"Spike?" Twilight's muffled voice came from behind the door, followed by a few brisk knocks. "Spike, you in there?"

"Yeah, Gadget too. Something up?"

The doorknob rattled a little, coinciding with a groan of frustration before Twilight opened the door. She eyed her assistant, withdrawing her teeth from the doorknob as she cleared her throat. "Yes. Something's very up, to put it simply. I think you can guess why I opened the door the way I did."

"You suddenly took a liking to the flavor of brass?" Spike lifted his brow with a smirk.

"Now's not the time for jokes, Spike."

"Sorry."

Twilight glanced at Gadget. "Just to confirm before I say anything more, do you feel any different?"

Gadget slowly shook her head, still sucking from the juice box in her hooves.

Twilight pursed her lips before letting out a sigh. "Regardless of how it may or may not impact others, this morning I woke up without any access to my magic. It's like it just... I guess, vanished, for lack of a better explanation."

"Maybe you bonked your horn on something?" Gadget pulled the juice box away. She gave the empty container a light shake before returning her attention to Twilight. "Ooh, or maybe you caught a cold or something! Sometimes when I'm sick I feel achy and weak all over."

"Gadget."

"Yeah?"

Twilight stepped past Spike, crouching down beside her. "How are you..." she tilted her head with a frown, inspecting the juice box in Gadget's hoof. "Gadget, can you drop the juice box and pick it up again with your hooves?"

"Ooo...kay?" Gadget did as she was told. The juice box clattered to the floor, only for her to effortlessly pick it up again. "What, can you not even grip stuff with your hooves?"

Twilight shook her head.

"Weird."

"Weird indeed," Twilight offered her hoof. "Can I try?"

Gadget handed (hoofed?) over the juice box. Just as expected, Twilight held it without issue.

"I--whuh?" Twilight pulled back, juice box still in her grasp. She looked between her hoof and Gadget. "I've been trying all morning to pick things up. Give me a moment--" she set the container on the floor and fled the room.

"Usual Twilight morning, you think?" Spike elbowed Gadget. "Or do you think something's actually up?"

Gadget shrugged. "I mean, this is Twilight we're talking about. Usually if she's freaking out about something then there's a good reason why. She said something about not being able to use her magic, so..."

She focused on the juice box in front of her, feeling for that flow of energy to envelop her horn and connect with her target.

Nothing came.

Maybe it was a fluke? She tried concentrating harder, though that creeping feeling surrounding Twilight's words continued to echo in her mind.

Nothing happened.

"Huh," she picked up the juice box in her hooves again. "So I guess magic is kinda wonky right now."

Twilight rushed back in. "Alright, I just tried grabbing multiple items across a range of shapes, sizes, and weights, and all I could reliably pick up and hold were juice boxes. Gadget, you mind coming with me?"

"I'll be in here if you need me," Spike waved the two off without a glance, his face already hidden in a comic.

"Open the fridge."

Gadget opened the refrigerator door, staring back at Twilight with furrowed brows.

"Ooo-kay," Twilight pushed the door shut. "Couldn't get a proper grip to do that myself earlier without having to wrap my hoof around the handle. Can you try grabbing an orange out of the fruit basket now? I wasn't able to myself."

Gadget paced across the kitchen to the fruit basket and reached for an orange. Yet, for whatever reason, it seemed as if the surface of the orange was... slippery? Kind of like a wet bar of soap. She pushed it aside and instead pulled a banana from the basket.

"Alright, I think I'm starting to get a bit of an idea of what's happening," Twilight rubbed her chin. "Close your eyes. I want to try something. Hold out your hooves over the countertop."

Gadget shut her eyes and lifted her hooves.

"Okay," Twilight's voice began, "I've rolled two fruits under your hooves. Mix them up first when I say so. One of them I could pick up, and the other I couldn't. I won't say which is which, and whatever fruit it is that you can't pick up, I want you to keep trying to pick it up until we open our eyes. Ready?"

Gadget nodded.

"Alright, my eyes are closed. Feel free to shuffle the fruits. Let me know when you've picked up one of them."

Gadget nudged the two fruits around. Both of them felt about the same in shape and texture as she rolled them around, though... she picked up the fruit under her left hoof by its stem without issue. The one on the right, comparatively, had seemingly transformed into a slippery sphere that she couldn't quite get a grip on. Still, this was what she'd been told to expect.

"Ready."

"Alright, open your eyes."

Gadget did exactly that, peering down now at the two...

Apples.

"I thought you said that you couldn't pick one of them up," Gadget lifted the second apple with ease now. "Weren't they going to be two different fruits?"

"Nope. They were the same fruit the entire time, and I in fact lied. I couldn't pick up either apple. You wanna know what I'm thinking?"

Gadget felt both apples begin to slip a little at the mention of her mentor being unable to lift either fruit. "What?"

"Magic seems to be very, if not entirely, perception-based now. You felt those apples slip a little just now, didn't you?"

"...Yeah."

"Let's repeat the experiment, except this time I'm not going to close my eyes. I want you to tell me if it's easier or harder to pick up the fruits. Both of these fruits are ones that I could pick up."

"Is that another lie?"

"No."

Gadget gave a small nod, returning the apples to the table and closing her eyes. She heard Twilight fiddling with the fruit basket again before two quiet thumps marked the placement of the new fruits.

"Okay."

She reached down and shuffled the fruits. Their textures were noticeably different this time, as was their shape. Yet, when she attempted to pick them up, she could feel their rougher exteriors slide past her hooves in a way that they definitely shouldn't have. Still, with some effort, she picked both of them up.

"Alright, open your eyes."

Gadget opened her eyes. Dangling in each hoof was a persimmon.

"Did you find it easier or harder to pick these up?" Twilight cocked her head.

"A... little harder," Gadget placed the fruits back on the table. If magic was based on perception now, then was Twilight's watching or not watching of what was happening affect things?

"Alrighty, so to begin, sorry, I had to lie again to hopefully keep you from doubting what I was saying. I couldn't pick up either of those persimmons either. I knew this, but I take it that you trusted my word when I said that I could pick them up?"

Gadget gave a slow nod. She also made a mental note that Twilight was excellent at gaslighting in monotone and shouldn't necessarily be trusted if she were to be part of another one of Twilight's experiments.

"Again, apologies. Had to do it for the sake of the experiment. But I believe that what we've just done is strengthening my suspicions about this whole 'perception' basis that magic, or at least the innate magic that lets us pick stuff up with our hooves, apparently operates on. That first time, I couldn't see what you were doing, and until you were done I did everything I could to not even think about the experiment by purposely getting a song stuck in my head. That way, I could isolate my own perception from yours as much as possible. And then, for the second run, you mentioned that it felt a little harder, right?"

"Yeah."

"Can you describe how?"

"Well," Gadget rolled one of the persimmons around on the countertop. "I could feel their dried stems on top, but at the same time, it felt weirdly slippery given the roughness."

"I can't say for certain," Twilight reached for the other persimmon and picked it up herself--after accidentally dropping it a couple of times. "But, I think in that case, our shared preconceptions of what would happen--that is, you expecting to be able to pick them up without issue, and my own personal experience in being unable to do so, may have averaged out."

Author's Note

~~it's almost 2 am I'm heading to bed now. part 2 in PE#9: "What if magic now drew energy from a newly-discovered energy field?" maybe~~