~~Legal Tissue Paper~~ Disclaimer: I don’t own The Codex Alera or My Little Pony. Jim the Butcher and ~~Satan~~ Hasbro do, respectively. Although, due to his work dealing with the occult in a world of fiction, some idiots might also argue that Satan owns Jim Butcher. This work is completely non-profit and done for the sake of my own ego....that's right, I didn't cross that part out so it must be true. Why are you even reading this? The story is down there \/

-Chapter Roman Numeral One-

Due to his lack of furies, small size, and fact that he grew up in one wilder places of Alera, the valley of Calderon, Tavi had spent a good deal of his life dealing with bullies. Not fighting them, that would have been akin to suicide. Even if he had been taller, stronger, faster, and armed to the teeth, his lack of a fury to control one of the six elements meant that anyone other than someone who could use a water fury could have easily dealt with him. And even a Water user would have had next to an insurmountable advantage.

No, Tavi learned that the best way to deal with bullies was to avoid them. Sure, getting help from someone who was older or stronger would solve an immediate problem, but that protection would fade be it from officials or friends, and the repercussions would be all the more severe.

Avoidance was by far the best option.

It was also not an option for him on this particular morning.

Unfortunately, it was also the option Ehren Patronus Vellus a young man that managed to be even skinnier and shorter than Tavi at five feet tall appeared to be about to advocate. So being the natural strategist that he was, Tavi moved to put a stop to it. “You’ve got that look again.”

“What look?”

Tavi drew back from the corner, and tugged idly at his own student's uniform. It seemed that no matter how many times he got the garment adjusted, his body kept a pace ahead of the seamstress. The robes were too tight in the shoulders and chest, and the arms didn't come close to touching Tavi's wrists. While he had been rather scrawny his whole life up until reaching the academy and was grateful to the extra size, it would have been nice to wear clothes that fit.

“You know it, Ehren. The one you get when you're about to give someone advice.”

“Actually it's the one I get when I'm about to give advice I'm sure will be ignored." Ehren peeked around the corner too and said, "Tavi, they're all there. We might as well leave. There's only the one way to get to the dining hall. They're going to see us.”

Tavi didn’t bother looking back. He had already seen everyone in the courtyard and made the tally. He also knew Ehern’s information was wrong. “The twins aren’t there.”

"No. Just Brencis and Renzo and Varien. Any one of whom could skin both of us together,” Ehern replied nervously.

"We might be more of a handful than they think," Tavi said stubbornly as he felt some annoyance that the smaller and weaker of the pair was actually trying to defend him.

The smaller boy sighed. "Tavi, it's only a matter of time before they hurt someone. Maybe bad."

“They wouldn't dare,” Tavi growled. That was one thing he knew from personal experience bullies didn’t do. A few cuts, plenty of bruises, and maybe a broken bone or two on accident. But nothing to get them in any real trouble that would put a stop to their fun.

“They're Citizens, Tavi. We aren't. It's as simple as that.”

“That's not how it works.”

“Do you ever actually listen to your history lessons?” Ehren countered. “Of course it's how it works. They'll say it was an accident, and they're terribly sorry. Assuming it even gets to a court, a magistrate will make them pay a fine to your relatives. Meanwhile, you'll be walking around missing your eyes or your feet. Well...if you could walk without feet, I mean.”

Tavi set his jaw and started around the corner. “I'm not missing breakfast. I was up at the Citadel all night, he made me run up and down those crows-eaten stairs a dozen times, and if I have to skip another meal I'll go insane.”

Ehren grabbed his arm. His lanyard, sporting one white bead, one blue, and one green bounced against his skinny chest. Three beads meant that the fury masters of the Academy thought Ehren barely had a grasp of furycrafting at all. Of course, with his three to Tavi’s none, it still meant he outranked the taller boy.

“Look, just wait for the third bell, if you do then maybe-”

As if by some unspoken cue, the third morning bell sounded and…Tavi’s stomach rumbled. “Last bell. If we don't get moving, we won't have time to eat. If we time it right, we can walk past them when some others are coming out. They might not see us. Are you coming or not?”

Ehren bit his lip and shook his head. "I'm not that hungry. I'll see you in class?”

Tavi felt a swell of disappointment, but he smacked Ehren on the arm. He could understand the smaller boy's reluctance. Ehren had grown up among his parents' quiet books and tables, where his keen memory and ability with mathematics far outweighed his lack of strong furycrafting. Before coming to the Academy, Ehren had never been faced with the kind of casual, petty cruelty that powerful young fury crafters could show their lessers.

Unlike Tavi. He had had been facing that particular problem for the whole of his life. “I’ll see you in class,” he told the smaller boy.

“You sure?”

“Don't worry. I'll be fine.” With that, Tavi stepped around the corner and started walking across the courtyard toward the dining hall.

A few seconds later, Tavi heard running footsteps and Ehren puffed into place beside him, his expression nervous, but resolved. “I should eat more," he said. “It could stunt my growth.”

Spring sunlight, warmer than the mountain air around the capital of Alera, poured down over the Academy grounds. The courtyard was a richly planted garden with walkways of smooth white stone set in a number of meandering paths across it. The early blooms had accompanied the green grass up from the earth after winter's chill, and their colors, all reds and blues, decorated the courtyard. Students lounged at benches, talking, reading, and eating breakfast, all dressed in the uniform grey robes and tunics. Birds dipped and flashed through the sunshine, perching on the eaves of the buildings framing the courtyard before diving down to strike at insects emerging from their holes to gather in the crumbs dropped by careless academs.

Tavi absolutely hated it. The whole thing looked all peaceful, but the truth was that the capital of Alera was one of the cruelest places in the world. They just needed all the glamour to cover up the dirt.

Kalarus Brencis Minoris and his cronies had settled in their usual spot, at a fountain just outside the entrance to the dining hall. Just looking at the other boy seemed to make Tavi's morning grow darker. Brencis was a tall and handsome young man, regal of bearing and narrow of face. He wore his hair in long curls, considered fashionably decadent in the southern cities, particularly in his home of Kalare. His academ's robes were made of the finest of cloth, tailored personally to fit him, and embroidered with threads of pure gold. His lanyard shone with beads of semi-precious stones rather than cheap glass, and lay heavily on his chest with multiple representatives of all six colors-one for each area of furycrafting: red, blue, green, brown, white, and silver.

As Tavi and Ehren approached the fountain, the group of students from Parcia, golden brown skin shining in the morning sun, started passing between them and the bullies. Tavi hurried his steps. They only needed to avoid notice for a few more yards.

They didn't. Brencis rose from his seat at the fountain's edge, his lips curling into a wide and cheerful smile. “Well, well,” he said. “The little scribe and his pet freak out for a walk. I'm not sure they'll let the freak into the dining hall if you don't put him on a leash, scribe.”

Tavi didn't even glance toward Brencis, continuing on without slowing his steps. There was a chance that if he simply took no notice of the other boy, he might not bother to push. However, Ehren stopped and and glowered at Brencis. The small boy licked his lips, and said, in a crisp tone, “He isn't a freak.”

Brencis's smile widened as he came closer. “Of course he is, scribaby. The First Lord's pet monkey. It did a trick once, and now Gaius wants to show it off, like any other trained beast.”

Ehren's dark eyes glistened abruptly, and his lower lip trembled. But the boy lifted his chin and didn't look away from Brencis. “H-he isn't a freak,” Ehren insisted.

“Are you calling me a liar, scribe?” Brencis asked. His smile became vicious, and he flexed his fingers. “And I thought you had learned proper respect for your betters.”

Tavi ground his teeth in frustration. It wasn't fair that idiots like Brencis should get to throw their weight around so casually, while decent folk like Ehren were constantly walked upon. Brencis obviously wasn't going to let them pass without incident. He glanced at Ehren and shook his head. The smaller boy would not have been here to begin with if he hadn't been following Tavi. That made Tavi responsible for what happened to him. He turned to face Brencis and said, “Brencis, please leave us alone. We just want to get some breakfast.”

Brencis put his hand to his ear, his face reflecting feigned puzzlement. “Did you hear something? Varien, did you hear anything?”

Behind Brencis, the first of his two lackeys stood up and meandered over. Varien was a boy of medium height and heavy build. His robes were nowhere near so fine as Brencis's, though still superior to Tavi's. The extra fat gave Varien's face a petulant, spoiled look, and his baby-fine blond hair was too lank to curl properly, like Brencis's. His lanyard bore several beads of white and green that somehow clashed with his muddy hazel eyes. “I might have heard a rat squeaking.”

“Could be,” Brencis said gravely. “Now then, scribe. Would you prefer mud or water?”

Ehren swallowed and took a step back. “Wait. I'm not looking for trouble.”

Brencis followed the small boy, his eyes narrowing, and grasped Ehren by his academ's robe. “Mud or water, you gutless piglet.”

“Mud, my lord,” urged Varien, eyes lit with an ugly sparkle. “Leave him up to his neck in it and let those clever wits of his broil in the sun for a while.”

“Let me go!” Ehren said, his voice rising to a panicked pitch.

Tavi looked around him for help, but there was none to be seen. None of the Maestros were passing through, and with the exception of a handful of other students, none of the others were willing to defy Brencis when he was amusing himself at someone else's expense. But none of them were in the courtyard.

“Wait!” Ehren cried. “Please, these are the only shoes I have!”

“Well then,” Brencis said. “It looks like your little freeholder family should have saved up for another generation before they sent someone here.”

Tavi had to get Brencis's attention away from Ehren, and he could only think of one way to manage it. He bent over, dug up a handful of sodden earth into one scooped hand, and flung it at Brencis's head.

The young Kalaran let out a short sound of surprise as mud plastered his face. Brencis wiped at the mud and stared, shocked, at his soiled fingers. There was a sudden burst of stifled giggles from the students watching the exchange, but when Brencis stared around him, they all averted their gaze and hid smiles behind lifted hands. Brencis glowered at Tavi, his eyes flat with anger.

“Pfft! Hehehehehehehehe.”

Tavi blinked at the familiar voice coming from somewhere nearby, but found it odd that he couldn’t find the source of the voice despite its apparent closeness. Even the bullies stopped in their tracks and listened in confusion.

“Hahahahahahahahahaha! Oh man, that was funny! You should totally see your face right now!” the young woman’s disembodied voice managed to say between the guffaws. “I…oh, crow feathers, forgot to tell her to keep up my sound shield.”

A few seconds later, a woman simply appeared floating in the air in front of Tavi, between him and the bullies. She was one of the three oddest people that he had ever seen and, despite knowing her since coming to the academy, the multi-hued hair still made him wonder just why she had chosen to craft her hair in such a multitude of odd shades.

With a name as odd as her wild hair, Rainbow Dash’s clothes were made from normal cloth, and the beads she wore signified an extremely high affinity for win fury craft, while a few water beads were placed on the other end of her necklace as if an afterthought. Although Tavi had thought he was staring at a pretty boy when they first met, the girl didn’t take any offence over how easy it was to mistake her for a male. The way she simply floated in midair spoke a level of control over wind furies that most people could only dream of, it was the girl’s perfect timing and method of her appearance that made Tavi frown.

“You…you were here this whole time, weren’t you?” the taller student grumbled as Rainbow just…reclined in the air as if she was laying on a bed. Ever since the girl had learned to turn invisible...it was even worse than when one of the Maestros had shown her about altering her appearance using water crafting. Although not cruel, the girl did have a penchant for pranks that just about everyone at the Academy had felt once or twice.

Rainbow let out a chuckle. “Maaaaaaaybe.”

“Then why didn’t you do something to help sooner?” Tavi demanded in anger.

The floating girl spun in midair until she was hanging upside down, but still looking at Tavi eye to eye. “Please! Where would the fun in that be?” she replied. “Not to mention how much cooler it is to come flying in at the last second and save the day. Oh, that reminds me.”

The odd woman disappeared in a blur of motion instead of simply vanishing, and Tavi heard a loud yelp coming from Brencis a second before he saw Rainbow scoop Ehren off the ground and then fly up and backwards as she spun around at a speed that anyone without wind fury craft would have found impossible to duplicate before she landed next to Tavi and let her passenger go.

Ehren stampeded a bit and managed a thank you before falling to his knees from the vertigo while Tavi tensed at the sight. Dash had taken Tavi up in the air so he could see what it was like in the sky once…the resulting ride that he could only compare to an out of control one-man riverboat that was forced through half a dozen rocks before it went over a waterfall and had left the boy afraid to even look at a sky carriage for more than a month.

A short ways away, Brencis was rubbing his arm where Rainbow Dash had touched him, probably nursing where the strange girls spark of lightning had struck. “You little bitch,” he growled as the other member of their group, Renzo, came to join him.

Renzo was simply huge. Huge across, huge up and down, built on the same scale as barns and warehouses-big, roomy, and plain. He had dark hair and the scruffy beginnings of a full beard, and tiny eyes set in his square face. Renzo's academy tunic was made of unexceptional cloth, but its very size meant that it had to have cost twice what a normal outfit would have. Renzo had only heavy brown beads on his lanyard. But he had lots and lots of them. “Don’t got your stupid whores with you this time you little cunt.”

The comment got a growl out of Rainbow, and she stroked a large iron band that she wore on her right middle finger with her thumb before her hand became a fist. “Please,” she said in a tone that showed she was definitely not asking for anything. “All I need is my personal friends to take care of you idiots.”

All around the courtyard, the wind picked up and Tavi instinctively tensed as Rainbow’s fury manifested itself to stand next to her in a mass of off clouds. Although Tavi had seen a wind fury in the shape of a horse before, the one that Rainbow possessed seemed like an odd cross between a horse and a dog…with wings. Its legs were thicker than the most fit equine’s and didn’t even seem to possess knees, while the creature’s muzzle and face seemed more canine in the positioning of its eyes, and a slight trick of the light seemed to make the horses mane shine in every color imaginable. The fury’s mistress only came up to the thing’s shoulders, and Tavi could swear ‘Bolt’ was crouching in preparation to attack while lightning crackled across its body.

Off to the sides of the two groups, the water fountain in the center of the courtyard went still for a second, but Rainbow raised a hand as if to wave off her other fury in mid-manifestation and the running waters went back to normal.

Brenics let out a snort of a laugh. “Girl when I’m done, I think I’ll slap a collar on you and show you how little nothings are supposed to behave.”

The empty threat, at least what Tavi hoped was an empty threat, got a growl from Rainbow that her fury mimicked before a slight tingling in the air made the hairs on the boy’s arm stand on end. Slavery was something Tavi had never really been fond of, even though the more logical part of his mind could admit that it had some uses. However, threatening to slap a slave collar on a free member of the Empire was an idea that turned his stomach. Even normal slaves didn’t deserve that, they were meant for only the most unrepentant criminals that could be put to better use as hard labor rather than simply doing away with them.

But the Kalarus family was known for their avocation of slavery and all of its darker uses and made no secret of it. Pleasure slaves were a known trade in the lands owned by Brenics’s father, and some people even said he had slave soldiers in his legions that were forced to fight rather than undergo the unimaginable pain the collars could cause on the demand of the one who put them on.

Rainbow’s fury Bolt vanished in a huge gust of wind, and the girl practically shook with anger. “Try it, and I don’t care what the others say. I’ll hit you hard enough you’ll never be walking again.”

For a moment, the bullies showed a bit of hesitation, and then Brenic’s goons spread out. Renzo slowly went left. Varien walked around to the right. Rainbow floated into the air a few inches, but didn’t even seem to bother to notice their movements. “You two should back up now,” she told Tavi and Ehren without looking back at them. “It’s going to get very violent, very soon.”

Part of Tavi wanted to just thank her and run but…letting a friend, a girl that had never once called attention to his…disability take on the three citizens that were clearly out for blood…the part of his brain that had put him into dangerous situation after dangerous situation back in his home valley and earned him a scholarship from the First Lord of Alera in thanks for Tavi’s efforts in dealing with the uprising that had happened before he came to the capital wouldn’t let him. Sure, it was the stupid part of his brain, because the logical part was saying how he now had an out and if he ran to get food it might just be enough of a distraction for Rainbow to get the upper hand and take out one or two of her opponents before they even knew what hit them…but he listened to it anyway.

“Brencus,” Tavi spoke up as his eyes scanned the crowd that looked like they were debating on watching the spectacle, or getting away from what was about to be a real fight instead of two boys getting beaten up by a trio of hoodlums. “Think about this for a second. You really don’t want to do this. The Maestros-”

The bully cut him off. “Won't care about you or your friend, freak.” He regarded Tavi with a relaxed, calculating expression. “I am the eldest son of a High Lord of Alera. You're no one. You're nothing. Haven't you learned that by now?”

Tavi knew that the other boy was trying to hurt him, to anger him, and had chosen his words carefully. He knew that Brencis was deliberately manipulating him, but it seemed to make little difference. The words hurt. For most of his young life, Tavi had dreamed of leaving his aunt and uncle's steadholt, of coming to the Academy, to make something of himself despite his utter lack of ability in furycrafting.

“How dare you,” Rainbow growled as her hands shook and Tavi saw faint traces of electricity spark out of her arms. “Just because you can do a few stupid tricks with those…furies,” she sat the name like a curse, “you’ve bullied into obeying you, you think you’re better than him? You think because you and your dad was lucky enough to be born where he was, you think that makes you special? No matter how much you dress it up, trash is still trash, and I’m going to put you where you belong loser.”

Then, Rainbow’s expression took on an almost feral grin. “I wonder what your daddy will think when everybody in town tells him his stupid baby boy got beat up by me and buried upside down in a refuse pile. Because I know everyone else is gonna see your bare butt sticking out, and they’re gonna point, and laugh.”

The comment seemed to have the desired effect, and Brencis’s face took on a look of pure rage. He made to charge, and then suddenly let out a surprised cry when he fell forward and smashed into the ground face first.

Tavi’s thought’s stumbled in confusion at the sight. “How in the-”

“Rainbow! How many times we gotta ask ya to not be pickin fights with the monkeys?” a deep female voice with an odd accent that Tavi had never been able to place said before three figures walked out of the crowd and slowly moved over to put themselves next to the flying girl.

The one who had spoken towered head and shoulder above the other two, as was by far the biggest woman Tavi had ever met, on equal size with Renzo in both height and girth. AJ, which apparently stood for Apple and something else that the boy could never quite catch wore down to earth robes and a lanyard that spoke of more than impressive skills in wood crafting, with only slightly less ability when it came to her manipulation of earth. However, while Renzo was a block-headed bully, the giant woman with the golden hair was the friendliest person Tavi had ever met and tended to keep herself grounded better than most.

It was a sharp contrast to the girl walking beside the mountainous woman.

Sunset Shimmer had an even more fierce disposition Rainbow, with a level of skill in fire crafting that matched her explosive personality and hair with its odd streaks of gold that made Tavi wonder just how she did that. Rainbow’s appearance would have been written off with her ability to craft herself to look different using her talents in water, but Sunset had no such abilities. However, the beads on her lanyard showed equal talents in metal crafting as she had in fire. Unlike the others, she wore silks of the highest quality and several gemstones that matched her hair, stylized into blazing suns of red and gold using actual gold. She also wore several large bracelets and two chain necklaces that weren’t adored with a single jewel.

Then there was the girl in the lead of the trio, and boss of their group overall. Like Rainbow, Twilight Sparkle’s hair was as odd as her name, mostly purple with a highlighted strip of it flowing from the scalp to the end. Her lanyard was covered with multiple beads from every fury craft, in numbers that didn’t seem to be bothered by the girl’s all encompassing realms of crafting. Like two of her three partners, she was dressed in simple clothes and seemed determined to downplay she was obviously the bastard child of a High Lord or Lady.

And a rather favored one at that, if the rumors were to be believed.

Twilight and her friends had come to the capital with enough money in their possession to buy a rather extravagant house off campus, pay for their tuition, clothes, food, and whatever thing the most impulsive member of their group wanted on whims that changed faster than the winds Rainbow could control. They never worked, and usually paid for the meals Tavi ate whenever Rainbow dragged him out of the Academy to have some fun.

“You stinking overgrown cow of a whore! Get this thing off me!” Brencis shouted, making Tavi look over to the boy as he caught sight of just what had tripped the High Lord’s son up.

A rope that was so brown looked more like a think piece of wood had wrapped itself around Brencis’s ankles. Then, Tavi noticed the tiny bits of it sticking into the ground and realized that it was indeed made of wood…because it was actually a small hardened vine.

The appearance of the plant life served to remind Tavi that the simplistic and good natures most of the girls had, they were in fact the four most talented crafting students the Academy had seen in the memory of every teacher who worked there. Some even went so far as to say they were the best ever…although that seemed to be stretching it in Tavi’s opinion.

Even with Rainbow’s easy control of the air, AJ’s unusual size and link to plantlife, Sunset’s unorthodox mastery of metal, and Twilight’s apparent gift in all things furycrafting, the idea that four young girls barely older than him could show up from out of nowhere and have talents equaling…or even surpassing a High Lord according to some rumors, was preposterous. But Tavi was hardly going to start poking around four of the five people who made getting by at the Academy possible.

“Ya know, on second thought, maybe teachin’ that boy some manners will be a good thing,” AJ said as she cracked her knuckles. The popping sound they made could have doubled for breaking bones. “Jus gimmme a minute to make a switch.”

Twilight, the group’s obvious leader held up her hand that had a metal band matching Rainbow’s own, and AJ froze in place. “We’re not here to pick fights or make waves,” she said before turning her attention to the three boys while her voice turned to steel. “Now you’re the ones outnumbered by two. Do what’s best for everyone and back down. I don’t want my friends getting demerits for fighting.”

A bit of irritation entered Tavi’s mind as he checked Twilight’s math and found she was counting Ehern, but not the larger of the two targets of the bullies. He also knew it was a plea on deaf ears. With a crowd around them and Brencis’s hatred of the strength of the female sex, there was no way he would be backing down in front of a crowd without something like a Maestro around to tell him so.

“Two? You think that little scribe is gonna be able to do anything?” Brencis said as he finally worked himself free of the plant with strength from the earth obviously assisting him. “Or are you talking about the freak?”

Twilight flashed him a bright smile and pointed in Brencis’s general direction. “No, I was talking about the big ape walking up behind you while you and your cronies were all looking at me,” she explained.

Brencis frowned, then turned around. He was just in time to block the fist belonging to the larger boy that had been making his way through the crowd his nose. The Kalarn son spun around while crying out in pain and smacked into the hard ground.

“Crows Brenics! I’m trying to give you a hand here! The least you can do is catch it when I throw it!” the fifth member of Tavi’s self-appointed protection detail exclaimed as he shook the droplet’s of blood off his hand.

Unlike the rest of the people that had come to Tavi’s defense, Antillar Maximus didn’t have an odd name, or come from some out there part of the Empire, or sport a pair of breasts. Instead, he had a weak link to a High Lord, was born in the far north where the shield wall kept the dreaded ice men at bay, and sported the part of human anatomy that made him quite male.

Max’s feature’s weren’t as…appealing as the girls Tavi had with him at the moment, but they were clean-cut, rugged, and strong. He had the wolfish grey eyes of the northern High Houses and combined a powerful build with a casual feline grace. Though usually he shaved scrupulously every day, he evidently hadn't had time to this morning, and shadowy stubble gave his features a roguish cast that went well with the dents in his twice-broken nose. Max's robes were plain and wrinkled, and had to struggle to contain his shoulders and chest. His lanyard, randomly arrayed with a hefty number of colored beads, had been carelessly knotted in several places where it had broken.

“Okay Twilight, for the last time,” Sunset cut in. “Max is a monkey, the two runts here are apes. If you’re going to use my lingo, could you get it right?”

Twilight looked over to the other genius of her group in confusion. “But I thought you used monkey as an insult. I mean, you call Brenics and his friends monkeys.”

A pair of crossed arms and a groan came from Sunset. “That’s because all they think about is breeding,” she corrected the girl with the more outlandish hair. “Just because Max is a good monkey doesn’t mean he thinks with his cock any less than those three. The apes at least have some brains.”

“Thanks for the distinction,” Tavi deadpanned. A comment that was ignored by the young woman.

“Crows just…get them you fools!”

Tavi tensed at the outraged cry that came from Brenics, and his eyes widened when the idiots that followed him apparently took the plural to mean the girls rather than the young man that had just left Brenics on the ground.

“Idiots incoming!”

From her place at the front of the group, Twilight didn’t even move as she let out an annoyed groan. “Yes Rainbow I know,” she said. “You’re the one who walked me through reading the air, remember? I don’t need to see them to-” Twilight’s words came to a halt when Rezo’s fist slammed into the back of her head.

A startled cry of pain echoed throughout the courtyard, and Twilight turned around while Renzo staggered backwards while clutching a his hand…that had broken on the back of Twilight’s head when he smashed it into her. What in the name of-Tavi was able to think before he saw a strange, almost…metallic sheen from behind her odd hair that through his thoughts completely off kilter.

Twilight sighed and turned around to face Renzo. “See? That’s what fighting-” she managed to say before the female mountain range with the golden hair sent her own bolder of a fist over Twilight’s head to land on Renzo’s face.

As the giant bully was sent flying, Twilight whirled back to face her own gargantuan ally. “Applejack! I said I don’t want any of you getting in trouble.”

“That weren’t no trouble ‘tall,” AJ replied with a smile that seemed to add a few extra blemishes to a face that seemed too cute to be on a monster of her size.

Sunset sighed and looked over to the floating woman. “Rainbow, could you ask Wonder to give Celestia a hoof with something?”

The look on the rainbow-haired woman’s face became a bit disbelieving, and she slowly coasted through the air behind the girl with the fire-red locks. “I still can’t believe you named your friends after them.”

“If I didn’t, Sparkles would have,” Sunset as they approached the third member of the opposing group.

“H-HEY! Sunset! I am…very strongly asking you to not…do anything…foolish!” Twilight ordered in an odd fashion rather awkwardly.

Rainbow held up a free hand, and water just started to gather from apparently out of nowhere until it was about the size of her head. “So, what am I doing with this?”

“Aim for the crotch,” Sunset replied.

The girl with the rainbow hair shrugged, then tossed her ball of harmless liquid at the larger man. A second after it hit, there was a rush of steam and Varien reached to grab his manhood as his voice died and the water simply…froze?

Tavi frowned at the sight of the boy that had gotten the area between his legs frozen and couldn’t help but wonder. “H-How did you do that?”

“That’s…a good question,” Rainbow said just loud enough to be heard before she looked over to Sunset. “I mean, I can freeze water by making it stay still, but how’d you do it? I know you’re terrible at water stuff.”

A groan came out of Sunset’s lips, and she rubbed the bridge of her nose. “I swear, there should be some kind of requirement that the rest of you go to high school too,” she grumbled before looking to Rainbow. “You stop water molecules from moving, I draw away the heat. It’s pretty much the same thing when it comes to water, but my way is more encompassing.”

Then the redhead took off one of her necklaces and it crumpled in on itself before floating in front of her finger. A finger she pointed towards the man with his lower extremities frozen. “Bang!” Sunset announced before the balled up necklace of metal flew into the center of Varien’s head hard enough to knock him onto his back before it bounced off into the air and untangled before landing in Sunset’s waiting hand so she could put the deceptive jewelry that was more of a weapon back on.

For some reason, a tiny flame flickered to life at the tip of Sunset’s finger, and then extinguished itself to leave behind a faint trail of smoke before she blew it away.

“You know, there’s such a thing as trying too hard to look cool,” Rainbow deadpanned.

Sunset let out a giggle that sounded more like a cackle while the rest of the group caught up. “That coming from you of all people,” she managed before catching sight of the others and giving a satisfied smile. “Hi Twilight, what took you?”

Twilight let out a groan in response, and glanced over to where Max was finishing off Brenics. “Honestly, can you two at least act a little like them?”

“When in Rome…or Alera,” Sunset replied, drawing Tavi’s attention at the odd comment concerning the ancient civilization. When no one else seemed to think the comment funny Sunset let out another groan and the smile disappeared from her face. “Ugh! Uncultured louts! At least one of you should have gotten that.”

With Sunset glaring at her, Twilight rolled her eyes. “I understand the reference Sunset-”

“No you don’t-”

“But this is hardly the time of the place for jokes,” Twilight went on before turning to the girl that was laying in the air again. “And Rainbow! Just what were you thinking? Picking a fight with these three?”

Rainbow rolled around on her air mattress until she would have been laying on her stomach if there was anything beneath her, and looked Twilight in the eyes. “They were messing with Tavi, Twilight. You know how I get around bullies.”

A long sigh escaped from the girl with the purple hair, and she stole a look at Tavi before returning her attention to Rainbow Dash. “Look, I don’t like those people any more than you do Rainbow. Crows! They don’t even belong in here! The fact that someone like Brenics is being tutored by some of the best scholars in this world makes me sick! And I know Tavi reminds you of-”

“Not. One. Word. Twilight,” Dash told her in an even tone.

Twilight’s mouth seized up and her eyes went wide as her arms shook for a second from the flying girl’s tone of voice.

Then Rainbow’s eyes went equally wide, and AJ looked over to the smaller of the two with a scowl. “Rainbow!”

“Sorry!” she said before landing and reaching up to grab Twilight by the shoulders. “Plenty of words! Use plenty of words!”

The leader of the for let out a long sigh, and rubbed her head. “It’s okay Rainbow. I… Look, did you at least eat breakfast before slipping out of the hall and waiting for these two to show up?”

“Umm,” she managed to say before her stomach rumbled.

AJ slumped. “Gonna take that as a no,” she said before grabbing Rainbow by the arm. “Come on partner, what do you say to me and you getting some grub?”

As the odd conversation broke down and a somewhat sullen Rainbow floated off the ground while AJ led her to the eatery, Tavi found Sunset. A few seconds of debate of whether he should ask the girls just what that weird interaction had been all about, or pursue his academic hobby had him going towards Sunset since it was the only choice that made sense. Twilight’s group might have been friendly, caring and some of the nicest people at the Academy, but they were also very secretive about anything that wasn’t in the now.

But if Sunset was interested in the ancient Romans as well, then there was a hope to strike up at least some kind of conversation with her about it. The interest was purely academic of course, as the girl was known to be…less than pleasant to any man that approached her in the mood for romantic activities. Max had been very vocal on that fact about her.

Up ahead, Tavi saw a member of the crowd come out to address the man that had taken care of Brenics. “Antillar,” the female said in a low and throaty purr drawling out consonants with an Attican accent. Tavi couldn’t help but wet his lips at the sight of the ravishing young woman, her dark hair worn in a long braid that fell over her left shoulder. She was surpassingly lovely, and her dark eyes smoldered with a sensuality that had long since enraptured nearly every young man at the Academy. Her academ's robes did not manage to conceal the lush curves of her breasts, and the southern silks they were made from clung to her hips and hinted at the outlines of her thighs as she walked across the courtyard.

Max turned to face her and gave her a gallant little bow. “Good morning, Celine.”

Celine smiled, the expression a lazy promise, and let Max take and kiss her hand. She let her hand rest on Max's and sighed. “Oh, Antillar. I know it amuses you to beat my fiancé unconscious, but you're so much... larger than he. It hardly seems fair.”

“Life isn't fair,” said a second female voice, and a second beauty, indistinguishable from Celine except that she wore her hair braided over the opposite shoulder, joined them. She slid one hand over Max's shoulder, on his other side, and added, “My sister can be such a romantic.”

“Lady Celeste,” Max murmured. “I'm just trying to teach him manners. It's for his own good."

Celeste gave Max an arch look, and said, “You are a vile brute of a man.”

Max swept his arm back as he gave the young noblewomen a gallant bow. “Celeste,” he said. "Celine. I trust you slept well last night? You've almost missed breakfast.”

Both of their mouths curved up into identical small smiles. “Beast,” said Celine, while her sister went with, “Cad.”

“Ladies,” Max bid them with another bow, and watched them walking away as he stood with Tavi and Sunset.

Tavi grimaced. It was easy enough to figure out what had happened and why Max was so late coming to breakfast from the way the twins were acting. “That's where you were all night? Both of them?”

“They do share the same quarters. Hardly would have been polite to only have one, and leave the other all lonely,” Max said, his voice pious. “I was merely doing what any gentleman would.”

Tavi glanced over his shoulder, his eyes drawn to the slow sway of the girls' hips as they walked away. “Sick, Max. You make me sick.”

For her part, Sunset sighed. “Yeah, yeah, you like to rut well-dressed whores,” she grumbled. “Don’t really care. What I do care about is when that means your little pet here gets in trouble, and my friend has to bail him out! I couldn’t care less what happens to your academic buddy here, but Rainbow’s stupid and has a soft spot for unfortunates.”

“Isn’t that the same thing your friend was spouting a second ago?” Max replied. “Don’t get in trouble by fighting?”

Sunset’s frown turned even more sour, and the air became a bit hotter. “Just because I don’t do what Twilight asks me to doesn’t mean I ignore her concerns,” she went on with a growl. “Keep your little friend here safe, or what I did to that idiot back here? I’ll do the opposite and burn yours off.”

The threat, which Tavi thought was probably empty as Sunset was way too nice a person on the inside to carry through with it, made Max laugh. It wasn’t a nervous laugh. “Oh, you’re already making me plenty hot down there already.”

Tavi gulped, then backed away in case Sunset did something she would later regret. As for the girl, she put on an evil grin. “Sorry little boy,” she replied in a way that left absolutely no doubt as to what was little about Max while she fingered the plain iron band on her finger that was an ugly contrast to the rest of her outfit. “But I’ve already got someone much bigger than you, with fingers that are twice as long as anything you’ve got, another whose touch is positively electric, and someone that can make me feel better than any human ever could with just her lips and tongue.”

As the girl departed, Tavi was left staring at Sunset with his mouth hanging open. “Y-You can’t…all four of them…together?” he managed.

“Great furies…the legends were true,” Max mumbled.

“Legends? Really?” Tavi asked the large young man next to him.

Max managed to take in a breath and let it out with some effort. “The four furies of the Academy, four women that appeared at the start of the year with an unheard of talent for fury craft in their areas, with their leader the unclaimed daughter of a High Lord. Each one a perfect beauty, depending on your preference,” he said before his voice became sullen. “And each one only preferring the touch of a woman, with all of them in some kind of four-way permanent orgy that occurs at their house every night!”

The reverence of which Max had in his voice made Tavi slump. “You’re kidding, right?” he asked in an almost bored tone.

“I know they’ll never let me in the group-”

“I’m going to get breakfast,” Tavi said.

“But can’t they at least let me watch?” Max lamented.

“Before I lose my lunch,” Tavi finished as he made his way to the cafeteria.

The house that Twilight called home was the envy of the neighborhood. Although it was a bit too opulent for the young woman’s taste, the large yard that made the two story, one bedroom, three fireplace home with its own miniature bathhouse and back yard that now served as a private vegetable garden and tree nursery was a block of the city unto itself. Thanks to all the space, and a few elemental spirits asked to help in various ways it provided the four women with what they needed most: privacy.

This need was also met by the numerous dark curtains placed behind the windows that let no light in, and required Sunset to light the small army of fury lamps to ignite as soon as they entered the dormitory just to see more than a few inches in front of her face.

However, it had all become so commonplace that Twilight paid it no mind. Her attention was all on the girl with the rainbow hair that was currently causing a stab of pain to run though the purple haired woman’s heart.

“Rainbow for the tenth time, it’s okay. I know you didn’t mean to tell me what to do,” Twilight assured her guilty friend as they made their way into the home Twilight’s ‘uncle’ had bought for her with the rest of her friends following behind.

The former pegasus didn’t seem to cheer up even after the assurance, and floated towards the basement. “I’m going to go check the mirror.”

Twilight sighed as she watched the woman who held her proverbial leash float through the air and leave out the non-descript door under the stairs. After she disappeared, Twilight shut and locked the door behind them before she reached to begin taking off the stifling clothes the real humans insisted she wear. “You don’t think she’s going to try and take my collar off again, right?” Twilight asked as the turned around and found Applejack in the process of stripping. “She knows why we have these things.”

A few seconds later, Applejack finished disrobing, and Twilight was met with the large pair of teats the earth and plant adept woman sported as a human, much to the farmer’s lament. “Ah told her not to.”

“Applejack!” Twilight scolded her as she looked up at the six foot nine woman’s face. “That’s against the rules!”

The giant human flinched, but only a bit. “Look Twi, we all know why we’re wearing these things. We all agreed it was safer, but…Ah don’t see why you just can’t hold them all.”

“We all hold one leash,” Twilight replied as she felt her anger rise. “I have Sunset’s, she has yours, you have Rainbow’s and Rainbow has mine. That’s what we agreed to. We all knew she was going to have the most slips, and I agreed to have my slave collar linked to her so the two of you didn’t get into a fight when the inevitable happened.”

“Please, out of all of us, the two of you fight like an old married couple more than the rest of us,” Sunset said as she collected their clothes and put them into the nearby was basket without adding hers. Two and a half years had allowed her to become far more adjusted to the awful fabrics the Alerns put against the sensitive skin humans were covered with.

Nearly a year, and Twilight still hadn’t gotten used to the crow-begotten things. At least the other human world she had journeyed to had bearable fabrics. But this branch of Roman decedents hadn’t seen the need to invent polyester, or a lot of other things for that matter. The whole thing would actually make a fascinating topic for a paper if…when she got home.

Twilight frowned at her slave. “But we don’t tell each other what to do Sunset. One comment by Applejack for Rainbow to go buck herself, and…I don’t want to know what would happen.”

“Celestia, I hate humans,” Sunset growled, catching AJ’s attention. At the two questioning glances, she rolled her eyes. “And don’t tell me you're going to argue.”

After a second of consideration, Twilight sighed and hung her head. “They’re not all bad Sunset,” she replied, her weak tone betraying her feelings on the matter. “But the last world we were on, it was better than…this.”

Sunset let out a humph, then her expression softened, if just by a hair. “Twilight, that naivety of yours is what I hate and love about you the most,” she said before sighing. “So, anything special you girls want for dinner before I take these to the laundry?”

“You want some help there sugarcube?” AJ asked before Sunset waved her off.

“I can carry badly processed sheep hair,” she replied before she looked over to Twilight. “Although I would like a kiss, Mistress.”

The sultry way Sunset spoke made Twilight roll her eyes. “Alright, but you’re so damn ugly,” She said before stepping forward and pressing their lips together while mentally commanding Sunset to experience a surge of pleasure at the touch. The redheaded human’s entire body shivered, and Applejack had to grab the girl’s basket when she almost dropped it.

A few seconds later, Sunset was panting from the touch. “Okay, gonna see you after I get dinner started.”

“Shouldn’t you be watching the food cook?” Applejack asked evenly.

Sunset let out a tiny laugh as she started to walk away. “Oh please AJ. With how much I’ve shown Celestia and Luna, all I need to do is put the food in the pan and wait.”

As the girl disappeared around the corner, Applejack let out a groan. “Can’t believe she named her main elemental friends after the princesses.”

Twilight thought it best not to grumble about how Sunset had beaten her to the punch on that one. Instead, she simply looked up at her friend. “Can you do me a favor and distract Rainbow when she gets done poking the mirror? We’ve got finals coming up and…I don’t want her moping around when I’m trying to study.”

Even though it felt like she was abandoning her mistress, Twilight knew it was all for the better in the long run. The academic tests would open a path for citizenship for her and the others, while the physical ones would increase her options despite the upside down gender roles this Aleran Empire seemed to run on. It seemed a bit a cheat, since Twilight had no intention whatsoever in keeping the oaths that would come with any new positions, but then she had no intention of spending the rest of her life on Alera either.

“By distract, Ah take it you mean…” Applejack left the rest unsaid, and licked her lips.

Unable to hold down her giggle as the barely contained excitement in Applejack’s eyes, Twilight nodded. “I’ll let the sound from downstairs reach me until I start hearing her squeal.”

“But uh…what if she don’t-” Twilight just gave Applejack a level gaze, and the giant woman sighed and nodded. “Yeah, Rainbow turning down mah attentions is about as likely as humans puttin a mare in charge here like they should. But um…what if she does?”

The thought scared Twilight more than she had been in eight months. “Then we’ve got a real problem on our hands, and you get the rest of us so we can talk to her.”

After collecting her books, which she had to place to side before stripping, Twilight made her way up to her study room and laid down on the single human bed before she took a moment to put her books away and looked over on the nightstand where a collection of bowls held everything from bits of wood, to some incense, water, metal shavings, simple dirt, and while nothing was inside the bowl meant for air, she hadn’t wanted her to feel left out.

“Hello everypony, can I have your attention for a second please?” she asked her friends before the elementals used the materials provided to take on a physical form of reduced stature, with her air friend simply creating a cloud the way Rainbow Dash’s had been taught.

A second later, six tiny alicorns of very familiar appearance came into being of the girl’s nightstand. When the elementals had first taken form based on Twilight’s unconscious desires, she had nearly broken down in tears thanks to how each one looked and the names they had obviously wanted for themselves, but…the heartbreak had long since healed and she could stare at the alicorn versions of the three friends that she hadn’t seen in so long without as much trouble.

“Thank you for all your help today, and thank you for protecting me Rarity,” Twilight told the tiny alicorn that looked like her namesake made from metal while the alicorn made of clouds became a thunderhead. “And yes Dashie, I know I didn’t dodge in time like you were telling me to.”

The increasing flames of the alicorn made of fire got a roll of the eyes from Twilight. “Sunny. Violence wouldn’t have solved anything.”

“That’s just because you just don’t use enough of it,” the other Sunny’s voice came from the door, making Twilight roll her eyes as the former unicorn walked into the room, as naked as Twilight had made herself when they got home.”

Twilight let out a good-natured sigh, and turned away from the physical manifestations of her magic in this upside down world before she rolled onto her back and Sunset walked up to get on the bed and straddle Twilight while she tucked her legs in under themselves. The girl with the purple hair hair grunted at the extra weight on her stomach. “What’re you doing here Sunset? I thought you were cooking.”

A roll of her eyes told Twilight all she needed to know about her slave’s current state of mind. “Like I said, Luna and Celestia can cook without me just fine once I put all the stuff in the pot,” she said before her hands lowered to cover Twilight’s human teats and squeeze them. “I came here to make sure you took mini-me’s advice. Oh, and have sex.

“Rainbow came out of the basement still sad, and Applejack was all, ‘Rainbow, you want me to stick my fingers in your honey pot?’ and Rainbow just went ‘Oh yes Applejack, and I want to be a little foal and suck on your ridiculously big tits cause I’m being such a baby right now and-’”

“Sunset,” Twilight warned her. “That’s out of line and you kno-oooooooh!” she managed as the other girl squeezed her small mammaries and sent a slightly painful wave of wonderful pleasure through Twilight’s body. How Applejack’s oversized teats could be so…tactilely dead despite their size while Twilight’s own made her shiver in pleasure at the lightest touch, the former alicorn had never been able to figure out.

But at the moment, she didn’t care. The hand expert of their four former pony relationship was giving Twilight her attentions, and the princess’s mind was much too full of enjoyment to care. “S-Sunset, please wait a second.”

“As my mistress commands,” Twilight’s slave replied in a joking manner, making the former alicorn roll her eyes before she looked to her elemental friends.

“Ahem, like I was saying. Thank you for all your help, I couldn’t have gotten through the day without you.”

The little Fluttershy with the extra horn appendage nodded her head. “Oh, you’re welcome Twilight. I’m just glad we could be of use to you.”

“Haaaaaave fuuuuuuuun seeeeeeeex.”

Sunset’s head whipped around to stare at the little Rainbow Dash alicorn double with wide eyes. “Since when can the wind talk?” she asked. “Not that they really need to but…”

A bit of excitement bubbled up in Twilight’s gut at the chance to talk about her new discovery. “Oh, I showed her this morning when Rainbow was taking in the new elementals that wanted to join with her, and Dashie was watching her and then…she just repeated what Dash said when she was done.”

“Are they all going to start talking?” Sunset asked. “I mean, I love Luna but…she’s kind of an overprotective nag. If I actually had to hear what she’s saying…ugh!”

Twilight thought about it for a moment, then shook her head. “No, I don’t think so. Of course Wonder and Fluttershy can speak because they know the sending spell the humans use, and Dashie…well, she can only do sounds like…you heard her.”

Sunset chuckled. “Yeah. Figures she’d take after the other Dash.”

“No!” Twilight exclaimed with a frown before giving the proper response. “She can’t vibrate the air well enough for full conversations. It’s all…ghostly. Enough for a few words, but nothing…conversational.”

As her elemental friends dissipated, Twilight looked back up to her human property and sighed. “I’m not going to get any studying done before dinner, am I?”

Once again, Sunset chuckled. “Nope!”

“I could just say no.”

Sunset only lay there with a smirk.

“I could order you to leave.”

Still, Sunset smirked.

“…would you please just get started then. Just don’t pass out when it’s your turn to take it please. Asking your friends to do something is hard enough when you're in the room, they’ll probably ignore me completely if your unconscious.”

Applejack sat in her personally crafted cushioned chair as she watched Rainbow come up from the basement. Judging by the fact she was still around, Applejack didn’t need to ask, she held out her arms. “Come here and sit Rainbow.”

The command was obeyed fast enough Applejack didn’t see any effects from resistance, and she took the smaller woman onto her lap, and wrapped the girl in a hug that pulled Rainbow’s head onto Applejack’s shoulder. “See now sugar, that wasn’t so bad. Was it?”

Applejack’s ‘slave’ let out a low moan, and the larger woman stroked her hair before Rainbow spoke. “I hate this place Applejack. It’s horrible.”

“Long as we got each other, we’re good though, right?” the farmer asked. “Ain’t nothing gonna happen to ya long as Ah’m around. Twilight and Sunset made sure of that. Right?”

As she felt Rainbow tense, Applejack guessed that she had picked the wrong topic to discuss first, and kissed her Rainbow on the top of her head. “Or you still frettin over that whole accident with Twilight?” she asked. “Cause that’s what it was, an accident. She wouldn’t of let you put that ring on her if she didn’t trust you completely.”

“…it’s not…that…”

Applejack moved her hand down to put it under Rainbow’s wonderfully toned rump and gave her a good squeeze. “Still rememberin’ that, huh?” she asked as the memory of a man’s screams echoed in her mind, and Applejack’s grip tighten on Rainbow’s rear.

“He got what he deserved,” the large woman told Rainbow in an even voice as she fought to keep herself under control. “Hay Rainbow, when we found you…I wanted to do it myself. I wanted to tear him apart, and I woulda if you hadn’t…” Applejack cut herself off. Rainbow didn’t need reminders, she needed consolidation. “Twilight woulda done something…lasting, and Sunset…well, compared to what she woulda done…you let that monster off easy.”

A flash of realization ran through her mind as memory faded, and Applejack noticed that she was digging her fingers into Rainbow’s butt just a little too hard. She forced herself to unclench her digits, and made the strength she was drawing from the earth recede. It wasn’t a slaver’s neck Applejack had her hands around, she was holding the woman she loved.

One of them anyway. Although Applejack would be lying if she didn’t say Rainbow had a special place in her heart. Sunset and Twilight did too, it was all just in a different way.

Rainbow was energetic, fun and all kinds of joyful. She was the brightest light in the new life Applejack had found herself in, separated from her old family. When they were together competing, or just messing around more often than not since the magic of Alera made wrestling Applejack an impossible task and turned Rainbow into the fastest thing alive on the land or in the air made competitions that matched their strength a moot point, everything just felt so good.

Sunset was the dependable one when it came to getting out of jams. She was as fierce as Rainbow and as smart as Twilight, if in different fields. While Applejack had to admit she had always been put off by the girl’s darker side, and her snarky ways were a might annoying, those traits that had made Applejack a little leery of her back home turned her into the most adaptable of the bunch. She could spot the threats that Twilight was too trusting to see and Rainbow couldn’t figure out, and deal with them too. Applejack felt safe with her around, not like when Rainbow watched her back in a fight, it was something deeper. She knew Sunset would always be there to protect the girls from the things that the rest of them would never see coming.

Twilight was…their princess, their center. That much hadn’t changed no matter what they looked like, or where they lived. She tempered Applejack’s stubbornness, Rainbow’s brashness, and Sunset’s anger to make them better ponies on the inside while the rest of them went to the extremes she couldn’t when the situation called for it. She kept Applejack from…not being Applejack. The farmer didn’t know how else to explain it.

The sensation of lips on her neck and a squeeze to the jugs that her human form had been cursed with drew Applejack out of her ruminations and she looked down to see Rainbow trying to fit her hand around the mound of flesh that was almost as big as the former pegasus’s head. “You wantin some of my attentions, Rainbow?”

“Y-Yes?” Rainbow whispered after she stretched up to whisper into Applejack’s ears.

Applejack felt the moistness on her legs where Rainbow was sitting, but the hesitation in her beloved girl’s voice gave the farmer pause. “You sure now? Ah ain’t gonna do nothin less yer sure. You known that. This is about you, Ah can go to Sunset if Ah want to feel good.”

A kiss to her earlobe made Applejack strain to contain herself. “I love you, Applejack. I want to feel it, real love not…what…they…”

“I love you too partner,” the large mare at heart said before she moved her hand up underneath Rainbow and into her already wet folds. “Now get yerself ready for one wild ride.”

Twilight sparkle paced back and forth in front of the crystal mirror Mk 3.4. Her wings fluttered a bit as she was unable to contain her apprehension. Despite her status as an alicorn for several years, the demi-goddess lamented that she never did truly get used to the things despite all of Rainbow’s coaching. They tended to obey the emotional part of her mind more so than the logical one. So much so that the rest of her friends could easily tell the alicorn’s mood just by giving her a brief once-over.

A tiny surge of magic drew Twilight’s attention away from the faults of her youngest appendages, and she looked back to the mirror as the tiny silver orb came through. It hovered in the air for a moment, then Twilight had to catch it in her magic when it suddenly fell for no apparent reason.

The alicorn frowned at the oddity, but filed it away for later and quickly checked the MALPS’s findings. Why Sunset insisted it be called that, Twilight had no idea, but it was her invention, so she got to name it. Atmosphere normal, the alicorn read while scanning the list. Presence of suitable vegetation, magical field in use, Equestrian compatible, high life-forms detected. Then, after reviewing the magical scout’s findings a second time, Twilight quickly glance around to make sure there wasn’t a non-council member present like that guard who had wandered in the last time it was time to celebrate something. After finding out that she was indeed alone, the alicorn reared up on her hind legs…and began to dance in joy.

“Yes! Yes! Yes!” Twilight shouted in repetition for a good thirty seconds before her hooves hit the ground and she cast another spell on the mirror to measure the time until dimensional desynchronization occurred. Once she had a reading, Twilight did some quick mental math and… “Carry the two and…forty eight hours!”

The portal to the new world she had located would exist for forty-eight hours. Forty eight hours to discover new life and new civilizations! To boldly go where nopony had ever gone before!

Twilight blinked at her estimation of the situation, remembering the pony it came from with a tiny smile. While she had said it in a snarky tone, Twilight couldn’t help but admit that it summed up her mission perfectly and…she owed the unicorn five bits because she had ended up thinking just that.

“Okay…focus Twilight,” the alicorn told herself. “Forty eight hours, get the girls and then get gone. New friends to make, to magic to learn, and not one moment to lose! Oh, why didn’t I have them here with me?”

Although, considering the last three times she had tried to open a gateway to a new world during a time of mystical convergence and ended up with squat…Twilight couldn’t blame the girls for not wanting to get their hopes up. So she would need to fetch them as quickly as possible and have provision prepared, and give them time to say goodbye to their families, or give Applejack time to say goodbye to hers at least.

Twilight awoke from her nightmarish memory and stifled a groan. Carry the two? Carry the two you idiot, she told herself. What in the pit of Tartarus kind of math has carry the two?

Because of her mistake brought on from…no, there was no excuse! Because of her mistake that was completely her fault, Twilight had led an expedition of three friends into this world and…overstayed their welcome.

On top of which, the equestrian compatible magic was so incomplete, and had taken so long to befriend. Memories of Rainbow crying in both sadness and terror for fear of never flying again assaulted the former alicorn as she felt the human mare stir in her sleep, her head currently resting on Twilight’s stomach. She had long since recovered her old adeptness and far beyond in the months following their arrival, but that first week had been Rainbow’s worst fear made manifest.

The strong arms that held her fast tightened around Twilight’s body, and she remembered how Applejack had taken to this new world. The loss of her family had hurt her to the point it affected her mood, appetite, and energy levels to the point the sought mare had spent more time asleep than awake those first few weeks. While Rainbow had mostly recovered upon connecting with the elemental wind spirits to provide her with flight, Applejack had taken so much longer. Twilight turned her head and buried herself in the chest of her larger lover to take in her scent despite the fact human olfactory abilities were so poor there didn’t seem to be anything different from Rainbow or Sunset’s.

Then a murmur from the foot of the bed drew Twilight’s attention, and she had to stop a giggle while Sunset mumbled to herself. “More pies Woona,” she cried in a voice that sounded rather foalish.

Sunset had taken the…being stranded in this new human world the best out of all of them. She understood human body language, the strange way they sometimes talked with their hands, and even had a basic grasp of the workings of the Aleran government from day one thanks to its basis on something called Rome that Sunset had learned about back in her high school. If not for her support and reassurance for Twilight, lessons in humanity for the others, and…as much as Twilight hated to admit it, her mistrusting nature, Twilight and girls would have been sitting on a lot somewhere out west, waiting to be put up for auction.

The mental image that created made Twilight shiver, and she found herself feeling the miniature slave collar Rainbow had placed on her finger. The things were a creation of Twilight and Sunset. They were their first collaborative work outside of the Academy on Alera. A copy of a real slave collar in every way, only small enough to fit on a finger before they were re-crafted much too small to be taken off. As long as Twilight and the others wore them, any other slave collars placed on the girls would be useless. It was the one weakness to the horrid things, as one slave couldn’t have two masters.

Of course thoughts of slavery and the collars themselves made the former alicorn’s mind split off on two paths. One concerning the so-called furies, and the other being the unknown side effects of the collars that the girls had only learned about after putting them on.

Laying as she was in Applejack’s arms with Rainbow apparently having gone to sleep after giving Twilight an orgasm so powerful she had lost consciousness, and her own slave still in la-la land, Twilight couldn’t quite agree with the notion that the collars could also be used to produce otherwise impossible amounts of pleasure was a bad thing. She would have never considered making any of the three girls that shared the giant mattress of their bedroom a lover had it not been for that. The major changes in appearance also played a part of course, allowing from a slight disconnect in a way from how the three girls that had shared tonight’s sexual experience with Twilight were also three of her best friends that she would never have thought of in such a way before.

But it was mostly the sex.

The Incredible.

Unquantifiable.

Sex.

Twilight sighed in contentment and settled into the pillows Applejack always had on hand...barrel...or chest really. Then she frowned when her body spoke to her. “And of course…now I have to pee.”

“Everypony…come on, wake up,” she called out while shifting around, getting the attention of her friends before she reached out to the tiny elementals contained in the several house lamps. “Light please.”

The request was answered, and the tiny groans became a mass of annoyed grumbling while Twilight fought Applejack’s tree trunk arms off her. “Sorry. Sorry.”

“I’m up! I’m up,” Sunset declared in a slurred voice as she picked herself off the mattress. “Just one second. Luna, make with the metal, would you?”

Twilight winced as she saw Sunset stiffen for a second, and all of her tiredness just fade away as the metal elemental stringier the limits of the young woman’s body.

“Morning already? Twilight can we skip class today?” Rainbow blasphemed.

“Rainbow get to work on cleanin’ the sheets, would ya? We got a puddle of stickiness again,” Applejack moaned, thankfully remembering to make it a request instead of a command.

The former pegasus let out a low whine. “You’re the one that makes them, big pussy.”

“You weren’t complaining when you were drinking my sweet cider last night like it was the last day of the season.”

Before the two girls could get into their inevitable argument and sexual make-up, Twilight cleared her throat. “It’s not morning. I just woke up in the middle of the night, and now I have to pee. You all can go back to sleep in a minute, and I’ll clean the bed. Sorry for waking everypony up.”

Twilight turned her head when she heard the slap of flesh on wooden floor, and groaned when Sunset ran out of the room. “Calling dibs!”

It took every ounce of Twilight willpower not to order her slave to stop right then and there and wait for her mistress to have her turn in the bathroom first. Instead, she summoned up the power of her wind elemental, and dashed out of the room as fast as she could. While nowhere near Rainbow’s speed, Twilight was able to pass the redhead in the hall and made it downstairs and into the room of relief before Sunset.

When the other girl arrived and got through the door, she let out grumble, and then turned around before crossing her arms while Twilight gave her a reminder. “Dibs only works on food and shout gun. Besides, you’ve got metal craft, you can endure.”

“It’s shotgun, and they don’t even have that here, or the term…backwards primitives,” she grumbled.

Twilight found herself staring as Sunset’s bare ass and then cleaned herself off before ordering the elemental inside the bowl to clean everything. Once she was done, Twilight thanked the elemental and got up to offer Sunset the seat.

“Ugh…fixture furies,” she grumbled while Twilight passed her.

The comment made Twilight frown sadly. “You know you shouldn’t call them that Sunset, they’re not…anger manifestations.”

Sunset looked back at her with a much deeper scowl. “No, it’s not even that,” the redhead spoke before her hand opened. A second later a flame blossomed in Sunsets hand and formed into a fiery duplicate of the pony that had laid the groundwork for everything Twilight knew about magic, the pony that had raised Sunset since she lost her parents at the age of five. “This is an elemental spirit. It is my companion, my protector, something that reached into my mind and took the form of something I knew would always be there for me, who would keep me warm, light up the darkness, ensure that I am never afraid, and turn anyone who dared to threaten my life to ash. That is what Celestia is.

“Yours took the form of the Council and your closest advisor. Applejack has her family, and Ms Ego’s look just like her own reflection,” she went on as she got right up into Twilight’s face. “They learn, and grow. Crows, Dashie used real words to talk to you today, not some mass of emotions and desires. They’re the perfect example of how friendship is magic.”

Sunset pointed at the water sitting in the toilet. “But that?” she asked rhetorically. “That’s what humans do. They beat that magic down until it doesn’t have form, or personality or...anything! It doesn’t learn, it doesn’t grow, it doesn’t feel! It just exists, and does what its told to,” she went on while raising the band on her hand. “Like the perfect little slave.”

The other geniuses tirade had Twilight backing up till she was against the wall as her stomach threatened to empty itself. “Sunset…what…I don’t…”

Twilight shook her head to try and clear it. It wasn’t like she could dispute Sunset’s facts. They had all traveled from the wilds where the elemental spirits roamed free and showed as much intelligence as Fluttershy’s pets. But the closer the girls got to a human city, the more...docile things became. Until Twilight found that in the heart of the human Empire, fire was simply flame instead of a raging unicorn, the breeze was just wind instead of a playful pegasus, and the ground was just dirt instead of a dependable earth pony. The presence of the spirit was still there, but it was just...silent.

Even the...furies that the humans of the outlying provinces used, the ones that still looked like an animal, or copy of their human owner were greatly diminished from what a free elemental spirit was. Sunset was of the opinion that the very presence of the humans enslaved all around them, although Twilight’s own theories were a bit less harsh towards the bipeds. It was possible that they couldn’t help it, while the ponies could.

Despite her appearance and lack of a horn, Twilight was at her core, a unicorn. She had made the new mirror give all the girls new forms, while keeping the hair as well as the all important cutie marks that the first mirror Twilight had encountered removed, but a unicorn was a unicorn no matter what she looked like. At her core, her magic was the same, even without her horn, or wings, or slightly larger body. It was a magic of friendship and inclusion not the magic of...domination that humans seemed to have.

All of a sudden, the other girl’s angry glare turned to one of exhaustion. “Sorry, I just…you don’t know what they’re really like Twilight,” Sunset went on. “They lie and cheat. They say one thing and mean another. They break promises, and throw away friendship for their own gain and leave you in a refuse pile because it’s convenient for them. And that was a society that considered this one barbaric.”

“You’re…not talking about the Alerans, are you?” Twilight asked. “That um, that last part I mean.”

Sunset stared at Twilight for a moment with sad eyes that reflected the purple haired girl’s own mood before breaking away. “Can I use the bathroom now?”

Before Twilight could reply, the sound of someone pounding on the door drew her attention. A look of surprise and confusion was shared with Sunset, and the princess wandered out into the main room to see just what the buck was going on with someone pounding on her door at what had to be a time well past midnight.

“Twilight!” Sunset called as she carried a pair of bath robes with her. “I know it’s late but, you’re naked, remember?”

For a moment, Twilight thought about taking the clothing, but then she looked up into the face of her intellectual love and smiled. It was time to show Sunset she didn’t bend over backward for humans all the time. “This is my house, and they’re knocking on my door in the middle of the night. If they have a problem with these things,” she said before lifting up her little less than average teats with her hands. “Then they can suck on them!”

Sunset rolled her eyes. “It’s, they can suck it. It! Not them! It implies that the human is putting a-hey come back here!”

Groaning at being corrected, Twilight turned and walked over to the door, then threw it open. The familiar boy standing on the other end of the doorway had his eyes go wide upon Twilight’s appearance, and the former alicorn put her hand on her hips as she looked down at him. “Oh Tavi it’s you,” she said before the icy demeanor she had been trying to make melted thanks to the appearance of he one human in the whole world that didn’t have an enslaved elemental at his beck and call.

Oh how Twilight wanted to experiment on him to find out why. He might even hold the answer to how to change the magic of the humans to be more equine!

“What’re you doing here?” she asked as politely as she could manage.

“It...you...the legends are true!” he managed to get out before Sunset walked up and delivered a slap across his face.

“Yeah yeah, we’re naked and you just interrupted the beginings of a four woman orgey,” she grumbeled before the girl with the second largest pair of breasts in their group crossed her arms in a way that made them seem bigger. “Now what do you want” And it had better be important.”

Tavi’s mouth hung open for a second while the imprint of Sunset’s hand decorated his face. Then, he apparently snapped himself out of it and looked to the girl in charge of the house. “It… The First Lord he...Twilight, you and Rainbow have been called to the Citadel to um...attend him.”

The tingle in the back of her mind from Fluttershy said that the boy wasn’t being completely honest, but he wasn’t really lying either, and he was definitely worried about something. “What for?” she asked. Twilight knew Tavi was one of the attendants for the First Among Equals, which was the biggest load of manure as far as Twilight could see when she compared it to her Council, but it seemed extremely out of place for Tavi to be the one to come and get her himself.

“The um...First Lord is...having problems and needs a water crafter that can keep a secret and...you girls are the most secretive bunch of people I know,” Tavi replied nervously.

Sunset let out a humph. “In other words, the old man is sick...or been poisoned, and you don’t want anyone to know about it,” she grumbled. The flinch from Tavi and his emotions made it clear Sunset had hit the nail on the head. “Fine, but I’ll need to go too.”

“But-”

“These fools don’t know anything about human anatomy,” she went on. “And I don’t trust you people enough to send two of my friends into the Citadel alone. In fact, we’ll bring AJ too.”

“But-”

“Take us all, or the old man gets no help at all,” Sunset said. Twilight glared at the girl for a moment, but Tavi spoke before she could.

“F-Fine! Just...get dressed and let’s go.”

Author's Note

Hey look, a story of mine where AJ isn't a JackAss.

Something must be wrong with me....