Chapter 2: Miscalculation

What is a dream? Is it an elevated level of desire for an end result that may or may not be possible? If they were definitely possible, they would then be goals, when either achieved or failed merely gets replaced by yet another. I believe that dreams are endgame outcomes that we desire. Perhaps they are simply not supposed to exist outside of slumber. Could it be that the only similarity between real world dreams and the ones we imagine whilst unconscious is the level of impossibility of such things.

Is it insane yearn for a dream even after acknowledging the fact that it cannot come true? Even so, should one lie to themselves and relegate these to the back burners? It makes me wonder if things would be better off if dreams didn't exist, though it is possible that we experience them in sleep as a way for our minds to keep our body's pursuing new heights. Or... Could it be that our minds are trying to keep us in our place, taunting us with worlds that will never be? Cruelty or compassion. The line appears dynamic at times...

“Fae!... Hey Fae… HEY FAE!”

As I rouse from my slumber, I see before me a peach colored mare with a rather unkempt golden mane down to her shoulders… roughly 3 inches from my face…

“Mrghmm…” I won’t lie, I don’t even know what I was attempting to say.

“Your alarm is about to go off” she whispers in a pitch that could shatter glass.

I brought myself to raise my head to see past the obnoxious pony at my bedside.

“Its only 7:15…. My alarm is set for eight.” Saying this took a great deal of effort.

A few moments later…

*beep*beep*beep*beep*

Immediately, my eyes shot wide open while my brow stubbornly refused to move.

“I was getting bored waiting for you to wake up, so I set it for 7:16.“ She says this like it's not crazy.

“Why wouldn’t you just wake me up instead of changing the alarm and doing it anyway?” I was growing tired of this alarm that keeps going off, but it was across the room. I couldn’t risk using my magic in front of somepony.

“I didn’t think it through?” Came yet another whispered reply with a crisp questioned end.

“Do me a favor?” I mumbled.

She blinked in response.

“Destroy that damn alarm clock.” It was starting to damage my soul at this point.

With a determined look, she glided out of my field of vision.

After about 10 more beeps, there was quite the thunderous boom followed by the sound of metal bits pelting the hardwood floor.

Afraid to know what the hell just happened, I rolled out of bed landing promptly on my face. A sharp pain shot through me, but I hardly noticed in my haste. In the quickest I’ve ever done so, I shot right up to see what the hell just happened.

On the floor was a obliterated jumble of metal with a gleeful looking pony standing over the remains, wielding a microwave.

I have to admit, I’d find this rather funny if I now didn’t have to buy a new alarm clock AND a microwave.

I was speechless. I reached into my bag of reactions just to find myself empty hooved. So, I just skipped a scene and didn’t react. I don’t think I was mentally prepared to deal with such a situation this early in the morning.

Me and my half assed ideas…

My new roommate’s name is Clarion Days. I don’t know how ponies can have such suitable names, its uncanny. I just call her Clare probably because it annoys her. She much prefers Clarie. I'm assuming she is around two years younger than me (mentally though I’d say that the gap was larger) she moved to Ponyville around a week ago, and has found work as an assistant party planner. Her cutie mark is a simple one of a sun with a smile.

I don’t like her, but in a weird way, I do find her to be entertaining. Well, when she is not demolishing my possessions. It is a relief on how not particular she is. My apartment really only has two rooms, a bathroom and a kitchen/living room/bedroom hybrid. Two beds take up a very large portion of the mostly bare living room.

One great quality is that she finds it so hard to be still, she usually ends up doing most of the household chores. So that’s pretty good for me. I usually put them off until the situation becomes dire.

One bad quality is that, in the week she has been here, she never leaves me alone. She just keeps talking at me until I exhibit some form of response, then keeps going. This is a new experience to me, as I usually require lots of alone time. Most of which involves me trying to sleep.

In actuality, I sleep very little. It's never enough. If I devote 12 hours to sleep, I may get up to 4 hours of actual sleep. That ratio never seems to change for the better no matter the circumstances.

I’ll be honest, she’s not exactly the pony I’d have chosen to annoy me, but I didn’t have many options, half rent and all.

I think that my lack of reaction upset her slightly because her face drooped and she managed to not talk for 30 seconds (a new record), but again, I was too tired to care.

I walked by, acting like she wasn’t there and proceeded to the bathroom.

"Fae, are you ok?" She questions in a worried tone.

"Ughh..." Zombie...

Upon gazing into the mirror, I noticed my face was very red, like crimson red. In all the excitement, I didn’t realize that I must have hit something on my way to greet the floor. A solid third of my face was covered in blood from my forehead. Nothing that water and a bandage wouldn’t fix.

After showering, I stuck my towel under the door to block any light I was about to give off. I finished my rituals with the aid of my magic, spending extra time to make sure there was no blood left in my hair before braiding. Doing this long braid has become so second nature to me, I can braid the whole length of my hair in under 5 seconds. I struggled while first learning to do it, as you have to telekinetically grab 3 separate locks of hair and move them all around in different directions. After admiring my hair in the mirror, I walked back to the main room.

Clare was cleaning up a puddle of blood with the splintered remains of my kitchen chair scattered about.

“Why is there a chair next to my bed?” almost afraid of the answer.

“While I was waiting for you to wake up, I got tired of standing.” She says this like it's obvious why it was there.

“How long…?”

“About 2 hours” followed up with a smile.

…

“Uh-huh”

Goodbye chair, I’ll never forget you...

This was a perfect chance to leave while she was preoccupied though.

“I'll be back, I’m going to look for work.” I stated during my departure.

Clare's ears drooped a bit “Oh OK…”

Still one bit to my name. I’ve never been good with money. I don’t know whether is poor planning or just plain bad luck, but I never seem to have any money whatsoever. The fact that I managed to save the bits to move here was nothing less than a miracle. Well, I don’t know if you can actually call it "saving" as I pretty much just sold everything I owned.

I set off for the bulletin board, since finding a job was proving to be such a hassle, I decided that maybe I could just take on requests when I needed the money. After all, it had already proved useful once. Maybe I could milk this board for more.

Daytime in Ponyville gave me a headache. So many ponies, I have to carefully monitor all of their eyes and subtle body movements so that I can alter mine in such a way to dodge any potential conversations. Avoiding ponies is too much effort.

Let’s see…. No. No. No. Too much work. No. Sure why not.

***************
Help wanted:
Temporary research assistant needed for the duration of 1 week.
Duties involve; locating and replacing various texts, note taking and must have an understanding of the arcane.
Please see Twilight Sparkle for details.
Pays 1000 bits.
***************

Holy crap! 1000 bits??? That’s enough to live off for 4 months (at my current level of finances) that is definitely worth 1 week of work no matter how much effort is involved.

Only problem is that there is no location written here… I guess I’ll ask somepony.

I was standing in the middle of town, so finding somepony wouldn’t be the problem. But I had to pick a pony that looked too busy to stand and talk.

Carefully scanning the area, I noticed that Apple… ugh… Apple…Dash? That’s not right. I’m really horrible with names. Screw it, she is freckles from now on, it's a bit easier to remember. She is out of the question, as she seems to enjoy talking.

While surveying the street, I happened to spot a rather massive red earth pony carrying a hay bale on his back. Also, he was wearing a yoke around his neck that appeared to weigh a ton. Perfect! He seems busy.

Trotting up to this mammoth, I approached him with an “Excuse me”

Silently he stopped moving and gave me his attention.

“Do you happen to know where I can find Trial-like Shackle?” that didn’t sound right… Quickly examining the parchment from the board, I corrected myself “Err, Twilight Sparkle?”

After a few seconds, he replies with a “Eyup” and gestures towards… A treehouse? Not like a tree with a house on top, but a building carved into a tree.

“Oh, uhm.. Thank you” I was almost caught off guard by how simple it was that all he did was say a word and point coupled with the fact that I was pretty much already there.

“Eyup” And like that he was off.

I couldn’t get a read on that stallion. I didn’t like that, but I still felt that he was probably the correct choice.

Making my way towards this tree-building, I couldn’t help but wonder if I overlooked something. Oh well, wracking my brain isn't going to help.

I approached the door to the tree and noticed there was a line in the door. Obviously the windowed portion can open separately from the bottom half, but I couldn’t help but wonder why. This seems like somepony put too much effort into making a door with practically no use for the extra feature. Wasted effort annoys me.

I opened the door and was promptly greeted with a bell ringing above my head. Inside there was a purple unicorn with a long straight deep purple mane with a bright pink and purple streak hanging from her bangs.

“Excuse me, but do you know where I can find Firefight Sprinkler?” That was no good. I’m glad I kept that paper. Glancing at it again I corrected myself “I mean Twilight Sparkle”

The response I got came in the form of a stifled chuckle, followed by “My name is Twilight Sparkle, welcome to Golden Oak library, may I help you?”

She seemed very polite in her demeanor.

“I came about the job listing… and I… umm… would like to apply for the position.” I reached out my hoof holding the parchment.

She gave me a very curious look that made me curious as to what the look was for.

“Oh, are you sure? I research some very advanced materials. But if you think that you are up for it, I could give you a shot,” she said almost apologetically.

What?

“Do I look uneducated?” I asked sincerely.

“No, no it's nothing like that, it's just that… I just. You are right. I made a silly assumption, and I apologize. I’d love to have you as my temporary assistant, miss…?”

“Fae.” I was a little confused but I decided not to pursue it. “And that’s great! (Forced smile) when would you like me to start?”

“Well if you are fine with it, we can get started right away.” She said this with a tone of excitement.

“Twilight! I’m getting ready to leave!” came a mysterious boyish voice.

I looked over to see the source of this new voice only to find myself staring at what appeared to be a dragonling. Not very old, nor very intimidating, more cute than anything. Scraping the ground behind him were a couple suitcases.

“Are you a dragon?” I asked very nonchalantly.

“That’s what I’ve been told!” he states with pride, poking his chest with his thumb.

“Neat.”

Twilight interjects “Spike, this is Fae. She’s going to be filling in for you while you are on vacation.”

He looks at me. “I know it's some pretty big boots to fill, but I’ll only be gone a week. I’m going to a comic convention being held in San Diecolt.” That explains the luggage.

“Neat.”

“I really wish I was able to make it Spike. But I am sure you and Button Mash are going to have a great time” Twilight sounded genuinely sorry.

“Pfft, maybe if his mom wasn’t chaperoning us…” Spike spoke through his pouty face. This face made his threat level drop below zero. I thought dragons were supposed to be scary.

“Spike, you are to young to be traveling all over Equestria unsupervised.” She stated boldly.

“Yes, MOoOM!”

“Are you his mom?” I am so confused.

“I, well, uh, kind of?” Twilight looks so flustered. It's kinda cute.

“Neat.”

The two exchange a hug, then spike heads out, hauling two suitcases bigger than him. I wonder what he packed, because he isn't wearing any clothes.

After his departure, Twilight explained. “I received him as an egg from Princess Celestia when she took me on as her apprentice.”

“Neat”

“Well let’s just dive on in, shall we?” Twilight said with much enthusiasm.

“Right, what would you like me to do first?”

“I am in the middle of trying to invent a way to recycle damaged mana batteries without the use of an industrial strength compression array. The process is extremely complicated as you have to break them down into their base components without letting the crystals absorb any of the magic or else it could set off a very nasty reaction.” She talks too much, but I follow.

“Right now I need to research arcane splitters to see if I can use those in my plans, they only split enchantments and artifacts into two base forms, magical and non-magical. The trick is that I need to further break down the non-magical without breaking the link for these gems to contain magic. If that link is broken, depending on the strength of the magic imbued in it, it could explode with disastrous results “ she was really into this

She trails off and looks at me for a moment and says “Sorry, could you find me some books on arcane splitters?”

“Why don’t you just imbue a tank of water with an arcane barrier, giving the water the ability to contain and block the transmission of mana.The water will not be able to change states from liquid to gas while enchanted either. Place the batteries in a silver bowl with the same enchantment and melt them down with time released heat stones with an amplifier spell on them. Let them melt, then cool. Once they harden, you should, in theory be able to safely remove them. There is no need to remove the magic from them, all you need is to let the magic merge at its own pace. Plus, It is much safer as every tool involved will act as a safety net to prevent...”

Aw shit…..

Twilight looks at me, wide eyed and open jaw.

“What!? OMIGOSH! I’ve been working on this for over a week and I didn’t think of that! I was horribly wrong with my assumption, but how do you know this much of arcane science? Most earth ponies aren't very knowledgeable about magic.” Twilight was beyond shocked.

Damnit! I didn’t mean to do that, I just got caught up in the conversation.

“I, uh… well… you see… my father was a unicorn so I grew up around this stuff” I managed to make this lie up on the fly.

Her jaw was still agape.

“Wow, I am so impressed, but at the same time I’d be lying if I said I wasn’t disappointed. If this works, I can’t possibly publish my paper on it. You single hoofedly solved this within minutes. You HAVE to let me publish your paper on this!” It was obvious that Twilight didn’t care about the credit, only that ponies knew of this. She seemed to be a pony who didn’t care about fame or glory.

“I’m sorry, I can’t. I didn’t mean for this. Please feel free to publish a paper with your name.” This was going to be tricky.

“I can’t take credit for somepony else’s work. What if I write and publish it with your name?” She is very persistent.

“Please, no… I don’t want any credit. I really don’t want to be mentioned.” Think Fae! I know that she’s not going to let it go.

"I don’t understand” Twilights ears droop as she said this.

“What if you publish the paper and credit anonymous?” Please let her go for this.

“I can, if that’s really how you feel, but I still feel bad.”Twilight's eyes lowed as her body slanted.

“I am sorry to put you in this position. I guess I screwed up the job on the first day…” Sure I felt a little guilty, but the purpose of this remark was an attempt to control the conversation. I needed to get her mind off of the credit topic, and get her feeling bad about me feeling bad. If I can get her to try and cheer me up, then I can navigate this conversation.

“No, you didn’t screw up. You did an even more amazing job than I requested! Look, how about we put this to the test, and we can discuss the rest later.”

Success! Now let’s just get this over with.

Perking up, I said “Ok then, where do you want to do it?”

“It's getting a little late, why don’t we put this to the test tomorrow?”

Even better! I guess it was getting rather late.

“Alright, what time do you want me here?

“Noon seems fine.”

After saying goodbye, I left the library. The sun had already began to set. It was only a 10 minute trot to my apartment and yet I was still annoyed by the distance.

Twilight in Ponyville is a very pretty sight. Everything stagnates in mild illumination without being too bright. Dark trees, hill and buildings in the distance in the contrast of a still bright sky.

My apartment was no fancy one. It could be worse I suppose. The cheap rent was really the only selling point. I could do without all the neighbors, but one day when I am rich I'll just rent all the rooms so that I won't have any. Then, the world...

The door to my apartment was a very scratchy looking door with a off-center, slanted "3B" hanging near the top. Upon opening the door to my apartment, I was instantly blasted to the ground in fright.

“HI FAE!” Clare sprung from the ceiling hanging upside down, right on the other side of the door.

“Sweet Celestia! Are you trying to give a filly a heart attack?” I panted.

“Did it work?” She said wobbly, still upside down.

“Yes!.... Kooky!”

“Yay!... Um… Hey Fae… Would you help me down?”

I entered my home and inspected the ceiling to see that she had duct taped her hooves to the it. That raised several questions about physics. I don’t own any step ladders and the table is a good 10 feet away.

“How long?”

“3 and a half hours,” with an even wider smile than before.

That explains the redness to her face.

Well she is dedicated. I decided to pay her back at least a little by retrieving her from the ceiling in the form of a tackle. I won’t admit that I took every precaution to ensure I didn’t hurt her.

After a few minutes of laughing, we got up and ate dinner together. I see that Clare decided to replace the microwave and in addition bought a few chairs. Technically, I was the one who broke the only chair, but I appreciate her ability to clean up after herself. That and she was an amazing cook. She had somehow figured out or guessed that I love lo mein. I haven't eaten a meal that didn’t require "nuking" before consumption since I was a foal. I haven’t eaten dinner with anypony in years, but I didn’t dislike it…

There was something just so comforting/yet offsetting about this mare. She gave me this weird vibe, almost as if I what I'm looking at and seeing are two different things. Why was she going so far out of her way to be friends with me when I made it clear that I only wanted someone to split rent with? I am not easily motivated, but I really wanted to get to the bottom of this.

I think not having a clock was driving me crazy. Not only am I laying here, sleeplessly staring at the ceiling, I don’t even know how long I have been doing it. At least before, I could approximate so many hours until I can fall asleep. The more I try not to think about it, the more my mind won't stop thinking about it. The more my mind won't obey me, the more annoyed I get.

What felt like several hours later, I gave up. As quietly as possible I got up, and ninja'd my way off the bed and reached under my bed to retrieve a chest from under my bed. I carried it with me to the bathroom and shut the door behind me.

The chest looked almost like just a wooden box that was not meant to open, plain and ordinary. I fired up my magic and pointed it my horn towards the box, with a click it opened. I lifted the lid to reveal hundreds of tiny glass vials filled with blue liquid. I removed one and emptied the contents into my mouth. *BLEGH* That taste is horrible. I placed the empty vial back inside and replaced the spell I had laid on the container, sealing it. No one could ever tell that this wasn’t just a plain block of wood.

Stealthily returning to box to its home, I returned to my bed and assumed the sleep position. Last thing I need is for my roommate finding out and trying to tell me divine secrets of the art of sleeping that's just more common sense than anything. Or worse, she could go on a tangent about how sleep potions are bad. If I'm going to have to tolerate somepony on a regular basis, it would be easier if they didn’t have a superiority complex.

This stuff is supposed to have instantaneous effects. 30 minutes later, I fell asleep and what a great sleep it was. I had a great dream too, though I cannot recall what it was about. Only thing I can remember is that I was very happy.

“Beep, Beep, Beep, Beep, Beep!”

I opened my eyes and prayed to Celestia I was wrong.

Clare was 3 inches from my face repeating the words “Beep” in a very obnoxious tone.

“mrphghh?” Again, I have no idea what I had attempted to say.

“Beep, Beep, Beep, I’m an alarm clock, Beep, Beep, Beep”

Delicately, I went to pat her on the head, but my arm dropped harder than I meant for it to.

*Whack*

“Snooze…” I played it off. CRAP! I didn’t want to hit her. It's too early for these feels.

She regained her balance and backed away from the bed silently and stood there watching me.

“Are you seriously going to stand there for 10 minutes to do it again?” I knew the answer.

She replies in a shrill whisper “I can’t speak, you hit snooze.”

“How do you even know what time it is?”

“…”

“Im getting up” I rolled out of bed as usual but this time was greeted with a very comfortable landing. There was a huge fluffy warm pillow that had rescued me from my fall. It smelled so nice. But, where did it come from? And why was it warm? Was this Clare's pillow imbued with her body heat? Wow, even though all ponies body heat is the same temperature, This pillow feels warmer than any of my pillows ever have.

“Thank…you”

The warmth, combined with the smell of a new twist on lavender. I couldn’t pick out what exactly was enriching this scent though. Some sort of sweet crisp...thing? Its going to drive me crazy until I find out what that smell is! It was more than enough to quickly send me back to sleep. I could care less about the cold hard floor, this pillow was nothing less than godly.

…….

“Beep, Beep, Beep, Beep”

No! I wasn’t ready for this to end. I’ve never been so at peace in my life! But this time the beeps were followed by a new aroma.

Sitting up, Clare was holding a steamy muffin. She joined me on the floor where we ate our breakfast, propped up against our beds facing each other.

"Clare?" I broke the silence.

"Yes, Fae?" She perked curiously.

"I didn’t mean to hit you. It was only supposed to be a tap. I am sorry."

"I know" She replied "I didn't give it a second thought."

She sat down her plate and scooted over to me, and gave me a quick hug. This is new. Wow, she's so... Soft. Looking down to see her face, I couldn't help but notice the blend of my blue coat and her pink one. It would've warranted more attention if I wasn’t wanting to see her face. All I saw was a smile before she departed. I felt disappointed when she backed away. I rather enjoyed that.

What is going on? I didn’t care, I wasn’t going to question it. This actually turned out to be a pretty bearable morning…

As I walked across town with Clare in tow, I couldn’t help but hate myself for not shutting up and telling her of this experiment at the library. Clare was not working today and begged to tag along. After 47 consecutive “Please?”-“No.”s I gave in.

Clare had a weird skip to her step whenever she walked, almost as if pronouncing her limbs with each bounce, alternating 2 legs at a time. What a waste of energy. If I tried that...no, just thinking about it is too much effort.

We approached the library in what seemed a shorter time that what it took me to get home the night before. I opened the door and made my way inside. Well, I did anyway, Clare stopped in the doorway and stuck her head in.

Twilight was there to greet us very promptly.

“Hello Fae. Oh, you brought a friend?” She was possibly the most polite pony I had met in this town.

“She is my roommate,” I corrected. “Why are you still in the doorway?” I asked turning to Clare.

“It's rude to enter somepony's home without permission” she stated.

“Do you live here?” I asked Twilight before realizing I accidentally proceeded the conversation.

“Yes, but this is a library first. Please feel free to come in. My name is Twilight Sparkle. What is your name?”

“Clarion Days, but my friends call me Clarie!” She said entering the room.

“Oh I’ve heard of you, don’t you work as Pinkie Pie's assistant?” Twilight asked with a very calm tone.

“Yup Yup! Are you friends with Pinkie?” Clarie was very excited at this revelation.

“Everypony is friends with Pinkie” she said with a slight chuckle. “If you would like to watch, I’d be delighted to have you, but please don’t touch anything, for safety reasons.”

“Yes Ma’am” Clare responded.

“Ma’am? Nonono, please just call me Twilight,” corrected the unicorn.

“Alrighty!” she said with a bounce.

I'll never remember that. I wonder if I can get away reducing that to one syllable?

"Care if I call you Twi?" I asked.

"I've read about this in one of my books. Calling me by a nickname must mean we are becoming friends! I don’t mind one bit!" Twilight seemed to get very giddy over my request.

"Y-yea..."

I hate being social.

After flipping the sign on the door to closed and setting up all the materials, we got to work. I actually felt really nervous for some reason. Why? Was it because Clare was here? Granted, this whole time she had managed to not make a peep, but she also was watching me. More than that, she was studying me. Twilight was doing much more interesting things. Thinking about this just make me even more nervous, damnit.

“Alright, everything is in order, let’s start the experiment!” Twilight was ecstatic.

As her horn began to glow violet, she began enchanting the tank, full of water, with a barrier and proceeded to place the silver bowl inside. Carefully lowering the mana batteries in, using a string, because telekinesis would be cut off by the water, she began trembling with excitement. She placed the enhanced heat stones on top of the batteries. They were round flat slabs of stone with a rune inscribed upon them. The character shown was the Zebran symbol for fire.

My role in this wasn’t an active one. I was really only hoofing Twi things occasionally when she asked for them, yet I was still very on edge. I was even beginning to sweat. Why was I sweating? Did I see this as a performance with an audience? Or is this the results of a sloth doing manual labor, albeit light labor. I don’t believe I am that out of shape so it must be a mental thing. I hate being the center of attention.

After a few minutes, the bowl started shaking. Slightly at first, but rapidly gaining vibration. A loud him was emanating from it, getting louder.

“Oh no, no no no no no, this is not good, they are starting to react. You two stand back!” Twilight was very worried. She had good reason, for I knew what was happening.

“Did you remember to place a anti-magic enchantment on the bowl?” At this point I was yelling because the him was so loud.

Twilight’s eyes widened. Damn, how did I let that happen, I was supposed to be assisting her, but I was too focused on not wanting attention that I missed it. With the bowl not enchanted, it can allow displacement of mana. Soon, the mana will begin to flow into the bowl. With nowhere else to go, it will build inside of it. Metal is not meant to contain magic, as it absorbs more mana, it will begin to destabilize, then explode.

“It’s OK, I prepared for this!” Twilight shouted as her horn began to glow a bright violet. Out from her horn shot a beam over the tank, trickling down to form a see-through bubble around the tank.

The hum had become a roar. The whole tree was shaking.

Gauging her barrier, there was no way that was going to be enough. Damnit, Damnit, Damnit! This explosion is going to destroy this whole building. Maybe even the whole block!

No, I can’t do it. I can’t ostracize myself. Bad things happen whenever somepony sees my magic! I can’t.

I started thinking of a way to abort the test way without using my magic. The only ways I could think of however, involved other ponies.

Shit! Clare!

I looked over to see a trembling little pony scared out of her mind. Tears had started forming in those amber eyes of hers.

Screw it, I’ll deal with the repercussions later!

“Twilight, that’s not going to stop it! Not even close. Listen get back and throw your barrier around you and Clare.” I took charge. Not knowing if I could stop it or not. This was going to be tough.

“What are you going to do” Twilight shouted with worry.

“Trust me” I have her the most determined look I could muster.

“But...”

“JUST DO IT!”

“Oh, I hope you know what you are doing!” She retreated to Clare's side and threw up a barrier, dissipating her previous one.

I planted all four hooves and let out a low breath. My eyes lit up into a bright sky blue. Out from my forehead came my ethereal horn dancing with blues of all tones. When it finished emerging, it was about 6 inches out from my forehead.

“What are you…” Twilights voice became overwhelmed by the rumbling noise that had become a screech.

“Damnit!” light shot out from my ghostly appendage over the tank forming a translucent blue bubble around it.

I cannot stress enough how difficult and draining this is. Barrier magic is not something I am particularly good at. My barriers are adequate at best. Luckily I know of a cheat to make them stronger.

I'm much better at transmutation, that is my specialty. I can cheat the rules and manipulate my weaker magic if need be. Most of my effort has been spent on this school of magic.

I redrew my breath for a second time. Doublecasting is so taxing on my body and soul, that I rarely do it, but I have to if I am to ensure the safety of Clare.

“ARGHHH!!!” I shouted, sweating profusely.

My horn grew, doubling in size as a second teal overglow engulfed it. The light that came this time was not as focused, hitting the whole bubble, making it much harder to see through. The density of the shield increased as its permeability decreased. Now there were two hues of blue surrounding the tank, almost as if lines forming a spherical web inside of glass.

“Did you just doublecast!? “ Twilight was screaming at this point. Doublecasting was not extremely rare, but it did show great arcane aptitude.

Not enough, this isn’t going to work. Double barrier strength might save the tree, but its inhabitants still wouldn’t survive. There's enough mana stored in those batteries to take out half the town. What a pain...

Pain was coursing through my mind. I needed more. I swear, this is what happens when I go against my laziness. If we survive this, somepony is going to pay my rent for me!

“AUGHHH” My voice had gotten shrill, clearly carrying my pain with it.

My horn began shrouded in an overglow again as I prepared the same spell I had just cast. I was going to have to cast another empower spell. I was already at my limits. I had poured everything in that last spell, but I have to try.

Sparks began to spew from my horn. The pain was overwhelming, almost as if a hundred needles began piercing my horn and exploding over and over.

Another beam of light stretched out engulfing the bubble, fortifying it. There were so many blues filling the sphere that it was no longer translucent.

My whole body had started feeling it. Every muscle tensed with the pain of a thousand needles.

“Tetrabarrier, secret technique…” It really wasn’t a secret technique, but I do enjoy adding that line to things, if only for myself. It took all the willpower and strength I had left to say that, but hurray for little victories.

And like that, the sphere puffed out momentarily with a muffled 'BOOF', followed by a thud.

The second noise had come from me having collapsed onto the floor. With the last of my strength, I moved my head slightly, using all the energy I had left in an already empty reservoir. In the middle of the tunnel vision I now possessed, I saw a peach colored mare galloping towards me with tears following in her wake.

Sound vanished as the universe faded away. Everything except for a lavender scent. That stayed with me for a very long time.

Author's Note

Chapter two, hope it was to your liking. Hopefully I'll get another chapter up before too long. Thanks for reading :3