Saaaaaaaaaaaaaannnnnnnnnnnnnnnnnnnnnnnd
Before she had become the ruler of Equestria, Twilight had enjoyed having at least one day off a week between her studies, her duties as an element of harmony, and all the various troubles that life threw her way. But now that she had ascended to the throne, her days off were few and far between. With an endless stream of disputes to settle, treaties to negotiate, and matters of state to attend to, Twilight could go months without having a day to herself. It wasn’t until Spike pointed out that overwork negatively impacted the health, well-being, and lifespan of workaholics that Twilight finally agreed to return to having one day off a week, and to commemorate this new change, she and her number one assistant would enjoy a day at the beach.
Now, standing before the sand, Twilight and Spike surveyed their playground: the sky was the cleanest, most vibrant blue imaginable, the sun was pleasantly warm, and the sea calmly came in and out upon the sand.
“Well, here we are!” Spike said. “The perfect place to kick back and relax!”
“Yes,” Twilight said with a noticeable lack of enthusiasm.
“Twilight, I know you want to work, but you promised that you—”
“It’s not work, Spike,” Twilight said. “It’s...”
“What? What is it?”
Twilight sighed; there was no way to confess her secret without sounding like a moron. “It’s the... sand.”
“Sand?”
“Yes, sand. To tell the truth, I’ve never liked it.”
“Really? Is it because it’s course, rough, irritating, and gets everywhere?”
“Pretty much.”
“Well... you can always teleport yourself to the water,” Spike suggested. “Or I can put a towel on the sand and you can fly to it.”
The thought was tempting, but Twilight dismissed it. “That’s okay, Spike. As the leader of Equestria, I have to set an example for my subjects and confront the things I don’t like.” She chuckled. “Besides, it’s just sand. How bad can it be?”
Spike grinned. “That’s the spirit! Now, come on! The surf’s calling my name!”
Eagerly dashing down the beach, Spike didn’t see Twilight hesitating for a moment before tentatively putting her hooves onto the sand. In years past, feeling the sand pouring over her hooves and getting tangled in her light layer of fur had felt so... wrong. Buried deep within her, Twilight’s younger self instinctively wanted to leap back and get away from the sand, not wanting to take a long shower to get every last grain and pebble out from her most intimate areas.
Yet... there was something about this sand that Twilight had never felt before; it seemed like a thing alive, warm and soothing. It felt almost like it was... caressing her.
Well, Twilight mused, this is new.
“Twilight! Come on!” Spike called.
Another step, and Twilight made her way through the sand. Slowly at first, not wanting the sand to get too high up her legs. Yet, she then found herself starting to jog, quickly catching up to Spike as he put up a large beach umbrella between two towels.
“So, which towel do you want, Twilight?”
“Actually, Spike, I’m going to go without a towel.”
“What?”
Grinning, Twilight stomped her hooves in the sand. “This sand is different, Spike. It’s not like any sand I’ve ever encountered before.”
“Really? Uh... how?”
“I... I can’t say.” Twilight scooped up a hooffull of sand, letting it trickle back down to the ground. “It actually feels good!” She smiled. “Really, really good!”
“Oh... well, that’s great! Now, are you ready to have fun?”
“You bet I am!”
***
“My, my, Spike; if I had to guess, I think you had too much fun on your day off!” Rarity joked as she walked down the halls of the palace beside Spike, who was rubbing his eyes and looking like he wanted nothing more than to be back in bed.
“It wasn’t me, Rarity,” Spike said, barely able to speak through his yawning. “It was Twilight: she spent her whole day making sand castles, sand cities, sand towers, sand everything. She got so into it she didn’t stop until five this morning.”
“Wait, really?”
“Yeah. The guards and I kept trying to make her come to bed, but she just... didn’t. It was like she was obsessed.”
“How... peculiar,” Rarity said; being the sole ruler of Equestria was a stressful job, and Rarity had seen Twilight exhibit some occasional outbursts of neurotic behavior. While Twilight had managed to control those urges as the years went on, Rarity knew they would always be there, just waiting for the right moment to emerge again.
“Well, perhaps it was just a one-time thing,” Rarity assured Spike. “After all, Twilight has been under a lot of stress recently. She just wanted to make the most of her free time.”
“Yeah... Yeah, I suppose that’s it.” Yawning again, Spike took out a scroll and read through it. “Oh, it’s going to be a long day; I’ll have to ask the kitchens to keep brewing the coffee.”
“Well, let’s focus on getting the first thing off the list,” Rarity suggested. “I have Twilight’s new dress ready! I can’t wait to see her in it! Just imagine: the Princess of all Equestria wearing one of my most fabulous dresses when she greets ambassadors, royalty, and commoners alike!”
Pushing the door to the royal throne room open, Rarity found Twilight at her throne… and something else that hadn’t been present the last time she had visited.
“Uhmm... Twilight?” Spike asked. “What’s with the sand?”
Giant mountains of sand filled the throne room, almost covering the stained-glass windows; only the lit chandeliers prevented the room from being submerged in darkness.
“Do you like it?” Twilight asked as she clapped her hooves together. “I thought the throne room could use a bit of a change!”
A few bits of sand slid onto the coronation carpet as Rarity struggled to make sense of what she was seeing. “But... why sand, darling? Why not some potted plants, or maybe some new curtains? If you want curtains I can—”
“Curtains? Who needs curtains, Rarity? We have sand! We can build sand castles with commoners! Or swim through it with kings and queens from other lands!” With a swan dive that put Equestria’s finest swimmers to shame, Twilight dove into the nearest pile of sand, her horn cutting through it like a shark’s fin.
“Uhh... maybe later, Twilight.” Spike brought up his itinerary. “We have a lot of meetings to get through today. The Griffin ambassador will be here in five minutes and he—”
Twilight rose from the sand, shaking herself off. “Oh, Spike, who cares about meetings?! You were right: I work too hard! Today is going to be dedicated to playing! In fact, everyone can play with me! All the guards and all the staff! We can all play in the sand!”
“But darling,” Rarity said, “what about your dress? The one you ordered specifically for the ambas—”
“Oh, that can wait, Rarity! We can always get new dresses, but we will never gain back the time we don’t spend playing in sand!”
With a cheer, Twilight once again dove into the sand and swam through it, laughing the laugh of the carefree.
Spike and Rarity watched Twilight swimming through the sand-filled throne room.
They glanced at each other.
They said nothing as they backed up through the doorway.
***
“Twilight!” Spike said. “This is getting out of hand! We can’t keep filling the palace with sand!”
Sitting at the far end of the table in the dining room, Twilight chuckled as she ate her dinner. “Oh Spike, you can never have enough sand!” Her horn glowed, and more sand appeared beneath the table, burying Twilight up to her waist, causing her to close her eyes and sigh like a soul that had found its place in the world.
“Twilight, look, can’t you just designate one room of the palace as a sand room? The staff can barely get through the halls, and the medical wing is running out of cream for all the rashes and chaffed bu—”
“Don’t worry, Spike! In time everyone will get used to it! And they’ll love sand, too!”
“But do you really have to put sand in all the bedrooms? I mean, I have to keep moving my bed up so it doesn’t get buried!”
“Who needs blankets and mattresses, Spike? We have sand!” Shoving her chair back, Twilight sank deeper into the sand until only her head was uncovered. “It’s so warm, it embraces you, and it feels so good!”
Sighing, Twilight sank even deeper into sand, until only her horn was left, and then that, too, vanished.
A waiter struggled through the sand and put a plate of hayburgers before Spike, trying and failing to discreetly brush sand off the buns.
***
“Guys, this is getting out of hand!” Spike said. “Twilight’s gone mad! She’s obsessed with sand!
Applejack, Fluttershy, Pinkie Pie, and Rainbow Dash, having received Spike’s summons, stood before him and Rarity in Canterlot’s park, safely hidden inside one of the most remote gazebos. From the urgency in his words, they had thought that Twilight had been kidnapped, or that Equestria was being invaded yet again, or that the world was in peril from some magically endowed monster. But they hadn’t expected this.
“You... You want to run that by us again?” Rainbow Dash asked.
“It’s all she ever talks about now!” Spike said. “She hasn’t done any of her royal duties since we came back from vacation! All she does is keep filling the palace with sand and playing in it!”
“Spike, is this a joke?” Applejack asked. “I got a whole bunch of apples that need to be picked, and—”
“I swear to you, Applejack, it most certainly is not!” Rarity said. “Spike’s telling the truth! I’ve seen it myself!”
“What’d I tell ya?” Rainbow Dash said. “I always knew Twilight would snap one day.”
“But why sand?!” Spike said.
“Why not sand?!” Pinkie said. “I mean, it’s so cool! You can use it to build sand castles, then smash them down and then build them up again! It’s so much fun!”
“But not when she’s supposed to be running the country, darling,” Rarity said. “I think she’s been cursed by some spell, and we have to free her from it!”
The air popped as Discord materialized above the worried ponies. “I think I can help with that.”
“Oh no.” Applejack groaned. “Let me guess: this is all yer doin’, Discord.”
“Guilty as charged! When I learned that Twilight was going to the beach last week, I thought it was the perfect opportunity to help her get over her distaste of sand! So I turned invisible, waited until she stepped on it, then cast an enchantment to make her fall in love with sand!” He giggled. “Oh, it worked perfectly! And it has been most enjoyable watching her fawn over sand like she would the most handsome stallion in all of Equestria.”
“It might have been funny for a day or two,” Fluttershy said, “but it has to stop.”
Sighing, Discord nodded. “I suppose you’re right, dear. It was fun, but alas, all good things must come to an end.”
Raising his hand, Discord snapped his fingers.
Then his smile turned into a frown.
“Discord?” Fluttershy asked.
Discord snapped his fingers again. Then again. “Oh no.”
“What’s wrong?” Spike asked.
“The enchantment! It’s not going away!”
“Not going away?! What do you mean not going away?!”
“The enchantment must have grown so strong that it is now bound to Twilight’s very soul!” Discord said. “I regret to say that Twilight will now want nothing in life but sand. That desire will consume her to a degree you cannot even imagine!”
Everyone was silent.
“Are you freaking kidding me?!” Spike said.
“This is a disaster!” Rarity shrieked. “The ruler of all Equestria wants nothing but sand, and will ignore all her other duties until the country falls into chaos! Anarchy will reign! Everything falls apart!”
“Oh, I like the sound of that!” Discord said.
Fluttershy glared at him.
“But... on second thought that might be going a bit too far. I’m afraid the only course of action you have now is to use the Elements of Harmony. Wipe the spell from her very soul, and restore our beloved princess to her old self.”
***
Spike and the others ran to the royal palace, where Spike grabbed hold of the doors and yanked them open, only to be almost knocked off his feet as sand poured out.
“Come on!” Spike yelled, his superior dragon strength letting him force his way through into the palace, the others following him into its darkened interiors. The air was saturated with the stench of dry, stale sand that flowed like rushing water. The smell choked everyone as they fought through hallways, trying their hardest not to be thrown off their hooves.
“Where is she?!” Rainbow Dash yelled, struggling to be heard over the roar of sand grinding against the walls.
Laughter drifted through the halls.
“Her bedroom!” Spike said. “This way!”
The six struggled long and hard until they reached the staircase leading up to Twilight’s chambers. Here the sand finally stopped, allowing them to get back on solid ground and charge upwards to the bedroom door. Normally it was guarded by two of Canterlot’s most elite guards, but they were nowhere to be seen.
“Okay, everyone,” Spike said. “Here we go. You all ready?”
The others nodded, their own respective elements brought out and ready for action.
The door was kicked open, and Spike charged inside, only to be immediately bogged down by a tidal wave of sand that knocked him off his feet. Behind him, Rainbow Dash and Fluttershy grabbed hold of Rarity and Pinkie Pie, lifting them up. Applejack, though old, still had her earth pony strength and managed to hold onto a pillar to keep herself from being swept away.
The sand stirred as Twilight emerged from beneath the surface, serene, content, and blissful. Her eyes opened, sand trickling off her eyelashes as she studied her friends.
“Twilight, listen to me!” Spike yelled. “Discord cursed you! He enchanted the sand at the beach to make you love it!”
Twilight chuckled. “Oh, Spike… I am no longer Twilight Sparkle. I am now Sandy Sanderson, empress of all sand.”
“What.”
A glow enveloped Twilight as she floated above the sand that flowed and swirled throughout her room. “I was wrong, Spike: Friendship isn’t magic… Sand is magic. Sand is love. Sand is life. Sand is everything.”
Everyone was speechless. It was a few moments before Rainbow Dash found her voice. “Okay... Anyone else getting creeped out?”
“Do not be afraid, Rainbow Dash,” Twilight said. “You, too, will come to love sand.”
“Right, that does it,” Spike said. “Twilight, I’m sorry, but we have to—”
Twilight’s horn glowed, and the Elements of Harmony were yanked off Spike’s neck, and the necks of the others. Metal, stone, and crystal turned to sand and fell, joining the ocean of sand that continued to swirl around the room.
“Uhmm… Did, uh, anyone have a plan B?” Fluttershy whispered.
“I was lost, but now I am found,” Twilight said, unfazed by the fact that her friends had tried to use the Elements on her. “My eyes have been awakened to the wonders of sand!”
Tendrils of sand rose up.
“And now, my friends, you, too, shall be enlightened!”
Spike yelled as he was grabbed by one of the sand tendrils and dragged beneath the swirling sand in the room, quickly followed by the others, their shocked screams drowned out beneath Twilight’s laughter.
***
Only a few days ago, Ponyville had been a charming community where everyone lived in peace, children frolicked in the streets without fear, and anyone could sing songs and play with bunny rabbits all day long. Now it was buried under fifty feet of sand. So, too, was the Everfree Forest and the surrounding areas. Tidal waves of sand had washed over them all and claimed the buildings, trees, and their residents. And it was not just the land around Ponyville: Manehattan had been washed away by endless waves of sand that not only buried all the skyscrapers, but the oceans as well. The Crystal Empire was now the Sand Empire, Klugetown... well, there wasn’t much that had changed in Klugetown, as it had already been mostly sand, but now it was even sandier.
In every land, in every continent, cities, towns, and settlements were vanishing beneath waves of sand pouring forth from Canterlot. And it was towards Canterlot that a single airship flew in at attack speed. From the cockpit, Queen Chrysalis, leader of the last, desperate alliance of peoples who had not been buried in sand, now directed their last-ditch effort to save the world.
Armies of changelings, ponies, yaks, griffins, and even bat ponies all dropped from the airship into the capital of Equestria. Each was armed with the best armor, the best weapons, and the most powerful anti-sand enchantments the unicorns had been able to muster.
A crystal glowed before Chrysalis. She tapped the surface, and a magical projection of Tirek appeared. “Tirek! Report!”
Screams came from behind Tirek; Chrysalis could just make out what looked like tendrils of sand snatching everyone and dragging them into the ever-increasing mass of the accursed sand. And then Tirek was grabbed. He fought, but even his enormous muscles were helpless against the combined might of tons of sand.
“Chrysalis!” he screamed. “The sand! There’s too much of it! It’s too powerful!”
“Shut up about sand! Just get to the palace and—”
Another wave of sand washed over Tirek, burying him and silencing his screams.
“Curses!” Chrysalis threw the crystal aside and yanked on her battle helmet. “Must I do everything myself?!”
With wings beating, the Changeling queen kicked open a door and rocketed towards Canterlot. “Twilight Sparkle!” she yelled. “Come forth and face me!”
All the sand in Canterlot came together and rose high above the city, growing until a literal mountain of sand towered above Chrysalis.
A small hole appeared within the mountain. Twilight floated out, her skin gritty and coarse, and her eyes glowing a magical beige.
“Princess!” Chrysalis yelled. “Stop this sand nonsense immediately!”
Twilight smiled. “Sand.”
“Yes, sand! You are ruining everything with your love of the cursed material! You—”
Others emerged from within the mountain of sand. Chrysalis recognized them: they were the princess’ accursed friends, only now their eyes glowed like Twilight’s, and sand constantly flowed from their bodies as they floated beside the empress of all sand.
“Sand,” Twilight said.
“Sand!” Spike said.
“SAND!” the others said in unison.
Twilight stretched her arms wide, as if wanting to hug Chrysalis. “SAND!”
Sand shot out and enveloped Chrysalis. She yelled, trying to fight her way free as the sand hardened around her.
“Saaaaaaaaaaaaaannnnnnnnnnnnnnnnnnnnnnnd,” Twilight said.
“Will you shut up about sand?!” Chrysalis yelled. But the sand engulfed her as she opened her mouth to yell again, and the queen was encased in a warm, gritty tomb.
Fluttershy turned to Applejack. “Sand?”
Applejack nodded back. “Sand.”
Chrysalis broke free from her tomb, her eyes now glowing beige. “Sand!” she yelled, weeping in joy as she embraced the sand that held her, wanting to hug it all day long. “Sand!”
The others smiled. “Sand.”
With a contented sigh, Chrysalis dissolved, her body, her essence, her very soul becoming one with sand.
Nodding her approval, Twilight Sparkle dissolved as well. Her friends joined her, sighing in bliss as they returned to the sand.
The mountain of sand dissolved and fell onto the valley below, where it resumed flowing through the land.
***
All was silent as wind softly blew over the deserts of Eqqus. There were no trees standing, no leaves for the wind to ruffle. Not even a cactus could be seen upon the sand that stretched from one pole to another that covered every continent and filled in every ocean.
To any observer, this would be a dead world. A lifeless world... a sandy world.
At a remote and unremarkable part of the planet, Empress Sandy Sanderson rose from the sand, using it to create a temporary body for herself as she surveyed her work. This world had once been infested with trees, grass, plant life, ice, fire, lava, rock, and oceans. Cleansing and purifying it had been no easy feat, but she had accomplished it, and with it, had brought true equality to all: There was no war, no conflicts, strife, suffering, or pain.
There was only sand.
Sandy Sanderson wanted to laugh; Starlight Glimmer had been hopelessly naive when she believed that she could achieve true equality by taking away everyone’s cutie mark, unaware that sand was the only truth in an uncaring world. But it didn’t matter now; Starlight was one with sand, as were all the ponies, dragons, changelings, yaks, and other species, all resting peacefully within sand’s loving embrace. Given time, Sandy Sanderson might try to head to other worlds to spread the gospel of sand. Now ageless and formless, she had all of eternity to bring true equality and unity to the cosmos.
Those dreams came to an end as an enormous green laser into the sand. With a flash bright enough to illuminate the cosmos, if only for a moment, Equus exploded, hurling the planet’s molten remains into the icy void of space.
Nearby, a grey metallic sphere floated near the ruins of Equus. Within its control room, a man in a grey uniform watched the scene. “The planet has been destroyed, Lord Vader.”
Darth Vader, the Dark Lord of the Sith, said nothing as he pulled his hand away from the control panel and left the room.
The Death Star shot into hyperspace, leaving behind behind particles of sand to drift forever within the darkness of space.
