Memories Long Forgotten

The right side at also now fallen away and only a shard of the blue gem remained.
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A few furred claws flexed and a scaled toes explored their new freedom.
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Ever since Sonic had been released from the hospital no pony had seen Pinkie Pie
and him away from each other. A friendly joke going around town now was whenever
you needed to refer to one of them, didn't matter which, you'd say Sonic Pie, Have
you seen Sonic Pie today, Look there's Sonic Pie and so on. Which is why Twilight
was so surprised when Sonic Boom came into her library looking for her and as she
waited a moment, she realized Pinkie wasn't coming in after him.

"where's Pinkie Pie? is everything okay?" Twi asked concerned.
"Everything is fine, she's at the house I told her I was running out to get her a surprise
lunch so I need to be quick" Sonic assured her.
""Okay, what did you need to talk to me about?" asked casually trying to hide the
curiosity at what he'd want to hide from Pinkie from showing.
"I need you help setting something up on the edge of town"
"What is it?"
"A surprise for Pinkie, I want to do something big so Pinkie will always remember the
moment I propose to her"
"I don't think no matter how insignificant a thing you did Pinkie would ever forget the
moment you proposed to her."Twi said with a knowing smile then stopped as the words
caught up with her,"WAIT! your proposing to Pinkie Pie! when?"
He chuckled happily at her reaction,"Tomorrow night."
"Where? can I come?"
I'll ask tomorrow at dinner, I'm gonna take her to that restaurant with the outdoor patio,
if her friends just happened to coincidentally show up there the same night to have
their own dinner I wouldn't be offended."
"Oh this is so exciting, I'm so happy for you, I need to go tell the others, wait! what did
you need me to do?"
Taking some supplies out of his saddlebags he told her where to put them and how to
set them up. Assuring she'd be able to do it, she hid the stuff in a corner of the room
till she could get to them later.
"Once again thanks Sonic for letting me be part of this and con-"
"Twilight have you seen Sonic?" Twi's head whipped around to look at the door as she
heard Pinkie's shout and sure enough a moment later Pinkie appeared i the doorway.
"Oh Pinkie! we were just........." Twilight's hasty explanation trailed off as she looked
back over and found Sonic was gone.
"We? who are you talking about Twilight?" Pinkie asked confused looking around at the
empty library.
"Oh just Spike, I was just about to say we've been working all morning and haven't seen
Sonic when a sudden thought relating to my work distracted me."
"Okay, well I'll let you get back to that and please let me know if you see him."
"Will do Pinkie, thanks for stopping by" called after Pinkie's retreating form,"phew! that
was clo- eeeep!" Twilight jumped back as Sonic suddenly appeared back where he had
been.
"Sorry for scaring you Twilight, it's just a invisibility spell I learned on my travels, I'm
completely unseeable as long as I don't move."
"That's amazing, I'd love to see how it's done" Twilight said getting excited.
"Another time, I promise, but right now I need to get back to Pinkie, see ya Twilight, I'm
counting on you" he called back as he hurried out of the library.
Watching the cyan unicorn run off disappointedly Twilight longed to ask him more questions,
but she understood he had to go. Turning back to her work she suddenly remembered why
he came, 'I need to go tell my friends!' she thought excitedly as she rushed out the door.
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The final bits of the blue gem fell into the pile and it faded to grey now resembling nothing
more than a pile of pebbles.
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"Oh that feels so much better!" Discord said as he stretched again,"I need to stop doing
that, getting turned to stone is just so restricting" Looking around him at the garden and
it's statues Discord sighed,"are they really that unimaginative, I mean this is the same place
they put me last time! Now that I think about it no ones here, how'd I get out?"
Curious he decided to investigate, inching sideways he disappeared and reappeared in
a sealed room. Going over to a safe box he easily opened it and looked inside,"Now that's
interesting, very interesting," he said laughing as he put the safe back and disappeared
again.
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"Twilight wake up!" Twilight came to in surprise as Spike frantically shook her.
"huh what? Spike what is it? what's the rush?" she got out groggily rubbing her eyes.
"I just got a letter from Princess Celestia, It has the word urgent written on it!"
Twilight sat up and took the scroll from Spike and still a bit tired but waking up more and more
quickly as eh read it aloud,"Dear Twilight, I'm sorry to send word of such bad news but Discord
is free again. A guard discovered what was left of his prison this morning. I need you to get
your friends immediately and come to Canterlot to get the elements of harmony. Princess
Celestia."
This is horrible Spike!, when is the next train to Canterlot?"
"in about an hour and a half I think"
"We need to hurry go let Rarity and Pinkie know what happened and let them know to meet me
at the train station pronto! I'll get the others." not even bothering with the door Twilight teleported
herself from her bed right outside and took off for Apple Acres.
In under an hour the six and Sonic were waiting to board the train, they'd all be informed what
little Twilight knew.
"How could this happen?" Dash asked for like the dozenth time.
The others just ignored the question at this point, the group was a tense knot of worry the whole
way to Canterlop nearly exploding out of the train car went they reached their location.
In no time flat they were following Celestia to the room where the elements were being kept.
"I don't know how he could have escaped but it doesn't really matter right now. First we need to
stop him, so far there have been no sightings but we all know that can't last long." the Princess
explained as she unlocked the door."Here we are girls, quick grab yo-" Celestia gasped as she
opened the box and saw inside, loosing her grip it fell to the floor and it's contents spilled out.
The others then all gasped too, on floor was Twilight's tiara and her friends five necklaces, but
the balloon shaped one, Pinkie's, was missing it's gemstone. Instead little grey rocks were
scattered across the floor.
"Could that have something to do with how Discord got free?"Dash asked in a subdued voice.
"How could this happen?"Twilight whispered in disbelieve.
The princess recovered first,"I don't know what happened but I'm gonna do my best to find out,
Twilight, you and your friends take the elements and return to pony ville, I'll send you a message
if I find out anything, while you wait check the library there, see if you can figure this out before
me." as she spoke a small pouch appeared and she used it to gather all the bits of rock into it
and tied the pouches string to the gemless necklace.

It was a gloom and subdued group that rode back on the train.
"Sugar cube, do you have any ideas what mighta happened?" Applejack asked Twilight softly.
"I'm starting to think it might be because of Pinkie Pie"
"What!" her friends all shouted turning to look at the pony in question.
Pinkie shrank back from the looks she got and Sonic moved up beside her, placing his right fore
leg over her back protectively and glared at the others with eyes daring them to upset her again.
"This is only a theory but some of us have noticed that Pinkie hasn't laughed once this past week"
"I knew it was a bad thing, I told you so!"Dash shouted.
"Quiet Dash, let me finish, I could be wrong, but I don't think so, having not manifested her element
for a weeks time she may have been removed as qualified to be that element."
They all stared at Twilight now, with stunned expressions.
"Can she get requalified?" Applejack asked hopefully.
"I don't even know if that is what happened, but if I'm right could she? I don't know, maybe if she was
actively an embodiment of it again, theoretically." Twi answered in an exasperated tone.
"You heard her Pinkie, laugh."Dash prompted as she turned to Pinkie.
"Ha, haha, hehehe"Pinkie forced out laugh after laugh but nothing happened.
They all hung there heads,"guess that theory was wrong."Rarity said sadly.
"Don't jump to conclusions yet,"Twi warned,"those were forced and unreal, she'd need to sincerely
be amused and laugh for it to work in my opinion."
"Why haven't you been laughing Pinkie? are you really still that sad?"Dash asked Pinkie, a look of
concern on her face.
"No I'm not sad, I feel happy and love," she smiled back at Sonic,"I just don't feel amused at anything
anymore, it just seems like I've been seeing the world through a pair of sunglasses and now that
they've been removed life doesn't hold the amusement it did for me before."
They all grew silent again for the rest of the trip back to town.

Getting off the train they were all immediately aware of where Discord had obviously gone. Except
for Sonic they had all seen their town in this state of chaos before.
"Maybe we should all stay together till we get this figured out"Twilight said as her eyes followed a blue
mare with a yellow mane swimming in the air.
The others didn't need convincing and they all set out bracing themselves for whatever they'd have
to face to reach the library.