A Foalish Mistake

The sound of the explosion shattered the afternoon peace of Ponyville. All across the town, heads turned towards the library, though just as many couldn’t be quite sure where the noise had come from. Rainbow Dash, Applejack, and Rarity ran to the scene so quickly that they got stuck trying to pass through the same door at the same time. They’d all been waiting outside, following the instructions their friend Twilight Sparkle had given them. Even after she realised the dark magic was out of control, her first thought had been to get her friends out of harm’s way in case she lost control.

As soon as they came inside, they found Fluttershy sitting on the floor, looking shocked. Twilight had been pretty sure that she would be able to resist the dark spell, her famous Stare halting a bolt of magical energy as easily as if it was some wild animal.

“Are you okay?” Applejack was the first to find her, and lowered herself to meet her friend’s eyes. She looked stunned, but wasn’t visibly harmed. She was sitting on the edge of the magic circle that Rarity had traced around the edge of the room, its glow just starting to fade.

“I… think so. It was so loud! I wasn’t expecting that. But I don’t think it did anything…”

Rarity was already moving around to tidy up the room, righting toppled furniture and placing books in neat piles ready for returning to their shelves. She was as concerned about Fluttershy as everyone else, but once it was clear that their friend was in good health, she just couldn’t ignore the state that the large room was in. Quite a lot of books had been strewn around the room in their earlier panicked search for a counterspell, and it seemed that the enslavement spell, although it hadn’t produced any curse-like effects, had still contained enough raw magical energy to shake up everything in the room.

Rainbow was also saying nothing to help, standing just inside the door and waiting for someone else to speak. She seemed irritated somehow, though it wasn’t clear what had drawn her anger today. Maybe she wished she could be the hero, and resented Fluttershy for getting a possibility of self-sacrifice. Maybe she was annoyed at Twilight for putting them in a position where this would be necessary. She wasn’t saying anything, though, so it would probably take one more imagined slight before she exploded into rage. Until then, all of the others could only guess what thoughts were racing around her head. Applejack glanced at the two silent mares, then gave a sigh and turned back to Fluttershy.

“You don’t feel like you got to do what anyone asks you to?” she asked, wanting more than a token declaration of health before they decided everything was solved. Then she thought for a second about who she was talking to, and added, “Any more than usual, I mean.”

“No, I just couldn’t think about anypony suffering if there’s a way I could stop… Wait, is that what this dark magic’s supposed to do?”

“Somethin’ like that, I think. Making slaves, they thought maybe that’s why you might be able to fight it, with the stare and all.”

“Well, I don’t know. I still want to help my friends, of course, but I’m sure that’s no curse. The magic…” Fluttershy’s voice trailed off into a few seconds of silence, and then she squeaked in realisation, jumped to her feet, and dashed off to the far corner of the large room: “Ohmygosh, where’s Twilight? Is she okay?”

A few minutes earlier, the doors had been sealed and the room protected by a surprisingly potent (and predictably neat) magical barrier. There was nobody there except Fluttershy and Twilight sparkle, both as nervous as could be expected. The pink glow around Twilight’s horn was turning a disturbingly deep red as she struggled to control the half-finished piece of dark magic she’d picked up. She could hold on to it for now by feeding it more magical energy, but that only made it more powerful. Sooneror later, she’d have to cast it on somepony, and she desperately didn’t want to do that.

“The books said that a griffon with a stare like yours managed to divert this spell away from him, which sounds plausible. There are other accounts we found, of a stare being able to reverse the spell.” Twilight clearly wanted to explain all the things they’d found in old books, but couldn’t speak at the length she wanted because of the pain she in. Magic had always been second nature to her, but when she was holding so much raw power it made everything a little different.

“Are you ready?” she finally asked. Fluttershy knew that against the buzz of all that magic, her normal voice wouldn’t even be heard. She just nodded, and then realised she hadn’t asked what this spell was going to do.

She focused her Stare on Twilight Sparkle, directing all her willpower through the cloud of magic that was forming between them. The stare was normally targeted at disobedient animals, and she didn’t have any illusions that it would be effective on a pony. But maybe it would be enough to scare the magic itself. She could only hope. The magic lept from Twilight’s horn, and flew across the space between them like a red, lightning-filled tornado. It moved like a bird, like a living thing somehow, and that gave her hope that it might be controlled. Fluttershy was afraid, but that didn’t stop her from trying. And then barely an inch from her nose, it stopped.

Then just as quickly, it leapt in the opposite direction, straight towards Twilight. The unicorn didn’t even have time to duck before the stream of power hit her, throwing her through the air like a child’s discarded doll. Fluttershy’s first instinct was to rush forward and help,to protect her friend. But then the excess magical energy in the spell, above and beyond what it needed in order to fulfill its function, was released in an uncontrolled wave. The boom shook the walls and brought books raining down across the entire room. Furniture was overturned, and Fluttershy was thrown back right to the edge of the protective magic circle. In the circumstances, it seemed a miracle that she was only dazed.

They found Twilight cowering in the basement, curling up in a vain attempt to make herself smaller, and tears flowing down her cheeks. Fluttershy ran forward without thinking and picked her up in a warm hug, while all their friends came down a minute later.

“Are you okay?” she whispered, “Were you worried about me? I’m fine, see?”

Twilight Sparkle shook her head uncertainly, “I… feels funny.” She was speaking much more slowly than usual, but raising her voice a little even though there was no hint of anger in her expression.

“What’s wrong? Don’t worry, you can tell me.”

“It’s weally… Really…” she paused again, making it obvious that even speaking clearly was posing as much of a challenge as channelling the dark magic had, “… hard to talk popper.” Fluttershy continued stroking Twilight’s mane, muttering soothing words that nopony could quite make out.

“Pwopperwy!” Twilight shouted out, spotting her own mistake a few seconds after her friends had ignored it. “I mean…” and for a moment it seemed like she was going to burst into tears all over again.

“I thought this was supposed to be a kind of controlling curse,” Applejack said, carefully keeping her voice low because it was clear Twilight was already worried enough, “Why’s it messin’ with her voice?”

Rarity thought about it for a moment, her mind reviewing the few books that had offered any clue at all. She could easily recall images of slave-griffons and ponies dressed up  in tight leather outfits with studs in the most unusual places, but it was a little harder to  think of any way this might be connected to the current situation. “Well maybe–” she started, but didn’t get time to finish the thought.

“What are you doing?” Rainbow Dash yelled, the secretive anger that everypony had seen building up over the past week finally reaching boiling point, “She’s practically sitting in your lap! This isn’t…” and then she turned and fled the confused stares, the rest of the tirade thankfully incomprehensible as the raging pegasus left the building.

“What’s eating her?” Applejack muttered in the direction of the closed door.

“Who knows?” Rarity answered, “Somepony should go talk to her. But she’s right about one thing, Fluttershy and Twilight are both acting a little strangely. Almost like a mother and her foal, if you think about it.”

On hearing that, Fluttershy realised that it had seemed almost too natural to hold Twilight on her lap, cooing to her like she would imagine doing for a young child. It certainly wasn’t the way she’d normally comfort a crying friend. The two backed away from each other a little, embarrassed by the way they’d both responded.

“We gotta try to act normal!” Twilight blurted out, though it was clear how hard she was finding it to even speak normally. And then with just a slight wobble she fell to the ground, legs spread wide like a purple starfish. “Mommy!” she screamed, and then descended to bawling like an infant, with no words at all.

“Maybe the curse is influenced by the thoughts on your mind?” Rarity speculated, trying to think about anything but the sight of Fluttershy trying to calm Twilight down.

“You mean, like Twilight secretly wants to be a foal again? That’s kinda weird if you ask me.”

“Some ponies have a lot of strange desires. As long as it’s not hurting anyone, I don’t think you should judge them.” Rarity’s voice was just about emotionless, hiding any trace of her own feelings about that interest. It would have been unfair to say what was on her mind right now. “But no, I was thinking maybe this is what she thinks of as control. The only situation where Twilight can imagine following another’s orders without thinking might be when she was too young to question them.”

“I guess, but then what do we do about all this? We need to find an answer, but do you think she can even read?”