Daring Disaster

It was an absolutely BEAUTIFUL day in Ponyville. Celestia's sun was shining, the birds were singing, the sky was clear thanks to the local weather pegasai, and even that one pony that nopony ever speaks about who is normally terrified of sunlight, was out enjoying this absolutely BEAUTIFUL day in Ponyville.

Unfortunately for Twilight Sparkle however, she was not in Ponyville.

"Remind me why we're out here again?" Spike asked his purple mother figure as he followed her into Froggy Bottom Bogg, a place they hadn't been too since the whole incident with Pinkie Pie and the doozy that seemed like forever ago. As much as Spike didn't want to come back here, for obvious reasons, Twilight assured him that if they did encounter that hydra again, she could stop it with her super alicorn magic, or something like that.

"Don't you remember, Spike?" Twilight replied to him without taking her eyes off of the road in front of her. "We're here to test out that spell I found in that old book." At that Spike held up the book in question, which he was carrying for her the only pair of saddlebags that she owned were unfortunately torn thanks to their recent adventure with A.K. Yearling. Thankfully for her, Rarity was on the case. More importantly though, the book that Spike held was an old, almost decrepit thing that seemed like it was bound in leather but Spike was almost certain that it wasn't, and its words were written in some kind of red ink. Also, it was written in a language that Spike, quite frankly, couldn't understand for the life of him.

Basically to him, the book pretty much screamed "DESTROY IMMEDIATELY!" rather than "TRY OUT EVERYTHING IN HERE TO YOUR HEARTS CONTENT!"

"Right," Spike said sarcastically as he tucked the book back under his arm. "Cause these things usually work out so well." Twilight just giggled at what she assumed was Spike's obvious joke.

"Oh, Spike," she said to him with a smile on her face. "When have I ever messed up a spell?" Spike just stared at her with a completely deadpanned expression on his face.

"Really..." was the only word that came out of his mouth.

"Okay, but even when I mess up things still work out in the end don't they?" Twilight said with a bit of a sheepish smile. Spike chose not to dignify that with a response.

Neither of them said anything else for the rest of their walk through the bog.

Eventually, they reached the spot they were looking for, a rather remote part of the bog where despite the rather large, round pool of boggy water in front of them, there didn't seem to be any animals. Even the hydra was nowhere to be seen. Twilight on the other hoof, just walked right up and stopped right at the foot of the bog. Spike stopped a few steps behind her. He didn't want to go anywhere near that water.

"Spike," Twilight said as she stretched her neck a little bit to make her seem just a bit taller than she usually was and closed her eyes in an effort to make her seem even more confident than usual. "Book please." Spike just let out an exasperated sigh as he held up the book for Twilight. Why she had to request the book from him like that though, he didn't even begin to understand. Maybe she was just getting used to being an actual princess now and was actually trying to give him orders now. If that was the case, then he dreaded the coming days, or at least the next few days until she got bored of it.

Twilight however, didn't care about any of that and took the book from Spike's hand with her telekinesis. She then levitated the book over to her, and after flipping through it for a moment, found the page she was looking for.

"Ahem," Twilight cleared her throat while Spike just crossed his arms and kicked a nearby innocent pebble into the bog. "Ph'nglui mglw'nafh Cthulhu R'lyeh wgah'nagl fhtagn!" Twilight spoke out loud like she was reciting the most important speech ever. When she finished speaking, she lowered the book and looked out at the bog with an eager smile on her face. After staring for several minutes though, nothing happened. Spike at this point, had stepped away from her and had taken to leaning against a tree. "Huh," Twilight said as she lifted the book back up and read the page the spell was on. "It didn't work. Here, let me try it again. Ahem..." Then, after breathing in for a moment, Twilight tried the spell again.

"P̀h̢'ǹglui͢ ͡m̵g̨lw͘'̸n̶af̀h̨ ̕Ct͏h̀ulh̸u ̛R̕'̵l̡yeh ̀wga̧h'na͏g̨l͜ f҉h̢t͡a͜gn̴!" Twilight spoke again, this time though, the difference was obvious. Even Spike heard it. The moment she finished speaking, Twilight almost dropped the book and looked back up at the bog, her pupils were about the size of the head of a pin. A single bubble popped up and then promptly popped in the middle of the bog, but Twilight barely noticed it. "D... Did that really come out of me?" She turned and asked Spike, who only shrugged. Confused, she turned back and read through the page one more time. Then, much to the displeasure of Spike, she tried again.

"P̨h̨'̴ńglui mglw'͏na͡f͠h ͢C͘thu̕l̛h͞u ̢R͡'̸l̶y̴e͡h̴ w͟ga̵h͢'̢na͏gl̴ ͠fhta͡gn!͘" Twilight bellowed like she had the royal Canterlot voice. The earth visibly shook beneath their hooves as she spoke. When it was over, both Twilight and Spike looked out at the bog, which had started bubbling even more now.