Author's Note
Well, this is my first real fanfic. Let's get this party started!
Warning: contains purple horse saying purple horse words. If purple horse words are too purple for you, feel free to skim her lecture. I felt the need to expand on it, so I won't blame you.
Prologue
The morning sun shimmered brilliantly at 45° above the horizon, as the harmonies of the songbirds oscillated up and down. It was a typical picturesque Ponyville day. A few scattered clouds speckled the sky, placed there by the pegasi overnight. Within one of Ponyville's many buildings, sunlight streaming in through a window, a lecture was about to start.
Twilight Sparkle nervously sifted through her flashcards, doubts racing through her head. What if I forget a line? What if I mispronounce a word? What if I misorder my cards and I talk about the effects of the rainboom before I discuss how it happened? She took a deep breath. It's fine. It'll all be fine. I've got nothing to worry about. I did lots of presentations back at Canterlot. I know how to do this.
While Twilight was stewing in her own fear, Mayor Mare approached her. "You're on, Princess Twilight," she stated cheerfully. "I'm excited for your presentation!"
Twilight swallowed hard, and exhaled. She slowly trotted around the curtain and onto the stage. Dozens of ponies watched her, tracking her every move. She stopped at the podium, and began, "Welcome everypony. I'm here to discuss Cutie Mark Magic." With her words, a picture of a cutie mark appeared on the screen behind her.
She flipped to another flashcard, and continued, "As a case study, let us consider the cutie marks of my friends and I. They are all interconnected by Rainbow Dash's sonic rainboom. Without her defending Fluttershy's honor, this rainboom wouldn't've happened. Fluttershy might never have discovered her love of animals." The thought of Fluttershy in a wonderbolt outfit shot into her head, and she had to suppress a giggle.
"Applejack might never have realized that she belonged on her farm. And Pinkie Pie might never have decided to leave hers. It might be hard to imagine Rarity without her sense of fabulosity, but it's even harder to fathom what my life would be like." Twilight Sparkle... the librarian? The bookseller? Celestia forbid, the comic book author?
"Without this rainboom, I might not have gotten into magic school. Celestia wouldn't have taken me on as her pupil, or sent me to Ponyville to meet my friends!" She scanned the audience, trying to gauge the ponies' reactions. She saw many happy faces, and many more laced with interest. Pink, blue, green, purple with cyan highlights, orange...
"And the most powerful thing I've found about cutie mark magic that I've found is the connection I share with them." Purple? With cyan highlights? Could it be...!? A chill ran down her spine at the possible implications of this development. She quickly looked back, but the purple-and-cyan pony wasn't there. Was it real, or was I just stressed?
Twilight hesitantly continued, "But, uh, um, the real question about... cutie mark magic... is who it seems to affect!" An image of the Staff of Sameness flashed into her mind, accompanied by the feeling of being restrained to regular magic levels. She knew all too well how dangerous and powerful cutie mark magic could be.
"Cutie mark magic affects several known equine species and subspecies. Unicorns, alicorns, earth ponies, and pegasi all possess this magic within them. Horses, donkeys and mules, however, do not. Griffins, changelings, centaurs, and minotaurs don't. No known non-equines have cutie marks, but that doesn't rule out the possibility." She looked back from the slideshow. "Whether zebras have cutie marks is unknown. This conundrum requires more research. Maybe somepony in this very room will be the one to figure it out!"
She paused again, and glanced down at her flashcards. "But one of the strangest cases we've seen so far is the breezies. When Fluttershy took care of them, they did not have cutie marks. However, when I transformed myself and my friends into breezies, we kept our cutie marks. Our retaining of our cutie marks is evidence, though not conclusive, that cutie mark magic is so powerful that it can even transcend biological restrictions. This hypothesis requires further research, and if there are limits to the transformations possible--as well as if the ability to possess cutie marks is partly genetic."
Twilight concluded, her voice now fully recovered from the shock, "As we have seen, cutie mark magic is an incredibly interesting field. I hope some of you decide to study it--I guarantee you'll find it engaging!" She smiled again, and gestured with her wings towards both doors. Her audience slowly filed out of the lecture hall, small talk replacing her precise, planned words.
Twilight exited the lecture hall slowly, shaking her head from side to side. Spike jumped on, a smile plastered all over his face. With a cursory "Hello," she took flight, thinking hard.
Spike, sitting atop her, perked up. "How did the presentation go? Did you impress everypony? Are they going to study cutie mark magic? Will Canterlot have an in...influx of new scholars?"
Twilight averted her eyes. "Kind of, Spike. I think I made a pretty good impression, but..."
"What's wrong, Twilight?" Spike asked innocently, eyes wide.
She sighed again, and answered, "I saw somepony at my lecture... and I think it was Starlight Glimmer." With that, she landed, not too far from her castle. Spike dismounted, eye-ridges raised
"Starlight Glimmer?" her companion echoed slowly.
She answered, nervously, "I was sure I saw her spike, but when I looked again she was gone." She was trotting at a comfortable pace, but every step seemed weighty. Her voice turned a little sadder. "I'm just worried what she could be up to."
Spike grumbled, "Nothing good, I bet. I heard she wasn't very happy the last time we saw her."
Twilight stated, taking on her friendship-lesson voice as she looked down, "Forcing everypony in her village to have the same cutie mark wasn't right. We had to do something!"
"And now she's coming back for revenge," Spike said darkly, scratching his chin with one claw. Noting how his words had disturbed her, he quickly amended, with a tentative giggle, "Uh, or, she was just really interested in your speech!"
"Honestly, Spike, I'm not really sure what I saw. As long as I have my friends I know everything will be alright."
She strolled into her castle, and hung her saddlebags at the door. After a pause, she said lightheartedly, "Maybe I was just more stressed about my speech than I thought!" With that, she walked towards her throne room, smiling again.
Spike agreed, with a giggle, "Yeah, heh. That sounds better than Starlight Glimmer coming back with an evil plot for revenge!" He hurried after her, not wanting to be left behind.
Feeling a little foolish, Twilight said, "Well, when you say it like that, it does sound kind of silly." As she finished speaking, Spike's expression rapidly shifted to fear, as she tried, confused, to understand.
"O-or it's totally true!" he cried. Twilight followed his eyes to the table-map, and... there was a pony sitting in one of the seats, facing her! Her rear hooves were spread out over the table, as she reclined in the throne, clearly comfortable. A moment later, she recognized the pony as Starlight Glimmer.
Starlight leaned towards her, smiling creepily. "Twilight," she half chuckled, half growled, her horn crackling with energy.
Twilight's eyes widened, as she instinctively thew up a magical shield to block that offensive spell Starlight had tried to use weeks ago. A force field of magic enveloped both her and Spike, who was hugging her leg tightly.
But to her surprise, no beam of uncertain purpose flew at her. Instead, Starlight blinked out, and then reappeared a few hooves in front of her. "Hello again, Princess. I see you're still just as talented as ever, still cursed to be special."
"What do you want, Starlight?" Twilight asked, eyes narrowed, looking ready for combat. She'd lowered her horn, and her glowing shield pulsated with energy. There is no way I'm letting her catch me off-guard. Not again.
The equality-loving mare opposite her laughed softly, and relaxed her pose. "Don't worry, Twilight, I'm not going to hurt you. I just want to talk to you!"
Spike yelled angrily, "She doesn't want to hear whatever it is you have to say! You're lucky she doesn't arrest you on the spot!"
Twilight raised her head, and opened her eyes, but the vibrating pink energy field in front of her remained. She declared, calmly but firmly, "Very well. What do you have to say?" She leaned down to Spike, and said softly, "There's nothing wrong with us talking, Spike."
Starlight gave one of her classic smirks, the ones that said "I know something you don't." "It's simple, Princess Twilight. You taught me today that you and all of your friends got your cutie marks at the almost same time, thanks to Rainbow Dash's sonic rainboom. And you observed that it would be 'even harder to fathom what your life would be like.'" Her smirk's smugness intensified. "How about we find out, Princess Twilight? Just as an experiment."
Twilight shook her head, looking a bit upset. "No. I don't want to see what my life would be like. I'm almost sure it would be worse, but if it was somehow better... I don't know if I'd be able to take it." She looked Starlight right in the eye. "I am happy with my life now, and I don't want to spend my time wondering or wishing for what could have been. The past is past."
Starlight smiled, if it was possible, even more smugly. "Don't worry, I've got a solution for that too." Her expression returned to the sympathetic, caring one she'd worn for most of their previous meeting. "But as for not wanting to... you're a scientist, Twilight, and you're turning down one of the greatest chances ever--the ability to see what could have been! Every scientist I've ever met or heard of would have sold their life savings for this chance, and I'm just offering it to you for free!"
Twilight sighed. "Fine, I'll hear out your crazy idea. How do you plan on seeing what my life would have been like if Rainbow Dash hadn't done the sonic rainboom?"
Starlight's smirk returned. "I've been watching you, Twilight, for quite some time now. I know you're friends with Discord. He has the power to let us find out." She briefly paused, before asking, in fake shock, "Unless Princess Twilight, the Princess of friendship, and scholar and erudite extraordinaire, doesn't want to get the chance to see what her and her friends' lives would be like if something had gone different."
Spike asked, with a skeptical look, "How would you even pull that off? Twilight tried time-travel and seeing the past, and it just doesn't work well. Discord can't be that much more powerful." Starlight only smiled at him.
Twilight's eye twitched. "Alright, you've convinced me."
"No!" Spike exclaimed. "It's a trap! Can't you see that? She's trying to lure you away so she can defeat you and there's nopony to stop her from conquering Equestria!"
Starlight ignored him, and looked to Twilight. "I knew you would come around! Let's go to him."
Twilight said, "You go. I've got to say goodbye to Spike." As the last of the purple-and-blue tail left the room, she turned to Spike and whispered softly, "You're in charge of the castle while I'm gone, so I guess you get to be a princess again. Try not to make any big mistakes. If I don't come back within a day, tell the other five what has happened and be ready for Starlight to try something diabolical. If she comes back without me, assume she did betray me, and consider her an enemy, like Nightmare Moon."
Spike whispered back, "I will, Twilight. If she does betray you, I'll make her sorry she did!" With that, he walked towards the kitchen, no doubt to get some guard equipment. Suppressing a giggle, Twilight looked around the corner, saw Starlight rather far ahead of her, and quickly teleported next to her.
She had a bad feeling about this.
Somewhere in between the bottomless pit and the flying badgers, a simple cottage floated. Its current resident looked up from his levitating table, which had just shown Twilight and Starlight exiting. "Ohh-ho-ho-ho! Isn't this nice! Two ponies who hate each other, coming to me! This is going to be fun!" A moment later, he felt a tug, much like someone had wrapped a cord around his tail and yanked it hard, and he vanished in a flash.
Twilight Sparkle scrunched up her face. The summoning spell was always tricky, but now she'd gotten herself into an experiment, and she couldn't very well just give up without seeing it through. Starlight watched on, her own horn glowing with what Twilight only could hope was just a simple detect magic spell.
With a flash of light, the draconequus appeared in front of them. Thankfully, he wasn't in the middle of a shower, but he nonetheless looked a bit annoyed. "Now Twilight, you promised to always send me a letter of warning before pulling me across dimensions!"
Twilight rolled her eyes, and a letter popped into existence. "Here's your letter. Now, can you help me? I need your magic, since I don't know the right spells." Starlight smirked, no doubt amused that Twilight had to ask for help.
Discord tapped his goatee, a thinking expression on his face. "Well, I suppose I could, but under one condition." He grinned in a way that reminded Twilight of how he had been before being reformed. "You two have to tell me everything about how different the world would be when you get back!"
Twilight nodded immediately. "I'll cast a memory-recall spell on myself, so I'll remember it perfectly. I'll twin it onto her, if she's alright with that."
Starlight shrugged. "I could do it myself, but I might as well conserve my magic."
Discord smiled, satisfied, and gestured for them to do so. "Go ahead, my little ponies!"
Twilight focused, and a surge of magic shot through her. Divination spells this powerful were hard to get right, and unlike more direct magic, messing up wouldn't just make the spell fail--it could actually report incorrect data.
But, with luck and skill, she executed it perfectly. "There we go," she declared. "We're ready, Discord."
Discord smiled wider, and said, "Enjoy~~~!" With that, he snapped his fingers, and the two ponies disappeared completely.
