Twilight Sparkle groaned in frustration. Not only had Starlight Glimmer beat her with magic, now she'd managed to actually just talk the filly Rainbow Dash and the others out of doing the race and thus doing the sonic rainboom at all, like she was "teaching them an important lesson." It was like Starlight was using friendship against her. Not to mention whatever bad future she got dropped into this time would likely be worse than the last one. Still, she hadn't been pulled into the future yet.
Looking up, Twilight saw the filly Rainbow Dash flying overhead, zipping through a couple of cloud rings. Twilight's wings kicked into gear, flying after the tiny pegasus. Spike had to seize Twilight by the tail to keep from being blown away.
"Twilight, what are you doing?" he called from behind her.
"I've got an idea!" she responded.
Eventually, she managed to catch up to the pegasus, catching her attention.
"Hi!" she called out.
"Um, hi?" said the younger version of her friend. Twilight didn't blame her for feeling awkward, considering they hadn't met, and Twilight was an adult mare, but it didn't matter right now.
"You think you could stop for a minute?" asked Twilight.
Rainbow shrugged. "Sure," she replied, immediately putting a stop to her forward momentum. Twilight tried to do the same, but ended up slamming head-first into a cloud. She shook it off, of course, since it was just a cloud.
She flew back up to Rainbow Dash, trailing little bits of cloud behind her. "I hear you're pretty fast," she said, smiling as wide as she could, hoping it would make her seem less threatening.
Rainbow scoffed. "Pretty fast? Please! I'm even faster than that!"
Twilight nodded vigorously. ""Okay, so, um, hey! You wanna race?!" she asked, poking Rainbow in the side with her elbow.
Rainbow narrowed her eyes. "Um, that wouldn't really be fair," she replied. "I mean, you a full-grown pony. And...wait, are you an alicorn?"
Twilight mentally cursed. She'd been hoping Rainbow wouldn't notice that. All she could think to do was act like it didn't matter.
"Come on!" she demanded. She reached over with one foreleg and wrapped it around Rainbow's shoulders, pulling the filly to her. "I thought you were fast!" Spike, still hanging from her tail, gave a thumbs-up.
Rainbow was starting to look uncomfortable, but Twilight couldn't afford to care about that now. She had to get her to perform the Rainboom, or else—
"OH MY CELESTIA!"
The scream snapped both Rainbow and Twilight out of their thoughts, and they both swerved their heads from side to side, looking for the source.
"OH MY CELESTIA!" came the scream again. Twilight's ears swiveled, and her head turned towards the speaker, who turned out to be a pegasus stallion, standing on a cloud a small distance away. The pony had a peach-colored coat, a short black mane, a small, neatly-trimmed goatee, and wore a black jacket, a burgundy tie, a pair of glasses, and a black cap.
"BAD TOUCH!" the pegasus yelled. He then pulled what Twilight recognized as a cell phone (thanks to her time in the human world) out of his shirt pocket, poked it a couple of times with his hoof, and held it up to his ear. "Hello, emergency Royal Guard? There's this purple alicorn creeping on this little pegasus filly, and now she's touching the filly and hugging her! HURRY!"
Twilight's eyes widened, and her jaw dropped. She was so shocked she forgot to question how the stallion had a cell phone in the first place.
"I was not creeping on her!" she snapped. "I'm trying to get her to do a Sonic Rainboom so that the past versions my friends and I all get our Cutie Marks at the same time, thus saving the future of Equestria!"
"I don't think that's gonna help your case, Twilight," said Spike.
"OH MY CELESTIA!" screamed the stallion again, whipping out the phone again. "Now she's telling her creepy conspiracy theories! There's no telling what she's gonna do next! HURRY!"
Twilight actually felt offended at that. She flew over to the stallion, glaring at him while her horn sparked with loose magic. The stallion's teeth clenched, and he backed up as far as he could on the cloud.
"I am on a very important, time-traveling mission to save Equestria from a crazy unicorn!" she snapped, getting in his face. "I don't have time for your nonsense! Now stop–"
She never got to finish, as a massive white hole suddenly appeared out of nowhere, mere inches from where she was hovering. Out of the portal came three white pegasi, all dressed in Royal Guard armor, who proceeded to tackle Twilight. The four of them wrestled in midair for a minute, though Twilight was clearly hampered, as she trying to keep Spike from falling off her back. Eventually, the guards managed to slap a set of hoof cuffs onto Twilight's legs, and an anti-magic ring over her horn. They even managed to chain the dragon to her back, keeping clamping his jaws shut so he couldn't breathe fire.
"Gotcha, you predator!" proclaimed one of the guards. "You won't be creeping on any more foals, that's for sure!"
"But I wasn't going to—" Twilight started to snap back, only for the other two guards to grab her by the flanks, pulling her along, while the third produced a long scroll from his armor.
"You have the right to remain silent," he read. "Anything you say can and will be used against you in Celestia's court. You have the right to..." The rest was drowned out as they flew away.
However, one of the guards quickly flew back to the stallion, and gave him a small salute. "Thanks for your help, citizen!" said the guard, before zooming back to rejoin the others.
Rainbow Dash merely floated in midair, blinking, as she tried to comprehend exactly what she had just seen. No matter how she tried to process it, it was as though her brain was refusing to accept it. Eventually, she decided to just go back to the flight camp. However, one thing still eluded her. She flew over to the stallion.
"So, uh, who are you, anyway?" she asked.
The stallion gave a small smirk. "Well, my filly," he replied, "let's just say I remember it so you don't have to."
With that, he spread his wings, and took off, leaving Rainbow Dash more confused than before.
A short distance away, Starlight Glimmer was rolling around in the air, laughing harder than she'd ever done in her entire life.
"Holy smokes!" she wheezed, clutching her stomach with her front legs. "I'm gonna have to remember that one!"
Author's Note
If you don't get the reference, watch this.
