Well come too may storey!
Once upon a time, on a typically beautiful Equestrian day, Twilight woke up bright and early. And she wanted to play with a ball.
Feed me! Stroke me! Scratch behind my ear! Lavish me with attention! were the unfamiliar prompts going through her brain, quite different from the usual 'read every book in sight and selfishly interfere in everyone else's problems' type-commands.
H-huh? she thought in an increasingly rare moment of lucidity... What's going on? Why is this happening? And what's with this strange craving for kibble I seem to have developed? I must endeavour to discover the reason behind this strange phenomeno... ooh! A knock at the door!
Now usually someone tapping on her bedroom chamber at this time would've inspired a slight eye-roll from the somewhat groggy princess. 'Come back later when I've finished volume IX of this advanced series on calculus' she'd state, with an irritated voice.
But today, her reaction was somewhat... different. Quite against her express wishes, she found herself excitedly bounding over to the entrance with her tongue hanging out, jumping about like a jackrabbit in heat with excited notions of: Who is it? I want to know! Tell me now!
To heap further indignity upon utter shame, the poor alicorn's tail had taken on a life of its own. Using a muscle she didn't even know she possessed, it would not stop waving from side-to-side... or 'wagging', as I believe is the more common term.
Fortunately, before Twilight's newly embarrassing behaviour could manifest itself into even more unbecoming conduct, the door abruptly swung open of its own accord.
And there, just like every day before that one, stood Twilight's faithful friend/employee, a bastion of sanity in an progressively insane world...
Only now, it appeared the madness was beginning to become a pandemic.
"S-Spike?" Twilight used all her inner strength to suppress the urge to whinny joyfully upon his arrival. "W-Why do you have the head of a fish?"
"So I'm a fish. It happens. It doesn't make me any less of a person." The freshly freshwater Spike shrugged his fins dismissively. "At least I can fly and swim underwater now. Pretty cool, huh?"
"B-But Spike, you stink!!" For some reason her Special Little Guy's putrid fishy odour seemed to affect Twilight even more than she expected. "I'm going to have to put every air freshener I have in your room, light incense candles all over the castle, scrub your throne after every Friendship meeting..."
"Twi, it's okay..." Spike seemed to have accepted his new appearance and lifestyle with remarkable candour. "This is who I am now, and learning to love yourself is the greatest lesson of all. Besides I'm not the only one here who's changed. Take a look in the mirror, and see."
"W-What?" All the puzzle pieces were beginning to click together in Twilight's head, and without further ado she left her newly amphibious buddy behind to glance at her reflection. "Oh my!!"
'Oh my' is right. For Twilight now sported a longer, furrier muzzle with a cold, black nose at the end of it, floppy oval ears in place of her old straight triangular ones and her aforementioned tail was less a collection of long hairs but a shorter, skinnier nub which naturally pointed upwards.
"T-This has to be a bream... I mean, dream!" Twilight exclaimed in hope, as further investigation revealed the presence of sharp canine teeth on her jaw. "There is no possible logical explanation for this... this nonsensical nonsense!"
"Hey, I'd pinch you... but I'm not sure I have the means anymore." Spike gestured to his now clawless limbs, before waddling over to where his best friend now stood in shock. "I understand this is quite a sea change... but don't worry! As I can tell you from personal experience, it's not a bad life being a mutt. I'll take you out for regular walkies, scoop up after you when you 'go', let you sniff other dog's but..."
"Okay, I've heard enough!" Twilight had no idea what had come over her longtime pal, both from a physical and mental perspective, but she needed to get out of there now. "I'm going to leave this second, and I'm not coming back 'til I've restored everything to the way it was before! And while I'm gone, I better not find out you've been swimming in the toilet, or they'll be no worms for a week!"
"W-Wait! You forgot this!" Spike held up a large studded collar engraved with the word 'TWILIGHT' on it. "Great. If she gets lost, how is anyone supposed to know where to take her? Oh well..."
..............................
Usually the sight of Starlight outside with rapidly rotating blades for hooves, being pushed around by a very tiny winged Trixie to mow the lawn would've startled Twilight a bit, but not today.
After witnessing Spike The Fish and her own 'unique' transformation, nothing would surprise her about this new topsy-turvy world she inhabited, so she afforded them a casual glance before heading on her merry way.
Besides, at least they were keeping the grounds nice and neat.
Upon passing by a local farm, the oddities continued... A duck-billed Applejack sweeping the yard using her little sister as a brush, while a snail-hybrid Sweetie Bell left a slimy trail near a hungrily-chewing-on-cud horned Scootaloo.
Deciding she wasn't going to get much help at Sweet Apple Acres, an increasingly perturbed Twilight persevered further only to find more outlandish oddities ahead.
Since when did Rainbow Dash act so snooty, and move in next door to Filthy Rich? Why had Rarity shut down Carousel Boutique, only to turn it into a thrift store? Why was Pinkie prostrate in the middle of the road, causing traffic jams a mile long? (mind you, her behaviour was always one big question mark)
If this was some kind of big cosmic joke, Twilight wasn't finding it very amusing. She was already more conscious of the fact fleas were nibbling on her exposed flesh, and the urge to use her hind hoof as a makeshift backscratcher was growing with every passing second.
And if somepony deigned to throw a stick... let's just say, things could get very uncomfortable indeed.
The last straw was when she arrived at Fluttershy's cottage, to find all her pets outdoors looking very confused.
Apparently, her pegasus friend had turned into some kind of serial hoarder, with traces of old newspapers, used tin cans and broken furniture poking out from every orifice of her formerly spacious dwelling.
This left no room inside for her animal friends, who now shivered in the cold virtually starving to death... aside from Angel, who seemed much more taken with figuring out complicated geometric equations in the wet soil with his stick...
As most rabbits do.
"What in Equestria is going on around here?!" Twilight could no longer control her distress, and almost howled in anguish at what her beloved Ponyville had been reduced to. "I haven't seen this kind of disturbing surreality since when we had chocolate rain, cotton candy clouds and daytime became night in the blink of a..."
A sudden realisation dawned on Twilight, a nagging suspicion that'd been there from the very beginning which she hadn't wanted to indulge, due to the individual concerned more than atoning for his past misdemeanours. What other possible interpretation of current events could there be, though?
"Discord! Get your serpentine butt out of Limbo and come here this instant!" Twilight wasn't usually so coarse or demanding in her requests, but present circumstances had swung her mood considerably to the 'angry' scale.
"You don't have to yell, Princess Twilight... I'm right here!" A familiar withering tone could be detected a few feet away from the alicorn, which almost made her yelp in surprise. "Or should that be... Miss Bark-le?"
"D-Discord? What are you doing down there?!" Twilight stared at a narrow inlet running to the ocean she'd never seen before, with a certain draconequus's face leering out of it. "Stop fooling around, and return the town right now to the way it was!"
"Why my dear poochie... sorry, 'pony'... nothing would give me greater satisfaction!" Discord communicated from underwater, in a remarkably clear tone. "...Except, I'm not the one responsible for this current mess. Don't you remember, the day I swore to my darling Fluttershy, or 'Cluttershy' now I suppose, that I'd steer clear of any such silly chicanery ever again? Why would I want to break her innocent little heart? What kind of cruel seaway do you take me for?"
Twilight was so confused right now, she could've collapsed onto her front hooves and whined. "H-Huh? I don't understand. If not you Discord, than who did this..."
"Actually, it's 'Dis-fjord' now, in case you hadn't noticed." the draconequus's paws appeared beneath the water, indicating the wide aquatic expanse was indeed who he was for real. "I believe you've also had the honour of running into Pike, Starlight Trimmer, Pixie, Applequack, Apple Broom, Sweetie Shell, Scoota-moo, Rainbow Cash (or is it Flash?), Charity, Pinkie Lie and Angle. In that exact order, by my calculation. That's the best thing about being a fjord, you can flow everywhere and spy on everyone. I spend a lot of time with my new friends the 'Lakes' now, formerly known as the 'Cakes'..."
"I don't care! I-I just want to fix this!" Twilight Bark-le whimpered sadly, with her ears instinctively flopping down and her new tail tucked firmly between her legs.
"Oh, there you are, girl! I've been looking for you all over the place!" Suddenly Pike appeared on the scene, gasping for breath from running so far... or maybe he was running out of air. "How many time do I have to tell you, don't go outside without your leash! I could get fined, or you might be picked up by the dogcatcher, and then... is that a fjord I see there? Woo-hoo! Time for a refreshing dip!"
And as her valued assistant (now apparent owner) dived in gills-first to the newly materialised expanse of water, and Applequack (having obviously finished her chores) also jumped in to see if there were any tasty breadcrumbs on offer from the locals, Twilight realised that the outbreak of craziness that had engulfed this once quiet provincial town had finally reach an absolute zenith.
"Can nothing stop this insanity?" The equine/canine amalgam screamed as she began rocking back and forth, unsure if it was a comforting hug or a tickly belly rub that would make her feel better.
Maybe a bit of both. Neigh...Ruff!
..................................
Meanwhile, in a much less interesting dimension, some spotty nerk was roused from his Cheeto-induced slumber by a disembodied voice coming from an unknown location.
"W-What?" he exclaimed, moving his prescription glasses out of the way to wipe down his sweaty brow. "Oh, I was just having a nightmare. Now, what was I doing again...?"
His attention was immediately drawn to his budget-priced laptop, upon which he'd been beavering away the previous evening. "Ah yes, the next gripping installation of my fanfiction! Who needs proofreading, it's just as good as it is! Now to write about everyone else. The guys are gonna love this..."
If was hard to imagine the Princesses Bestial, Tuna, McFlurry or Cokehead agreeing, though.
Author's Note
This humorous little piece was inspired by a fic about 'Shinning' Armour. I'm sure he's a very good climber, but...
