Twilight's Tiny Trouble
by Twippledash
It was a calm late evening in Ponyville. Celestia's sun was already setting and the salesponies around the market square were making final sales before calling it a night. Most of the businesses were already closed and the streets were empty save for a few random ponies passing by now and then. A spiraling and twisting rainbow trail could be seen against the clear sky as a certain pegasus was doing her evening training routines, occasionally coming dangerously close to crashing any buildings or passing ponies.
All in all, it was a perfectly normal evening in Ponyville.
In the secluded basement of the public library of Ponyville the purple librarian unicorn was completely oblivious of what was happening outside, having been thoroughly sucked into her own experiments since closing the library a few hours prior. She was intensely concentrating on a spell, pointing her glowing horn towards a basket full of small rocks set on a table.
Releasing her spell Twilight Sparkle hit the basket with a beam of magic causing its contents to glow in a purple light. The glow dissipated in a bright flash, leaving the basket and the rocks in it intact. Except there were no rocks anymore; the basket was now filled with bright red apples.
Another success, Twilight smirked to herself, levitating one of the apples out of the basket and taking a bite, appraising the taste.
Hmm... not as good as naturally produced apples, but still quite tasty. Better not to tell Applejack about this experiment though, or she might think I'm about to drive her out of business.
She levitated the basket of apples aside to a growing pile of random junk on one corner of the basement, wrote a few notes on a parchment set on the table and turned back at a book next to the parchment. She had found this book in the advanced magic section of her library and decided to experiment with several spells in it. The book was titled Tricky Transformation Tricks for Talented Magicians, and sure enough it contains transformation spells with difficulties ranging from a relatively simple spell for reforming non-living objects to some very complex spells for turning a pony into an animal or even a plant. How there was that kind of dangerous and likely even illegal spells in her library, she didn't really know, not that she really cared about it either. She wasn't going to try those spells on other ponies anyway, and nopony in Ponyville aside from herself would be potent enough to be able to cast those spells as far as she knew.
She glanced at a clock on the wall noting it was already becoming quite late, but still decided to try out a few more spells before ending her experiments for the day. Skimming through the book, she noticed a spell she had not tried yet. It was a spell for simply altering the size and mass of any living being. Memorizing the spell she put the book aside and looked around to check what materials she still had. Next to the staircase there was a large potted cactus she had brought to the basement because she always bumped into it accidentally when it was up at the library. She grinned devilishly and levitated the cactus over and set in on the table.
This is for all the painful times you've pricked me you devious plant.
She concentrated on the new spell, about to shrink that two feet tall cactus into an inch-long stump. Her horn glowed brightly as she concentrated, about to release the spell—
CRASH
Suddenly a thunderous crash resounded from the library above shaking the whole tree a bit.
"What the—" Twilight started, turning to face the wooden basement door, horn still glowing brightly with the spell ready to be launched. She accidentally bumped the table while turning around, causing the cactus she was targeting a moment ago to topple over, hitting her right on the rump as it fell.
"Aaaahhh!" She jumped in sudden pain as the cactus had its revenge for her trying to shrink it. This caused her to involuntarily release the spell she had charged up and was holding. A bolt of magic shot from her horn, ricocheting from a metal pipe of some of her scientific equipment and bouncing back to where it came from, hitting Twilight squarely on her chest.
She was still a little dazed about what had happened during the last few seconds, but after collecting her thoughts she took a look around. She noticed that everything around her was growing at an alarming rate. Her eyes widened in realization as she started to panic. No, everything is not growing... I am shrinking!
"Oh no no no no no..." she pranced on place and panicked, not able to think straight at the moment to do anything useful. She continued shrinking, everything growing into enormous proportions from her viewpoint. She was just two or three inches long as the glow surrounding her finally dissipated and the shrinking stopped. Once her state was stable once again, she took deep breaths, gathered her thoughts, and managed to think somewhat coherently.
Okay, no need to panic... every spell in that book is reversible as far as I know. Just... what happened anyway? What caused that crash? She paused for a moment, thinking for possible causes. Oh well, it was probably just another failed trick attempt of Rainbow Dash, that wouldn't be the first time she made unexpected crash landing into my library... gotta scold her later about that. That can wait though, I have a more pressing issue at the moment. I'll just have to look for a counter-spell and that would fix everything like nothing had happened at all... I hope.
She glanced around the basement, looking for the spellbook. All she saw was a huge table, a gigantic cactus lying on a floor next to her, a few bookshelves here and there, an enormous pile of junk in the corner, and various scientific equipment way too large to use in her current state. She looked up at the tabletop, not seeing what was on it, but still knew the spellbook would lie there. The table was just about two and a half feet high, but as she was just about a quarter of a foot in length, it was way too high for her to reach. Too high to reach without magic or wings at least, levitating the book down wouldn't really be any problem.
She activated her horn in order to levitate the book off the table. The book refused to budge, so she put more power into the levitation. She managed to lift the book off the tabletop and levitated it over the edge of the table, finally lowering it on the floor in front of her. It landed with a loud thud as Twilight was slightly exhausted from the surprisingly energy-consuming levitation she just did.
Huh? Levitation shouldn't be that hard... even though that book is like ten times my size now, I have easily lifted objects that were way larger than this proportionally to my size at the time. I guess I can think about that later though, now to look for that counter-spell...
She flipped through the pages with her magic, looking for the page where the original shrinking spell was. She finally found the page, climbed on the book and started to read the instructions for the growth spell on the next page. Memorizing the spell she jumped off the book and started preparing the spell.
Her horn glowed, the glow growing in intensity every moment. She noticed that she needed a lot more power and concentrated harder, way harder than she had to concentrate when casting the initial shrinking spell. Still she couldn't gather enough power for the growth spell, even though it should have been almost equally energy consuming as the shrinking one. Finally after straining herself into near-exhaustion, she had to give up and let the energy diminish into nothingness. She panted and started to panic a little again.
What's wrong with me?! Why can't I gather enough energy for that simple transformation?! Okay, calm down Twilight, calm down, no need to panic... She took a few deep breaths and tried to think straight despite her panicked state—she didn't like the thought of losing her magical powers at all. Now, what could cause the significant diminishing of my magical power? There must be a reasonable explanation to this. At least I haven't lost my powers completely, that is a good sign.
She tried to recall what she had learned about the magical properties of all ponies in general and how they harness the ambient magical aura present all over Equestria. Normally ponies draw magical energy spontaneously from their surroundings, the magic building up into their body to use either for plant growing, flying, or unicorn magic, depending on the race. There is also a limit in how much power one can absorb, which varies greatly between individuals... the limit depends on different factors: inherent abilities, amount of magical training, age, and—
"Of course!" she gasped, the voice coming out as a high pitched squeak due to her tiny size. Body size affects the amount of raw magic one pony can draw to him- or herself! Under normal circumstances that wouldn't make a noticeable difference as the inherent magic-absorbing abilities are usually inversely proportional to body size, balancing the differences. But in my case, as I am artificially shrunk down to the size of a mouse...
She groaned realizing that she would not be able to transform herself back into her normal size, she would need help of some other unicorn who is adept enough with spell casting to cast transforming spells. Problem is, even the simplest spells designed for transforming living beings need very high amounts of raw magical power, and no ponies with sufficient power live in Ponyville as far as Twilight knows—except for herself of course, everypony in her family had strong inherent magical abilities and she have trained very intensely—so she would have to ask help from Canterlot.
There is a problem with that also though. Spike left to Canterlot yesterday for a few days for some royal business, so in order to contact the Princess she would need to use traditional methods, that is Equestrian postal service, which would take a few days to deliver a message.
However, more immediate issue for her at the moment was to get out of the basement. She wasn't going to spend her night in the basement in her current state as she knew that there were a few spiders living down here, she had seen them occasionally during her experiments. Normally she didn't really care, they weren't dangerous and she was not being arachnophobic or anything. But when the spiders would be almost as big as her head, she didn't really want to meet them. Those things are really scary when magnified to those proportions, probably still not dangerous, but scary nevertheless. Twilight sighed and started trotting towards the staircase, which seemed to be a few hundred feet away.
I didn't realize how dusty it was here... I really should clean up this place more often, she thought to herself as she passed numerous small pebbles and balls of dust littered all over the floor. To her some of those pebbles were the size of tennis balls and her hooves buried in dust occasionally. She noticed one of those aforementioned spiders in the distance and frowned, luckily it didn't notice her or just didn't care and it was not in the way where she was going. She put a little more speed to her trot to get away from the monster as soon as possible.
Finally arriving at the stairs she stopped and looked up at the first step. A step that was more than twice as high as she was tall.
"Oh, great," she muttered to herself. "How am I supposed to climb these?"
Teleporting is out of question, even if teleportation is a simple spell, it is still quite energy consuming and I'm sure I can't do that in my current state. Maybe if I could find something to use as additional steps or a ramp... Aha! Next to the stairs she noticed a bookshelf she used to keep some of the books she referred to most frequently during her experiments down here. She trotted over to the bookshelf and stopped there appraising the books on the lowest shelf, deciding to take two small yet thick tomes with her to use as makeshift stairs. Those books were almost as heavy as the spellbook she lifted previously, but with some effort she was able to levitate both of them at the same time despite her weakened magic.
She looked back at the stairs the books in tow and started trotting back. The trip was barely a few feet long, but from her perspective it seemed to be a hundred feet. Once there she put the books down next to the first step, noting that now she was able to climb up one step at a time, but it is still going to be a test of endurance to get all the way to the top.
I hope I'll get better soon... even carrying these books is a strenuous task in my current state, she lamented to herself and sat down resting for a moment and preparing herself mentally for the long climb ahead.
As she got back on her feet, she looked up the few dozen stairs leading to a ledge overlooking the basement level, a wooden door at the other end of that ledge. The door was slightly ajar, enough for her to squeeze through so she wouldn't have to worry about that obstacle. Huh? I usually close that door when experimenting down here. Not complaining though, it would be impossible for me to get out of here if it were closed. Oh well, here I go. She climbed up on the first book, then on the second book on top of it. From there she was able to climb on the first step and sighed, having a look of determination on her face.
One step down, only thirty nine more to go.
She levitated the top book next to her, then levitated the other book on top of it, once again forming two additional steps for herself. She used them to climb onto the second step, already feeling slightly exhausted—climbing up ledges nearly as tall as yourself can really be a strenuous task.
Two steps, thirty eight to go...
Twenty... eight... only twelve... more... steps...
Twilight splayed on one of the steps wheezing and trying to catch her breath, muscles desperately trying to tell her to stop. She looked down from the side of the step she was lying on at the moment, seeing a drop that seemed to be a few hundred feet from her point of view. She suddenly felt really glad that she didn't suffer from acrophobia.
She shook her head concentrating on the current task, there was still a dozen of steps to go. After her short rest she looked back up at her destination and got back on her hooves still determined to climb all the way up. She once again lifted the books from the lower step setting them next to her to allow herself to continue.
And... forty... finally! Never... again...
The tiny purple unicorn was lying on the floor of the ledge overlooking her basement, the climb having completely exhausted her physically. All of her muscles ached and she just lay there for who knows how long taking heavy breaths and doing nothing.
Finally she managed to to get back on her shaking hooves and looked at the clock on the basement wall. It was already long in the night, nopony in their right mind would be awake anymore. With unsteady feet she slowly wobbled towards the massive wooden door leading to the library. It was another few hundred feet to walk but walking on a level ground was exponentially easier than trying to climb stairs seemingly designed for giants.
Finally reaching the door she had managed to shrug most of her dizziness away, though her muscles still ached and she refused to even think about how she would feel tomorrow or two days from now. She easily slipped trough the gap between door frame and the slightly ajar wooden door and walked into the dimly moonlit interior of her library. She noticed even in the dim light that there were several books littered on the floor in front of one of the bookshelves, presumably thrown out of the shelf due to a high-speed collision with a pegasus if her suspicions were right. Just the typical Rainbow Dash, leaving the scene after her crash like nothing had happened and not even bothering to clean up the mess she'd made.
As Twilight trotted past the library floor still not sure where to go now, she heard a sudden ruffle of feathers from above.
"Huh?" She glanced upwards as she suddenly heard similar ruffle right next to her. She looked right and up, just to see an enormous feathery monster with two gleaming eyes pointed at her.
"Aah!" she yelped in surprise and jumped back heart racing, until she quickly realized it was just her nocturnal avian assistant. She wasn't so sure he realized her though and she was shaking a little under his intimidating gaze. "Owlowiscious! Uh... you recognize me, right?" she asked nervously.
"Hoo?"
"Me, Twilight Sparkle!"
"Hoo."
"Twilight, you owner you know?"
"Hoo."
"I said—" she started, but stopped abruptly and facehoofed once she realized who she was trying to talk with again. "Never mind. I don't think you can help me in my current situation though, so you just go do whatever you normally do when I'm not around."
Her owl assistant hooted once more and flew off out an open window to the night sky.
Twilight relaxed once more as her number two assistant left her alone, thinking what she could do now. She was unable to go outdoors as she couldn't open the door, though it wouldn't really accomplish anything anyway as there likely wasn't any ponies outside this late in the night. She came to a conclusion that she wouldn't really be able to do anything until the morning, so she could as well go to bed and get some sleep.
Except she couldn't get to bed as there was another flight of stairs on the way, and she was definitely not going to repeat the climbing exercise from earlier. She could as well find something to eat and drink as her mouth felt like sandpaper after all that strenuous physical exercise. Then she could find some comfortable nook to turn in for the night.
She trotted into the kitchen—good thing most of the rooms in the library don't have doors between them—and looked around for something she would be able to grab in her current size. She noticed a bag of oats in the corner, as well as a half-full glass of water on the counter, that was more than enough for a pony her size. She carefully levitated the glass onto the floor next to her, the glass being slightly larger than she was. She couldn't possibly reach the water without risking to topple over the glass and spilling everything on the floor, so she levitated a small glob of water drinking it out of the magic field surrounding it.
Her thirst sated after a few globs of water, she trotted over to the oat bag, levitating a few grains of oat out of it. That was a big enough snack for the night, so she gratefully ate the oats and started to look around for some padding to build a makeshift bed for herself.
Seeing nothing useful in kitchen she trotted back into the main hall lined with numerous bookshelves and squinted her eyes in the moonlight to see if there was anything comfortable and small enough to use as bed building material. She saw the feather duster normally used to dust the bookshelves lying against wall by front door and smirked. Now that same duster will have to do for her substitute bed.
She trotted over to the duster, picked it up with her magic and looked around for any good place to settle in. It didn't really matter where she slept though, it wasn't like anypony would come to visit and accidentally step on her until later tomorrow when her friends would start to wonder why she had not opened the library and get worried whether something had happened to her. She decided to just put the feather duster in some small nook next to one of the bookshelves and lay on the soft, feathery surface. Not as comfortable as real bed and also somewhat dusty as expected, but it's definitely better than sleeping on the cold and hard wooden floor, with that thought she set her head down, closed her eyes and took a few deep breaths. It was already long into night and she had been up since sunrise last morning, so she slipped into a peaceful slumber almost immediately.
Twilight stirred as bright sunlight shined on her improvised bed through the library window. She turned her side and muttered "just five more minutes" as she tried to drift back to sleep. For a moment she wondered where she was and why she wasn't sleeping in her comfortable bed, until she awoke with a start remembering her current predicament from last night.
She slumped off her feathery mattress and clambered onto her hooves, cursing her agonizingly stiff muscles. She flexed a bit to get rid of the worst of the stiffness and started walking leisurely towards the kitchen. The bag of oats and the glass of water were still where she left them last night, so she levitated another few grains of oat to eat for breakfast washing it down with a few sips of water.
Now that it was morning already, almost noon actually, she could start to think how to get the growth spell cast on herself. Obviously she should first try and find some of her friends as she couldn't do almost anything without help. She wouldn't be able to go out and look for them as there was still the impassable obstacle called door in the way, so the only thing to do would be to wait until they get worried enough and start looking for her.
She hated waiting idly though, so she trotted back into the main library room and looked around for any interesting books to read to pass some time. She ended up picking a copy of The History of Ponyville, Abridged Edition, that wouldn't last long but she could always pick more books after reading that. She had read the unabridged edition earlier but that didn't matter, she just needed something to take her mind away from waiting and the Ponyville's history was actually quite captivating. She propped the book against library wall so she wouldn't have to continuously climb on and off of the book while changing pages and started reading.
Finally long in the afternoon she heard knocking from the front door and chatter of a few familiar voices of her friends. She jumped up from the floor where she was sitting reading the book set against the wall and galloped as fast as she could—which was slightly more than a foot per second for a pony of her size—towards the door.
"Twilight? Are ya in there?" a voice with a familiar southern accent called.
"Yes! I'm here!" Twilight shouted, but she doubted her tiny voice was heard behind the door over the chatter of her friends. "Come in! I need your help!"
She arrived at the door and kept shouting at them. Her friends silenced for a moment as she kept shouting trying to get their attention through the thick wooden door.
"Do you hear that?" Rarity's voice sounded.
"Um... I think I hear something... or somepony?" a meek voice of a certain shy pegasus answered.
"Ah think ah hear somethin' too," Applejack confirmed, and then shouted through the door, "Twilight! If you're in there, answer us!" She went silent after that, waiting for answer pressing her ear on the door.
"Yes! Come in! I can't open the door for you, just come in!" Twilight yelled back with her way-too-silent voice, and the surprisingly well sound-absorbing door in between her and her friends didn't help matters. Good thing she had trusted her closest friends for where she had hidden her spare key so they wouldn't have to break the door in order to get in.
"Yep, it's Twilight all right," Applejack said to her friends confirming their suspicions and conveyed Twilight's words to them. "Ah barely heard her, but she said us to come in and she can't open the door for us."
Some muttering later Twilight heard the rattle of a key in the keyhole and a telltale click of the lock. The door then opened abruptly to the inside and Twilight could see the fast approaching massive wooden wall for a split second until it hit her. Hard.
Note to self: if I ever again get shrunk down to a size of a mouse, do not stand on a way of opening doors—getting hit by a wooden object way larger than you are really hurts.
She was hit by the door with a force that felt like having a flowerpot, an anvil, a hay wagon, and a piano being dropped on her in a quick succession. She knew what that felt like from a personal experience not so long ago, a memory she would not like to relive. She was flung several feet—which felt like hundreds of feet to her—backwards and hit a bookshelf painfully.
"Owww..." Twilight groaned weakly, falling on the floor dazed yet still somehow conscious as the three of her friends stepped inside, looking around for any sign of the purple unicorn.
"Do ya see her?" Applejack asked her two companions while still looking around.
"No, how about you Fluttershy?" Rarity said turning at the yellow pegasus next to her.
"No..." Fluttershy answered weakly as she looked around. Her gaze then locked at the way Twilight had just been thrown, gasping as she saw the tiny purple bundle in the corner of the room. "Oh dear..."
The other two looked at where Fluttershy was looking at as she took a flight at the nearly unconscious mouse-sized unicorn. Their eyes widened as they realized it was their missing friend, lying on the floor and being small enough to fit on one hoof.
"Twilight! Are you okay? Please say you're okay..." the yellow pegasus pleaded with her usual timid voice.
The dazed unicorn groaned again, the world spinning around her as she tried to focus on what her friend was saying to her. She finally managed to stop the spinning so she could think of something to say as her three friends loomed over her, each of them being the size of a full-grown dragon from her perspective.
"Uh... yes, I'll be okay... it's not like I haven't been hit by a door before..." she managed to blurt out still lying on the floor, now easily heard as there was no door in the way to muffle her voice. "Nice to see you though. How are you doing?"
"How are we doing?" Applejack looked incredulous. "Hay, I'd say we should ask that from ya, seein' you're the one being shrunk to the size of an apple."
"Yes darling, I agree with Applejack for once," Rarity said with a worried tone. "What happened to you? Why are you so... tiny? Also, you really should brush your mane, it looks atrocious." True enough, Twilight indeed had quite bad case of bed hair at the moment.
"Just a little accident with magic last night, and I would brush my hair but I don't have a brush small enough for me," Twilight said nonchalantly, getting back on her hooves and looking up at her friends beaming. "but now that you are here I should be able to turn back in no time!"
"How so?" the white unicorn questioned, ignoring Twilight's messy hair for the time being. "If you couldn't help yourself with a magical problem, how can we help? I mean, I'll do anything to help darling, just tell us what we could do."
"Well..." Twilight started unsurely, scratching the back of her neck. "Long story short, my current state has diminished my magical prowess so I can't possibly cast powerful enough spell to change myself back. Also, I don't think you could help directly either as you, Rarity, are not powerful enough to transform me back, no offense, and you others are not unicorns. But you could help me get a message to Celestia. I would normally use Spike for that but he is on a trip in Canterlot and won't be back until tomorrow afternoon."
"But... it would take at least a whole day to deliver a message there..." Fluttershy pointed out.
"Couldn't Rainbow Dash deliver it?" Twilight inquired. "It wouldn't take but a few hours for her."
"She said she left for Cloudsdale this mornin'," Applejack told, shifting her gaze a little trying to recall what Rainbow had said to her earlier. "Somethin' about a mandatory meeting for all weather ponies in leading positions. She also said she'd visit her parents while there, comin' back sometime late tonight."
"Great, just great..." Twilight muttered almost inaudibly, casting her gaze on the floor. "And for anypony else around here it would take until night to deliver a message to the Princess and I wouldn't like to bother her during nights. As Rainbow Dash is getting back tonight and Spike is returning tomorrow, it wouldn't be any faster to send somepony else for a delivery duty. I guess I'll just live this day as I am, it could really be much worse actually, but I am not going to tempt fate listing what exactly could be worse." She sighed in defeat.
"I could take you to my cottage to take care of you until then..." the animal caretaker pegasus offered with a caring, sincere smile. "That is, if you want to..."
Twilight considered that for a moment, but decided against it and shook her head. "Thanks for offer, but no thanks. I don't think I would be able to live with your animal companions at the moment, being smaller than most of them. I would just feel like a prey under their gaze, not that I'd think they would ever harm me, but I just wouldn't feel comfortable there." She put on an apologetic smile and looked up at the meek pegasus looming over her.
"Oh..." The yellow pegasus tried to hide behind her flowing pink mane, looking ashamed. "I'm sorry... That's okay I guess..."
"Hey now, sugar cube, there's nothin' to be sorry about." Applejack cheered her shy friend up, and turned back to the tiny unicorn. "Ah know the feeling, Twi. Ah'll admit I was mighty scared the mornin' I woke up after our poison joke incident when we first met Zecora. Ah wasn't quite as small as ya are now, but it was still a startlin' experience to face Winona loomin' over mahself, licking all over mah face like every mornin'."
"I can imagine..." Twilight shuddered, still remembering how her confrontation with her avian pet had startled her, not to mention the spider she had seen in the basement, luckily not from too close though. "I think I could actually just stay here reading some good books. Would you be so kind and fetch a blanket from the closet upstairs for me to lie, it would be a lot more comfortable than lying on the wooden floor."
"I'm on it," Rarity chimed and gracefully trotted upstairs.
"Also," Twilight added to the two of her friends still there, "would you fetch me something to eat and drink from the kitchen, I haven't eaten anything since morning. No need to bring much, just a tiny bit is enough for me in my current situation."
"Sure thing, Twi!" the apple farmer complied, exiting to the kitchen, soon followed by the silent pegasus.
After a few moments of relative silence Rarity trotted back downstairs levitating a thick blanket in her tow. Twilight pointed out the place where she wanted it set and the alabaster unicorn laid it neatly folded in front of the book still propped against the wooden wall. She also made sure to set it in a way that Twilight would easily be able to climb on and off it whenever she wanted.
As Twilight climbed on the blanket to see whether it was comfortable enough to read when lying on top of it the other two visitors returned from the kitchen. Applejack was balancing a plate with a sandwich on one of her forehooves—Twilight had originally prepared it for a snack for the last night—and the yellow pegasus was carrying a jar lid filled with water. They set them on the floor next to the blanket where their shrunken friend was now lying on.
"Thank you! You've been a big help for me," Twilight expressed her gratitude to all three of her friends as she hopped back down onto the floor next to the meal her friends had brought. She eyed the huge sandwich with an amused look and added with a little laugh, "I am quite hungry but I doubt I'll ever be able to eat that sandwich as a whole. Not until I change back that is."
"No problem sugar cube, always happy to help."
"Why, I'm just glad if I can be of assistance Twilight darling."
Fluttershy just nodded silently acknowledging Twilight's gratitude.
Twilight teared off a small piece of the sandwich and ate it, washing the slightly dried bread down with a sip of water. Fluttershy had thoughtfully put the water in a jar lid, making it a lot easier to drink than it would be from an oversized glass. As she ate she looked around, seeing her friends still there just watching and occasionally looking at each other. It made her quite uncomfortable to have three giant ponies sitting around and overseeing her eating, even if they were her friends.
Twilight swallowed a piece of bread she had in mouth and looked back at her friends unsurely. "Uh... you can go now if you wish. I appreciate if you'd still want to help, but I'll be okay and I'm sure you all have more important work to do than to watch me eating and reading."
"Sure think sugar," Applejack complied and stood up about to leave, the two others following suit. "We'd still better come back and check if ya need anything later though."
"I don't think that would be necessary," Twilight said, "but however you like. See you later then!"
Her three friends said their goodbyes and left the library, leaving the purple mare alone with her oversized meal, a blanket to rest on, and her books to read.
Almost an hour later Twilight had already sated her hunger and was set comfortably on the folded blanket, lying there and reading a book propped in front of her.
Suddenly the door was slammed open—good thing she wasn't on its way this time, the force the door opened with would have probably broken a few bones and put her into a coma or something—and an energetic pink pony bounced inside. Ugh... I'm not really on a Pinkie-mood at the moment, but I can't just turn her away either, that would be quite rude of me, Twilight thought as she groaned silently. She just put on a strained smile as the pink blur bounced towards where she was lying.
"Hi Twilight!" Pinkie Pie greeted with her usual mirth. "Applejack told me at the market that you are shrunk into an itty-bitty-teeny-tiny unicorn, and she's always telling the truth so I just had to come and see it myself!"
"Pinkie," Twilight said, her head twisting back and forth as the pink pony was skipping all around her.
"And I just had to come here to cheer you up as you're probably so bored just being here alone and—"
"Actually, I'm quite happy here just reading..." Twilight tried to say to Pinkie as she continued her endless blabbering.
"—I though you'd like a party so I brought some party supplies and cupcakes and—"
"Pinkie!" Twilight shouted trying to get the attention of still bouncing hyperactive pony.
"—hearing about you I remembered Applejack being so tiny back then and Fluttershy speaking all funny and your horn so floppy and—"
"Pinkie!" Twilight yelled as loud as she could, which wasn't very loud at all, but the pink pony still continued her now badly derailed monologue. The annoyed unicorn levitated a small book out of the nearby bookshelf and flung it hitting her pink friend right on her muzzle. Pinkie just blinked a few times as she paused, and then looked down at the purple unicorn.
"Yes Twilight?" the pink pony asked. "You had something to say?"
Twilight sighed in relief seeing that that had worked. "Yes, I was just saying that it's nice of you to come visit me, but I am quite comfortable as it is and I don't really need a party to cheer up at the moment."
"Oh, but I still have these mini-cupcakes just for you!" She pulled a tiny white box out of her saddlebags and placed it next to Twilight opening it. Inside there was a dozen (plus one extra for some reason) of really tiny and masterfully decorated cupcakes, diameter of each being just a fraction of an inch.
"Wow, I... thank you!" Twilight stammered as she looked at the delicious looking cupcakes, which really looked to her like normal-sized cupcakes would be to normal-sized ponies. How she even managed to make this tiny cupcakes so accurately? Oh yeah, it's Pinkie Pie, question answered, she thought to herself. She levitated one of them and took a bite. Taste was just as good as ever with Pinkie's cupcakes, or any Pinkie's confectionery for that matter. She took another bite, and another, until she had eaten the first cupcake completely. "Mmm... these are delicious!"
"Of course they're delicious, they are cupcakes and cupcakes are always delicious!" Pinkie exclaimed and suddenly without any warning grabbed Twilight into a hug.
"Augh!" Twilight yelped as she was pulled against the giant pink pony. Pinkie was squeezing her as hard as she always did when glomping others. Normally that would just be a slight inconvenience, but now Twilight felt like she was about to be crushed by the force and couldn't breath at all as her midriff was under great pressure of Pinkie's forelegs. "Pinkie! Let go! You're crushing me!" she shouted weakly.
Pinkie realized her mistake and released Twilight, setting her back onto the blanket. Twilight was lying there gasping and trying to catch her breath. As she was able to breath normally again, she glared back at her pink friend who nearly broke her ribs just a moment ago.
"Pinkie, you almost crushed me!" Twilight shouted, but her anger quickly dissipating. "You really should be more careful with the force you use when giving hugs, especially if the receiving pony is barely the size of your hoof."
"Oopsie..." Pinkie grinned sheepishly. "Sorry. Glad you liked those cupcakes! If I'm not needed here anymore I'll just go, bye!" With that she was already bouncing away.
"Bye Pinkie!" Twilight shouted after her and set back on her blanket to continue reading. She levitated another mini-cupcake and savored its taste while reading. At least something good turned out from that visit, though I'm not sure if I could take another visit from her until I'm back to normal.
The rest of the day went peacefully, her other friends visiting occasionally one at a time to check if she needed anything. She was also visited by some of the regular library clients, who were understandably surprised to see Twilight's state, but hearing everything was under control they also just stopped for an idle chat and for their usual business in returning and borrowing books. Nothing really interesting happened during rest of the day, and sun was already setting and it was getting gradually darker outside. Rarity, being the last one to visit her that day, had thoughtfully helped her to set some candles for reading light and locking the door for the night.
She had one unexpected visit more that night though, as Rainbow Dash flew into the library at a high speed, crashing with one of the bookshelves again. The rainbow maned pegasus was buried in falling books, but stood up quickly and flew off of the book pile looking around to see if there was anypony else around seeing her embarrassing crash. She didn't immediately notice anypony, but then set her gaze on the blanket, specifically on the tiny purple unicorn lying on it and looking back at her.
"Twilight?!" Rainbow exclaimed as she flew at her purple friend. "What—how—but—" she stuttered and then shook her head to comprehend with what she was seeing and then launched a barrage of questions. "What happened? How are you so small? And why?"
"A magical accident that happened last night," Twilight said.
Rainbow laughed a bit but then became more serious. "You're going to be alright though, right?"
"Sure, I'll just have to wait for Spike to come back tomorrow and she can send a letter to Princess Celestia, explaining my problems."
"Okay, so I'm not needed here." Rainbow said, turning back towards the window she used to crash in. "I'll go finish my evening trainings, bye!"
"Wait!" Twilight shouted sternly, causing Rainbow to stop at place. "You're not going anywhere until you clean up that mess you've made." she said pointing at the pile of books in front of the bookshelf Rainbow had crashed into.
"Aww... alright..." Rainbow relented and as quickly as ever picked the books from the floor and setting them back into shelves, seemingly in random order. Twilight made a mental note to rearrange that shelf tomorrow.
"Okay, all done!" the azure pegasus exclaimed, once again ready to leave.
"Rainbow, before you go, I got to ask you one question. Just to confirm something I've been suspecting since last night."
"Sure, go ahead."
"Did you crash into my library late in the last evening also?"
"What? Me? No no no!" the prismatic maned stunt flier stuttered, taken aback and suddenly tried to look anywhere but the tiny mare standing in front of her. Twilight immediately noticed she was lying, Rainbow Dash was always a bad liar when caught off guard. Rainbow looked back at Twilight who was now giving her a disbelieving glare. "I mean...! Ugh... alright, I did. Happy now?"
"Very," Twilight smiled, but then put on a questioning look. "Just why did you leave without bothering to even try to clean up the mess you made or without telling me about it?"
"I had still training to do," Rainbow snorted, now floating a feet above the floor. "Besides, I tried to look for you to apologize, but didn't find you anywhere. I checked kitchen and bedroom, even looked at your basement where you usually do your freaky experiments, but no luck, so I just left to continue my training routine."
"It seems your training routine includes constantly crashing into my library..." Twilight muttered, but then looked back at Rainbow with an expressionless look on her face. "I was in the basement the whole time, but thanks to you I accidentally shrunk myself into my current size so you probably just didn't see me there."
"Thanks to me?!"
"Yes Rainbow, you," the librarian stated monotonously. "Without the crash you caused, I wouldn't have hit myself with an erratic bolt of magic in the first place."
"It's not my fault you misfire your spell because of a little crash somewhere near!" Rainbow exclaimed, but was still looking slightly apologetic.
"I'm just stating the facts," Twilight continued, "without you I wouldn't be in my current predicament."
"Whatever..." the azure pegasus muttered, but still turned back to Twilight looking genuinely apologetic for what she caused even if she would never admit it. "So... did you have anything else to say or am I free to go?"
"I could ask you to carry me into Canterlot to see Princess Celestia," the librarian said accepting Rainbow's wordless apology, "but I wouldn't like to bother her this late in the night and Spike will be returning from his trip early tomorrow afternoon. He can send a letter to Celestia then, explaining my problems to her." She paused for a moment, coming up with a simple task Rainbow could do right now, "You could carry me to my bed though, I could sleep on this blanket here but I'm sure I'll be more comfortable in my own bed upstairs."
"Sure!" Rainbow gently grabbed Twilight between her forehooves, watching carefully not to accidentally squeeze her too hard. Carrying the purple unicorn she flew to the upstairs and into her bedroom and placed Twilight on her bed. "Anything else?"
"You could put out the candles downstairs, otherwise I'm fine." Twilight yawned as she added, "Good night Rainbow."
"Okay, night," with that Rainbow flew downstairs, putting out all lights and finally flying out of the same window she used to fly in.
Twilight curled on her cozy bedsheets, once again falling asleep almost immediately.
Next morning Twilight woke up just after the sunrise, the early rays of Celestia's sun illuminating her bedroom. She squinted her eyes at the bright light and stood up after flexing her still aching muscles. She looked down over the edge of her bed, noting that it would be too high fall for her to just jump off onto the hard wooden floor without risking any injuries. A moment of thinking later she dragged a corner of her blanket with her magic and lowered it onto the floor and stretched it a foot away from her bed, forming a ramp she could slide down. And so she did; still holding the corner of the blanket on place with her magic, she slid down until she was lying on the wooden floor and stood up.
She decided to go downstairs to have some breakfast, going down the stairs would be a lot easier than going up. She would wash her teeth and face as well as brush her mane—it was quite a mess already—but for obvious reasons she just has to skip those for now. She walked out of her bedroom and to the stairs, looking down along them. It was easy enough to jump those steps down one step at a time but she wouldn't be able to get back up as easily, as she found out the hard way when climbing those basement stairs. Mentally checking one more time that she didn't forget anything important she carefully moved over to the edge of the first step.
She looked down, these stairs were not as steep as the basements stairs, but it was still about one and a half body lengths per step to her. She jumped down the first step, landing on her hooves without any trouble and moved towards next step.
A few dozen jumps later she was finally on the library floor, heading back at the blanket still lying where it was last night. She took a bite out of her sandwich (which was already quite dry) and took a sip of water to wash it down. After that she took another of Pinkie's mini-cupcakes—there was still half a dozen left—and slumped back onto the blanket, continuing reading from where she left last night.
She soon heard a rattle of a lock at the door as one of her friends was about to come visit and check on her again, as well as to open the library for a day. This time the visitor was Applejack, wearing her signature stetson hat and being as cheerful as always in the mornings, she was really a morning pony always waking up before sunrise.
After having a short chat and assuring that nothing was amiss Twilight just continued her reading while Applejack exited to do whatever work she had that morning. Twilight glanced at the clock on a wall; it shouldn't be but a few hours until Spike would be back and she would finally be able to contact her mentor.
A few hours and several visitors later she heard a sound of light footsteps at the door, followed immediately by the sound of her number one dragon assistant.
"Twilight! I'm home!" the small purple dragon shouted into the library and walked in, heading straight to the kitchen, not noticing the tiny unicorn still lying on the blanket set on a floor on the opposite end of room.
I'll just wait here, he'll come back soon looking for me after having a snack, Twilight thought to herself listening as her assistant walked across the kitchen, opening and closing a few cupboards presumably looking for something to eat. And sure enough, after a minute he walked back with a few gemstones from his personal stash, munching on them happily.
He looked around the library and dropped her snacks eyes widening as he saw her guardian and adopted sister looking back at him with her tiny eyes.
"Huh, what happened?" Spike asked arriving next to Twilight and raising an eyebrow. "Didn't something like this happen to Applejack once? Is it poison joke again? You know the cure for that already."
"No Spike, this is not because of poison joke," Twilight was already quite tired to explain what happened every time somepony new came to see her. "It was because of an accidental transformation spell I cast on myself and I can't change myself back. But am I glad to see you here, finally I can contact the Princess! Take a letter, Spike."
"Ready!" Spike didn't question any more, pulling a piece of parchment and a quill out of nowhere and put the quill tip at the top of the parchment, waiting for Twilight to dictate the contents. Just how he always seemed to conjure those quills and parchments out of thin air went over Twilight's head, and it was another item in her list of unresolved mysteries among with Pinkie Sense and other seemingly impossible phenomenons, most of them involving Pinkie in one way or another.
"Dear Princess Celestia," Twilight started like she did every letter to her regal mentor and paused for a moment thinking how to continue. "I ask for your assistance in a small problem of mine. This is a little embarrassing, but I—" she stopped and looked into nothingness and grinned as a silly idea popped into her mind.
"Uh, Twilight?" Spike asked after a moment of silence, looking at Twilight concerned. "Is everything okay?"
"Huh? Yes, I'm okay. Actually, scrap that letter," Twilight told Spike, having changed her mind. Spike looked at her confused as she continued, "I got another idea, and I'm sure she'll understand..."
The Princess of the Sun was calmly lying in her personal living room on a plush carpet, sipping her afternoon tea in peace while reading the latest book of one of her favorite authors. She raised her head as a wisp of green flames suddenly burst out of nowhere, materializing into a scroll. It was a quite bulky looking scroll, there was evidently something wrapped into it. She looked at it questioningly, but shrugged it off as she levitated the scroll in front of her and opened it.
"Hello, Princess!"
Celestia was taken aback and almost dropped the scroll in surprise. Whatever she expected was wrapped into the scroll, she didn't expect a tiny purple unicorn to pop out and address her. After the initial surprise she immediately recognized her as her own protege, although in a miniature form.
"Twilight?" the Princess blinked her eye in disbelief as she held back a giggle at the sight of her own star pupil standing in front of her, barely mere inches long. "You never cease to surprise me... What are you doing here? And what happened to you?"
"It's a long story, sufficient to say it all was because of a backlashing spell..." Twilight said and hung her head in embarrassment. "And I realized being shrunk down diminishes my magical power so I couldn't change myself back and I needed your help."
"Long story, hm?" Celestia grinned, placing the empty scroll Twilight was standing on onto the floor in front of her. "Well, I'm on a break now so I have time, and I always enjoy hearing more about you and your friends' adventures."
"Could you change me back first, please?" Twilight asked her mentor, cheering up as she didn't scold her at careless use of magic, not yet at least. "I have been like this for almost two days already, and I'm quite tired of looking up at all the other ponies and feeling so minuscule."
"Almost two days?" Celestia looked surprised raising an eyebrow. "Why didn't you contact me earlier?" Right after finishing that question she realized the reason. "Oh, right, Spike was here at the time. But sure, I can change you back. Just stand there on the open so you won't accidentally crush anything when you grow back to your normal size."
Twilight eagerly complied and ran off to where Celestia was pointing. The Princess's horn started to glow as a bright yellow aura surrounded it. She nodded her head at Twilight's position, releasing a burst of magical energy from the horn and surrounding the purple unicorn in the same yellow aura.
Twilight looked anxiously around as everything around her started to shrink. Or so it seemed to her, in truth she knew she was just growing back into her original proportions. Her head was on around the same level as the Princess's chest as the aura surrounding her finally disappeared and she stopped growing. She looked around her own body and flexed her legs, noting that nothing was different except that she was back to her normal size.
"Wow, everything looks so... tiny." Twilight stated the obvious as she looked around. She tested her magic by levitating a couch, a table, and a full bookshelf at the same time without feeling even a slightest trace of exhaustion, noting to her relief that her powers seemed to be back to normal. She put the objects back on their places and trotted over to her mentor and nuzzled her, a gesture the Princess gladly returned. "Thank you Princess!"
"It's no problem my faithful student, you know I am always here if you need any help."
"Yeah... I just don't know how to thank you enough. Not only for this, but for all the times you have been here just for me."
"I'm sure this time you can return my favor by sharing that story of yours. It sure is going to be more interesting to listen than reading this book," she nodded at the book she was reading. "I love this author's work, but it can't be nearly as captivating as an interesting real-life story from my favorite student." She smiled at the slightly blushing mare next to her, lifting an empty teacup and a teapot at her. "Care for a cup of tea?"
"Sure, thanks," Twilight answered as the Princess poured tea into her cup. She levitated her cup and took a careful sip, flinching a little at the hot beverage and savoring the taste afterward.
She began retelling her story starting from her experiments at her basement nearly two days ago. Celestia occasionally nodded approvingly and asked some supplementary questions throughout the whole story, showing honest interest in her protege's story. They laughed together at some parts, even Twilight could find initially embarrassing or even painful parts of her story quite funny in the hindsight. They sat there together just chatting and exchanging news for a few hours, until finally Celestia had to go back for her duties and sent Twilight on her way as the purple unicorn started heading for the train station to get a ride back to Ponyville.
