There was a new student at Canterlot High. Sunset Shimmer had only met her briefly; On this occasion, Lyra Heartstrings and Bon Bon had volunteered to give the tour.
“…and here's the music room. Oh, here's Sunset Shimmer, Twilight Sparkle, and Rainbow Dash. Everyone, this is Harmony.”
They'd waved, and said “Hi.” Harmony had waved back, and mouthed what looked like “Hi,” in return. She was slightly taller than Sunset, with pale magenta skin. She was wearing sunglasses, even indoors, and a dark green beanie with earflaps, which clashed with her skintone. Straight red hair hung down one side of her head from beneath the hat, onto the shoulders of a grey hoodie, which she had was keeping zipped up, left hand buried in one pocket. Her body language was kinda grouchy, though Sunset was hoping the girl was just shy. Black slacks and white sneakers completed her “look.”
“It's nice to meet you!” Sunset beamed, stepping forward and offering a hand. Harmony hesitated before flashing a tiny smile and shaking Sunset's hand briefly, before withdrawing.
“OK!” exclaimed Lyra, punching a hand in the air, “on to the computer labs!”
And with that, the two had lead Harmony away.
As first meetings go, it had been a little disappointing, but Sunset hoped to see more of the girl later, and get to know her better.
At lunchtime, Sunset felt a slight buzz from the pendant she now wore every day — one magical gemstone from a set of seven that she and her friends had found at camp earlier that year. She wasn't sure what the sensation meant, but it seemed to be pulling her gently in the direction of the front entrance. Pulling out her phone to text the other girls, she followed the pull to see where it would lead her.
She had just finished sending the text when she opened the front door, to see a group of girls hanging around the statue — or rather, the base of the former statue —that stood at the front entrance to the school (and also held the magical portal to Equestria). The girls were in school uniforms of some kind, but Sunset recognised neither them, nor the school.
She recognised the way they were standing, though. Crowded around one figure in the center, blocking any escape, leaning in with nasty expressions. Bullying hadn't really been a problem in Canterlot High since, well, the days of Sunset's “dark past”. All the more reason she couldn't stand by.
She was half way there, yelling, when one of the girls — the boss bully, from the looks of it — shoved their victim against the pedestal, and Sunset caught a glimpse of her. It was the new girl, Harmony. Sunset's fists were clenched ready, but she faltered in place when Boss Bully was thrown back along with a flash of light and clap of thunder, flying several feet back before landing squarely on her ass.
Harmony was glowing, hair and earflaps lifted by an non-existent wind. Tiny arcs of multi-coloured lightning were jumping off her feet and hands, dancing across the ground beneath her.
Sunset would later reflect on the fact that her own first thought in this situation was: “Oh no, not again!” Magically-powered supervillain women were occurring all too frequently of late.
Boss Bully, unfortunately, was apparently in a “too blinded by anger to notice the glowing girl with lighting coming off her” mood. She jumped up, running straight at Harmony with a fist raised.
“You disgusting FREAK!” she yelled, before Harmony flicked her wrist, and sent a bolt of magic square into the other girl's chest. For a moment, nothing happened, but everyone stood frozen. Then Boss Bully stepped forward and her hair kinda… exploded. One moment she had shoulder-length blue curls, the next she was tripping over locks that now trailed across the ground beneath her. Her bangs blocked her face until she pushed them aside, then Sunset realised it wasn't just the hair on top of her head that was affected — her eyebrows were now blocking her own vision. There was even hair forcing its way out from beneath her clothes.
The girl screamed, and stumbled away, flailing wildly as her body began to slowly disappear beneath the massive mane. The other bullies stepped back uncertainly, glancing around and raising their hands… Sunset charged in headlong, magic already transforming her clothing.
She wasn't close enough, though. Harmony let out a shriek and flung her hands, bolts of magic leaping from them at two of the bullies…
Sunset felt things whoosh past her. The next moment, she saw Rainbow Dash putting one of the girls down on the other side of the street, her speedster power having dodged the arcing bolt that now cascaded across the ground, painting it a checkerboard of brilliant hues. The other bolt careened off one of Rarity's magical barriers, which had been thrown just fast enough to block the attack. Ricocheting into the air, the bolt transformed into a swarm of bright blue butterflies.
The magical aurora surrounding Harmony was starting to form something more solid, a pair of large but mostly formless wings emerging from her back. Sunset reached the pedestal just in time for Harmony to leap up out of her reach, floating in the air. Without Twilight's assistance, Sunset needed physical contact to use her empathic powers.
Dodging around into the relative shelter offered by the pedestal, Sunset glanced around. Rainbow and Rarity were already leaping into action to rescue the bullies, Pinkie Pie was also here, and throwing exploding candies high into the air, presumably to try and get Harmony's attention. Applejack and Fluttershy were just emerging from the school, and taking in the situation. Twilight was yet to arrive.
Sunset snuck a glance upward. Harmony's glasses had fallen off, or possibly vapourised, at some point and the girl's eyes were blazing with magical green flames. One had a single point of red light in the center, the other blue. Her beanie was gone, her red hair streaking out up and to the side like a shooting star's tail, and on the left side of her head a mass of short blue curls were writhing to complete the effect.
And Harmony was laughing, and wailing, and sobbing. It seemed she couldn't decide which. Her body twisted and writhed as the raw magic flowed through her, uncontrolled.
Sunset gestured to Applejack — if Twilight wasn't here, perhaps she could lift (or even throw) Sunset up into range? She didn't fancy her chances of talking the girl down, knowing practically nothing about her. It looked like Applejack got the message, wasn't too happy with the idea, but was rushing forward anyway.
A clawed spectral leg gripped the stone pedestal, cracking the stone. One of Harmony's human legs was inside it, though at this point it was hard to tell. It seemed the magic enveloping her couldn't decide what to turn into — limbs and wings from completely different animals were materialising around her body. A dragon-like claw, and a horse-like hoof. A cat-like paw, though her left arm seemed unchanged. One wing was feathered, the other like a gigantic butterfly. A scorpion-like tail was hovering behind her, seemingly unsure where to attach itself. Her clothes were still twisting and flowing, a mass of liquid colours swirling around her body.
Applejack clasped her hands together, giving Sunset a leg up. She just caught a glimpse of Twilight arriving on the scene, before being launched straight at the glowing, still-transforming girl above them. She just about registered that the ground had become a mass of multi-coloured hexagons instead of normal concrete. She just for one moment came face-to-face with Harmony, the now demonic-looking girl registering Sunset's presence…
Sunset was standing in a forest. It was slightly disorienting, she hadn't been standing in a forest half a second ago. It didn't feel like a memory, exactly, because she could move around and think, instead of just experiencing. She looked at her hands. They were faintly glowing, and see-through. An astral form, she guessed. This was a new experience, her powers hadn't quite worked this way before. Then again, last time she'd attempted to enter the mind of a magically powered-up individual, she'd had Twilight's magic, and all their other friends', to help her.
Maybe it would have been smarter to wait. Then again, Harmony had been going wild and there hadn't been time.
There was a path. Sunset followed it.
She heard water, and reached a clearing.
There was a lake, and a waterfall, but the water was falling up instead of down. The lake was perfectly smooth, but the trees and flowers on the bank opposite were rippling. Their reflections weren't, though. The flowers kept changing colour, too. It was quite pretty though, in a disturbing way.
Standing on top of the water in the middle of the lake was Harmony, looking entirely normal and human, but completely naked. She was turned away from Sunset, who only briefly stared at the girl's bare ass before averting her gaze and raising a hand to block her vision of everything from Harmony's neck down. Sunset wondered if her astral form could blush.
Sunset began to approach, wading out into the lake. “H-Harmony?” she called out.
Harmony straightened, and turned. With that motion, the world changed around her. The sky went black. The water turned red. Trees and flowers glowed in harsh neon and Sunset felt suddenly unsafe.
“Get OUT!!!”
The word was not just screamed, and not just heard. It was struck. Sunset felt it slam into her entire being with such force that everything else was blocked out for a moment, nothing existing but the word smashing her aside. Even when it ended, it echoed all around inside her, and she tumbled backwards through darkness. It knocked her fully out of consciousness, and the world slipped away.
Sunset woke up, slowly at first but then with extreme urgency as her recent memories replayed themselves.
She was lying down. On concrete, from the feel of it. Her head hurt, but not as badly as she'd expected. She began to sit up, reaching up to touch her face. Her hands encountered an obstacle — for some reason, she was wearing glasses. She pulled them off, frowning and wondering who had put them there. She looked around.
Everything was really blurry, but she was pretty sure she was lying on the ground in front of Canterlot High, just in front of the steps, even if the ground was painted a patchwork of glaring neon colours. There were some blurry shapes starting to move that could be her friends…
She sat up, rubbing her eyes with her other hand, and squinting. It didn't seem to help much. Then she noticed — her hand was purple. A familiar, lavender-purple. She looked down at the glasses with trepidly dawning realisation, and placed them back on her face.
The world slid back into focus, barring a smudge she'd left on the right lense. Harmony was gone. The ground was multi-coloured. The bushes had an assortment of unnatural-looking flowers. There didn't seem to be any immediate danger. She looked down at “her” body. Then she looked a cross the courtyard, at her body, which was starting to move, quite without her direction.
At this point, Rarity ran into Sunset's field of view, stopping right in front of one of the bullies, who was seemingly just waking up. Rarity stood, angrily glaring down, legs set wide and hands on hips in what struck Sunset as a very uncharacteristically masculine pose.
“Hey!” yelled Rarity, “What do you jerks think you're playing at? I oughta kick your butt!”
Sunset squinted, then hazarded a guess. “Rainbow Dash?”
Rarity jerked her head around. “Yeah, Twi?”
Across the courtyard, someone screamed. Sunset turned her head to see Applejack, staring down in horror at her own clothing and fanning herself with one hand.
“Applejack?” asked Rarity.
Applejack seemed not to notice, but then caught a glimpse of Rarity and executed a perfect double-take. “Gah,” she said, starting with eyes wide at her friend, “ga-aah. B-buh. Whu? Hu, yuh? Aah?”
“Rarity,” Sunset intervened, directing her comments to Applejack and raising her hands placatingly, “it's okay, just stay calm.”
Across the road, raucous laughter burst out. Pinkie Pie was standing, looking perplexed, repeatedly touching various parts of her own body, particularly around her eyes. Fluttershy was standing right next to her, doubled over, howling hysterically and pointing at her pink friend as if the confused girl was the most hilarious thing in the world.
Sunset jumped up, bounding up to the top of the steps and spinning around, cupping her hands around her mouth and calling out.
“Everyone! Stay calm and listen!” Wow, she thought, I even sound like her.
“We've been body-swapped!”
The girls gathered around her, both her friends and the two remaining bullies.
“Okay,” she declared, “first we need to figure out who's who. I know this is weird, but please just say yes when I call your name. I'm Sunset Shimmer.” Currently in the body of Twilight Sparkle, she mentally added.
“So… Twilight?”
“Uh, yes?” Pinkie Pie raised a hand uncertainly, touching the other to the bridge of her nose.
“Pinkie Pie.”
“Yepperoni!” exclaimed Fluttershy, bouncing for extra emphasis.
“Fluttershy.”
“Um, here,” whimpered Rainbow Dash, seemingly trying to curl up and hide while standing out in the open.
Sunset stared. Rarity cringed.
“Uh, Rainbow Dash?” Sunset turned to look at Rarity expectantly.
“Yeah,” replied the weary tomboy-turned-fashionista.
“Oh, marvelous,” muttered Applejack.
“Rarity?”
“Yes, darling, I'm here,” replied Applejack, raising one hand.
“Applejack.”
“Yup, looks like I'm you, partner,” replied… Sunset Shimmer.
“This is great!” laughed Pinkie-Fluttershy. “We're all gonna need new names, though.” She pointed at Sunset-Twilight. “You can be Sunlight, 'cause then everyone'll know you're Sunset in Twilight,” she moved on, “Twilight's me, so she can be Twipie, I'll be Pinkieshy, then we have Flutterdash, Rainity, Rarijack, and Appleset. That'll make everything so much less confusing.”
The newly-dubbed Sunlight shook her head, to clear the confusion that came from seeing Fluttershy act so hyper. “Uh, right. And uh, you two?” she directed the question at the two bullies who they had rounded up.
“Um, I think I'm still me,” replied one girl.
“Yeah, me two,” replied the other. “What… what was that? I mean, I know Harm's a total freak, but that's, like…”
“Hey!” exclaimed Rainity, “butt-kicking is still an option here.”
“Oh darling,” interposed Rarijack, “please don't engage in such uncouth behaviour while you're me. Whatever will I do if you run my manicure?”
“Don't worry about that,” proclaimed the first bully, “she looks like a hooker anyway.”
Silence followed as several of the girls stepped back. Rarijack turned to the girl who has spoken with a wide smile, and gripped her own fist in one hand.
“Applejack, dear, you don't mind if I use your body a bit roughly now, do you?”
Appleset coughed, and stepped forward. “Now, uh, Rare? I don't deny these two deserve a whoppin', but I reckon my body's a might bit stronger that you're used to, and I don't reckon you want to overdo it.”
“That's a good point,” interjected Twipie. “Rarijack, do you think maybe you have Applejack's super-strength right now, or do you still have your shields?”
“Wait!” exclaimed Pinkieshy excitedly, “Do you mean I can talk to animals?” and she ran off before anyone could respond.
“Uhh…” began Sunlight, “would you girls mind figuring this out? I think I need to write to—” she had twisted to reach for her satchel, before remembering that it wasn't there. “Oh, right. Um, Applejack? Do you have my journal? It should be in the bag, there.”
Applejack passed the bag across to Sunlight, who opened it and removed the magical journal, opening it so that she could write a message to Princess Twilight back in Equestria.
“So…” resumed Appleset, “how do we…?”
A sudden clap made them jump, each girl starting round to look for the source of the noise, except for Twipie, who was staring intently at the slightly scorched-looking patch of ground a short way in front of her. In one hand, she held a small bag tub of candy sprinkles.
When she realised the other girls present were now looking at her, Twipie's expression became sheepish. “Oh!” she exclaimed, “I, uh, well it looks like I have Pinkie Pie's glucocombustive ability.”
“I KNOW, RIGHT!?”
The words came from across the courtyard, and didn't seem directed at Twipie. Turning to look, the girls saw Pinkieshy apparently engaged in excited conversation with a dalmatian, despite the dog's owner's confusion.
At this point, the front door to the school opened, and Cheerilee stepped out.
“Girls — what is going on out here?”
