A Monster By Any Other Name

by EchoApple

Rating: teen
Tags: Violence, Alternate Universe, Twilight Sparkle, Sad, Drama, Gore, Original Character, My Little Pony: Friendship is Magic, Dark
Length: 1519

Twilight Sparkle learns an important lesson about life, friendship, and messing around with things you don't understand.

Takes place after season 5, but before season 6.

One year after the reformation of her star pupil, Starlight Glimmer, Twilight Sparkle decides to look more into the forbidden mysteries known as Alternate Timelines. After tweaking around with Starswirl the Bearded's altered time spell, she tests it out in an open meadow.

But she honestly didn't expect it to work.

She honestly didn't expect to pull not one, but two blood-covered children from beyond the veil.

And she honestly didn't expect to find herself fighting for her life against a desperate monster.

Second place winner of Art for Fanfiction's 2019 Summer Writing Contest!

I do not own the cover art. All rights go to the original artist.

Published 2019-08-12 19:00:01 UTC
Last updated 2019-08-12 19:00:01 UTC

Why?

It was a warm autumn night. A pleasant breeze blew through the meadow, bringing with it the scent of fresh goldenrod from a nearby field.

Twilight Sparkle let out a sneeze.

"I really should've waited to test this spell," she groaned to herself as she flipped through her notebook. "Stupid allergies."

Time Magic; the power of endless possibilities. It fascinated Twilight to no end, and it was because of this power that she was here tonight.

But, despite her intense interest in Time Magic, she only began researching it a few weeks ago. Her fear of Princess Celestia's wrath was what kept her from looking into it. But she managed to work up her courage to begin playing around with it.

After about ten minutes of searching, she managed to find what she was looking for. A satisfied smile spread across her lips.

It was Starswirl's altered time spell. The same one that Starlight Glimmer used in an attempt to stop the Rainboom.

Twilight hummed quietly.

Well, it wasn't exactly the same one. She may or may not have done a bit of tweaking to it. Her version of the spell was supposed to do something a bit different than just send the user back in time. Her's was supposed to, in theory, bring the target of the spell TO the user.

Of course, she wasn't entirely sure if it would actually work. As she said, it was just a theory.

Her eyes danced across the page, taking in every word. Once she was sure she had the spell firmly memorized, she set her notebook down on a nearby rock and turned towards the empty clearing.

Twilight sighed. She just couldn't seem to calm the storm of conflicting emotions within her. They were telling her not to do this, to not go against her surrogate mother's wishes. But she just had to know. She had to know what was out there, beyond the firm veil of reality that now sat before her.

The possibilities…

… all the POSSIBILITIES.

It was almost too much for her curious mind to take!

Celestia would understand, right?

Her nerves now set in stone, she conjured up her magic. Her mana's familiar magenta glow pushed away the darkness as it quickly grew power. Her horn soon begun sparking. The spell was taking quite a bit more magic than she originally thought it would, but it wasn't anything she couldn't handle. She didn't weld the Element of Magic for nothing, after all.

With a bright burst of light and a loud boom, her building magic released itself. It was only because of her years of magic training that Twilight didn't go flying from the sheer force of magic that came from her horn. But that doesn't mean that she didn't fall on her hindquarters.

Twilight stared with a dazed look in her eyes as she watched as her magic created what appeared to be a spinning vortex of some sort. There was what sounded like clicking and what looked like a miniature sun before her.

Finally, after what felt like an eternity, the light faded away.

Twilight grunted slightly as she rubbed at her eyes, trying to rid them of the flashing colors.

'Well that was interesting.' She thought to herself as she pulled her hooves away from her eyes. She took a look around before her gaze landed on a circle of dirt that once held grass.

Her curiosity risen, she pulled herself to her hooves and approached the burn spot. What she saw made her gasp in absolute horror.

Laying in the dirt was two children, a small pegasus filly and a rather large unicorn colt.

The filly was pale yellow in color, and her short mane was brown and red. Her cutie mark was that of a crow in flight with a pencil in its beak.

The colt on the other hoof was brown with a black and white mane. His cutie mark was a shield with bat wings.

They were both covered in blood.

"Oh my Celestia!" Twilight shrieked loudly as she began approaching the children. "Are you two okay?!"

At the sound of her voice, the filly's eyes snapped open, revealing that they were a bright golden yellow. Her eyes darted around frantically until they landed on Twilight, which then her pupils shrunk to pinpoints; a pony's biological reaction to any strong emotions.

It is also a natural warning sign of an impending attack.

Not that Twilight was actually paying attention to that, though. She was too worried about coming to the aid of the two bleeding children.

She only stopped her advance when she heard the young pegasus sharply yell, "STAY BACK!"

"...Huh?" Twilight questioned before she once again started to trot towards them. "But sweetie, your bleeding! You need--"

"I said..." To Twilight's shock, and newfound terror, the filly's form began to change. Her fur darkened, and the red in her mane began to seemingly glow. But the most dramatic change was the whites of her eyes, which changed to a deep black.

Twilight took a step back as the pegasus rose to her hooves. The filly's monstrous eyes seemed to burn a hole into her very being.

"... STAY BACK!!!!!"

With a scream not unlike that of a wild beast, her tiny wings expanded and warped into tendrils of darkness.

Twilight screamed with terror and jumped out of the way as the newly formed weapons shot at her, missing her by an inch.

Her hooves skidded across the ground, and she was almost caught off guard by the warped filly. She had, somehow, managed to cross the distance between them faster than what should have been possible for a filly her age.

Twilight barely had enough time to cast a shield spell, preventing her from being punched in the face.

Sweat ran down Twilight's brow as she gazed into the child's glowing eyes. Looking into them, she saw a storm of emotions. But beyond that storm, unnoticeable to the untrained eye, she saw something more.

The will to protect.

She pushed the filly away with a burst of magic, who landed on the ground almost a yard away.

The darkened pegasus laid there groaning a bit. She was obviously in quite a bit of pain, and this fight wasn't helping matters any.

She needed to end this.

After taking a moment to catch her breath, Twilight slowly approached the bloody filly.

This filly was a monster. There was no denying this, despite how much she tried to.

Twilight stopped her approach. The child was now right at her hooves.

But she was still a child. A child in need of help.

And that was exactly what she was going to do.

She nearly jumped out of her fur when the young pony-monster flipped onto her back. She swiped weakly at Twilight with a tendril, which the mare easily deflected.

Twilight stared down at the poor filly, who glared back in defiance.

After a few minutes of eyeing each other, the youngest of the two closed her eyes and laid back down, sighing in defeat.

"Just do it already," she mumbled quietly. "I know you want to."

Twilight's conflicted stare quickly turned to that of confusion.

"Huh? What do you mean? Twilight questioned with squirted eyes. "What are you talking about?"

The filly gazed at her with a look of poorly concealed sorrow.

"Just do it, get it over with and kill me. I knew this day was coming for a while now, and I have already accepted it." She sighed and took a glance at the colt on the other side of the meadow.

"With me gone, Chaos Shield can finally rest. He won't have to worry about the possibility of getting executed anymore." She turned away. "Of course you're just going to kill him too, aren't ya? Just promise me that you'll make it quick. He doesn't deserve to suffer."

After that, she finally fell silent, waiting for the killing blow.

It never came.

Instead, the filly felt the warmth of a loving hug.

Shocked by this sudden turn of events, all she could ask was, "Why?"

"Because nopony deserves to die," Twilight whispered. "I'm not going to kill you, I refuse to. You are going to live, whether you like it or not."

Hearing those words, the filly couldn't stop the flow of tears from running down her face. Soon, she was bawling like a foal.

Twilight gently patted her back. She let the tiny pegasus cry for a bit before she asked, "Can you tell me your name?

The child pulled away and eyed Twilight. After a moment, she sighed and wiped away her tears.

"My name is Crimson."

Twilight smiled kindly.

"You have a nice name Crimson. Now, how about we get you and your friend some medical attention, huh? You look like you need it."

"Okay."
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Author's Note

I hope you enjoyed! Please let me know what you think, okay? I love to hear your guy's thoughts! :heart:

Edit: fixed grammar and spelling.