Twilight Sparkle and the Chamber of Shipping
Written by TheCrimsonDM
It was another cold, dark night in the outskirts of Equestria’s fragile borders. The ponies were scared, the changeling siege had pinned Canterlot down for nearly three months, and with Canterlot pinned down, it meant that there was nopony to stop the growing threat of raiders roaming the countryside. Yet even in this darkness there was one ray of light. Ever since Cadence’s capture by the changelings Twilight had grown close to her brother again, very close. She turned toward her bed only to see the sleeping form of her big brother lying there. What would her friends think of her if they knew about this? Would it matter? Twilight finally had somepony to keep her warm on these cold nights.
Twilight’s heart was racing as her quill danced across the book. This was the last chapter for the evening. After this she could hide the book, go to bed, and work on it again later. Writing these stories had managed to offer her a safe place to hide in. Twilight looked up and smiled. Her secret desires, dreams, and fantasies could all happen within the frame work of her fanfiction. The best part was that nopony was ever going to know.
With great care she closed the book, wrapped it up into a cloth and rose out of her seat. She left her study behind, and ventured forth with the book floating by her side into the dark castle. It was always so quiet here, even during the day time it was quiet.
Eventually she came to a stop at a series of torches that lined the hallway. The torches themselves all looked familiar. Blue crystal rods with magical blue fire at the end. One of them however was slightly crooked. Which was her fault. After nearly being caught by Rainbow Dash she had managed to pull down on the torch so hard that it almost snapped off. Still it functioned, and Twilight was able to tug on the torch. It went down about three inches and there was a click. The sound of stone grinding against stone defeated the silence as a section of wall slid up into the ceiling.
Twilight walked in and found a table with a mass of candles sitting on top. She lit them all with a single spell and the dim outline of the room showed her she was now standing inside a hidden library. Some of these books were very old, written from when she was twelve. Others were fairly new, like the one still clutched to her side. She found the section on the wall where she had works that were currently in progress and set it down in between a copy of Rainbow’s Massage Mischief and Taste the Rainbow.
She was going through a Rainbow Dash phase again. Next to the completed works was her Celestia shelf. Some of them so taboo that she’d positively die if anypony ever saw them. Still Twilight was secretly proud of her work. It wasn’t easy writing this many stories about ponies after all, and the research she’d had to do, countless nights spying on random ponies, or befriending them so that she could get a better grasp on their personality was rough. But it was worth it. Her position as Princess of Friendship gave her a lot of leeway in doing her research as well.
Twilight left the room she affectionately called her shipping chamber and after closing it decided it was best time for bed. She could continue her work tomorrow. It wasn’t like her stories were going anywhere.
***
It was three in the middle of the night when a horrible crash rang loudly throughout the castle. Twilight nearly jumped out of bed and it took a few moments for her brain to turn on as she simply stared around the dark room trying to spot any danger. The sound of hooves galloping down the hall past her bedroom made her nearly jump again. It took a few seconds to remember she had magic. She ran out into the hallway with an orb of light hanging above her horn like a lantern.
She couldn’t tell where the galloping had come from, and since she was only halfway awake she wasn’t sure what direction they had gone. It was quiet again, but there was a distinct smell of smoke coming from somewhere to her left. For a moment she tried to figure out what it was that was burning, certainly not a wood smoke, no it was more like burning… paper.
With great speed she took off flying down the hallway. She twisted and turned as she tracked down the scent. It got stronger the further she got away from her personal library. There may have been books scattered across the house but she couldn’t fathom how such a strong smell could be created without at least a good portion of her books on fire.
When she turned the last hallway she saw dropped from the air and landed onto the hall stomach first. Starlight Glimmer stood in front of a gaping hole in the wall. Bricks scattered the floor of the next room through the hole. Books were thrown about, a few of them were burned, actually a lot of them were but it looked like Starlight was busy repairing the damage with her magic. Of course she was also reading three of the books at the same time as fixing the others. This would have been fine, impressive even, if not for one very important fact.
This was her Shipping Chamber.
“S-S-Starlight! What are you doing?” Twilight stammered as she pushed herself up.
Starlight didn’t look away from her reading material. “Oh, hello, Twilight.”
“S-stop that this instance, those books are private!”
“They seem to be about me, of all ponies. Don’t I have a right to read a book about me?”
Twilight stomped her hoof. “No! Those are not to be read, not ever, by anypony-“
“Except you?” the three books shut simultaneously creating a loud sound that rang through the hallway. Starlight shot a glare at Twilight. “Are you serious? What is this to you? Some kind of sick fantasy room that you use to get off?”
Twilight shook her head. “Only a few of them are actually erotic.”
“That doesn’t make it better!” Starlight waved a red book in the air, the title of which was, Brainwashed and Loving It. “What in Celestia’s name is this?”
“I… wrote that after our first meeting.”
“And?”
“Um…”
“Do you have a crush on me or something? Or, does Fluttershy more likely? This book is about me and her after all.”
Twilight pawed the crystal floor and looked down at her own reflection shining through it. “I do not have a crush on you. I just… write stuff like that. About… everypony.”
“You have a story in here about Maud falling in love with a rock named Tom and Rarity gets jealous in the story…. A freaking rock.”
“Um, I can explain. Tom was a rock that Rarity thought was a diamond when she was corrupted by-“
“TWILIGHT!” Starlight snapped, her voice was filled with anger. “This is weird, disgusting, and most importantly it’s wrong. Does anypony else even know about this?”
Twilight took a step back. “Of course not! How could I ever tell them. They would hate me.”
“So you keep writing in secret, even knowing how they would feel?”
Twilight shivered. “I need to do this. It… helps me calm down. I didn’t plan on sharing them with anypony, not ever. Their just stories.”
“Stories about your friends, their lives, and their supposed secrets. I don’t know if even half of what’s in this book about Fluttershy is true, but if it is… These are not things you write down. It would hurt your friends feelings to know you objectified them like this without their consent.”
Twilight blinked. “Wait… shouldn’t I be giving you this advice?”
Starlight’s cheeks went pink and she looked away. “I… might have just learned that lesson myself… from your book about me and Fluttershy…”
“Oh, yeah, she did turn you into a good pony by the end. It was super romantic and sweet.”
Starlight’s frown deepened. “You need to tell your friends and apologize.”
“But they might not like me?”
“At worst they’ll be upset, and ask you to get rid of the books.”
Twilight’s eyes popped out of her skull. “G-g-get rid of books? Are you joking? This is literature, secret, sometimes smutty, but literature none the less. You do not get rid of knowledge.”
Starlight rolled her eyes. “Well you don’t have worry about at least five of the books.”
“Why? Did they burn?” Twilight asked. Then she remembered that there was a smoldering hole in her wall. “What happened here anyway?”
“I have been teaching Trixie a few… spells. I was teaching her how to use a shield and might have gotten a little carried away. She saw the books, read a few of them, found the ones with her in them and ran away. I assume she’s going to burn them and pretend that you never had even a passing interest in her.”
Twilight looked away shamefully. “I am not getting those back am I?”
“Not likely.”
Twilight sucked in a quick breath. “Please don’t tell anypony about this. I… I won’t write them anymore. I promise. But please don’t tell anypony.”
Starlight gave Twilight a long and hard stare. Moments went by with painful silence. At length Starlight said, “So long as you stop writing them without consent then I won’t tell anypony.”
Twilight nodded. Bit her lip and then added. “It’s not any worse than when ponies write stories about celebrities. Like Princess Celestia.”
“It is when they are your friends. and you are using their real names.”
Twilight nodded. “I guess so…”
“Come on,” Starlight said as she picked up another damaged book. “We can fix this mess together if you want.”
Twilight offered a weak smile. “Okay. I can do that.”
***
The next day came by and the morning proceeded without incident. Starlight kept true to her word and didn’t tell anypony. Instead she and Twilight worked on practicing their magical spells all morning. It wasn’t until the afternoon that five very familiar friends showed up at Twilight’s doorstep and asked to meet both her and Starlight in the map room.
Twilight entered the room only after everypony had found a place to sit already. They were all looking at one another, passing looks that Twilight could only understand as meaning trouble. It wasn’t until Twilight took a seat with Starlight standing next to her that Rarity pulled out a book from her bag and set it on the table. Twilight’s face whitened at the sight.
It was a slightly faded book, ruffled and old. It was brown leather, and had a gold softly glowing title. The book read, “Friendship is Romance, by Twilight Sparkle.”
“So,” Rarity began. “Have you ever seen this book before?”
Twilight blinked, looked over at Starlight and asked, “How?”
Starlight cringed. “That’s one of the books Trixie took. I guess because it didn’t star her she didn’t burn it.”
Rarity’s voice returned with a quiet power that demanded Twilight’s full and undivided attention. “So it would seem that you did know. Is there anything you’d like to say before we begin this discussion in earnest?”
It was like somepony had dumped a bucket of ice cold water all over Twilight’s back with how much she was shaking in her seat. She was beyond terrified. It would be easier to face a dozen Tireks at full power then face her friends. They were never supposed to see any of those books. Now because of Trixie, they’d not only seen it, they were about to rip her into a thousand tiny pieces for what she’d done.
She was already a dead mare, so she might as well be honest. “I’m sorry.”
Rarity gave Twilight a small frown. “Sorry?”
“Yes,” Twilight agreed. “I’m sorry that I wrote that story about you girls. Nopony was ever supposed to see it, you understand. It was a secret. For my eyes only.”
Rarity stared down at it. “Well I’m glad you apologized but it doesn’t explain much does it?”
Applejack had her legs crossed over her chest and she was drilling holes into Twilight’s skull with her eyes. She didn’t speak, probably for fear of saying something harsh. Rainbow Dash had her wings pressed tightly against her sides, and was sneaking quick peaks over at Fluttershy every so often. Fluttershy’s face was hidden behind her mane but Twilight could see just enough of her cheeks to see how red they were. Finally there was Pinkie Pie, who had already picked up the book and was reading it while they were talking.
“Pinkie,” Rarity said calmly. “Put that thing down, we are in the middle of a discussion here.”
“No way,” Pinkie replied. “This is just way too juicy.”
“I understand, it was difficult for me to set it aside as well, but I did so out of respect for our more sensitive friends.”
Pinkie blew a raspberry. “We have Rainbow Dash and Fluttershy making out, Applejack and you having sex in Twilight’s spare bed during the sleepover, and me and Twilight having threesomes with pretty much every member of my family. This, is, awesome!”
Fluttershy squeaked.
Rainbow Dash seemed to interpret that. “Fluttershy and me are not okay with this Twilight. First of all, I do not cry after having sex, especially not to reveal secret feelings to the pony I am with. I have also never had my heart ripped out. If you must know I don’t do touchy feely stuff because it’s dumb.”
“That was rather calm and pointed of you Rainbow,” Rarity said appreciating.
Rainbow Dash then punched her hoof into her other hoof. “But don’t get me wrong; I can forgive you for writing dumb crap about me. My fans do that all the time. Don’t get me started on all the stuff that Scootaloo’s drawn about me. Apparently it’s called yuri or something dumb like that.” She popped the bones in her neck. “But for what you wrote about Fluttershy. I could beat you senseless right now if I hadn’t sworn to Rarity that I would keep my hooves, and teeth, from harming you.”
An image of Rainbow Dash pouncing cat like, sinking her teeth into Twilight’s flesh while kicking the crap out of her guts with her legs came to mind. It made Twilight want to cry.
“Now, now, Rainbow,” Rarity said. “Threatening Twilight won’t fix the problem.” Rarity turned to face Twilight once more. “Would you care to explain what drove you to write this?”
Twilight shook her head.
“Darling, if you don’t talk to us, we may assume things and it could hurt our relationship. Please just talk to us.”
Twilight let out a quiet sigh. “I just like to write stories about the ponies I know. I always have. I tried not to write them about you five at first… then I allowed myself to bend the rules and do some research into how compatible any of us were to one another for romantic partnering. I even have a shipping chart laid out. Fluttershy and you would make a lovely couple, Rarity.”
Rarity’s cheeks grew a little pink. “Oh my, t-thank you. I think.”
Twilight laid her head face down on the map. “Then I started to outline ideas on how to get all of you hooked up, just in case I wanted to pursue that... Then I turned those outlines into stories. Those stories became books, those books piled up, and now your all right here, judging me, hating me, and about to end our friendship because I like to make up stories about you. I wasn’t going to share them, not ever!”
“Darling, you were really trying to set us up? That sounds more like something I would have done.”
Twilight shook her head. “No, I mean, I thought about it, but I wasn’t actually going to do it. I have plans for everything. This just seemed natural.”
“Okay, then you wrote this book,” Rarity provided.
“Yes.”
“I suppose I can understand where you came from with it,” Rarity said. “And although I love reading about my own personal drama, real or otherwise, you need to realize that most of us are not keen on the idea.”
Applejack finally spoke up. “She said books.”
Rarity blinked, looked back and asked, “What are you talking about?”
Applejack was still looking as bitter as ever. “She said she wrote books about us. As in more than this one.”
Rarity slowly looked back at Twilight. “Is, is this true?”
“I… a few?” Twilight admitted.
Starlight kicked her in the leg. “Tell them the truth.”
“A lot.”
“W-where are they?” Rarity asked.
“In my Shipping Chamber. It’s a secret library.”
Rarity bit her lower lip. “Oh, that sounds… troubling. Might we take a peek?”
Reluctantly Twilight pushed away from the map and went about walking the group upstairs. Starlight split off halfway there, saying she needed to look into something. Twilight didn’t argue, she was already six feet in the grave, now she just needed to bury herself. When they reached the wall and Twilight revealed the secret door the group all shared a collective gasp.
The group all entered the dark room slowly. Twilight lit the mass of candles in the center and waited. The group took their sweet time to go around looking at the different shelves, stories, sections and sub sections. Finally when they were done they all looked to Twilight for some kind of explanation.
Twilight didn’t have any.
“H-how many books?” Applejack asked. Her anger had been completely replaced by shock.
“Four hundred and sixty two. I am currently working on three more,” Twilight explained.
“All of these are romance?” Rainbow Dash asked. She picked up one that had a picture of herself on the cover and opened it up to a random page. A few seconds later her wings sprung out slapping Applejack in the face.
“Watch what yer doing with those things,” Applejack complained.
Fluttershy had several on her back. From the titles Twilight could see they were all about Fluttershy and various unicorns. She gave a silent stare at Twilight, looked at the open doorway, back to Twilight, and finally took off in a mad dash with the books on her back, her face a deep shade of crimson.
Twilight lowered her head. “There goes more of my books to the incendiary.”
Rainbow Dash blinked. “Hey, can I borrow this one?”
Twilight looked up at her. “What?”
“Can I borrow it? For like… tonight? I’ll give it back tomorrow, clean too, I promise.”
Twilight’s mouth worked silently as she tried desperately to figure out what she was trying to say. Rainbow Dash took that as a confirmation as she jumped into the air and flew off down the hall after Fluttershy. Applejack kept glancing back toward a particularly naughty book of Twilight’s. Rarity and Pinkie had already opened up other books and were discussing the material in each one.
Twilight couldn’t believe it. First Trixie stole her books, then Fluttershy, and now Rainbow Dash was borrowing one and that left Pinkie and Rarity who seemed more interested in the content then in punishing Twilight. However Twilight thought today was going to go, this was not it. Even Starlight decided to keep some of the books.
“Well, Twilight,” Applejack finally said. She grabbed a book off the shelf. “Ah’m going to confiscate this from you.”
It was a copy of, “Apples are Forever.” An incest story about Applejack and Big Mac.
“Do you know what that is?” Twilight asked.
“Figured the title said enough, yer not getting it back. It’s too dirty fer you.” Applejack walked out the door and left Twilight behind.
“Twilight,” Rarity said after finally finishing her conversation with Pinkie Pie. “Why haven’t you gone into erotic writing before? This is fantastic work! Just if you publish anything don’t use our real names.”
Twilight gave her a blank stare. “Aren’t you mad at me?”
Rarity looked as though confused by the very notion. “Oh, that? Well it was a bit awkward at first, but now I must admit that I will need you to loan me a few of these for reading purposes. Perhaps I can even get one of my editor friends to come down and speak to you? How would you like writing for Mischievous Mare Inc?”
Twilight had no idea what that was. Yet as long as Rarity wasn’t mad she was okay with it. As for Pinkie Pie she had a collection of books she was likely to take, or borrow herself. None of them had anything to do with Pinkie Pie herself.
“Um, Pinkie, what a-“ Twilight began asking.
Pinkie flashed a devilish grin. “I’m going to jerk off to these later. I really like this one about Fluttershy and Luna.”
Twilight blinked. “I, but, wait, you’re going to what?”
Rarity led Pinkie out of the room and down the hall leaving Twilight completely dumbfounded as she sat there. Several long minutes went by before the sounds of hooves coming her way brought her back to her senses. Finally a pony that wasn’t completely insane.
Twilight poked her head out of the door and saw Trixie holding a bag of very familiar books. “Um, Twilight.”
Twilight let out a sigh. Finally somepony to rip her to shreds, one that even brought the evidence with them. “Yes, Trixie.”
“Trixie apologizes for borrowing your books without permission. She was just… obsessed. She wants to return them now, much like she tried to do earlier only this time in person because she fears that you wouldn’t accept a request via proxy.”
Twilight blinked.
“May Trixie borrow some more books?”
Twilight walked away.
“Um, Twlight, Trixie asked a question.”
Twilight grumbled something that could be interrupted as, ‘do whatever you like, I’m going to sleep.’ She went straight to her bedroom. Crashed on her bed and closed her eyes. She was done with today.
The End
