the right moment to strike, got that?” Discord laughs and drops Applejack. She lands with a hard and painful thud on her stomach, knocking the air out of her.

Rainbow Dash zips over to Discord, lifting a hoof in the air. She’s about to knock him out when Discord snaps his chicken fingers and he's gone. The cyan pegasus is going too fast, and she ends up crashing into a bookshelf. She gives a loud huff and scrambles onto her hooves. "We have to do something, girls. We can't just sit here!"

"Then why did you come back to Ponyville instead of convincing Twilight's innocence?" Spike asks curiously.

"'Cause we wanted ta tell ya first, Sugarcube." Applejack trots up to Spike and smiles weakly. "Once Twilight disappeared, we skedaddled out a' there. Right now, Nightmare Moon is sittin' in Celestia's throne in the Canterlot castle, from what Ah heard."

"Then we need to get to Canterlot and convince Nightmare Moon that it was Discord pronto," Rainbow Dash declares, laying one foreleg horizontally and smacking another foreleg down on it vertically.

Rarity nods her head. "I do think that's the best we can do."

Fluttershy shuffles over to her friends. "I guess it's worth a try."

"Alright, let's go!" Pinkie Pie shouts, running two tail-lengths upwards, then zooming out the door. The ponies follow the excitable pony in hopes of bringing back their best friend.