The day was just drawing to a close, with Princess Celestia’s glorious sun just dipping over the horizon. For the School of Friendship, another day of long lectures on the history of friendship was over. Many of the local pony students were dragging themselves back home, but looking forward to learning more about the magic of friendship. However, for a group of five particular students from faraway kingdoms, and one pony, they had their lodgings within the school itself. After grabbing a meal, they all were sat around the table having some good chats and laughs.
Usually, their friendly chat is about what they learn at school. Sandbar would talk enthusiastically about Equestria’s heroes’ adventures and daring feats. How Spike fell from the top of a crystal castle with the Crystal Heart to save an entire empire. A magic-stealing centaur from Equestria’s long past having escaped from Tartarus bent on stealing all the magic in Equestria, only to be defeated by Princess Twilight Sparkle and her friends. How Ponyville was turned into a chaotic playground for the then mad Spirit of Chaos, Discord. However, he was then defeated and turned to stone, but the Element of Kindness reformed him and now has regular tea parties with the yellow pegasus. And how they all saved Equestria from being drained from magic from some manipulative, smart pegasus.
His friends would listen with varying degrees of interest. Gallus would just have a talon to his face, a bored expression on his face. He didn’t want to go through what they learned from school again. Silverstream would have her full undivided attention, her eyes glistening with wonder. Ocellus, being the smart one, would nod at every fact and make her contributions to the stories. Smolder would punch the ait at every defeat, being from a land where competition and triumph are preferred. Yona would be the calm one out of the six, smiling at being in the company of her friends during these storytelling sessions.
Other topics were what their kingdoms were like, plans for any dreaded homework, or worse, a test set by the Princess of Friendship. Today, however, was something different and interesting.
“If you had a different body part out of the six of us, what would it be?” Silverstream asked unexpectedly one calm evening, “That doesn’t include Ocellus, who can magically shapeshift whenever she likes.”
“Hey!” The usually shy changeling piped up, causing the others to laugh. Yona thought long and hard before nodding.
“Yona would love wings!” The yak piped up, “Flying fun!”
“Flying or falling?” Gallus teased.
“Flying!” Yona glared at Gallus, “Yak don’t like falling.”
“Anyway,” Gallus smiled, “Silvertream’s swimming ability would be amazing. Swimming and flying do sound cool.”
“I would love to have the ability to fly like a pegasus as well,” Sandbar smiled, “That sounds so cool. Watching the world go by on some nice fluffy cloud.”
“It sure does!” The happy hippogriff beamed, “But to have the ability to change into different creatures like a changeling would be amazing! I would get to try different things all at the same time!”
“Why would any creature want to exchange different body parts or abilities?” Smolder huffed, earning a round of confused looks from the other creatures, “I wouldn’t change any part of mine for some other creatures’.”
Silverstream gasped at her dragon friend, “What do you mean?! Do you ever wish you can have some different part of ability?”
“Feathery wings mean you have to spend hours preening them than scaled wings, Swimming would block my fire-breathing, and as much as I would like the ability to shapeshift, it would get rather old for me. Not to mention I already have horns like a yak,” Smolder listed off her issues with what they just discussed.
This earned a nod from Gallus and Silverstream, who inspected theirs and each others’ feathery appendages. Ocellus was just annoyed and grumbled silently. Yona looked up until she was cross-eyed at her horns before inspecting the dragon’s horns. Sandbar rolled her eyes.
“What about hooves?” Sandbar asked.
“How do you ponies even grab things with those round ends?” Smolder raised a brow, “Some freaky pony magic must be behind it, but I don’t want to make my head hurt. Headmare Twilight’s lectures already do a good job with that. Anyway, you can’t beat claws.”
“What about paws?” A voice spoke up from behind them, causing them to jump in surprise. They turned around together to find Spike coming towards them, a warm mug of hot chocolate with marshmallows floating on top in one claw.
“What do you mean?” Smolder asked the other dragon.
“How would you feel about soft paws?” Spike asked the question again.
“You mean like a dog?” Smolder asked, “You had paws?”
“Yep, and it was an experience,” Spike chuckled.
“What do you mean?” Sandbar said. Spike looked around before coming closer.
“Twilight isn’t here and she doesn’t want any pony or creature knowing about what she has in one corner of her library. Can I trust you all to keep a secret?”
“Cross my heart, hope to fly. Stick a cupcake in my eye.” The group did the famous vow.
FOREVER
A familiar voice echoed around the room.
“Don’t question it, it’s Pinkie Pie. Don’t question it, it’s Pinkie Pie,” Gallus muttered as he buried his head in his talons.
“It’s for the best,” Spike nodded sympathetically before moving on to his secret, beckoning the others to lean into a group huddle “What if I were to tell you that in the castle, in one corner Twilight’s library is a mirror.”
“What’s so special about some mirror?” Smolder asked with little interest.
“This mirror, when activated with magic, leads to an entirely different dimension, where there are strange creatures that walk on two legs instead of four. However, somehow, I became a dog…” Spike trailed off, performing some sort of dramatic pause. The others looked at him as if he had gone mad. Smolder tried her best to hold back her laughter.
“A magical mirror? Yeah, right. And I thought the Tree of Harmony teaching us about friendship would be weird, not some made-up mirror,” Smolder said with a hint of sarcasm.
“It’s no joke,” Spike glared, “I became a dog and me and Twilight became one of those creatures. We had to travel through it to get her Element of Magic back.”
“Why didn’t we get taught this at school?” Sandbar asked.
“Twilight thought many wouldn’t believe her, and she was given strict instructions for Princess Celestia to never say anything about what happened on the other side of it,” Spike explained, “But you guys are good at keeping secrets, so I feel safe to tell you. You spoke to Twilight and her friends, including me, privately about the Tree of Harmony after your adventures with it.”
“As fun as this story sounds, it’s getting late and I would really like to catch some Zs,” Gallus said, the other four students nodded and left. The only ones in the room were the two dragons.
“So what do you think, Smolder?” Spike wiggled his eyebrows, “Want to check it out?”
Smolder gulped. It clicked that her friends left her with Spike to settle this, so she got herself into this one fair and square. There was one way to get out of it and she had to just go with it.
“Okay Spike, you win,” Smolder sighed, "But if Headmare Twilight founds out, I’m going to say it was your idea.” Spike nodded and led Smolder out of the school and into the Castle of Friendship. Spike knew the castle like the back of his claw. He also knew that, according to Twilight’s schedule, she would be busy marking yesterday's homework and coming up with exciting ways to engage the students in her next lecture.
Spike and Smolder soon arrived at Twilight’s library and presented the magical mirror to Smolder. She looked at it from different angles. It stood just above an average pony’s height. It was decorated with purple jewels around its border, and she admitted that they looked tasty. Spike, with limited knowledge, explained how magic is used to activate the mirror, along with his and Twilight’s adventures on the other side.
He went on to explain how they met alternate versions of his pony friends, of a former student who went against Princess Celestia’s wishes and ran through the mirror. How Twilight offered her a hoof, or hand, in friendship. How they found out Star Swirl the Bearded imprisoned sirens into that dimension and were defeated by Twilight and her alternate friends.
Smolder soaked in all the information as she continued looking at the magical mirror, walking around it and flying at different angles to get a better perspective.
“Sorry, Spike, but I still have my doubts,” Smolder scratched her head as she stared at her reflection, “So you and Headmare Twilight went through this mirror and went to some alternate crazy dimension. Big deal.”
Smolder turned to Spike but became a bit worried when she saw a smug look on his face. Spike went over to the machine next to the mirror and turned it on. The mirror glowed softly and the glass became more fluid and waved around in the frame.
“Now put a claw through,” Spike instructed, “I learnt that that best way to get some creature to believe me is by simply letting them get a taste of it.” Smolder turned to the glass and gave a strong gulp, a ball forming in her throat. She raised a claw and let it past through the liquid glass. What she saw next made her draw drop and Spike’s smug face grow bigger.
From the other side of the shifting glass was an orange-furred paw. It was not a trick or an illusion spell, Smolder could feel this new appendage. She flexed each digit, confirming that it was her paw, or was it still a claw? Smolder’s head couldn’t get past what she was seeing in front of her. She flipped it over to inspect the fur. It was a similar colour to her scaly body and she felt that it was lighter and softer.
“Okay,” Smolder stuttered, “This is just plain weird.” She quickly retracted her paw, which changed back to a dragon’s claw once out of the glass. She inspected it before sighing. Spike deactivated the mirror’s magic and it became just a regular mirror again.
“Now imagine that same thing, but a whole dog,” Spike smiled victoriously. Smolder didn’t even want to imagine what it would be like to be a full dog.
“Too many details,” Smolder waved her claws, “I think I have seen enough to believe that this is some crazy portal to another dimension." She then turned back to the mirror, seeing her dragon self in the glass. She could have sworn that her image flickered to a more canine reflection, but didn’t want any more craziness in one evening.
“So ponies turn into these strange two-legged creatures?” Smolder asked, which earned a nod from Spike, “And other creatures turn into dogs?”
“No, I think it’s more of a dragon thing?” Spike pondered on that. Smolder imagined what her friends would be like, but dismissed the very thought. She would rather have them as the creatures they are as well as her friends.
“Well, as much as I found this experience weird and interesting, I think I would still stick with claws,” Smolder chuckled, “It’s still an easy way to grab things.”
“Agreed, much better than doing it with your mouth like an earth pony,” Spike nodded in agreement.
*Ahem*
Both ponies froze as the sound of some pony clearing their throat could be heard from across the library. Both dragons froze as they turned to face a familiar purple alicorn marching her way towards them.
“Could some dragon explain this to me?” Twilight asked sternly as a certain diary with a split cutie mark front cover was levitated from behind her in the alicorn’s purple magical aura. She flipped through the pages and showed them the latest entry. Both dragons peered at the words.
Hey Twilight,
I was going back home from Canterlot High when the portal to Equestria suddenly opened up. I thought you were here for another visit, or that maybe some wild magic was on the loose again. I rushed over to see you, only for an orange dog paw to come out and disappear back through the other side.
Is something wrong on your side?
Hope to see you soon.
Your friend,
-Sunset Shimmer
"I always keep this close to me whenever I sit down in case something pops up from a certain friend of mine. Imagine my surprise when I found it glowing and vibrating. Then this strange message appeared on the page. I was worried something was wrong with the mirror so I rushed here to see if there was something wrong with it. So I'll ask again, what did you do?"
Twilight waited impatiently for an explanation, her hoof tapping on the carpet. Both Spike and Smolder gulped before Smolder pointed an accusing claw at the younger dragon.
“It was Spike’s idea!” Smolder shouted hurridly before zooming off out of the library, leaving a trail of dust behind her. Twilight and Spike watched her go before the alicorn turned to her Number One Assistant. Beads of sweat trickled down his head and he gave a smile to Twilight.
“Welcome home, Twilight… How was the marking?”
