The morning where the story begins
BRRRIIIINNNG! BRRRIIIINNNG! BRRRIIIINNNG! BRRRIIII-chrk!
With a loud crunch, Twilight's alarm clock found itself smashed into its atomized components beneath a heavy hoof of solid violet magic.
Twilight rolled out of bed, her mane once again covering her eyes. I love waking up to see the beautiful morning-mane that is only penetrable by Celestia's unyielding sun!
She groaned, stretching out her back muscles, her wings flaring out, joints popping after being mistreated throughout the night. They flapped back down to her sides, and-
Twilight ran through her mental morning checklist. 'Wake up. Check. Turn off alarm clock.' The clock in question was no where to be found, only the small hour-hand remaing. '... Check. Curse the sun for being so bright. Check. Curse the night sky for being so beautiful. Hmm... Damn you, you stupid, pretty, shiny stars! Why d'you always keep me up so late?! Check. Stretch. Check. Wake Spike. Spike wasn't in his bed. Check.'
She ran through the list a few more times, finally realising what was bothering her.
She gasped. "Oh, sweet Celestia! The milk gets delivered this morning!" She flew down the stairs to grab the milk, lest Ditzy accidentally break the bottles... again.
*~*~*
The milk safely in the fridge, and her stomach now full from the delicious pancakes her wide-eyed assistant made for her, she suddenly felt the urge to scratch her back.
"Gah! Stupid wings! No wonder Dash is always lifting them in the air! You can NOT put them down for more than a minute before-" She cut herself off, turning her head slowly towards the wings whose existance she had just been cursing.
"... I- I- Wings..." This was unprecedented. Nopony had ever transcended their ponyhood by growing an appendage where there had not been one before. She was an Alicorn.
She was now one of three, instead of one in a million.
"Th-that's... so.... AWESOME!" She let out a whoop and flew out of the kitchen's back door, into the morning sky.
'Now I can get revenge on Rainbow Dash for that prank she pulled last month.' She grinned wickedly to herself.
*~*~*
Twilight hovered silently over Rainbow as she slept peacefully on her cloud.
The newly winged Unicorn had painted herself black with a magic spell, to make herself look like Nightmare Moon. Her memory had been the basis of the spell, but, she was a spotlessly perfect replica.
She landed on the cloud next to Rainbow Dash, wrapping a forehoof around her.
She glanced around to make sure that they were well and truly alone. Nopony in sight, Dragon Mountain blocking the view of Ponyville.
She snuggled up close to the cyan pegasus, getting comfortable. This wasn't needed for her to perform the spell, but it would give Rainbow an even worse scare. Heh heh heh.
Twilight tapped into the dream-state that Rainbow Dash was floating in, finding her friend's consciousness.
She nudged it, pulling it into a new dream from the one she had just been in.
Rainbow Dash was feeling awesome. She was on top of the world - no, too small. She was on top of the UNIVERSE. She had pulled a triple Corkscrew Rainboom right in front of the Wonderbolts, and she had been given a place on the team and everything was completely perfect.
"Dash! Go get outta your uniform! Put it in your locker, and meet me in the shower, hmm?" She looked at Spitfire, and thought, 'no. Now it's perfect.'
She trotted to the locker in question, opened it up, and was sucked in.
She opened her eyes.
She was lying in a bed, a soft, winged body beside her. 'dammit, stupid brain! You always skip the good parts...'
She rolled over to look at Spitfire, and...
It wasn't Spitfire. Nor was it Applejack. Or Twilight. Or, ugh, Rarity. It was, in fact, worse than Rarity.
The mare next to her opened her gleaming, teal, draconic eyes. 'It's Nightmare Moon.'
Dash tried to jump out of the bed. "N-n-n-ightm-m-mare M-m-moon!!!"
The eyes became half-lidded as she purred in a sultry voice, "yes, my sweet little Rainbow?" She gave Dash the most sensual nuzzle she had ever received. Booing! Her wings gave away how awesome that had been.
"Aww, Dashie~~<3" The nuzzling continued, Nightmare Moon rubbing her cheek against Dash's chest while her hooves rubbed at the best points along her wings. Rainbow felt herself melting. She was enjoying this, Oh Celestia why did she like this?
"You like it because you know that, out of all your friends, I picked you and Twilight as my personal slaves, because you're the very best."
'Twilight..?' Dash looked up, her eyes going wide as she saw one of her other fantasies breaking into the dream. Twilight, in an exotic dancer's costume. Her eyes were so crossed, She could have taken five people on at once in a staring contest. She seemed to have been to Euphoria, and was still lost, trying to get back.
"Now, I chose her because she's the best lover. I chose you because you make the best CUPCAKES!" Nightmare Moon suddenly tried to bite into Dash's foreleg. She pulled it back and screamed.
"Hory Shit!!!" Dash panted, looking around wildly. "Oh... Okay... Just a dreaaahhh!!!" There she was again.
"Was it good for you, too?"
*~*~*
"Twilight! What the bucking hay?!" Dash seemed to be extremely upset. Or embarrassed. Twilight couldn't tell which.
"That was payback for what you did to me."
"Really? Wow... You are one evil mare, you know." Dash flopped back onto the cloud. "... Did you really put yourself into the dream like that to trick me?" Her cyan face was a shade of red.
Twilight giggled, a blush coming to her face, too. "Actually... I put it up to your brain what happened inside the dream. I just told it Nightmare Moon, Dash, and fear. Anything past that, was all you. Whatever dream you were in prior obviously had added a small altercation to my incantation."
Rainbow Dash nodded, as if that made sense. It did, sort of. Twilight wasn't really, truly sure.
Her pegasus friend's ears perked up. "Say... Wanna prank the flank off somepony?" Dash's muzzle grew a wicked grin.
Twilight returned the evil smile. "Well, actually..."
*~*~*
Luna opened the door to her bedroom, to find a wrapped present inside. "Oh! Wherefore is there one gift such as this residing in my chambers? Where hast thou cometh from, ye encased enigma?" The present remained silent.
"... Very well, I shall play your little game." Luna grabbed an end of the bow tied around the box in her teeth, and pulled.
"BWA, HAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA!" A midnight black mare in indigo armor burst forth from the box, leaping atop of the princess of the night.
"N- no! Y-you're not real! Y-you can't be! The nightmare was destroyed! D-d-d-destroyed!"
"Surprised to see me alive, hmm?" Twilight purred the same chuckle that Nightmare Moon had when they had met. "I wish to.... reconnect with you... If you get my meaning." Twilight waggled her eyebrows provocatively, and Luna did the one thing that had always saved her when she found herself in danger.
She leaned her head back, her magic starting to cast a spell that was never far away.
In her Royal Canterlot Voice, she screamed: "I NEED AN ADULT!!!"
*~*~*
The door slammed shut on a laughing Purple Alicorn and her blue feathered friend. "That was truly awesome, Twi! Gimmie some hoof!" They slammed their hooves together. "Wing it!" They slapped their wings together. "Flip out!" The two dove sideways away from each other, swooping towards each other again to slam their hooves together again. "Awww, yeah!"
Twilight and Rainbow Dash fell onto their backs again, their guffaws trickling off, becoming chuckles, then giggles, and finally stopping as they sighed in contentment.
"So... Twilight, how are we gonna get outta the dungeons, anyways?"
"Eh, Celestia'll come down at some point or another. I'm surprised we weren't sent to the moon or something, though, with this get up. And, by the way, you looked so cute in that guard armor! Tee hee!"
Dash blushed hotly. "Shaddup! I wasn't 'cute'! I 'looked good', sure, but not cute!"
The door slammed open again, a white Alicorn striving to keep her normally calm composure as she stared at the two sitting before her. "Rainbow Dash, I might have expected something of this sort from you, but... Twilight Sparkle! How could you? My sister is in hysterics! She cannot raise the moon in this condition!"
Celestia stopped, holding her breath as she counted to ten. "Twilight, release whatever spell you have used to give yourself wings, and get in the sky chariot. It will take you two back home to Ponyville. For Gaea's sake, you two... Come, my little ponies. I will escort yourself to the courtyard myself."
"Umm, I'm sorry, Princess... But I didn't cast a spell on myself to get like this. I... I'm not sure how it happened. I didn't even realize anything was different until after I had had my breakfast." Twilight smiled sheepishly as Celestia sputtered.
"You... you're... Oh, fuck me!"
Twilight gasped, she had never heard such vulgarity from the princess. Rainbow Dash and Applejack? There were a couple sailor ponies who could learn a few from them, but... the Princess?!
"What is it?"
"Now I remember why I had had your family under such scrutiny. I forgot that I had... procreated within it. I'm sorry, Twilight Sparkle, but the truth is... I guess we're related. Eh heh... Sorry for not telling you sooner?"
Twilight almost fainted at this, but... "It... makes sense. Is that why I'm so powerful, even though my parents weren't so? I know that we were Second Tier Royalty, but..." Twilight shook her head. "So... what caused me to... change, then? And why not somepony else in my family?"
"It most likely has to do with the Element of Harmony that you are the avatar of, Twilight. It amplifies the wielder's magical ability by almost twenty-fold, and you already had so much power at your disposal that you were within the same tier as me and Luna. That surge must have caused your body to mutate to emulate the power it contains."
Twilight thought about that. "Okay."
"This is truly an unprecedented event, my faithful student. As an Alicorn, it is within your abilities to control a celestial body. But the Sun and Moon are already under mine and Luna's control. The only body with any import would be the earth we reside on... You could transform the very essence of this planet, if it is your calling. If that is the case... then we might have found a way to create complete harmony between all aspects of nature."
Twilight nods with a determined look on her face. "I'll try, princess."
*~*~*
A few days later, Twilight had made a connection with the Earth's being. She caused a little movement there, a tremor here. The sun was rising, and the moon was setting. They were trying to change the seasons with only the three of them. The planet spun on its axis, tilting to the side from the exactly polar north/south it had sustained for eons.
The balance shattered. The planet began to move from its fixed position in the galaxy, the Sun pulling it closer. The three Alicorns struggled to keep their bodies in control, but to no avail. Chaos and Discord - Father and Son - descended upon the planet as it fractured along a long fault line.
Everything but the smallest organisms died in the chaotic rupturing of the galaxy. The Sun and planet traded places. Two of the four fragments of the planet floated closer to the Sun. The moon caused the fourth piece to careen away, the fourth and final piece staying in its new orbit, no longer the center of it's galaxy.
Eons passed, and the water and iron-rich piece of the planet once again became round, and turned red. The water froze, and disappeared into space. The one that had retained its Moon became fertile with life once again, the organisms growing into fish, then lizards and mammals, and finally, Homo Sapiens.\
Many thousands of generations passed, and they destroyed their world along the lines that she had tried to sew herself up with, and Twilight, the one known as Mother Nature, wept for the loss of this planet of wonder that she had destroyed, preserved, and recreated. It was destroyed once more, and Twilight was no more.
Luna looked down upon her eternal friend of greenery, and felt the sadness consume her. she wished to cradle her friend's body and weep. The moon sensed her wishes and began it's journey towards the broken pieces of the planet the creatures upon it had called Earth.
Celestia, trapped within the giant of gas that had been her responsibility to maintain every day, every month, year, and decade for the past eternity, flared with anger. Her anger consumed the two fragments of her beloved, fractured friend that had been closest to her since their mistake. 'Oh, what fools we have been. We hath destroyed in the name of birth, and gave birth to nothing but destruction. I wish to cease this.'
The Alicorn used all her power to blow apart her own shell, that had housed her soul since that faithful morning, eons ago. 'We have been fools, but we are, of course, only equine.' As the Sun collapsed, she thought no more. The galaxy swirled and fell within itself, falling into the black hole that had once been the center.
The galaxy disappeared, the black hole widening. The death of the Universe was at hand. The Universe collapsed. The Universe exploded. The matter that had been pulled together once again was hurled all across a large expanse of dark, airless space.
The matter congealed into bodies of massive size, and on a few, life began. The smallest components of oxygen and carbon and a few other materials came together and began building upon itself. The components multiplied and divided. Soon - in the universal sense - a being was formed.
This being contained nothing but spite at the very fact that it had been created, and began to shape the planet as It saw fit. It decided that it would choose a name to cause fear in the hearts of the creatures it would create: Chaos.
The creatures were not smart enough to fear, it soon realized. They were too busy trying to learn how to swim with only one appendage. It caused them to grow fins on their sides.
They soon learned fear.
The animals Chaos created to prey upon these weaklings were good at that - too good. It was bored. It gave them magic.
With magic came intelligence, even if they could not channel the powers within themselves. That intelligence gave them a fighting chance, but at times, this chance was slim. The creatures migrated. Some found that their flippers were growing out. They began to jump out of the water, flapping them to get high into the air.
Chaos was angry. How were these getting these new abilities? He found the answer.
Gaea was playing against It. She had decided that She would be a female; the mother of these creatures. It would be the father. It had a new title. It became He.
He and She fought as they loved. They created miracles and destruction. They were growing weak. They had been alive since time first began, and their powers were taking directly from their bodies.
The creatures had moved to land, and had new dangers to face. The ones with control over their powers grew horns, the ones with long flippers developed wings. The others followed along behind the rest, unable to cast magic or take to the sky. They built the tools necessary to help them along.
Resentment and tension grew between the three different groups.
The pegasai, the Earthwalkers, and the Unicorns were at each other's throats as much as they were at each other's backs when danger presented itself.
He disrupted the precarious balance they had created. She gave the groups the chance to restore balance.
He strove to destroy that balance with his son, which he created the same way he had created his Manticores, Chimeras, and Griffons. He used a little of everything.
She created two that portrayed the best parts of the three species of ponies: They were as smart as any Earthwalker, used magic as proficiently as any Unicorn, and could fly as fast and as far as any Pegasus.
She gave birth to Alicorns, just as Her opposite created Discord.
They fought. Her creations won. Peace came over the land as the three clans were brought together under one banner, two rulers. She gave them the job to raise and lower the Sun and Moon, He was dormant, and the night not as fierce. She felt the need to rest. She fell into her slumber, shifting slightly so as to disturb the peace as little as possible.
She was woken by a new daughter, one she had not foreseen. Her opposite woke, along with His son. The world shattered as their restored powers came full bear upon her. She gathered the new child as she placed her two earlier within their protective homes. She knew that Her time was done, but so was His. They went off together, only Discord still around to do as he pleased.
Pinkie Pie Becomes an Alicorn while sleeping and doesn't give a flying squirrel
Pinkie's tail wobbled.
Now, this wasn't a twitcha-twitch, so nothing was falling. She kept her eyes closed, trying to once again fall asleep.
Ear itchy, tummy grumble, left eye barrel, right eye roll.
Pinkie sat up in bed, looking around her room wearily. "Ooookay, the last time I got that combination, Pound and Pumpkin were poised precariously on the hoof of my bed, a giant bag of flour floating above them. What else with wings and a horn could be in my room?"
Leaping out of bed, Pinkie's wings fluttered a little so she'd hit the ground softly, trying not to wake up anypony else, as it was still quite early. Not seeing anypony in her room, Pinkie shrugged it off; maybe it didn't mean in her room specifically; maybe it could just mean something about the Cake's' twins. Opening the door to their room, she found the two of them sound asleep... but also stuck to the ceiling with glue. The glue bottle was stuck as well. "Well, that's probably it, then. Okay, time to get you two down from there..."
A few minutes later, and Pinkie had the twins safely tucked into their crib, manes and coats glue-free. Sighing happily, she made her way downstairs to get herself something to eat.
Now, this wasn't something many new about Pinkie, but she could be considered scarily calm during the morning, and without a small breakfast (usually consisting of 12 cupcakes, 9 pancakes, 6 flapjacks, 3 apple strudels, and 15 cups of chocolate milk), she would be only as 'exuberant' as any other pony on the street. Walking into the kitchen, she began whipping up some of her favorites, when she decided on something different today. Dumping the pancake mix and the cupcake mix into one big bowl, and stirring in a generous amount of chocolate chips and syrup, she began to shovel large amounts of the mix into muffin trays, and set them to bake. If these turned out well, they could sell them as breakfast muffins!
Her breakfast finished, she forewent her chocolate milk and instead poured herself a nice cup of Earl Grey tea, setting aside a bag of muffins for Ditzy, who came and went on her way not long after, happy with a nice present from her favorite bakery. Stretching her wings, Pinkie flew up towards Rainbow Dash's house, to see how her friend was doing. Upon arriving, however, her friend promptly yelled in inarticulate confusion, and jumped back in bed, wishing that it was only a nightmare.
Finally, unable to convince herself that she was, in fact, dreaming (as the numerous self-plucked feathers and a few bite marks could attest to), Rainbow Dash flew as fast as she could to find Twilight.
*~*~*
Twilight, in the midst of having a pleasant mid-morning meal with her draconic helper, found her ear flicking as a sound steadily grew louder. "Twiiiiiiiiiiiilllliiiiiiiight!!!"
Sudden blindness, the world was sent askew, then she found herself with Rainbow Dash's plot blocking her field of vision in a glorious display of toned muscle, for a whole half a second that would later resurface as a moment of embarrassment, but was, at that point, just a point in time that went by too fast for it to truly register. "Twilight!" Dash yelled right into her face as she whipped around, her eyes crazed. "Pinkie Pie grew wings!"
Now, Twilight knew that Rainbow Dash was prone to exaggerating things, but didn't outright discount the possibility; this was Pinkie, after all. Nothing could be certain with her. "Well," Twilight began, before being interrupted as Pinkie jumped out of her pantry.
"Heya, Twi-Twi! Why the long face? Heehee, get it? Because we're ponies? No? Eh, whatever. The author just wanted a filler joke anyways, and using 'heeere's PINKIE!' would be too close to the Shining, and-"
"Pinkie!" Twilight gasped as she stared at her friend in wide-eyed bewilderment.
"Yes?"
"You-you're an Alicorn!"
Pinkie looked at her wings, and then up to her forehead, where a regal pink shaft you dirty minded bastards was prominently jutting out. "Huh, so you can finally see them?"
"I can final- what?!"
"Oh, I've always had these, silly! How do you think I'm me?" Pinkie's face became what was possibly the second cutest attempt at a scary glare Equestria had seen in at least three decades. "I'm a natural disaster. Rules? Screw the rules, I'm Pinkie!" Pinkie then shrunk in on herself, until she popped back out, only this time as a little taller, and with a pair of broken shades. She turned her head towards her two dumbfounded friends (and a dumbfounded, and somewhat catatonic dragon, but he's not really important here), one of her irises now glowing red, and said in as macho a voice she could muster, "Hasta La Veestuh, Dashie."
Twilight fainted from shock, and Dash's wings popped out wide.
Rainbow Dash becomes an Alicorn while asleep and gets pissed off because her perfectly balanced body weight is now thrown off kilter by the overly long horn on her forehead
Rainbow Dash woke up on the floor of her bedroom, having fallen out of bed during one of her dreams about flying with the 'Bolts. "Owww, my face," the rainbow-maned pony groaned as her wings twitched. Her horn lit up, her magic crudely fumbling for her lamp's light switch.
Turning the vile contraption on, she looked about her room; it was well before sun-up, but her head was buzzing like a nest of wasps and she couldn't possibly go back to sleep. Getting off the floor and mumbling to herself, her horn lit up again and her bed, which was a mess of blankets she didn't feel like picking up at the moment, neatly made itself as she trotted downstairs to get something for breakfast.
Rainbow Dash opened her pantry to find her favorite brand of WonderBolts WonderFlakes® gone. "Ugh, come on..." She picked up the empty box in her mouth, ripping the section off that had the coupon on it so she could go buy more. Picking up a small pile of bits and pulling on a hooded, wool-lined raincoat (Rarity had made sure it was perfect for bad weather after the time Dash had gotten a cold while trying to stop an Everfree storm from ruining Ponyville's Weather Schedule as a thanks and a get well soon present.), Rainbow trotted out the door and took wing for Cloudsdale, since the Ponyville Market never carried it.
She got to Cloudsdale just as the sun started up over the horizon. Ugh, this is stupid, she thought to herself. I'm Equestria's fastest flier! What's going on with me today?! Still flying around like Ditzy would if she drank as much as Berry Punch did in three nights, Rainbow finally came down for a landing outside of Cloud-Top Food and Drug, the only store that was open 24 hours that wasn't a motel diner. Why they added the "Cloud" part before the rest of the store's name was a mystery to her, since it was only called that here in Cloudsdale.
It took her only a few seconds to find her favorite breakfast food in one of the aisles closest to the back. She was on her way to the checkout stand when the thought struck her: Did she have milk?
Resisting the urge to facehoof, she counted her bits and decided that it would be easier to just get some milk from Mootilda or Mooreece, if they were still in Ponyville. Setting the bits down on the counter at the checkout, she continued on out of the store, her newly bought cereal floating in the air at her side, her head still tingling slightly. Did I drink too much last night, or something? Mentally shrugging, she strutted past the gaping onlookers and jumped off the edge of the cloud city, quickly gaining speed for a medium-level glide back towards Ponyville. She still felt off-balance, and she wasn't going to let anypony know that she wasn't at her best.
Knock knock knock!
"Spiiiike!"
"I got it!"
A scuffle, a thump, and the soft sound of scaly feet padding across a wooden floor later, and the library door was open. "Hey, Spike, is Twilight in?"
Spike, his mouth opening and closing slowly, like a fish out of water (but not quite as about-to-die as that analogy may make you think), just pointed towards the stairs, where the faint sound of running water could be heard, along with a faint waft of steam. "Woah, she can hear the door being knocked on from her bathroom? While in the shower? She must have some freaky good ears."
"N-no, she-- uh.. she just implemented a small magical doohickey that lets her know if the door gets knocked on," Spike says, his eyes beginning to glaze over.
"Thanks, bud," Rainbow Dash replied, patting his head. He then fell over in a faint, and Rainbow giggled to herself as she made her way up the stairs towards Twilight's living space. "Hey, Twilight?"
"Oh, Rainbow Dash!" Twilight says, the words turning into a yelp as she slips. Rainbow Dash, still a few feet away from the door, lunges forward, her head feeling tingly again as she races forward to help her friend.
Throwing open the door, she finds Twilight, dripping wet and still halfway under the shower's spray, caught in a somewhat yellow-orange magical aura. One of her eyes opens as she realizes she hasn't hit the ground yet, and she looks up at Rainbow Dash. "Oh, thank you, Rainbow Daaaaaahhh!!! Your head!!!"
"Aaahhh!!" Rainbow replied, forelegs flailing as she ran them over her head. "What?!?! What about my head?!"
"YOU HAVE A HORN," Twilght screamed at the top of her lungs, the bathroom mirror ripping itself from the wall and thrusting itself at Dash.
When Rainbow saw that, yes, she did indeed have an extremely long, extremely pointy horn on her head and that yes, her wings were longer than usual, she and Twilight started their screaming contest again in earnest.
"Come now, Sweetie Belle, get in the bath... I'm surprised you're home so early! And you're covered in more tree sap than ever before! What ever were you three doing?"
"We were trying to get our Syrup Tapping Cutie Marks. I didn't even know that trees could shoot out so much at once. They positively drenched Scootaloo. Every tree in the clearing started shooting off all at once, even though we'd only tapped like, three of them. It'll take forever to wash it out of our capes!" Sweetie continued her mumbled rant as she plunged into the hot, steamy bath, not noticing her sister's cheeks as they became a bit rosy while painting a very different picture using the same words Sweetie was.
Whatever thoughts Rarity had running through her head were completely shattered, however, when a voice that clearly belonged to Ponyville's Proudest-- and loudest-- Pegasus shouted so loudly that it was as if she were inside the boutique:
"BUT I DON'T WANNA BE A PRINCE-HEA-HEA-HEAASS!!!!"
Rarity shook her head. "Ugh, sometimes that Rainbow Dash can be such a Drama Queen."
Fluttershy pops a Wing-boner, and nopony around her notices
"Oh my, this dress is, um, quite lovely, Rarity, but-ouch-um, d-don't you think it's a little too... revealing?" Fluttershy blushed and squirmed as Rarity worked her magic to pull the hem line a bit further up under the shy pegasus' tail.
"Relax, Fluttershy, I just needed somepony to model this, I won't make you wear it in public... unless you want to, of course~!" Rarity giggled as Fluttershy's blush grew hotter. "Besides, I don't want anypony seeing my delicate and beautiful flower in such a risque outfit! That wouldn't be nice of me~!" Fluttershy's wings twitched a bit and tried to unfurl, but she managed to keep them quivering down near her sides.
"U-um, w-well, whenever you're done--"
"But I did need somepony's thoughts on the dress, so I asked some of the girls to come over so we show it off~!" Rarity yanked on a silk rope hanging overhead, and the backdrop went flying open, to show that Pinkie, Twilight, Rainbow, and a few other girls from town were looking at her with cameras and wolf-whistles.
"U-um, wh-what?!" As Fluttershy's wings promptly extended to full length, her irises shrank to pinpricks. As her voice caught in her throat, she gasped. As her face overheated, she began to glow. Then, suddenly--
The door flew open as an orange-colored pony came shooting through it, ending up in a pile of moans and flailing limbs.
Fluttershy stood frozen, rooted to the spot as everypony ignored her. "Applejack~!" Rarity whined as she approached the lump of orange pony now straddling a rainbow-maned pegasus. "You've utterly ruined my fashion show! What can you possibly--"
Rainbow Dash pushed Applejack away, face flushed and breathing hitching. "Wha-hah, hah... what the hay was that, AJ? You know I'm not into mares!"
Applejack groaned and grumbled. "Yer wings don't match what yer mouth's sayin', Dash, but that's besides the point. Just look at me!"
Everypony gasped and oohed and ahhed as they looked at the orange-feathered wings and the long, pointed horn atop her head and poking out from beneath her stetson.
Twilight got up in Applejack's face, her eyes large and starry with amazement. "Wow, Applejack... That's incredible! I didn't even know you could become an Alicorn, though I guess it might have something to do with the Elements, but that means that we all are probably going to become Alicorns at some point! Oh, this is so exciting, how was it?!"
Applejack chuckled nervously. "Uh, well, ya see..."
Still standing on the stage, wings at full mast for everypony to plainly see, stood Fluttershy. She was relieved that nopony had seen her wingboner, but at the same time... She couldn't help but feel the littlest, teeniest, tiniest bit jealous now that nopony was looking at her. "Oh, well," she mumbled. "I should get undressed so nopony thinks I'm being n-naughty..."
Fifteen minutes later, Fluttershy was at home under an ice-cold shower, washing away the embarrassment of the afternoon, when she suddenly remembered something. "Ahh! Applejack grew wings!"
