“My student, are you certain you want to try again today?”
“Of course!” the young unicorn insisted. “Every night, no matter what!”
Princess Celestia sighed. She and Twilight stood, facing each other, in front of the door. Twilight looked up at her teacher with a hopeful and yet naïve gaze. Her student certainly had both motivation and discipline, but she was perhaps lacking when it came to wisdom and patience.
“Twilight, perhaps you should take a day off.” The white alicorn looked outside. “Don’t you want to get to bed early for a change?”
Sometimes, Twilight wondered if her teacher was ever a young filly like herself. Going to bed early? Who would want that?
“But princess,” Twilight pouted, “you promised you would watch me every night until I did it!”
Celestia cringed. She did make that promise a week prior, but only so the poor filly would stop practicing and get some sleep. She had been attempting the spell for three hours straight without success. Even after a week of nightly practices, her student still had yet to manage it.
“You know, Twilight, this spell is meant for ponies much older than yourself. Why don’t you-”
“But Celestia, I’m so close! You watched me all those other nights!”
“Yes, Twilight,” the princess answered, “but on those nights it was not pouring rain.”
Twilight stopped her pleading for a second to look outside. Sure enough, raindrops fell smoothly and evenly from the sky, with no sign of letting up. If she went out there tonight, she would get drenched. And so would princess Celestia.
But what did that matter? Twilight had resolved to attempt the spell every night, and she was so close!
“Please princess?” Twilight put on what she thought to be her cutest pleading face.
Celestia sighed. She supposed a little rain never hurt anypony. “Very well Twilight. Just one try.” One try couldn’t take too long, could it? How much energy could the little filly have?
“Yay! Thank you princess!” Twilight was already bouncing out the door, charging into the pouring rain. Celestia sighed a second time, and followed her out. It was going to be a long night.
The rain drummed against Twilight, each raindrop pressing her down. She felt each one hit her, and she wished she could hit each one back. But she had more important things to worry about now. The young unicorn blocked out the rain and turned to look expectantly at her teacher. Sure enough, the princess had followed her out, despite looking a bit unhappy with the situation. Celestia gave her a nod. Alright, time to start.
Twilight closed her eyes and began focusing on gathering the magic. Just like any other night, she told herself. Rain or shine made no difference. The power came from within her, and she slowly pulled it out, focusing it in her horn. For some reason the power was moving slowly; it was taking her a while to gather the amount she needed. Could it be because of the-
No. It wasn’t because of the weather. The rain did NOT matter. She forced herself to drag more magic into her horn. Bit by bit, the power grew, and every addition put even more strain on the young unicorn.
All right, Twilight thought. According to her calculations, that should be enough energy. She opened her eyes to see her horn glowing with a violet aura, made more visible by the darkness of the night, and less visible by the annoying rain. Celestia nodded with approval, and Twilight beamed with pride. Step one, complete.
Now for the tricky part. Twilight focused hard, her body tense with concentration. The idea was to bring her physical self towards the magic. (Or the magic towards her physical self. The prevalent theory was that the two concepts were identical.) The key to success lied in the border between physical and magical. If she could just balance on that line, then she could surely complete the spell.
With supreme effort Twilight pushed herself- her body- towards the magic. Despite her in depth reading on the matter, it was still a completely alien concept. How could she possibly push her physical body through something so insubstantial? It felt hopeless, just like all those other nights, but, Twilight reminded herself, thousands of unicorns had done it before her. Even in the rain.
Twilight redoubled her efforts, tensing every muscle in her body. It felt like trying to squeeze an apple into a test tube. How was she supposed to fit herself through her magic? Her research indicated that if she properly visualized the flow, and incorporated the proper…
UGH! That Rain! It beat against her endlessly, lightly tapping her, just hard enough to be noticed. It taunted her, tormented her, and above all, it distracted her. She couldn’t focus, and for the first night in a week Twilight felt like she hadn’t made any progress. Reluctantly, she let her concentration drop, and hung her head in shame. She had failed again, and this time she hadn’t even come close.
Twilight looked at her mentor, expecting some soft encouragement followed quickly by a suggestion to get back inside. What she found, however, was Princess Celestia looking right back at her expectantly. Did she expect her student to try again? For once, Twilight didn’t feel like giving a second attempt. Maybe she should just tell the Princess that she didn’t feel up to it?
And then Twilight realized that her teacher wasn’t waiting for her second attempt. She was waiting for the first one. Somehow, Twilight hadn’t released the magic in her horn. It still glowed with energy even though the unicorn wasn’t consciously holding it in.
Twilight puzzled this mystery for a moment. She reached out with her mind and touched the magic. It was whole. It was complete. It was pure. She realized that some part of her mind was holding the magic there gently, allowing it to swirl and flow without leaving. Then Twilight realized something else.
The rain. She no longer felt the drumming of drops against her back, even though it was raining harder than ever. What she did feel was the flow of the water. It didn’t just hit her: it flowed onto and around her. She was in the rain, not under it, and she was undeniably a part of it as well. At least, she thought with a laugh, she was quite wet.
Celestia watched, puzzled, as her student laughed as she got soaked by the increasingly heavy rain. But then the young pony exhaled, slowly, and began to work her magic.
Twilight was a part of the rain just as she was a part of the magic. She didn’t have to drag herself into it because, she realized, she was already there. The magic was in her and around her, and she just had to ride the flow of it. Twilight relaxed her body as she reached out with her mind. Without realizing it, she brought the magic out of her horn. Meanwhile, her mind’s eye saw the flow of magic around her. It SAW the world for what it was, and, with a gentle push, she changed it ever so slightly.
To any ordinary pony watching, the magic around Twilight just seemed to shimmer, but to Twilight it was something more. She could feel through the magic to the other side. It had become gate, made especially for her, and she knew that she could jump in. So she did.
The gate led nowhere, and Twilight didn’t move at all. Somewhere, in the back of her mind, Twilight knew that she must be moving, but it seemed to make so much sense that the world around her shifted instead. One moment the unicorn was in front of her teacher, and the next moment she was behind her. Celestia gasped and turned around.
“I DID IT!” Twilight shouted. Finally, the spell was HERS! Her knees were shaking, her eyes were unfocused, and her head was spinning. She felt AMAZING.
“Very good my faithful student!” Celestia gave a full laugh. “You never cease to amaze me.”
Twilight beamed. A lot of grown up unicorns didn’t know how to teleport, but Twilight had done it as only a filly. If she had the energy, she would have done it again. She almost tried, but her head hurt just thinking about it. Maybe if she didn’t go as far…
Princess Celestia’s voice snapped Twilight out of her thoughts. “Perhaps, my student, we should go dry off inside. I don’t think ponies were meant to be out in this weather."
Twilight thought for a moment, and then shook her head. “In a second,” she replied, and then ran out, laughing, into the rain.
