Horsefeathers!: A Matter of Taste.
“And you’re sure that this is safe?” Spike asked with a hint of cautious incredulity to his voice. It wasn’t that he didn’t trust Twilight, or have confidence in her magical proficiency. Far from it, he very much believed in her and had ever since they were both very young. After all, it was her ability that bought him into this world.
It was just that sometimes he worried that it might be that same ability that would end up taking both of them out. Hence why he was stood behind a mirror as he watched her write the last of a considerable span of arcane equations on the glass. The silvery surface would at the very least deflect the brunt of any significant tomfoolery that would be otherwise inflicted upon him, even with his tough magic resistant scales it was better to not leave such things unconsidered in the presence of the potent unicorn.
She simply gave a soft chuckle as she capped off the final odds and ends of the math behind this new spell and nodded. “Of course it is Spike, I have run the numbers dozens of times, I even icositetruple checked the math one last time here just to make sure!” she said as she flourished at the array of numbers that at best Spike could vaguely nod at in a way that implied he had any idea what it meant.
After this expected and almost prerequisite nodding he continued. “Well, I guess that’s fair but uh, what does the spell even do?”
“It is quite simple really.” She said as she gestured to different sections of her math” It is a spell that should theoretically allow me to temporarily transform into another species. Only temporarily, of course, wouldn’t want to get stuck as a zebra or something, or Celestia forbid a…” She shuddered a bit before grimacing and finishing “a moose.”
Spike shuddered slightly at the thought and nodded his agreement. “But how are you even doing this? I thought shape-changing magic was really difficult, you could only do one pair of butterfly wings when we went to Cloudsdale a while back.”
Twilight beamed a bit, stepping in place a few times as she explained. “Well, Shining Armor and the Royal Guard were able to find a few changelings flung to locations relatively close to Canterlot after the invasion, and they were ever so gracious enough to allow me to personally…-ahem- examine and interrogate one of them before they were shipped off to Betonda Bay to be held indefinitely without trial as enemies of the Crown. I managed to reverse engineer the changeling transformation spell and recreate it with conventional arcane weaves."
Spike gave a soft sigh, staring blankly at her, looking disappointed. He had tried to curb her habit of acting like stuff like that was normal, but his limited success had left him fairly desensitized to those little outbursts. “Wow, amazing,” he said plainly.
She squeed softly and nodded exuberantly as she started to charge up her horn “I know right, oh, but enough walking, let’s get this spell on the road!” She said eagerly, allowing the glow on her horn to intensify, the strands of magic intertwining into a cone of complex weaves around her horn, from the tip of which a pink-colored fire began to cascade down, her horn seeming to melt away, followed by her features beginning to shift and lose form for just a split second before reforming to a new shape as the ring of fire passed over her body. Her front hooves now claws, her muzzle shifting to a curved, powerful beak. Her haunches shifting to be reminiscent of those sported by a cat.
Yep, as the spell faded it was clear that she was now a Griffin. Her front halves fur had shifted to feathers, and in color from lavender to being closer to a dark fuchsia. Her beak was a slightly darker shade of the same color, as were her clawed forelegs.
Her hindquarters were now a deep, grapey purple, with lighter rings along her feline-like tail. Her eyes remained the same as before, her mane replaces by a fluffy arrangement of feathers roughly reminiscent of her usual style.
Spike, despite his early concern followed by disappointment, was visibly impressed, his eyes wide as he looked her over as she inspected herself in the mirror, looking quite excited. A beaming grin was on her face as she ran a claw through her feathers slowly. “Yes! It looks like it worked. Spike, Please take note of my appearance. The transformation should wear off in about thirty minutes, so let’s go run some tests.” She said, trotti- no, padding off towards the kitchen without even bothering for him to say yes and write the notes.
The poor dragon simply sighed, scribbled it all down as quickly as he could, and bolted to follow her into the kitchen.
She was already quickly, although somewhat clumsily, laying out a few plates with her beak. She seemed to be struggling just a bit with the unfamiliarly structured mouth as opposed to her normal one. Spike rolled his eyes and walked over to help her layout the rest. “You have claws now, ya know, you could at least use those instead, you know I hate cleaning your spit off of the dishes when you set the table.”
Twilight gave a small embarrassed nod and chuckle, reaching up with one of her claws to take the last dish out of Spike's hand. “I mean, I suppose you’re right…” she said before proceeding to take her claws for a test drive by digging through the fridge and setting out an array of different fruits and vegetables, as well as some eggs and a few other foods, like fish. “Get ready Spike, I am going to record the experience of consumption of several different stable foods to give a firsthand account of what eating each is like.” She said as she picked the first of a line of fruits, an Orange in her claw.
She used one of her talons to slowly, shakily peel the orange, making a slight mess but the sphere of exposed orange flesh was left mostly intact. She cut it in half, then in half again, setting three of the quarters on the table as she brought one to her beak, chewing it and-
“Phhtffbt, ugh! That was absolutely awful! Why is it so bitter and sour, it should be ripe.” She cried out as she spat the pulpy remains of the orange back on the plate, splattering over the unwanted slices and provoking a disgruntled groan from Spike.
“I was going to ask if you we're gonna eat those…” He said with a slightly sulky tone as she took a drink of water from the sink and huffing, walking over to the next one, A Banana. “Alright, let's try…”
“Blech!” She declared, managing to get it down at least, but it was plain and sort of chalky. “Spike, take a bite of this and tell me what you think of it.” She said firmly, Passing the banana to her assistant, who peeled the unbitten end and started from there, humming softly.
“Hhmmm...I dunno what to tell you Twi, It’s a banana. A little ripe too, nice and sweet.’ He concluded before placing the little bite mark ridden stump of the banana back on the plate.
Twilight rubbed her forehead with her claw before she realized. She must have the taste buds of a cat! Of course sweet fruits would taste off if there was no way to taste sweet!
Of course, that would mean that sampling the vegetables would also be a bit lacking, felines were generally carnivorous anyway, no need to risk a stomachache for the next half hour. She started walking towards the...uncooked egg. Seems she had gotten a bit ahead of herself and forgotten to cook the eggs...and the fish.
She internally debated with herself for a moment. Sure it was a little gross, And maybe a little awkward to be a griffin devouring an entire raw egg. But she was designed to eat this way as a griffin, it should be perfectly safe!
Probably.
She gulped softly and cracked the egg, letting the insides drop into her upturned beak.
And as the meal hit her tongue, her eyes sprung open, her pupils dilating as she envisioned herself in one of those very pleasantly stimulating scenarios, very much reminiscent of how it feels to chew some manner of gum product. She was suspended in a vat of gently jelly-like fluid, floating in it, soaking it in…
Snapback to reality and twilight licks her beak slightly, walking over to the refrigeration to grab about three more eggs. Closing it before cracking the produce open into her mouth one by one. A very grossed-out spike watched on in mild disgust. Not at the fact that she was eating raw eggs, but because her table manners were somehow even more atrocious than when she visited her favorite fast food establishment.
“Ugh, Twilight, please swallow with your mouth closed, you’re kinda yucking me out here with that….” He said softly, finally averting his eyes from the scene.
Twilight had the good graces to look embarrassed over her bad manners, flushing slightly and ripping at her mouth with a napkin, giving him an apologetic look “Heheh, I guess I got a bit carried away there. It was...it was really good, Spike. Is that what it's like for creatures that eat meat to have animal proteins?
“Uh...I mean, if you are asking if it tastes really good, yeah, yeah it does. Why do you think I get so excited when you get real bacon instead of the hay stuff? It definitely tastes way better.” He said, licking his chops slightly. He felt a bit guilty for a moment as he remembered the last time he had had bacon, but hey, that pig was an executed criminal anyway, he wasn’t using it anymore anyway. He wasn’t using the chops, the shanks, the ribs…
Spike shook himself from his savory daydream and returned his attention to Twilight, nodding and affirming his answer. “But uh, yeah, it's great!” he finished, rubbing the back of his neck a bit with a wry, nervous smile.
Twilight nodded back, turning her attention to the fish, which she was only now just noticing actually smelled pretty good. The fishy smell got her salivating, enough to be a little gross, frankly, as she reached over and grabbed the fish, bringing it to her mouth with an audible crisp and crunch.
Her eyes went wide again, and she could see...she could see something beautiful beyond reality as she savored the wonderful flavor, her body enraptured to shuddering. Time seemed to stand still there for a long moment before she suddenly stumbled and everything went black.
She awoke in her bed with a small start, seeing Spike sitting next to her, looking mildly amused but also slightly worried until he saw her awake, looking relieved before going right back to amused. “Hey! You’re finally awake.” He said with a small chuckle. As she looked over at him, still a bit groggy.
“Wha...what happened?” She said softly as she rubbed at her head with a….hoof, a familiar purple hoof, thankfully.
Spike chuckled softly as he thought about it and said “After you had a bite of the fish you passed out and busted a nut”
“I WHAT!?”
“I said you passed out and busted your head, it was nuts,” he said without skipping a beat, raising his eyebrow at her. “Are you alright? Do you need to lay down a little longer?”
“Huh, yeah, maybe…” she said softly, settling back into her bed with a small sigh. Before long the unicorn was snoring softly.
Spike looked down at her for a moment, then slipped back down the stairs, retrieving a mop and a bucket from the broom closet. That mess twilight had left when she passed out wasn't going to clean itself. Gross...
Author's Note
Just something I popped out with the express purpose of giving the guy a little giggle, hope it's up to snuff for ya, guy!
