Chapters

Creation and Insertion
Sleepless in the Castle
If This Castle Is A Rockin
Running Down the Clock

Creation and Insertion
View Online

No Pedigree Save Chaos

Creation and Insertion

"Speech"

'Thought'

Spell

Everfree Forest, Equestria

Trotting along happily, Celestia luxuriated in the feel of soft grass and earth underneath her unshod hooves. Her castle was everything that she had ever dreamed it could be growing up as little alicorn fillies playing make believe with her younger sister. But the beautiful stone floors were not the most comfortable surface to walk on everyday even when wearing shoes.

"I'm so happy that you joined me for a walk today, sister," Celestia beamed, stopping to use a wing to hug her younger sister, Luna.

Her dark blue coated sister rolled her green eyes, "Why do you always sound so surprised? We've shared a walk in the forest at least once a month since we got our cutie marks, Cellie."

"I'm only expressing my joy," she giggled and released her younger sister.

"Save some of that joy for when you see the spot I found for our picnic," Luna's horn glowed blue as she summoned a small map from the saddlebag at her right flank. Purposely keeping her from seeing what was written upon it.

"Why are you being so secretive? What are you hiding?" she craned her neck attempting to see but it was hastily shoved back into the bag.

"Because occasionally it's nice that I know something that my egghead big sister doesn't," Luna sniffed indignantly.

"I don't always have to know everything," she protested.

"Then thine generous hindquarters can remain patient," Luna teased with a smirk and took off at a light trot.

"Rude!" she called after her sister and paused, feeling some disturbance that made the tips of her feathered wings tingle for an instant before it was gone. It was so brief she wrote it off and shook herself out, rushing to catch up with Luna.

Bayankala Mountain Range, Qinghai Province, China

Released from the unbearably hot updraft of the tornado he had created, Ranma Saotome fell for what seemed like an eternity before he painfully hit the steep slope outside of Mount Phoenix. Still clutched in his hands, the Gekkaja staff's cooling magic kept him from being roasted alive from the heat. Cursing as he tumbled uncontrollably, crashing through small trees and bouncing off hard stone, he recovered enough to lash out with the staffs crescent moon head into the closet rock and came to a bone jarring halt.

"Please stop spinning world," he begged, squeezing his eyes closed and clutching the ancient weapon for dear life as he dangled. 'I'm going to throw up."

His black hair, usually tied back in a pigtail had come undone somehow, whipped upwards from the winds to get in his eyes and mouth. "Bleh," he let go with one of his hands to brush it away only for it to get right back in his way.

Hearing the very disconcerting sound of heavy rain, he held his hair away from his face long enough to see that the tornado created by his Hiryu Shoten Ha technique was growing in size, chewing up and destroying more of the mountain peak. While most of the debris was immediately sucked up into the funnel to pummel his opponent, a great deal of the extra was flung out randomly and was coming to visit him. Seeing a large boulder dropping straight for him, he planted his feet against the rock and pulled the Gekkaja free to drop just in time as his previous perch was destroyed by the impact.

Feeling his precious cargo shift inside his red Chinese style button up shirt, he reached up to keep it closed, and landed on an outcropping briefly before launching himself away to another further down to avoid head sized stones pelting his previous location. "Whatever Saffron is up to in there, I don't care, I need to get back inside so I can save Akane."

Starting to make his way down the perilously steep side of Mount Phoenix and avoiding being crushed, he stopped his descent when the winds picked up and nearly tossed him away from the side. Up above, the king of the phoenix people, Saffron screamed out in rage so loudly that Ranma heard it above the tornadoes roar. Flames began to erupt in violent wild spurts from the funnel, the high winds dramatically increasing in intensity, a bright orange sphere appearing midway up the tornadoes height.

'Another fireball? That'll just make it worse, you moron,' He shook his head and knocked away a large stone. With the added source of warm air, the funnel grew dramatically in size.

Clutching the closest outcrop to avoid being blown away, the winds grew so intense they started to tear away the trees and soil around him. Ranma squeezed his eyes closed tightly from a bright flash of light the preceded an explosion rocking the mountain. The rock he held onto slipped suddenly but then stopped just as quickly making his heart skip a beat at the thought of being caught in a landslide.

The roar of the wind dropped into a momentary stillness broken just as suddenly as everything lifted up by the tornado, now came crashing back to the earth.

"Uh oh," Ranma's blue eyes grew big at the literal tsunami of debris rushing down the mountain.

Without thinking, he launched himself head first down the nearly vertical mountainside, bouncing and running, desperately searching for anyplace he could hide from the wall of death. It was on him before he could find safety. Choosing the only path that might keep him from being buried alive, he jumped as high as he could away from the ground out into the open air.

'This is going to hurt a lot,' Ranma grimaced, trying to gauge where he was going to land in the sparse forest below. Unfondly remembering being bedridden for a month the last time he had dropped from this height.

His thoughts on how best to avoid severe injury from a fall were interrupted by the high pitched screech of the circular Kinjakan blade screaming towards him. Twisting in mid air he lashed out with the Gekkaja and deflected the projectile away.

The phoenix lord Saffron followed right behind it, his formerly pristine white clothing shredded, red chest armor battered and cracked, body covered in so much dirt it was the only thing keeping his modesty. Saffron's golden eyes burned with fury as he approached, taloned clawed hand pulled back preparing to slash forward.

Ranma couldn't recover from his swing to respond, Saffron's hand flashing forward to catch him across the chest. Saffron's claws barely grazed him but sent him spinning out of control, cutting through his clothing, and leaving four painful gashes from the center of his chest to shoulder.

That didn't hurt nearly as much as the tree that broke his fall.

"Think I would have preferred the landslide," he groaned, fumbling to push a thick branch laying across his stomach off himself. Wincing, he dug into his shirt to make sure he hadn't lost her, hands closing around the dehydrated form of his fiance, Akane Tendo. "Still with me?" he asked without expecting a response as he pulled her doll like body out.

She was his entire reason for fighting the phoenix people at this point. To get her back to the water at the heart of their mountain so she could be saved. When her eyes closed, she would be dead, and right now they were three fourths of the way closed.

"Still alive, peasant?" Saffron taunted sadistically, lowering himself down to hover several meters above the ground. In his right hand was the Kinjaken with its deadly circular throwing blade that would always return to the staff perched on one end.

Tucking Akane safely back into his shirt, he struggled to his feet and steadied himself on the remains of the tree trunk. Something was probably broken but he didn't have the time to care.

"Not for long if I have to look at you much longer," he joked, trying to pick out where the Gekkaja had landed. "Can't you put some clothes on? You look like a burnt chicken," he added, catching sight of the silver staff among some leaves.

"Poor choice of last words," Saffron sneered and raised his left hand, a bright red ball of fire gathering in his palm.

"Is that the third or fourth time you've said something dumb like that? I hit my head a bit and forgot," he rolled to the side, Saffron's ball of fire impacting the ground behind him and sending out arcs of plasma from the explosion.

Grabbing hold of the Gekkaja, Ranma brought it up to catch Saffron's downward swing with his staff creating a clang that echoed around them. "I thought those were my last words?" he taunted, driven to one knee while Saffron floated just off the ground.

An inarticulate snarl was his answer; Saffron backing away enough to swing his staff forward to release the circular blade harmlessly off to the left. Ranma's eyes couldn't help but track the swing, missing as the staff was brought back to catch him in the temple. Staggering, he deflected another swing and retaliated with his own attack out of instinct that took off Saffron's left hand.

"Fool, it's useless, I am the immortal phoenix!" Saffron bellowed, recoiling away to allow his body to regenerate the lost hand, and pointing his staff directly at him.

"I bet that doesn't make it hurt any less," he stood up a little straighter just in time for the Kinjaken's blade to make its return and slash him across the back.

Falling face first into the dirt, he writhed in pain kicking at the ground. That pain was immediately eclipsed by Saffron dropping onto his left leg and deeply burying the six massive talons on his feet into the flesh of his thigh and calf. Ranma opened his mouth in a silent scream of agony, Saffron flapping his powerful wings and jerking them up into the air. Barely able to keep hold of the Gekkaja, he dangled helplessly, every moment a new feeling of misery.

"This all started because of Jusenkyo, isn't that right landling peasant? You wanted to cure a curse, that one that turns you into a girl," Saffron laughed cruelly, violently jerking with each flap of his golden wings in the direction of the cursed training ground. "You're so close, let me help you get to your destination."

Crying out, Ranma rolled up and grabbed one of Saffron's ankles with his free hand. Head dropping back limply, beginning to feel dizzy from blood loss and unrelenting pain. Saffron bounced upwards suddenly and released his talons, only to drive them in again. Ranma didn't even try to scream, his body going limp to dangle underneath the phoenix, the Gekkaja dangling by a finger tip.

"Oh but look at what you did to the pools. They're all mixed together. I look forward to seeing what sort of monstrosity you'll turn into when I drop you in," Saffron taunted but he could only dimly hear him.

His eyes struggled open to see the lake beneath him where the pools of Jusenkyo should have been. Bamboo poles sticking up alongside taller spouts of water, backfeeding uncontrollably from Phoenix Mountain with the water taps destroyed. But there were still a couple spots of land in the middle that hadn't been overwhelmed yet.

'That'll have to do,' he gathered the last of his strength and gripped the Gekkaja with both hands and swung it up to drive the crescent moon blade deep into Saffron's back, the pointed ends exiting out the front of Saffron's chest. The phoenix released his leg and they both dropped like a stone to land on the last dwindling strip of land in the middle of Jusenkyo.

He woke up just as a spout of cold water sent enough spray in his direction to activate his Jusenkyo curse. A new symphony of agony made him scream as the magic forcibly changed him into a girl. Rolling over and away from the water, she breathed out rapidly trying not to pass out from the pain of her injured flesh settling in a new configuration.

Hearing Saffron whine in pain, she twisted her head and looked past her now red bangs to see him lying face down, desperately trying to dig the Gekkaja free from where it was still lodged in his back.

"Told ya, still hurts," she spat, shifting so she could tear off the right sleeve of her shirt, she stopped to breath heavily through gritted teeth. Rolling onto her back, eliciting new spikes of misery as she jostled her butchered limb about. Gathering her torn off sleeve, she quickly used it to hastily tourniquet her shredded leg around her upper thigh. Dimly she noticed how torn up her flesh was and the amount of blood that stained the muddy ground but didn't want to consider the implications of it.

"I'll— kill— you—," he choked out, giving up reaching for the weapon to slash at her with his taloned hand. The Gekkaja's magic powers freezing him faster than he could generate heat, Ice starting to spread further and further over his body from where he was impaled.

'Well you may have,' she conceded, no longer able to feel her legs, and with no way to get out of the pools in sight she'd probably pass out and drown before anyone else got here. Rolling onto her back she looked back at Phoenix mountain and taking in the scale of the destruction she had unleashed.

"Please be safe everyone," she breathed out, patting her chest to verify that Akane's dried up form was still with her. "We're not."

Turning away from the destruction of the phoenix's home, she saw Saffron's clawed hand locked in place reaching out to her, his body now one solid block of ice.

Tenderly taking out the doll sized body of her fiance from her shirt, she took a haggard breath. "I'm sorry Akane, I couldn't get you to the water in time." The doll's eyes were still partially open, but there was no time for her to get back to the mountain even if she still had two good legs.

As was her luck, one of the spouts of water spraying uncontrollably straight from the source decided to change its angle enough to cover her with water. Akane, still in her hands, was suddenly her real size again and crushing her. "Chunky tomboy," she wheezed and started to laugh at the absurdity of it all. Here she was going to die of blood loss and Akane was going to live but become some hideous amalgam of all the creatures that had ever drowned in the springs.

Gasping with sudden realization, she slid out from underneath Akane. Stripping out of the remains of her red shirt, she draped it over Akane, realizing that she was naked.

'The Gekkaja! I can freeze it all! I can save us!' Dragging herself past Saffron's claw, she broke the staff free causing a spiderweb if cracks to spread over his body. "Cool enough for you, your highness?" she pushed his rock solid body into the water, immediately feeling the hairs on the back of her neck stand on end as a warm red glow pulsed then spread over the water. Too tired to care, she tossed in the staff and dropping lifelessly onto her back. The only thing left to do was wait for its magic to freeze the lake solid.

"Ranma— please wake up."

She dimly heard Akane plead with her, drawing her back from blissful unconsciousness. Ranma had expected to be surrounded by a lake of ice by this point not a mix of colorful pudding, hardwood floors, snow, chocolate milk, and asphalt. All the bamboo poles had been replaced with candy canes, palm trees, or light poles.

"You're alive," Akane sobbed and crushed her in a hug.

"Am I?" she asked in a tiny whisper, having trouble believing that what she was seeing was real. The spouts of water that had been everywhere were now doing things like spitting up feathers, bubbles, or turning into twisty straw like shapes that stayed in place even though water was clearly flowing through them.

Her eyes tracked upward feeling that she was being watched. Hovering in the air was what looked like a small dragon, its long serpent body with limbs that were all from different creatures, twisted and coiling as it observed her. It made a noise like a car horn before vanishing with a confusingly loud twig snapping noise and then reappearing with the sound of popcorn popping near her leg.

"Akane, what is that?" She weakly struggled against Akane who was still crying over her.

The little dragon creature was difficult to look at, like her eyes refused to focus or even accept its existence. Details about its form kept shifting like she was seeing multiple random creatures all overlapping each other at the same time. It did a quick little somersault with the sound of snapping fingers and all feeling suddenly returned to her leg and her weakness from blood loss vanished.

"What the hell happened to my leg?!" Ranma screamed, pushing the distracted Akane away so she would finally snap out of it. Her mangled leg was still covered in blood but had been replaced by one covered in red fur and ending in a hoof of similar color.

"I fix!" the creature cheered repeatedly in a high pitched voice and zoomed around them in a circle in excitement.

"This is not fixing!" She screeched at the small creature, reaching down to confirm that she wasn't actually going crazy from blood loss.

"What is that thing?" Akane reached out to grab the creature as it made its next pass around them. Her hand passed through its body as though it was made of smoke, its tiny legs, arms, and wings lagged behind the body before it snapped back together like a toy being reassembled. "Uh—," she stared at her hands.

"You want play too?" It asked excitedly and a small platform popped up with a giant spring to fling a screaming Akane out into the chaotic mess of the pools.

"Akane!" She called out in alarm, her fiancé coming down to land in one of the few sections still water. Except there was no great splash but her bouncing back upwards like she had landed on a trampoline.

Akane gave her a similarly confused look that the water was now no longer acting like a liquid. "Ranma, what's going on?" she asked nervously.

"Ranma?" The small creature asked itself, her name echoing repeatedly even though it had only said it once. "Wild Horsey!" It happily cheered and started laughing.

The entire world started to spin around her while she remained fixed. The creature's laughter causing random splashes of color splatter against the world that now reacted like a flat painting. It finally seemed to pay attention to what was happening to the surrounding area which made it laugh like piano keys being randomly struck by a toddler.

Ranma snapped her hands up to cover her ears and squeezed her eyes shut tight as the world around her became an impossible to understand cacophony of chaos. She felt like she was weightless, tumbling through a cold empty void one moment and the next she was crushed by the force of gravity in a sweltering sauna. Opening her eyes only briefly time slowed to an immeasurable crawl as she struggled to close them once again to shut out the impossible structures that danced around her. The creature's laughter solidified like it was concrete yet it poured into her ears like liquid.

And then it stopped, depositing her unceremoniously face first into a field of soft grass.

Groaning she pushed herself up to her hands and knee, her horse-like leg not allowing the movement. Feeling a wave of nausea from trying to stand she tried to throw up but a flock of butterflies erupted out of her mouth. Whimpering at the assault on her senses and mind, she rolled over into a sitting position. The nice open field or the pleasant sunshine and temperature barely registered after being put through whatever blender she had just experienced.

"OOOOOoooooh!" The dragon creatures voice sounded like it had found something it really liked. "I fix?" It asked, jumping in front of her face.

"Fix whatever, just please leave me alone," she cried, falling over onto her side as another wave of chaos washed over her like electricity dancing over her skin, making various portions of her body feel light and others heavy, finishing with a burp that let one last butterfly escape her.

"Fixed!" It exclaimed happily, doing a little dance that made it look like it had twenty legs and arms. "Bye bye, my Wild Horsey!" It waved its whole body like a hand and then folded in on itself like a piece of paper being crumpled up before vanishing into a small dot.

"Today can't get any worse" She whimpered and tried to bury her head further into the grass.

A gentle nudge tried to drag Ranma back from the brief comforting embrace of pain free unconsciousness. "Go way Pop— tired," she tried to dismissively wave her hand but the movement didn't feel right.

Not that she cared, she had saved Akane and defeated Saffron, then survived a trip through what she honestly thought might have been hell. There would be a lot of work to fix wherever she had ended up. But for now, she was relaxing on a perfect patch of the most wonderful sweet smelling grass and enjoying a beautiful day. 'Do your worst panda, I've already won.'

She did begin paying slightly more attention when two feminine voices began animatedly discussing something with each other. Flicking an ear in annoyance that she may have ended up in someone's yard, her eyes snapped open in alarm because she did not have ears capable of flicking.

Ranma's evaluation of her ears stalled out at the sight of two colorful equines of some sort watching her with great interest. Both were quite large with the white coated one standing taller than the dark blue one. The white one had a colorful striped mane and tail of blue, green, purple, and pink that drifted ethereally while the other had a brighter shade of blue than her fur that twinkled in the sunlight like stars. Both wore some sort of armor wrapping around their chests, gold for the white one, black for the blue, with small matching crowns peeking up behind their horns.

"So who was talking?" she pushed herself up into a sitting position, finding that there was nobody else but here in sight. Both of the horses responded with the same series of sounds as if they were trying to greet her.

'They were?' She felt her ears move again, twisting forward, and quickly reached up to try and feel what was going on causing her to lose her balance and fall forward until she planted her hooves back down. Ranma's eyes grew big, staring down at her transformed body covered in deep reddish brown fur with a lighter underside.

"How is this fixing it?!" she screamed and stomped her front legs down, completely forgetting about the two odd horses. "Get back here you little— whatever you are and turn me back into a human!" she shouted then shakily attempted to get up before stumbling to one side then the other. Quickly finding her balance even if her legs refused to stop wobbling. "You hear me?!" she turned and felt new limbs respond, wings spreading with an audible clap of feathers against the air throwing her off balance to trip sideways into a soft cushion.

Gently lifted back to her feet, the cushion was revealed to be a cloud of yellow magic that matched the color glowing around the white horse's horn. Opening majestically from the white horse's back were large wings. Ranma spared a glance at her back where new wings were spread in a much less grand display.

"Oh great I'm a talking horse with wings," she snorted and unconsciously stamped her hooves in frustration.

Her actions only seemed to amuse the two equines, the dark one snickering like a human before the white one said something in a tone that sounded like an admonishment.

"So who are you two supposed to be? The welcoming committee?" she asked rhetorically, not recognizing a word the two had spoken or expecting them to understand her in the slightest.

"Sorry sister, we shouldn't laugh at this poor creature's misfortune, but she is simply too cute. Look at her stamping her little hooves and pouting," Luna apologized with little sincerity.

They had witnessed the young creature arrive in an explosion of wood chips that evaporated upwards into smoke. Briefly, she had been in the form of a furless biped wearing wet and torn up clothing but a small magical being of incredible power had changed her into an alicorn before their very eyes and then it had left, leaving a wake of powerful chaotic magic that they would have felt clear across the Everfree forest.

"Adorable visual aside, she is obviously confused and scared," Celestia took a long breath, deep in thought.

"What should we do if we cannot communicate?" she had never heard the girl's language before in all her travels. "We can't abandon her here, she is no foal but she is clearly helpless."

"I think I may know of a way— at least to break the ice. Would you keep an eye on her while I return to the castle and prepare a spell?" Celestia asked, the former biped growing tired of them speaking over her and had started wandering off on shaky legs that were very quickly growing steady.

"I can handle one little pony," she flippantly responded. The former biped couldn't even walk straight, what could she possibly have to worry about?

"I'll return as quickly as I can," Celestia flapped her wings and took to the air in the direction of their castle, leaving her alone with the false alicorn.

Her quarry had put quite a distance between them while she was distracted, and seemed to be testing the full range of motion of her legs, making big circles with each limb. In no hurry, Luna leisurely closed the distance, noticing how intently two blue eyes watched her. 'Is there something behind me?' she looked behind but saw nothing that would inspire such focus.

Sitting down a reasonable distance away, whatever interesting thing the transformed biped had seen in her was gone. Which was just as well, she didn't know how to really respond. She and Celestia were the only alicorns, that was something she had accepted as a given for almost a hundred years. So seeing two become three, even if the creature was just visually the same due to magic, was still unnerving.

She was also unused to being up at this time of day. Yawning, she pulled an apple from her saddlebag with magic, intending to eat it. 'Sister's daytime walks through the forest are a welcome distraction but I wish she would want to do them later.' Yawning again, she jumped upon finding the false alicorn sitting directly in front of her staring at her treat. 'When did she move?'

"You have apples from your place of origin?" she asked, lightly teasing the creature by waving the apple side to side. "Here, we have more," she extended it towards the filly who reached out with her front legs to take it from her magic. The apple popped out and was caught in her mouth before it could start to fall.

'Quick little thing,' she raised an eyebrow, having barely been able to track the movement.

The false alicorn brute forced her jaw to close enclosing the entire apple in her mouth making her cheeks bulge humorously before chewing rapidly and swallowing.

"That was gross," she summoned up another apple from her pack after watching the mannerless creature swallow the entire thing. Once again the filly's blue eyes were fixed firmly on her apple.

'What happened to you?' she wondered in concern, taking in the significant amount of blood dried on the pony's coat. Mostly on her rear left leg with a much smaller amount across her chest. But there wasn't any visible reason for it, as if the transformation had healed her injuries.

"You seem alright physically, let us see how smart you are," she put a hoof to her chest and spoke her name. The false alicorn cocked her head to the side without response so Luna repeated her name.

"Ru— na," the filly answered chewing over the word.

"Luna," she again repeated, stressing the pronunciation.

"Loona" the reddish alicorn's muzzle scrunched up, struggling with the pronunciation.

'Progress, huzzah!' she nodded her head and handed over her apple as a reward that was greedily gobbled up.

"Ranma," the transformed creature copied Luna's attempt at communication.

"Luanma." She responded with her own attempt, believing that she had done a perfectly acceptable job using the first word in an unknown language. But judging by the facial expression of the filly, she may have not done as good a job as she had expected. So she tried again and received an affirmative nod.

"Sister will not have expected such progress!" she announced to herself and received a very confused look from the creature. Gathering the last of her apples, she held one up. "Let us see if we can communicate further."

Celestia returned to the clearing where she had left her sister with the mysterious creature. Circling once overhead, she saw that the two were appearing to converse, sitting now in the shade of a tall tree. 'This is quite an unexpected sight,' she smiled at her usually standoffish sister actually getting along with the poor transformed creature. Landing gracefully, her saddlebags bounced heavily with the items she had brought.

"So do we share a common language after all?" she asked assuming that something had finally made sense between the two in the hour it had taken to return, noticing the reddish alicorn staring at her with wide eyes, especially her wings as they settled back into place along her back.

"Unfortunately we do not. However, Ranma is quite intelligent and we have been amusing ourselves by exchanging words," Luna answered. "In her tongue, apple is ring—o, how bizarre! Though I do not believe I pronounced that correctly, some of the sounds are difficult to emulate."

"Fascinating," she removed her saddlebag from her back, and started to unload her cargo. All the various items flew out and gathered on a small blanket in an orderly fashion. "I brought these," she held up three simple necklaces ending in a small stone she had prepared to be enchanted.

"And these will let us converse freely?" Luna asked.

"Not yet, I'll need to finish the enchantment. There is no one size fits all spell for the spoken word. The spell must be crafted and developed with ponies who know each language, so it can be shared between," she explained, not giving too much attention to the new pony that she now knew was named Ranma, who had come to her side and inspecting her wings with a worrying amount of attention. "Did she do this with you as well?" she asked.

"I believe she is studying us. Her real body must function far different than our own," Luna answered.

"I see," she watched Ranma out of the corner of her eye as she opened up a spellbook to the page with the incantation she would need. Celestia stopped to pay more attention when the filly began bouncing around and flapping her wings attempting to fly. "Energetic little thing."

"She should be, she ate all the apples I brought," Luna grumbled. "And whatever the cause was for the blood appears to be have been healed by her transformation."

"I barely noticed it mixing in with her coat color, but that is good to know. Do you think you can get her back here so I can finish the spell?"

"Easily," Luna used her magic to lift up a pastry she had discretely brought in her saddlebags. "Ranma!" the pony of the night called out, catching the filly's attention, who upon landing from her latest jump, moved with a shocking burst of speed back over to them. That speed didn't translate into stopping power, the transformed creature slipping and tumbling into a large tree. Celestia would have gone to help the poor child but she was back up on her hooves and over to them as if nothing had happened.

"She's very food oriented," Luna explained, taking an immense amount of joy in her reaction, while Ranma quickly gobbled down the cake her sister had offered.

"Yes— right," she lifted one of the necklaces to let it fall over her head and rest against her chest. Without thinking she quickly tried to place another over her sister's head and Ranma's. The reddish alicorn took exception to this and dodged out of the way to regard her coolly. "That was rude of me, you wouldn't have happened to have gotten to exchanging apologies?"

"Allow me to try and smooth over your diplomatic faux pas, big sister" Luna answered, waving a hoof to get Ranma's attention. Gesturing towards the gem, then to her, then to Ranma, then made a show of talking to both of them. Ranma seemed to grasp that at least that she was not intending harm, and she attempted to reach for the stone with her front hooves, struggling to grip the small object between them.

Taking pity on the poor non-pony, she used her magic to lift it up so Ranma could stick her head through. Linking the three stones with her aura forming a thin yellow line between each, she began to recite the incantation. "A connection we seek, of the languages we speak. So that we may talk and listen, and share together our wisdom."

Celestia's stone pulsed yellow, Luna's blue, and Ranma's pink before they traveled out to bounce between each point and returning to their starting stone. "I believe it was successful," she announced.

"I understood that!" Ranma exclaimed happily and pointed at her. "This solves so many problems, you talking horses are cool."

"We are ponies, not horses," Luna corrected.

"I'm sorry for not introducing myself sooner, I am Celestia, and you have already met my younger sister, Luna," she greeted finally able to communicate freely with the transformed creature. "And your name is Ranma?"

"Saotome Ranma," she answered with a small bow of her head towards the two of them. "If it's not obvious I'm not really supposed to be— this," she gestured down at her body. "I'm also a little— okay really badly lost. So— where would be— here?"

"This is Equestria, do you know how you got here? There was something with you, but we weren't close enough to see what it was," She asked, more or less already knowing what the reddish alicorn had said.

Ranma sighed and her shoulders slumped. "I'm here 'cause a bratty little kid turned out to be a completely pompous ass adult who tried to kill me and my friends, freeze dried my fiance, mangled my leg pretty badly. But I beat him finally and then this weird— thing shows up and it's all 'I fix!' It made my leg like this," she stuck out her back left leg and wiggled it.

"Then it gets all giggly so the world goes all crazy which I'd really rather not talk about cause it still hurts thinking about it. Next thing I know I'm here, my brain feels like scrambled eggs, and you're waking me up."

"Sister, are you sure the spell worked as intended?" Luna asked.

Celestia tried to digest the rambling and semi-incoherent answer to her question. "So you defeated an evil villain to save your betrothed. But suffered a serious injury and the creature we saw brought you here."

"More or less. So have you ever heard of a human? We walk on two legs, have hands, and a lot less body hair. Most of us at least, I know this one guy who has a lot more but that's more because of a curse."

"There are no such thing as humans in Equestria, and no creatures that look like you did," she answered without hesitation.

"Oh," Ranma's entire body seemed to deflate and her ears drooped to the side.

"Mayhaps we have something in the library that Star Swirl had developed? At least to find this creature and to get it to return her to where she belongs?" Luna asked without confidence.

"Checking the archives would be an excellent place to start," Celestia offered.

"So what do you want for helping? Do you use money? Not that I have money or even money you might use," the reddish alicorn began to mumble to herself. "I was wearing clothes, where did they go?"

"Relax, we don't need or expect payment. We're going to help you because it's the right thing to do," Celestia quickly cut Ranma off. 'That this may bring us into contact with that dangerous magical creature who can transform others at will for further study is purely a bonus.'

"Really?" Ranma sniffled and her eyes started to tear up. "Just like that you're going to help me?"

"If we turned away somepony in distress, what kind of ponies would we be?" Luna gently patted the filly on the back. "Is it not the same with your kind?"

"Some are, not usually the ones I meet. Thank you," Ranma awkwardly wiped at her eyes. "Sorry— it's just been a really long day."

"You have nothing to apologize for," Celestia smiled reassuringly. "Our castle is not far from here, and as beautiful of a day as this is, I believe a tour would be better handled while we can still understand one another."

"Huh? But this thing?" Ranma gestured to the stone.

She shook her head before answering. "Will only last a few hours at most before the spell will need to be refreshed." The spell was a tool for diplomacy when no interpreter could be found, nothing more. 'Something less— temporary will need to be found if this is not a short term arrangement.'

Ranma blinked in astonishment, first at the heavy stone bridge crossing a ravine, and then at the massive castle that the road ran up to beyond. "You— you made this?" she blurted out in confusion. Smart magical ponies were one thing but she hadn't believed that they had an actual European style castle with a tall pitched roof keep surrounded by multiple towers. Beyond the castle up on a hill was a domed building that reminded her of an observatory but it was too far away to make out details.

"Do you not have castles on your world?" Celestia asked easily without seeming to take offense to her rude question disparaging their capabilities.

"They kind of stopped being made when we found ways to blow them up and I just wasn't expecting anything as— impressive as this," she nervously laughed, hoping she hadn't offended the nice talking ponies who were helping her out and only gateway for her to even communicate. "I mean, you look like the horses from where I'm from, and they are not very smart. No wings, no magic. But really strong so they used to be used a lot to haul heavy stuff or just ride from place to place. Not like you two at all. Cause you're both pretty smart so I don't even know why I brought it up, you're nothing alike, forget I said anything, sorry," she rambled.

"Keep up thy apologizing and we may find a way to take offense at your ignorance," Luna responded with grave seriousness.

"Right," Ranma nodded, willing to give a fair amount of deference considering the situation.

"My sister is teasing you," Celestia whispered in her ear. "She comes across a bit strong because she is not well practiced with banter."

"My banter is known throughout all of Equestria," Luna declared haughtily.

"Yes, it is— well known," Celestia rolled her eyes skyward.

"Well received too! I know your game to besmirch my reputation with vagueness and implication," Luna quickly added.

Ranma glanced to the side and discretely giggled to herself.

"Fine, let us ask Captain Lockheed if it's true or not. He's a reliable sort who wouldn't lie," Celestia challenged while a sea green pony with wings flew towards them from a small wall surrounding the castle.

"Let us not waste his time, sister," Luna's bluster sputtered out and she stepped back to let Celestia be the closest to the incoming pony.

Landing with the clank of metal and several hops to slow his speed, Lockheed quickly bowed deeply to the two sisters. Taller than she was by a head and thickly built, he was clad in gleaming silver armor, a heavier chest piece than what the two sisters wore, an ornate helmet with red plume of hair running front to back, and layered flank pieces that looked like feathers. Rising from his bow, he began speaking to Celestia in the language Ranma couldn't understand.

'So this spell really doesn't help much, does it?' she glowered at the limitation of it, but curious how the sea green pony could fly when he should be far too heavy to get off the ground. He grabbed her attention as he suddenly turned in her direction and gave a deep bow, nearly touching his nose to the ground and greeting of some sort. "Um, what did he say and why is he bowing to me?" she quickly returned the gesture as best she could. "We do that too, but this seems way more respectful than it needs to be."

"He said that he is blessed to meet you. Thank you Captain, she is still in shock, so please try to keep things contained with the rest of the staff," Celestia answered and Lockheed nodded before taking to the sky once again back towards the castle.

Ranma looked dubiously at the white pony, not really disagreeing that she was still in shock over the swerve the day had thrown at her. "Blessed? Is that a common greeting?"

"Allow me, Cellie," Luna started. "Before your arrival today, in all of Equestria, we were the only two alicorns. Ponies gifted with power and responsibility above all others. By coincidence or destiny now there are three."

"Um— so what does that have to do with me?" she asked, sitting back on her haunches.

"Equestria has three tribes of Ponies. Pegasi have wings, unicorns have horns, and earth ponies have neither. Only Alicorns are gifted with the magical and physical qualities of all three," Celestia answered.

'I have a horn?' Ranma went cross eyed, but could only see her dark red bangs, so she reached up with one leg and found that she did in fact have a short red horn jutting out from her forehead. "Guess I missed that."

"Just to avoid causing any undue panic, we should get you cleaned of that blood as a start, and forgive me for saying but you have quite a different— fragrance about you," Celestia fumbled slightly for words.

"Your scent is alien and pungent," Luna butted in with a less diplomatic approach.

"Is it that bad?" she raised a front leg to sniff at it. 'Guess I do sorta smell like I've been out training with Pop for a week.'

"No need to be rude, sister," Celestia lightly admonished. "And then you can take as much time as you wish to appraise your form."

"Does that mean you have hot water?" she asked, equal parts hopeful and concerned over what that would reveal. Cold water was what turned her into a girl, perhaps hot water would return her to her real body.

Author's Note

Very special thank you to Bree R for all the help in proofreading and bouncing ideas off of.

Sleepless in the Castle
View Online

No Pedigree Save Chaos

Sleepless in the Castle

Ten Days from Arrival

Following the hard packed dirt path as it snaked its way up the hill, Ranma almost felt a sense of normality even though she wore the form of a talking pony. The woods were nice, the air was clean and fresh, and with barely a cloud in the bright blue sky. But there was nothing normal about how she was well and truly stuck as a female pony.

Hot water did not activate her Jusenkyo curse and return her to being male and the little monster that had brought her here had not yet reappeared. If she couldn’t be the right species she should have at least been able to be male. Was that really so much to ask of the universe?

Supposedly there were a lot of dangerous creatures that lived in the Everfree Forest, and she dearly hoped that some of them would cross her path so she could take out some of her very justified frustrations upon.

But no such beasties seemed inclined to cross her path.

‘Though,’ she glanced back at the dark blue guard unicorn mare following dutifully a short distance away. ‘What was her name? Olanver? No, Oleander, I bet she’d jump in and be annoying about it.’

Oleander noticed her attention and seemed to smile reassuringly before resuming her vigil for any possible threats. The unicorn wore the same style armor as the rest of the guards but included a short straight sword held securely in a simple scabbard strapped behind her left foreleg.

“Oh yea, she would get in the way,” Ranma mumbled to herself, jealous of the unicorns ability to casually manipulate objects with magic while her own attempts barely resulted in an embarrassingly small sputter of pink mana around her horn.

‘At least ponies don’t seem that different from boy to girl and I haven’t really lost any of my strength or speed,’ she consoled herself with that fact.

It would take some time to train herself to adapt to a quadrupedal form but she had been dedicated and felt confident she could hold her own in a fight. She had tried to demonstrate this to Celestia to avoid her assigning a guard to follow her about like she was a child.

‘You seem quite capable, but appearances!’ she sarcastically whined in her mind, holding up her right hoof intending to make a talking gesture with her hand before remembering she didn’t have fingers.

“This pony thing is stupid, and the alicorn thing is even more stupid,” she grumbled and kicked at a few stray rocks as she increased her pace. “I can’t even have bed head without some pony getting on my case.”

Oleander gave one last glance at the tree line further down the hill just for something to do as she kept track of the new alicorn of the castle. Everfree forest held more than its share of dangers, but not this close to the castle; or the small village Gaitlend that was also in the forest. How was she supposed to make a good impression when she couldn’t even speak to Ranma? ‘Poor thing can’t even speak Ponish. I wonder what land she hails from? How can an alicorn be so ignorant?’

At the crest of the hill, Ranma sat down to take in the view of the castle grounds far below them. As one of Celestia’s guards, it wasn’t often that she had reason to come visit Luna’s observatory. Only a handful of ponies ever made the trek out to use the massive telescope or to service the device and mechanisms that maneuvered it. The double doors leading inside were open and she could hear at least two voices conversing from inside so they had come at a good time if Ranma wanted to see more of it.

Not having wings herself, Oleander allowed herself to enjoy the elevated view that she was usually denied. To the north, she could even barely make out the floating pegasus city of Cloudsdale holding position alongside Mount Cantor.

Her new assignment was content to sit and enjoy the day for a long time, looking out pensively at Everfree Forest reaching out to the horizon.

‘Please, please don’t take off flying, I don’t want to have to gallop all the way back down this hill after you,’ she pleaded fervently when the young alicorn excitedly bounced back to her hooves and stretched her wings.

Oleander had just barely begun to consider how much of a pain it would be to try and follow Ranma when the alicorn appeared suddenly inside her personal space, their muzzles nearly touching. She barely stopped herself from shrieking in shock from Ranma’s surprise appearance so close, but couldn’t avoid the instinctive reaction to magically grasp the hilt of her sword ready to draw and deal with whatever threat had appeared.

Ranma bounced away and pointed animatedly in the direction of Mount Cantor, rapidly asking something in her strange language.

“Um—,” her ears laid back in trepidation. “I don’t know what you’re saying.”

The alicorn paused and groaned in frustration, “What?” she once again invaded her personal space, pressing against her side and trying to see from her own perspective to point directly at the city made of clouds next to the mountain. “Cloudsdale,” she answered as clearly as she could.

‘Hmm,’ she glanced at the telescope, not sure on it’s operation but there were ponies inside who would be. “Come with me,” she jerked her heads towards the observatory and trotted the short distance over to it.

“Greetings,” she called out upon finding a grey unicorn stallion on the lower floor near the base of the telescope and two pegasi at various positions among the giant machinery that turned the fully opened dome.

Everything was decorated with intricate moon designs in silver and navy. The dome high above with the doors closed displayed a full moon and as it opened would change phases until it became what it was now, a slim crescent. Taking up the majority of the space was the telescope that reached the full height of the structure. It’s exterior covered in glittering stars and subtle lines to denote constellations. Purely decorative rotating rings depicted shooting stars and the sun and moon. It’s what she had heard artsy ponies call a one of a kind work of art in Equestria.

“Greetings, to what do we owe this visit—,” the unicorn who was clearly the oldest of the three asked, adjusting the glasses that perched on his muzzle. “Corporal. Hopefully there’s no danger in the area.”

“Nothing like that,” she glanced behind to see that Ranma’s head was peeking out from the side of the doorway taking in the interior curiously. Oleander frowned and her horn glowed azure. Ranma yipped as she was lifted off the ground and swiftly carried up next to her, body surrounded by her azure magic.

The trio immediately bowed deeply to the new alicorn and Oleander safely deposited the surprised pony to the floor. “The Steward’s ward was wondering if the telescope could be turned to see Cloudsdale?”

The elderly unicorn quickly recovered from his bow, “It would require some recalibration but of course we could do it for her.”

“Thank you,” she allowed the trio to go about turning the building to face Mount Cantor and make some complicated looking adjustments to the place she thought they would look into. This kind of thing was something her sister would understand, while she just didn’t have a head for understanding how anything with more than two moving parts worked.

Ranma gave her a giggly happy smile before bounding off to pester the stallion as he carefully adjusted things. Before she galloped up the steps to see the gears and wheels that drove the dome mechanism.

‘Seems like I figured out a way to make a good impression,’ she smirked, watching Ranma be directed to look into the lens by the stallion unicorn. ‘And I’ll also have something to report back to Celestia that isn’t just well she walked up a hill. Bleh that’d be boring who’d want to hear about that?’

Four Days Later

Ranma jerked awake, quickly ducking her head underneath the covers to block out the bright sunbeam that hit her in the face. Shifting the leg she had nearly lost about so she could confirm that it was still there, she finally calmed down and relaxed. The pins and needles sensation rapidly vanishing. Turning away from the window, she settled back into the lumpy mattress and hoped to get a few more minutes of sleep before her alarm clock went off.

‘It’s like the sun itself rises just so it can blind me.’

Her room was in one of the tall towers rising up around the center keep, and had a single large window facing East. The scale and level of construction the ponies were able to achieve in order to make such a castle by themselves seemed absurd at first. But after two weeks of seeing their use of magic or ingenuity with raw brute strength, it no longer seemed so ridiculous.

From under the covers she heard her door swing open with a soft creak.

“Good morning!” Pine Berry’s cheery voice announced as the baby blue coated unicorn trotted into the room before she started to say more that Ranma didn’t understand. The unicorn was almost thirty years old but like most female ponies stood shorter than her by a small amount.

‘And there’s my alarm,’ she quickly rose up into a sitting position to respond, trying to tuck her tail away so she wasn’t painfully hauled out of bed by it once again by the unicorns magic. Had happened twice already and she wanted no further repeats. “Good morning,” she responded in Ponish trying to blink the sleep from her eyes.

Berry seemed to take no issue with how she had pronounced the words, and used her magic to pull the blanket off of her, and fold it carefully off to the side in one complicated movement. The unicorn then spared her with an expectant look. Ranma rolled out of the bed barely big enough for her to land on the floor with a big yawn. Berry’s lavender eyes traced around her face before summoning up a comb that she held before her and said some words that Ranma had learned were encouragement but she couldn’t remember exactly how it went.

Focusing on forming an aura around the brush, a faint pink glow appeared above and between her eyes where her horn was. The light blue aura currently around it turned more purple as her magic joined in holding it. Pine Berry released her hold leaving Ranma to hold it alone. Suddenly it felt like she was holding a several hundred kilogram weight from her neck. Struggling just to hold it in place, the unicorn finally took pity on her and ended the test by taking it from her.

Ranma angrily glared at the lightweight object that vexxed her so much and sat down in a huff. Every morning she failed this test even if she was slowly making progress. The first week of attempts, she had barely been able to manifest any visible sign of the magic she now possessed. Up until two days ago all she had done was make a pink aura, and now she had at least been able to hold it briefly.

“Good,” Pine Berry congratulated her, casually using it to brush through her mane and tail to help her be presentable quickly.

‘Only a few more weeks and then I can try that mirror thing Celestia mentioned and I’ll be home,’ she reassured herself, and then she wouldn’t have to put up with this babying.

Though it was nice to get a little pampering, even if it was to uphold some ridiculous standard of appearance simply because she was an alicorn. All the cheerful colorful magical barnyard animals she was surrounded by were very helpful in attempting to get across that she was special and had to live up to high standards. Standards she was completely ignorant of, but even though she couldn’t understand them, the ponies of the castle did their best to try and impress upon her their importance.

At least if she could figure out the magic she was slowly gaining awareness of, she would be able to feel less awkward without hands. Celestia had been very helpful in trying to go over the basics with her, but all it had done was overload her with information. She failed to grasp most of the information save that it was like a new muscle she had to build up. Which wasn’t easy since she had never had this particular muscle.

Berry finished up smoothing out her mane quickly and gestured for her to go. “Breakfast,” she indicated.

“Yes, breakfast,” she answered and happily headed out to go visit the dining hall for the best part of her morning.

To get to the dining hall required that she go down a long spiral staircase that still set her on edge to travel face first. Even if the entire thing was designed to accommodate a species of quadruped she currently counted amongst. Getting to the fourth floor, two earth ponies going the same direction hastily stepped out of the way and performed small bows to her waiting for her to pass.

“Good morning,” she greeted and quickly went past so they would stop. Both immediately returned the greeting before going about their business.

Inside the long two story dining hall, she easily found Celestia waiting along with Luna sitting to her side along a rectangular table only used by the two sisters at the far end of the room. Well except for her now.

Overhead the gable roof was supported by heavy wood beams. Running around the roof underside were lifelike paintings depicting various events of Equestrian history. Everytime she looked at them she always found something new and interesting in the highly detailed works of art.

Her brief inspection of the one with the wendigos allowed her to miss Pine Berry taking her leave so she quickly trotted over to take a seat across from Luna. A plate already waiting for her piled reasonably high with delicious human looking pancakes and various fruits.

Luna looked like she hadn’t slept at all last night, a perfectly normal occurrence Ranma had found out. The dark blue pony seemed to take that moon mark on her flank seriously as she was the only nocturnal one save a handful of castle guards keeping watch. Unlike her dead tired younger sister, Celestia looked chipper and attentive, her appearance perfectly immaculate, the very image of refined equine royalty.

“Good morning,” she greeted the two with one of the few phrases she could pull off.

“Good morning,” Celestia responded like the cheerful morning pony that she was.

“Morning— good,” Luna mumbled tiredly, barely keeping her head up as she used her magic to fork more food into her mouth.

‘Well she’s using words this morning and not unintelligible horse noises.’

Not wanting to embarrass herself publicly trying to use magic to manipulate a fork or wanting to fumble with a much larger one some ponies used with their front legs, she leaned forward and just used her mouth to dig into her stack of pancakes. “These are so good,” she commented between mouthfuls, curious if they would have tasted as good if she was human. Neither sister responded, both having tuned out her use of Japanese unless they were addressed directly.

‘I wonder if I should try to get them to learn Japanese?’ she paused long enough to lick at some syrup that was stubbornly sticking to her short muzzle. ‘But why would they want to learn a language only I know? I’m not the best teacher and I don’t really got the time to learn how to. Suppose I could ask if they’re interested.’

Hearing Celestia cast the translation spell for the first time in four days, her ears perked up, and she forgot about asking if they wanted to learn her language. “Did you find anything else in your library about getting me home?” Ranma asked hopefully. “How ‘bout just back to my real body?” Though food might become an issue if she did get to be human again. Pony food was not exactly made of the same stuff as human even if it often looked similar.

“Sorry, we haven’t been able to find anything else we can try. Which leaves the mirror gateway that will open in three weeks.”

“Oh— alright,” she sighed and no longer felt like finishing her breakfast. But she would soldier on so that none of it would go to waste, maybe even see about getting seconds, no reason to be rude to the cooks.

“As for the reason why I activated the spell, your aerial escapades while learning to fly on your own have attracted some interest. Captain Lockheed has been kind enough to volunteer himself to give you a lesson in proper flight,” Celestia explained.

“What? I’m getting the hang of it,” she half heartedly protested, ears laying back and looking away evasively. Ranma had no clue when she would be human again, getting to do cool stuff like fly or learn magic were the best and most enjoyable ways to keep herself busy. Even if she made that dumb minotaur wannabe Pantyhose Taro look graceful in the air.

Lockheed’s deep authority filled voice responded, “And I’m sure with a little help you WILL have the hang of it.”

Luna was awoken from where she had fallen asleep with a start and Ranma nearly jumped in surprise, not having noticed the sea green pegasus standing stoically off to the side, most of his armor removed except for a decorative red sash wrapped around his neck and tied to his front right leg, a familiar stone that Luna usually wore resting where his neck and body met.

“I’m honored to be given the responsibility,” the pegasus stallion politely inclined his head to her and Celestia.

“Thank you, Captain. I’ll send Ranma along to meet you in the courtyard momentarily,” Celestia instructed and stood as tall as he could and briskly saluted with his right wing before trotting off at a measured pace.

“Thank you,” she whispered to Celestia, once she was sure the only other pony who could understand her wouldn’t over hear.

“Nonsense, other than your trip to Luna’s observatory you’ve been hiding in the castle so much I’m worried you might become part of the decor,” Celestia laughed lightly to herself.

“I shouldn’t keep him waiting then,” she said eagerly on her way out the door before she remembered she should return her plate to the kitchen.

Ranma maneuvered quickly through the castle on her way to the back courtyard, nearly running into many of the ponies who worked in it on the way, eager to find out how to take to the skies properly. Passing by a window with a view out at the main courtyard, she was impressed by the number of ponies that had come today to do business at the Castle of the Two Sisters. Not as much as when Celestia had some big wig over a few days ago but there were still a lot of colorful bodies on the grounds.

Finding a window facing the right direction and locating Lockheed who must have flown out a higher window, she leapt out and used her wings to glide semi-gracefully down to the dirt below. Her landing was a lot less jarring than if she had been human, and she bounced a couple times from the momentum before continuing with a spring in her step.

“A solid beginners glide,” Lockheed announced, having watched her leap. “But you relied too much on your wings to keep you aloft, ignoring maintaining posture to let your body dangle like a useless piece of meat.”

Ranma was taken aback by the blunt description of what she had thought was a reasonably successful use of wings. But at the same time it made her even more eager, actual direct instruction of how to do something felt so refreshing. “What’s the right way then?”

“We’ll get to that, first things first, wings up and hold em,” he stood up straighter and stretched his own wings out.

She copied his movement and held her wings out to the side. He relaxed his stance and approached, stretching out his right wing to try and push hers around. Lockheed gave a satisfied noise after finishing pushing each one forward and back then up and down.

“Solid muscle tone, feather condition is— acceptable but could use more regular and thorough preening, and you have enough confidence to leap from three stories up. Impressive for a former earth pony. Let’s get started with the basics and break those bad habits I’ve seen you developing. And then we’ll start on the obstacle course,” he said after finishing his brief inspection. (1)

‘Wonder what he would think if I told him I could have done that jump without wings?’ she mused briefly before paying close attention when he began to lecture and demonstrate proper wing positions.

Ranma hovered several meters off the ground, feeling a small amount of strain from using new wing muscles so much. She ignored the fatigue, excitedly waiting to test the skills she had been working on in Lockheed’s obstacle course.

It was made out of clouds! How could she not be excited to play around with clouds? Little puffy white clouds shaped into rings or walls all obediently holding the positions the seagreen pegasus had put them in.

In terms of teacher, Lockheed was a wonderful change of pace compared to the wise old human masters she had learned under. He gave clear instructions, didn’t patronize her with empty praise, and corrected her when she wasn't doing something right instead of repeatedly making her fail until she deciphered whatever vague lesson he had intended.

“You’ve done really well with what my kids did when they were five for fun.” Lockheed swooped past her at a leisurely speed, finished with his preparation. “Now I want you to try to get through all the hoops as fast as you can, then if you’re up to it, a barrel roll over that cloud at the end,” he explained and flew over to land on a small cloud he had placed halfway down the course off to the side. “Whenever you’re ready.”

Eager to show off, Ranma shot forward like a furry missile through the first two large rings, weaving around small cloud obstacles between them without slowing. The next required her to tuck her limbs in order to fit through. Immediately past was a cloud she had to suddenly throw out her wings and swerve to avoid, almost losing control. Flapping hard, she rounded a corner through the next ring. Climbing, she had to tuck her body in again to fit through a ring placed high above the rest before initiating a sharp dive to reach the next.

Coming up towards the large cloud blocking the last ring, she glided briefly before with one final flap shot upwards with enough speed to carry her over. Adjusting her wings to create more lift on her right side, she created too much and jerked suddenly to nose dive directly into the cloud to get stuck in the cotton candy like substance facing straight down.

“I’ve been stuck in a lot of stupid embarrassing positions before,” she grumbled, feebly kicking her still exposed hind legs in the open air as she struggled to escape her yielding precipitation based prison. “But I think this is one of the worst.”

Later

‘This place is kind of creepy at night,’ Ranma stopped and sat down to look upwards at one of the beautiful tapestries that hung from the high ceilings in the main hall. A stylized version of Luna posed at the bottom with a night sky stretching up above her to reach the actual sky through the glass ceiling. ‘Pretty though,’ she had never seen the stars look so big and bright in the sky as they did on this world.

Luna’s voice saying something she didn’t understand in her ear made Ranma jump up halfway to the ceiling. Hovering there, she glared down at the smirking dark blue pony who had somehow snuck up on her and was now giggling at her.

‘How did she sneak up on me?’ Ranma seethed, unable to walk around in this hall without producing loud sounds due to the acoustics. ‘Even as a human without these damn hooves, I couldn’t get across this place without making a noise.’ She snorted and dropped back to the floor with a loud clatter, trying to act like nothing had happened.

“Ha ha, sneak up on me, fun times. I’d get you back but I don’t own a castle,” she told the bigger alicorn, who wouldn’t have any clue what she was saying before looking away with a huff.

“Correct, you don’t own a castle,” Luna answered, emerald green eyes twinkling with amusement.

“But you didn’t— say the spell,” Ranma nervously pointed a hoof at Luna.

“Cellie loves her pomp and circumstance even though the spell does not need to be spoken,” Luna answered with a roll of her eyes. “You’re up quite late, should you not be asleep like the others?” she asked a bitter edge to her voice.

“Couldn’t sleep,” she answered somewhat evasively, muscles in her back leg unconsciously tensing and Luna nodded knowingly like she knew that Ranma had had a nightmare. “It’s too peaceful here, I need more crazed idiots screaming for my head to get a good night's sleep,” she quickly added.

“If you wish, you could come visit the forest with me?” Luna offered before hastily adding. “Not that I am a crazed idiot! But there is little to do about the castle until the morn. And while Captain Lockheed is an accomplished day flyer he knows little of how to deal with the still air under my moon— and I could give you some instruction— if you wished,” Luna awkwardly smiled, lips twitching from the strain of holding it.

“Just out to the forest?” Ranma asked and raised an eyebrow, getting the sense that Luna didn’t ask many others to go with her anywhere.

“Not to Everfree.”

Ignoring the shiver elicited by the cool night air cutting through her fur coat, Ranma felt giddy skimming the tops of trees. Thoroughly enjoying the chance to fly without restrictions. The moon was almost full with barely any clouds letting her see almost everything now that her eyes had adjusted to the soft light. They had covered a huge distance, well past the borders of Everfree before following a large river cutting through a grassy plain that took them to a different forest.

“This way,” Luna buzzed past her with an impressive burst of speed and arc down into the forest.

Ranma recovered from the wake of Luna’s passing before following with less grace and speed, finding Luna settling her wings against her back next to a small quick flowing stream. “Is this where you run off to at night?” Ranma asked, breathing heavily from the extra exertion needed to keep up with Luna’s quick pace.

“To the White Tail Woods? Not often, I get restless about the castle alone so I travel all over Equestria, though obviously not all in one night,” she answered and dipped her muzzle into the water to start drinking.

“I get why you’re tired in the morning,” Ranma also took her opportunity to get a drink from the refreshing stream. Coming up with a gasp she shook her head to get rid of the excess. ‘No contest, Equestria has the best tasting water.’

“Follow me,” Luna didn’t wait before bounding over the stream and through the woods.

Ranma traced Luna’s path with far less speed, eyes struggling with the moon hidden above the trees. Coming up to stand next to the much larger alicorn at a tree line facing the big river they had followed on the way here. In the distance, a mountain range rose up slowly from the plains with the moon hanging overhead.

“Tired?” Luna jokingly teased, trotting out into the field to roll around in some long grass hooves splaying in the air as she got comfortable and relaxed. Disturbing the grass caused a swarm of fireflies to launch themselves into the air, filling the area with pulsing flashes of green light.

“Is the rest of Equestria like this?” Ranma asked breathlessly as she followed slowly enjoying the sight of all the insects putting on a show. ‘I’m going to have to go track down that Cloudsdale place so I can see it up close.’

“Equestria has much wonder and danger,” Luna paused in rolling around only briefly to answer. “Most ponies only care to see the beauty of the day, always sleeping through the night.”

“Well they’re missing out,” Ranma replied watching watching the fireflies with rapt interest before they began to return to the grass. Luna favored her with an intense but unreadable look before with a snort she returned to rolling on the ground. “You look ridiculous,” Ranma said returning the snort and dropped into a sitting position.

“I look nothing of the sort,” Luna righted herself up into a lying position with her legs tucked underneath her. “You’re going to be very stiff tomorrow if you don’t give yourself a nice big stretch,” she explained beginning to pick at some grass to eat. “I love coming here, it has the best sweetgrass in all of Equestria.”

“It’s just grass,” Ranma half heartedly made a disgusted face.

“Try some, it’s so much better when fresh.”

“Humans don’t graze in a field,” Ranma’s nostrils flared as she took a more deep appraising sniff of the wonderful smelling grass before quickly jerking her head back and shaking her head. “Who knows if that little monster changed me all the way. I could still have human insides. I’d rather not get sick,” her stomach chose that moment to betray her with a loud growl.

“You have eaten hay regularly,” Luna stared at her like she was a moron. “You have the body of a pony, inside and out, you will not get sick or else you would have already.”

Ranma winced and looked away, her mood souring the moment Luna so bluntly summarized the situation.

“I— am sorry. I know that your true form is quite different. It was rude of me to presume you—,” Luna haltingly apologized.

“Whatever,” She interrupted Luna who seemed as uncomfortable making an apology as Ranma was with discussing her currently being the wrong species. “I’m just being dumb about something that doesn’t even matter. Food is food.”

“To some ponies it does matter,” Luna quickly tried to switch the tone of the conversation, changing her voice to sound like an uptight snob. “Eating from the ground? How uncouth!” she bemoaned dramatically and brought a hoof to her forehead before rolling into her side like she was fainting. “The very foundation of Equestria shall shudder and crumble if there is not separation between the food found upon the ground and a plate with which to serve.”

“Are you calling me a snob? You? Who has a castle with servants? Calling me— a snob?” she asked incredulously.

“You doth protest a great deal something I did not say,” Luna smirked.

Ranma glared at the dark blue colored alicorn who remained relaxed and unconcerned. “Fine,” her head ducked down to grab a mouthful of sweetgrass. “Happy? I did a pony thing,” she mumbled with her mouth full. Ranma didn’t have a palate to discern much when it came to this style pony food but it did taste better than other grass or hay she had eaten. Though that was usually prepared in other dishes not by itself.

“My happiness wasn’t dependent on you having a snack,” Luna’s smirk turned into a genuine smile. “Ooh, let us play a game. You have stars on your world, right? I shall point to a constellation and you shall tell me if there is a similar one in your sky.”

“I don’t want to play that game,” Ranma responded quickly in a small but stern voice. Feeling an intensely painful ache in her chest at the thought of home as she looked up at the unfamiliar stars twinkling brightly against the dark.

Luna visibly wilted like she had just done something awful. “I fear I shall never succeed in being a good friend if I can but make you sad or agitated.”

“What are you talking about? I just don’t want to talk about home. You’re a great friend. I’d be in a lot of trouble if you and your sister weren’t helping me out. I wouldn’t even know what I was,” she scoffed at the idea that Luna was a bad friend. There were enough of those waiting for her back on Earth so she was a fairly solid expert in that. “I’m the one who should feel bad, cause I can never repay you two.”

“So then we are— friends?” Luna’s voice wavered nervously and she was biting her lower lip.

“Of course, but it doesn’t seem like I’d be able to visit very often when I do get home, if the thing Celestia was talking about works,” Ranma lowered herself to lay down, letting her tired wings relax.

“Wonderful!” Luna bounced over to hug her around the neck with her front legs. “We shall be the bestest of friends!”

“Can’t— breathe!” she gasped and flailed her limbs.

Pine Berry hummed happily as she entered the room of her young charge. A grumpy young utterly uncivilized alicorn who didn’t appreciate her efforts, and who as usual was buried underneath a blanket hiding from the day. “Come on now, up with you,” she levitated away the blanket and folded it with a simple spell. Unusually, Ranma continued to lay lifelessly on the bed.

“Still tuckered out from Lockheed’s instruction, hmm?” she clicked her tongue, imagining what an honor it must be to receive instruction from such an accomplished pegasus.

She gave Ranma a bit of a warning nudge with her magic but the red alicorn ignored her. ‘This again? I’ll not be known as the mare who let an alicorn get her cutie mark for laying in bed wasting the day.’’

Taking a firm hold of the young mare’s tail, she yanked her out of bed to drop to the floor. Ranma’s response was to mumble some nonsense in her foreign language before snuggling into the stone floor completely oblivious. Pine Berry tapped a hoof repeatedly in irritation before noticing a small note pinned to the end of the bed.

‘The steward of the moon?’ she wondered at Luna’s signature. ‘Ranma was up much of the night, allow her to sleep. We will inform my sister.’

“Oh, well now I seem silly for missing that,” she grimaced and quickly levitated Ranma back up into bed with a little strain on her lifting capabilities, and tucked her back in. ‘I’ll need to speak with Celestia about this, accompanying her sister or no, the poor thing shouldn’t be getting exposed to such dangers.’

Next Day

‘Is it lunchtime yet?’ Ranma’s stomach made a strangled gurgling noise, laying on a comfy cushion rhythmically tapping her front hooves against the stone floor while her folded wings twitched unconsciously to the same rhythm. ‘I miss hands, I miss hands.’ Sometimes she tried to keep a musical beat she remembered and just generally made it sound like some pony was dashing about the library.

Sure it was barely ten in the morning but sitting around as Celestia read from books in the castles giant library was boring. Being that this was not a public space the library was almost always completely quiet. ‘Why’d she even ask for me to come here when she’s just going to stick her nose in a book?’

“If you’re bored,” Celestia started as she floated a book down in front of her. “This one is mostly pictures,” the mare offered, sitting on a chair in front of a desk with several books propped up on stands before her.

“This looks like a babies book,” Ranma leveled an annoyed look at the white alicorn. “Why would you even have this?”

“Because it’s appropriate to your level of literacy,” the aurora maned alicorn answered teasingly.

Ranma favored Celestia with a sour look for her joke. “I can read and write just fine— just not in your language.”

“I have some books that would help with that as well,” Celestia summoned forth more reading material.

“That seems like a waste, I’ll be going home and won’t need it,” she quickly waved off needing to learn any more Ponish, her declaration not sounding as confident as she had wanted. But she had to hold onto that hope and learning this worlds language seriously would be tantamount to accepting a permanent place in it.

Celestia nodded as though she was in agreement but Ranma caught the worried look in her eyes. “Are you likely to have a horn or wings when you return home?” the alicorn asked, her horn glowing as she summoned back all the materials she had placed in front of her to a small bookshelf filled with similarly bound material nearby. “Or are your aptitudes simply less suited for academic pursuits?”

Ranma shifted uncomfortably before answering, “I’ve been thinking a lot on how I don’t have a great record for fixing magical problems. Why does all the magic on Earth have to suck so hard?” she sighed. “It’d be great if I get both changed back and return home at the same time, but I can’t rely on that. So there’s a very real possibility that even if I can get back to Earth, I’ll get back home— as a pony. I know if that happens then I’ll need every advantage I can get so I can start working on fixing that.”

“That seems to be a very reasonable outlook to have for somepony in your position,” Celestia paused before her horn glowed again to open a drawer at her desk and deposit a thin brown book to place in front of her. “I have been very impressed with how quickly you have learned anything you have set your mind to. So while Ponish may not interest you, maybe you would be interested in learning to write with your magic? Maybe keep a diary of your thoughts? Horn writing is an excellent way to work on your fine object manipulation and that will be a useful skill on your world, no?”

“That would definitely be useful,” Ranma fumbled with her hooves to open up the cover to find it filled with empty pages.

“I also want to see what your language looks like in written form, so it’s not a purely altruistic suggestion,” Celestia laughed softly to herself, slipping off her chair move over and take a seat next to where she was laying, a quill following behind her to come to rest across the journal.

‘Gee, no pressure,’ she breathed in through her teeth, Celestia looming over her expectantly. Struggling to lift the pen with an aura of pink magic, her horn vibrated from the effort creating an electric tingle. But the quill did move, jerking into the air with several small dots of black ink dropping from it due to the unsteady motions.

“Gently,” Celestia instructed, her yellow aura created an outline around her own steadying the quill. “You’re galloping when you only need to walk.”

Ranma almost lost concentration at the odd sensation of feeling Celestia’s mana directly yet indirectly at the same time, the quill dripping a large blot of ink on the page before stabilizing. In a way it reminded her of the ki aura martial artists could create to intimidate others, but Celestia’s aura was the opposite, like the warmth of the sun. Reassuring, calm, and confident.

“It’s not the amount of power you conjure, it’s your clear intent,” Celestia leaned forward so that they were closer in height. “Start with a straight line, see the quill performing the action in your mind then make it happen.”

Ranma wasn’t able to make a straight line but she was able to make an uncontrolled scribble down half the page. “Oops.”

Celestia’s aura retreated leaving Ranma to hold the quill alone. “No oops, you’re already far above most young unicorns who have had their abilities since birth. Telekinesis is a learned skill not an innate one,” the white alicorn patted her on the back with a wing. “I’ll return soon. See what you can do on your own,” she added reassuringly.

Ranma’s muzzle scrunched up in thought, straining to keep her tenuous grasp on the writing utensil. ‘Nothing to do but practice,’ she nodded to herself and set to work.

Most of the first page was filled with clunky marks before she started to get the hang of big strokes and had finally, if very clumsily, written her name in big characters at the bottom of the first page. Which she felt reasonably proud of considering how alien the action was to perform.

She looked up briefly when a unicorn stallion walked by pulling a cart with a harness wrapped around his chest. He gave her a small bow of his head before using magic to unload almost a dozen small cushions, arranging them like seats in a classroom. Ranma watched in confusion wondering what he was doing before there was a rapid and disorganized clatter of tiny hooves from the library entrance.

Celestia had returned with a group of ten small children who were following around her excitedly. The colorful group of various pony races all looked around the same age with a pair of pegasi that looked like twins standing taller than the rest. ‘Oh my pony kids are adorable,’ Ranma gulped and rose to a sitting position inadvertently drawing their attention. ‘Their vision must be based on movement,’ she realized in horror.

“Children, please say hello to Ranma, she’s an alicorn like me,” Celestia entreated, sounding far too amused at her reaction.

“Hello, Miss Ranma,” the group enthusiastically greeted, a phrase that Ranma recognized even if it was in Ponish.

“Hello,” Ranma returned forcing herself to use the Ponish version, feeling foolish for her brief shock of seeing pony children for the first time. They were just kids after all, what could they possibly do?

“Now, why don’t you all take a seat and we’ll get started, I’m sure Ranma would love to play with you all afterwards,” Celestia instructed, long legs carrying her over to the front of the small cushions. The kids all made happy noises and clamored to get the nearest spot and any who didn’t moved themselves closer.

“Um, what is this?” Ranma asked her benefactor, happy that the group was suitably distracted by Celestia and weren’t badgering her but worried about the promise of her getting involved.

“Their teacher in Gaitlend is sick unfortunately, so they are here at the castle with their parents. I thought it’d be a nice change of routine to tell them a story and maybe play some games afterwards,” Celestia answered, sounding positively giddy at the opportunity.

“Ah, guess I’ll just be over here working on writing then.”

“Alright children, who here has heard the story of Melvin the Manticore?” Celestia grandly asked while holding up a large book, an image of a winged lion with a scorpion tail on the cover.

Later

Lockheed walked out onto the private courtyard, his full armor clanking lightly with each step. He knew he shouldn’t be worried but he couldn’t help himself anytime his twins spent time here at the castle out of his watch. Colts and fillies could be a right terror under the proper conditions. But he was obviously worried for nothing, all the children were held in rapt attention as Celestia spoke.

Ranma was laying in the grass opposite the other alicorn, looking trapped by kids who were competing to see who could be cuddled up closest to her. Hearing his approach, many tiny ears swiveled in his direction but their focus remained on Celestia.

“Excuse me, Steward,” he bowed to her, interrupting only when she was at a natural pause.

“Hello, Captain,” Celestia greeted him warmly.

“Father!” both of his sons happily exclaimed, pushing other foals roughly as they excitedly bounced over to greet him.

“I hope they were on their best behavior,” he briefly ducked down to affectionately nuzzle the two colts. “Your mother will hear of it otherwise.”

“Vapor and Stratos were perfect little gentlecolts,” Celestia answered and the twins beamed at the praise.

“Thank you for watching them,” he bowed his head to her respectfully, nudging his twins to do the same. “It is an honor to be gifted your time.”

“Thank you, Steward. Thank you Miss Ranma,” the pair said in unison.

“It’s our honor and our joy to take care of the wonderful children of those who take care of us,” Celestia answered him while using her magic to pinch his son’s cheeks. “But it is around that time, so let’s all head to the kitchen and get some snacks so we can spoil all your dinners,” Celestia playfully suggested.

“Aww,” the twins whined at the thought of missing fancy castle food.

“Come on boys, let’s get you home,” he bowed once again to Celestia as he left, both colts happily bouncing along at his side. “So what did you do today?” he asked, noticing that they were both far less energetic than usual.

“Celestia told us the story about when Luna met Melvin,” Stratos answered. “He’s a manticore and was really scary— he uh kept ponies locked up cause he thought they were— stealing from him.”

“But then Luna found out she could talk to him!” Vapor butted in. “And then he even helped build the castle, cause he was nice not mean.”

‘I’ve told them this story and they never remembered a word,’ he forced a smile. “Was that it?”

“Then we got to play with miss Ranma, but she can’t really talk right so the Steward said we could play tag. That doesn’t require no words,” Vapor started.

“But she was SO fast!”

“We couldn’t catch her at all!” Vapor exclaimed. “And then sometimes she’d let us catch her, we could tell she did,” Vapor nodded to himself.

“Do you think we can be fast like her someday?”

“With hard work and listening to your father,” he answered while stretching out his wings.

“Ya but you’re slow, dad,” Stratos scoffed. “She was so fast and she didn’t even have to use her wings.”

“This old stallion is still pretty quick, let’s see if you two can beat me home, I’ll give you my dessert if you can,” Lockheed didn’t even receive a verbal response, the two launching themselves towards home as fast as their tiny wings could carry them.

Ranma paused on her way up the spiral staircase to shake herself out, fur still damp from her bath, and hoping not to get used to the feeling. Arriving at the apex of the tallest tower, she entered the open doorway directly at the top of the steps and knocked on the heavy wooden door carrying Celestia’s sun mark.

“Um, Celestia?” she glanced side to side, not seeing the white alicorn anywhere in the circular room that took up the entirety of the top two floors of the tower.

The lower floor was a lounge area with big carpet in the center of the floor near a substantially sized hearth recessed into a decorative mantel that reached all the way up through the second floor to heat the entire room. To the right were curved steps up to the second floor loft where Celestia’s bed was. A small library of books lined the wall underneath the steps. To the left was an open exit to a balcony overlooking the castle grounds and next to the bookshelf was a doorway to Celestia’s private bath.

Celestia’s head peaked back into the room from the balcony. “Over here, come quickly you’re just in time,” her multi-colored mane briefly whipped into view as her head vanished.

“For?” she asked, quirking one eyebrow as she approached in curiosity. ‘Guess the spell hasn’t worn off yet.’

“So we can set the sun together,” Celestia answered, looking out from the balcony at the sun that seemed frozen unwilling to touch the horizon.

“You mean watch the sun set?” Ranma asked in confusion at the wording, right ear flopping down, and rearing up to rest her front legs on the railing that was too high for her to easily look over. It was a pretty sight from so far up, the sun bathing Everfree forest in a warm orange glow.

“Obviously you’ll watch, but if I don’t lower the sun on time, Luna will be most upset,” Celestia giggled to herself as if she knew from experience.

Ranma’s other ear flopped down as she tried to figure out if there was something wrong with the translation spell. “I didn’t exactly get the best grades in science class, and I am just a human from a different dimension, not normally a magical pony, but even I know that you can’t move the sun.”

“How else would it move across the sky?” the white alicorn asked rhetorically, as if she was explaining something obvious.

“It doesn’t, we’re the ones that are spinning, and the sun stays in place.”

“The sun may exist at the center of the solar system for humans from a different dimension. And I am certainly interested in hearing more about how such a system functions,” Celestia shifted over to be closer. “But maybe this will make it easier to understand,” her horn glowed a brighter yellow than Ranma had ever seen and she leaned in to be flank to flank.

Ranma froze as Celestia shared a small connection of her aura as she reached out towards the sun with a spell. There was a surge of immense warmth and power that made her jump in shock, breaking her connection to Celestia’s aura. She quickly backpedaled into the room, tripping over the edge of a carpet to land painfully on her tail.

“I’m sorry, I’ve only ever done that with Luna before, I didn’t think it could be painful for another alicorn,” Celestia asked in concern. The sun obediently beginning to set behind her as the spell took affect.

“That was—,” Ranma fell over to one side, tucking her right leg up to her chest while holding herself with her left.

“Too much, I should have known you were far too inexperienced to be exposed to that level of magic,” Celestia’s face fell, purple eyes staring at the floor.

“AMAZING!” Ranma jumped high into the air, wings fluttering excitedly at the apex before dropping to the floor to bounce excitedly around a shocked Celestia. “How did you even figure out how to do that? Or train for it? Why do you even need to do it? Did someone do it before you did? Do you have to do it all the time? Can anyone else take over? Wait, that means Luna controls the moon, this definitely explains why you two have a castle!” She skidded to a stop in front of Celestia, body humming with excitement, and expectantly waiting for answers.

Celestia blinked her purple eyes multiple times processing her rapid fire questions.

“You’re this worlds Amaterasu,” Ranma gasped loudly before the alicorn could speak and she hurriedly bowed deeply, almost falling over from the unfamiliar motion. “I had no idea you were a goddess, Celestia-sama.”

Ranma was starting to get a little wobbly in her position from waiting before Celestia finally responded.

“Ranma, what are you doing?” Celestia asked with a soft giggle. “I’m not a goddess.”

“You’re not?” she asked and gave up her attempt at reverence to sit and look up at Celestia.

“Powerful and long lived, yes,” Celestia used a wing to pat her on the head as she walked by into her room to lay down on the thin cushion positioned in front of the unlit fireplace. “Divine? No, well— no more divine than you are.”

“But I’m not,” she protested with one last glance out the balcony to where the last rays of the sun were finally disappearing over the horizon. “If I hadn’t felt it,” Ranma put a hoof to her chest. “I wouldn’t have believed you,” she quickly took a deep breath trying to center herself, traveling to a different reality felt like less of a seismic shift to her perspective than knowing that the two alicorns she lived with moved the very sun and moon. ‘I hadn’t even noticed them doing it, what else have I missed?’

Celestia’s mouth quirked to the side deep in thought, a thin pulse of magic traveling up her horn led to the fireplace roaring to life. “Come sit, I think learning more about how Equestria works may ease your mind. Perhaps our control of celestial bodies may seem less daunting if given a little more explanation.”

‘I hope so,’ she dragged her hooves accepting Celestia’s offer. ‘If she can’t help me get home, and she can move the sun, just how powerful was that thing that brought me here?’ she wondered fearfully.

Celestia smiled reassuringly before beginning. “It would have been easy for you to miss because of Everfree Forests unique ecosystem, but the rest of Equestria requires ponies to maintain it. Without earth ponies to tend to the land we would have no food as the plants. They wouldn’t be able to do this without the pegasi who control the weather or the unicorns who move the seasons along.”

“What?” she asked incredulously.

“Did that not translate correctly?”

“No— I guess it did, go on,” she tried to add that new information to the pile in her mind that would need to be worked through later. Having purposely avoided finding out more about this world past her immediate surrounding now made her feel like she had missed important details about the wider world.

“A group of unicorns used to shepherd the sun and moon. But the strain was too much and drained them of their magic. Our mentor, Star Swirl encouraged us to try and cast the spell, believing that with our more potent magic we would be able to handle the strain. It worked out so well that we each received our cutie marks,” Celestia finished proudly, lifting a wing and looking back at her sun mark.

‘Wow, that’s a girly sounding name.’ Ranma had been wondering about the flank markings but it wasn’t until she saw the children that she had realized that they weren’t something they were born with. “Oh right, what’s up with those? That’s what I came to ask about.”

“Cutie marks? To put it simply they are an expression of what brings a pony their greatest joy, the purest expression of who they are. Often, like with mine it’s a special talent. Some have obvious meanings while others are vague.”

“So— shouldn’t I have one for martial arts? Or punching my old man in the face after he did something stupid? Cause that always made me feel really good,” she giggled to herself.

Celestia grimaced and laughed nervously. “Assuming that you are capable of receiving one, perhaps enjoying violence against your father is not what will cause its manifest.”

“Aww,” she whined but feeling better knowing that Celestia was not in fact a goddess she may have offended.

“I think this is the most you’ve ever spoken of your family,” the white alicorn looked pensive for a moment. “Luna is my only family and we’ve never been apart, so I can only imagine what you’re going through. It is my dearest hope that you can get back to them.”

“Thanks,” Ranma stared down at the floor with her wings twitching. “And I just like to complain about my Pop. He might be greedy, shortsighted, and lazy but he’s always been my only family,” she shrugged her shoulders, avoiding the complicated mess that was her mother. Or Akane who also occupied a very complex but important part of her life.

“Would you tell me about him? He sounds interesting,” Celestia asked adjusting herself into a more comfortable position.

“I don’t know if anyone has ever called my old man interesting,” she laughed to herself and slid forward to lay down on her stomach. “Lots of other things though.”

Author's Note

1 - Easier for the sisters to explain Ranma’s ignorance by saying she was a former earth pony from a far away land than a former primate from a different reality.

Really don't expect chapters to appear this fast, this was already done I Just did some editing to address a few questions and things I saw in the comments that were less addressed before.

If This Castle Is A Rockin
View Online

No Pedigree Save Chaos

If This Castle Is A Rockin

"Speech"
'Thought'
Spell

Ranma saw the familiar sliding wood doors of a traditional japanese styled home she was well acquainted with and didn’t even stop to think before racing to them from her place next to a koi pond to throw them open. Collapsing to the floor in relief, “I’m back,” she exclaimed happily to the assembled group who looked to be sitting down for a meal at the square table.

“I don’t know how it happened—,” she sighed in relief choosing not to question her good fortune. Her father Genma and mother Nodoka were seated next to each other. Akane, her fiance was next to her two older sisters Nabiki and Kasumi while the trios father Soun sat off by himself. “It’s only been a few weeks, did you miss me?”

“Who invited the horse?” Nabiki asked shattering Ranma’s euphoria.

“I’m not a horse,” she corrected, looking down to find that she still possessed the body of a pony. “Well I’m a pony but it’s me, Ranma!”

“How adorable, it looks like its trying to talk,” Kasumi sweetly remarked.

“I am talking,” she would have stomped her front hooves in frustration but her ears caught the tail end of a whinny, and that stopped her cold. “But I can talk,” she tried again but it was only a long neigh. ‘Why is this happening? Have I been talking like this the whole time without realizing?’

“Don’t worry, I’ll take you someplace where you’ll fit right in,” Akane said soothingly as she appeared at Ranma’s side, gently stroking a hand along her neck and through her mane.

Before she could plead with Akane, something was slipped over her head, a single band wrapped around her muzzle linked to another ring that went up around her jaw and behind her ears. “Akane?” she tried to back away but her head jerked painfully as Akane held tight a rope leading to a ring by her muzzle.

“Akane, get this off me now!” she demanded, raising a front leg to try and push it off but it wouldn’t budge. Akane made no move to listen to her so she tried her next option and closed her eyes to try and get it off with her magic.

Another quick painful jerk broke her concentration and when she opened her eyes she found that she was no longer at the Tendo home but the pig farm of Akari Unyru. That is if the comically giant form of her prized sumo pig Katsunishiki being ridden by Akari herself was any indication.

“Look what showed up at our house,” Akane declared happily and thoughtlessly jerked the rope holding her head again causing a sharp spike of pain in her neck. “Right away I thought she’d be perfect as a gift for your and Ryoga’s kids.”

“I’m sure they’ll love having a pony,” Akari gushed, sliding down Katsunishiki’s flank to land on the ground.

“I’m not a pet!” Ranma jerked and pulled straining to pull herself free, her hooves leaving deep ruts in the dirt. But Akane held the rope easily and paid no attention to her efforts.

“And when the kids get tired of having a pony, we could always sell her to that nice Kuno Tatewaki boy, I hear he was looking for a new broodmare,” Akane added, oblivious to Ranma’s increasing panic.

Ranma screamed and felt a sharp jolt before she fell out of bed tangled up in her blanket.

Luna spread her wings and launched herself off of her balcony into the brisk night air. Giving a few hard flaps, she glided lazily around the tower dedicated to her. She had barely raised the moon an hour before and already the castle grounds were silent and empty. Like most nights she welcomed the quiet solitude, often feeling overloaded by all the activity of the day. And like most nights she found the way everypony shunned the wonders of her night en masse upsetting. But if she had patience eventually they would see the beauty in the darkness.

But now was not the time to focus on the negatives, finding the right window, she hovered outside long enough to telekinetically open the glass window before she went through. Inside was the barren room Ranma had been given upon her arrival. It wasn’t a room fit for an alicorn but it was one of the better guest quarters that they had available, and they weren’t yet convinced Ranma would be around long enough to justify furnishing her a proper room.

Closing the window, she silently made her way over to Ranma’s bed and sat down next to it. The reddish equine was facing away from the window asleep, her legs twitching enough to be visible underneath her blanket. Being able to sense when ponies were dreaming was an ability she had slowly grown into since gaining her cutie mark. And judging by how strongly she could feel Ranma’s mental state recoiling, it must be a nasty nightmare.

It stood to reason that if she was capable of sensing the state of a pony’s dream, then she may grow to be capable of influencing them. The temptation to experiment when given access to a perfect subject was strong but she knew Ranma had been having regular nightmares, and she felt too protective of the displaced creature to use her in that way. At least not without explaining the situation and getting permission.

“Ranma, wake up,” she whispered, prodding at the girl with a hoof to wake her up.

Her touch, along with her desire to know what was troubling Ranma, caused a shiver to pass over her whole body like a wave and she had to shake herself out to get her fur to stop standing on end. “Woah,” she gasped and wavered side to side feeling dizzy.

She had seen Ranma’s nightmare, just a flash of an image, blurred like she was looking at it from underwater. There had been a room with several indistinct human figures lacking details, the only one who did was a human mare with a short mane of dark blue hair who was directly next to Ranma’s point of view. At least Luna thought it was a she but who could tell with alien beings? The human was tugging harshly on a rope tied to Ranma’s muzzle.

Luna didn’t know the full context of the scene only that Ranma was terrified and the humans were the cause of it.

She reached out to more forcefully wake Ranma from her nightmare, wondering if her touch would cause another vision. Ranma screamed, and the next thing Luna knew she was being knocked to the floor flat on her back by a blanket wrapped pony.

“Um— are you up?” she hesitantly asked the moment she came to her senses, unable to remember the last time any pony or beast had overpowered her.

The little alicorn began speaking rapidly in her language, kicking and struggling to get out of the fabric wrapped around her. Luna heard the sound of fabric tearing instantly as Ranma’s monstrous strength ripped it apart. Having never been in such a situation, she panicked herself, wrapping her forelegs around Ranma, and trying to make soothing noises as best she could.

“It was just a nightmare,” she gently whispered, struggling to actually hold onto the smaller alicorn whose bucking was becoming too much.

Ranma’s wild blue eyes finally focused and her heavy breathing slowed to a normal pace. With one last long breath the red alicorn relaxed fully. “Luna?” Ranma asked in a small voice, continuing on in words Luna could no longer understand. But her body language said a lot, sinking into herself and trying to hide within the remains of the blanket.

“It’s alright,” she shifted to get out from underneath Ranma. The other alicorn was hopelessly entangled in her blanket, her limbs sticking through multiple layers. So Luna did the only reasonable thing and magically cut out the material from Ranma’s neck down past each leg to free her. “Blankets can be replaced,” she joked more for herself, seeing that Ranma was not wearing the pendant so she couldn’t cast the spell to communicate properly.

‘I didn’t think she ever removed it,’ Luna raised an eyebrow and stood up to look for the necklace, needing to know more about Ranma’s nightmare. Finding it on the small table against the wall, she levitated it over intending to place it back around Ranma’s neck but finding the little alicorn moving her head out of the way. “We need to talk,” she augmented her voice briefly with magic to speak with authority, distracting Ranma long enough to slip the necklace on her.

She was in the process of casting the spell but Ranma was trying to use her hooves to push the amulet off. A ponies front legs were quite dexterous but Ranma didn’t seem to be thinking clearly, and was merely trying to push upward making the movement awkward and ineffective.

“Calm down, I just want to talk about the nightmare you were having,”

“And I don’t!” Ranma angrily snorted, horn beginning to glow a blindingly bright white. “Who asked you to butt into my dream?”

“Ranma, please don’t be angry,” she pleaded, looking away and shielded her eyes with a wing from the overpowering light. “I was only trying to help.”

“I’m not doing this, wha— what’s going on?” Ranma’s anger vanished into fear as her aura continued to expand, pushing Luna with enough force to slide her along the floor to bump up against the wall.

“Then relax and it should abate!” she called out, buffeted by a wall of mana that threw the few pieces of furniture in the room crashing against the walls. Luna took one step forward, then another, surrounding herself in a protective bubble as she slowly trudged her way towards Ranma.

‘Unless—,’ she thought worriedly.

Very young unicorn foals often had uncontrollable magical surges, normally they were ultimately just a nuisance, too weak to cause any real harm. Could Ranma be going through a similar event? Regardless of her former status as a magicless biped, she was now on the cusp of being an adult mare, and an alicorn beginning to grow into her powers. With as much mana she could sense being gathered, an errant thought was all it would take to cause devastation.

“Keep your mind clear do not desire anything to happen!”

Suddenly the light and unrestrained release of mana stopped, causing Luna to slam forward painfully on her muzzle. She allowed her barrier to dispel and ignored the small amount of pain in her nose to quickly look up to Ranma who stood frozen, head turned downwards where he necklace was now a band of pure white magic.

“I didn’t want to talk,” Ranma admitted in a small voice, grimacing nervously. “I wanted it off,”

The magically enchanted item dissolved like it was a cloud being dissipated.

“Oh no,” Luna gasped.

A spark of magic ran up her horn like lightning to teleport Ranma to her side, leaving the uncontrolled magic hanging in place an instant before it exploded.

Celestia’s eyes snapped open, her ears pinning back in vain to muffle the explosion that shook the castle around her. Up and out of her bed, she dropped down to the balcony a floor below, and slid to a stop outside at the railing. She immediately spotted the two story tall gaping hole in the guest tower, the top two floors and roof beginning to topple inwards.

With no time to waste, she took to the sky, and cleared the distance in an instant with a single powerful flap of her wings to come to a stop beneath the falling tower. Her horn glowed and a yellow aura sprung up around the structure as it began to pick up speed. She couldn’t let it fall, there were close to forty ponies sleeping in the residential section below who would be crushed. Struggling against the massive weight, she grunted as it forced her down towards the castle below. Wings flapping and horn glowing brighter, she struggled to arrest the momentum.

Sparing a glance downwards, she grimaced at the ponies who had gathered to see what the commotion was, inconveniently putting themselves right where she needed to divert the tower remains to fall. ‘Hopefully there’s nopony in this part of the tower,’ she fretted, and began to loosen her hold to divert part of her attention to the ponies below.

There was no room for error, the ponies below weren’t moving away fast enough, and she would not be able to hold the heavy load much longer. Reshaping her hold on the tower, she began to direct it towards the open courtyard. Her eyes began glowing white, the nearest side of the courtyard rose up with a yellow wave traveling away from the impact zone, sweeping any pony in it’s path safely away, and holding them in a protective aura at the far end while the tower crashed into the open space, the roof portion breaking free to crush the outer wall.

Letting all her magic fade away, Celestia closed her eyes, and released a ragged breath. “That was quite taxing,” she sighed, looking down briefly to see several ponies below already had begun checking the wreckage, so she turned her attention upwards.

“Steward, are you alright?” the pegasus guard Moon Shower asked, hovering next to her.

“Not yet,” she answered worriedly, shooting upwards with a flap of her wings. “Where is Ranma? How did this explosion happen?” she asked, landing on a portion of stone that still appeared stable. Ranma should be incapable of such a spell so who could have done this?

“Your sister entered through the window. Past that we do not know what occured before the explosion,” another guard pegasus answered, the pair floating just in front of her.

“We must find them. Moon Shower, lock down the grounds, we can’t rule out this being an attack of some sort,” she commanded.

“Yes, Steward,” Moon Shower nodded, diving over the edge of the ruined tower.

“Hot Air, come with me,” Celestia launched herself back into the air to see if she could spot her sister and Ranma. (1)

‘Is it possible that one of the nobles attempted to assassinate Ranma and caught Luna in it as well?’ she considered in horror. They had always been leery of her power over the Sun and ultimately the power she held over them. Was the appearance of a third alicorn too much in their eyes? Did they fear an attempt to take over their Kingdoms? Even after all they had done to remain neutral?

‘If they’ve hurt my sister—’ she took a deep breath and buried her anger to deal with the most important issue of finding out what had happened to Luna and Ranma.

“Ouch,” Ranma moaned, limbs twitching erratically as she hung upside down in a tree. One wing hopelessly tangled in thin branches while a thicker branch was shoving leaves annoyingly in her face.

Her body was one big dull ache from the explosion which was probably the reason why she was buried in a tree. Well it was the only explanation she had for how she ended up in a tree, so she had to go with it. There was a pony talking up to her from below but she wished he would shut up. Every word made her ears twitch uncontrollably, like she was hearing two languages spoken simultaneously while being unable to understand either.

“I’m— fine,” she groggily tried to respond. “Just— gimme five— maybe ten minutes.”

She had enough experience with concussions to know that the constant buzzing of her thoughts wasn’t one. Unless ponies had different symptoms. Maybe she really should find out more about pony biology cause feeling like a ball of static electricity was bouncing around her brain and screwing up her ability to move was unpleasant.

Celestia strode with purpose into the room chosen to treat any injuries. She had just finished getting a report from all the guards pertaining to the possibility of an intruder but nothing had been found. The explosion had left it’s own evidence that narrowed down the cause to two very specific mares. Since her fears of an outside attack were thankfully unfounded, she now had to find out why it had happened.

Stopping just in the doorway, she gave a reassuring smile to an earth pony in the process of leaving, she didn’t immediately recognize him but his head had been bandaged from being struck by a piece of stone. Luna was awake and laying on a mat next to a comatose Ranma. Both were covered in bruises and cuts that had already been cleaned and bandaged. Her breath caught seeing her sister in such a state but she fought down the urge to run over and comfort her.

“Bounding Brook, are there any other injuries that need tending?” she asked the unicorn doctor.

“No, Steward. Your quick action limited it to only five injuries, all but your sister and ward were minor.” He answered.

“Thank you, I’ll need some time alone with my fellow Alicorns, please.”

“As you wish,” Bounding gave a deferential nod of his head before leaving the room.

A spark of magic traveled up the length of her horn as she secured the room for privacy. Even with an open door nopony could enter or hear the conversation she was about to have. “Luna, would you please tell me what happened?” she asked after taking a deep breath.

“Cellie, please don’t be mad.”

“Do I sound mad, Luna?” she snapped a little too quickly and her younger sister winced. “I just want you to explain yourself.”

Luna glanced at the sleeping form next to her worriedly before answering, “I was going to see if she was still awake, not to wake her. But I could tell she was having a nightmare so I decided to rouse her.”

“No doubt to take her halfway to the Crystal Mountains.”

“That is not true, it would have been to a place within Everfree itself,” Luna blurted out.

“Luna— Sister, she has a family to return to. It’s wrong for you to try and distract her with pretty things hoping she will stay here with us.”

“Yet it is fine for you?” Luna paused to rise into a sitting position. “Was I supposed to remain ignorant of you providing her with flight lessons from Captain Lockheed?”

Celestia recoiled slightly at the accusation, not having expected her sister to defend her actions in this way. “She was trying to learn on her own, the Captain wished to help so she wouldn’t hurt herself.”

“And your personal tutoring so that she might use the magic of her horn?” Luna continued her line of questioning with growing confidence.

“I have only given her what she has asked for,” she responded without much conviction.

“What if she is not able to ask? Am I to sit idly by while my friend suffers?”

“Luna, how could Ranma be suffering while safely asleep in her bed?” She asked incredulously.

“She cannot have a good nights rest because she has a nightmare nearly every night. Tonight I was able to see a glimpse of it, and she’s terrified of the humans she would return to,” Luna exclaimed overcome briefly by emotion. “How can we let her go back, Cellie?”

“They’re her family, what could she have to fear? You must be misinterpreting what you saw,” she tried to sound convincing but she had her own doubts. The way Ranma had talked about her father, with long pauses to compose the most gentle way to frame events, had not allayed her worry.

Shaking her head she wanted to get away from the uncomfortable line of thought, resolving to be more direct in questioning Ranma later. “We can discuss whether or not Ranma belongs here with us now or not later. It’s not relevant to what I really wish to know, and that is why is part of our home now in ruins?”

“Ranma had an uncontrolled surge.”

“Luna, she is no foal, why would she have any sort of uncontrolled outburst?” she scoffed at the idea, writing it off as absurd but almost immediately realized an issue. Ranma professed that her mind had not been affected by her transformation so her maturity should not be an issue. However the body she now wore was still a barely two week old alicorn. Would it really be so unbelievable for there to be growing pains that could not be predicted? “That still wouldn’t explain the explosion.”

Luna gestured to amulet draped around her neck. “Ranma gathered far too much mana and with an errant thought destroyed the necklace I had just cast the communication spell upon.”

“Raw magic from two alicorns with nothing to contain or direct it,” she summarized and Luna nodded. Celestia sighed, knowing that if it happened once that it would likely happen again. “So now there really is no choice, she must be trained so she can contain such outbursts.”

“I’m sorry, Cellie.” Luna said head falling, “I felt like I had to try and protect her, and it happened so fast.”

“I know,” she let the tension in her body drop as she collapsed next to her sister. “I was so worried something had happened to you, both of you,” she admitted tiredly, wanting nothing more than to go back to sleep.

“I was worried too, I’ve never been blown up before,” Luna joked in her usual deadpan tone and painfully lying back down against her. “I did not enjoy the experience.”

Later the next day

Ranma slowly awoke to find herself laying on a mat with a pillow underneath her head. The static headache from the last time she was awake was mostly gone but she could still feel a faint tingle. As she grew more aware, the tingle around her brain was drowned out with the painful throbbing she felt from her horn.

Delicately raising her head while ignoring the way the scent of dried blood made her nose scrunch up in disgust, Ranma dimly remembered being brought to this room after being pulled out of that tree. Luna was on a mat next to her, exactly where she had seen her the night before. Seeing the dark blue pony safe immediately set her mind at ease even if both of them were covered in similar amounts of bandages.

She wasn’t feeling very good to start, and her mood darkened further seeing the only other occupant to the room was a unicorn stallion she knew all too well from the examination he did when she had first arrived on Equestria. He was laying near the doorway reading a book, with a quill writing to a scroll to the side. Luna chose that moment to take a deep breath in her sleep and Ranma saw that the unicorn’s ears turn before he glanced up.

The castle doctor smiled brightly, saying something in Ponish that was probably supposed to sound reassuring, and rose up to his hooves.

Ranma winced as the buzzing static headache returned in full force, her ears pinning back, and muscles twitching painfully like a muscle cramp. “Ah! What is this?” she hissed, hearing him speaking to someone outside the room. Burying her head underneath the pillow she had slept on, she tried to block it all out.

Without being able to hear the words clearly, the buzzing subsided into a light tingle again, allowing her to think. ‘I think I broke this body and Celestia is probably going to kick me out,’ she let out a haggard breath, her chest seizing up at the thought.

Slamming her right hoof into the floor, she cursed her luck. The explosion was an accident and she was about to get blamed for it. ‘Are they even going to let me use the mirror? It’s not my fault!’ she hit the floor again, hearing it crack from the force.

“I didn’t mean to do it,” she whispered to herself. An image of Luna’s face frozen in fear, that brief instant when the overpowering bright light from Ranma’s horn had moved to the necklace.

How many ponies were crushed underneath tons of stone? She may have been disorientated when being carried back but she had seen the missing tower. There were dozens of ponies who lived beneath her, whole families, and all of them would have been asleep when it fell. Why would they let her go home now? Luna may be alive and well but she had killed so many.

Shifting to be able to push the pillow down around her head with both front legs, she wanted to block out this world, maybe if she could deny it enough she would awake back on Earth like it was a dream. Back where she was a human, with hands instead of hooves, no wings to fly with, and no magical horn to kill with an errant thought.

“Pop, I screwed up so bad,” she whispered in self loathing.

She remained hiding under the pillow for what felt like a long time until a hoof softly nudged her shoulders. Ranma chose not to respond except to tuck her hind legs up underneath her, unable to completely bury the instincts telling her to run from such a huge problem she could never hope to fix.

Another nudge and this time the hoof stayed in place applying gentle pressure.

Reluctantly she pushed the pillow off her head and sat up facing away from Celestia. A golden shoed hoof stretched out to hold up one of the necklaces in front of her and she nodded. Yellow magic surrounded it before it was lifted up and placed around her neck. Celestia didn’t speak the incantation as she always did but Ranma could feel it as the buzzing exploded in her head. She almost collapsed but the sharp spike of pain passed just as quickly as it appeared and it even took the tingling with it. (2)

Taking a deep breath, she squared her shoulders briefly before turning to face Celestia expecting to see all manner of incriminations, disgust at what she had done, so she was not prepared to be gathered up into a hug.

“You gave us a scare, how are you feeling?” Celestia asked full of concern, releasing her to sit back while Ranma remained stunned.

“I— uh— I’m,” she stammered in a daze. Why wasn’t Celestia angry? She seemed to care so much about all the ponies in the castle, why wasn’t she at all distraught or furious over their deaths?

“Luna told me you had yourself an uncontrolled surge of magic last night. We should have realized it might happen. Unfortunately there was a sort of comedy of errors that led to quite a bit of property damage. But what’s done is done,” Celestia laughed softly to herself.

“Just tell me how many I killed,” Ranma blurted out in disgust with herself, ears drooping as she stared at the floor watching tears start to stain her muzzle. “How many?”

“Kill? Nopony died, Ranma. Is that why you were so upset?” Celestia gathered her up in a hug again. “Oh my little pony, you and Luna were the only ones seriously hurt by the explosion. I was able to catch the remains of the tower before it could hurt anypony else.”

Relief washed over her and she relaxed against the white alicorn, traitorous equine body desiring the comfort and closeness after working herself up over nothing. Everything was as alright as it possibly could be in this colorful barnyard animal world.

Ranma stiffened when Celestia continued talking, noticing immediately how she was no longer understandable and had slipped into Ponish. “What did you say?” she asked in confusion, the spell had never failed to translate before.

Celestia released her to look down into her eyes, “I was just saying how you seemed to have gained some curious mana mingling with your own aura that I was going to investigate,” the white alicorn started before her speech suddenly shifted back to Ponish mid sentence.

“Uh Celestia, I think somethings wrong with your spell,” she gulped.

Later

Gliding down to a parapet, Ranma flapped quickly to stop her momentum before landing lightly next to a pair of pegasi. They were trying to push the last remaining stone block down to a group of earth ponies. But the two stallions were not having much luck moving a square block of stone bigger than both of them. It was locked in place at an odd angle and they just didn’t have enough power to budge it. The two noticed her after finishing their latest attempt without having any more success.

“Let me help,” she said, hoping that she was using the right Ponish phrase. She had heard it used by others working to clean up the rubble and hoped that it meant that and she didn’t sound like a moron.

Without waiting for a response, she shouldered the nearest one to get enough space to put her own muscle behind it. Giving them an expectant look when they both hesitated, the pair nervously laughed before enthusiastically joining her in pushing. This time the block gave way to fall flat next to the parapet, so they repositioned to gently push it over the edge where it fell to the dirt with a heavy thump.

The pegasi thanked her and bowed before setting off to help others. Ranma didn’t immediately go anywhere, looking over the side to where the earth ponies were already inspecting the block to decide how it would be reused.

After the eventful talk with Celestia, she had thrown herself into helping fix the mess she had caused to distract herself but found that her help wasn’t exactly needed. Plans had been made while she had been out and groups organized to execute them. Being that this seemed to be the most exciting event to happen at the castle in a long time, there were a lot of volunteers eager to get involved. The communal effort of the whole thing was infectious.

Which meant they didn’t need her getting in the way as they ground to a halt attempting to explain to her what needed to be done.

Her stomach protested the lack of attention she had shown it today with a loud growl. “Alright I’ll get some food,” she shook her head and took off to visit the kitchen.

Normally the kitchen was empty of ponies at this late time of day but as she peaked her head around the corner she confirmed what her ears had been telling her. The kitchen was filled with more cooks than usual and by the looks of it were preparing a lot more food than usual. Celestia must have thought it would be a nice thank you to prepare a feast rewarding all the ponies for dealing with the extra work Ranma had accidentally created.

She had barely taken two steps through the doorway to see if she could scrounge up a meal without getting in the way when Mint Drop, a shorter plump earth mare wearing a chefs hat stopped her. The golden coated pony with pale green mane shooed her back out and gestured encouragingly towards the table Ranma usually sat at with the alicorn sisters.

“Thanks, Mint Drop,” she nodded, giving the mare a big smile before trotting off to her usual seat. Truly relieved to see the golden pony had not come to any harm.

Mint Drop was a great cook and had caught her raiding the kitchen several times. The reward was usually a swat to her hindquarters with a wooden spoon and then a much better prepared meal than she could hope to make herself. Reaching her normal table, she settled in to wait as patiently as she could with her softly rounded stomach making occasional rumbling noises.

‘I wish there was a TV or a radio or something to read,’ she sighed, having literally nothing to do to kill the time. There weren’t even any other ponies to watch in the big empty hall save some cooks who passed through without stopping. ‘Too bad Celestia isn’t here so at least I’d have someone to talk to.’

Ranma stopped that thought immediately and tried to smack her forehead into the table but instead bounced her horn painfully off the surface. “Ouch!” she hissed and rubbed near the base with a hoof. ‘Shouldn’t have done that.’

Grumbling, she crossed her front legs on the table, and rested her head on them to stare out at the empty hall. ‘I’ll never get to talk to anyone here again,’ she blew out a long breath through her nose.

She had broken a magical enchantment and that seemed to have consequences that weren’t expected. Some of the last words she had understood the white alicorn saying were speculations that fragments of it were lingering and feeding off her aura. Past that she didn’t know what Celestia had said or how that explains why further applications of the spell lasted less and less time.

By the time Celestia stopped attempting to fix it, she had not looked or sounded hopeful.

But what did it matter? So what if she couldn’t understand anyone anymore? Not like that was any different from when she had shown up here. As daunting as it was, she would adapt and survive like she always did. Just like how she had made out quite well spending a year in China not knowing the language, even if her father had ruined the last weeks of it with his stupidity. She could get along here just fine now, she didn’t even need to wait that much longer, and then she’d be able to go home.

Mint Drop interrupted her, the earth pony using a wheeled cart to carry a tray filled with food and utensils to the table.

“Thank you,” Ranma said gratefully, having lost track of time as her thoughts had all started to spiral together into a tangled mess of confusing emotions.

The cook used her snout to push the tray onto the table and then gave her a big smile and reassuring pat on the back. She then said something in Ponish that Ranma guessed from the tone was a phrase like everyone feels better after a good meal. Or that’s what she hoped it meant so she just returned the ponies smile.

Mint Drop waited with an expectant look, clearly wanting to see her try some of the food before she would leave. She guessed that because it was the same look that her fiance Akane would give after making some inedible toxic dish because she had no clue how to follow simple directions. Being that Mint Drop’s food was some of the best she had here, Ranma was eager to dig in.

As always utensils were left out for her if she wanted to use them. Having been excited about her progress with telekinesis the day before and wanting to show off, she quickly used it to grasp the fork. It leapt obediently off the table with much greater ease than she had the day before to hover over the salad portion. Her mouth went dry and she quickly set it back down before making a show of rubbing near her horn again as though it was bothering her. Mint Drop seemed to buy it so she just used her mouth to eat some of the food. Satisfied, the mare went to return helping the other cooks in the kitchen.

Ranma ate enthusiastically until Mint Drop was out of sight and then she slowed to a halt to stare at the fork. Going back to eating the food slowly, her eyes occasionally looking up to the empty hall, struggling with how isolated she felt.

Edge of Everfree Woods, Outside of Gaitlend

Bouncing!

I loved bouncing!

Boing! Boing! Boing!

Maybe I should have rolled into a ball first? Nah! I giggled, keeping my serpentine body coiled in a spring shape as I bounced my head repeatedly off the ground through the forest.

A delightful tingle raced up my spine, down my leg, around to my arm, back to my head, and my spine again. Wanting to feel more of it, I gave up the pretense of bouncing, and appeared next to the creatures who had caused it. Gasping in delight I swept down and gathered up the spiky rodent in my arms. It made such wonderful noises as it cuddled against me violently. I loved it already.

Oh but there were more! One, two, five, nine, three, pi, I love pie you never know how long you’ll get! What was I at? Who cares? I know I didn’t, I just wanted to play with them all!

The one chewing on my neck didn’t seem very fun though, they were just porcupines. Are they? I don’t know what a porcupine is. Well if they were porcupines they were too dull. They needed something more. Some kind of flash, a little razzle dazzle. Dumb animals weren’t fun to play with.

I dropped my boring toy to wonder how I could make them more fun. Just some extra parts, a few new abilities, and certainly a few I didn’t expect.

Giggling, I snapped my clawed fingers.

Four Days Later

Ranma had been awake for some time, laying still on a thin cushion in front of the slowly dying fireplace in the room she now shared with Celestia. She couldn’t figure out if it was to keep an eye on her better or if it wasn’t worth putting her into another guest room. The tall balcony doors were closed, but they didn’t seal tightly enough to keep an occasional chilly draft out. Buried underneath a blanket and with a fur coat couldn’t even keep her from shivering occasionally and Ranma didn’t know why Celestia didn’t have it fixed. Or what reason she had all this fur if it couldn’t even keep her warm?

Picking her head up to glare at the remaining embers then shift her focus to the stack of wood to the side. Briefly considering the option of using magic, she decided against it, quickly leaving her bastion of warmth to use her mouth to throw several more pieces of wood into the fire place. And just as quickly she was back into place impatiently waiting for the fire to build up again.

As the wood started to catch fire, Ranma enjoyed the familiar sound of soft popping and crackling, feeling nostalgic for her times traveling with her father in the wilderness. Adjusting herself to fully face the fireplace and enjoy the warmth it radiated out, she could almost imagine his awful snoring.

‘Ugh how bad is it that I’m wishing to hear that?’ she laughed to herself and started to doze off.

“Good morning,” Celestia greeted, bringing her back to wakefulness, the alicorns hooves making soft tapping noises as she descended the staircase.

“Good morning,” Ranma returned without picking her head up.

The white alicorn opened up the balcony doors to go raise the sun. Ranma barely trusted her own magic now but eagerly watched as Celestia cast the spell, her own horn tingling as the powerful spell completed, and the sun obediently began to rise from where it had been hiding behind the horizon.

‘That’s always incredible,’ she sighed as she went back to watching the small fire that was quickly becoming unnecessary, the sun rapidly chasing away the former chill of the fall night. ‘If Luna hadn’t been avoiding me, I’d like to find out if the moon rising is as impressive as that. But seems like she’s pissed at me for blowing her up so I’ll probably never get to feel it,’ she thought sadly.

Celestia wasn’t content to watch the sunrise, closing the doors as she left the balcony, and walking around to a place behind her. Ranma followed this with her ears, enjoying the small perk of movable, and sensitive ears. The pad she was on jumped slightly when Celestia laid down on the far edge.

‘She really doesn’t need to take the morning pony thing this seriously,’ Ranma huffed, sitting up because she already knew what the the white alicorn wanted.

Sitting on a tray was a stand carrying the replacement for the journal she had destroyed. On the tray itself was a quill and inkwell waiting to be used. Celestia was looking at her with an expectant but reassuring look in her eyes. Ranma glanced at the blank page, having had Celestia push her to write with magic twice a day now. Once in the morning and usually again in the afternoon.

There hadn’t been another incident yet but it was always in the back of her mind that she could have an uncontrolled outburst again. If Celestia wanted her to do something with it than she probably expected that she could handle another surge. But she honestly felt sick at the thought of hurting anyone by mistake.

‘She did say horn writing was good for control,’ Ranma’s mouth quirked to one side debating with herself over what the limits of control meant in context of magic.

When first experimenting with magic, she had thought it might be just a more useful and stable version of ki, an energy she had used in multiple ways back on earth. But ki was directly tied to a single emotional state, was difficult and slippery to use, and more likely to fall apart harmlessly than be useful. With all the crazy and dangerous martial arts techniques she had trained in without a second thought over the years, she wouldn’t normally be hesitating to play with such an awesomely powerful tool. If it weren’t for the fact that while magic had some of the superficial properties of ki, it operated off a completely different ruleset.

‘Fine I’ll do a little, but I’m not responsible if something happens,’ she narrowed her eyes and reached out with her magic to surrounded the quill in her pale pink aura, and it lifted obediently up into the air. Celestia looked on with a look of eternal patience, lavender eyes seeming to watch more than just the movement of the quill.

Concentrating on the task at hand and clearing her mind of other distractions, she found herself capable of exercising a greater amount of finesse than her first attempts had allowed. Considering what to attempt first, she settled on writing her name properly.

OMAKE TIME!

A Musical Interlude

By Bree R

Edited by Lawra

“I better get back to work,” Ranma declared returning her dish to the kitchen so Mint Drop wouldn’t have to come and collect it for her.

Making her way back to the cleanup site, her ears started twitching as she heard a vaguely musical beat and happy voices.

She was shocked to see nearly every worker singing, dancing, and otherwise celebrating. Happy smiles adorned each of the ponies faces as the song continued, some even seeming to hit cues to go along with various work activities and shaping of stone, or the dropping of stone serving as makeshift drum beats.

“Did...did they practice this?” Ranma muttered quietly falling into a sitting position in shock as she watched the musical number continue. “When did they have time to rehearse?”

Everything just seemed so unbelievably well timed that they just had to have practiced this. “It’s a nice song though.” Ranma mumurred a smile spreading across her muzzle and before she knew it she was tapping her front hooves and bobbing her head to the beat.

“Okay...enough, magical pony world is tolerable but I draw the line at musical numbers,” But she was powerless, her body was being taken over by the rhythm and welcoming nature of the music. Something about it spoke to her in a way, a harmony that resonated from the end of her nose to the tip of her tail. Feeling her worries washing away from the collective expression of friendship and unity that was being expressed.

The world seemed to fade out with a blink and before Ranma knew it she was singing out the end of a rather stirring and beautiful piece. To which the other ponies around her all applauded and cheered. Breathing heavily with a big smile on her face, she felt an amazing feeling of belonging.

A gentle warmth settled over her flanks and when she looked she found a stylized crystal blue treble clef turned on its side, a crescent moon overlayed the top flourish while a sun with stylized rays was nestled within the swirl. Her special talent! She felt a wonderful sense of purpose. Why had she been so worried about going home? She already was home here in Equestria! She really was a pony! It was her destiny to be an Alicorn and she would be forev—.

Screeching Ranma woke up in a cold sweat. Throwing off her blanket she created a small ball of light with her magic and checked her flank. Blank! Collapsing back to her bed, blessedly missing any sort of creepy magical brand marking her destiny and purpose. She was the one who decided her destiny! And she had no reason whatsoever to be disappointed in remaining a blank flank.

“No way am I ever joining any creepy choreographed pony musical numbers.” She declared before getting up and out of bed. Amazed Celestia hadn’t woken up with her scream. “I wonder what Luna’s doing…’cause I’m not getting back to sleep after that.” With that she exited Celestia’s room to go off in search of Luna and maybe go on some dangerous adventure to take her mind off that horror.

Trotting along, she started to absently hum a tune.

Omake V2.0:
Twilight Shimmer
A pony that looked strangely a LOT like a pony version of Nabiki Tendo walked onto a stage holding a clip board and a pen. "Ladies and Gentlecolts, I would like to now open the betting on whether or not Ms Saotome Ranma's dream will come true or not. Or whether or not she will get that cutie mark. she began with a smirk.

"Can we make multiple bets? Or bet on what aspect she will be a princess of?" a mare asked earning a nod from the bookie.

"Indeed you may, You may also place bets on whether or not she gets home, learns to speak ponish, or gets a marefriend/colt friend, just note different categorys have different minimum bets ranges" the bookie explained then smiled "That said Let the betting begin!"

Author's Note

Chapter 3

1 - I am not kind and loving writer
2 - In an effort to avoid confusion, and because the characters are not omnipotent nor will they ever get their own satisfactory conclusions on it. The broken bits of the spell that were messing up Ranma’s head were corrected by the recast. Unfortunately, the fragments that are sticking around also stop any further applications of the spell from taking hold.

Originally Ranma was going to have to fumble around with no way to communicate. The first time Ranma was going to ever be able to speak to Celestia would have been after traveling through the mirror. But there were too many convenient magics in MLP for them to have nothing to help bridge the gap. Even if all those spells exist after 1000 years of peace to develop them. But now it was time for me to be mean and take it away.

An upcoming chapter will be dealing with a festival. As I am poor at coming up with a good variety of background characters. If anyone wants to have an OC included to fill in space for a town. I promise that I will not do anything horrible to them. :pinkiecrazy:

Please either leave a response or send a pm with a name and simple description.

Running Down the Clock
View Online

No Pedigree Save Chaos

Running Down the Clock

"Speech"
'Thought'
Spell

Gaitlend, Edge of Everfree Forest
12 Days before Crystal Mirror Opens

Celestia listened attentively to the Mayor, matching his slower pace as they headed towards the fields outside the village. He was recounting recent attacks on several farmers by strange new monsters. Normally that wasn’t something to bat an eye at as dangerous creatures were a fact of life living in and around Everfree, but she had believed all the beasts had been cataloged by now. So even if it hadn’t been a safety risk, she would have been positively giddy to study a new type of creature.

Trailing behind her was Shadow Haze, her earth pony guard in full armor while high overhead a young pegasus named Snow Drift was keeping an eye on Ranma as she played among the clouds. Occasionally the little alicorn appeared as a red blur bouncing through the openings in the overcast sky. Magic might still make the newest alicorn leery after the accident but she had no qualms about flight.

‘I’m so happy that she’s having fun again, moping about the castle alone is no way for a pony to live,’ Celestia caught herself before she smiled, realized what an inopportune time it was to do so seeing the ruined field before her.

“They really seemed ta like the rutabaga,” Toffee Leaf sadly summarized.

“Or they were very angry with them,” she joked, impressed by the scale of damage that this new species had accomplished in a day.

“Not much else fared any better. Nothings going ta grow before Cloudsdale starts throwin’ snow at us,” Toffee added suggestively.

‘And now we reach the heart of the matter,’ she mentally sighed, wishing that he would have been more direct in asking for assistance. “We are happy to lend you aid.”

“With no whay ta pay ya back? We can’t accept,” he answered.

‘Just take the offer you bullheaded stallion,’ she thought in annoyance, hiding it with a regal smile. “Your village has done so much for us in the past, we insist.”

“I guess if ya insist, then we’ll have ta accept. Thank ya, Steward,” Toffee inclined his head towards her with a polite bow.

“If that is settled, then would you please point me in the direction that the creatures were last seen? I would like to investigate this further on my own,” she inquired, hearing the metallic clinking of her lone guards armor as he stiffened, realizing that she wanted to actively go towards the danger.

A strong gust of wind ruffled her feathers as Ranma flew past just overhead at high speed back towards the town. Snow Drift trailed behind at a more reasonable height and speed, following as Ranma bounced excitedly between the shops in the center of the village, quickly moving out of sight. Celestia demurely laughed to herself as the mayor muttered complaints about irresponsible children.

Coming in for a landing atop a light grey cloud with a happy sigh, Ranma decided to relax for a few minutes, and enjoy the warmth of the direct sunlight. Usually if she lounged on a lone cloud looking down, it tended to give her a bad case of vertigo from what should have been an impossible viewpoint. With the cloud cover being so thick today, she could forget the great height and imagine the sky to be an entire landscape made out of bouncy cotton balls.

In twelve days she would be going home and nobody would believe her if she told them she had been walking on clouds. ‘I guess if I’m still a pony I could show them. Would the magic work the same or would I just fall through?’ she idly mused, failing to ignore the voice in the back of her head reminding her of how daunting it would be as a lone pony among the crazies back in Japan searching for a way to become a human again.

‘Well if I’m stuck on all fours, I’ll just need to use every advantage,’ she smirked, gathering up a head sized ball of cloud fluff between her hooves she pulled it up and away to let hover in front of her. “Now this is what I’m talking about, magic that’s tactile.”

Using her hooves she squeezed and compressed the tiny cloud until it was half the size, its color darkening, and she began to sense just how close it was to releasing the water contained in it. ‘Oh! So it’s like a sponge. Squeeze and it takes in even more water from the air around it.’

Casting a mischievous glance sideways at the guard who had been tailing her, she bounced the small rain cloud in one hoof testing its weight.

‘Come on Snow Drift, keep your breathing steady. Don’t let her see how out of shape you are.’

Fluffing up his white wings tipped with sky blue primary feathers and settling them against his armored sides, he took the opportunity to catch his breath while Ranma seemed to be doing the same. He had never been the strongest flier and he was still getting used to the weight of his armor so keeping up with the youngest alicorn was a struggle.

‘Maybe I should have listened to mom and stayed in the Crystal Empire,’ he sighed, missing the crystal city and all its gleaming splendor over the dark and rustic castle hidden in the Everfree Woods. ‘And that hall of hooves thing always creeps me out,’ he shivered, remembering his first time he had seen the sisters oddly morbid sense of humor on display.

Captain Lockheed himself had given him this assignment and what had felt like a great honor now hinted at being a little more than another round of hazing.

‘Bet they’re all having a great big laugh, ha ha let’s all laugh at the BNP. Stick him with the duty of flying nonstop all day to keep track of the hyperactive cute new alicorn.’ (1)

“YEOWCH!” he cried out, feeling a sharp crack of electricity and wetness hit him in his flank. Launching himself up into the air, he spun around searching for his attacker, ready to defend his charge if needed.

Ranma’s riotous laughter was the only thing he found, the alicorn rolling around on her cloud, legs kicking in the air.

“Bwa— what?” he rubbed at the spot, initially unsure of what had hit him as he slowly floated back down to land on the cloud.

The mare shot back up into a sitting position and started to gather up a wad of cloud between her forehooves, pushing and prodding at it until it became a miniature thundercloud.

“Are you five?” he asked, rolling his lavender eyes and giving a disgusted snort. ”Not that you understand me, but I’ll have you know that I was on the Crystal Empire’s Tempest Ball team, and we went undefeated, even against Cloudsdale.”

With a light flap of his wings, he sidestepped Ranma’s next amateurish throw, deftly catching the small storm cloud in the frog of his hoof before redirecting it right back at her. A disturbingly wide grin spread across the alicorns face as she attempted to copy his feat and ended up catching only a zap of electricity as the impact jostled the cloud enough to release its energy.

‘Oh no! What did I do?!’ he panicked and leapt over to Ranma’s side to find the mare giggling uncontrollably. “Are you alright? I didn’t hurt you did I?” he asked quickly.

Blue eyes locked onto his lavender and Ranma stopped giggling. “Again,” she demanded with deadly seriousness.

“Industrious little diggers,” Celestia calmly noted, inspecting the sizable mound of dirt displaced by the creatures to make a tunnel. A young filly might be able to traverse the tunnel but she was far too large to even fit into the hole. “Hello?!” she called down into it. “Any creature in there?”

Other than some angry chittering echoing from deep in the tunnel, she received no response.

“How unacceptably rude,” she huffed and an aura sprung up around her horn. Finishing her spell, a pulse of golden light shot out into the hole. Waiting patiently, yellow lines began to wind and weave over the fields surface, tracing the network of tunnels. She didn’t need to wait long before the ground ripped upwards like she had pulled up the roots of a giant tree, exposing the entirety of the burrow, along with a trio of angry brightly colored creatures.

“Luna would just love you,” she gushed upon seeing them roll up into spine covered balls and bounce towards her and her guard.

They came to a stop with a loud snarl and unrolled themselves to screech at her. Tiny beady eyes buried in a squished in face set above a giant mouth filled with triangular teeth. Its body shape vaguely reminded her of porcupine with thick quills covering its back and stubby tail. Waving stubby little arms tipped with sharp digging claws, they slowly began to advance on her. (2)

“Now I don’t know what you are but you have not been very nice. You’ve torn up these poor farmers land and now they won’t have any food for winter,” she chastised. They grew even more agitated when she didn’t show any fear at their display and turned around to advanced towards her back first.

Celestia’s eyes narrowed as some of the spines on their backs quivered out of sync with the rest. Summoning up a large shield to cover herself and her guard, dozens of sharp quills shot out from their backs to bounce harmlessly off of it. She didn’t need to give a command, Shadow Haze immediately launching himself forward to crash down on the nearest with both front hooves. Having dispatched it, he lashed out with a powerful buck that sent the other two bouncing across the ground unconscious.

“Have you heard of any creature like these before?” She asked her guard.

“No, Steward,” Shadow answered, grinding his hooves vindictively into the creature trapped beneath him. No doubt upset that he had not acted faster to the threat.

“Mayor Leaf said there were twelve of them,” she frowned, her ears swiveling backwards, hearing a soft rumble come from the skies above. Turning back towards the village, she gave the increasingly dark patch of clouds directly overhead a cross look. Her horn glowed and all three of the animals were levitated up to squish together, and then become enveloped in a stasis spell bubble. “Shadow, would you mind rolling these creatures back to Gaitlend? It seems I am needed elsewhere.”

“Of course, Steward.”

“Thank you,” she responded graciously and opened up her wings to launch up into the air.

Rising up through a cloud that was still a light grey and benign, she settled on top of it, and the cause of the disturbance immediately became obvious. Ranma and Snow Drift were having an exciting impromptu bout of Tempest Ball, happily forming and tossing small storm clouds at each other. Every time they missed and hit the clouds beneath them they imparted that energy into them, rapidly creating the conditions for a dangerous thunderstorm beneath their hooves.

“Ahem,” she coughed into the back of a hoof. Neither noticed as her voice was swallowed up by the repeated cracks of tiny bursts of thunder.

“Ahem!” she repeated more forcefully.

Snow Drift realized her presence finally and stopped what he was doing long enough to get caught and zapped by Ranma’s last throw. He grit his teeth as the electrical shock passed through him before addressing her sheepishly. “I’m sorry Steward, did you need anything?”

Celestia casually gestured downward with a hoof. “First, would you kindly stop bouncing on those clouds before you are both electrocuted.”

Snow Drift drew in a sharp breath, the cloud beneath his hooves was a pitch black and so charged up that his metal armor made the situation quite dangerous. “Right away, Steward,” he carefully took to the air.

“Aww,” Ranma whined, not understanding what was going on, and swatted at the cloud beneath her in frustration.

Celestia was blinded by an immediate flash of lightning arcing through the clouds that hung in her vision, a thunderous crack deafening her. When her vision cleared, she saw Ranma still in her position, body covered in a sparse covering of black singe marks, her wings were disheveled with many of her feathers visibly destroyed. The only other sign of damage was Ranma’s mane and tail that were sticking out at odd angles and missing significant chunks of hair.

Ranma rose to a standing position, muzzle scrunched up in some unreadable expression of pain. She let out a groan and coughed, a small puff of black smoke billowing from her mouth.

Next Day, Castle of the Two Sisters

With a skip in her step, Ranma meandered through the courtyard, feeling none the worse for wear after striking herself with a bolt of lightning the day before. Keeping out of the way of all the ponies streaming into the castle grounds, she was lost in the hectic activity of the caravan that had arrived late in the morning as they began setting up a market that filled the entire courtyard. (3)

Nothing was being placed out for display yet, but she could guess some of them by the crude billboard drawings. Food items were the most obvious but the ones that were more abstract kept her interest as she tried to figure out what the images represented. She lingered for an especially long time near carts that carried the strong scent of familiar and unfamiliar spices. The thought of exotic foods making her mouth water and stomach growl.

Hearing yet another pony laugh in her direction, she stopped to narrow her eyes dangerously in his direction. He was a dark grey earth pony who was hauling in a long cart along with another stallion. Seeing her dark look made him elbow his counterpart and say something, the other stallion quickly joining in to laugh even harder.

She wanted to go over and demand to know exactly what it was that they found so funny but she didn’t know the words for that and worried she’d look like some air headed moron if she did with her limited vocabulary.

Of course she knew what the visiting ponies found so amusing. The lightning bolt she had created hadn’t actually hurt her, all the voltage had arced around her body and not through it as though her fur coat was a built in faraday cage. But it had still burnt off much of her mane and tail along with destroying more than a few feathers. Better than being a cooked equine but she still looked ridiculous.

She had expected some comments but not how much it would bother her. Her vanity and ego, which had gotten her into so much trouble in the past was not happy to be mocked by a bunch of barnyard animals. With only a small amount of time left before the portal to her world would open up, she wasn’t going to make a scene like an idiot over a couple of ponies laughing at her. They were just a temporary distraction and didn’t matter to her in the slightest.

And she totally wasn’t memorizing which stand she would be knocking down tonight when they were asleep.

Exploring some more didn’t yield anything further to hold her interest. She would need to come back when the market was finally going to see if she could find anything to bring home. Kasumi would definitely need to have some of those spices to work with, those smelt too good.

Realization dawned her on. ‘Recipes! No way can I go back finding out how to make Mint Drop’s food.’ As the date crept closer to going back to Earth she kept figuring out things that she should probably bring along if she wanted to be as prepared as possible. ‘I should make a list.’

Flying up up to Celestia’s balcony to avoid the long walk and any distractions, she gave the pegasus guard keeping watch at a post above the courtyard a quick wave as she passed. With all the new visitors to the castle there came an increased visible presence of the armored ponies.

Leaving the doors open, she settled down in the warm sunlight, and opened her notebook to a fresh page. First she started by listing off all the foods that must be safe. It took up more space than she had wanted as her characters were still three times the size she normally would write with hands. But with practice they all turned out legible. Unlike the previous pages filled with childish scrawl that made her father’s writing look good.

Moving onto a completely new page and leaving the backside empty on the previous, she started to list thing that were probably not safe to eat. Meat sat right at the top of that list and she didn’t feel much need to be specific. Almost felt redundant to even include it. But she didn’t really have much to put down. It wasn’t like anyone was going to keep food around they couldn’t eat. She’d need to somehow find out more.

Which brought her to a new page. She might get sick eating the wrong kind of food, but there were also more normal illnesses and she really didn’t know what ones ponies needed to worry about. Would a doctor be able to figure out what’s going on if something came up? Or did she have to think about the indignity of seeing a vet? Did she need to worry about carrying over some super disease? This was a different reality and she might have only been spared a slow agonizing death by the change of body. Or maybe something from Earth that would only cause a human to get a runny nose might instead make her drop dead without any warning.

‘Nope! Not going to think about that,’ Healthcare was probably a bit beyond what she would be able to figure out with the language barrier. She’d need to just hope for the best. All the ponies she had ran across were quite healthy so she took that as a good sign.

Yawning, she moved on to less extreme things. She would need to figure out some sort of clothing to wear. Her sense of modesty had always been lacking and being without clothing while she lived with other naked creatures never struck her as something to be concerned about. But no sense showing off her gross pony parts around Nerima and encouraging the locals to treat her like an animal. An image of her wearing an ill fitting Furinkan High School uniform almost made her drop the quill.

“Ya, that’ll be the day,” she scoffed, losing her train of thought to stare unfocused at the page, idly correcting a missed stroke. “What am I so worried about? Half the people in my life turn into normal non-magical, non-talking animals, and they get along fine,” she yawned again, deciding to rest her eyes. “Not a big deal at all.”

Ranma sat down on her haunches next to the low table, a big smile on her muzzle, her life back on Earth finally seemed to be getting back on track. Neither of her parents and none of the Tendos were happy about her being stuck as an alicorn but Jusenkyo was still flooded so she was stuck without an opportunity to fix that.

The familiar traditional family home of the Tendos hadn’t changed at all in her brief absence. She wallowed in the familiarity of being once again in the living room, seated at a table with her parents and the Tendo family.

Only her fiance, Akane forcefully slamming a plate of something that smelled utterly repulsive on the table in front of her could put a dent in her good mood.

“Eat up, I made it just for you,” Akane beamed brightly.

“Uh— well— oh no!” Ranma gasped dramatically, leaning back to pose with her front hooves going to her forehead as though she might faint. Horn glowing faintly as she filled up a bowl of edible food behind Akane’s back. “I’m sorry Akane, but the smell of all this meat has stolen my appetite, I guess I’ll see you at school,” she gracefully bounded around the table, pulling the meal she had secretly taken with her as she took off out outside towards the koi pond.

“Ranma! Don’t you dare fly off! Get back here and eat the food I made!” Akane chased after her, carrying her toxic sludge with her.

She looked up long enough from shoving her mouth full of sustenance to reply. “Why would I want to be sick for the rest of the day?”

Akane skidded to a stop, face turning a bright shade of red. “I followed the recipe,” she snarled. “It’s perfect, I just added in some beef broth for extra flavor,” she explained in a voice that grew higher in pitch with every word.

“How’d you follow it when you can’t even read the recipe?” she asked curiously.

“They put pictures next to all the ingredients, you stupid horse!” Akane’s temper snapped as she charged forward clearly intending to force feed her the concoction.

“And you still couldn’t follow it?” She gave up any pretense of looking majestic, flapping her wings in a panic to take off.

Making her way to school, she landed some distance from the door hidden behind a tree. Peeking just her head out, she carefully scanned the grounds, and the few students arriving early. No crazy principal with a palm tree growing out of his head waiting to ambush her and neither of his equally insane children so that was good. Stepping out from behind the tree, she flared her wings, and pawed at the ground preparing to go the entire distance in one momentous leap.

‘If I can make it in the door, I’m safe,’ she thought, feeling like today was the day.

And then she felt a sharp tug on her tail and realized it was over before it even began. Relaxing her stance, she turned to face her homeroom teacher, Hinako Ninomiya. Having the form of a eight year old child due to learning a ki draining technique at a young age to restore her health, she still acted very childish even though she was really in her twenties.

“You got me,” she announced with a nervous chuckle.

“I did!” Hinako beamed childishly, dark brown pony ears peeking up from the girl’s hair. She then switched to a tone that was more mature than her young form should have had. “And as per the conditions of our agreement, I get my pony time.”

‘Why did I have to come back to Earth through her mirror?,’ she grimaced.

Hinako under normal conditions, pulled out a ten yen coin, and drained a person’s ki to grow to her full adult human body until she bled off the extra ki. The age changing teacher had used this technique on her after being spooked when she and Celestia had suddenly appeared through the mirror in her room. So now a different reaction happened, and some of the repeated changes appeared to now be permanent.

‘I guess if she likes being a unicorn that much,’ she sighed and felt the ki draining technique hit her. ‘Would be nice to have another pony around.’

“Ranma, wake up,” Pine Berry’s expectant voice urged.

“Hi, Pine,” Ranma blearily responded in Ponish, blinking her eyes, and smacking her lips together. Rolling to her side, she stretched out her legs. “Stupid weird daydreams,” she mumbled, checking Celestia’s ornamental clock revealed that she had been napping for an hour.

The baby blue unicorn took a moment to inspect the damage to her mane like it was a big deal, looking like she clearly had something to say before giving up and motioning towards the doorway with her head. “Come,” she instructed softly.

Having nothing better to do, she nodded and rose up to her hooves, and gave a quick stretch of her back and wings. It was a little early for a call for dinner and Pine Berry had bigger responsibilities than to chase her down for that so something must have been up.

Following Pine Berry back down into the castle and lamenting that she couldn’t just fly to wherever they were heading in a fraction of the time. It also took longer than needed because her guide was stopping regularly to respond to ponies Ranma had seen baby blue pony socializing with before. Mostly casual greetings as they went about their business, others shared a brief conversation even a few jokes.

‘I don’t think I ever found out what her actual job is,’ Ranma realized, trying to think of what the pushy pony could have been hired to do at the castle. It certainly wasn’t being a glorified alarm clock and mane brusher.

‘Why is she taking me to the baths?’ Ranma wondered, having already taken a bath this morning before visiting the grounds.

This was one of the first places she had visited in the castle to be cleaned of blood from her fight with Saffron. Oddly enough it had set her mind at ease, seeing that ponies were just as interested in hygiene as most civilized humans. A more sensitive nose was both a gift and a curse after all. Being more practiced with it, she could only imagine how awful she must have smelt covered in all that blood and sweat.

Like bathhouses back on Earth, they were organized with small semi-private areas for washing and a large tub for soaking. Instead of using water from the faucets to rinse off after cleaning, ponies stood underneath a small rain cloud held in place by magic. The rain constantly filled a hanging bucket tied to a draw cord for helping with the more difficult task of purging manes and tails of shampoo. Fresh, impossibly clean water right from a cloud was something she didn’t know how she had lived without. The baths themselves were communal and rectangle in shape, sunk into the floor that could easily seat ten and were filled with comfortably hot water.

Most of the castle had cold running water but only a few rooms had their own bath facilities. There were three of these bath areas in rooms next to each other. Intended to only be used by the denizens of the castle, they were quite crowded after a shift change, or later in the day when families wanted to relax together.

Following Pine Berry to a room across the hall that was normally not used, she was curious to see a few unfamiliar ponies from the traveling market in the area. Celestia and Luna were both already inside being tended to by more of the travelers.

Celestia was laying on her side atop a flat bench covered in a red velvet cushion, her golden shoes removed, and placed to the side. Tending to her was a unicorn mare using magic to deftly control a flat file as she refined the shape of the alicorns hooves. Luna laid in a wooden tub barely big enough for her to fit with her legs folded up, her mane and tail no longer floating magically. An earth pony mare stood on a two-step stool gently used a long handled ladle pour cloudy water, smelling strongly of lavender over her head and neck.

‘Oh, it’s like a little spa,’ she noted clinically, feeling a gentle pressure surround her before she was magically lifted into the room. “Hey!” she protested, surrounded in an unfamiliar purple cloud that gently but forcefully deposited her on a cushion in front of a middle-aged magenta unicorn with pale green eyes. Pine Berry gave her a small wave and cheerful smile before trotting off back the way she had came.

“Don’t you have any manners?” she asked the mare irritably in Japanese and was completely ignored.

The unicorn summoning a brush, manual shears with long thing handles for easy manipulation with magic, and scissors that snapped shut several times with a crisp metallic snap. Tsking repeatedly as she surveyed the state of Ranma’s mane before patting her reassuringly with a hoof.

“I guess I could use a trim,” she gulped, leery of all the sharp cutting tools floating around her by themselves.

Not that she had a choice as two brushes rushed towards her head and began to swiftly brush her mane so it all went forward. She sat completely still when the shears began trimming the sides, narrowing her mane down to a uniform width. Scissors then worked to deal with the length. In less than twenty seconds the unicorn had finished cutting and quickly brushed any clippings off with a long bristled brush, leaving her bewildered at the speed of it all.

“Up please,” the stylist instructed, tapping her on the flank. Ranma did as asked, intending to find a mirror before magic gripped her tail firmly.

“No, no, no, no,” she quickly pulled herself free to turn and face the mare before realizing that the stylist was just going to clean up her tail as well. Giggling nervously, she reluctantly turned back around so her frazzled tail could be cleaned up. Watching as the whirlwind of brushes and scissors quickly shortened and evened out the hair of her tail, she was very impressed by the control exhibited by the stylist.

Celestia had said that most unicorns only had limited magic related to their special talent, and usually struggled with controlling more than two objects independently. Checking out the mare’s cutie mark revealed a pair of scissors over top a yellow comb. ‘So this must be her talent,’ she realized, having watched the stylist control more than three objects at a speed even she found difficult to follow.

‘Little less coverage than I’m comfortable with,’ she thought as she inspected the results of her tail cut. The hair was barely longer than the actual appendage and without the added weight made the hair stand up like a brush. A mirror rose up in front of her face, revealing her new narrow short spiky hairdo, bangs now falling to the right side of her horn rather than covering her entire forehead. ‘Never had a mohawk before.’

“Thank you,” she told the stylist, happy to no longer look like she had stuck a fork in a wall outlet using her mouth.

“You’re very welcome,” the unicorn, crossed one of her forelegs in front of the other and bowed her head. She then started to ramble on in a friendly tone but Ranma couldn’t understand the rapid fire Ponish.

Luna listened as Superior Cuts tried to good naturedly tease Ranma for having joined the long standing pegasi tradition of finding out the hard way that lightning was not a toy. Believing without question the rumor Celestia had created that Ranma had been born an earth pony to explain her awkwardness with wings and unicorn magic. Not that the red alicorn understood the joke but seemed to be nodding along trying to respond to the stylists tone.

Rising from her special lavender salt bath to step into a waiting towel, she enjoyed the gentle ministrations. Only dimly paying attention as they moved to different areas of her form, instead she kept her eyes on Ranma.

Celestia had finished her hooficure and was encouraging Ranma to have her hooves cleaned and shaped as well. The little alicorn did not appear to be enthused about the procedure but relented shortly after her sister had shown off the results, and Ranma had compared them to her own which had never been tended to and looked quite rough.

Removing her snowflake obsidian tiara so the attendant could begin to dry her mane, she lost sight of the festivities with her head covered. When it was removed, she struggled to fight back a nicker. Ranma was cooperating but couldn’t stop herself from jerking away from the metal file like she would be hurt by every stroke. Celestia’s amusement at the filly’s skittishness came to an abrupt end and she magically held Ranma’s leg in place so that the unicorn could finally begin the hooficure. As soon as the little alicorn realized that there was no pain, Ranma relaxed with an embarrassed chuckle, and Celestia removed her hold.

“Must you be so— forceful?” Luna asked, stepping back into her silver shoes with a satisfying click as they locked in place. “The poor filly isn’t used to having— such pampering,” she caught herself before letting slip that Ranma had only recently came to have hooves to maintain.

“Sometimes to be kind, we need to put down a firm hoof,” Celestia answered with a pleasant smile. “If our easy means of communication hadn’t been lost this would have been much simpler.”

“Yes it would be, sister,” she winced with a small sigh and her ears laying back. Summoning her tiara, she allowed her mane and tail to resume their ethereal state, and settled it back into place. Her fur was still damp but would dry off soon enough. “I don’t suppose it’s possible you would part with some of your salts?” she asked the matron of the traveling merchants. “My coat despairs over only being able to have thy treatment but once a year.”

“For you, dearest Luna? I think we may be able to part with some of our stock. Not much, it wouldn’t feel as special if it was everyday.”

“Maybe if we had some on hoof I could get my sister to enjoy the experience, Cellie will not admit it but she fears being turned purple.”

“Maintaining a coat of white requires sacrifices, sister,” Celestia retorted. “You would be amazed at how the smallest things show.”

“We have heard,” she rolled her eyes, her sister having used that excuse for a long time. “Thank you for thy generosity, Matron.”

“You are most welcome, Steward,” the matron bowed to her before bowing to Celestia, “And Steward. For your wards wings, do you prefer a pegasus for a more natural result or a unicorn for a more thorough one?”

“Whoever is available, I know you are all very busy setting up for the market, and preparing to service the ponies here at the castle,” Celestia answered. “I’ll remain to assist as she may not understand or cooperate.”

“Nonsense, sister. There’s no need to throw her about the room just to get her to sit still. I’ll see that she’s taken care of,” Luna trotted over to Ranma’s side, the filly testing the new lay of her hooves. “Ranma, let us visit the kitchen, and then we shall make your wings presentable again,” she suggested. The little alicorn’s grasp of Ponish was limited but her ears perked up the moment Luna mentioned kitchen.

Later

“Blech!” Ranma spat out a medium sized feather that had been split right down the middle, trying to hold her wing steady so as not to lose her place. “This is so disgusting.”

Laying on the floor in Luna’s room, the dark blue alicorn was laying perpendicular to her, forelegs folded up with knees grazing her ribcage. Her room was in the opposite tower to Celestia’s and opposite in design of the bright two story room. There was only one floor, the small windows and balcony opening were covered with thick drapes to keep out most of the light. The color scheme of the room was soft blues and silvers mixed with blacks. Luna’s crescent moon symbol was worked into any design in the room, even the floor that was the moon set against a starry sky.

Ducking her head back down to try and grab a smaller one burnt black by electricity. “Come on— there!” her lips finally isolated the offending plumage from the rest so she could grasp it with her teeth. Jerking her head away from the wing it released with only a small pin prick of pain.

Unable to stop herself from instinctively shaking out her wing, the feathers returning to their former position, she stared at the limb as it slowly folded against her side with a defeated frown.

“Flying isn’t worth it, take ‘em, take my wings,” she whined and dropped her head into her folded forelegs. Up until this point she had avoided preening entirely even after being lectured by Lockheed on the finer points and importance of proper feather maintenance.

Luna laughed softly and shuffled forward to be even closer before staring at her folded wing expectantly. Spreading it once again, Luna took over rooting around in her feathers with her mouth. Suppressing a shiver at the utterly alien sensation of the alicorn sifting through her feathers at a rapid pace. It was like someone was braiding her hair but she could feel every movement of the hair at the root. Unlike her, Luna had no trouble keeping her place, barely moving her head as she efficiently sifted through and pulled out dead fathers.

‘Of course she’d be good at this, she’s done it longer than I’ve been alive,’ she thought before feeling intensely embarrassed by Luna’s actions and closeness.

The whole situation was so utterly inhuman. Laying with all four legs tucked up underneath while she spread one of her wings so that it could be preened. Increasingly life as a pony was becoming less unnatural and that made her tail swish in irritation. She was already dealing with the minefield in her mind of odd new urges she had to keep track of, a body appropriate for them only made that harder.

But there was the strong possibility that she may inhabit this body for far longer than she wanted, so weird and inhuman or not, it was still a good idea to get comfortable with the basics of maintaining it.

And she didn’t want to squash how happy she was that Luna was no longer avoiding her by thinking too hard about what they were doing.

It didn’t take long for Luna to finish and pull away allowing Ranma to shake out the wing so the feathers settled back into their proper place. Her wing was slimmer but only good feathers remained, the dead ones laying on the floor. “Thanks,” she gratefully told the other alicorn, folding her wing back against her body.

Luna beamed as she stretched out a wing to hold in front of her.

“Your wings are perfect, what do you want me to do?” Ranma asked in confusion before remembering the language. “Yes?” she asked in Ponish.

The midnight blue alicorn’s horn glowed and her feathers separated to reveal one that was just barely out of place.

‘Fair is fair,’ she rationalized. Digging at her own body with her mouth was distasteful, doing the same for someone else didn’t feel much better. Leaning forward, she gripped the feather in her teeth, tasting some of the salt from Luna’s earlier bath, and gave a quick tug. Luna let out a shriek of pain and snapped her wing back so fast it slapped across her sensitive nose.

“What was that for?” she demanded angrily, rubbing her nose with a hoof before remembering to spit out the feather.

Luna leveled an annoyed glare back at her and levitated the feather she had just spit out to show that it had blood at the end.

“Sorry,” she apologized in Ponish. ‘I’m new at this, it’s not my fault.’ Lockheed’s crash course on wing care had covered the possibility of ripping out a good feather. Including that it would hurt a lot and if it had an active blood supply would bleed all over the place.

She didn’t seem to have done the latter as Luna ripped out the feather she had wanted gone in the first place herself, and ruffled her wing. The larger alicorn gave her a pat on the back and a nuzzle with her head before glancing at her other wing encouragingly.

‘What? I can’t get you to finish this one too?’ She snickered and began working on her other wing, trying to copy Luna’s more efficient method. Once she got over the inhuman and distasteful nature of pulling out her feathers with her mouth, the simple repetitive nature of it was actually quite relaxing.

When Luna rolled against her and fell asleep, she shifted slightly to push back against her, happy for the closeness. She ignored the ever vigilant part of her that pointed out that cuddling against another pony was probably one of those new urges she should avoid. But Luna was her friend and it clearly made her feel better to spend time together so what would be the harm in indulging the alicorn?

Of course she also used the opportunity to dump as many feather remnants as she could on the sleeping pony.

Later

Snow Drift rolled his shoulders and stretched out his wings, spreading his feathers in different ways to relieve his stiffness. Yawning, he gave Luna’s tower a tired glare before settling back into his post in the guard tower on the exterior wall. Night watch was always the worst, there was little to distract himself from the boredom than staring up at the stars or trying to see some of the nocturnal creatures of Everfree as they went about their nightly activities.

Soon enough he’d rotate to a different post and be partnered with a different guard so they could remain vigilant. It was his turn to keep his position, so he had to wait patiently for somepony to talk to and break up the monotony, then in an hour it would be his turn to be on patrol. At midnight he’d be relieved and Steward Celestia’s special assignment would fall to another lucky pegasus.

“You will maintain eyes on my young ward, no matter what,” he spoke, attempting to imitate her voice.

“Do you have a problem with my orders?” Celestia’s disembodied voice questioned from the walkway up to his post.

“Steward!” he exclaimed in a panic, jumping to his hooves and coming to rigid attention while trying to think up an excuse that would sound good enough to justify his disrespect.

“Gotcha,” Oleander grinned peeking up from the edge of the steep steps.

He stared at the unicorn, left eye twitching, wings fluffing up on their own repeatedly.

“Lighten up, kid,” Oleander laughed to herself, finishing the final few steps up to the post. Two large steaming mugs of hot chocolate levitating obediently beside her. “Celestia is never up at night unless there’s an emergency. Brought you something to help warm you up.”

Dropping roughly back down into his seat, he took the offered mug between his hooves. “Thanks,” he said, failing to hide his irritation.

“I said lighten up,” she elbowed him and took her seat next to him. “It was just a joke.”

“You sounded just like her,” he admitted with a small smirk.

“Thanks, took me three years to get the inflection down,” Oleander boasted.

“And I’m bored not cold. The wind doesn’t bite here like it does off the Crystal Mountains,” he added and took a sip.

“Uh huh,” she laughed and let out a big yawn. “Anything interesting happen yet?”

“Other then you scaring me half to death, not a thing,” he answered slowly.

“Those are the kinds of nights to appreciate,”

“I’d rather have something to do.”

“Don’t jinx yourself, we’ve had enough excitement to last us the next year,” she inclined her head towards the tower that had recently been remodeled by an errant explosion.

“Not that kind of excitement,” he quickly took another sip.

“Like getting into pegasus games with the new alicorn?” she asked suggestively causing him to choke and spit out some of his hot chocolate.

Setting his cup down he wiped at his muzzle. “That wasn’t funny,” he glared at the snickering unicorn before licking the liquid from around his mouth then the spots on his legs to avoid leaving brown marks on his white coat.

“But your reaction was,” she teased in a sing song tone before daintily sipping some of her own drink.

They both fell silent as they finished their drinks until he finally broke it by asking the billion bit question. “Where do you think she comes from?” he asked. “She’s— different.”

“A pony who doesn’t speak a word of Ponish appearing in Everfree? I grew up hearing tales of the old world from my grandmother but even there, all the tribes spoke the same language. You’re new around here so you may not have figured it out yet, but Celestia loves games, especially riddles. And she loves it when somepony is able to connect her clues together and figure them out. This though— doesn’t feel like one of her usual games. I don’t think she wants us to know where Ranma is from.”

‘We could always ask,’ he thought. Ranma’s lack of words wouldn’t stop her from pointing to a place on a map.

“Uh oh,”

“What?” he asked turning to his superior.

“Someponies ears must have been burning,” she pointed to Luna’s tower.

‘Ponyfeathers,’ he cursed, his eyes barely able to make out the mare sized form against the dark cloud filled sky, casually leaping over the balcony railing to glide down to the courtyard being prepared for the yearly traveling market.

“I’ll leave this to your capable wings brave pegasus, don’t go having too much fun,” Oleander called after him jokingly.

Ignoring her teasing, he focused on his flying, and doing his job of following Ranma. Circling overhead and keeping his wingbeats to a minimum, he lazily drifted down towards the ground. The traveling ponies had almost all turned in early to get a jump on finishing their setup in the morning before their first customers would arrive from the castle, Gaitlend, and any of the small villages around Everfree. So it was relatively easy to spot Ranma in the process of finishing stretching.

Curious to what she was up to, he landed as silently as he could, following her as she set off purposefully towards one of the empty stands.

The soft earth let him get within a few paces without being noticed. A feat he was quite proud of while wearing his armor that almost always made some sort of noise. Remembering Ranma’s shocking way to get his attention the other day, he considered returning the favor. He could even pass it off as completely innocent. All he had to do was keep silent, speak up loudly enough, and stay far enough away to avoid being bucked through a wall if she panicked.

Opening his mouth and taking in a deep breath, he froze in shock. Ranma had reared up to stand almost vertically on her hind legs, holding the position after a brief wobble, and crossing her forelegs. She didn’t do anything else, just held that pose like she was deep in thought.

‘She’s so weird,’ he closed his mouth and sat down heavily making his armor clank.

Ranma’s ears immediately swiveled to him and her head turned just enough to confirm his presence. She let out a startled shriek, legs all kicking out of sync at once. Succeeding only in doing an awkward little hop before falling flat on her back.

“You alright?” he asked, desperately trying not to laugh but unable to keep himself from devolving into gross snickers and snorts at her upside down glare. They immediately died when Luna landed with complete silence to his right. “Steward,” he quickly stood at attention.

“Thy appear to have only injured her pride,” Luna remarked in amusement.

Ranma angrily flopped around trying to right herself quickly. He would have laughed more if the dark alicorn was not standing so close. As soon as Ranma got her hooves underneath her, she cleared the space between them to get right up muzzle to muzzle with him, her horn dinging against his helmet saving him from being cut. She backed off a tiny amount, eyes crossing to her horn as if she had forgot its existence.

He took a step back, not liking the close proximity to the angry mare. Her horn glowing gave him a tiny warning before something firm took hold of his back legs just above his hooves, and jerked forward with a great deal of force. He flared his wings catching himself in the air before he could be flipped onto his back. Rising up into the air, he leveled himself off before landing with a smirk, and a confident spread of his wings. Ranma’s eyes narrowed in a mix of excitement for a challenge and irritation that her prank had failed.

‘She plays rough, but she’s still just a novice who doesn’t like getting shown up,’ he settled his wings back against his sides and addressed Luna. “Steward, is there anything I can help you with?”

“We were about to explore the night with Ranma, thy presence is not needed,” Luna answered as if he was intruding, spreading her long wings.

“I’m sorry but I have orders from your elder sister,” he interrupted, pausing as Luna’s green eyes bore into him. “At least one guard must follow her at all times,” he explained quickly trying not to look away.

“Then we shall give thee a new, more appropriate order,” Luna’s muzzle split into a large grin.

‘Uh oh,’ he gulped, having no clue how he was supposed to handle this. Celestia and Luna were supposed to be equals but one was clearly the elder. Celestia had given the guards clear and concise orders to monitor the youngest alicorn. If Luna gave him an order that contradicted that, who was he supposed to listen to? None of his training had covered this situation because Luna never went against her sister.

“Attempt to keep up,” Luna commanded.

Author's Note

1 - Bucking New Pony
2 - Pukwudgies, TV Y crites, Season 8 episode 2
3 - Market that makes its way around Equestria yearly buying and selling goods as it moves

Tempest Ball - dodgeball like game that was banned after several unfortunate incidents with unicorn and earth ponies being caught in the crossfire.

Festival has been pushed back, this chapter got out of hand so I chopped it in two as this felt like a nice ending point for what was happening. So casting call is still open if anyone wants an OC included.

As you can also see the cover art has been updated with a wonderful commission I had done by Cass @artofcassrobles on the twitters.