White flecks of snow fell around Rainbow Dash as she crouched low on a cloud near the edge of Sweet Apple Acres, prepping for a quick flight full of cool tricks. A subtle mist dissipated with each breath she took and a slight shiver tingled her spine as the cold wind blew. The weather wasn’t ideal, but being out in the wintry sky was better than sitting around all day. Dash had to stay fit, especially as a wonderbolt, and she couldn’t afford to get so lazy that she was unable to perform. If she were to wait until the weather was more to her liking, it’d be months before she’d get to feel the wind between her feathers.
Dash adjusted the scarf around her neck, briefly regretting her decision to leave her jacket at home. She started to count to three. As soon as she uttered the last number, she took off, leaving behind a disintegrated cloud which soon evaporated into nothing. Rainbow Dash zoomed through the sky, performing a series of loop-the-loops, spins, and twists. For her finale, she tilted herself upwards and began her ascent. She flapped her wings hard as she fought against gravity, going higher and higher until she stopped. With a sigh, she dived down, tucking in her wings and closing her eyes. The ground came closer with each second, but before her body could touch the floor, she reopened her wings and flew forward.
Dash smiled as she felt the adrenaline course through her veins. Blurry figures flew past her as she weaved past the trees and fences.
"Heya Dashie!" Pinkie Pie exclaimed as she popped out of nowhere.
"AAAAHHHHHH!!!" Rainbow Dash screamed, frantically trying to brake. Unfortunately, her momentum was too strong and she ended up crashing into Pinkie. The two ponies rolled a good distance before they came to a stop when Dash’s face collided with a tree.
“Ow!” Dash yelled, clutching her nose in her hooves. “What the heck, Pinkie!”
“Whoops, sorry Dashie. I just came to check up on you and ask if you wanted to go pull a few pranks since it’s been a while since we last did that together and I figured you could use a break from all the training you’ve been doing lately for your upcoming wonderbolt tour.”
“Now’s not the best time Pinkie…” Dash groaned, her nose throbbing in pain. “Damn, that hurt.”
“That was a pretty nasty hit. Are you okay?”
Instead of answering, Dash let go of her nose, intending to inspect the damage. She was surprised to find it red and glowing. “What in Tartarus has happened to my nose!”
“Wow, you’ve got a shiny nose,” Pinkie said, staring wide-eyed at Rainbow. “Heck, I’d even say it glows.”
Dash proceeded to try to rub the glow off, but nothing happened. She then tried flicking, clapping, snapping, and shaking. No matter what she tried, it didn’t work. With each failed attempt, her worry grew. She had no idea why her nose suddenly started glowing. For all she knew it could’ve been a curse or a sign of an illness she was unaware of. One thing she knew for certain was that she wanted it gone.
“It won’t go away. What do I do?”
“Well, why not ask Twilight?” Pinkie suggested. “She’s the most smartie pants pony I know, so maybe she can come up with a spell or something to fix it.”
Rainbow Dash facepalmed, “Of course, if anybody could figure this out, it’s Twilight. Thanks for the idea, Pinkie. I gotta go.”
Before the party pony could say another word, Dash zipped off toward Twilight’s castle. It wasn’t long before she reached the front door, swiftly giving it a series of rough and frantic knocks. As she waited for the door to open, she couldn’t help but fidget in place, tapping her hoof repeatedly against the ground. Eventually, the creak of the door reached her ears and she watched as the door opened to reveal Spike.
“Oh, hey Rainbow Dash,” greeted Spike. “What brings yo— Woah!”
"Spike! Where's Twilight? I need her help."
"Uh, she's inside reading," Spike said, unable to tear his eyes away from the red light. “Bu—”
“Okay thanks, bye!”
Before he could say another word, Dash zoomed in and flew straight toward the castle library.
Twilight Sparkle had her head in yet another book, studying a theory on the effects of chaos magic on the pony psyche by Whammy Jinx. The theory was an interesting one, suggesting that an over abundance of chaos magic could drive a pony insane but the effect might possibly be reversed with some proper training, similar to the process of developing poison immunity. Of course, nopony had dared to try it yet. Fortunately, Twilight did not consider herself a nopony.
She had just finished reading the last chapter and slammed the large tome shut, turning to face the other creature in the room.
“Oh, finally!” Discord exclaimed, looking slightly irritated and very bored. “I was under the impression that my services were direly needed, but had I known you were going to just sit there and read for an hour, I would’ve just come back later. Or was this a part of your experiment?”
“No,” Twilight said, “I just needed to quickly review a few things before we get started. I’m sorry if it took longer than expected, but with how dangerous this could potentially be, I needed to be absolutely certain that I was not missing anything important.”
“Oh, but Twilight, what’s a science experiment without a sprinkle of danger? You of all ponies should know the possibility can’t be eliminated completely, especially with an experiment such as this one. Besides, you have the literal embodiment of chaos right here to help you.”
“That’s the part I’m most worried about…”
“You wound me. And to think I considered you to be a good friend.”
Twilight ignored him and rolled her eyes while she began to hook herself up to some complicated machinery. Using her magic, she bound her hooves with metal hoof cuffs and put on a metal hat full of colorful lights connected to an assortment of wires. The main part of the machine was box-like with a long string of paper coming out of it, a needle drawing a continuous jagged line marking it with ink.
“You’re not going to strap me into one of those as well, are you?” Discord asked.
“No. Since you are going to transfer a bit of chaos magic into me, I’ll need this machinery to record all the data acquired from this experiment to track any changes in my brain activity, among other things.”
“Now, why would I give up some of my magic to you? You didn’t mention that part earlier.”
“Well, nopony has ever tried to acclimate their bodies to chaos magic in a controlled manner before. Those that have held such power went insane due to absorbing so much of it in so little time, except for you of course. If this works, this could be revolutionary in the field of chaos studies. Plus, it’s not like I’ll be taking all your magic, like Tirek did. You’ll just be volunteering a small fraction of it temporarily. Once the data is collected, it’ll go back to you.”
“Hmm…fine, I suppose I’ll grant you a bit of my chaos magic. Besides, this might turn out to be a bit more fun than I could possibly hope for. You were always a bit of a stick in the mud, but perhaps this will loosen you up a bit.”
“Hey!” Twilight pouted.
“I’m just being honest. Isn’t that an important value in your friendship curriculum?”
Twilight muttered unintelligibly, getting even more irritated with her current companion, while she finished calibrating her equipment. Everything was in place and running smoothly.
She turned towards Discord and let him know she was ready. At her signal, the draconequus snapped his fingers, causing a small floating orb of light and electricity to form upon his claw. With a slight nudge, he pointed a finger towards Twilight and watched as the magical ball flew straight towards her. Before it could reach its target, a prismatic blur appeared and crashed into a very bewildered alicorn.
Twilight was knocked back, her hooves slipping out of the cuffs. With its original target no longer within range, the orb ended up hitting a bookshelf, causing a few books to start flying about.
As for Rainbow Dash, she tumbled, rolling forward a bit, and landed hard against a wall. The force of the action knocked the air out of her and a tiny ball light flew out of her nose along with a small glob of mucus.
“Huh?” The object had landed on the floor in front of Dash’s hooves, still glowing a bright red. Realizing what it was, she let out a cheer and looked for the nearest reflective surface to check her face. Peering into a nearby crystal wall, she smiled and pumped her fist when she found her nose no longer resembled a flashy beacon.
“Awesome, my nose is back to normal!”
“Wha— Rainbow Dash!?” Twilight exclaimed in surprise as she pushed the blue pegasus off and picked herself up. She looked around to assess the damage Dash had caused and found loose pages and live book-bird things flying everywhere. Some of the texts were just lying about but it was apparent that something about them had changed. Twilight could only stare in disbelief as she watched chaos unfold from her bookshelf.
“The experiment is ruined.”
“Oh please, you’re being so dramatic. If anything, the experiment was improved.” Discord smiled in amusement as he conjured up and drank a glass of chocolate milk, watching as “The Raven” by Edgar Allen Pone attempted to dive bomb Twilight.
Rainbow Dash stared wide-eyed at the disarray the room was in. Rubbing the back of her head, she sheepishly muttered, “Whoops, my bad.” This earned her a glare from her friend. There was a lot of cleaning up to do.
Author's Note
So, this is my first story on FiMFiction and I suck at comedy. I tried my best, but any constructive criticism is appreciated. Thanks for reading!
