The day I lost my mind

by Aether Spark

Rating: everyone
Tags: Spike, Comedy, Discord, Twilight Sparkle, Main 6, My Little Pony: Friendship is Magic
Length: 27064

Twilight tries to surpass her previous success against Tirek through a rare spell-book. But her plan to gain access to the lost knowledge backfires in the worst yet funniest way possible.

It’s been a few months since Tirek’s defeat.

Peace reigns over the land. So why does Twilight feel so unaccomplished? Has she completed her studies? Is there nowhere else to go to expand her knowledge? Has she reached her limit?

The worry she won't amount to anything more has left Twilight in a tizzy.

Then Twilight comes across a hidden archive, and she finds a rare spell-book that could push her intelligence to its limit, or destroy it.

[I don’t own the show MLP]

[It's thanks to Crimson Arrow and the support of others this was possible, thanks]

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(4/3/2020) : this story is undergoing a few edits.

Published 2018-10-13 17:40:01 UTC
Last updated 2019-07-13 22:20:40 UTC

Mistakes were made

Spike was stressed from the earlier shenanigans, after calming Twilight down he went to read some comic books while Twilight took a walk to cool off. She didn’t come home until late, but Spike was already asleep, so he didn’t see the giddy look on Twilight's face when she came racing in.

“Mmmhh…. Sure Rarity… I’ll marry you…” *snore*

As Spike was dreaming of romance with Rarity and his hero persona, He barely heard the sounds of an eager unicorn gathering materials out of their bedroom before rushing out to start setting up for a spell downstairs.

---meanwhile downstairs---

Twilight was getting all of her necessary materials together. She couldn’t believe her luck! The spell she found was going to help give her the wisdom needed to master the spells of Starswirl’s tome as well as fill in the blanks the book has.

---1 hour prior---

Twilight finally returned home and sat solemnly on her chair glancing over at the book before bowing her head in shame.

“I’m the student of magic, and I can’t master this spellbook due to 'lack of experience'… I’m an alicorn now! Shouldn’t I be powerful enough!?.... I thought I was worthy, but if I’m an alicorn and can’t master a type of magic then… are my goals- NO! this is just a minor setback! I'll try… studying some other subjects for now and see if it’ll help me get focused again…yeah…” Twilight finished with clear misery.

Twilight went downstairs to her new hidden archives where she found Starswirls legendary spellbook and skimmed the racks for anything to take her mind off of her woes.

“Hmm… there are more rare books here, let’s see if any of them can take my mind off of… well, that book…” Twilight mused

“Ancient gardening arrangements… no, I don’t even have a garden… how to train your…. No, Spike wouldn’t appreciate the reference, the Aether and how you can use it to clean your kitchen? How bizarre… next up is “Spells for struggling scholars”?... hmm Nah I’d-.” suddenly Twilight paused and grabbed the dusty green book with her magic.

“Spells for struggling scholars? A guide to getting ahead when you hit a snag? Huh… how convenient, I’ll read it I suppose”. Twilight sat on the ground and lit a candle and began looking through the pages as she looked through the passages however she was mostly unimpressed at what she’s seeing. It looked more like a cheat sheet, and she may not be the element of honesty, but she wasn’t crude enough to exploit her luck like this, as she was about to close it, however, she spotted something.

“Huh? What’s this?” upon close examination it was revealed to be a passage speaking of a ritual that involves temporarily filling one’s mind with selected knowledge in a simplified and listed way to help center one’s thoughts and allow one to take notes of said information to help them catch up later when it wears off.

Twilight skimmed the page thoroughly, and her expression was joyous. “A thought boosting spell??... It sounds sketchy but… It might work! I have to gather some materials! Starswirl I’ll master your most prized tome yet!" Twilight said reenergized by this discovery.

With renewed vigor Twilight quickly memorized the spell and put the book down and then ran off to prep for the spell as the book laid there.

In her haste, she forgot to check for warnings… specifically the warning on the back of the book that bore a single message

Warning:
Please do NOT use the spells listed in this book without clearance/assistance from the Royals, highly experienced magic users or higher powers as they are dangerous and difficult to control! If done incorrectly it could lead to death, damage or mind loss.

----now----

Twilight had eagerly gathered the necessary candles, drawn the symbols on the ground with chalk and [just for precaution] moved the closest books downstairs as the spell could be dangerous to the current surroundings…

‘I’m not going to risk any more books after what Tirek did.’ Twilight thought to herself as she carried the last few books from the surrounding shelves downstairs.

Twilight set up a pedestal with a large emerald surrounded by smaller emeralds and using her photographic memory looked back at what she read.

“I wonder if I should have brought it up with me… no! I have this memorized! I can do this! An avid student of magic should be able to remember complex spells even if it was a skim… right?” Twilight hesitated but shook her head clearing the doubts, she was ready to take the next step, and this was a stepping stone to that.

She then glanced at the emeralds making sure their properly arranged “I sure hope Spike is ok with me borrowing his lunch” Twilight said as she adjusted them with her magic.

She then set Starswirl’s spellbook in the center of the circle of runes, just in front of the pedestal mentally reviewed one more time and stood in a runic circle and lowered her head to the book and lit her horn, focusing she pictured the tome in her head.

“Ok… focus on the knowledge you wish to obtain.” Twilight picture a random one of the spells and their complicated intricacies and blanks

“Ok good, now imagine yourself casting it…” she focused harder and saw the spell she intended being cast “I’m almost there! Now I need to project the image onto the crystals.” Twilight whispered softly

She focused the thought into her magic and projected it onto the emerald an image flashed on the emerald. “Now hold for…. 20 seconds?… No wait, maybe it was 10?... darnit Twilight! This isn’t the time to lose focus!” surely enough the image grew foggy as her focus wavered, she gasped and focused intently, and the image cleared having to guess what the time of waiting was she held the magic for 30 seconds

‘Better safe than sorry, right?’ she thought hesitantly. As she did this the emerald began to grow hot as the magic in it was becoming slightly unstable from the extended containment in the vessel and upon realizing this Twilight braced herself for the knowledge intake.

“Sure hope this works.” She released the magic, and it unexpectedly exploded out in what seemed to be a yellow-ish stream of magic that flowed into her head causing her to instinctively take a step back as though she had been struck.

Twilights eyes went wide as a peculiar sensation overcame her “Whoa! I-is it working?” Twilight said nervously

Surely but slowly the images of the instructions simplified in a much less bizarre way we’re filling her mind, she began to feel the knowledge that she couldn’t see through the books age smears filling her mind and she laughed with triumph.

“Yes!” Twilight laughed “it’s working! I can feel new knowledge seeping in! Now I need to note it down, allocate the ingredients and draw out the circles and then I’ll be able to-” suddenly the stream began to pause and the information slowed to a crawl, and she paused in her speaking.

“Huh? What’s happening? The transfer can’t be complete already. I mean the image it was projecting doesn’t look-“ suddenly the information stream began to recede instead of flow forward and the image in Twilight's mind quickly faded.

“What the? Where did the image go? This wasn’t stated in the book.” Twilight sighed and prepared to try the spell again when suddenly she found she couldn’t leave the circle she was in. And not only that the stream continued to pour from her head which caught Twilight's attention.

“Huh? W-what’s going on? It should have finished receding by now!” she noticed something else the information regarding the spell itself began to leave her as well, and a fog began to enter her mind.

“Th-this isn’t right… it should have ended by now!” the information continued to flow and as it continued Twilight began forgetting other spells as well, and she felt as though she couldn’t think straight anymore. Idea’s and thoughts began to go quiet in Twilight's head.

At this point, the alicorn began to realize what was happening.

“No… I-it’s absorbing my thoughts!...ngh!…” Twilight grunted as an unbearable headache began moving through her head and she puts her hooves to her head trying to will it to stop, but the stream only grew in size as Twilights thoughts left her. She tried to summon her magic to stop it, but she couldn’t summon up the concentration. So she attempted to crawl over to manually interfere but was still unable to leave the circle, already years of experience were dwindling away.

“Agh!….Spike… Spike!....” Twilight moaned in mental agony, she focused with all her willpower and used her royal Canterlot voice “SPIIIIIIIKE!” she called out and then collapsed.

---In dreamland---

Spike the brave has just vanquished the horde of 10,000 zombie ponies, and he is standing atop the pile of dead undead’s, sword in hand and the damsel standing before her hero showering him with thankfulness.

“Oh Spike the brave! I commend you for rescuing me from those awful zombies! My hero!” the white-coated princess Rarity leaned in “I wish to reward you, my valiant knight…”

“Very well my princess, might it be a kiss?” Spike the brave inquired

“Something even better my prince…” she leaned in closer and just as Spike the brave was about to make a second guess she suddenly screamed in a loud voice that sounded like Twilight right into his ear.

“SPIIIIIIIKE!”

“GYAH!” Spike the brave shouted in surprise

---real world---

“GYAH!” Spike the dragon yelped jumping out of bed and onto the hard ground.

“Ow!… What the heck Twilight?! I-” Spike only then notices Twilight isn’t around.

“Twilight?” Spike asked before suddenly he heard crashing noises downstairs, and he realized that the voice came from downstairs as well. “oh no… TWILIGHT!” Spike leaped from his position on the floor and ran down the halls.

By the time he got downstairs and into the library room he saw a weak and pained Twilight struggling to stand back up and only succeeding in raising her front end, and a strange yellow stream was flowing out of her head and into a gem.

“Twilight!?” Spike screamed in shock “wh-what’s happening!?”

“Spike?…” Twilight replied weakly “T-the spell… it’s…it’s gone horribly wrong… I’m- I’m losing everything…. I-I can’t remember…agh!... help… me…” Twilight groaned as the stream seemed to speed up and grow larger. Spike moved to get the gem off the pedestal in hopes it would help, but Twilight quickly stopped him by shouting briefly

“S-STOP! If you get… too close it might hurt you!...” Twilight managed to croak out, sure enough, the gem was giving off electricity.

“W-WHAT DO I DO THEN!?” Spike began to panic

“T-there’s a book…. It can fix this!... It’s called……. It’s called…” a look of confusion crossed Twilight’s face.

“Called what?” Spike demanded

“I don’t remember... I-it’s taking all of my other memories too!” Twilight said looking even more fearful than before.

“Then what else!? What color was it!? How thick was it?! What page!? Twilight, please answer!” Spike said growing more desperate

“The-…ngh!.... the c-color was!…. th- the color was… um… the book was thick! N-no it was… medium?......grr!...it was medium I think! And…and…” the stream seemed to grow larger and become even faster like a final burst, as it did Twilights eyes became more vacant and glazed over.

“I think…the….page was…one hundred and…..one hundred and…… hundred and……hun…dred…a..nd…….…..a…n…..d….” the stream began to shrink and slow to a trickle. Twilights eyes began drifting in two different directions becoming wall-eyed, and her mouth slowly hung open.

“Twilight?” Spike nervously looked at Twilights vacant expression

“…uuuuhhh...” she droned, the stream broke off and flowed into the emerald and the green emerald became a purple-colored crystal. A line of drool left Twilights mouth, and she groaned weakly as her eyes became half-lidded and she proceeded to sway a little before passing out on the ground in front of Spike who immediately ran to her side and shook her.

“Twilight? TWILIGHT! Wake up! Please! TWILIGHT!” Spike exclaimed as he shook her.

Author's Note

Finally! :pinkiehappy:

It took me long enough to get this posted, but now it’s finally out!

Be sure to like and comment and tune in for the next chapter! :raritywink:

And feel free to critique my freshly redone story It’ll help me improve and give you more good material. :twilightsmile:

anyways see ya! :rainbowdetermined2:

Off her rocker

Spike was careful yet struggling in carrying Twilight up the stairs to her bed due to her being bigger than him made extra difficult ever since she got wings… after laying her in bed and making sure she’s ok, he went ahead and cleaned up the downstairs to pass the time and hopefully give him a chance to put two and two together.

“What happened to her? I-I came downstairs, and it looked AND sounded like it was stealing her memories… maybe something else too… I hope she’s alright.”

After cleaning the mess up, Spike went upstairs to see if Twilight was ok, he found her still passed out, and he decided to sit by the bed and waited for her to hopefully wake up.

“Please be ok Twilight…” Spike whispered

---Meanwhile at the boutique---

“Is everything gathered dears?” Rarity asked as she finished picking out her favorite tea time casual attire consisting of a yellow sundress and sun hat.

‘It is quite sunny after all!’ Rarity mentally sang.

“Sure,” Rainbow Dash said halfheartedly gathering up the stuff for ‘possible pampering time later’ “I don’t know why you think I need to participate in ‘grooming activities’ I’m not even into getting all dolled up.” Rainbow Dash said sarcastically.

“One must always come prepared darling, and you're joining whether you like or not” Rarity tittered Rainbow just rolled her eyes “did you grab the confections just in case we become hungry?” Rarity asked.

“Yeah sure give me a sec.” Rainbow Dash went over to the fridge and opened it expecting to find the stuff they needed for food… instead, she saw a pink pony wearing a winter jacket sitting in the fridge holding a sign with a troll face on it.

“Hi-“ Rainbow slammed the door in surprise before opening it up, and Pinkie was gone, Rainbow sighed giving a knowing expression and waited for Pinkie to pop up behind-

“HI RAINBOW DASH!” Pinkie squealed from above her.

“GAAH!” Rainbow Dash yelped jumping back in a defensive posture and saw Pinkie laughing on top of the fridge.

“The heck? Weren’t you going to appear behind me like always?” Rainbow Dash said equally confused and annoyed, relaxing her stance.

“I waaaas, but then I saw the author type that I was going to appear behind you, so I surprised you both by appearing above you!” Pinkie giggled.

The author's eye twitched in frustration at the 4th wall breaking pink earth pony.

“Ugh… well, anyways I assume you also somehow knew we needed food?” Dash said with a grin

“Yup!” Pinkie grinned showing off the basket she just pulled out of her mane.

“How’d things go with asking Applejack?” Rainbow Dash said while taking the basket and putting it on the counter.

“Not good, she said she’s ‘too busy with this year’s harvest’ to join…” Pinkie pouted

“That’s great…” Dash frowned “what about Fluttershy?”

“Angel scraped his knee, so she’s staying behind to care for him… oh! Oh! However, I also heard that the ferrets at Fluttershy’s cottage were having babies!” Pinkie chirped.

“Uh-huh, cool, well then, HEY Rarity! It seems we’re the only ones who’re gonna go to go see Twilight.” Dash said bluntly.

“Oh dear… very well then we’ll make due” Rarity said as she came in with her make-up on.

“Why are you all dressed up?” Dash questioned

“Why? To try out a look, I have been planning,” Rarity said with a raising of her head.

“Testing a new look to see how quickly it’ll make Spike pass out to gauge how effective it’ll be on getting a date for future Gala’s?” Dash guessed.

“No!...yes…” Rarity conceded, and Dash chuckled.

---A half-hour later---

Spike awoke to tired groaning noises and realized he must have fallen asleep at some point, and he also realized Twilight was waking up, he shot to his feet and bolted to Twilights side.

“Twilight!” Spike shouted when he saw she was waking up, as he saw her eyes crack open and found one eye staring at him already.

“Twilight, are you ok? Please speak to me.” Spike pleaded, leaning in a little.

“Ugh…. wha?…” Twilight weakly said.

“Yeah? What is it, Twilight?” Spike said hoping to get a confirmation that she’s ok, he then noticed a faint smile appear on her face as she was raising a forelimb up to him.

“Huh?” Spike said with a raised brow. ‘Does she need me to hold her hoof? A little cheesy but if it’ll make her feel better...’ Spike thought as he reached his claw out to grasp her limb. However, she suddenly brought the hoof forward and jabbed him full in the nose.

“BOOP!” Twilight squeed

“OW!” Spike exclaimed as he fell back from being punched in the nose.

Twilight was giggling and kicking her hind legs at Spike’s reaction, Spike’s eyes were swirling, and when he sat up and checked if his nose was bleeding, he groaned in frustration when it was.

‘Man that hurts…’ Spike thought bitterly when Spike recovered he stood and glared daggers at her.

“What the heck was that for Twilight!?” Spike said, upset, “you could have broken my nose!”

Twilight popped up to four hoofs, seemingly brushing off her previous tiredness and looked at him with a goofy smile and Spike jumped a little when he saw she was now wall-eyed.

“Twilight?” Spike said a little more unnerved than angry now; she giggled at his face.

“Purple lizard funny!” she laughed sitting on her haunches’ banging her fore hoofs on the bed “make more funny faces!” she demanded.

“Purple lizard?” Spike said somewhat offended but a little more perturbed by her actions and words “Twilight? What’s going on with you?!”

Twilight didn’t answer and ran up to jab him in the face again earning another pained shout as Spike was sent flying against the wall. While Spike was picking himself off of the ground Twilight squealed with laughter.

“Purple lizard fun! You my new friend!” Twilight laughed as she scooped him up and gave him a bone-crushing hug, and Spike realized now just what the spell had taken from her.

“Oh no…” he groaned and managed to struggle out of the loopy alicorns grip after finally getting her to calm down he decided to test his thoughts “Twilight! Listen to me, ok?” Spike said as calmly yet disarmingly as he can.

“Okie!” Twilight beamed, though she still vibrated with energy.

“Umm.. ok, how many fingers am I holding up?” Spike said; hopefully, Twilight stared at his hand with one eye while the other looked at a wall… before she opened her mouth and bit down on his hand and drooled all over it, Spike yelped in surprise, disgust and the pinching pain of her teeth yanking his hand away.

“HEY!” Spike yelled as she just giggled and ran off into the castle.

“This can’t get any worse…” Spike said before hearing a knocking sound coming from the front door, “….I just HAD to open my big mouth!” Spike shouted in frustration.

Spike ran down the halls as fast as his short legs could carry him, also keeping an eye out for Twilight who seems to have completely lost her mind. Spike ran downstairs and looked around for Twilight, but he didn’t see her, and the knocking came again. Calming himself, he wiped the blood off of his nose and came up to the door briefly checking behind him to make sure Twilight wasn’t there and then answered the door, and then got a face full of pink mane as the party pony got in his face.

“Hi, Spike-Wikey! Are you having a fun day because I sure am we came over to see Twilight and cheer her up andwe’resohappytoseeyoutoalsowhydoyoulookstressedoutSpikey?” Pinkie babbled a mile a minute.

Spike tried to process that last part the hyperactive pink pony said she was pulled back by Rarity who approached Spike.

“I’m terribly sorry about that Spike, is Twilight here perhaps?” Rarity stood tall and proud, and Spike gaped going dry in the mouth when he saw her in all her regality in that yellow sundress and hat and neckless and sundress and make-up and sundress…

“Um… uh… well…” Spike stuttered earning a grin from Rarity as she mentally checked off the dresses effectiveness in catching his eye ‘I wonder how effective it’ll be with other stallions, however…’ Rarity thankfully failed to say out loud, after Spike finally found his tongue he coughed into his claw.

“Umm, that dress looks pretty good on you R-Rarity,” Spike said sheepishly which earned a chuckle from Rarity.

“Why thank you darling” Rarity smiled

“Ahem, anyways what’s up squirt?” Rainbow Dash grinned peeking around Rarity “where’s the egghead?”

“Umm… Twilight… isn’t feeling herself right now… could you all come back later?” Spike said, hoping he can avoid an awkward situation.

“Ah yes, her sorrows have recently grown, and so we wouldn’t wish to leave her when she needs us the most.” Rarity said with determination

“Yeah! So, can we see her? Canwecanwecanwecanwe?!” Pinkie bubbled

“Well...-“ before Spike could get out his next words they heard multiple crashing sounds that snapped all their attention to the door that led to the library section of the castle.

“…That didn’t sound good…” Spike dreaded, the girls all glanced at each other before heading towards the sound upon entering the study area they found multiple book stacks had been overturned and several objects are scattered everywhere.

“Woooow, this place is messy” Pinkie said

“The heck? Did you throw a party here earlier Pinkie?” Rainbow flew up high to see the damage

“Nope! I’d remember if I had a party here... recently” Pinkie chirped.

“My word! What has happened here?” Rarity glanced about nervously before they the heard a noise akin to ripping paper.

“Oh no…” Spike moaned in dread running towards the noise, Rarity and Dash glanced at each other before following the small dragon while Pinkie just hopped after them. After rounding an overturned table and seeing a familiar purple pony sitting in the middle of the floor and a familiar purple horn poking out over a book

“Huh? She’s reading?” Spike said surprised.

“Um... seriously? She’s reading? she does it all the time.” Dash gave him a look like it was the dumbest question in the world.

“I know! I know! It’s just that she’s… still acting like herself?” Spike said beginning to wonder if how she was acting earlier was just tempor-

*RRRIIIIIIP, chew chew… spit!*

Spikes blood went cold at hearing that sound again; it was the sound that Twilight hated most [next to squeaky doorknob bolts] ripping paper, Spike ran over to her, like a thestral out of Tartarus, just in time to see Twilight rip another page out of the book with her teeth. She was still wall-eyed and chewing on the paper for a few seconds before spitting it out into a small pile of ruined, chewed up paper.

“BLEH! This thing tastes icky!” Twilight spat before pausing and ripping another page out.

“TWILIGHT! STOP THAT!” Spike knocked the book out of her hooves; he wasn’t going to let himself get chewed out by Twilight for not stopping her from causing an entirely ruined book. Twilight paused and stared at him for a second before glancing, turning and biting down on the table to her left, actively trying to slobber and nom on it on it while her friends stare shocked.

“Mmmm! Tastier!” Twilight giggled licking the table like a lollipop, while the others showed varying degrees of disgust and shock Pinkie curiously came over and tasted the table only to shrink back with a grossed-out face.

"Needs cream cheese!" Pinkie gagged

“Uuuuhhh…..Twi? what are you doing?” Rainbow hesitantly approached the mindless alicorn, who stopped her chewing and glanced at Rainbow Dash, a nearly Psychotic grin came onto her face followed by a girly squee.

“RAINBOWS!” she pounced on Rainbow Dash earning a surprised yelp as she was knocked to the ground and Twilight stuffed her face into Rainbows colorful mane. “mmm… pretty colors!” Twilight squealed as she shoved her head deeper into Rainbow Dash's mane.

“H-hey! GET OFF OF ME TWILIGHT!” Rainbow shouted as she managed to roll onto her hooves, but Twilight held on burying her face into Rainbows mane, and Rainbow Dash bucked in an attempt to fling her off, but Twilight Was holding on tightly with her earth pony strength.

“Wheeee! Rid’em horsey!” Twilight giggled

“I am NOT a personal riding horse!” Rainbow Dash shouted again

At this point Raibow Dash decided to take off circling the room quickly multiple times although making sure not too fast that she would severely injure Twilight when she got her off.

“That looks fun!” Pinkie cheered while hopping in place.

Finally, after what felt like 5 minutes, Rarity had enough and stepped forward. “ENOUGH! Twilight release her NOW!” Rarity demanded.

“Wheeeeeeeeeeee!” was Twilights only response.

“GET HER OFF ME! I think she’s trying to chew on my mane- OW!” Twilight proved this claim by chomping and pulling at Rainbow's hair.

“Very well…” Rarity fired a beam of telekinesis using her precision observational skills to grab Twilight and yanked her off by her tail, this thankfully made her yelp, and she let go of Rainbow Dash and her mane while Rarity held Twilight in the air Rainbow Dash descended slowly and gradually, falling in a panting heap.

“My turn! My turn!” Pinkie hopped up and down in anticipation.

“Shut….up….” Rainbow Dash panted having overexerted herself in her panic. Meanwhile, Rarity approached the still floating Twilight who is flapping her wings lightly and looking joyful despite the look on her friend’s face.

“I do hope you have an explanation for why you did what you did to Rainbow Dash back there Twilight.” Rarity said miffed. Twilight just rolled around in midair ignoring her.

“Wheee! I’m flying!” Twilight laughed happily

“Twilight that is enough playing around! I am serious! You or Rainbow could have gotten hurt!” Rarity snapped

Twilight eventually stopped laughing and just stared in two different directions, drooling a bit before flaring her horn and dispelling Rarity’s magic grip with her own telekinesis. Twilight landed with a thump on her rump, but she didn’t seem bothered by it and continues to stare aimlessly and continued drooling.

“Twilight?... Is something the matter with you?” Rarity said worriedly

“That look reminds me of gummy!” Pinkie observed

Twilight said nothing until she noticed her horn was still sparking with unused magic her left eye narrowed on it and sparkled as a goofy smile came to her face.

“Oooohhh, pretty light…” Twilight tried to grab it, but the sparking magic stung her, causing her to yelp in pain and suck on her hurting hoof.

“Ok, now I know there’s something wrong with you… however, just to make sure” Rarity approached and got eye level with the alicorn who was still sucking on her hoof, “what’s two + two Twilight?” Rarity asked simply.

“Thirty splillion!” Twilight giggled as if it were obvious before becoming entranced by her horn sparking again which resulted in her touching it and stinging herself again and with a yelp she continued sucking on her throbbing hoof.

“That’s not even an actual measurement…” Rarity sighed

“Soooo what’s up with the egghead?” Dash said trotting over after recovering from Twilights assault on her.

“I’m not sure… she’s in no condition to answer us. However, Spike is.” Rarity said, turning to the dragon.

Spike felt three pairs of eyes staring at him with questioning looks that made him feel uncomfortable, with all eyes on him the dragon felt a lot like Fluttershy at the moment.

“Ok! Ok! I'll tell, just stop staring at me like that!” Spike gave in, after giving a long-winded explanation to all the sitting ponies everypony hopped up from where they were sitting on the floor.

“Twilight messed up on a spell, and now she’s lost her mind?!” Rainbow dash said

“And you know not how to help her?” Rarity added

“And worst yet! I left the sink on at home!” Pinkie finished, this resulted in everypony shooting her an unamused glare and Pinkie shrunk back.

“Too soon?” she chuckled nervously.

“How exactly did this happen, Spike? What caused this?” Rarity asked

“Well… Twilight's been pretty stressed lately as you know.” Spike said

“Yes/Yeah/YUP” were the responses.

“She was reading one of the rarest spell books Imaginable, but it turns out it’s one of the hardest to master as well, and Twilight was heartbroken when she couldn’t do it. So she found a spellbook, heck if I know what the spell was supposed to do but it failed, and now she’s like this.” Spike glumly said gesturing to Twilight who’s sitting on a carpet nearby, giggling as she knocks a hoofstool over and stands it back up repeatedly.

“Sooo…. Egghead’s sprung a leak, and all her brain yolk has drained out? Huh…. I… I gotta write that down that was genius, Pinkie! Note that down!” Dash said with a grin and Pinkie saluted and pulled a note pad and pencil from her mane and wrote it down.

“You two stop joking around! This is serious!” Rarity scolded.

“Sheesh ok, ok, so what do we do?” Dash said with an eye roll.

“We should try to find out how we can help Twilight.” Rarity said before turning to Spike “is there any remnants of the previous spell we could use as a hint or do you have any information?”

“Well, for info the most she was able to give before she lost it was that the way to fix this is a book she found downstairs in the hidden archives-” Spike said.

“Hidden archives?” Dashes wings raised slightly at the adventurous sounding prospect.

“-of books.” Spike finished

“Oh…figures…” Dash groaned at the prospect of reading something that isn’t Daring Do, only to receive an elbowing from Rarity.

“Go on.” Rarity said.

“She also told me that the book is at least medium… although she was losing memories too, so that much is inaccurate… Oh! And she mentioned that the page was a hundred and something so that might help narrow it down.” Spike said

“Yeah, from 100 to 999… OMF!” Rainbow Dash received another elbowing from Rarity this one knocking the wind out of her.

“I suppose if that’s all she could give, we can work with it.” Rarity said with a nod.

Spike pondered for a moment before a lightbulb went off in his head. “OH YEAH! I almost forgot the crystal she was using turned purple after it was done absorbing her mind.” Spike added quickly.

“A crystal?” Rarity asked

“Yeah Twilight used one in her spell, I was curious about it, so I kept it around,” Spike answered.

“Where is it?” Rarity asked

“I left it where I found it, follow me” Spike walked away, and Rarity and Pinkie followed, but Rarity paused and stopped Rainbow Dash before she could follow.

“You… should probably stay here.” Rarity said carefully.

“What? Why-“ Dash began but was cut off when an explosion occurred behind them, and they glanced back and saw the burnt spot where the stool once was, and a laughing, clapping Twilight.

“Chair go BOOM! Hahaha!” Twilight cheered and skipped away to look for something else to do.

“I believe that’s why” Rarity deadpanned

“Ok… point taken, But… wait! You mean I’m stuck with alicorn sitting?!” Dash whined.

“Because we need you to, your capable” Rarity reasoned.

“SHE. TRIED. TO. EAT. MY. MANE!” Dash snapped

“Relax Dash, while me and the others are trying to fix this little fiasco, you and Twilight can…play?” Rarity said almost reassuringly

“How am I going to keep a mindless alicorn from causing trouble? She’s already starting to relearn how to use her magic!” Dash said panicking a little as another explosion resounded this time a lamp fell prey to the alicorn.

“I’m sure you’ll think of something, dear, Twilight is our friend. I’m sure you can help her.” With that Rarity went out of the library room and Dash gulped.

“M-maybe everything will be o-“ another explosion occurred, and it knocked Dash onto her side .

“This is gonna be hard….” she groaned.

Author's Note

Enjoy :moustache:

Joyfully ignorant

In Twilight’s study, Spike showed Rarity the vibrant dark purple crystal. As he was talking it glowed with inner magic that gave it an air of beauty yet at the same time mysteriousness.

“Oh my… it’s beautiful!” Rarity said dreamily, interrupting Spike as she was entranced by the glowing crystal.

“Um, Rarity?” Spike said snapping her out of her trance.

“Oh! Oh dear, I’m so sorry it’s just that I can picture a crystal of this… luminescence on a dress!” Rarity said already dreaming up the possibilities.

“It contains Twilight’s mind though!” Spike quickly protested holding on to the important crystal protectively.

“Yes yes dearie, I apologize for that… now we should begin our search. Hopefully, Twilight was accurate when she informed you of the qualities of the book.” Rarity said

“Yeah.” Spike agreed

“Spike you should look over there on the north side of the book stack Twilight had brought up with her, Pinkie you must look on the east side, and I will check this area over here. Only look in the 100’s pages and let everypony know if you found anything got it?” Rarity strategized

“Yes, ma’am! / Yes ma’am!” Spike and Pinkie saluted before running off to search, as Rarity began searching through a book on the table she heard Pinkie exclaim.

“I FOUND IIIT!” Pinkie squeed waving the book back and forth in the air.

“Whoa! already?” Spike said with surprise

“My my Pinkie, I seemed to have misjudged the timing! Good job-“ she paused when she saw a book labeled ‘foreign cupcakes and how to prepare them’ “…That’s not what we’re searching for Pinkie…” Rarity deadpanned.

“Oh… ok! Then what are we looking for again?” Pinkie asked with a tilt of the head and Rarity facehoofed and sighed.

***

For the next 3 hours the group goes around the library searching all the books at pages 100 to 999 with no luck, a few times they had to take breaks or Pinkie walked off to bake them snacks, and they had to remind Pinkie what they were looking for because she kept losing focus. Finally, they stacked the last of the many books Twilight brought up with her initially.

“Any luck you two?” Rarity said tiredly and hopefully

“No…” Spike said glumly

“Nope!” Pinkie said with a slightly deflated mane

“I don’t get it!” Rarity exclaimed “where else could it be? She should have brought it up with the rest of these! If we cannot find this book, then Twilight will remain unintelligent forever! Oh, this is simply dreadful! Awful! The most horrible thing!” before Rarity could conjure up her self-pity couch Pinkie got up to her.

“Don’t get all pouty wouty Rarie! We can still find it!” Pinkie chirped with her usual optimism.

“I wish I could share in your infinite optimism Pinkie dear, but I don’t see what else we can do.” Rarity said sadly

“Yeah, she always brings the book upstairs…. Unless… Twilight…” Spike said growing increasingly annoyed as he spoke

“Hmm? What is it dear?” Rarity asked

“She tried to memorize it and left it downstairs…” Spike said frustrated at the lost time.

“Then why are we still here? Let’s go look for it downstairs!” Pinkie cheered

“That’s going to be hard Pinkie, judging by the lack of books around the spell area she most likely moved them downstairs… so we got a lot more looking to do…” Spike’s stomach rumbled “Maybe after dinner? Anypony?” Spike said hopefully.

“This is hardly the time to be thinking of food Spike…” Rarity said with a frown.

“Well, this is going to be a pleasant few hours then…” Spike said as he slumped in disappointment

“We could get Fluttershy and Applejack to help out; it’d make things easier.” Rarity inquired

“I guess… let’s check out what we’re facing first while we’re here.” Spike offered as they went to the basement door they suddenly heard a massive explosion coming from the library.

“Aah!” Spike said in surprise as he fell over.

“What in Equestria was that?!” Rarity looked on in shock

“It came from the library!... you don’t think-“ Spike began.

“Oh dear….” Rarity groaned in dread, the group got up and bolted in the direction of the library, when they got there they found a hole in the wall, several destroyed furniture items, and a half-conscious Rainbow Dash under a bookcase.

“Oooww…..” Dash groaned

“RAINBOW DASH!” Rarity yelled as she galloped over, using her magic to lift the bookcase slightly and Spike and Pinkie pulled her out from under it.

“Is she ok?” Spike asked

“Quick! How many hooves am I holding up?” Pinkie said raising a hoof

“One.....” Dash said plainly

“I think she’s good” Pinkie grinned confidently.

Rarity was surveying the damage, and the apparent lack of the mindless Alicorn was an evident reality of the situation.

“What happened here?...” Rarity said in shock of how much damage had been caused by Twilight.

“She went nuts… that’s what.” Dash groaned sitting upright and rubbing her throbbing head “I tried to get her to hold still, but she kept getting distracted and blowing things up with her magic.” Rainbow moved to stand up but winced and sat back down.

“What set her off?” Spike asked

“She kept saying she wanted to play, but I told her it would be best that she stays in one spot considering she has almost no control of her magic at the moment and I’m not good with dealing with unicorn OR alicorn magic. Then she freaked out, called me a “blue meanie” and then blew the whole room up…” Dash winced again checking her head for any signs of a concussion, sure enough, there was a lump growing there.

“It makes sense I suppose… unicorns who lack proper focus tend to over-surge their magic…. and given that she’s an alicorn now…” Rarity shuddered at the thought of the magical damage she can do now.

“We gotta find her!” Spike said getting ready to bolt for the door, but Rarity stopped him

“You must continue your search, the quicker you find that book, the quicker, we can save Twilight from herself.” Rarity assured, but Spike shook his head.

“We can't just let her remain loose throughout town! She could get hurt or she could hurt others!” Spike protested

“That is why Pinkie and I will go, you and Dash will search through her collections downstairs.” Rarity said calmly while folding up her sundress and putting it on a counter nearby.

‘To avoid it getting filthy, I’ve learned since last time…’ Rarity thought.

“Oh no!... you’re not leaving me out of the action!” Dash said stumbling a little and leaning against the wall “I gotta help save Twilight…” she said stubbornly as stumbled forward a little.

“You are going nowhere in that condition Rainbow Dash; you’ll do better to sit and nurse your injuries, perhaps help Spike out?” Rarity said casually.

“I’m not-“ Dash started but was cut off by Rarity.

“You're staying whether you like it or not.” Rarity said as Dash frowned.

“You should find some help.” Spike offered

“I will be dear,” Rarity said turning to Pinkie “let’s go.”

“You got it chief!” Pinkie saluted as the two mares galloped on out of the castle.

***

Twilight clumsily fluttered through the air. A blissfully ignorant look on her wall-eyed face, seeming content with just flying aimlessly and humming even as she bumped and ran into random things, a few ponies stopped and noticed Twilight’s bizarre state.

“Is that the princess?” one mare asked.

“What’s with that weird look in her eyes?” a random filly said

“Why is she flying like that?” a Pegasus colt said

Twilight paused and glanced out at the ponies looking at her weirdly, and a grin came to her face as she wanted to go play with the ponies and she decided to go down to them. Instead of flying down she just stopped flapping her wings and she landed face first in the dirt before getting up and skipping over to a filly and her mother, The filly hid behind her mother’s leg.

“Umm…. Hello princess Twilight Sparkle, is everything all right?” the mother said slightly uncomfortable as Twilight stared at her with one eye while the other stared at the filly.

“YYYUP!” Twilight cheered before getting in her face “you two wanna see something cool!?” she said with a wide grin.

“Um, well that mighty kind of you princess but we have to get home and-“ the mother attempted before Twilight got in her face.

“OK GREAT! Watch this!” her horn lit up, and several ponies and objects were lifted into the air including the mother and the filly.

“Aah! Mommy!” the filly cried frightened.

“P-put us down please!” the mother begged, but they fell on deaf and most likely not very attentive ears as she spun them rapidly around her until they were a blur.

“Woo hoo! Round an round you go! When you stop- oh hey what’s that?” Twilight beamed falling on her back and laughing in amusement before being distracted by a pebble causing everypony to fall in a dazed heap, several got up and galloped to the nearest trash can to empty their lunch into.

After losing interest in the pebble, Twilight skipped on while a stallion hid behind a tree to avoid the path of the princess who just threw a bunch of ponies in a tizzy.

She looked for something else to entertain herself when suddenly her stomach growled, and she stopped and looked around for the source of the growling.

“Huh? Where’s that noise coming from?” suddenly the noise came again, and Twilight looked down realizing it came from her stomach and poked her grumbling tummy curiously.

“Hmm? Why is my tummy growling? Is it mad?....” she poked it again, and it rumbled again, and she jumped looking very scared “Oh no! it might try to hurt me!”

Twilight bolted screaming until she ran into the shopping district and ran into a sign over by a food stand in the market knocking it over and startling Carrot Cake and Cup Cake who was walking away from a stall.

“Yikes!” exclaimed the stallion

“Eek!” Mrs. Cake exclaimed she noticed it was a disheveled Twilight curled up on the ground shivering “oh dear! Are you all right princess?” she asked worriedly

“No! you gotta help me!” Twilight exclaimed out

“Um… what can we do for you?” the Mr. Cake asked

Twilight grabbed him and pulled him close locking only one of her eyes on him.

“You’ve gotta help me! My tummy’s making weird noises, and I feel dizzy! I think it’s trying to hurt me!” she wailed earning some confused looks from the two ponies as well as some surrounding ponies.

“Umm… pardon?” Mr. Cake said

“My tummy is evil, and I think it’s trying to hurt me!” Twilight wailed again waving her hoof’s wildly, and the two exchanged confused expressions before the stallion takes an apple out of his bag and hoofs it to Twilight who stops her wailing and stares down at it confusedly.

“Um… perhaps your just hungry? Y-you can have that one we’ve got plenty…” Mr. Cake said now eager to get away from the loopy princess.

“What do I do with this?” Twilight asked innocently

Now they just stared at her as if she had just asked the stupidest question ever.

“What do you mean what do you do with it? You eat it; It’s an apple.” Mrs. Cake chuckled, hoping it was a bad joke.

“Ooohhh” she nodding thinking she understands… So she throws it in the air, and it ends up impaled on her horn, and she giggles and claps as apple juice runs down her face.

“….” The two are speechless and turn to each other whispering quietly.

“Ok… now I know something is wrong with her… should we call somepony?” Mr. Cake asked

“I-I'm not sure.” Mrs. Cake glanced at Twilight trying to bite at the apple on her horn and falling over as a result.

“I think we should… I’m no expert on royals, but I’m sure royals don’t act like this.” Mr. Cake insisted

“Oh, very well” Mrs. Cake turned back to where Twilight was “um pardon us Princess but would you care if we’d take you to the hospi-” the words died in her throat when they saw that she wasn’t there. “wh-where did she go?!” the mare exclaimed as the two glanced about.

---elsewhere in town---

Twilight popped out of thin air and plopped onto the ground and proceeded to clap joyfully “again again!” she exclaimed, but when nothing happened she seemed disappointed and took to the air again yanking the apple off and tossing it aside.

“That didn’t help me… liars!” she stuck her tongue out at nothing in particular and hovered on.

---meanwhile---

Rarity and Pinkie galloped through town looking for Twilight, as they ran on they saw a group of dizzy ponies being helped by passerby’s Rarity took a guess and approached a mother and a crying filly.

“My word, what happened here?” she asked the mother.

“Princess Twilight went crazy! She was flying nearby before coming up to us looking like a brain trauma patient and then she levitated and spun us faster than a bullet train on a circular track! She scared my daughter half to death.” The mother said while she was comforting the crying filly.

“We assure you she’s not in her right mind right now; this was not done purposefully.” Rarity assured

“Well do find and stop her before any more of this happens please.” The mother said

“Will do! Come Pinkie!” Rarity said galloping off.

“Okie doki loki!” Pinkie said bouncing after her.

---meanwhile with Twilight---

Twilight hovered on rubbing her groaning stomach “Oooohhh…. I don’t feel good… also, my tummy sounds so angry!” she flittered onto a cloud collapsing with a groan both pupils drooping unevenly “I’m not gonna make it… finish me now tummy….”

As she laid there groaning a shape went through the air falling towards her exclaiming “look out!”.

“Huh?” Twilight looked up just in time to see a figure crash into her knocking them both off, and they luckily landed on another bigger cloud, the thing about clouds is that their super soft and comfy and provide better cushions for falling pegasi, the two got up and the other mare looked up and quickly apologized.

“I’m so sorry! I don’t know what happened! I was getting some muffins, and I was heading to work to collect mail for my next delivery then I got a wing cramp, and I fell and i-… oh hey, Twilight!” The grey pegasus had been revealed to be Derpy Hooves smiled seemingly immediately forgetting about what she was apologizing for, Twilight looked up at her and their eyes locked….er…they sort of locked.

“Can’t talk… cant move… tummy angry for some reason…..” Twilight groaned, the grey pegasus ’hmmmd’ for a second trying to keep her cross-eyed eyes locked on the wall-eyed alicorn before gesturing and exclaiming.

“Ohmygosh! You look different Twilight!” she rushed over…. And smoothed out her hair “your hairs all messy!...hmm…..aaaand done! Just like before!” the cross-eyed pegasus smiled, and her ears perked when she heard Twilights tummy growl loudly. “wow, you sound like your very hungry Mrs Twilight!” the Derpy exclaimed

“Whatever that means…. Then yeah…” Twilight said locking the other one of her eyes on the Pegasus while the other drifted and she caught sight of the pony reaching into her bag and pulling out a muffin and putting it at her hooves and Twilight glanced down at it.

“Here! I was going to eat it but you look like you need it more, I guess I'll just have to handle only nine muffins for lunch instead of 10” Derpy said kindly

Twilight only stared at the confection, and Derpy frowned “do you not like blueberry? I also got honey wheat and chocolate and-”

“What do I do with this thing?” Twilight said giving her a clueless look and Derpy cocked her head to the side, and the chuckled a little thinking she was kidding, so she played along.

“You eat it silly!” she chuckled.

Once again Twilight looked down at it and then grinned before grabbing it and smushing and mashing it against her face getting crumbs all over her face and ruining the muffin which caused Derpy to jump and exclaim.

“Oh no! the muffin! Why’d you do that?” Derpy exclaimed, and Twilight just shrugged cluelessly. Derpy seemed a bit concerned now before shaking it off and wiping the crumbs off of her face “that was silly of you miss Twilight, don’t you remember how to eat?” Derpy said chuckling jokingly.

Twilight just stared at her dumbly.

“Oh… oh no! you HAVE forgotten how to eat!” this startled Derpy, she never expected Twilight of all ponies to forget such an instinctual thing as eating. However, the princess needed somepony now more than ever. And the fact that she could help let Derpy puff up with pride.

“Alrighty then! I’ll help ya!” Derpy said joyfully hopping up and down, and this made Twilights face lighten up.

“You can help me? Yay!” she got up and hopped in joy with her seemingly forgetting her previous tiredness.

---meanwhile with our two protagonists---

“You didn’t see her leave?” Rarity said with an exasperated expression.

“No, we took our eyes off of her for a second, and she was gone.” Said Mrs. Cake that was talking to Twilight earlier.

“She was acting a little… off, what happened to her?” Mr. Cake said

“It’s a long story, we’ll talk about it later… well, Pinkie it seems our search continues…” Rarity sighed

“Don’t worry! We’ll find her!” Pinkie hopped in place “I’m sure she’s not going to destroy the town and cause a ton of problems because some crystal absorbed her intelligence and it made her act all loopy and funny and-“ Pinkie was cut off by Rarity dragging her by her tail.

“Let’s not cause a panic too early Pinkie!” Rarity said through clenched teeth on Pinkie’s tail.

---a half an hour later with Derpy---

Twilight is happily yet clumsily munching on a muffin, and Derpy grinned victoriously at the extraordinary effort it took to reteach the princess how to eat.

“Nummie!” Twilight beamed as the muffin satisfied her and she was happy her stomach stopped growling at her she ran up and gave Derpy a bone-crushing hug “thank you! Thank you! Thank you! My tummy is happy again!” Twilight squeed

“No…pro-…problem…” Derpy strained to respond, gasping in relief when she released her, and she fell down dizzily.

“I’m going bye bye now! Bye bye!” and she took off leaving Derpy to poke her head up and shrug at the interesting turn of events in her day, and she took off to continue her errands.

---Currently with Rarity and Pinkie---

Rarity and Pinkie galloped through the town until they have reached the edge of town, and they [mostly Rarity] had to stop to take a breather.

“We… may…need to get…help… after all” Rarity panted after all the running she did while Pinkie was still looking energetic.

“Come on Rarie we got this!” Pinkie said bouncing with her usual vigor.

“Not all of us have boundless energy Pinkie….” Rarity sighed “perhaps we should go retrieve our friends Applejack and Fluttershy, the more hooves we have in this, the better.”

“Okie doki loki! BRB!” Pinkie went to hop off in the direction of Fluttershy’s cottage, and Rarity ran after her

“Wait! I was going to suggest you get Applejack since she’s farther away from here than Fluttershy and you have better stamina than me!” Rarity called after her.

“Unfortunately, I can’t!” Pinkie called back

“What? Why?” Rarity cocked her head confusedly

“Because my Pinkie sense is saying we should get our plots heading in this direction!” Pinkie called back

Rarity deadpanned at the random comment and sighed.

Author's Note

And at last, the story continues. :yay:

Let me know what you think in the comments below.

A chaotic encounter

Twilight fluttered through the air happily once more, having calmed her angry tummy and she learned how to eat today! and it was tuff, but now she wants a nice and cozy place to nap.

As she fluttered on, she spotted a cozy little lump on the ground with smoke coming out of a weird pipe thingy and a bunch of tiny houses and flowers and… stuff.

Twilight saw a comfy place in the sun on top of the lump to sleep on, and she fluttered up to it startling away some birds that were perched there curling up and blanketing herself with her wings and sighing contentedly before passing out, snoring softly.

***

While Twilight slept atop her cottage, Fluttershy exited her cottage with several gardening tools.

“I’m heading around back to work on planting some flower seeds Discord, let me know if Angel needs anymore disinfectant,” Fluttershy said quietly, but loud enough Discord could hear and went around back humming softly to herself while Discord called after her.

“Sure thing! Don’t be long Flutterbuddy!” Discord called from inside the cottage

He is laying on a couch while bouncing a bouncy ball off of a wall sighing. Evidentially ever since he betrayed ponyville to that centaurian jerkwad Tirek going out in the open has been much less pleasant. The ponies all giving him those dirty looks, being refused at various food stands. He hasn’t been able to pull any pranks either what with Twilight nagging him every time he does, Discord the handsome rouge he is must find some way to power through this and show how helpful and understanding and friendly and handsome he-….

“Don’t steal my narrative Discord!” The writer shouted in frustration

“Heheh your no fun… well cut to it then, the audience is waiting!” Discord laughed as the narrator facepalmed before getting back to it

*sigh* Anyways… Discord continued to be obnoxious before going back to his activities until a strange sensation ran down his spine. See Discord has made himself a living perimeter alarm able to detect when somepony comes close to the cottage that isn’t Fluttershy or her animals. Sure came in handy when somepony tried to break in like last time, it didn’t end well for said burglar. And right now he’s sensing a familiar magical wavelength and yet, something is…missing from it. Deciding he’s got nothing better to do Discord chose to investigate.

---meanwhile on the roof---

Twilight is snoring a bit louder now and is sprawled on her back drooling up a puddle. Next, to her, a flower rose up, and Discords face appears on it and looks around before spotting the sleeping alicorn, and he sighs, teleporting in full next to her and poking her in her arm until she began to stir and talk in her sleep.

“ZZZZ…. Flying pancakes…ZZZZZ...cotton candy…ZZZZZ….tacos….ZZZZZ” Twilight murmured

Discord poked her harder, and she snorted before waking up and glancing at him with one eye.

“What are you doing sleeping on Fluttershy’s roof Twilight? Did you even ask her permission?” Discord asked her impatiently.

Twilight just looked up at him with wide eyes seeming to look him over.

“Equestria to Twilight! Hello? A response would be nice; I need to get back to self-loathing and boredom… until 4:30 that is, then I have self-pity and reflecting and then thinking up ways to amuse myself at 5:00” Discord said

Suddenly a pair of arms wrapped around Discords neck and pulled him close and Twilight glanced him over before a big goofy grin came onto her face.

“Umm…. Twilight?” Discord said with an eye raised taking notice of her reverse Derpy eyes

“You look funny!” she squeaked, Discord pulled away from her and looked at her unamused

“Yes yes I know I look like an oddity to you ponies, thanks for that by the way, so what’s with the eyes?” Discord asked, but Twilight continued unabated and proceeded to dart about examining him.

“Look! A birdie arm! Look! A lizard tail! Look! Two different horns! Look! A…. what’s that?” she pointed to something and Discord hopped away from her blushing a bit.

“None of your concern! What in the name of chaos is wrong with you right now, Twilight!?” Discord snapped, making the alicorn shrink back and whimper a little in fright of his volume, and he paused.

“Hold on…. did she just whimper? I thought Fluttershy was the sensitive one of Twilights little posse…” Discord mused quietly

Twilight heard him and stood, giving him a confused look “who’s Flubbersky?” Twilight said

“…What?” Discord made his ears larger to make sure he heard that right.

“Who is Flubbyscawl?” Twilight said with a tilt of the head

“Flubby- whaaaat?! You don’t remember your dear friend, Fluttershy?!” Discord said, quite surprised.

Twilight’s following nod confirmed it and Discord decided to investigate. He walked up to her and looked at her carefully moving around her, sniffing her hair, looking at her horn, looking inside her mouth which made Twilight giggle. He shook her head a little then pressed his ear against her head after waiting a second he then just knocked on her head, and a hollow echo sounded, and Discord couldn’t help but smirk and take a step back chuckling.

“Ah, I see what’s going on. You messed up another spell and made yourself all empty in the noggin, huh?” Discord giggled before bursting into laughter “This is your biggest mess up yet Twilight!” he continued to laugh while holding his sides until a thought came to him which made him pause.

“Although... I want to stay on Fluttershy’s good side to make up for what happened, so um… we should probably get this fixed...” Discord sighed and snapped his fingers but found nothing happened “hm?” he snapped a few more times trying to get Twilight to go back to normal but found it didn’t work and Twilight instead let herself get distracted by a butterfly hopping and fluttering after it trying to catch it.

“What? That's odd... usually, this works! Is her conscience magically imprisoned by some means?” Discord tried to wrack his brain for answers for this dilemma and snapped his fingers, conjuring a chair to sit down and think about this. In the process, Twilight ceased her chasing of the butterfly and glanced one of her eyes at the display of conjuring magic and immediately ran over to him with a giddy look.

“Hm? What do you need now?” Discord casually said as her eye skimmed the chair excitedly

“How did you do that, mister?! That was amazing!” Twilight squealed

“Umm… it’s magic… you know the thing this show runs on, and I just conjured a chair; it’s nothing special.” Discord deadpanned at Twilight’s enthusiasm over a conjured chair.

‘Wow, empty in the head, and she’s still enamored by magic’ Discord thought to himself.

“But you made it appear with a snap of your wiggly arm, thingies!” Twilight said her eyes sparkling

“Their called fingers and I wouldn’t think this would be as much of a surprise to you as I think it would be, near full mental amnesia or not.” Discord smirked a little at Twilights behavior

“Wow! Fingars… fin… fingers! You must be really smart, mister!” Twilight said admiringly, which made Discords smile grow as his ego had been stroked.

‘Me? Heh, praise from Ceaser is one thing, but praise from Twilight? That’s something I never expected… I wonder…’ Discord thought.

“If you liked that so much then how about this?” he snapped his fingers again and conjured a dozen chairs a few feet away and made them dance the Cossack. Twilight gasped before laughing jovially, sat down and was clapping her hooves.

“I love it!” she cheered “do more fun things!” she said looking like a foal who just saw their first amazing magic trick and Discord smirked for what may be the 3rd time today mainly because of her. So he snapped his fingers again and made the chairs dance to a hip hop tune with moves to match making Twilight joyfully laugh again.

‘One could get used to this, heheh looks like my day will be interesting after all…’ Discord thought mischievously.

---Meanwhile---

Just outside the stretch of woods Fluttershy’s house was in Pinkie and Rarity galloped along the dusty trail, they hurried on and finally reached Fluttershy’s home, and a dripping with sweat Rarity leaned against a tree panting heavily.

“Oh…oh, dear… I’m all sweaty! I’ll have to bathe post-haste before I end up smelling something terrible!...” Rarity lamented dramatically

“No time for that Rares! We’re here! We’re here!” Pinkie hopped excitedly and ran up knocking on the door quickly, and Rarity sluggishly trailed behind, not being used to all this exercise, and Discord answered.

“Yes?” Discord said

“HIII DISCORD!” Pinkie said

“Ah, hello Pinkie! And Rarity. What can I do for you this fine day?” Discord said with his usual grin

“Well, darling…” Rarity had to stop and take a breath real quick to help formulate words “we’d like to speak to Fluttershy, it’s about Twilight” Rarity said quickly

“Oh? And uh-“ he glanced behind him, “what about her exactly?” Discord said with a raised brow

“I don’t think this necessarily concerns-“ Rarity begins before being cut off by Pinkie.

“She messed up a spell and became a dummy, so we’re trying to find and help her out,” Pinkie said too quickly for interruption.

“Pinkie!” Rarity scolded having not wanting anything else to go wrong today

“Oh! Sounds serious” Discord had to speak over a crashing sound in the house. “I’ll fetch her immediately toodles!” with a snap of his fingers, he disappeared, and a half a minute later, Fluttershy approached the door.

“Yes?...oh, hello, guys!” Fluttershy said, smiling a bit at the familiar faces.

“Hello, dear” Rarity responded, “we’ve come to seek your help.”

“Oh, my, with what?” Fluttershy said

“Twilight seems to have become… unlike herself because of another unfortunate accident with her magic, we were both hoping to obtain some help in possibly finding her before she hurts herself and others.” Fluttershy nodded and smiled at her friends

“Ok, but let me clean up first… i-if that’s ok with you?” she asked

“Very well, dear, but do hurry.” Rarity smiled back, and Fluttershy nodded before closing the door and giggled to herself.

“Heeheeheehee!… I’ll probably regret this tomorrow, but that’s hours away from now!” she turned into Discord “I do make a good Fluttershy don’t I?” he looked over to Twilight who was watching from the living room while sitting on the couch and eating out of a bag full of fertilizer before spitting it out.

“Bleh! This stuff tastes yucky!” Twilight said sticking her tongue out, and Discord chuckled

“Is it bad that I wish you could be like this more often?” Discord chuckled while Twilight looked for something else that looked like food.

“Where’s something that doesn’t taste yucky?” she asked being hungry again, but Discord grabbed her forearm.

“No time! I’d wager that’ll buy us a few extra minutes of fun.” Discord grinned and teleported both him and Twilight into town.

---Meanwhile---

Minutes pass, and Pinkie and Rarity wait outside wondering where Fluttershy has gone off too.

“Oh... where has she gone off too? Every minute that passes, Twilight could be getting into more and more trouble.” Rarity said worriedly

“Maybe she went to take a poo!” Pinkie said

“Pinkie dearie she wouldn’t just take a-… um, do her business after we just explained to her that our dear friend Twilight requires help…” Rarity deadpanned before jumping a little as Pinkie’s right hind hoof suddenly bounced off the ground and bucked out several times, “Pinkie sense?” Rarity guessed

“Yup! It’s the one that tells me that we’ve just been-“ before she could finish Rarity saw Fluttershy covered in dirt walking back around from the side of her cottage and she saw them and waved.

“H-hi guys,” Fluttershy said as loud as she could, which considering how loud she usually speaks isn’t very loud.

“HI, FLUTTERSHY!” Pinkie squeed as she ran over to her friend and Rarity calmly trotted over

“There you are darling; I was beginning to wonder when we’d get to it.” Rarity said, but her expression quickly became confused when Fluttershy’s face became confused.

“Get to it? What do you mean? I-if, you don’t mind me asking.” Fluttershy asked

“What do I mean? I mean, we were going to go find Twilight together.” Rarity said

“Find Twilight? Did something happen to her?” Fluttershy became worried

“What? We already talked about this; don’t you remember?” Rarity said, but Fluttershy just shook her head

“I’ve been out back planting new flower seeds all afternoon; I just came back around to refill my watering can.” She gestured to her watering can in her forehoof

“What?” Rarity took a step back, ‘but I could have sworn we saw her at the door?.... unless…’ Rarity thought as a suspicion formed in her head.

“Pinkie?…” Rarity asked

“Yeah?” Pinkie said looking at her friend

“What were you saying before Fluttershy appeared?” Rarity slowly asked

“Oh! I was saying that it was the Pinkie sense that tells me we just got duped by a chaotic being, and he took Twilight to town to prank without reprimand.” Pinkie grinned

“That’s…. oddly specific,” Fluttershy said

“Discord…” Rarity growled, “I should have known he wouldn’t pass up the chance to take advantage of Twilight's condition…” Rarity murmured angrily

“Twilights condition? What’s going on Rarity? Is Twilight in danger?” Fluttershy said genuinely worried

“No,” Rarity said, “but I have the sneaking suspicion she’s going to be…”

Author's Note

the next chapter has entered the running :yay:

be sure to comment, like, favorite, follow and critique if you want more.

I also want to announce that I'm starting up an idea’s board, comment down below if you need help with writer's block then you can P.M me.

I love being helpful to the community and all, so I look forward to helping people.

anyways hope you enjoyed this chapter, ciao! :moustache:

Discord and Twilight: the chaotic and the destructively stupid

Some ponies were going about their day, although talk of Twilights odd behavior had spread quickly in the small town. However, the citizens were confident the other members of the mane six would see to it that she would be helped. On a rooftop near the school grounds, Discord and Twilight popped into view.

“Alrighty! What to do first? Hmm… perhaps…” Discord smirked as he saw the CMC playing with a ball and gave a snap of the fingers

---Meanwhile---

The cutie mark crusaders we’re tossing a ball to each other seeming a tad glum.

“Sucks your sister busted us Sweetie Belle,” Scootaloo said

“Well it was unavoidable, I suppose. Next time we should do it farther away from the Boutique.” Sweetie replied

“Ah still wonder why ya thought the flamin’ hoops were necessary.” Said, Apple Bloom

“Cuz they're awesome that’s why maybe doing something dangerous is how we’ll get our cutie marks!” Scootaloo said proudly.

“Ah fail ta see the logic in that…” Apple Bloom deadpanned

“Well, I see plenty of logic in-“ suddenly the ball bounced back without being tossed and bounced off of Scootaloo.

“Hey!” she shouted in surprise as she fell over “what the heck Sweetie?” Scootaloo glared

“That wasn’t me.” Sweetie Belle said defensively

“Then why did the ball hit me in the face when I passed it to you?” Scootaloo said narrowing her eyes

“I don’t know!” Sweetie said

“Ah’m sure it was an accident, ah-“ Apple Bloom began to say when suddenly the ball bounced from Scootaloo’s direction into Applebloom knocking her over.

“-AAH!” Applebloom fell over and glanced at Scootaloo angrily “What in tarnation was that for?!” Applebloom said loudly.

“What?! I didn’t even touch it!” Scootaloo defended

“What’s happening?” Sweetie said looking quite confused by all this before the ball bounced off of her then ricocheted between the three fillies and was bouncing in place in the middle on its own.

“What the hay?” Applebloom shouted in confusion

“Aah! Haunted ball!” Sweetie exclaimed. Scootaloo, not one to be shown up by a haunted bouncy ball stomped up to it.

“Hey! Back off, tough guy!” She said looking ready to rumble, the ball responded by gaining a mouth and blowing a raspberry and bouncing away.

“GET BACK HERE!” Scootaloo screamed, chasing the rogue ball, and the other two fillies looked to each other before following Scootaloo.

Discord was laughing his head off at his prank [literally] after picking his head up and reattaching it he glanced to Twilight to ask her if what he just did had bothered her at all but saw her laughing on the ground as well kicking her legs about.

“That was funny!” she laughed jovially while Discord gave a triumphant grin.

“This is going to be a great day I’ll need to cherish for a while.” He mused

She ran up and hugged Discord surprising him. “This is fun! You're my bestest best friend! Dissqward” she squeed which made Discord’s eyes widen a little at the display, he was forced restraining some emotions from surfacing like with Fluttershy.

“Umm, thank you Twilight,” he said gently pushing her off of him ignoring the mispronunciation of his name and awkwardly coughed into his hand. “if you liked that I’m sure there’s so much more we could do.” Discord said with a grin

“Yay!” Twilight said waving her arms about.

***

The group is rushing back into town with the knowledge that Discord is loose with a brainless Twilight causing who knows what kind of trouble or damage.

“M-maybe we could ask Discord nicely, and he can let us have Twilight back?” Fluttershy said trying to ease the anger

“I’m afraid not! A stern reprimanding is in order for Discords carelessness!” Rarity shouted

“I think I should, if that’s alright I mean, he’s likely to listen to me, n-not saying you aren’t good at speaking to others i-it’s just-“ Fluttershy began, but Rarity gave her an assuring nod.

“Very well then dear, I’ll leave it to you then.” Rarity said making Fluttershy smile, “but you’re going to need to punish him later, or I will enlist one onto him.” Rarity immediately followed up with. Fluttershy’s smile fell, but she nodded in agreement as they got back into town.

“I do hope Spike is having better luck than us,” said Rarity

---meanwhile back at the library---

Dash and Spike were in the basement, and Spike was idly munching on a small bowl of gems while looking in the secret archives spot thankfully Twilight marked it with red crayon so she wouldn’t forget where it was while Dash poked her head out of a book pile looking around and sighing in boredom and frustration.

“This is torture! Why didn’t she just bring it up with her? We’ve looked through like what, 60 books and we haven’t found it and my heads pounding worse than that time when Pinkie had that airhorn party…” Dash said irritably tossing another book into one of the other piles.

“We have to keep looking, or Twilight’ll never be herself again,” Spike said eating another emerald while glancing at the purple gem housing Twilights mind.

“Then why are you eating right now?” Dash said

“Well me starving isn’t going to help her!” Spike retorted as he climbed up a shelf to grab a loose book stepping onto a stool that held a stack of books.

“Almost… got… it” Spike reached up and grabbed the book only to fall backward and to the ground.

“Meant to do that!” Spike declared while Rainbow Dash rolled her eyes, neither of them noticed a particular purple gem fell off the table where it was put to keep in sight and into the bowl of gems Spike was eating.

***

A group of foals ran from their sprinkler that was spraying orange soda instead of water making their coats all wet and sticky while a few other ponies approached with curiosity. Meanwhile, Discord was holding his sides laughing, and Twilight was rolling on the ground, holding her sides as well.

“They look funny!” Twilight said grinning widely

“You bet they do!” Discord laughed alongside

“What next mister Discy? What?’ Twilight sputtered happily

“We go to the town hall and prank somepony I’ve been dying to prank for a while now!” Discord grinned

“Town…hall? What’s a town hall?” Twilight asked innocently, Discord chuckled and patted her back.

“The town hall is where the mayor works my mindless friend,” said Discord

“What’s a mayor?” Twilight said confused

“A pony that runs the town basically,” Discord said

“Oooooh…..what’s a pony?” asked Twilight, causing Discord to laugh out loud.

“Ahahahaha! Oh, you’re a riot, Twilight!” Discord nearly keeled over from that sentence.

“Hmm?” Twilight said still confused on what a pony is but Discord just snapped his fingers and him and Twilight were in the mayor mare’s office on her desk, shrunk to the size of ants.

“Whoa! We’re so tiny!” Twilight cheered jumping up and down, but Discord put his arm over her mouth and got out of view

“Shush shush! We don’t want to blow the prank too early!” Discord whispered sharply

“Mph ppfffflowy” she spittled into his arm getting spit all over which made Discord cringe a little bit.

“Gross…” Discord grumbled

Meanwhile, the mayor mare set up a stack of papers and sighed frustratedly.

“The full repairing of the damage Tirek caused is taking forever, not to mention the word is that various things in town have gone crazy today… and there’s also so many taxes to file and no thanks to that pesky Discord I’m still processing all these restraining orders…” Discord flinched and frowned a little at the mention of restraining orders being issued against him. “I have no time to myself….” She sighed discontentedly Discord felt a tad bit of sympathy but his urge to continue with the prank overrode it.

“Oh, on with it, pay attention Twilight!” Discord declared

“Mmmphhhiph!” Twilight said, Discord groaned as more spittle got on his arm and he loosened up a little.

“What?” he asked

“What?” she said, and Discord sighed and just got on with it. He snapped his fingers and the sound of a door knock came and the mayor looked up.

“Come in…” she sighed and hung her head when no response came she looked up again, “I said come in!” she called louder, but when no reply came forth she trotted up to the door and opened it and looked out into the hallways. Mayor Mare blinked in confusion snorting in frustration and closing the door. She went back to her seat with a huff.

“Did I just get ding dong ditched? The nerve! I’m stressed enough as it is!” she fumed for a second before taking a few breaths to calm herself and went back to her seat and sat… only to hear a farting noise after jumping out of her chair, she saw a whoopie cushion and frowned.

“Discord…” she sighed and picked up the whoopie cushion with her mouth and put it on the desk “honestly though, a whoopie cushion? This seems too easy for you…”

“Indeed… you know me too well!” Discord grinned, as she set the whoopie cushion down it suddenly inflated and then deflated by itself and pushed a golf ball that wasn’t there a minute ago and triggered a series of pulleys and objects in the room. Ranging from a lift that brings it up to a shelf which then rolls onto a binder and it bounces off of Tanks shell and onto a contraption all these objects [and Tank] weren’t there before, and the mayor can only stare in shock as a pie flew into her face. Discord laughed heartily, and Twilight was on the ground laughing and banging her hoof on the desk, while the mayor jumped out of her seat in surprise and Discord and Twilight went back to normal size.

“Discord!” the mayor quickly said wiping the cream off of her face “you better have a good reason for this mess!” she said sharply.

“Oh, hush now it’s just a spot of innocent fun.” Discord chuckled

“FUN!” Twilight cheered

“I would plenty expect this behavior from Discord, but you Twilight?” the mayor mare said flabbergasted at the princess actually enjoying Discords antics.

Before she could question it further Twilight ran up to her gave her a hard poke borderline punch in the snout, the mayor stumbled back in surprise and pain.

"BOOP!" Twilight giggled

"Ow!" the mayor mare cried stumbling back and clutching her snout “What on Eqqus is the matter with you, Twilight!?”

“Your face looks funny! I-“ Twilight paused when she saw a chair next to the desk, and her mind flashed back to the unfortunate stool back in the library… blowing it up…. was fun!

“Chair go boom…” Twilight whispered

“What?” said the agitated mayor.

“Chair going boom was… fun… fun! FUN! FUN! CHAIR GOING BOOM IS FUN!” Twilight cheered suddenly as her horn flared.

“Uh oh…” Discord said before teleporting over to the mayor and grabbing her by the shoulders

“Huh?” the mayor said

“Time to go!” Discord said as the room began to shake, and he teleported them a fair distance. As the mayor was trying to regain her bearings, an explosion sounded across the town, and she spun and saw town hall but with a massive hole in its wall where her office was.

"MY OFFICE!" Mayor Mare cried in dismay

"Oh dear... well that was unexpected" Discord said

When the smoke cleared, Twilight was just sitting in there staring innocently out to all the shocked ponies.

“HI!” she called out, waving.

---meanwhile---

The group wasn’t even halfway into town when Pinkies tail began spasming.

“Pinkie sense?” Rarity groaned already dreading what it could be

“YUP! EVERYPONY DUCK” Pinkie threw a rubber duck into the air and then threw herself to the ground. Everypony that knew the signs of the twitchy tail followed suit and seconds later an explosion rippled through the area when the dust cleared Rarity looked around and saw she was covered in dirt and groaned in dismay.

“What just happened!?” Fluttershy exclaimed out at a pitch less usual for her

“Town hall just blew up! that’s what!” Pinkie exclaimed pointing towards it

“Surely this can’t be Discords doing right?” Fluttershy said hopefully

“I cannot be confident Fluttershy dear but if it is, then may his punishment be increased tenfold! Come now! We may still have time!” Rarity said angrily as she galloped on down and is closely followed by the others

***

“Discoooord! You- how could you do this to my office!?” the mayor mare scolded while Discord put his hands up defensively.

“Hey, I didn’t tell her to blow up town hall!” Discord said indignantly, and Twilight galloped up to Discord beaming.

“Didja see that Discord? I made the chair go boom!” Twilight exclaimed out happily, and Discord just chuckled

“You did much more than that sport,” he said, ruffling her mane before a sharp ahem caught their attention showing an impatient looking Mayor Mare.

“Oh, here it comes…” Discord sighed, the mayor mare approached Twilight with a mix of anger and confusion

“I don’t know what’s up with you Twilight. But I have a distinct feeling who could be behind this...” She said with a glance at Discord who just rolled his eyes.

“Just because something went wrong doesn’t mean it’s always my fault,” Discord said indignantly.

“I’m sure…” the mayor said with evident sarcasm, before turning to Twilight worried now “this is clearly going to be a serious problem, Twilight you must come with me so we can hopefully inform somepony about this, perhaps the princess or somepony close to her can help with this issue since you two are close?” the mayor said.

“Princess?” Twilight said with confusion.

“Yes? Don’t you remember? Princess Celestia? Your former mentor?” said the mayor with a look of confusion.

“Who?” Twilight said, still confused.

“Oh dear… you don’t remember who Celestia even is?!” the mayor exclaimed.

“Cel-est-tee-uh?….. nope! I don’t know someone called that!” Twilight beamed unaware she just said the most shocking thing anypony could hear, even Discord was a little perturbed by this news.

“….We need to get the princess… now!” the mayor said quickly, but Discord got in her way holding up his hands in a placating gesture.

“N-now hold on we don’t need to cause any more issues; I can fix this.” Discord said admittedly starting realizing that if word of his actions get to Celestia, he could be in trouble, he isn’t afraid of the princesses... just a tad fearful of losing Fluttershy’s forgiveness, and so, in other words, fun time is over.

“Can you really?... you’ve caused enough problems today Discord! If you can fix her then do it now!” the mayor demanded

“That’s the thing! I don’t know exactly how… yet! However, I assure you I’ve handled similar cases before. It seems something has imprisoned her mind, and it requires a special method to undo” Discord reasoned.

“That’s sounding like an excuse Discord…” the mayor sighed.

“I’m not kidding! Now if I can just find out what happened I can-” Discord began until…

“DISCORD!” an angered voice called out.

“Oh, crud…” Discord sighed as he saw the group of mare’s galloping up to him, Rarity looking especially ticked off and even Fluttershy seemed a little upset with him which made him feel terrible.

“Well, this isn’t good…” Discord sighed

“You bet Discord! You made a mean move back there!” Pinkie said hopping up to eye level with him as a particular frazzled white unicorn approached him.

“Discord… you better have a good explanation for your actions here…” Rarity said quietly but accusingly

“Boredom, lack of chaos, the main one who constantly complains about my chaos causing being rendered stupid and actually enjoying my pranks, because I’m a prankster I and I came up with new things to do, it was all just a spot of harmless fun, that's all.” Discord paused as he glanced back at the hole in the wall. "Well... mostly harmless, in any case, I could fix this all in a jiffy, so I'd say alls well that ends well," Discord said shamelessly before catching Fluttershy's disapproving look.

“Discord…” Fluttershy said quietly

“Yes, Flutterbuddy?” Discord said already dreading the scolding words

“It's true that this is a fixable situation and I could have turned the other cheek if this was simply a pranking spree, but do you realize you basically just took advantage of my friend Twilight! And while she’s not in her right mind? That’s horrible!" Discord winced as her voice grew louder with those last few words "I-I want to let this go Discord I truly do but… Rarity insists on a punishment…” Fluttershy scolded in contrast to her usual whisper and polite demeanor making Discord shrink back a little in regret as he hadn’t paid any thought of Twilight and now Fluttershy was mad at him.

“Well I did expect this at some point I just wish things hadn’t escalated so quickly…” Discord said

"Speaking of which, what’s the story behind THAT!” Rarity pointed to the smoking hole in the town hall

“That actually isn’t my fault, Twilight got excited remembering an exploding chair or something, and then her magic went out of control.” Discord explained

“Very well, a punishment later. Right now we must help Twilight…” Rarity sighed

“Punishment? As in your going to punish me? Very well then Rarity what do you implore?” Discord said in a cocky tone before Fluttershy approached him.

“No… I will…” Fluttershy said quietly, which shocked both Rarity and Discord

“Oh, you don’t have to dearie. I will take care of it if you-“ Rarity started.

“No!” Fluttershy said cutting Rarity off abruptly before blushing and pawing at the ground nervously “...I-I understand that what Discord did was wrong, I will make sure he understands it… although if you would like to help, then that’s ok.” She said quietly

“Very well dear” Rarity said with a nod, somehow leaving it in Fluttershy’s hoof’s made Discord a little more worried.

“Now that we have it all together let us be on our way Twili-“ Rarity paused when she looked at the currently empty space Twilight previously occupied next to Discord.

“W-where did she go?” Rarity asked nervously, instinctively checking over her shoulder.

“The thing is… it seems I may have… possibly excited her with the prospect of chaos.” Discord nervously said.

In the distance, explosions could be heard...

Author's Note

Be sure to like, critique, comment, and fav! :raritywink:

New game

Another book gets tossed into the growing pile of books as Spike reached for the few books left on the shelf.

“If I have to read one more book; I’m going to test just how durable these crystal pillars are with my head!” Rainbow Dash exclaimed out with growing frustration for the 5th time

“We just need to check a few more! We can find it!” Spike assured

“You said that like a million times already!” Rainbow Dash said irritably

“Well!... I can’t help that! we find it when we find it!” Spike sighed, trying to regain his thoughts and calm down while idly grabbing another gem out of his emptying bowl and eating it. After flipping through a few more pages without looking Spike reached back for any last gems and found one more and decided to savor it by taking a small bite out of the top.

“Hmm… this tome has something on mind displacement, is this it? Hmm, I'll put it in the ‘maybe’ pile and then I'll review them after i-“ suddenly a sharp pain shot through Spikes' head, and he dropped the book and the gem he was holding and let out of cry of pain while holding his head.

Rainbow Dash noticed immediately and galloped [or more like stumbled] over to Spike.

“Spike!? What wrong?” Dash came up to the dragon curled up on the ground and saw the purple crystal with a chunk of it gone.

“You ATE a piece of the gem that has Twilights brain in it!?” Dash shouted in shock, Spike wanted to respond but could only let out a moan of pain as he felt information forcibly entering his head.

“Spike! Speak to me! Spike!” Rainbow Dash pleaded

Suddenly Spikes eyes shot open and they flashed purple briefly.

“Spike?” Dash said confused and worried as Spike seemed to have gone into a 100-yard stare towards the ceiling.

“I know what book it is…” Spike said suddenly

“You do? Which one?” Dash said surprised, Spike hopped to his feet and ran around the room, looking around before finding an overturned green book sitting in front of several book stacks on a chair and showing it to Dash.

“This is the book!” Spike said excitedly, with a skeptical look, Dash examined the book.

“Spells for struggling scholars? But… how did-” Dash began

“I honestly don’t know, I accidentally ate a chunk of the purple gem and suddenly…. I knew which book it was. I even know what page it was!” Spike said with a bit of unexplainable energy.

“You mean you…. Absorbed some of the knowledge from the crystal?” Dash said with a tilt of her head.

“Yeah… I think so!” Spike said grinning broadly

“Why didn’t we do this sooner?...” Dash sighed

“We gotta find Rarity and the others!” Spike said ignoring her

“Alright! Let’s-“ Dash began but before she could finish the room suddenly shook, causing both of them to fall over.

“What the heck?!” Dash sputtered in surprise

“That came from outside,” Spike said, not liking where this is going.

“Let’s go!” Dash said hobbling up the stairs

***

Meanwhile, things outside we’re less than ok, ponies ran for cover as Twilight flew around. She was laughing happily as she shot beams from her horn and blowing random things throughout town up.

“Making things go BOOM is FUN!” Twilight squeed as she made a cart filled with cabbages blow up startling the stallion next to it.

“MY CABBAGES! NOOOOO!” the stallion exclaimed out in anguish, falling to his knees.

“YAAY!” Twilight sang as she levitated the remains of the cart and flung them into the air before she continued to blow things up. “mister Disqy will love this! Heehee!”

---Meanwhile in the acres---

A pair of toned legs kicked out, hooves collided with a tree shaking some apple’s loose as they fell into buckets, standing there was none other than Applejack, the resident apple farmer.

“Hoo-wee” the farm pony wiped the sweat from her brow “harvest’s been good this year!” she smiled before taking the buckets of apples over to the carts and unloading them into one of them, she then stood back and admired her handiwork.

“Ah think this calls for some apple pie to celebrate!” Applejack said with a smile

As she got ready to take the harvest in however suddenly the remains of a cabbage cart fell from the sky and smashed the apple cart splattering apple juice and applesauce all over the place and coating Applejack head to hoof in the apple remains. She stood, mouth agape for a few seconds at what just happened before jumping in shock.

“THE APPLES!” she galloped forward, desperate to salvage what’s left of the apple stock.

"What in tarnation happened? Oh, Granny'll have mah hide if ah don't find out who did this..." Applejack growled in frustration at all the lost work, before looking out into town and seeing smoke and explosions.

“Somethin ain’t right…” Applejack glanced at the smashed apple cart before galloping down the path to town to investigate.

***

Nearby Dash and Spike ran outside seeing the alicorn laughing giddily and firing destructive blasts; one blew a hole in a nearby house and causing an overhead sign to fall towards an unsuspecting Lyra and Bon Bon.

“Ah, crap! Look out!” Dash despite her aching head and hurting wing screaming in protest, she dove forward and tackled them both out of the way.

“Oomf!” Lyra exclaimed

“Ah!” Bon Bon shouted in surprise

When the danger had been avoided, Dash could only put a hoof to her head and muttered “ow…”

“Thanks for the save there Dash! Come on Bon Bon!” Lyra exclaimed

“O-ok!” Bon Bon replied as the two galloped away from the destructive princess, and Spike ran up to her

“You ok Dash?” Spike said

“Feeling like I got kicked in the head by a mule a repeatedly… but yeah, never better…” Dash groaned

Nearby Twilight landed on a house and looked around for something else to blow up when one of her eyes centered on her castle, and a goofy grin came to her face.

“Big house go boom… BIG HOUSE GO BOOM!” Twilight hopped in place joyfully before heading out to destroy her own home, and Spike looked on in horror.

“TWILIGHT YOU GOTTA STOP!” he vainly called out to her as she began firing more blasts to blow holes in her castle.

“Is she seriously trying to crash her own castle?!” Dash said in disbelief

As they were racing their minds to think of a way to stop her, the sounds of footsteps came their way, and they turned seeing Rarity, Fluttershy, Discord, and the mayor mare.

“Guys!” Rainbow Dash said happy they came

“My word! What is she doing?!” Rarity gaped at the attempted wonton destruction of the castle.

“Guys! Thank goodness your here! Twilights gone off the deep end!” Spike said hurriedly

“Yeah!... by the way, what’s Discord doing here?” Dash said raising an eyebrow noticing the draconeqqus.

“He’s here to help fix the mess he escalated, isn’t that right?” Rarity said glaring at the lord of chaos who just sighed.

“Yes…” he said half-heartedly.

“Wait… escalated?” Dash said with a raised eyebrow

“It’s a long story…” Discord sighed

Another explosion sounded, and Discord easily ducked an oncoming burning table.

“My my, she’s really going to town” Discord mused.

“While there’s a castle to save please!” Spike pleaded

“Alright alright” Discord flew up to Twilight who was levitating a bunch of bricks and gems and pelting them around.

“Hey there Twilight!” he said with disguised glee, which in Twilights altered state she couldn’t tell.

“Disqy!” she exclaimed happily, flying over and hugging him “didja see how I pranked everypony!? They were so happy they were running and screaming!” Twilight giggled

“Indeed, you did very well” Discord chuckled at her broken logic.

Meanwhile back on ground level, the group has noticed that Discord seems to be chatting with Twilight.

“…What is he doing?” Rarity said confused

“I think he’s… talking her down?” Fluttershy said

“But it’s Discord!” Spike said in disbelief

“I-I'm not sure how I should react to this” Mayor Mare said with a deadpan

While the group on the ground were pondering this Discord got ready to implement his plan.

“Hey, Twilight!” Discord said

“Yeah?” she said with a tilt of the head

“Wanna play a new game?” he glanced back at the group and gave a thumbs up and a wink.

“New game?! Newgamenewgamenewgamenewgamenewgamenewgame!” she babbled a mile a minute.

“It’s called tag.” Discord said after she slowed down enough to hear.

“Tag? What’s tag?” Twilight paused, trying to guess the game.

Once again on ground level, the group overheard Discord proposition and began to shuffle nervously at what he just suggested.

“D-did he just say tag?” the mayor mare said nervously.

“What is he planning?!” Rarity said

After Discord finished explaining the rules, he teleported to the group and Rarity spoke up first.

“TAG!? Really!? Are you trying to rile her up more!?” Rarity shrieked

“Now-now, let me explain, I’ve dealt with somewhat similar cases like her current mental state in the past, she won’t be easy to contain, however, there is a way to ensure she’s pacified until she can be fixed.” Discord explained

“You’ve done this before?” Spike asked

“Eleven times as a matter fact…” Discord said with reminiscence

“How is tag going to help her?” the mayor mare said, confused.

“Heheh simple my little pony-“ he glanced back a saw Twilight shaking excitedly “however we don't have time, by the way, your all it, she’s going to try and tag all of you” Discord quickly said before teleporting away his voice lingering “keep her as distracted as possible!” Discords voice said

“I severely dislike him…” the mayor mare groaned.

“Me too,” Rarity muttered before jumping to the side with a yelp as Twilight swooped and turned towards the group who immediately scattered with individual screams of fright and surprise and Twilight laughed as she pursued them.

“DISCOOOORD!” Rarity called out in frustration

Author's Note

Let the games begin! :rainbowdetermined2::twilightsmile::ajsmug::yay::pinkiehappy::raritystarry::moustache:

Tag till you drop!

Rarity dove out of the way again as Twilight swooped and reached out a hoof to tag her, a street sign exploded as she basically punched it in Rarity’s place.

“Is she tapping into her natural alicorn strength?! I’ll be done for if she tags me!” Rarity yelped diving into an alleyway as Twilight swooped back in and dove at Spike who rolled to the side and accidentally exposed the mayor mare who was tagged right in the face and sent flying by Twilights strength.

“Aaaaaahh!” the mayor mare exclaimed out before Fluttershy managed to catch her.

“Oh, dear! Are you ok, Mrs. Mayor Mare?” Fluttershy said concerned and holding the unconscious mayor mare before yelping in surprise as a purple blur shot past her and Twilight swung around towards her.

“TAG YOUR IIIIIT!” Twilight called out

“EEEEK!” Fluttershy squealed in fright flying as fast as she could away from Twilight bobbing in and out of cover and under a bridge, but Twilight was keeping up with her.

---meanwhile---

Applejack was hurrying into town after her hard work had been desolated out of nowhere by a falling cabbage cart and she saw the town is up in smoke.

“Ah hope this ain’t Pinkies fault again!” as she galloped onwards however a shrill scream sounded which made her pause.

“What in thunderation?” Applejack said as she narrowly ducked a yellow blur that said: “excuse me!”

She jumped up and looked in the direction of the blur as it vanished above the trees.

“Was that Flutter-OOMPH!“ she was cut off when a purple blur rammed into her taking her with it, when she glanced back she saw it was a messy Twilight with a weird look in her eyes.

“HIIIII,” she said jovially.

“Twilight!? What in tarnation is going on? Let me down this instant!” Applejack demanded.

“OKAY!” Twilight beamed dropping Applejack causing her to tumble through the air.

“AH MENT CLOSER TO THE GROUND!” Applejack flailed in midair.

“APPLEJACK!” Fluttershy exclaimed Applejack managed to calm herself somewhat and looked for a way to save herself and saw a long branch and pulled out her rope.

“Ah got one shot” she muttered as she flung her rope and managed to get it around the branch leaving her dangling a dozen feet off the ground, and both Applejack and Fluttershy sigh in relief when Applejack gets to ground level she turns towards the two figures in the sky.

“ARE Y'ALL TRYING TO KILL ME TWILIGHT!?” Applejack shouted after the disappearing ponies.

She went unheard.

***

“If you could stop chasing me, that would be really great!” Fluttershy exclaimed out fearfully.

“TAG TAG TAG!” Twilight jabbed her hoof forward missing Fluttershy narrowly, and she wound up snapping a tree branch off with one of her jabs.

“I really don’t want you to tag me! It looks painful!” Fluttershy exclaimed out, before realizing the grip she had on the unconscious mayor was loosening.

“Oh, no! I need to find somewhere to put her down!” Fluttershy panicked

She looked around for something and saw a bridge with a wagon full of hay conveniently being toted by a blue earth pony. She smiled and lowered her dive speed.

“Alright, just let go and hope her landing isn’t too hard…” Fluttershy muttered.

As Fluttershy swooped and dropped the Mayor Mare, she landed in the hay without injury which made Fluttershy sigh with relief only to be immediately replaced by fear when Twilight caught up with her and raised a hoof to strike/tag her.

“Eeek!” Fluttershy squeaked before magic teleported her away and in her place, a wood replica was tagged out of the air.

“TAG! Ahahaha!” Twilight flew back into town to look for the others, and Fluttershy was laying on the ground on a random rooftop hidden from view and she was hyperventilating as Discord handed her a paper bag which she graciously used.

“Are you ok, Flutterbuddy?” Discord asked after she finished calming herself.

“Dis-…Discord this has… has gone on far enough! Twilight has no control of her earth pony strength right now; she could hurt somepony!” Fluttershy wheezed panicking again and putting the bag back up to her muzzle.

“Don’t worry; I have a plan I just need you all to distract her until then.” Discord assured

“Why? What is this plan?” she asked before Discord leaned over to whisper in her ear.

“Y-you think it would work?” Fluttershy said quickly

“Yes,” Discord nodded.

“B-but my friends!” she began.

“I got that covered they’ll be alright” Discord assured

“I-I hope so…” Fluttershy muttered

---in town---

Ponies dodged out of the way as the crazed princess descended seeking her other friends to tag with her hoof, she flew by Spike who was hiding behind a corner of a building.

“Discord you jerk…” Spike said, glancing around nervously, “how's THIS supposed to help us?!” Spike said a little too loudly and quickly covered his own mouth and looked to see if Twilight heard him.

***

Twilight flew through the air giggling thanks to her being wall-eyed now she can now see in two different directions, she flew past several objects and buildings looking for her friends as she flew by a restaurant however Rarity peeked out from behind an overturned table and Pinkie poked her head out of a teacup on the ground.

“Is she gone?” Pinkie asked

“I-I hope so… goodness, she doesn’t know her own strength like this and I’m a tad delicate, to say the least.” Rarity said before the two mares heard an exclamation in the distance.

“That sounded like Dashie!” Pinkie said going back into the cup and reappearing in a tree nearby with a telescope and saw Rainbow Dash running the best she could from a laughing Twilight who’s trying to reach her. “she’s in trouble!”

“Oh, dear.” Rarity said in dismay

***

“TWILIGHT! This isn’t going to end well for either of us!” Dash said frantically which went ignored as Twilight dove for her and Rainbow dash jumped over her as she swooped in.

“FUN!” she exclaimed

“How do you even remember how to fly!? You’ve lost your mind for cloud's sake!” Dash screamed, and she dodged Twilight again but stumbled into a trashcan as she rounded a corner.

“RAINBOW DASH!” Rarity called out to her friend, which drew Twilights attention.

“FOUND YOU!” she giggled in mid-air before flying towards her.

“Err… perhaps I should have stayed silent…” Rarity mumbled before galloping away while Twilight is in pursuit and Pinkie poked her head out of a bush.

“OHMYGOSH! Rarie’s in danger! I need to set up a trap!” Pinkie said before vanishing back into the bush.

“Aaah! Twilight please no! I can’t afford to clean red out of my coat! Furthermore, bruises would clash horribly with my eyeliner!” Rarity exclaimed as Twilight descended but as Spike saw Twilight was about to tag Rarity and in a moment of bravery, Spike ran out to her.

“No!” Rarity closed her eyes as Twilight closed in and awaited the painful punch

“NOOOO!” Spike ran and jumped in front of Rarity and took the brunt of the hit sending him flying over Rarity and into a nearby wall and Rarity’s eyes opened when she heard him yell as he was sent flying and she turned to see a giggling princess.

“Hee hee hee! Purple lizard fly away!” Twilight giggled with a twirl oblivious to the hurting dragon now laying in a heap next to a damaged wall.

“SPIKE!” was the collective response as Rarity ran over to him and lifted him showcasing his blackened eye.

“Spikey! Oh dear, where does it hurt?” Rarity said worriedly

“I-i'm fine… just *cough cough* help Twilight…” Spike croaked dramatically

"No! I won’t just leave you like this Spike!” Rarity said with tears in her eyes

“I-I always loved…. Loved… ugh...” Spike fainted, and Rarity turned her head skyward

“SPIIIIIKE,” she exclaimed out to the heavens. Nearby Rainbow Dash just looked on confusedly.

“...Are they seriously pulling the drama at a time like this?!” Dash groaned

Rarity stood up and eyed the laughing alicorn with anger stepping out into the open.

“Nopony… hurts my… SPIKEY WIKEY!” Rarity shouted, firing a magical blast which made Twilight stop laughing and dodge it.

“Yikes!” Twilight exclaimed

“Hey, hey! Easy Rarity! we’re trying to subdue her not blow her to smithereens!” Dash said cantering to her.

“I couldn’t vanquish her if I tried; I’m simply trying to incapacitate her… painfully!” Rarity said back before firing more shots at Twilight who flew around them and tried to dive into them, and they both jumped as Twilight closed in, but then suddenly Twilight froze in midair and tilted her head when she eventually realized she wasn’t moving.

“Huh? Why am I not moving?” Twilight said confused before glancing behind herself to see a lasso had wound it’s way around Twilight’s leg and at the other end of the rope was none other than Applejack struggling against the princess.

“Gotcha!” Applejack said around her lasso, “Twilight! Enough of this! What in tarnation is wrong with you?!” Applejack said through clenched teeth, despite her effort Twilight began pumping her wings and Applejack was being tugged along but Dash saw a chance to capture Twilight.

“Grab her!” Dash yelled

Rarity dodged to the side and fired a telekinesis beam that assisted in holding Twilight in place, and Rainbow Dash took this chance to jump up and grab onto Twilight and Twilight struggled with three separate beings holding her.

“Um, Pinkie! Now would be a good time to help!” Dash said straining against the struggling alicorn but when Pinkie didn’t appear Dash glanced about.

“Where’s Pinkie?-” Dash said before Pinkie popped out of nowhere.

“HYAH!” Pinkie squeed as she tackled Twilight out of the air and thus out of Rainbow Dash’s grip making the rainbow mare jump back with surprise.

“PINKIE!?” Rainbow Dash said surprised before she wound up hitting the back of her head on a low-lying roof edge in her surprise, causing horrible pain to rip through her skull. Her vision began to swim, and her headache returned with a vengeance making her lower to the ground groaning in pain as black spots entered her vision.

“Ah cumulous…” and with that Rainbow Dash passed out on the spot.

“RAINBOW DASH!” Rarity exclaimed out, Meanwhile Pinkie was on Twilight and poked her head.

“Tag! Now, you're it!” Pinkie said a bit cockily before she was sent flying by Twilights hoof.

“Tag! You're it now!” Twilight said before giggling again and taking to the air making Rarity and Applejack strain to hold her.

“TWILIGHT! STOP THIS!” Rarity called out desperately

“What’s the matter with her, anyways?” Applejack asked

“It’s a long story…” Rarity said with a grumble

“But I want to PLAY!” Twilight whined

“At the expense of others?!” Applejack said

“Whatever that means, then yes!” Twilight said as she began to drag them along.

“Ah can’t hold her much longer!” Applejack said and almost immediately after Twilight broke free and flew around to them.

“TAAAAAAG!” she said with a vicious grin.

“Uh, oh!” Applejack said as they both closed their eyes and awaited the pain when suddenly they found themselves on a building rooftop near the spot they were before and looking back they saw Discord standing there Twilight glanced about with her mismatched eyes before seeing them and flying up to them.

“DISQY!” Twilight exclaimed happily, “Wanna play?”

“Indeed,” Discord said cracking his knuckles

“Discord?” Applejack said confused while Rarity quietly fumed

“There you are, you troublemaker!” Rarity practically spat in anger

“Hush hush now girls, it’s time for the draconequus to step in! time for some rule changes eh Sparkle?” he asks but saw that Twilight was hardly paying attention, so he gestured to the girls to step back, after exchanging a nervous glance the two backed up.

“Time to tag till you drop!” Discord said with a smirk

The two mares just stared confused as Discord stood off against Twilight the two locked in a near staredown before Discord teleported forward and tagged Twilight and flew off.

“TAG! YOUR IT TWILIGHT! NOW FOLLOW ME!” Discord called back, and Twilight stared off into space for a sec before she gave a laugh and Twilight bounced happily before she took to the air and chased him around. As the two moved through the air rapidly, Rarity and Applejack watched with shock and confusion back on ground level.

“What is Discord up to now?” Rarity said with a frown

“Ah don’t even know anymore…” Applejack responded about to take a step forward when suddenly the two blazed past her making her jump back with a yelp.

“I wouldn’t step outside the circle if I were you!” Discord said as he looped around again.

“Circle?” the two said simultaneously glancing at the ground in front of their hooves to see a red circle had been drawn there.

“When did this circle appear here?” Rarity said surprised

“And when did those lines appear over there?” Applejack pointed to another set of lines that led through town as well as various circles especially around their friends in circles it’s as if Discord had tagged the ground with red paint all over town and noticeably the ponies are being kept on the outside of the lanes that appeared as a result.

“What in tarnation is goin on here?” Applejack said completely confused about the bizarre situation that has taken up her day and destroyed her hard work.

“I-I'm not certain, to be honest, what was Discord doing before he appeared?” Rarity said looking around wondering how she missed this… although one does tend to get distracted when their being chased around by a crazed alicorn.

The two mares watched Twilight pursued Discord happily, as he flew between the lines and managed to keep pace with her as he went around and circled a building Twilight continually keeping at him the chase went on for 25 minutes before they blew by them again.

“Discord! What on Equus are you doing?!” Rarity exclaimed out in hopes of getting a valid answer.

“You’ll see!” Discord shouted back circling around an unconscious Rainbow Dash before dashing to city hall to circle it 20 times “just stay in the circle! Unless you want to be run over!” Discord added

Sure enough, this game of cat and mouse went on...

And on...

And on…

And on…

And on…

Nighttime came and with that Discord finally slowed and landed in a panting heap on the rooftop in front of a snoring Rarity and Applejack startling them awake.

“Hwah?!” was the collected reaction from the two as Rarity straightened up her messy mane from after she fell asleep in the circle with Applejack. The two saw Twilight flutter up to Discord and give him a hard poke in the side eliciting a wince from the draconequus.

“BOOP! You're it!” Twilight giggled

“Sh-she’s not even winded? after that?!” Rarity sputtered surprised

“What was the point of that then?!” Applejack exclaimed

“YAAY THAT WAS FUN! LET’S PLAY AGAI-“ Twilight suddenly fell on her back and passed out.

“Huh?” both the mares said at the same time looking down at the snoozing alicorn.

“H-heh… had to tire her out while making sure the town was ok, right?” Discord got up conjuring a fan to cool off.

“So… you painted lines and informed the ponies to stay behind it so they wouldn’t get run over as you we’re tiring Twilight out?” Rarity said with an air of uncertainty.

“Indeed,” Discord said as he levitated Twilight over to a cage he conjured and placed her on a pillow in there, and she curled up and sighed comfortably.

“That should hopefully hold her by the time we can get to the solution.” Discord said, dusting himself off. "Whew, haven't exercised that much in... what century is it again?..."

“Ya managed to solve the problem without worsening it further?” Applejack said shocked not even hearing Discords question.

“I-I'm speechless…. good job” Rarity said “but that doesn’t change your punishment later, don’t forget that!” she quickly added.

“Yeah yeah…” Discord sighed

---later on at the castle---

Twilight slowly wakes up, as her vision clears, she looks up and sees another purple alicorn staring back at her.

“Huh? Who are you?” Twilight asked before seeing the other alicorn repeat her exactly.

“I’m Twilight!” they both said before gasping.

“Me too! Wanna be friends?” Twilight laughed and giggled at the other alicorn who seemed to have the same idea.

“YAY!” she exclaimed as she tries to unsuccessfully give the other alicorn a crushing hug through the cage.

Meanwhile, her friends stare with a mix of confusion and amusement at her befriending of her reflection in a mirror.

“I’m a tad surprised that that’s working,” Rarity said with a chuckle.

“I thought it would; the brainless types always fall for the reflection gag, she should be distracted until Spike finishes.” Discord said glancing over at Spike who was drawing out the runes and circles single-handedly setting up the spell much to the initial surprise of the group.

“So… tell me again how ya know how to do this spell?” Applejack drawled

“I’m not sure, to be honest, but I think I absorbed some of Twilights memories from the past month or so when I ate a chunk off of the purple crystal. Including the spell, she used and… um… other things...” Spike trailed off towards the end.

“I still hope nothing bad happens to Twilight when she’s back to normal,” Fluttershy whispered.

“Me too.” Spike agreed

“Wait! What kind of things?” Pinkie said, being curious about the end of Spike's sentence.

“Um… I’m sure she doesn’t want you all to know.” Spike said with an edge of worry.

“Ah can respect that.” Applejack said with a nod

“Oooh, more juicy gossip!” Rarity said excitedly

“We shouldn’t pry if that’s alright,” Fluttershy said

“Just a few more adjustments… aaaaaaannnnnnnd THERE!” Spike said, drawing attention back to him, “the circle is ready! However, according to Twilights, memories of the book…” Spike trailed off focusing on the foreign memories “she has to be in the circle without any obstructions.” Spike double-checked the book itself to confirm.

“We’re gonna let her out of the cage? Don’t ya’ll remember how tough it was to get her calm in the first place?” Applejack said with worry evident in her voice.

“That’s what it says” Spike shrugged.

“Oh dear… to get her to stay in one spot for more than a minute?” Rarity dreaded

The girls glance at Twilight, seeing her playing peek-a-boo with her reflection.

“Alright! No use prolonging it if we want our friend back!” Rarity said, stepping up to the plate and unlocking the cage. “U-um.. hello there Twilight,” Rarity said a little nervous now, and the alicorn glanced back at her and giggled.

“Hiiii! Did you meet my newest friend? Her name is Twilight too!” Twilight said gesturing to the reflection.

“Umm, yes yes very good, say would you come over to that circle and hold still for just a-“ Rarity is sent flying by a purple hoof smashing into her snout causing her to fly back.

“BOOOP!” Twilight exclaimed

“RARITY!” Spike exclaimed

“Alright if ah have to hogtie her then ah guess ah have no choice!-“ Applejack got her rope out and approached, but Pinkie stepped in front of her and giggled.

“Leave this to me.” Pinkie said trotting up to Twilight who’s approaching a still unconscious Rainbow Dash with bandages wrapped around the top of her head on a couch and poked her shoulder making Twilight turn around.

“Hey, Twilight!” Pinkie grinned

“Hi, pink thing!” Twilight said beaming

“Pink thing?” Applejack said confused and a little disgusted with what she called Pinkie, but before she could question it, Discord leaned in and whispered in her ear. Something about “she doesn’t know what a pony is apparently” which got a bewildered look from Applejack.

“Do you wanna play a game?” Pinkie said in the same voice she uses for the cake twins.

“YES! GAME! PLAY! NOW!” Twilight beamed while everypony just cringed from Twilights loudness.

“Okay! It’s called ‘follow the line’ you follow the line from inside that circle until you find the end of it,” Pinkie explained.

“D-don’t tell her it’s a circle! Everypony knows circles don’t have an-“ Rarity cried stumbling back to the group with a bruise on her snout.

“Ooooh, that sounds fun!” Twilight grinned

“…Once again I stand corrected…” Rarity deadpanned for the umpteenth time today.

“Alrighty then let’s go!” Pinkie said as the two skipped over to the circle and Twilight got into the circle and carefully traced the edges of it mumbling ‘follow the line’ repeatedly.

“Honestly too much has happened today for me to handle…” Rarity sighed while Twilight was still shuffling around the circle in the background.

“You can say that again…” Spike sighed

“Come on, everypony! Fore she gets bored!” Applejack called to her distracted friends.

They glance at her and seem a tad embarrassed, and Rarity moved into position.

“Alright let’s hope this works! Everypony ready?” Rarity asked, and they all nodded. “alright then! Spike darling, what is the first step?” Rarity asked

“Make sure your horn is pointed at the crystal then focus on the image of the knowledge and what’ll it do when you use it,” Spike assure as Rarity focused her power Discord helping with his assigned task of feeding magic to her to prevent her from tiring out too soon.

“Too bad I’m not being paid for my part…” Discord grumbled, but a quick stare from Fluttershy stopped his complaining. Rarity concentrated hard on the lost knowledge that Twilight possesses and tried to crack open the gem that was containing her mind, Discords magic being a big help to her.

“Come on!... Come on!” Rarity said as her horn burned with pain, unused to this much effort being put forth.

“Almost there…” Spike said quietly, as she continued to output energy; eventually, the crystal began to crack and splinter, making it glow. Twilight paused and stared at the glowing crystal with wonder in her eyes.

“Ooohh pretty…” almost like she was hypnotized Twilight began to trot towards it.

“Oh, crap! APPLEJACK!” Spike exclaimed

“On it!” Applejack responded getting out her lasso and throwing it around Twilight's tail and Fluttershy and Spike helping her tug the rope and managing to slow her down a bit.

“Hurry, please!” Fluttershy exclaimed

“I’m… trying!” Rarity strained as the other two mares and dragon struggled, and the alicorn approached the edge of the ring. With a final shout of effort, Rarity managed to crack open the crystal and draw the stream of knowledge out.

“Wowie! What’s that!?” Twilight chirped trying to reach up to it.

“I’ve… done it! Now what Spike?” Rarity said glancing back

“Don’t lose focus! Try to maintain the thought of the knowledge and where you want it to go.” Spike assured

Rarity nodded and concentrated on Twilight and the knowledge, and the stream swirled and descended and slammed into Twilight’s head earning a yelp of surprise from her as she fell on her back and the stream was flowing into her and the ring around her glowed intensely.

Sweat beaded down Rarity’s forehead as she tried to maintain control of the stream. Twilight twisted and turned her head to try and get away from the stream which made it harder but in the end, her struggles ceased and with a final grunt of effort Rarity managed to cram the rest of the flow into her head and Rarity collapsed in exhaustion.

“It… Is done…” Rarity breathed heavily, and everypony else sat down winded from this effort.

They looked up and saw Twilight was thankfully still breathing, but the ring was still glowing brightly.

“That's strange,” Pinkie said

“What?” Spike said almost reluctantly

“My right hind hoof is shaking, and my eyes are twitching, that means an explosion is going to happen because of the spell.” Pinkie said

“E-explosion?” Spike said nervously

“Ah think we’d better go then,” Applejack said quickly.

“Nah no need it didn’t happen so I don’t think-“

An explosion ripped through the area the group stood near, leaving a burnt circle around Twilight.

“Ow…” Discord said falling off of the wall revealing Spike behind him who fell onto him afterward.

“Pinkiiieee… why didn’t you say so earlier??...” Rarity whined while coughing, covered in blackness from the explosion.

“For comedy purposes…” Pinkie said with a raised hoof before fainting.

Author's Note

And the rising action has arrived! hope you all enjoyed! :pinkiehappy:

as always like, fav, critique, and comment. ciao! :raritywink:

Picking up the pieces

Twilight’s vision was foggy, as she was waking up, she glanced around seeing a few blurry shapes that looked like her friends.

“Guys! I think she’s waking up!” Spike said excitedly

“Ugh… wha?...” Twilight groaned as she looked around her room and saw her friends. They all could see her eyes were back to normal now.

“Twilight? Ya back to normal now?” the blurry figure that looked like Applejack said at the same time Twilight realized she was very thirsty.

“W-water…” Twilight said weakly

“Already got it for you!” Pinkie said, grabbing the glass and giving it to Twilight who drank it quickly and gratefully when Twilights head stopped spinning, and her vision began to clear she could see some of her friends are wearing bandages.

“You alright there,” Rainbow Dash said noticeably there we’re bandages on her head.

“What… what happened?? Why does my head feel so-?” Twilight said looking around before Pinkie popped up in front of Twilights face.

“QUICK! What’s one plus one?” Pinkie demanded

“Umm… two?” Twilight said a little nervous about the sudden close proximity.

“SHE’S BACK!” Pinkie cheered

“Ahm sure she is” Applejack chuckled.

“I’m back?” I-I don’t-“ Twilight began, but Spike cut her off by hugging her which surprised her, but she returned the hug.

“I’m glad your back Twilight,” Spike said quietly.

“I’m glad to be back I guess, I'm not sure what happened. But I’m sure you all have a story to tell me.” Twilight said with a chuckle which morphed into a yawn. “clearly it’ll have to be later…”

“Indeed, we do.” Rarity smiled before turning to her friends. “come now, I do believe Twilight needs a little more rest” the group nodded and walked out of the room. Spike gave Twilight a last glance before walking downstairs.

---the next day---

Rarity and Twilight were standing on a high balcony drinking some ice teas overseeing the town repairs. Twilight was funding the project with some gems she had on hoof feeling personally responsible. She even helped out in several area’s herself.

She then looked to a nearby house Discord was repairing it with a hammer and nails grumbling to himself.

Twilight had discussed with Celestia of a proper punishment for Discord, but since Fluttershy is his overseer, she got the final say. Fluttershy voted that Discord help with town repairs, but he cannot use his powers he has to repair the damage Twilight did under his jurisdiction with his own two claws, which unfortunately was about 70% of the damages done to the town.

“Let’s hope this sets him straight.” Rarity chuckled

“Yeah, let’s hope so,” Twilight responded.

“Do you remember anything yet? I heard it would slowly come back to you,” Rarity asked.

“Umm… not quite” Twilight hesitantly responded which Rarity noticed but before she could question it the flapping of wings caught her attention.

Rainbow Dash flew up to the group a little unsteadily; she had been getting better as of late; unfortunately, her concussion was affecting her flying a little bit. However, the stubborn mare refused to stay down and rest to show how she was determined she was to help repair the town.

“Hey, Twi!” Rainbow Dash said with a wave

“Hey, Rainbow Dash” Twilight responded with her own wave “how are things going with the weather?”

“Great! I managed to convince the Cloudsdale weather team to push the storm that was scheduled for today down south. So we got sunny sky’s today.” Rainbow Dash said enthusiastically

“Thanks!” Twilight smiled, and the Pegasus saluted before flying off.

“I do wish sometimes she would take a break. We can’t have her passing out mid-air like this morning.” Rarity sighed

“Yeah, good thing Thunderlane was there to catch her,” Twilight said before staring off into town sighing discontentedly.

“Hmm?” Rarity said, noticing Twilights ire and takes a few steps closer. “Are you alright, Twilight dear?” Rarity said with genuine concern.

“It’s… it’s fine…” Twilight sighed, “it’s just… It still hurts knowing I caused all this…” Twilight said before Rarity gave her a light thud on the head with her hoof.

“Now-now none of that Twilight, we’ve had enough self-pitying for one day. To be honest, you were quite adorable , and dangerous as a nitwit” Rarity said with a giggle.

“But I hurt so many ponies! I terrified the townsfolk, and I acted crazy in public! I imagine a certain foal free press is going to be all over it…, I vandalized my own house, I hurt you and my other friends and went along with Discords crazy schemes…” Twilight moped

“I said quiet now, the situation is over with now, and you hardly remember it.” Rarity cooed trying to calm Twilight

“I hope that the CMC aren’t mad about their ball…” Twilight grumbled quietly which Rarity still picked up on, and a hint of surprise crossed her face before a knowing smile came. She decided to test a thought.

“Oh, but surely you enjoyed the part where Discord turned the water from a sprinkler into orange soda? it was quite funny.” Rarity mused out loud.

“What? No, it wasn’t! It could have stained one of the outfits they were wearing or make their fur all sticky! And I laughed at them, if they find out I had a hoof in it I could be in troub-“ suddenly Twilights eyes widened as Rarity put on a half-amused half accusing look.

“Umm… I mean…” Twilight attempted

“You DO remember, don’t you?” Rarity said accusingly

“N-no I don’t!” Twilight defended

“Is that so? Because even though Discord explained it we never talked about that in your presence and whenever we asked you about Discords pranks you said, and I quote I'm still foggy on the details why did you lie?” Rarity asked, and Twilight blushed and looked to the ground.

“M-maybe some of it came back! L-look can’t we just drop it?” Twilight begged, but Rarity’s deadpan showed she wasn’t going to drop it until she got answers and Twilight sighed

“You’re not going to drop it…darnit… ok ok fine, do you at least promise not to tell anypony?” Twilight said nervously

“Cross my heart, hope to fly, stick a cupcake in my eye” Rarity said making the hoof motions.

“Well… for a while there… I………enjoyed it…” Twilight said quietly, looking embarrassed.

“What?” Rarity said looking surprised.

“I-it’s just that I spend so much time worrying about results and knowledge that it just… felt nice to… let go and just… well….um… y-you see I felt like for the first time I had no worries or a care in the world… a-and it felt so liberating! And… I…I just…” Twilight took a deep breath before spilling the beans loudly.

“I enjoyed it when I stopped thinking rationally for a while ok!? Everything felt new and amusing again, like back when I was a little filly, And I didn’t remember anything at the time so for the first time I felt like I had nothing to stress about! It was fun and liberating, and I’d almost want to do it again were it not for the fact that others could get hurt! THERE! I said it!” Twilights face was now red, and her eyes were focused on the floor.

“You mean to tell me that the studious Twilight actually enjoyed her time as an idiot?” Rarity said amused, and Twilight nodded slowly refusing to look up “why are you so embarrassed Twilight? I do admit one needs to turn off their brain now and then to de-stress.”

“I’m the princess of magic! If I act out of control like this, It just proves I shouldn't be called a princess!… as enjoyable as it was to be blissfully unaware for a time, this is just proof I should look for a way to turn back into a unicorn… I’m not worthy of this power anymore…” Twilight said, looking more distressed than ever, and fresh tears came to her eyes.

Rarity sighed frustratedly before raising Twilight’s head up and looked her in the eye “I’m tired of this! You ARE worthy Twilight!” Rarity said startling Twilight with her sudden volume

“You do plenty of good in day to day life you've saved ponyville many times, and you are smart enough to think your way out of any situation or challenge presented thus far! You bested that brute Tirek for Celestia’s sake! You don’t have to surpass every achievement you make, another challenge will come, and you’ll face it! As you always have!”

Twilight was shocked and tried to respond, but Rarity cut her off.

“And I know this mess was mostly your fault, but everypony makes mistakes! You don’t have to keep putting yourself down for what you cannot change! It happened just deal with it and move on!” Rarity said a little exasperated and Twilight turn to the ground looking a little shaken by the thought of merely accepting her losses tremendous as they were but thinking back on it she was right, she messed up a lot, and she was pretty sure a previous friendship report advised against letting your failures drag you down.

“W-what if I do something else wrong like this again?... what then?” Twilight asked shakily

“Then we’ll face it together, with our friends,” Rarity said with a smile.

Twilight thought about it, and after looking inside herself, she realized Rarity was right in that regard. So she managed a smile.

“Thanks, Rarity, I needed that,” Twilight said, looking at her.

“It’s no problem, Twilight, just know your friends are here if you ever need them.” Rarity said, and the two shared a brief hug before Rarity stood and trotted out.

“As fun, as this chat was, I do have a boutique to spruce up after the roof was caved in.” Rarity chuckled, and Twilight groaned.

“I said sorry!” she called back as Rarity left and Twilight sighed and looked out to her beloved town.

…

…

…

“Everypony makes mistakes…” Twilight said with a smile, “I think I can live with that…”

---three hours later---

Dear Celestia

I know I haven’t sent one in a while, but some thoughts and lessons came, and I decided to inform you of them.

Today I learned not to let my failures make me think I’m not worthy of the power I obtained, goals and deadlines can be met with time. And if you let the challenge of it all wear you down, you’ll never get anywhere in life. It's like Dash once said you just have to roll with the punches. I let what happened nearly push my other friends away at one point in time… I may need to review some of my earlier friendship reports just in case. Also, before I forget Discord has something to say...

***

Dear Celestia

As much as it pains me to participate in one of these goodie-goodie friendship reports it’s one of my punishments in order to regain Fluttershy’s trust so here I go…

Today I learned not to take advantage of others particularly the mentally incompetent- @%#@#$!... sorry about that Twilight just ‘accidentally’ stomped on my tail… and yes, I’m tailoring what I’m saying to the paper. Anyways don’t take advantage of others especially if they aren’t in their right mind… there.

***

Anyways that’s the first report I’ve made in months. I hope this finds you at a good time.

Yours truly.

Princess Twilight Sparkle.

Author's Note

HAPPY 4TH OF JULY EVERYONE! :ajsmug::yay::pinkiehappy::rainbowwild::raritystarry::twilightsmile::moustache:

Sorry, this chapter isn’t very long or good, but I figured today's a good day as any to post it. :twilightsmile:

In any case, I hope you enjoyed it. 🎇

Epilogue: I'm you now!

It's night time, and Twilight is sitting and reading a book on thermodynamics when Spike comes out of the kitchen and heads over to her.

“Hey Twilight it’s getting late,” Spike said tiredly.

“Alright, just go upstairs and I'll be in shortly” Twilight said, not glancing up from her book.

“Ok, and don’t forget that in a couple of days we have that meet-up with our friends,” Spike said

“Don’t worry I’ll note it down on the schedule,” Twilight said affirmatively as Spike nodded and turned to head upstairs but paused and turned back to her.

“Oh, and how is that ‘month of amnesia’ thing coming along,” Spike asked.

“My what?” Twilight asked looking at him with a raised brow.

“Remember? You forgot everything that happened over the past month?” Spike said

“Oh! Umm… not too well but it’s fine, I can ask Applejack to fill me in anything important I forgot tomorrow, don’t worry.” Twilight said with a nod.

“Ok,” Spike turned but couldn’t resist messing with her, “and don’t worry, I didn’t tell them.”

“Hm? Tell them what?” Twilight asked

“About… you know,” Spike said vaguely.

“No, I don’t, what are you talking about?” Twilight asked

“What you do in the closet when you know nopony is around.” Spike half shuddered at the memory, and half chuckled at Twilights face becoming a few shades paler at what he said.

“Wh-wh-what are you talking about…?” she whispered.

“I didn’t know you were into that stuff though, nor did I know you could use an old notepad, 15 toothpicks, a protractor, and a roll of string all infused with magic for something like that,” Spike said hoping some brain bleach would help him maintain his innocence later on.

POMF

Spike glanced back and saw that Twilight was tomato red in the face.

“You have my memories from the last month… so, in other words, you know that…I…-“ Twilight said with a twitchy eye.

“Umm… yeah, I do but don’t worry, I won’t-“ Spike began to take a few nervous steps back. Before he could react, Twilight sprang at him and scooped him up.

“YOU CAN’T TELL ANYPONY SPIKE! ANYPONY!! I’LL BE RUINED!!! CELESTIA WILL NEVER LET ME LIVE IT DOWN!!!!” Twilight shouted and shook him as a few hairs sprung up in her mane as well.

“O-ooo-ookaa-aaa-ay!” Spike said as his head bobbed back and forth in her grip after a while she calmed down and let him go and Spike teetered and fell down as she panted from her freak-out.

“Promise…” she said

“What?” Spike said trying to get the world to stop spinning.

“Pinkie promise you won’t tell!” she said sharply.

“Umm…” Spike's brain stalled

“PROMISE!” she said desperately.

“Cross my heart, hope to fly, stick a cupcake in my eye,” Spike said quickly now ready to get upstairs.

“Ok…” Twilight took a deep breath and threw herself onto a nearby couch with a relieved sigh and Spike didn’t wait for another second and made his way upstairs.

“Yeah, that wasn’t a good idea…” Spike said

---2 hours later---

Spike was sleeping in his room, and Twilight came upstairs a half an hour later and went to bed. As the two were sleeping in their separate rooms, Spike stirred in his sleep as an odd feeling came over him. His head began to pound, and in his mind, something called out to him.

“Wake up Spike” a quiet voice said

Spike twitched about as he mumbled what the voice in his head said.

“Wake up Spike.” The voice said louder than before.

Spike sucked in his teeth as the pounding in his head got worse.

“Wake up, Spike!” the voice shouted.

Spike jolted awake and glanced about a little concerned about the strange voice. It sounded like Twilight's voice, only… it wasn’t.

“Hello? Twilight? You there?” Spike said nervously

No response

“Heh… I’m probably just imagining things” Spike shrugged and went back to sleep, but then he promptly jumped out of bed at what he heard next.

“WAKE UP SPIIIIIKE!” the voice boomed in his ears.

“GYAAH!” Spike yelled as he hit the ground hard; unfortunately, crystal floors aren’t a good fall breaker.

“Ow…” Spike groaned, as he slowly got up and shook his head to clear the dizziness. Spike glanced around panting and wiping some of the sweat off of his scales.

“Wh-what the heck? I-I know I heard something that time!” as he glanced around, he sighed and went to the door.

“Go downstairs” the voice commanded

“I need to go downstairs… m-maybe get some water. Yeah, that’s it.” Spike said to nopony in particular.

Spike went downstairs and went to the kitchen, after drawing a glass of water he went back to the stairs before pausing.

“Don’t go to sleep. Go to the library.” The voice said

Spike didn’t know why but he responded to the voice in his head.

“Why? I’m tired, and I want to go to sleep” Spike said

“Because there are books there!” The voice said joyfully

“I know that, but I can read them tomorrow I’m tired now” Spike sighed emphasizing the word now.

“Who needs rest when you can learn? A scholar mustn’t sleep when he could be learning!” The voice persisted

“Sheesh, you sound just like Twilight-“ Spike’s eyes widened at the facts. Voice in his head, sounds like Twilight and sort of acts like her too, could it be?...

“Who are you…?” Spike said nervously.

“I’m you now.” The voice said chuckling mischievously

“Now?” Spike gulped

“Yes, now let’s get moving, knowledge doesn’t learn itself.” The voice said, almost commandingly.

“I-I'm heading to bed!” Spike said now determined to defy this strange voice telling him to go where it wants him to.

“No, your heading to go read that book on thermodynamics Twilight was reading earlier, It looked so fascinating.” The voice asserted

“No, it didn’t!” Spike protested

“Yes, it did! it’s a science book and science is fun!” The voice retorted

“I like comic books! Not science books!” Spike said defiantly as he started to move up the stairs

“No, you like science books!” The voice insisted

“Who are you to tell me what I like?!” Spike said getting annoyed

“You know you want to…” the voice whispered.

“No, I don’t!” Spike panted, hurrying up desperate to get to his room.

“Yes, you do; you want to go.” The voice was almost smug sounding.

“For the last time, I’m not-!” Spike started

“-Going to your room?” the voice said suddenly interrupting Spike.

Spike gasped upon realizing he was in the library and that he had unconsciously gone to the library area of the castle without realizing it.

“Wh-why? how did- HUH?!” Spike exclaimed, scaredly dropping the glass in his shock.

“Excellent! now let’s get to studying.” The voice said cheerfully

“IM-!” Spike tried to say, but suddenly his voice wouldn't come as if he didn't have control of his own mouth anymore he struggled to say that he's not going to do it, but eventually, he blurted out something else.

“N-not! G-going to bed!” Spike blurted out, the voice tracing his words exactly.

"Good! Now let's get studying" the voice giggled.

After recovering, he then turned and almost as if he was on auto-pilot he walked over to where Twilight had left the book on magical and non-magical thermodynamics and sat down.

“Wh-what’s happening to me?!” Spike said desperately

“You're realizing your inner potential as a student of magic! That’s what!” The voice cheered “and check it out, some facts about energy conversion and it’s uses.” the voice pointed out.

“I don’t care! I’m going to get Twilight! And then I’m going to-… Going to… I-I’m going to…” Spike trailed off as his eyes skimmed the page, now that he thought about it, the information was pretty interesting. Spike turned the page out of curiosity and found a page talking about some more info regarding thermodynamics.

“Hmm? Heat can also be converted to and from other forms of energy? For example, a steam turbine can convert heat to kinetic energy to run a generator that converts kinetic energy into electrical energy. A light bulb can convert this electrical energy to electromagnetic radiation (light), which, when absorbed by a surface, is converted back into heat… Wow… I… I didn’t know that! That’s very interesting! I wonder what else this book has in store for me!” Spike said enthusiastically suddenly.

Completely forgetting about everything else but the book in front of him Spike relaxed and continued reading with vigor.

And suddenly his eyes flashed purple once more…

[The End…?]

Author's Note

And that’s all she wrote. :moustache:

I thank all who took this journey through my first story with me, and I hope you’ll enjoy my next project, and the one after that. :twilightsmile:

I’ll begin my next work when I get the chance but first, I need to update my other story “Dragon Chronicles”

until then CIAO! :ajsmug::yay::pinkiehappy::rainbowdetermined2::raritystarry::twilightsmile::moustache::eeyup:

Abysmal success

Sunrise in the busy little town of Ponyville comes today without explosions, chaos, giant monsters, or any other overwhelming disasters.

Yet.

See, Ponyville Equestria is a “disaster-prone zone.” To some, living there is a dare since it’s next to one of the most dangerous wild zones in Equestria.

The Everfree forest.

It’s mainly thanks to six powerful ponies known as the elements of harmony and their dragon friend named Spike that the town is even still there.

One particular resident of a certain castle in the town had been on another studying binge. The towns local princess Twilight Sparkle; who is also the brave soul who took on the monstrous centaur Tirek a few months ago thanks to her and her friends a significant problem in Equestria was narrowly averted. However, the peace wasn’t to last...

In fact, you can say our resident Alicorn WAS the newest problem… let’s start at the beginning of the mess…

***

“Spike! Can you get me Starswirl’s 2nd recorded index of all things from section S please!” Twilight called out to her trusty assistant dragon Spike.

“Yes, ma'am!” Spike said with a salute

“Also, could you get the One-hundred uses for Aether book from section B.”

“Sure!” Spike said trying to gun it to the bookshelves

“Also, could you retrieve Dynamics of the tribes it’ll help with my most recent project.”

“Ok…ummm which section is-” Spike said as he hurried to retrieve the books she asked for him to get.

“Oh! I just remembered could you also retrieve-“ she began before Spike cut her off.

“Perhaps you could just tell me all the books you need at once and their sections instead of every 3 seconds please!” Spike said a little exasperated as he was already halfway up one of the ladders.

Twilight glanced back and chuckled a little. After apologizing to her assistant, she wrote a list for him and teleported it to him.

After reading it off, Spike went off to collect the listed books and bring them to Twilight.

“Here ya go!” Spike grunted as he set the stack of heavy books on the table and sat down to catch his breath.

“Whew, man I can’t wait until I hit my growth spurt….” Spike panted

Twilight chuckled again and thanked Spike before examining the book a little more closely, squinting a little to pull aside any distractions.

“Sooo… can you tell me again what all the hustle and bustle is about? You even had me make the 'special discovery tea' this morning.” Spike asked

“Well, you see, I’ve recently been digging through my new sets of archives that I’ve received after Tirek… well destroyed our previous selection.” Twilight said her expression becoming distant.

Twilight trailed off remembering how much of her original collections had were ruined that day and the abject horror she felt when it happened. Spike snapped his fingers in her face bringing her back to reality.

“Oh! Sorry, um where was I?” Twilight asked

“Tirek destroyed our previous selection…” Spike said bemused

“Oh yes, Um…” Twilights began to drift off again.

“Just! Don’t think about all the books that were destroyed and continue please!” Spike frantically said hoping to avoid another space out.

“Ok! Ok! So when Celestia had the new castle detailed a week after it emerged while we were all out for dinner as a thank you for the efforts of my friends and me.” Twilight chattered with growing excitement trotting over to the other side of the table.

“She added new archives to the bottom floor I didn’t even know about until now! Even more exciting is that it turns out there was a secret section behind one of the unknown sections I discovered last night containing a reference spell book dating back as one of Star Swirls private selections he entrusted to Celestia! In other words, THIS BOOK-!” Twilight grabbed a massive and rather old looking book with her magic and plopped it down on the table and looked at it with sparkles in her eyes. “-IS A TREASURE AMONG ANCIENT SPELLBOOKS! IT IS FILLED WITH THE KNOWLEDGE AND ADVANCE SPELLS NECESSARY TO PUT ONE'S KNOWLEDGE AND DEDICATION TO THE TEST! AND BREAK NEW BOUNDRY’S IN THE REALM OF MAGIC; EVEN CELESTIA DOESN’T KNOW WHAT'S IN IT! SO THAT MEANS I-” Twilight was practically shouting from her excitement.

Spike covered his ears as she began a fan trance outpour. When he tapped her shoulder, and she turned to look at him. She blushed a little bit and calmed herself coughing into her hoof awkwardly.

“S-sorry about that Spike, you understand right? This is one of the most important spell books I’ve gotten the chance to read. I heard it’s got many highly advanced spells in it; So you should understand my eagerness to get started” Twilight said with a grin.

“I suppose… so! Um hey, can I take my break? Pinkies got a new treat for me to try” Spike asked hopefully.

Twilight sighed at Spike's lack of enthusiasm for this project.

“I suppose… just be back in-” Twilight looks to see he’s already gone.

“…Well then… I suppose I should get everything together.” Twilight rolled her eyes and she started setting up all the books, opening them simultaneously and glancing among them at random, flipping a page now and then.

---meanwhile---

Spike walked out of Sugarcube Corner eating a cinnamon roll with small ruby’s embedded in it.

“Mmmm, am I glad Pinkie came with Rarity and me on our last gem hunt, I’m still a little confused as to why she thought she could eat the gems though… hopefully, she didn’t damage her teeth permanently…” Spike mused

As he walked on munching his treat, a cloud flitted over him. Glancing up he saw Ponyville’s resident weather pony Rainbow Dash. Having finished today’s forecast of overcast and she looked down and noticed Spike, she zipped up to him.

“Hey, Spike!” Rainbow Dash said looking as full of energy as ever

“Hey Dash” Spike casually replied

“What’s up? You seem a little bummed.” Rainbow Dash said landing next to him.

“I’m just a little worried about Twi that’s all,” Spike said as he kept his eyes downcast.

“Another studying binge?” Dash guessed

“Yep…” Spike replied plainly

“She really needs to get out more… so what’s caught her interest this time?” Rainbow said with a tilt of the head.

“She found this super important spellbook that was a personal keepsake of Starswirl. So she's excited as all get out to master it… considering these are advanced spells; I’m a little worried somethings gonna happen to her.” Spike said remembering several incidents where her magic caused problems.

“Well, I guess the best thing you can do is keep her company on this adventure of hers and help out when she needs it most,” Dash said wisely.

Spike just stared with surprise “since when do you give sage advice that doesn’t relate to exercise?”

“Rarity, and I talked, and she said I need to start giving helpful advice if I want to stop being in the background during these helpful chats…” Rainbow Dash said with a shrug

“So you-“ Spike started.

“Quoted rarity? Yes, yes I did” Rainbow said shamelessly.

“I see… so um I guess I'll go do that, see ya Rainbow Dash!” Spike said with a grin as he walked off to the library

“Bye Spike!” Rainbow Dash waved back

---later---

Spike got home EVENTUALLY after being slowed down by the CMC for another one of their cutie mark crusades.

The CMC had forced him to try and help them with their antics, but thankfully he managed to get to leave earlier when Rarity saw them trying to get Spike to light some rings for a scooter trick to get their “action stunt cutie marks” or… something like that.

As Spike approached the door and knocked on it expecting Twilight to answer; hopefully in one piece, instead the door creaked open…

“That’s definitely a bad sign…” Spike said with dread evident in his voice

He slowly opened the door to find books on the ground and an overturned chair, glancing about frantically he found Twilight laying on her back staring at the ceiling with an empty-looking expression.

“TWILIGHT!” Spike screamed as he ran over to her, “Umm, ok is your heart beating? Is there a pulse?” Spike said quickly; internally wishing that he had paid more attention in Twilights medical lectures.

He lifted her head and was checking her vacant expression.

“Did you somehow accidentally transfer your soul somewhere else? …again?” Spike said forlornly, mentally cursing himself that he wasn’t here when his older sister figure was treading in uncharted magical terri-

“I’m fine Spike…” Twilight said glumly, cutting off his thoughts

Spike jumped a little bit when he saw her blink. He huffed and dropped her head back down landing with a thump.

“Don’t scare me like that! I thought you were hurt!” Spike exclaimed exasperatedly

“….”

“hmm?” Spike quirked a brow

“I can’t do it…” Twilight finally croaked out miserably

“Can’t do it? Twi what are you saying?” Spike said surprise evident in his voice

“These spells are too much…” Twilight said

“T-Twilight what are you saying?! Your talent is magic! Are you just going to give up on a spell? when you were so enthusiastic an hour ago?” Spike almost pleaded with her to tell him what he heard was a sick joke.

Twilight trembled on the ground in what looked like her usual stressed way before pointing at the large book on the table.

“…Take a good look at the spells…” Twilight finally said

“Why?” Spike asked

“Just do it…” Twilight grumbled

Spike walked over to the spellbook to see what’s causing his sister’s neurosis this time, he climbed onto the stool and checked a random page and immediately his expression fell and then became quizzical.

“Huh? What language is this? Why are there only a few sentences in a language I can understand?... Ok, so that IS frustrating considering how eager you were. However, I don’t see the problem that threw you into such a tizzy like this.”

“I used a translation spell found in the start of the book… here, let me get that for you…” Twilight said as a small spark flew off of her horn and hit the book and the words cleared up, and Spike looked again, and his expression became shocked. It only grew when he saw the multiple complex spell orientations, the number of days required for such rune spells even switching pages showed list after list of strange ingredients and specific conditions for the books spells. Not to mention the number of years of life the more advanced spells require of the user.

“Requires the user sacrifices a limb? Sacrifice life years?! Sacrifice your favorite pastry- Wait what?… What kind of magic is this?!” Spike exclaimed, Twilight just nodded bitterly.

“And some of the pages are missing bits and pieces due to wear and tear. I can’t even see some of these…” Spike said now fully understanding Twi’s situation.

“Now you see why…” Twilight droned

“Yeah….” Spike agreed

“I’m not ‘wise’ or ‘ancient’ enough to know how to use such old magic… not to mention there are too many repercussions to cast them. And the spells I can understand are too faded out by age… and here I thought I was going to unlock Starswirls most untappable spells…” Twilight said, the beginning of tears appearing at the corners of her eyes.

Spike went over and patted Twilights back, and she leaned over and began to sob into his shoulder.

“Hey, um… it’s ok Twi, I guess… not every spell is meant to be mastered, I suppose-“ Spike said comfortingly before Twilight tensed suddenly on the last words.

“NOT MASTERED?!” Twilight shouted suddenly startling Spike

“Umm… Twilight?” Spike said backing up slightly as the Alicorn got a somewhat crazed look in her eyes as she stood and approached with a twitchy look in her eye.

‘Here we go again…’ Spike groaned in his head

“That’s just the thing isn’t it? I approached this with such confidence that I could master this magic only to learn I lack the longtime experience or resources to use it.” Twilight began her outpour.

“Twilight-“ Spike tried.

“And I wasted your time! It’s not your fault! You did as I asked of you! I’m the one who got so eager that I would finally complete a work that even Starswirl struggled to complete! I did it once, but I guess that was a fluke after all! Now I know why I can’t do this!!” Twilight cried

“It requires more experience than he had in his lifetime to properly gather the ingredients! To understand the runes and which ones require adjustments for each! He wouldn’t even live long enough to fully gain the experience with how the spells worked because they’re so very complex or they require amputation or some of them are hexes meaning they are dangerous to others!” Twilight shouted

“Twilight! Please calm down!” Spike briefly checked outside to see if anyone was listening in and unfortunately saw a few weird glances at the library through the window.

“I’m supposed to master magic! If I can’t do that then what have I been training for!?... Why did I ascend??... Am I a failure…?” Twilight finished miserably.

Finally collapsed with a look of defeat on her face and tears on her face. After a half-minute of listening to nothing but Twilights sniffling to ensure she doesn’t have anymore rage to vent Spike went up to her and gave her a reassuring hug in hopes it’ll calm her down; she quietly sobbed and hugged Spike back.

One thing Spike knows is that not long after she ascended she has been having a few confidence issues regarding her new powers. He’s been the one to support her through the hard times. Moreover, after she defeated Tirek Twilight has been even more ~~crazed, obsessed~~ determined to master magic. Thinking she has a ball to keep rolling, that she needs to continue improving or she’ll fall behind her latest achievement.

Her neurosis hasn’t gotten any better as a result.

“You’re not a failure Twilight; you’re the smartest pony I’ve ever known, I’m sure you’ll find a way.” He patted her back

“I hope so…” Twi grimly replied

---later at the carousel boutique---

“Oh dear, that bad?” Rarity asked while working on a vibrant blue dress

“Yeah, she was practically screaming her head off at him, I saw and heard it all from the window, in fact, I wouldn’t be surprised if Applejack heard it from the Acres.” Rainbow Dash said with a nod while relaxing on a stool next to the door.

“Oh… I hope she didn’t yell too much at poor Spikey-Wikey or I’ll give her a good talking to.” Rarity said without a glance

“Well, she has been a bit… edgy and a little too determined to exceed in magic since she became an Alicorn” Rainbow Dash thought out loud earning a look from Rarity.

"just saying!” Rainbow Dash quickly defended.

“Well, instead of standing here talking about it, perhaps we should prep for a visit to our dear friend in hopes of lifting her spirits” Rarity inquired before both of their eyes widened, and they looked to each other.

“You thinking what I’m thinking?” Dash said with a grin

“Perhaps I am,” Rarity said with a smirk of her own

“She needs-“ they both began.

“-an awesome race between me and her to get her mind off of things!/ -a talk about her problems and how to help her with them over tea.” Both said at the same time before pausing and giving each-other half-lidded looks

“I fail to see why I thought we’d say the same things…” Rarity sighed

“Come on! What she needs is to get out of that old library and away from her books to clear her head! It’ll be like 20% more effective than 'talking about our problems' Right?” Dash reasoned

“Not everyone is as athletic as you Darling, perhaps talking about her problems will better clear her mind.” Rarity scoffed

“Exercise always helped me.” Rainbow Dash said with confidence as if it would win the argument.

“Yes, but we both know your also the fastest Pegasus around. I’m sure a loss will only make her feel worse than she already is.” Rarity said

“While I don’t disagree with the first part I disagree with the second part. I’ll go easy on her!” Dash bit back

“Regardless, you-"

“Oh! Oh! Oh! Oh! I know what’ll cheer her up!” Pinkie called from inside the unfinished dress

“Not now Pinkie! Now as I was saying I think it would be in our best interest to-“ Rarity pauses and turns towards the dress and was face to face with Pinkie’s head poking out of the neck hole.

“HIYA RARITY!” Pinkie cheered

“GYAH!” Rarity stumbled back a little “Pinkie! What have I told you about sneaking up on me like that!” Rarity snapped

“Sorry there Rares, but my hind-hoofs itched, my right ear flopped around, and my left eye blinked rapidly! It was a sign that somepony was talking about a sad pony!” Pinkie squeed

“Well then… next time just be a little more- WAIT! Get out of that dress Pinkie! It’s not finished! You’ll stretch out the loose areas along the neckline!” Rarity quickly freaked out.

“Hm? Oh! Okie Dokie Loki!” she popped back down through the dress.

“That’s not what I-“Rarity peeked into the dress and didn’t see Pinkie in there.

Rarity sighed dramatically “It’s just Pinkie being Pinkie…” she waited for Pinkie to appear elsewhere and eventually saw her coming down the stairs.

“I’m here! Sorry I took so long I had a few tail twitches and hoof stomps that told me sugarcube corner was getting super duper duper duper busy because I wasn’t there, so I went back to make some of my patent Pinkie chimi-cherry-changas! But then the twins woke up and I could tell because my Pinkie sense flared up again, boy it sure is getting worked overtime today I wonder if I’ll get a cramp because of it Oh! Oh! Mabey ill invent the new Pinkie cramp! It could be a new type of Pinkie Sense! although it sounds unlikely I'll use it much because it sounds painful, also considering-”

Rainbows eye twitched, and she finally snapped “PINKIE ENOUGH WE GET IT!” she shouted.

“Aww, I was getting to the good part…” Pinkie pouted

“Nevertheless, we’d appreciate it if you would please get to the point” Rarity said

“Okie Dokie Loki!” Pinkie said perking up again

“so, what was your suggestion again Pinkie? Dare I ask…” Dash mumbled

“A PARTY!” Pinkie bubbled

“Why am I not surprised…” Rainbow Dash shook her head

“Pinkie dear, I would think unexpected parties would be a tad… counterintuitive for twilight right now…” Rarity said which of course resulted In a Pinkie Pout. Rarity tried to resist, but every time she looked away Pinkie was somehow in front of her giving her the puppy dog eyes.

“Pinkie darling…” Rarity attempted

“Please?” Pinkie said sweetly

“No Pinkie i-“ attempted again.

“Pleeeeease” Pinkie begged again with bigger puppy dog eyes.

“Pinkie-“Rarity tried again.

“Puh-leeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeese!” Pinkie begged with eyes so huge they began to seem too big for her skull.

“Umm…” Rarity said a little perturbed by the size of her eyes

“Give in while it’s early Rares before she hurts herself…” Rainbow Dash deadpanned

“Oh…. Oh all right” Rarity sighed cursing the fact that nobody can say no to those crocodile tears [or not get annoyed into doing things because she won’t stop until they break]

“YAA-“ Pinkie began but was stopped by a hoof covering her mouth.

“A SMALL little get together group party! That’s it! We could use this chance to converse with Twilight about her problems.” Rarity insisted

“Aww…” Pinke frowned

“Um… hello? Don’t I still have a say in this?” Rainbow dash said peeking over Pinkies shoulder

“I’m afraid that’s two to one Dash we’re going with our plan.” Rarity said with a giggle

“Typical…” Dash said with a huff and a crossing of the arms

“Alrighty! After my long shift, we’ll get started!” Pinkie bounced towards the door

“Long shift-… Pinkie darling aren’t we heading over there now?” Rarity said with a confused look

“Noooope! The story hasn't reached that part yet so the writer had me distract you two so that he'd have more time to finish the next chapter. If he can ever stop procrastinating that is, teehee! See ya later guys!” and with that Pinkie bounced off leaving a very confused Rarity and Rainbow Dash.

“Story… writer… procrastination- what on eqqus was she talking about!? I-" Rarity began to freak out, but Dash put a hoof in front of her to stop her.

“It’s Pinkie being Pinkie… don’t question it…” Rainbow Dash said knowingly

“R-right… indeed…” Rarity nodded

Author's Note

IM BACK!

and better than ever, I made some edits, and I hope it’s more readable this time. :twilightsmile:

feel free to critique in the comment section when you can.