Daring Do's Bipedal Adventure

by insaneponyauthor

Rating: teen
Tags: Moondancer, Comedy, Adventure, Equestria Girls, Pinkie Pie, Daring Do, Twilight Sparkle, Profanity, Random, My Little Pony: Friendship is Magic, Alternate Universe
Length: 16185

Ponies in human bodies… humans in pony bodies… cats and dogs living together, mass hysteria!

After braving metafictional narratives and crazed fanfic authors, Daring Do meets her greatest challenge yet: Canterlot High School. Meanwhile, the school science club has inadvertently set up an exchange student program with Equestria of their own. Will anypony or human find their way back before reality collapses under the sheer weight of the plotholes?

This all might make more sense if you read the previous story first. Or it might not. This is an exquisite corpse, and sense is in short supply here.

Cover art kludged together by Meta Four, with apologies to GrapefruitFace, 90Sigma, SketchMCreations, and namelesshero2222.

Published 2019-10-18 15:10:01 UTC
Last updated 2019-10-18 15:10:01 UTC

Prologue

"Hey, what's that? Are you writing fanfiction again?" asks Daring Do.

That's none of your business! I try to tilt the screen so that she can't see, but she just leans in closer. My efforts at typing are hampered considerably by the pony pressing against my shoulder, but my narration continues undaunted.

"On the contrary, it is of critical importance to me. Ever since Moondancer's bookwalking spell went wrong and trapped me here with you, you've been promising that you would write me back into the story like you did for the others."

Look, I already explained this a million times. We only write one chapter each. You showed up too late to make it back into the last story, so you'll just have to wait until we do another one.

"It's been EIGHT MONTHS!"

You don't have to shout! You're like three inches from my ear. Anyway, it can't have been that long. Hold on, let me check. Huh, I guess you are right. Time really does fly. I guess I just got busy with important stuff and forgot about the whole Round Robin thing.

"Busy? You just watch Netflix all day!" she shouts again despite my previous admonition.

Like I said, important stuff. Besides, maybe it'd be easier if you gave me some writing tips. You are an accomplished writer right? I suck enough at writing even when I don't have a hostile equine breathing down my neck.

"What would I know about writing? I'm an adroit adventurer archeologist, not an author! Unless the writing you want help with is ancient runes in which case I'd recommend starting with a high quality carving tool."

Oh of course! You're the fictional Daring Do. Of course she wouldn't write about her secret identity in the published books. You've probably never even heard of A.K. Yearling. I mean, not that she's not fictional too, but I guess you're like doubly fictional or something.

Well you're in luck, because we finally agreed on a topic for the next story. It'll be a bit different than what you're used to though.

Daring's anger momentarily gives way to apprehension. "Wait, before I go, can you tell me where the real Falcon—"

Chapter 1: The Doom

It was a beautiful day in Equestria. The sun was out and the birds were singing at the top of the sky. Unfortunately, this fact was lost on Daring Do because our story is set not in Equestria, but in a world altogether more sinister. A world stalked by twisted abominations beyond the comprehension of ponykind. A world permeated with an insufferable gloom. A world by the name of Canterlot High.

"Ooooof!" Daring Do slammed into the ground, which incidentally serves her right for that time she ate all of my chips without telling me and the store was closed so I couldn't get more.

Disorientation gave way to shock as she examined her surroundings. The surface she now found herself sprawled upon was fashioned from stone, expertly cut and polished until no purchase could be found. Away from her stretched walls lined with metal enclosures and great wooden portals that mercifully shielded their contents from her view.

Daring had visited many deadly ancient temples, and yet she would have gladly given anything to be dodging poison tipped arrows again, for even in their hostility, the traps of old betrayed a fundamental recognition of the primacy of life that could not be discerned anywhere within the unyielding indifference of the austere labyrinth she now found herself within.

She discovered with growing terror that she had been transformed into a horrifying human. Her previous ordeal had done nothing to inure herself to the presence of humans, but had rather served merely to give her further appreciation of the true horror of the fate that now befell her.

"Meh, I've had worse," she said, gamely attempting to conceal the revulsion that must pervade every fiber of her being, as she gingerly picked herself up. "Now where did those blasted unicorns get to?"

Suddenly, an intolerable ringing sound pierced the air. It came from all directions, as if the very firmament itself was rebelling at once against the notion that any accommodation would be provided to the sanity of the unfortunate interloper. After a moment that stretched into eternity, the cacophony ceased, and Daring Do was left with the realization that the desolate foreboding halls had now filled with a multitude of humans, rendered no less ghastly by the fact that she now shared their appalling form.

In her traumatic delirium, she imprudently drew the attention of the eldritch beings, for the distant hope of securing succor in this most miserable milieu had overruled whatever shred of reason remained within her battered spirit.

"Excuse me girls, have you see any unicorns go past here? Or the Falcon? The fate of the world depends on it!"

"Hey, aren't you Chestnut Magnifico?", the nightmare replied. "What are you doing here? Can you sign my book?"

As she gazed upon the proffered tome, the reality of Daring Do's torment became palpable. This was the end. She could no longer deny it, for now the monster had seen her and would pursue her forever until she completed its inscrutable ritual. Even if her physical husk endured, she knew that this was truly the end for her, as there could be no hope for happiness in this accursed world.

Chapter 2: A Dream Derailed

For a moment, Daring Do was at a loss for words, like someone whose thesaurus had suddenly run out of synonyms for horror. She quickly tried to regain control of the situation.

"Chestnut? You must have gotten me mixed up with somepony else. My name is Daring Do. But what's really important right now is the Falcon, and the trail has gone completely cold."

"I didn't know you were into method acting," said the pale blue human. "Could you sign my book as Daring Do then?" She made air quotes around the last bit with her fingers.

Suddenly, Daring recognized her voice. "You're that annoying kid who almost screwed up the Ring of Destiny!" Now that she thought about it, there was an uncanny physical resemblance as well.

The human seemed offended. "Actually, that was the Marked Thief of Marapore, and I didn't ruin it, I enhanced it. Anyway, why are you here anyway? And where are the camera crews?" She looked around, but the hallway had emptied again with the exception of the annoying human and the others in her herd.

One of the yellow humans spoke up. "Um, did you say you were looking for a falcon? Because one recently arrived at the shelter. It might, um, be the one you were looking for. We could go after class." Then with a timid glance at her friend, she added "It really is horrible you know. People think that they would make a cool pet, but they are completely unsuitable as pets."

At last, a clue! "There is no time! We shall depart for this shelter immediately."

The purple human looked like she was about to object, but the blue human preempted her complaints. "Come on Twilight, we skip like all the time. Remember the dance contest? Besides, the police are probably still busy investigating the disappearance of those lawyers."

As they set off, Daring Do heard sobbing coming from a passing doorway and stopped.

“They attacked me! They tried to grab and kick me and one of them threw exploding candy at me!”

Her blood froze (but not literally). She would recognize that ominous voice anywhere. Lyra Heartstrings, we meet again at last.

Suddenly, a deeper, more regal voice came from behind the door, apparently trying to console Lyra. “Do you know what caused them to attack you? Did you perhaps express your disappointment with this world to them?”

The orange human noticed that she had stopped to eavesdrop and tried to pull her away. "You can't go in there! That's Vice Principal Luna!"

Daring was undeterred. "Don't you see? This is the falcon we've been looking for." Then in a much louder voice, she said

"Halt evildoer! You thought you could elude me, but though the wheels of justice are often delayed, they do not stop turning for anypony. The countless months I have spent tracking you will only make your imminent downfall all the more satisfying! Now hand over the Falcon before anypony further gets hurt!"

Her dramatic speech was unfortunately undermined by her struggles with the doorknob, for although Daring had more experience with living with humans than she would have ever desired, she had considerably less experience with actually being a human.

"Oh you've got to be kidding me!" said Daring Do, who gave up flailing at the doorknob with her strangely tentacled limbs. She turned back toward the rainbow-haired blue human and the pink-haired yellow human and tried to scream out “How do you operate this thrice-accursed mechanism?!”, but had only gotten to “How” before she felt a sudden blunt force against her back, and proceeded to lose consciousness.

First Interlude: A Disclaimer

At this point, I feel compelled to remind the reader that this entire story is simply that: a story. It is a work of fiction. Despite the sheer magnitude of fourth-wall breaking that we have engaged in at the beginning of the story, none of the events described within have actually happened. No ponies, humans, or authors were harmed during the making of this story. Readers need not be alarmed by any of the potentially dangerous events described over the course of the story. None of the events of this story are real. The story--

“Get on with it!”, shouted Iron Will.

Sorry.

Chapter 4: And The Manes Were There, Too

“Unhand me, you fiend!”

“Lyra, you can let go now,” said the blue-and-pink-haired person.

As soon as Daring Do was released from Lyra’s grip, she took a step back to put some distance between themselves. She had never heard the words “I’m sorry” uttered as many times as she had just now. Was the perpetrator showing remorse, or could this be some sort of trap? For now, some questions needed to be asked.

“What have you done with the Falcon? Where are your other accomplices? And who is this one with you now?”

“Oh, this is my very best friend Bonfetti.”

“I thought you agreed not to use Bon-puns when introducing me?”

“Sorry. This is my very best friend Bon-Bon.”

“...and your other companions?”

“Who?”

“The ponies you call Lemon Hearts, Twinkleshine, Minuette, and Moondancer?”

“Well, I don’t know a Moondancer, but I’m in a class with Minuette, and… did you say ponies?”

“Yes, ponies. I’m not sure how this world has transfigured us both into--”

And once again, Daring Do was interrupted by the green skinned one.

"OHMIGOSH! You know about ponies!?"

Daring blinked.

"Umm... yes?"

Immediately, the one with pink and blue hair covered her face with her hand and shook her head.

"Oh, here we go..."

"How do you know about them? Are you one of them!?" Lyra gasped, now getting her face less than three inches from Daring's. "Does that mean you're like Sunset Shimmer or Twilight Sparkle!? Are you a pegasus or a unicorn? I bet you're a unicorn. You're a unicorn, right?"

"What...? I don't..." Daring tried to follow along and process everything, but Lyra was already continuing.

"Oh yeah, DEFINITELY a unicorn," mercifully Lyra backed off and took to pacing around the room. The only ponies who've made it through have had unicorn powers so far, so that means you TOTALLY have to be one!"

"I'm actually a pegasus--"

"Ooooh, what's your favorite spell!?" Lyra asked, invading Daring's personal space again. "Can you summon meteors? I bet you can summon meteors."

"I'M NOT A UNICORN!" Daring finally screamed, sending Lyra scrambling backward and causing Bon Bon to let out a tiny "Eep!"

"You're... not?" Lyra asked, recovering from The Scream and looking a bit disappointed. "Aww..."

"Assuming she even is a pony," Bon Bon said, giving her friend an annoyed look, "why does it even matter what kind of pony she is?"

"Because she could take me back, and I could be a pony myself!"

"Lyra, we've been over this," Bon Bon covered her face with her hand. "Every time those... ponies show up, something weird always comes with them. There was Princess Twilight and Sunset Shimmer's demon thingy, there was the Dazzlings, there was Cinch and evil Twilight, there was that forest monster..."

"Did you say 'Princess Twilight?'" Daring asked, suddenly finding herself more than a little interested in this conversation again.

"Oh yeah, her!" Lyra beamed. "She showed up here and helped us beat Sunset Shimmer!"

"'Us?'" Bon Bon lifted an eyebrow. "Lyra, there wasn't an 'us.' It was the Rainbooms. You and I were zombies."

"Oh, right," Lyra scratched at the back of her head sheepishly. "But yeah, she totally came over from ponyworld--"

"Equestria," Daring corrected reflexively.

"HAH! I knew it!" Lyra pointed at her triumphantly. "Only a REAL pony would have corrected me like that!"

"She's a lost cause," Bon Bon shook her head and stepped forward. "But she is right. Princess Twilight did come over here from your world, assuming you are a pony."

"Well, that gives me a lead on how to get back at least," Daring muttered. "I know Princess Twilight Sparkle in my world. We've gone on a little adventure. And her friend Rainbow Dash joins me from time to time."

"Oh, wow, they have a Rainbow Dash too!" Lyra squeed. "What about Pony Me? Do you know Pony Me?"

"Can't say I do," Daring shook her head. "I keep my circle of friends small."

"Why? Are you a spy, or something?"

"Nope," Daring shook her head.

"Waaaaaaait," Lyra frowned, squinting at Daring closely. "Light vest, pith hat, going on adventures... You're a jungle explorer!"

"Eh," Daring shrugged. "Sort of. I do a lot of jungle exploring, but that's not my job."

"She's a grave-robber, Lyra," Bon Bon sighed. "That's why she doesn't have many friends."

"That's treasure hunter, thank-you," Daring huffed, crossing her arms. "I find valuable artifacts and donate them to museums, all so I can keep them away from Dr. Caballeron and Ahuizotl, who would use them for devious purposes."

"Oh, so she's like pony Indiana Jones!" Lyra grinned. "We can trust Indiana Jones, Bonnie."

"Who is 'Indiana Jones'?" Daring asked nervously. Something told her this would set Lyra off again.

That something was right.

"Oh, he's this adventure archaeologist who runs around saving artifacts from evil Nazis and..."

"You know what, forget I asked," Daring sighed. "Okay, I've been here long enough. I need to go find those ponies I asked about earlier."

"Minuette, Moondancer, Lemon Drop and Twinklestar, right?"

"...but then they opened the Ark and it turned out to contain sand, and then these ghosts came and melted everyone's faces except for Indy's and Marion's..."

"Lemon Hearts and Twinkleshine, yes," Daring nodded. "You said you don't know a Moondancer, but Lyra mentioned she had a class with Minuette, at least?"

"Yeah, we're in Mr. Iron Will's phys-ed class," Bon Bon sighed. "Though we do know where she lives, since we had to collaborate on a project last year."

"...and then she gave him a fake grail, so he drank from it and he withered in front of all of them, and the knight said 'He chose... poorly'..."

"If it's this world's version of them, they won't know anyone we're looking for," Daring pointed out. "I'm looking for the pony versions of them. Not the... what are you?"

"Human," said Bon Bon.

"Yeah, I'm not looking for the human versions."

"...but a lot of people don't think the fourth movie is canon because it wasn't nearly as good as the last three, so we just pretend it doesn't exist, but now they're apparently working on a fifth one..."

"Well, they might know the ones you're looking for," Bon Bon countered. "And who knows? Maybe they did run into their own pony selves."

"Fair enough," Daring nodded. "Alright then. Lead the way."

———

Unaware that Daring Do was looking for them, Moondancer, Twinkleshine, Minuette, and Lemon Hearts were in the library of Canterlot High.

"Moondancer, I don't think you're going to find any answers in this library. Let's face it, the only one who would be able to explain why we ended up in this place is Twilight Sparkle, the one who came here before," Lemon Hearts said with a sigh. "We've all looked through the shelves here multiple times and the only books about magic are in the fiction section."

"Did you say you're looking for Twilight Sparkle?" piped up a familiar, perky voice. The four of them turned to see a very pink human girl who looked surprisingly like Pinkie Pie.

"Yes, we are. If you know where she is, that would be very helpful," said Twinkleshine happily.

"She's at a Science Club meeting, silly! You know that; you're in the Science Club too! Did you do an experiment that made you forget things?" Pinkie asked, pointing to Moondancer.

"No, I..." Moondancer hesitated, and then she realized something. The girl they were talking to looked like a human version of Pinkie Pie. If Pinkie had a human counterpart, did that mean she herself had a human counterpart somewhere in this school too?

"Yes, she did. I think it affected me too," Lemon Hearts butted in, momentarily pretending to be dizzy. "I forgot where the Science Club is too, can you show us where it is so they can give a cure for our memory loss?"

"Okie dokie loki!" Pinkie chirped, and she bounced away down the hallway without even looking to see if they were following.

"Lemon, why did you tell her we have amnesia? Couldn't we just tell her that we're from Equestria and we want to know how to get home?" Moondancer asked quietly as they followed Pinkie.

"What if she didn't believe us?" Lemon Hearts replied.

"I think she would have believed the truth. Twilight came here before and I think she said she told the humans who she really was and they still helped her so the humans must know about our world by now," Minuette said.

"YOU'RE FROM EQUESTRIA?!" Pinkie Pie shrieked excitedly, getting right up in Minuette's face. It was obvious that she had overheard what they were saying, even though both Moondancer and Lemon Hearts had tried to keep their voices down.

"Yes, we are. And we're trying to figure out how to get home. We thought that if Twilight Sparkle was here, she could tell us how. She did it before, so I assume she would know," Moondancer explained.

"Oh, that's easy-peasy! You just go through the statue portal," Pinkie said, "Isn't that how you got here in the first place?"

"No, we don't know how we got here. One minute we were all looking through this really interesting book that the pony Twilight gave us, and then we just suddenly found ourselves sitting at desks in human bodies in a classroom," Minuette said.

"An interesting book, huh? You should still come to the Science Club room. I think Sunset Shimmer was going to be there today and I bet she'd like to see your book. She has a really interesting, magical book too!" Pinkie exclaimed. Luckily, Moondancer did recognize the name "Sunset Shimmer", because she had heard it from Twilight during their discussions of Twilight's adventures in the human world. From what she could tell, Sunset was also originally a pony from Equestria, but she was now living in this world as a human.

"If she can help too, then let's just go there," Twinkleshine agreed, and the five of them set off again towards the Science Club room.

~~~

Meanwhile, Daring Do had run into a problem in her search. According to the human Lyra and Bon Bon's information, the human versions of the ponies she was looking for should be in various afterschool clubs right now. However, when she went to look for Lemon Hearts, who was supposed to be on the prom committee, she was told that Lemon Hearts never showed up that day. She then was told by a girl who looked a human version of Amethyst Star that she saw Lemon Hearts with three other girls who were all going to the library, and that they were walking funny like they were used to crawling on all fours most of the time. Unfortunately, once Daring Do got to the library, Moondancer and the others had already left with Pinkie, and her search was at a dead end again.

"There better not be a Caballeron in this world too," Daring Do muttered to herself. She normally wouldn't try to chase after ponies she barely knew, but they had a very important, potentially dangerous book with them. One that had spells that supposedly could be used by non-unicorns. Daring Do had heard rumors that Caballeron was looking for ways that he could harness magic for himself despite being an Earth pony, and that book would be exactly the kind of thing he would be looking for. But by the time Daring Do had come to Twilight to ask her to keep the book safe, it turned out that Twilight had already lent it to Moondancer, who then just had to get lost in the human world.

^^^

Meanwhile, in Moondancer's home in Canterlot, the human version of Moondancer opened her eyes, wondering why she had suddenly fallen asleep in Science Club. She then looked at her hands and screamed. Her hands had turned into pony hooves! And there were three brightly-colored unicorns sitting on chairs near her, all looking like they were shocked too! And beside her, sitting innocently on a table, was a book entitled "Hornless Magic." It was the book Daring Do was looking for, still in Equestria!

%%%

“Right this way!” Pinkie bounced on each of her steps as she led Moondancer, Twinkleshine, Minuette, and Lemon Hearts through the crowd of miscellaneously-colored students going about their business. The mildly confused quartet of human-transformed ponies were eventually lead to a wood door that simply said “Science Club”. “And we’re here!” Minuette looked behind her and realized that they had only traveled a couple of doors down from the library. She opened her mouth, paused, then closed it. Pinkie happily raised her hand to knock but it swung backwards before she could.

“Oh good, you’re here. Come on.” A familiar-looking purple human darted out, grabbed Moondancer’s hand, and dragged her into the room. Pinkie Pie, Twinkleshine, Minuette, and Lemon Hearts followed before the door could snap shut.

“What the-?” Moondancer found herself in a seat and surrounded by the human Twilight and a yellow human with red and yellow hair, Sunset Shimmer, she presumed.

“Okay are you our Moondancer or Equestria’s Moondancer?” Twilight quickly asked as she adjusted her glasses and looked over Moondancer who was still too shaken to respond. Sunset didn’t say anything but watched with vested interest as Twilight poured over the human in front of them.

“THEY’RE FROM EQUESTRIA!” Pinkie suddenly shouted, causing Sunset to wince in surprise and Twilight to nearly fall on top of Moondancer. “Isn’t it exciting!?” Twilight and Sunset saw the three other ponies behind Pinkie and sighed in exasperation.

“That’s… not the word I’d use.” Sunset chuckled and smiled, “Not until we find out what happened here at least.”

Twilight looked back at Moondancer closely, “You’re really from Equestria?”

Moondancer composed herself finally and nodded in acknowledgement, “Yes and we have no idea how. We were reading a book given to us by the pony-you and suddenly we found ourselves in a classroom here.” Lemon Hearts, Twinkleshine, and Minuette walked away from the door and joined Moondancer in front of Twilight and Sunset.

“Wait, how did you figure that Moondancer might be from Equestria?” Lemon Hearts questioned with a head tilt.

“Well…” Twilight explained that the human Moondancer never showed up to the Science Club meeting and had heard stories that Twinkleshine, Lemon Hearts, and Minuette didn’t show up to their respective extracurricular activities either. “-And whenever something weird like that happens around here, it is almost always because of Equestria.”

“Always.” Sunset nodded in agreement.

“Is that so?” Moondancer pinched her chin thoughtfully. She was slightly disappointed as she had kind of wanted to meet her human counterpart.

“Well do you have the book still?” Sunset asked.

“Moondancer should, right?” Twinkleshine looked expectantly at the ex-unicorn.

“Oh! That’s right, I should.” Moondancer grabbed at her bag and shuffled around. “Um…”

“Oh no… don’t tell me…” Twilight braced for the dreaded words.

“It’s… not here.” Moondancer finished sheepily.

Sunset’s eyes widened as she looked at Twilight, “You don’t think that…”

“It’s possible I suppose…” Twilight answered…

Moondancer figured out exactly what those two were talking about. “You don’t mean…”

Their train of thought was broken by the sound of a door opening and a familiar voice, “Where’s the book!?” Human Daring Do was standing in the doorway, out of breath. She looked at the humans in the room and sighed in relief at Moondancer, Twinkleshine, Minuette, and Lemon Hearts, the very ponies-turned-humans she had been looking for.

“What!?” Almost everyone said at the same time.

===

In Equestria, the ex-humans had spent a good twenty or so minutes running around and panicking as they examined their new surroundings and their apparent change into equines. Moondancer was the first to acclimate to her situation but was unable to calm the others down. The book on the table called to Moondancer in a metaphorical manner and she picked it up. Or tried to. She had hooves now. The screaming and panicking slowly simmered down as a familiar pony entered the room, clearly drawn by the commotion. Moondancer gasped at the pony. She had a horn and wings but she clearly looked like a pony version of Twilight Sparkle.

,,,

Moondancer quickly got over the shock. Clearly that book was magical and it would definitely be something that Daring Do was after. Of course she’d be after it.

“Yeah about that…” Moondancer began to explain amidst everyone’s shocked, gaping jaws.

“It’s WHAT!?” Daring Do doffed her hat in frustration.

“And there’s more… Twilight?” Moondancer queued the purple human to explain. She pushed up her glasses.

“Well given how all previous examples of crossing over between our two worlds resulted in everyone carrying what they had with them and given the account provided, it seems far more likely that instead of being transferred into our world wholesale, they were more likely to have-”

On the other side of the room, Pinkie’s head felt fuzzy.

“...” Twilight trailed off without finishing her explanation and she looked around. “Wait a minute…”

Meanwhile, in Equestria, Twilight finished explaining what she thought happened to the panicking ponies. Moondancer, who still had the book that caused all of this in her hooves, Lemon Hearts, Minuette, and Twinkleshine had finally calmed down to listen. She raised a hoof to continue… wait… a hoof? Twilight looked at what was no longer her hand. “Oh you have got to be kidding me!” She yelled.

“Oh wow, this is so weird.” Pinkie’s voice drew Twilight’s attention. She had entered the room at some point and was now examining herself.

“Pinkie… is that you?” Twilight slowly asked.

“Yeah! Guess I’m a pony now. So cool!” Pinkie gleefully hopped around. Or tried to anyway. She fell on her face.

Back in the human world, the previously pony Twilight grumbled in frustration. “Yep. This is happening again.”

__—~~**~~—____——==<!&!&!&!>==——____—~~**~~—__

Meanwhile, in Pedestria …

“Pinkie, are you okay?” Twilight-the-pony-suddenly-inhabiting-the-body-of-her-human-counterpart asked. “I know this new body takes a bit of adjusting to. My first time, I spent at least five minutes just screaming and flailing around …”

“Nah,” Pinkie answered. “I’m practically a pro by now.”

“What?”

Ignoring Twilight’s baffled stare, Pinkie sauntered over to Moondancer and her friends. “So … are you girls having fun yet in your freaky hairless biped bodies?”

“Um,” Moondancer said, holding up one finger. “We’re not technically hairless.”

“Oh, way to go, Moonie!” Pinkie clapped. “You’re finging already!”

And now everyhuman in the room was staring at Pinkie, with equally baffled expressions. Twinkleshine was the first to verbalize what they all thought: “What the hay is finging?”

“C’mon, you should know!” Pinkie held out her hands and wiggled her fingers, rapidly contorting her hands into all sorts of bizarre shapes. “Humans have flat paws called ‘hands’, and these wiggly-waggly noodles on the end are called ‘fingers’. Because they fing!”

Twilight rolled her eyes. “Pinkie, fingers don’t work like that.”

Moondancer also rolled her eyes. “Pinkie, the Ponish language doesn’t work like that.”

Unperturbed, Pinkie continued, “C’mon girls! Fing my hair!” She grabbed the nearest two wrists—belonging to Lemon Hearts and Twinkleshine, as it happened—and forced both girls to plunge their hand into her own curly hair. Human Pinkie’s hairdo was somehow even larger and more unruly than pony Pinkie’s, and both girls’ hands easily disappeared into it.

“Oh, wow,” Twinkleshine said, her eyes widening.

“This feels weird,” Lemon Hearts said. “But a good kind of weird.”

———

Meanwhile, in Equestria …

“Pinkie, are you okay?” Twilight-the-human-suddenly-inhabiting-the-body-of-her-pony-counterpart asked.

“I guess?” Pinkie answered. Suddenly, two human hands stuck out of her mane. “Honestly, it feels a little less weird than usual, this time.”

“What? ‘This time’?”

But before Pinkie could answer, Moondancer interrupted: “Twilight! I think the pony versions of us used this book to swap places with us.” She tried to hold up the book in question, but fumbled with her hooves and dropped it on the floor, again. “If we study it, I think we can find a way to swap back.”

“Great!” Twilight said. She started to reach for the book with a hoof, then stopped and glanced up at her horn. “Of course! Why use these awkward hooves when I have magic?” Her horn glowed, and the same magic aura surrounded the book, lifting it an inch off the floor.

Then the book shot upward, struck the ceiling hard enough to leave a crack, and fell back down on Twilight’s head.

“Ouch,” Twilight said, rubbing her head. “Who knew magic would be so finicky?”

———

Meanwhile, in Pedestria …

“And now,” Pinkie Pie said, producing a huge bowl filled with something white and fluffy, “the pièce de résistance: mashed potatoes!”

She plunged both hands into the mashed potatoes; Lemon Hearts and Twinkleshine immediately followed suit. As their fingers squeezed and squished the food, expressions of pure bliss washed over all three girls’ faces.

“Oh my Celestia!” Twinkleshine proclaimed. “Where has this been my whole life?”

“I know, right?” Pinkie replied.

Twilight and Moondancer just watched the scene, befuddled. At their side, Daring Do shook her head. “It’s so sad,” she said. “The body swap has driven them all crazy. But if you transfer them back quick enough, you might be able to save them.”

“Crazy?” Twilight replied. “This is pretty normal for Pinkie.”

———

Meanwhile, in Equestria …

“So,” Twinkleshine said. “We’re stuck in this universe for now, in these weird pony bodies … and you two just want to turn it into a study session?”

Twilight and Moondancer had both been poring over the magic book; at Twinkleshine’s question, they both looked up. “This book is our best bet for getting back home,” Twilight said.

“So unless you have any better ideas …” Moondancer added.

“Ooh! Ooh!” Lemon Hearts waved an unfamiliar hoof, nearly falling over in the process. “I think I’ve got one! Twilight, didn’t you say something about the other Twilight, the pony princess one, being several years older than you? Already an adult, or something like that.”

“No. I mean, yes, but …” Twilight reflexively tried to push her glasses back up her muzzle, and was slightly puzzled to find she wasn’t wearing any. “Yes, pony Twilight is older than me. But I don’t recall ever telling you that. Isn’t this the first time we’ve talked? How did you—”

“Twiliiiiiiiiight,” Pinkie Pie said, sotto voce, leaning uncomfortably close to speak directly into Twilight’s ear. “She’s trying to advance the plot. Just agree with her.”

“So,” Lemon Hearts continued, “it stands to reason that all our pony counterparts are also older than us, right?”

Twilight glanced over at Pinkie, who was nodding aggressively. (Until this moment, Twilight didn’t realize it was even possible to nod aggressively.) But Moondancer answered before she could: “Yeah, probably. Whatever.”

“Then—” Twinkleshine stood tall and beamed, “—since I’m an adult now, I’m gonna find the nearest bar and get drunk, one hundred percent legally.”

As she turned and walked away, Twinkleshine rushed to join her. “That’s a great idea! Count me in!”

“I bet I can drink you under the table.”

“Oh, yeah? Challenge accepted.”

As Twinkleshine and Lemon Hearts exited, Moondancer snorted. “How ironic. They finally figured out how to walk in these weird horse bodies, and now they want to deliberately impair themselves.”

“On the bright side,” Twilight said, “without them distracting us, we can probably get this research done faster.”

Then Pinkie suddenly squeezed between the two unicorns. “And I know what’ll help you do it even faster—a studying song!”

“Okaaaay?” Twilight said. “I guess some mood music wouldn’t hurt. Something mellow, that won’t distract—”

“I’ve got the perfect song!” Pinkie shook her head until an accordion and trombone fell out of her mane. “Prepare yourself for more motivation than your body can handle!”

Pinkie foisted the trombone onto Moondancer, then grabbed the accordion for herself. Twilight gulped, her ears folding back. “What did I agree to?”

Then Pinkie began playing, coaxing a surprisingly gentle melody from her instrument. With an equally soft voice, she sang:

“Last night I dreamt that Twilight was flying,
Fixing magic problems for us all,
Like it weren’t no thang …”

Twilight breathed a sigh and relaxed—and then Pinkie launched into the much more raucous chorus:

“Get us back into our bodies, Twilight!
Back into our bodies, Twilight Sparkle!
Don’t even think of plodding, just get us in our bodies,
Twilight baby, Twilight baby mine,
Oh Twilight baby, Twilight baby mine…”

Twilight recoiled at the sudden increase in volume—then found herself nearly blown onto her back, as Moondancer, caught up in the energy of Pinkie’s song, played the trombone accompaniment directly in Twilight’s face.

“There’s a bookshelf inside your head,
all those facts filling up your mind.
You say you're making a solution for us.

“But you’re taking way too long, oh Twilight!
Don’t make me get the prong, oh Twilight Sparkle!
Get us in our bodies, Twilight!
That’s why I wrote this song, oh Twilight Sparkle!

“There's a place called Pedestria,
the place we wanna be,
with our best friends and a nice high school
and all our families.
Last night I dreamt that Twilight was flying,
Fixing magic problems for us all,
Like it weren’t no thang.

“We've crossed the line again
This magic’s an embarrassing thing.
If there were a crowd, they’d be laughing at us.
So get us to our bodies, Twilight …”

Twilight scrunched her eyes shut and placed both forehooves on the sides of her head. I’m not here, she thought. I’m a thousand miles away. I’m not here. I’m a thousand miles away. I’m somewhere safe and quiet.

And the song—Pinkie’s voice, the accordion, and trombone—actually grew quieter it continued:

“When you’re in the zone, oh Twilight …”

I’m somewhere safe and quiet, Twilight mentally chanted. I’m somewhere safe and quiet.

Keeping her physical eyes closed tightly, Twilight opened her mind’s eye, taking in her familiar mental constructs of her Mind Palace. Ancient wooden bookshelves—rows upon rows of them, loaded with literally every book imaginable—stretched as far as she could see. Nearby sat a well-worn armchair with a matching ottoman, the ideal imaginary seat for some serious reading time.

“Where do you go to, Twilight?”

Pinkie’s song was still audible through the thick walls of Twilight’s Mind Palace, but barely so. Twilight only heard it as a distant echo, like a train whistle on the other side of town.

Much better, Twilight thought. Now I can finally … What’s that?

Twilight saw something unexpected—something she hadn’t conjured from her own thoughts. Sitting in her comfy armchair was brightly colored gift box, its pink wrapping paper and blue bow a marked contrast to the soft earth tones of its surroundings. Gulping once, Twilight untied the bow, then slowly lifted the lid.

Pinkie Pie stared back out, then chirped, “Hello in there!”

“Ahhh!” Twilight stumbled backwards and fell, but didn’t hit the floor. Her Mind Palace dissolved into fog around her …

… and she returned to the waking world just in time for the finale of Pinkie’s song.

“Get us back into our bodies, Twilight!
Back into our bodies, Twilight Sparkle!
We’re feeling really odd, so get us in our bodies,
Twilight baby, Twilight baby mine,
Oh Twilight baby, Twilight baby mine...”

As the song wound down, Moondancer stopped playing—then she stared at the instrument in her hooves as if seeing it for the first time. With an “Ugh!” she tossed it away. “I’m sorry, Twilight. I don’t know what came over me …”

But before Twilight could reply, Pinkie butted in: “Don’t worry, Moondancer, I didn’t forget you! I’ve got a song for you, too!”

She shook two keytars out of her mane and passed one of them to Twilight. From somewhere unseen, a drum machine began playing an unmistakable beat, and Pinkie sang:

“We’re no strangers to magic.
You know the rules and so do I …”

———

Meanwhile, in Pedestria …

“So, you wanna know all about that magic book that got you into this mess?” Daring Do asked.

Twilight and Moondancer exchanged glances. They certainly wanted to know, but neither of them had actually asked.

“Alright,” Daring continued, “I can tell you all about it …”

***

The drugs were beginning to wear off.

Starswirl the Bearded blinked. Then he blinked again. Then, just for a little bit of variety, he widened his eyes.

He didn’t much care for that. Light, he decided, was entirely overrated.

“I agree wholeheartedly,” Luna said.

Starswirl rubbed his eyes and looked over his shoulder. Luna was moving through his study, tidying up stray papers and various enchanted knick-knacks.

“It’s rude to read minds,” Starswirl said.

“Then it’s a good thing I don’t need to,” Luna said, crossing around his desk. She went to the window and threw it open.

Light flooded through, reaching Starswirl’s eyes with the gentle caress of a Yak Masseuse. He swore pathetically and pulled his hat down over his eyes.

“See?” Luna said. “Everyone always thinks the same thing when they wake up from a hangover. ‘Oh, woe is me, however shall I face the dawn, why has this thing I’ve done to myself happened to me, who doesn’t deserve it in the slightest and kisses puppies and teaches magic to poor orphan children and--”

“Yes, yes,” Starswirl said irritably. He leaned back in his chair and harrumphed. He harrumphed once or twice more for good measure, as though making absolutely sure his point had been made, before a thought struck him.

“Hungover,” he said. “What makes you think--”

“You were doing dimension things again,” Luna said.

“Don’t have to be high to do dimension things,” Starswirl grunted.

“No, but when you ring up the dimension with those short little whatsits and buy another tin full of ‘tobacco’, we all know how your evening is going to go. Anyways, you didn’t exactly do a good job of hiding it. You were storming around the castle raving.”

Her tone had taken on an all-too-gleeful tone. Starswirl lifted his hat to peer out at her as she worked. “What are you doing?” he asked.

“Cleaning up after you,” Luna replied. “You went on an enchanting spree. I found a coloured pencil last night, you should SEE what it did to Celestia’s mane. Half of this nonsense could do anything, but I’m inclined to think most of it is aimed at her. You never know what might come in handy down the line.”

“You seem to know more about what I did last night than I did,” Starswirl said.

Luna laughed. “I will never forget last night,” she said. “You’re quite the poet when the mood takes you. ‘Rose-headed, rose-scented, rose-coloured trollop.’ Beautiful.” She shook her head and pointed to Starswirl’s desk. “Anyways, I’m letting you hold onto your piece de resistance for the night. I don’t want to go anywhere near that thing.”

“Mm, yes…” Starswirl said. He turned his attention back to the book in his hands. He flicked through its pages, each one an illustration of a strange mirror of himself, accompanied by a short passage. “Yes, that much I do remember… oh dear. I should probably apologize to Celestia.”

“Why?” Luna laughed. “You weren’t wrong. And frankly you were too prosaic for her to really be mad about it. At least if you hadn’t belted it out for the whole court to hear. The Duchess of Whinnipeg fainted.”

She dropped her assorted odds-and-ends in a velvet sack and slung it over her shoulder. She paused for a moment, looking around the study, and began to sort the papers. “Never could keep house,” she muttered. “Still, I suppose it’s not completely fair for you to criticise her for needing to ‘get some cock in her without putting everything in a five dimension radius at risk’, considering the end product filled with so many of your proclivities.”

Starswirl shut the book defensively. “I see you’ve been out plundering booty as well,” he said.

Luna put a hoof to her chest. “I’m not judging,” she said. “Well, much, anyways. Your obsession with those odd… noodly things--”

“They’re called humans and they’re not weird, they’re elegant--”

“Notwithstanding, I would be more comfortable with them without the High School Dimension,” Luna said.

Starswirl began a retort, but paused. “That what?” he asked.

“The High School Dimension?” Luna said. “The Dimension where everyone’s identity is inexplicably tied to a high school or trendy local hangout? Did you think we didn’t know about it?”

“No, I--It’s the College Dimension, isn’t it?” Star swirl asked

Luna cocked an eyebrow at him. “No,” she said. “No, not even a little bit.”

Starswirl stared at her for a moment. He opened a drawer at his desk and pulled out a stack of papers, and began sorting wildly through them. “Oh shit,” he said. “I forgot to carry that one.” He was quiet for a moment, then said again, “Oh shit. I’ve been banishing people to a High School Dimension. They must think I’m so terribly cruel.”

“Oh, don’t worry,” Luna assured him. “We all just think you’re a weird pervert.”

“That’s not better!” Starswirl shouted. Then he paused. “Wait,” he said. “Why have you been letting me teach you, then?”

Luna shrugged. “I sneezed and opened a portal to a dimension of angry scottish dragonflies. It seemed worth the risk. Don’t worry, history has a way of forgetting about little things like this.”

***

Meanwhile, in the future that was the present...

“Give me a bucket, please,” Twilight said.

“I mean it’s not like he was actually a weird pervert,” Daring Do said.

“Give me a bucket please,” Twilight insisted.

“It looks like Pinkie and the others are finished with their mashed potatoes,” Moondancer said. “You can use that soon.”

“Anyways,” Daring Do continued, “Luna’s journal didn’t have a lot to say about why it was locked away. Just three pages worth of ‘nah man fuck this shit’. But I think we can at least draw some conclusions based on what we do know.”

“Like what!?” Twilight demanded.

“Apparently a pretty comprehensive list of fetishes,” Moondancer said. “Morphologically speaking, anyways.”

“Naw, Luna’s Journal also mentioned a bondage dimension,” Daring Do said.

“Noted,” Moondancer said.

Twilight shrieked. Or she would have, but the noise was too high-pitched to be audible.

“Anyways,” Daring Do said, waving her hands as though to banish the subject, “Luna is pretty open on Starswirl’s ‘hit it and quit it’ philosophy--”

A nearby dog exploded.

“--so it’s pretty unlikely that we’re going to be stuck here for long. There has to be some kind of easy mechanism for getting back.”

“That sounds about right,” Moondancer said. “Guy did a lecture at my university once. He seemed…” She glanced at Twilight, who had almost finished off her panic attack. “Dimension-hopping is probably cigarettes for this guy. We could just--”

“No!” Twilight snapped as she finally returned to Pedestria. “Nobody is sullying starswirl’s legacy any worse than they already have! Especially not with… that!”

“He’s not dead, he doesn’t really have a legacy,” Moondancer said. “Also, ‘That’? Girl you were in college for six years.”

“You forgot to introduce me to your friends for like three hours after we met,” Daring Do said. “I don’t feel like you have that much room to talk.”

“Put some asocial girls together in a library during exam season and miracles will happen to work out the stress,” Moondancer said. She looked over her shoulder and added, “Speaking of.”

Twinkleshine, Pinkie Pie and Lemon Drops had returned, their hands all dripping with all matter of goop.

“Finging!” Twinkleshine declared. “It’s the new hotness! You guys have to try this!”

“No!” Twilight shouted.

“Come on, Twilight!” Pinkie said. She leaned her head in Twilight’s direction. Her hair seemed to lean as well, as though reaching out to Twilight’s hands. “Fing me!”

“N--” Twilight began, but stopped. After a moment of herculean effort she managed to say, “No. No! No. Nobody is finging anybody. We are going to go to a library, and we are going to find every book on magic in this Celestia-forsaken dimension, and we are going to find an actual, real, normal solution to this problem that definitely cannot be solved by insinuating the man who is basically my magical grand-teacher is some kind of--

***

“Absolute Genius!” the Twilight from Pedestria said. “This Starswirl was brilliant! Combining dimensional quantum physics with his magic--he could have revolutionized science! I wonder why his studies don’t seem more popular?”

Moondancer spritzed Pinkie with a spray of water before she could start up another congratulatory musical number. She smiled to herself. She was starting to get pretty good at this whole ‘magic telekinesis’ thing.

Then the water bottle turned to sand and the water fell in her lap.

“Who knows,” She tutted irritably. “Bad lecturer maybe. Anyways, I’m just glad he had the decent sense to put in a failsafe to the spell. However long it will be. ‘When the midnight of ours and the midnight of thine meet to make sweet bon-diggity’. I hope that’s soon…”

“Oh, Equestria and Pedestria experience day/night cycles at about 1.335:2.227,” Pinkie Pie said. “The next midnight sync should be in about six hours!”

Both Twilight and Moondancer blinked slowly at Pinkie Pie.

“Should we, uh…” Moondancer said.

“She’s probably right,” Twilight said. “Celestia only knows how.”

“Okay,” Moondancer said. “Then--” she paused. “Did you just swear on your principal?”

Twilight waved a hand dismissively. “The point is, it’s all good news. All of this mess is going to clear up on its own is a few hours. We just have to wait it out! And try not to do anything stupid in the mean--”

“Hold up,” Moondancer said.

Twilight blinked.

“We’re in a magic library, right?” Moondancer said.

Overhead, a book flapped past.

“I think that would adequately describe this, yes,” Twilight said.

“And the people in our bodies in our dimension--they’re effectively us too, right?”

“Everything but the fingers!” Pinkie said. “They think it’s a verb. It’s adorable!”

“So it stands to reason they’re probably trying to find a solution too, right?” Moondancer said.

“Right,” Twilight said. “And like us, they’d… oh. Oh, I see what you mean.” She looked down at the book. “They’re not going to have the answers.”

They exchanged a long, worried look.

“I saw a reference to a hand-mirror that can see into other dimensions,” Twilight said. “I’ll go see if I can find it and get in touch.”

“I’ll get Twinkleshine and…” She tapped her head. “Shit, what was the other one?”

“Lemon Hearts?” Twilight said.

“Right--I’ll get them from the bar. No sense letting them roam around and possibly screw things up, and we might need the extra magic.”

“And I’ll get a broadsword!” Pinkie declared.

———

From above, Equestria’s visage looked like a shattered mass of pieces. Gaping holes of nothingness dotted its once picture-esque countrysides. Misshapen fragments of greenery and architecture lay strewn about without a care. Slowly, very slowly, a flickering pale blue aura was trying to return everything to their proper places. It had gently settled the south-eastern tip of Horseshoe Bay back into the sea, when it paused, and a purple unicorn took a deep, inebriated breath.

“Did you know that the jigshhhaw puzzle was originally created by the Coltics during the original coloniz-colo-col...coolerization era of Equestria?”

“I don’t care,” Trixie said over the lip of her cider mug.

Starlight hiccoughed. “Rockhoof’s friends had just finished the first ever map of Equeshtria, when one of them joked that since they had spent so much of the journey washted, they probably couldn’t even remember where they’d been or where everything was.” Starlight gestured wildly with her flagon, causing a healthy amount of the golden apple extract to slosh over the edge. Trixie thought about saying something as she watched the liquid fall towards their incomplete jigsaw puzzle, but without even looking Starlight caught it all in an envelope of telekinesis and shot it right into her mouth, gulping loudly. “So when one of them said ‘Yer full of shit, ShhhhhhPEARTTIP!’ the map ended up being chopped into a hundred pieces. Each of them tried to put it back together. None of them could!” Starlight held her hooves out in front of her, and brought them together with agonizing slowness. A note of awe crept into her voice. “Only by working…TOGETHER was the map reshtored. Do you get it, Trix?! It’s, like, a friendship thing.”

“Uh-huh,” Trixie gazed down into her mug. Trixie was very confused. For one, Trixie very much doubted there was even much alcohol in these beverages. So Starlight was a breezie-weight? Trixie would file that away for later use. “Trixie bets you learned that story from Sunburst, right?” She grinned.

Starlight’s blush was visible through her coat. “Nooo. That’s the teasing voice, Trixie!”

“The teasing voice at least brings me joy. Why are we even playing with a jigsaw puzzle anyway?”

“Because board games are coooool,” Starlight drawled, scooping up a bunch of puzzle pieces. “And puzzles are good for the brain.”

“There are countless party games more suited to a mare’s night in! Spin the bottle? Twister? Reverse charades? Truth or dare?!”

A massive smile split Starlight’s face “Those don’t really work with only two people, shhilly.”

Trixie narrowed her eyes and pulled a long swig from her mug. “T-trixie knew that.”

Starlight gasped. “You’ve never played party games before have you, Trix?” Starlight considered what she just said. “That’s so sad…”

“Trixie recommends falling silent before-”

Starlight’s telekinesis, unfathomably strong, plucked Trixie from her seat and tossed her into the unicorn’s outstretched forelegs. The ensuing hug tested Trixie’s rib cage, and she inwardly groaned. She had always thought Starlight hated the touchy feely stuff.

Still, it was hard to stay mad at Starlight’s wide, watery eyes as she looked up at her. Trixie sighed, and moved a random puzzle piece into its proper place. Probably.

A sudden alarm, high pitched and piercing, blared throughout Twilight’s castle, and both mares yelped. Trixie looked around in a panic, while Starlight remained seated, sluggish and confused.

“What in the name of Hoofdini’s holy fetlocks is this?!”

Starlight blinked, as deep in thought as a drunk could manage. Then grinned and lurched to her hooves. “It’s the THING!”

“The map?” Trixie offered in a tiny voice.

“No no!” Starlight magically heaved Trixie into the air like a sack of potatoes and started to leg it through the halls.

They arrived in a room which Trixie failed to recognize. Besides the shelves upon shelves of books that Trixie couldn't have cared less about, she found her attention set upon and assaulted by a monstrosity of wires and technomagical clutter in the centre of the room. It all flowed into what appeared to be a mirror. If a mirror had a swirling pink vortex in place of its glass. The whole thing reeked of Twilight and Trixie suddenly felt tired.

"Trixie requests an explanation," she asked. Without a care, Starlight released her magic, leaving Trixie in a Great and Powerful crumple on the cold, unforgiving crystal. So pretty, yet so cruel.

"It's the thing, Trixie. You know the thing. It shouldn’t be working right now though. Shhomething is w-wrong."

Trixie staggered to her hooves. "Names exist for a reason Starlight. They're specifically to prevent situations like this."

In lieu of a response, Starlight held up a hoof and ignited her horn. Curling wisps of magic gathered at the end of her hoof, forming what appeared to be five distinct tendrils. Trixie looked on, perturbed. Each wisp flexed independently, and took on the appearance of some bizzare pack of sausages. Trixie recalled Starlight mentioning such unsettling digits before. Trixie looked up from Starlight's fingers.

"Oh... that thing.”

———

“Are you sure you know what you're doing?” Moondancer asked from the safety of cover.

“Does any of us ever truly know what we're doing? In a reality where science has proved woefully unequipped to explain our current existence, can we really judge anything through the unrelenting veil of our brain's inherent subjectivity?”

Twilight was hunched over a desk, muttering to and frantically fiddling with what appeared to be a small, handheld mirror. Her hooves moved with attempted dexterity, trying to articulate fingers that currently didn't exist, and an ominous aura of frustration was beginning to radiate from the girl.

“Twilight,” Moondancer offered carefully. “Use your smart person words. Just... ones that make sense this time.”

“I'm saying chaos reigns, Moondancer!” Twilight snapped. She continued, brighter. “And I've almost got it!”

“You can get through to them?”

“Yes! No! Maybe. Weren’t you going off to find Twinkleshine and Lemon Hearts?”

“They’re standing right over there,” Moondancer gestured to far rear of the library, at a makeshift barricade created out of books. The perky pair of unicorns waved merrily from the other side.

“Hi!” Lemon called, her voice distant.

Twilight blinked. “But-”

“You’ve been at this for three hours,”

“Three?! That’s half our time before Starswirl’s failsafe kicks in to let us home!”

“Yeah, we thought about saying something, but you were really into it,” Twinkleshine chirped. So ya done yet?”

“I…” Twilight took a deep breath. “No. Almost.”

The mirror she levitated up for everyone to see was rather unremarkable to look at. A small, silvery affair with a few faded pieces of gilding running up the handle. It looked old. Possibly ancient.

“I’m positive this is a device for peering into other dimensions.”

“Is that all it does?” Moondancer asked.

“What, you think something dangerous would just be left hanging around a library?”

“I’m still not convinced Equestrians know what the word dangerous means. So, maybe?”

“Well, this is all we have to go on, and what’s worse, this thing has got me bit by the curiosity bug.” She looked at Moondancer pleadingly. “I’m a scientist, Moon, and I can feel the sunk cost fallacy gnawing at my brain. I need to know how this works. I’ve been trying to figure out how to activate it. I eventually decided on a brute force approach of incanting every combination of words I know with every combination of applied pressure to the device. It may be our only hope and… why are you looking at me like that?”

“Because you’re a crazy person!” Moondancer barked hysterically. ”Isn’t there a manual we can look at?”

“There is, but…” Twilight quickly rummaged through the sheets of paper on the desk. When she looked back she had a specific sheet clenched between her forelegs. “It’s currently being rented out.”

“By who? Maybe we can find them,”

“About that…” Twilight chuckled nervously. Moondancer snatched the piece of paper in her telekinesis and snapped it straight before her eyes.

“Currently rented out by library member…’Moondancer,’” she read solemnly.

“Ohhhhhh,” Lemon Hearts’ voice echoed quietly.

The sheet of paper erupted into flames in Moondancer’s grip. Unsettlingly, her face appeared ice cold.

“Well…” Moon finally said. “I can’t say that doesn’t sound like me.”

“I don’t suppose you know where you’d choose to live if you were a pony from an alternate universe, do you?” Twinkleshine asked hopefully.

“No,” Moon sighed. “No, I do not.”

“I do!” yelled a smiling voice, punctuated by a cartoonishly large broadsword embedding itself deep into the ground right in front of Moondancer. Balanced atop it was Pinkie Pie, giddy with chest puffed out in pride.

“You do?”

“More specifically, I know what I would do if I were a pony from an alternate universe,” Pinkie hopped off the sword. “Phew, that was heavy. It’s like this: Pony Twilight probably got it in her head that she needed to help pony you at some point. She probably wanted to cheer pony you up, which meant throwing a party, which means coming to pony me. And if I could imagine pony me going to visit pony you’s house, pony me would likely travel to… follow me!” Pinkie spontaneously drew the sword from the ground with her tail, brandishing the massive hunk of steel with seemingly negative effort, indeed she somehow appeared even bouncier, and ricocheted from the room like a terrifyingly sharp bouncy ball. Twilight looked on, dumbfounded, but not particularly surprised.

“Follow her, Moondancer. Make sure she doesn’t maim anybody. I’ll stay here and try to brute force it. It’s not like we have anything better to do. We need to get in contact with the others. Make sure they’re ok and aren’t trying anything stupid,”

“Can we come too?” Lemon Hearts asked, peeking out from behind the barricade.

“Yeah,” Twinkle popped out too. “Twi was getting kinda … intense. It’s not like she needs us. She didn’t even know we were here,”

“No, one of you stay. Someone has to keep an eye on her.”

“I’m right here, you know,” Twi put in weakly as she slumped down at her desk. With her hooves, she cradled the mysterious mirror.

“Arbitrarily, I choose Lemon Hearts,” Moondancer said. “Twinkleshine, let’s go.”

———

“Why does everything involving this man invariably link back to sex!?” Twilight almost flung the latest book they’d found on Starswirl to the ground. A certain passage caught her eye, which was all that stayed her hand.

“I thought he was your Great Grandteacher or something? A real unbroken pedestal type by your account,” Daring Do said lazily, reclining with her hands behind her head.

“I’m increasingly tempted to re-evaluate the integrity of such masonry in light of the mounting evidence.” Twilight said through gritted teeth.

It had been the same story in every library they visited. Surprisingly, Starswirl had been a pretty prominent figure even in Pedestria’s history. Myths of a bearded man who could open portals between dimensions abound in certain corners of their folklore. Unfortunately, a distressing number of these tales had turned out to be cautionary fables of a more… mature variety. Promiscuous behaviour, Stood up dates, outlandish sexual decadence. The consequences of which could all be deftly evaded simply by sidestepping through a portal back into parts unknown.

“And after hours of this, are we any closer to knowing how to get back?” Moondancer asked, looking over the assembled books.

“I just found this.” Twilight ran a finger along the passage. “Earliest accounts of Starswirl depicted him with a small handheld mirror, which he used to peer ahead into whatever world he was planning to travel to next.”

“Oh, the Unemployed Shaving Mirror of Deployment? I think I know a bit about that.” Moondancer said.

“The what?” Daring raised a single incredulous eyebrow.

“I picked up a whole bunch of reading material last month. One of them was about a very short lived item used by Starswirl the Bearded. One of his… friends,”

“I know there’s a ‘with benefits’ after that word, Moon…”

“I didn’t want you freaking out, okay? But one of his friends gave him a mirror to help him shave with. Obviously, that never ended up happening. That would ruin his brand. So he instead repurposed it with his portal magic to burrow an audiovisual hole into other dimensions. It let him look around and talk to people without needing to create whole portals each time.

“So, if our human selves are anything like us, they might find out about this mirror too and use it?” Twilight posited. She was visibly trying to control the nervous tremors in her arms. “That sounds like it could be... ok,”

Moondancer winced and shook her head. “He stopped using it for a reason.”

“Which was?” Twilight narrowed her eyes.

“I… didn’t reach that part,” Moondancer averted her gaze and flushed.

“You didn’t finish the book?! You? Not finishing a book?!” Twilight squealed under her breath.

“I know. I got kinda distracted. I also picked up ‘85 Unexpected Uses for Ancient Somnambulen Hieroglyphics.”

Twilight hissed. “You poor fool! You never stood a chance.” She began to pace the room, mumbling to herself. “For my sanity I’m going to pretend that none of that was important,”

But-”

“Just let me have this!” A shaking purple hand added the book she was holding to the pile. “Now, let’s get back to work.”

"Ok everyone, listen carefully, because this isn't going to be easy," said Pinkie Pie. "Our target is the most heavily guarded building in all of Equestria." She waved at a giant chalk drawing of a castle on the wall.

"Seismic sensors will reveal any attempt to tunnel in, while every door in the castle is under constant guard and magically locked. The halls are patrolled by a flock of highly trained attack flamingos, and aerial approach is rendered impossible by giant fans all over the roof."

"Oh, those are supposed to be fans?" asked Twinkleshine, "I thought they were giant lollipops."

"Of course they're fans," Moondancer groaned. "We passed the castle on the way here. They're kind of hard to miss." She rolled over on the ground and looked at the sky. "Look, you can even see some all the way from here". As if to punctuate her point, there was a distant crunch as a bird flew into one of the fans.

"But they're pink! And green!" insisted Twinkleshine. "Have you ever seen fans that are pink and green?"

"That's because there's no grey chalk, silly," said Pinkie Pie. "Anyway, we need to focus if we're ever going to retrieve the Ultimate Book of Addresses and find Moondancer. Pony Moondancer I mean."

"Anyway, intelligence indicates that the objective is kept in Luna's quarters within the tower here," she continued. She tapped the drawing with her sword, which had somehow turned into a katana while noone was looking. "At nineteen hundred hours tonight, a diplomatic dinner will take place in the Gala Room here."

"That's an awful lot of hours," commented Lemon Hearts.

"It means 7pm tonight", said Moondancer impatiently.

"Oooooohhhh, that makes way more sense"

"That dinner is our ticket past security. This is the first time that Yakyakistan has sent a delegation, so noone here will know what they look like. I'll distract the real yak delegation, while Moondancer and Twinkeshine take their places to infiltrate the castle. During the dinner, you will pocket breadcrumbs to feed the guard flamingos and then feign illness and excuse yourselves from the dinner."

"Once you leave the main hall, you will have to carefully avoid any guards. I have analyzed the plans for the castle and identified the only route from the lobby to the north tower which avoids all of the locked doors and guard posts." She drew a crazy zigzag across the castle in red chalk, which went up and down and up and down stairs and all around the archives and dungeons before finally snaking its way to the top of the tower she had pointed at earlier. "Meanwhile, I will scale the outside of the tower with my ninja skills and disable the fans on the way, allowing Lemon Hearts to bring in the hot air balloon for our getaway. She will also be responsible for forging the identity papers so that Moondancer and Twinkleshine can sneak into the dinner. Got that, Lemon Hearts?"

"Huh?" Lemon Hearts looked up from where she had been trying to count on her hooves with a confused look.

Pinkie Pie happily started to repeat the entire monologue, only for Moondancer to stand up and exasperatedly provide her own retelling of the plan, which of course took even more time. "So as you can see," Moondancer concluded, "the schedule will be tight, so we don't have time for nonsense. Any questions?"

"Um, the dinner is at 7pm, right? And right now it's a bit after 2:30. So that's um..." Lemon Hearts consulted her hooves again before giving up with a frown. "Four hours, right?"

"Exactly! We've only have a little over four hours to get ready, and lots to prepare," said Moondancer. "I'm not even sure where we can find a hot air balloon on such short notice. So it would be really nice if we could get a move on."

"Only... Starswirl's failsafe will activate and bring us home in two and a half hours, right? No matter how I look at it, the times don't seem to add up."

"We just need to do the plan extra fast so we can get back in time," replied Pinkie.

This time, Moondancer turned to Pinkie Pie. "Seriously? That's your master plan?" She face-hoofed, which would have worked better if she hadn't forgotten that she had a horn now.

"Um, girls?" interrupted Twinkleshine. "I think we have a problem."

"Hey, look at this!" said the other Moondancer, shoving a book in Twilight's face so close that she couldn't possibly read it. "According to this, Star Swirl has been lying low for centuries, ever since one of his little hookups ended particularly disastorously. No wonder we haven't been able to find any more recent information about him. He could be hiding in this very library and we would never know!"

"Hmmm, that is a good point", Twilight said thoughtfully. "Have you checked the school directory?"

Moondancer leaned back in her chair. "No, I haven't, because that is a) a stupid waste of time and b) they don't have directories here anyway. Everypony here uses the internet nowadays. Are you sure you're feeling all right? We've been at this for hours. Maybe it's best if we take a break."

"I'm fine! Anyway, a break sounds like a great idea! Maybe we can go outside and use the portal in the statue to travel to a world that isn't completely crazy." Twilight looked around and then lowered her voice. "I'm not supposed to tell anypony this, but Princess Luna's address book is actually a dark magical artifact of great power. Within that tome's infinite pages lies every address in existence. We'll be able to find Star Swirl the Bearded in no time! Or in about 2-5 minutes, at least. Well plus the time it takes to—"

Twilight fell silent as she noticed a commotion at the front of the library. A tall and muscular white guy holding a bow and violin seemed to have gotten into an argument with the librarian.

"I'm sorry sir, but the library rules are very clear. No musical performances within the library."

The student broke down crying. "Nobody ever lets me do anything! I just wanted to cheer everyone up as they're studying for finals, and now I can't even do that."

Suddenly, he was engulfed in a dark purple cloud. When the smoke finally cleared, he had grown to giant size (i.e. slightly taller than normal) and was clad in a totally rad and mostly monochrome supervillian outfit. His now freaky white eyes scanned the library in determination, without a trace of the previous tears.

"Seriously? That's the third time this month," one student muttered under her breath. "Welp, guess it's time to text the dork squad again. I swear if I hear 'Equestrian Magic' one more—"

"Bulk Biceps! You don't have to do this!" shouted a much bolder student. "You know that being corrupted by Equestrian Magic never ends well!"

"Bulk Biceps is no more! I am the White Violin and We. Are. Going. To. Party!" He struck a chord on his violin, which had also turned white, and a laser shot out of the violin. Where it touched the ground, giant white loudspeakers sprouted up.

This was impressive because the strings on a violin are arranged in a curve, and thus it is impossible to play more than two notes simultaneously without excessive pressure on the bow. Four is right out. But the White Violin was just that awesome. The magic lasers were also a little bit impressive too though.

"This rulebreaking will not be tolerated! Take off that silly costume and get those loudspeakers out of here," shouted the librarian, defiant to the end.

In response the White Violin, struck another chord, which caused a laser to turn the librarian into an albino orangutan. "Ook! Ook ook ook!"

"Anyone else have an opinion they'd like to share?" asked the supervillian formerly known as Bulk Biceps. He then launched into an electric orchestral hiphop violin solo, playing both the first and second violin sections simultaneously thanks to his magical violin skills. His real violin skills helped a bit too though.

As he played, a shockwave blasted out of the loudspeakers and flung all the students against the walls and bookcases. "Oww oww oww. I think I broke my ankle," one student shouted, but nobody heard him because of the amazing music.

As Daring Do flew through the air, she assessed the situation. This violin guy didn't seem as dangerous as some of her past foes. The lasers were flashy but easy to dodge, and all his attacks were presaged by a convenient musical cue. Of course, she wasn't stuck in a frail human body before either. Then again, if she could defeat Ahuizotl with both wings injured, she could take any pony.

Daring Do teched the impact and started wallrunning along the bookcases. Luckily, she had landed in the section that housed the complete records of every decision ever by the National Lawyer Relations Board. The tight packing and even spacing of the giant tomes advertised the fact that noone in the history of the library had ever tried to read them. Which meant that they also provided a sturdy and even surface for bookcase running.

As she lept from one bookcase to the next, another shockwave bore her towards the ceiling. She air-doged off the ceiling past the next shockwave and fast-fell into a triple somersault, rolling right between the loud speakers without a scratch. Maybe humans aren't so weak and helpless after all.

Her approach seemed unnoticed by the White Violin, so she tugged on his cape, which was covered in sheet music patterns rather than being pure white, since otherwise, there wouldn't be enough contrast to appreciate the hard work of the costume designers.

The White Violin stopped playing and looked down on her in surprise.

"Hey violin dude, is it possible for an artifact to make you supernaturally full of yourself? Because you're talking like you nicked Ahuizotl's entire antique jewelry collection." Wait, what made her think that was a helpful thing to say in this situation?

Daring Do instinctually started to taunt him, only to be surprised by her own words. "Hey Mr. Violin, sorry to bother you, but I'm a really big fan of yours, and I wanted to tell you how much it means to me to be able to hear you play in person in my hour of darkness."

The White Violin looked down in interest. His eyes turned back to a friendly red color and he slowly started to shrink.

"You know, I've been an adventurer archeologist for as long as I can remember. Which is a little weird since I'm pretty sure I had a childhood at some point. And out in the jungle for months on end, battling alone against the horrors of the ancient world, my sole companion was my trusty violin. But my real dream was to some day retire and be able to listen to the music of the true greats."

"Really?"

Of course not! I haven't touched a violin in my life. "Of course!" said Daring Do. "I actually once was an aspiring violin player like you. I practiced so hard every day. It was all I dreamed of. I lived violin and breathed violin. But one day, I broke my hoof, I mean finger, and had to set my dreams aside for the boring life of an adventurer."

"Hold it!", Bulk Biceps interrupted. "I thought you couldn't play the violin anymore. Why did you bring it on your travels then?"

"Well, I got better, obviously. But I knew I could never again entertain hopes of being one of the greats. Still, my violin skills, meager as they are, bring back memories of the happiest time of my life."

Bulk Biceps appeared satisified at the lack of further contradictions in her testimony. As the two reminisced about her invented violin passion and her true life of adventuring, the other students began to emerge from hiding and started picking up the debris.

"Wait a moment," said Bulk Biceps playfully. "The fortress of clouds... the sapphire statues... do you mean the Daring Do movies are real? You must be Chestnut Magnifico!"

"Yep. Though of course, we have to build the sets ourselves because my adventures almost always end with the real things in ruins."

"Huh, I would have never guessed you were a student here. I thought actors would be so busy between shooting, and you're a real adventurer too..."

Wait for it, thought Daring Do. She prepared to fight again. He's going to figure it out any second now.

"... that's so awesome! We can be best friends in school and you can tell me about your adventures and sneak me behind the scenes of the movie sets and everything... Hey, can you autograph my violin please?"

Perfect, thought Daring Do, reaching for the magical violin. Time to liberate another dangerous artifact and fly off into the sunset while a villian howls impotently in the distance. Maybe kindness does pay off after all.

Suddenly, Bulk Biceps turned evil and slightly taller again, and started apparently talking to himself.

"..."

"What do you mean, what the buck am I doing? I'm doing exactly what we agreed to!"

At the end of the alley, a group of menacing looking unicorns looked menacingly at our poor heroes. "And just where do you think you're going?" asked one.

Twinkleshine tried to stammer out an answer, but Pinkie was faster. "To the dinner in the castle of course! Or at least those two are. Lemony and I need to find a balloon first."

A blue unicorn with pink hair and a snowflake cutiemark stepped forward. She seemed to be the leader. "So we have not been misled by the fragmentary nature of our eavesdropping. You really were invited. What a disgrace! I'm sure the reasons they snubbed mom for you worthless lot must be fascinating. Still this presents an opportunity. Give us the password and nopony need get hurt!"

"Never!" shouted Pinkie and turned around so she could wield her katana with her tail. "Wait, what password?"

Moondancer facehoofed again, but more carefully this time. "Of course there'd be a password. They wouldn't want just anyone waylaying the guests and taking their place. In fact, there's probably a seperate password per group."

"Exactly!" said the blue unicorn. "Which is why Queen Gossamer needs your password to go to the big dinner she was so rudely disinvited from in your place. It should be on the back page of your invitation."

The ponies went into a huddle. "I think we should do what they want," said Lemon Hearts. "The plan wasn't going to work anyway, and there's bound to be a better way."

"Yeah, what she said," said Twinkleshine. "Who has the invitation anyway?"

"THERE IS NO INVITATION!", shouted Moondancer.

"Yes there is. We just need to get it from the yaks before we take their place, silly!" said Pinkie.

At the end of the alley, the unicorns watched the huddle. "Princess Cara," one said, "I don't think this will work. What do we do if they refuse to give up the password?"

"Oh, just cocoon 'em and go through their stuff. The invitation is bound to be somewhere," Cara said. "Hopefully, it will not come to that."

The strange ponies concluded their deliberations. "We reject your offer and substitute our own," said the pink one. "Which is go away or die!" She turned to the others and loudly whispered "don't worry, they can't see me because I'm a ninja. This should be easy."

"Very well. Guards, open fire!"

Daring Do watched as the White Violin carried on a conversation with thin air. She considered trying to attack him while he was distracted, but she doubted that would be helpful, especially when the friendship approach almost worked once already. Perhaps the conversation would reveal clues about the mysterious entity that had turned him evil.

"..."

"What do you mean you were supposed to rain havoc and destruction, not give them a bucking therapy session, you imbecile, you need to keep spreading chaos so those idiot heroes will show up to stop you and you can defeat them and take their magic jewelry and give it to me so I can obtain ultimate power muhahahahahaha?"

"..."

"What do you mean stop repeating everything I say verbatim, I know you can hear me perfectly well, it's really quite tiresome?"

"..."

"Well I didn't repeat the part where you said buck."

"..."

"Look, I'm just saying that being able to understand your ranting doesn't mean I agree with the implied premises. For example, you told me you'd give me superpowers so I could fight a great injustice. You didn't say anything about the chaos and destruction part before."

"..."

"Well the students weren't allowed to enjoy a concert in the library and now they are. Injustice solved."

"..."

"I mean sure I'll keep playing since I'm a nice person and that's what I meant to do anyway and I didn't even get to finish the opening number. But I don't see what that has to do with..."

"..."

"You already said that. Twice."

"..."

"Ok, but I still think you are going to be disappointed. Why would they want to stop my concert? Look at how happy everyone is!"

"Can anyone please get help? My ankle really hurts," one student called out near the back of the library, but the White Violin thought he was just calling for an encore.

"..."

"What do you mean she's right behind me?"

"..."

"Stop repeating me? You stop repeating you! You already told me to stop repeating!"

"..."

The White Violin suddenly winced in pain. "Ok, sir. Understood, sir."

He turned to examine the surroundings. True to the stranger's word, Twilight and her friend had been sneaking up during the intermission to secure better seats.

"Ok girls, I know you want to get on with the concert as much as I do, so let's make this quick. This show wouldn't be possible without the contributions of listeners like you, so it would be really really helpful if you could hand over any magical jewelry you might have and tell me where the other five of you are. And if you act now, I even have a special gift for you!" He used a violin laser to give them White Violin tshirts in preemptive thanks.

"Oh no," said Moondancer, "he's gone crazy! What do we do?"

"What, did the part where he transformed into a supervillian and trash the library not clue you in?" Twilight replied. "If we find the locus of the evil magic and smash it, that should fix everything. And it's pretty clearly the violin." She reached for the violin, but Bulk Biceps was large enough to make that no easy feat, even when Equestrian Magic hadn't just made him about 20% taller.

The White Violin seized the opportunity, and with his bow hand, he grabbed at Twilight's amulet, the one that let her move the sun and moon when she wasn't busy not being a pony. Thinking quickly, Daring Do did a power slide between his legs and crashed into Twilight, knocking her away just in time. The three temporarily human ponies landed in a tangled heap on the floor.

"Hey, watch where you're going! I almost had it!" yelled Twilight, but Daring Do was already on her feet again and circling around with the inhuman agility of a veteran action hero.

"Wouldn't have worked anyway," said Daring Do without looking down, keeping her eyes on the White Violin. "You need to do the friendshippy thing like before. I'll distract him as long as I can." She held up a cheap plastic imitation of the Amulet. "Hey grabby, I've got your magic artifact right here. Come and get it!"

"What the hay is the friendshippy thing?" Twilight wondered.

"How would I know? I wasn't even—" Daring Do dodged another laser, leaving white scorch marks on the carpet. "— there. I just read about it while we were researching Star Swirl. Apparently, this kind of thing happens pretty often around here. Just do what the other you did before. Aren't you penpals or something?" She ducked under a thrown loudspeaker, which exploded with a giant crash against the rear wall of the library, causing the students to duck for cover again.

"That's impossible. I always had friends with me before!" shouted Twilight over the noise, provoking a rather cross "Excuse me!?" from Moondancer.

"Then call them!", shouted the White Violin angrily. "That was apparently the whole purpose of this farce anyway! The sooner Lord Dumplin assembles his stupid lucky charms bingo, the sooner we can enjoy the music Like. Sensible. People!"

Suddenly, a bookcase swung away from the wall and an old, bearded, man stumbled out. "Can you keep it down please? Some of us are trying to work!" yelled Star Swirl, who had carefully located his office behind a bookcase full of NLRB rulings to avoid the risk of ever having to do any work.

"Come on out and live a little. Enjoy the music," said the White Violin. "All work and no play makes you a dull boy. Unless you'd rather become an orangutan?"

"That will not be necessary," Star Swirl said, as circles of glowing runes appeared around his hands. "Now begone!"

"Wait, don't do this! He's just a student, not a monster to be banished! We can turn him back and fix all this if you give us a chance," said Daring Do, Twilight, and Moondancer. But it was too late. Star Swirl brought his hands together and released a blast of Pedestrian Magic. At the last moment they jumped in front of the White Violin to try to save him. There was a flash, and then there wasn't a Twilight, or a Daring Do, or Moondancer.

"You didn't see anything," Star Swirl said to the shocked students, then turned and slammed his secret bookcase door.

"Aww man, I should have been more careful about getting pastel chalk dust all over my ninja suit!"

"What, like a black suit would have been any more stealthy? It's broad daylight out in case you somehow didn't notice."

"More like late afternoon. It's almost three. Which means we really need to get going to get back in time."

"Watch it Lemon Hearts! Your horn keeps poking into my back!"

"Hey, it's not my fault they put me in the cocoon thingy upside down."

"Chrysalis"

"What?"

"It's green and semi-transparent. It's a chrysalis, not a cocoon."

"Whatever, we need to get out of here fast, so we can find the book in time."

"Didn't we just agree the heist plan was impossible anyway?"

"Hey, I wonder how Twilight's doing. She probably doesn't have to deal with floating upside down. My head feels funny."

"Wait a moment. If Lemon Hearts is here, who's with Twilight?"

"Oh don't worry. I left her with The Other One."

"Screw you!"

"Wait, who was the other one again?"

"That green haired chick that was following us around. Remember?"

"You mean Lyra? I'm pretty sure I would have noticed if she was here."

"I'm right here!"

"Oh hi Other One. I didn't notice you out there. Are you Lyra?"

"Seriously? We've known each other since Kindergarden!"

"..."

"I'm Wallflower Blush. Nice you meet you. Again."

"Hey, how come Wallflower gets to be outside the cocoon? I wish I was outside. Floating upside down is making me dizzy!"

"Because everyone is blind and always leaving me behind. Don't worry, I'm used to getting left out of everything. It's still a bit frustrating sometimes though."

"Then why are you here?"

"Because I hoped that if I went on enough adventures with you, you might finally grow a spot check?"

"No, I mean, why not like go get help or something? We need to stop those weird bug ponies before they finish searching our stuff and find the invitation."

"THERE IS NO INVITATION!"

"Wait, where'd the other one go?"

"Who?"

"Ugg, this is hopeless," said Changeling #1. "I've already looked through everything twice. They must have hidden the invitation somewhere else."

"Hey Glinster, come check this out," said Changeling #2. "They made a drawing on the wall."

Changeling #1, who probably didn't even have a name, walked over to look at the drawing. "It's a nice castle and all, but I don't see what that has to do with anything."

"See the lollipops? This is the Gumdrop Keep. Those ponies must have been in contact with Nihilbog! Maybe it knows where the invitation is."

Changeling #1 examined the drawing more closely. "Are you sure about that Swiftbow? Nihilbog would have told us if ponies showed up in Candyland." Suddenly she was struck with an awful realization. "This isn't just any drawing. Look at the red arrow. These are invasion plans. We have to warn Nihilbog immediately."

She looked up, only to notice that her nameless fellow changeling had vanished. "Swiftbow? Where'd you go?"

Suddenly, there was a rush of wings from above, and then there were two.

Changelings #3 and #4 looked up. "Did you hear that scream? I think Glinster and Swiftbow are in trouble!" said #3. They carefully edged around the giant chrysalis, horns ready to blast the intruder. "Show yourself, you monster!" said #4.

"With pleasure," said A.K. Yearling as she dropped out of the sky and dispatched the two with a flying double kick. She turned to Cara and said, "Looks like it's just the two of us now." (And me! interjected Wallflower)

Princess Cara, who was also A.K. Yearling now, experimented with her new body. "These bones possess uncommmon strength," she said approvingly. "You are no ordinary pony. By what cause were you empowered so?"

"I am but a humble author," Yearling said, "helping out those in need as anypony would in my stead should the caprices of fate so decree it. If I fight with the force of a thousand, it is because along me stand the legions of all those whose hearts manifest justice and kindness and all that is good in this world... But just between you and me, I've kicked way bigger butt than you so scram!"

Cara was unintimidated. "Your undecorous yet prideful language betrays the fallibility of your tactical assessment, for in me you have at last met your match and more. There is no action open to you which these bones cannot answer in equal measure."

"Really?" asked Yearling. "Riddle me this: What have I got in my pocket?"

Cara indulgently reached into her pocket and pulled out a ring. "A ring," she answered, "with manufacture apparently unknown to the modern world, and yet my arts have nonethless duplicated it with utmost fidelity. I confess that I can not perceive the applications to which you intend to put this device, but I shall observe and mirror your actions and thereby derive whatever benefit or advantage you hope to achieve."

"It's not just any ring," said Yearling. "It's the Noetherian Ring, forged in the dark depths of the Krull dimension in time immemorial and guarded by fearsome beasts against all who would use it for evil. At least it was up until last week, when it came into my possession through circumstances so astonishing, so breathtakingly audacious, that their future chronicler will find it necessary to temper them with minor misrepresentations and fanciful fabrications merely so as to endow the tale with sufficient versimiltude such that it will not engender in its audience disbelief sufficient for them to abandon the enterprise of reading althogether!"

"... buuuuut I digress. The important part is that you can't copy the power of ancient artifacts like this." She pulled out the ring and helf it aloft, causing it to glow brightly as an invisible choir started to chant in a long forgotten language.

Cara held her own ring up, but nothing happened. "No! This cannot be! I must depart to make more careful study of this—".

While she was distracted, Wallflower jumped and tackled her to the ground, forcing Cara to sheepishly turn into a small bird and fly away. "God, I thought she was never going to shut up. Speaking of which, how did you learn to talk all fancy like that, Miss Yearling?"

"I am a professional author, you know. Now, I believe your friends are in need of rescue." A.K. Yearling picked up a katana lying on the ground and started to hack away at the giant chrysalis.

With a loud crack, Twilight, Moondancer, and Daring Do reappeared in Equestria, now once more in pony form. In fact, they ended up right by the others, who had just been rescued from a changeling attack. Meeting their pony human counterparts led to many humorous misunderstandings and misadventure which must sadly remain undocumented because this story has rambled on far too long already.

"...well, now that that's all been cleared up, can you help us out with the heist? We need to find Luna's magic address book so we can find the other Moondancer and find the book she borrowed from the library so we can figure out how to use Twilight's mirror. Pinkie made this elaborate plan to get it, except it was doomed in so many ways I can't even count, but maybe with the power of a pony princess we can find a way to make it work again," said Moondancer.

"Wait, you mean this book?" asked the other Moondancer, as she pulled out the old library book.

The two began reading the book. "Oh no, we have to warn Twilight!" one Moondancer said. "No, I mean our Twilight", she added as pony Princess Twilight looked up in confusion. "She must still be in the library, working on the mirror."

Suddenly, her Twilight appeared, reflected in a small oval floating in the air. "Hey everyone! I finally figured out how to make the mirror work!" she announced excitedly. "Turns out it just needed new batteries the whole time. Anyway, what did you figure out with the book?"

"According to this book, there's a reason Star Swirl stopped using the mirror. You see, the mirror works by creating a hole through space and time to channel sound and images. But Star Swirl's overuse of the mirror basically turned reality into swiss cheese. He theorized that even a few more holes could be enough to destablize the fabric of spacetime and cause all of reality to collapse."

"That's ridiculous! Even if physics worked that way, what are the odds that just one hole would—"

Scootaloo kicked her space scooter through the rings of a lonely rainbow planet, admiring the view for the last time. One by one, without any fuss, the stars were going out.

"Well, J-dogg, we had a good run of it. See you on the other side." Scootaloo turned to her mouse-deer companion, who was watching the disappearing galaxy with alarm.

"What's going on, Scoots?" asked the diminutive tragulid. "We need to do something! Do you think the Ten Shards Made Whole can fix this?"

Scootaloo opened her half of the locket, which contained a photo of a strange orange earth pony with purple hair and a butterfly cutie mark. "No," she said at long last. "There's no stopping this. Not this time. But perhaps this end may also be the beginning of something great."

We'll meet again, don't know where, don't know when,
but we'll meet again some sunny day.
Did you know you're all my very best friends?

Author's Note

These ponies should report to Principal Celestia’s office immediately:

Story wrote from the beginning to "Oh you've got to be kidding me!" said...

KylerThatch wrote from ...Daring Do, who gave up flailing at the doorknob... to And once again, Daring Do was interrupted by...

Rytex wrote from the green skinned one, to "Alright then. Lead the way."

Rainbow wrote from Unaware that Daring Do was looking for them... to It was the book Daring Do was looking for, still in Equestria!

LordVatek wrote from “Right this way!” to “Yep. This is happening again.”

Meta Four wrote from Meanwhile, in Pedestria … to “I can tell you all about it …”

Kegisak wrote from The drugs were beginning to wear off, to “And I’ll get a broadsword!” Pinkie declared.

GingerNinja wrote from From above, Equestria’s visage... to “Now, let’s get back to work.”

And Story wrote from "Ok everyone, listen carefully..." to the end.

Chapter 3: Your Lyra Is In Another Chapter

“Look, Bonfire, she’s waking up!”

“Ugh, Lyra, no, that sounds terrible.”

“Bonnet?”

“Better.”

Daring Do felt worse than the time she failed to evade a swinging log trap in the Jungle of Jascone. The soreness she felt was compounded by the fact that she had yet to grow accustomed to this new alien physiology. Her eyelids felt heavy, and she could barely make sense of the chatter she heard as she slowly came back to consciousness. But soon she recognized a very familiar voice, and her eyes snapped open as she bolted upright.

“YOU!” She pointed an accusing finger straight at Lyra. “Give me…” She immediately regretted her actions, as it felt like the room suddenly seemed to tilt as her vision clouded over.

“I think you need to leave, Ms. Heartstrings”, said a firm, commanding voice. “You’re agitating the patient.”

“Oh. I guess I’ll just wait outside, then?”

“And you,” said the nurse who just now came into view, “do try to take it easy for a bit. Now let’s have a look at you.”

“There is no time! I must pursue--”

“Take. It. Easy. NOW.”

“Yes, ma’am.”

For the next ten minutes, Daring Do was subjected to a horrifying battery of probing tests. A light was shined directly into her eye. At some point, the nurse shoved a stick into her mouth.

“You’re lucky you didn’t suffer a concussion from that.”

“I’m not sure what happened, exactly. One second I’m attempting to open a door, then I suddenly lose consciousness and wake up here.”

“Oh, Lyra accidentally slammed the door into you. Believe me, you’re not the first person she’s sent here doing that.”

Soon afterwards, after the nurse was content that there was no lasting damage, Daring Do was allowed to leave. She would have to work double-time to pursue her quarry. Because of the delay caused by the nurse’s examination, Lyra now likely had a healthy head-start. No matter, she had successfully pursued the thief and her compatriots this far. And if Daring Do could catch at least one among their number (though that does beg the question of where the other four had gone), she would be that much closer to recovering the real Falcon.

Imagine her astonishment when that very person appeared out of nowhere, wrapped her in a tight embrace, and uttered a string of apologies.