Sparkle Is An Imposter

by Swish

Rating: everyone
Tags: Comedy, Random, Princess Celestia, Twilight Sparkle, Main 6, Princess Luna, My Little Pony: Friendship is Magic
Length: 8441

When Twilight's spell accidently turns her into Celestia, she had no idea what to do.

Twilight Sparkle never meant to do anything wrong. But then again, all magical mistakes are caused by ponies who have no idea what happened. That's why they're called mistakes. The only difference with Twilight's mistake is that it accidentally sort of turned her into Princess Celestia. And now she doesn't know how to change back.

Published 2012-09-26 22:34:02 UTC
Last updated 2012-11-02 00:22:22 UTC

An annoying reflection

Twilight Sparkle stared open-mouthed at the mirror floating in front of her. She had collapsed into a sitting position and was continuing to focus blankly on her reflection. No, not her reflection, Princess Celestia's reflection.

You have got to be kidding me.

She had known she was Princess Celestia since this morning but it wasn't until she looked in the mirror that she actually understood. She had even raised the sun this morning and it hadn't been hard at all. She had just thought 'I want the sun to raise', and voilà, it was done.

All those times she told me how difficult this was?! She's such a liar!

Twilight shoved her hoof through the mirror, causing it to break into a cascade of small pieces.

"This is not happening. This is NOT happening." She had been repeating those words since this morning, each time getting louder and louder. Pretty soon she'd be shouting.

Speaking of shouting, I just want to scream right now. Twilight stood up and decided to let out all of that annoyance that had built up in the past hour and a half.

"AAAAUUUUUUHHHHHHGGGH!" Her scream echoed throughout the room. She sat down, satisfied until she heard a voice from outside her room.

"Sister? Are you alright?" Twilight gulped. She hadn't really meant to wake Princess Luna, but she decided that it didn't matter anyway. Using magic to throw open the door, she ran out of the room and collapsed onto the ground in front of the great 'Princess of the Night'.

"Lunnaaaaaa! Help meeee!" Twilight couldn't help but notice how incredibly WHINY Princess Celestia's voice sounded.

"Help you with what, sister?" Luna asked. Then suddenly she frowned. "Did you get into my cider storage again? I thought I told you that was off limits. It makes you go crazy."

"Huh?" All Twilight seemed to have learned this morning is that Celestia certainly didn't act anything like she had expected her too.

"Oh, never mind." Luna shook her head "But what is wrong with you, sister?" Luna's face seemed truly worried, and Twilight couldn't believe how much she cared for Celestia.

"I'm not your sister! I'm Twilight Sparkle!" Finally. An hour and a half of not-telling-anyone-she's-Celestia was just too much for Twilight.

Luna seemed generally surprised at this, maybe too surprised.

"WE DO NOT UNDERSTAND." Twilight flinched, Ugh, anything but the Royal Canterlot voice.

"I misused a spell, and now I'm Celestia!"

Luna paused as if she was thinking. "WHAT IS THOU GOING TO DO?"

Twilight flinched again. "I don't know! I don't even know the reverse spell!"

Unfortunately, their conversation was interrupted by a knock at the door.

"Uh... come in?" Twilight composed herself, trying to stand in a way that made her look taller and more... Celestia-like. The door opened and Twilight stared as her friends came parading into the room, and they all started talking at once.

To Twilight it sounded something like, "Oh gee hey sorry nice to see you hello princess something Twilight wrong Celestia won't open Twilight door can't see don't understand will you help?"

Twilight blinked a couple times, and then smiled, "Uh, could you repeat that?"

Applejack, Rainbow Dash, Fluttershy and Rarity all looked at each other politely, waiting for one of them to speak. Pinkie Pie of course, took the opportunity to blurt out the whole story.

"Well, you see Miss Princess Lady, we all woke up this morning, on this super-duper-fantasticly-wastic nice day, only to discover that our friend Sparkly-warkly had locked her door and REFUSED, I repeat, RE-FU-SED, to come out of her house."

Rarity quickly interrupted with "And you can hear her COMPLAINING from inside. Endless, torturous, COMPLAINING."

"Ah didn't think it was THAT bad..." This was Applejack now.

"Not that bad?" Rainbow flapped her wings angrily. "It was all 'But I'm not pretty anymore and don't come in and I'm stupid 'cause I'm Twilight and that's dumb."

Twilight suppressed the urge to groan. It was one thing to be stuck in Celestia's body, and it was another to know that Celestia was being a depressy-pants in hers. I mean, she wasn't THAT ugly.

"Well." Twilight smiled, trying to be as Celestia-like as possible. "I suppose you all should wait and see if she's better by tomorrow. If she isn't, come and see me again. Oh, and if you're able to talk to her, please tell her that Princess Celestia has some questions.

Twilight smiled to herself as she closed the door behind her friends. She had just achieved one of the things that had been worrying her since this morning: Tell her friends everything is alright.

"WE STILL HAVE QUESTIONS TO ASK." Twilight groaned out loud this time, and rolled her eyes. After I return to being Twilight Sparkle, I swear I'm inventing a spell that makes her speak quieter.

"What do you want to know?" Twilight turned to face Luna and smiled politely.

"HOW DOST THOU INTEND ON RETURNING TO THINE OWN SELF?"

Twilight glared at Luna. "I don't know! Now hushy-hush, I'm trying to think!" Twilight Sparkle paced around the room, and could only imagine what Princess Celestia would look like with her face in such deep concentration.

"Don't I have... responsibilities?" Twilight couldn't believe this had only just occurred to her. Obviously she hadn't had enough time to evaluate the current situation.

"No. You haven't had responsibilities since the incident with the changeling queen." Twilight couldn't believe what she was hearing.

"What? Not have responsibilities? Changeling queen? I'm a PRINCESS for Equestria's sake! Of COURSE I have responsibilities!"

"With the exception of lifting the sun in the morning, you currently have no responsibilities." Luna was obviously not looking at Twilight, so Twilight bent down until she was staring straight into Luna's eyes.

"Why? Why don't I have anything I'm supposed to be doing? There has to be a reason for me being Princess Celestia instead of Queen Couch Potato!"

"Do not distress yourself, Twilight Sparkle. You have hired a changeling to take your place in any important events."

"WHAT!?" Twilight stared dumbfounded at Luna. "You mean Princess Celestia's decisions have been made by a CHANGELING?"

"That is exactly what I am saying, Twilight." Luna seemed genuinely pleased that Twilight was catching on.

"I am soooo going to have a talk with her next time I see her. I mean, I have more responsibilities than her! And from now on, I'm addressing all my letters to Queen Couch Potato! I can see it now,

Dear Queen Couch Potato,

Today I learned that the easiest way to make friends is to become super important doing absolutely nothing.

Your lazy student,

Twilight Sparkle.

P.s- I was too busy being lazy to write more than one sentence. I hope you don't mind.

"Twilight! I believe you are overreacting!" Princess Luna's voice completely ruined Twilight's beautiful hypothesis about what the future would be like. "Everypony has secrets they keep from people. Princess Celestia does help out her changeling every now and then, and attends really important events. I can also assure you that whenever you have seen Princess Celestia, it has been the real one. Now please, calm down"

Twilight stared at Luna, and decided in that one moment that royalty was completely crazy. Not only was Celestia shirking her royal duties, Luna was actually defending her!

I can't help but wonder though, what exactly is Celestia learning about me? She is in my body after all.

Back at the Library...

Princess Celestia stared at the hooves in front of her. There was absolutely no way she was going to think of these... these, PURPLE hooves as her own. I mean, they were nice and... purple and all, but there was absolutely no way they were going to compare to her beautiful, white, shining hooves. Celestia hadn't really had much of a chance that morning to... er... admire her new appearance. At the moment however, she had set up no less than 15 mirrors around the library so that she would always be able to see herself.

He morning so far had been, well, terrible. She had barely even managed to keep herself together enough to tell Spike to run along and play.

Oh. Now that had been terrible. After convincing Spike that she REALLY was POSITIVELY sure that she could handle everything on her own, he finally consented to leaving and helping Twilight's other friends. How unbearably cute.

Speaking of Twilight's friends, they were almost as ~~annoying~~ er... cute? Well whatever they were, they had been knocking on the door of this... library tree all day. Well, Celestia regretted it of course, but at the time she had been moaning over all the problems her current predicament posed, and had gotten a bit... out of hoof in her description of Twilight.

If that wasn't enough, as soon as Twilight's friends had left she had accidentally knocked over a huge pile of scrolls. When opening them up, she realized they were ALL adressed to her! Well, you can only imagine how excited she was... until she noticed that these were copies of all of Twilights's friendship reports. That mare actually kept a copy of every single report she sent! Now this was fine, she didn't really mind Twilight being studious and all.

Then she saw the list on the table. It was obviously Twilight's checklist for that day, and it looked something like this-

~~Create checklist of things to do for today.~~

~~Create a checklist for all the checklists I'm going to need today.~~

~~Alphabetize friendship reports.~~

Determine what the spell on page 103 of 'Hilarious magical curses' does.

Buy streamers for Pinkie Pie.

Re-evaluate my checklist.

Double check that I've done everything on the checklist, and then create a new checklist for anything else I need to do.

Celestia had been horrified at this checklist. Of course, to a normal person it would just seem like Twilight was some crazy studious pony that needed something better to do than reading books all day. But for Celestia, this meant two horrible things. First was the fact that whatever spell had been on page 103 was most likely the cause for her current purple body. The second was that these friendship reports she'd just knocked down were supposed to be in alphabetical order.

So the great Princess Celestia had spent most of her morning alphabetizing friendship reports. But she didn't just alphabetize those reports. She alphabetized them with DIGNITY. That's right. Purple or not, she was still Princess Celestia.

Actually, she was a very disappointed Princess Celestia. She'd spent all morning in this library, and hadn't discovered anything bad about Twilight, which meant whatever secrets she had were kept hidden and out of sight. She only hoped that Twilight hadn't discovered anything that upset her while she was in her castle.

It's ok, she reassured herself. Luna is a trustworthy sister, she won't tell your secrets to anypony.

Yeah, well as the reader you all know that isn't true. But let's just leave Princess Celestia to her wishful thinking now, shall we?

So anyway. Princess Celestia finally reassured herself that there was no way her secrets could be told to Twilight. There was also another question: What was she going to do now? It wasn't that entertaining to stare at herself in the mirror all day, and Princess Celestia was starting to get bored. So, she did what Twilight Sparkle would do. She thought of this as a 'Learning Experience'.

Now, what is a learning experience? Well, it's an experience that you learn stuff from. And Celestia knew she wasn't experiencing anything from sitting in the library all day, (Though one can learn a lot in a library) so she left to go into Ponyville.

The first thing she noticed when she opened the door were all of Twilight's friends, and they were all looking extremely worried. Celestia couldn't imagine why they would be so... loyal, but she smiled at them anyway.

"Oh, Twilight!" It was the white unicorn with the purple mane talking. Celestia was 98% sure that her name was Rarity. "We've been so worried!" Celestia couldn't believe these ponies. It had been one morning of her not talking to them, and they were already WORRIED.

"Ah was worried you'd never come out again sugarcube!" There it was again. These ponies. Were. WORRIED.

"Seriously though Twi, you shouldn't worry us like that!" Celestia was definitely sure this was Rainbow Dash. In fact, she was 120% sure. And evidently Twilight's friends had no originality, because there was that word again, worried.

"Yeah Twilight! Worrying is worrisome, and it's bad! It causes me to get sad and upset, and when I get really sad and upset my hair goes all Fwooooosh, and it's straight, except for that time with Discord and that time I turned GRAY! Can you believe it?" Well. Celestia was tired of this whole worried thing. And she was extremely happy that she hadn't switched places with this pink pony. That would have been a disaster.

"Ok, I'll try not to worry you anymore. I just had a uh... a nightmare." Celestia forced another smile as she stared at the ponies gathered in front of her.

"Alright, but as long as ya promise to talk to us when y'all have any problems."

"I will," Celestia was a bit more serious this time, mainly because she knew that Applejack was really concerned for her. Or at least, whatever she had said must have been true if she was the Element of Honesty.

"I was really worried too..." Celestia looked at the trembling yellow pony in front of her. Oh great. Every. Single. One of them. They all used the word 'worried' or 'worry'. I think I'm going to be sick because of how unoriginal they are.

"Well, I promise to consult you with any problems I'm having." She was lying, of course. I mean, can you imagine? A princess, consulting her Faithful student's friends when she had problems? Bah. Nonsense.

The ponies insisted on taking her around with them to help her forget about her 'Nightmare'. So Celestia began her walk around Ponyville, paying just enough attention to the chatter of Twilight's friends to decide what to do to Twilight when she returned to her normal self. Banish her to the moon? Nah. As long as Twilight hadn't discovered any of her secret's, Celestia would dismiss this as simply an accident.

Confusion and Pink

Twilight Sparkle sat at a long rectangular table and Princess Luna was seated directly across from her. Both the ponies had solemn, serious expressions. The purple mare politely cleared her throat, hesitated, and then began to speak in a slow, serious voice.

"Today I have faced many challenges. The greatest of which was coming to terms with the fact that even Princess Celestia has secrets. I've learned about raising the sun, and the dangers of hard cider. I've learned that not all changelings work solely for evil, and that the Princess isn't the only one making important decisions. I have made a mistake that I have made many times, which is tampering with unknown magic spells. Now I face the difficult task of deciding what to do next."

Luna stared at her in silence, her face as serious and emotionless as it could possibly get. After letting Twilight's speech soak into her very being, she let out a few words of wisdom.

"Who art thou speaking to, Twilight Sparkle?"

It was now around noon, and Twilight was starting to get hungry. In fact, she was hungrier than she had ever been in her life.

Does being taller make it so you have to eat more?

"Hey Luna!" Twilight flinched at the sound of Celestia's voice coming out of her mouth. "Do we have anything to eat?" She winced again. Ugh. All I asked was for something to eat, but I feel like I'm whining.

Luna grinned, looking extremely happy. "Oh, I thought you'd never ask! I prepared breakfast for you today, but you don't mind eating it for lunch, do you? It's your favorite!"

"Uhhh..." Twilight looked quizzically at the alicorn in front of her. "How do you know what I like to eat?"

"Oh..." Luna's smile disappeared. "I meant it's my sisters favorite." The blue pony avoided looking straight at Twilight Sparkle and stared at the ground instead, looking a little bit upset.

Twilight smiled as cheerily as she could. "That's COMPLETELY understandable. I mean, I do look EXACTLY like her!" Twilight prayed that this would cheer Luna up. The Night-controlling princess had to completely trust her if she was ever going to return to normal. Or stay as Celestia. Or do anything besides getting sent back to magic kindergarten.

Oh no. Oh no oh no oh no. What is Celestia going to do to me? She won't just send me back to kindergarten, she'll send me to magic preschool! No, it'll be worse than that. She'll send me to magic preschool... in the Everfree forest! Or maybe she'll send me to a preschool in the Everfree forest, that's guarded by ponies whose cutie marks are resistance to magic! This is going to be terrible, this is going to be so, so bad! Maybe she'll send me to a magic preschool guarded by ponies whose cutie marks are resistance to magic on the MOON! Twilight paused. Actually... the moon would be kinda cool. The purple unicorn shook her head to clear away all of the pressure she was feeling. She had to think of a way to return to her normal self, and telling herself that she was going to be sent to moon preschool wasn't helping her situation at all.

"Today," Twilight Sparkle stood up as she spoke, creating a princess-like air of importance. "Today, I'm going to right the wrong I have caused, despite whatever punishment I recieve!"

"Do you Pinkie Promise?" Twilight whirled around, and stared at the empty space behind her.

"Who said that! Who's there?" Twilight was absolutely positive she had just heard Pinkie Pie speaking, but alas, there was nopony around. Luna was looking more confused by the second.

"Are you alright?" she asked in a worried tone of voice. Twilight couldn't believe how adorable Luna was with that concerned voice.

Of course, anything would be better than her normal way of speaking. Twilight nodded, and Luna seemed satisfied.

"I'll be right back with your breakfast," she said, and left towards wherever the kitchen was in this place. Thirty seconds she returned with something on a platter, and placed it in front of Twilight.

Twilight stared at the specimen in front of her. It was obviously pancakes with banana slices on top, and everything was covered in maple syrup. What she didn't understand was why this was Celestia's favorite. Pancakes weren't bad but... they weren't really what you'd expect a princess to be eating. I guess I'm just going to have to deal with the fact that whatever I've assumed about royalty is false. Back to studying I go. As Twilight wolfed down the Royal Pancakes she decided to look at her surroundings. Next to the door was a large pile of scrolls, and not all of them were the normal brown color. Some were blue, others were purple, but a majority of them were either pink or yellow. On top of ceiling was a large painting of the sun and moon, and the right wall was a bright, sunny picture of Equestria. The picture on the left wall was Equestria at night, and Twilight could see that the constellations were all in the perfect place and- wait.

"Uh, Luna?"

"Yes?" Luna had been absently flicking dust off her hooves, and looked up embarrassed when Twilight called her name.

"Why is your face in the moon in this picture?"

Luna's face flushed a deep red. "Sister!" she yelped. "I'm going to... to... do... uh, something terrible to you when you get back!" Luna focused on Twilight again. "Sorry, but my sister painted that in while I was in the moon, and she still hasn't hired somepony to repaint it again!"

Twilight sighed and turned her back to the picture. Not only was her mentor irresponsible, she was also forgetful.

Or she was just stubborn and didn't want to remove the whole 'Nightmare Moon' picture.

"Princess Celestia would never do that," Twilight whispered to herself. Behind her a high-pitched voice began to speak.

"Do you really think that?"

Twilight Sparkle turned around just in time to see Pinkie Pie's face fading from the moon in the painting.

The discoveries of Princess Celestia

Princess Celestia had spent ALL DAY with these ponies, and had learned more than she had ever wanted too. I mean, they were great ponies and she was sure that they were loyal friends to Twilight. It was just that... well frankly, they were annoying. Take the white one with the purple mane for instance. All she does is WHINE! And Luna complained about her whining! Bah! This pony was all 'But it'll mess up my mane! I'll get dirty! I'll be ugly, and it'll be the Worst. Possible. Thing!' Then there was the Rainbow coloured one. All she did was talk about becoming a Wonderbolt and pranking ponies, and how awesome she was and the difference between coolness and awesomeness. Oh, and something about a pony named Daring Do. The other pegasus (the yellow one) was adorable, but she didn't talk much, and when she did it was in a shy tone that made you feel awkward. Really awkward. Er.... Moving onward, the hardest pony to understand was the pink one, and whenever Princess Celestia saw her she seemed to be bouncing up and down in some sort of trance that still allowed for an excessive amount of forward motion. Also... she could have sworn that that pony had disappeared at least twice.

Princess Celestia's eyes then rested on the orange pony trotting happily in front of her. This one was... perfect. No flaws at all, with the exception of her strange accent, but Princess Celestia could dismiss that. Nopony wants to be ruled by a princess that judges her subjects on their accents. The only real issue Celestia had ever had with her was that one time when she'd received a letter from her claiming she hadn't learned a single thing. I mean seriously? Who does that? These are reports on what you've learned, not what you haven't learned. Sheesh.

...

After a while though, Princess Celestia began to tire of discovering what Twilight's friends weaknesses and strengths were. She was beginning to get bored of learning and experiencing what Twilight's life was like. So naturally, Celestia decided that it was about time to end her very important 'Learning Experience'.

"Uh, guys?" She began. "I have something to tell you," I can't believe how scientific Twilight sounds when she's talking! She's like one of those psychiatrist ponies who listen to all of your problems and then talk to you in this matter-of-fact tone that makes them sound like they're a first-grade teacher.

"What's wrong, sugarcube?"Applejack looked worriedly at Celestia. "Is the about that nightmare y'all had?"

"Are you not feeling well deary?" Rarity fluttered her eyelashes at Celestia. I'm not really sure what she's accomplishing by her excessive eyelid movement, but oh well.

Pinkie Pie (wherever she came from) rolled her eyes as if all the ponies were complete idiots. "She's going to tell us she really isn't Twilight Sparkle! Duh! I mean, I dunno what you guys are talking about, but whatever it is, it's just plain silly!"

"I don't really think that's quite right Pinkie," muttered Fluttershy.

"Actually," Princess Celestia began. "Pinkie Pie is quite right. I'm not Twilight Sparkle at all."

"Then what in tarnation are ya? An alien?" asked Applejack.

"Applejack! There are no such things as aliens and you know it," scolded Rarity.

"There are too such things as aliens! They're called humans!" Aaand... everypony just ignored Pinkie Pie.

Princess Celestia personally had no idea what Pinkie was talking about with the whole 'human' thing (It could potentially be dangerous) but at least the pink pony had enough common sense to understand that she wasn't really Twilight Sparkle.

"I am not an alien, nor am I a 'human'. I am actually Princess Celestia," she said matter-of-factly.

"Well duuuh," Pinkie Pie interrupted, "Tell us something we don't know!"

Everypony just ignored Pinkie again.

"Well if you are the Princess," began Rarity, "Then pray tell us, how do you intend on getting back to normal?"

Celestia smiled. "I intend on visiting Twilight Sparkle."

Two hours later, Celestia and her five crazy companions were on a train headed towards Canterlot. It had taken quite a long time to get ready, as all of Twilight's friends had many questions to ask such as 'How are we going to get past the guards to see Celestia?' and 'What is our way of transportation?'

Princess Celestia had answers for everything, of course. Answering her subjects problems had always been her top priority. Well... almost always. Their current plan was to head to Canterlot and ask one of the guards to send a message to 'The Princess' saying that 'Twilight Sparkle' had arrived. If Twilight was smart, she would be willing to let Celestia in. And if not, well... Twilight's body was still capable of casting quite a few magic spells, and Celestia wasn't afraid to use them.

The only problem with their plan so far was that it was taking AGES to get to Canterlot. She had been fine with just sitting around back in Ponyville, but now that these ponies had understood that they were in the presence of the Ruler of Equestria, they became less entertaining.

Princess Celestia stifled the urge to groan. Soooo boring! I wish I at least had Luna to talk to. All of a sudden there was a blur of pink, and a hyper looking Pinkie Pie was grinning wildly next to her.

"Somepony seems bored! Do you want me to sing you a song?" Without waiting for an answer, Pinkie Pie burst into an explosion of song. Seriously, it was complete with background music.

"When you're feeling bored or blue,

The world seems like it's against you, It's true!

But sometimes we need to stand up high,

And fly into that sunny blue sky.

Sometimes the world can fall apart,

But don't let that rip apart your heart,

Cause even though life can get you down,

It doesn't have to make you drown! Yeah!

When you're a little worried,

When you're a little disappointed,

When you can't seem to understand,

and when this world seems a little bland,

You just need to stand up high,

And look for that sun in that Bright, blue sky!"

Pinkie Pie looked over at the other ponies. "Isn't that right?"

"Uh, yeah, sure..." Nopony was really sure how to react. Pinkie Pie never really cared about the Princesses being higher up than she was, she still just did whatever she wanted too. "So remember Princess! Even though Twilight made a bad mistake, you still don't need to banish her to the moon!"

"I wasn't going to banish her to the moon!" Princess Celestia countered. "I'm sure that no harm was done."

"I wouldn't be so sure about that," said Pinkie. "I'm pretty sure Princess Luna told her quite a bit about you."

Princess Celestia's face turned an almost white shade of purple.

Understanding with exact time

The past two hours had been nothing but dull small talk with Luna, and despite learning all sorts of things, she had started to get bored. Like, really bored. Plus, Luna's harsh voice was REALLY hard to listen to for such a long period of time, and she would sometimes speak in the 'Royal Tongue', causing even Twilight's head to hurt. This obviously caused sort of a chain reaction; She was bored so it was hard to concentrate, Luna's speaking made concentrating even harder, therefore she became tired, and since she was tired, she took a nap.

And one other thing. The bed she was laying on, (presumably Princess Celestia's) was extremely soft.

Twilight had never really had that many dreams, or nightmares really. In fact, the last dream she had was probably the time when she had first seen Zecora coming to Ponyville. Unfortunately, this small nap decided it was time to break the chain, and it was officially the worst dream this studious little pony had ever had.

... Alright, it wasn't that bad, but it sure was weird.

Twilight woke up in a room with bright yellow walls, and black and yellow tiled floors. The ceiling had a large picture of the sun in it, and it was really beautifully decorated. There was a sort of buzzing in her ears, as if somepony had decided to mow their lawn right next to her head. She could faintly hear rustling behind her, and upon turning around she saw a terrible sight. It was her body, as in Twilight Sparkle's, but the mane was styled to be exactly like Princess Celestia's. Her irises had become smaller, giving her a terrifying expression. Smeared on her face were remains of squashed banana pancakes, and Twilight screamed as the other Sparkle opened her mouth and posed a question.

"Would you like a lick?"

Twilight Sparkle woke up screaming.

Naturally, it was only seconds before Luna burst into the room. "Si- I mean Twilight?" she began, and then she seemed to get even more worried as Twilight yelped again, so continued with "ART THOU ALRIGHT?"

"Yes, yes I uh, um, think so?" Twilight responded. She was happy she wasn't dreaming, but the experience seemed to remind her of the urgency of the situation. Meanwhile, Princess Luna stared at the ceiling as if she was trying to remember something, and then her face suddenly brightened.

"I have a letter for you! It's from 'Twilight Sparkle', so it must be from my sister." Twilight leaped out of Princess Celestia's bed only to get tangled up in a mess of pillows and blankets. "A LETTER? How long did you wait to tell me this?" she yelled. What are you doing Luna? Do you know how important this situation is for me? I don't want to be banished to kindergarten on the moon!

"Well...." Luna began, looking disdainfully at the tangled up Twilight. "I was down in the swimming pool when it was delivered, but I flew up as fast as I could when I heard you scream. I must thank you, fast flying is a great way to dry yourself off."

"The... swimming pool."

"Why yes! How else did you think we got our excercise?" Princess Luna asked.

"Well, I dunno," responded Twilight sarcastically. "Maybe you know, since you're an alicorn you could have excersized by like... MAGIC AND FLYING?" Princess Luna didn't seem at all fazed by Twilight's sudden outburst.

"Well, after you've lived a thousand years, it can get boring to do the same few tricks over and over again. Do you understand Twilight?" Twilight grunted her agreement, and then looked surprised. She had absolutely no idea what noise had just come out of her mouth, but it certainly wasn't a 'grunt'.

Princess Luna looked just as stunned.

Exactly twenty-five minutes and 40 seconds later, (the time was easy to figure out, just count how many times Fluttershy had closed her eyes and counted to ten) Princess Celestia's train had arrived at Canterlot. The Princess and Rarity stepped out of the train in a perfectly synchronized fashion, looking very dignified indeed. Now, the best way to be dignified is to close your eyes lightly, so that you look more relaxed. Princess Celestia accomplished this perfectly, but she might not have looked that relaxed when she opened her eyes, as she was staring right in the face of two stone-faced guards.

"Uh, umm... we come in peace?" she asked, completely forgetting whatever brilliant plan she had for getting in, but the guards both talked over her.

"Oh! You're Shining Armor's little sister! Don't worry, you're always welcome in Canterlot. We won't forget what you've done here." Princess Celestia was about to yell something about not being Shining's sister at all, but then she realized whose body she was in. Smiling politely, she resumed her 'dignified walking' and made her way into Canterlot.

"SO!" Pinkie Pie yelled from behind. "The first part of our plan went smoothly! Now what, now what? Do we get to be spies? Do we get to wear.... NIGHTVISION GOGGLES?" As usual everyone ignored Pinkie Pie.

Looking behind her, Princess Celestia checked to make sure she was far away from the guards. "The next step is to get to Canterlot Castle as fast as possible. Twilight get's paranoid when she makes mistakes, and she might be trying to stop us. The faster, the better." As soon as she finished talking, she broke into full gallop towards Canterlot Castle, without waiting for anypony to agree with her.

"Waaaiiiit!" yelled Rarity. "I can't keep uuuuuup! Auugh! I tripped! Oh no, I think I chipped my hoof!"

"Is that even possible sugarcube?" asked Applejack.

"Well, evidently it is! Now shut up you rodeo pony and get running!"

As they galloped forward, Princess Celestia could almost swear that their was some sort of epic music following them. In fact she was certain that... oh. The cause of the music appeared to be Pinkie Pie, as she was running on... well, two hooves somehow, and was playing the harmonica. Ignoring her, Princess Celestia turned her attention to the goal placed for her, and changed her expression into one of pure, cold determination.

I haven't been on an adventure in forever! It feels as if I'm looking down on myself, from way atop those puffy clou- Her dreaming was suddenly interruped by a cry from above.

"TWILY!" yelled Shining armor. Princess Celestia looked up to see the captain of the Royal Guard looking down at her. Oh no. Preparing her best 'little sister voice', she looked up at him and hollered.

"Not now Shining! I'm busy!" she yelled as sweetly as possible.

Shining Armor grinned. "Really? So am I! How about you come and talk to me for a second! And don't you dare tell me it's urgent, because if it was I would have heard about it by now." Princess Celestia winced. Of all things that could happen...

Exactly twelve minutes and 15 seconds later, she was eating lunch with Shining Armor. The time could be told by the amount of times Princess Celestia held her breath and counted to ten.

Luna had been staring at the window for quite some time now. She was extremely surprised to see a very determined Twilight Sparkle come running towards her, and was now quite amused that she had been stopped by Shining Antlers. Or whatever his name was. "Hey Twilight! I think she's having lunch with your brother!"

Twilight poked her head out of Princess Celestia's bedroom. She had been desperately fussing with the Princess's hair, trying to put it in the same style she normally used, but it didn't work at all. "What!? My brother? Luna, we must go at once!"

Luna began absently twirling her hoof on the floor. "About that 'we' thing..."

"Okay, fine, I'll go!" And with that, Twilight Sparkle ran out of the room, but not before checking the time.

Exactly two minutes and thirty-two seconds later, Twilight Sparkle, looking like Princess Celestia, arrived outside a normal restaurant in Canterlot. She knew how long it had been because she had checked the clock before she left, and as soon as she arrived. Naturally, the arrival of the Princess caused most ponies to stare, and a lot of them were kind enough to politely leave the restaurant. After everypony had adjusted to her sudden presence. Twilight walked in a quite casual fashion over to Princess Celestia. A casual fashion is achieved by walking normally.

"Excuse me Shining, I would like it if I could have a word with my pupil in private."

Exactly 3 minutes and 46 seconds later, they were back in Princess Celestia's room.

"I presume you understand the situation, Princess?" Twilight Sparkle was more than a little bit nervous. She had absolutely no idea what was going to happen to her.

"Of course, Twilight. Am I correct in assuming that you have a spell to reverse this?"

Twilight nodded, happy that she hadn't mentioned this until they were close together with little distractions. The spell she was about to perform was very difficult.

"Then, if you don't mind, I wouldn't like to stay like this much longer."

"Of course, Princess." Twilight's horn began to glow with an eerie sort of power, that wasn't really that different than normal. And the spell took precisely 8 seconds to cast, with no interruptions. Opening her eyes, Twilight discovered that she was much shorter, and was pleasantly happy to find herself staring into her teacher's face.

"What am I going to do with you Twilight?" Princess Celestia shook her head, but despite everything her voice still had a kind tone. Turning to Luna, she asked "Have you told Twilight a lot about what goes on around here?"

Twilight suddenly had an idea about what to do. "Luna has told me absolutely nothing! Isn't that right, Luna?"

Princess Luna looked from Celestia back to Twilight, and the back to Celestia.

"I, uh...."

"Yes?" asked Celestia.

"I um..." Luna shifted her gaze back to Twilight. "I didn't tell her anything, really."

Princess Celestia smiled.

Exactly six hours, thirty minutes and twenty-five seconds later, Twilight was seated in front of a book at her library in Ponyville, studying the prospect of royalty.

Complications

Twilight Sparkle was sitting on the floor in her library. She was surrounded by a stack of books, and looking at them made her feel sick. All she wanted was some banana pancakes. Her eyes were bloodshot from lack of sleep, and when she did finally decide to rest, she had terrible nightmares. The most common dream was seeing Princess Celestia addressing all of Ponyville, only to suddenly have a changeling take her place, pieces of the real Celestia floating off into oblivion. She let her tired eyes close, and began to rest when she heard a voice behind her. Turning around she saw a ghost-like Luna with a plate of pancakes.

"Care for a bite, Twilight Sparkle?"

For the seventh time that week, Twilight woke up screaming.

Panting, Twilight glanced around the dimly lit library. If she squinted her eyes hard enough she could barely see a small, familiar baby dragon sleeping to her right. Looking around the rest of the library she found that there wasn't a book in sight that wasn't neatly tucked away in their proper places on her bookshelves. If this had happened a week earlier she might have been happy about this sudden change in the way the place was organized, but right now she was much too tired to care about anything except for the sleep that she seriously needed. As her bloodshot eyes absently surveyed the room further she managed to mentally coax her body into moving her out of her bed, only to collapse on a heap of blankets she'd pushed off in her sleep.

Resting her head on the cold floor, she tried to understand the change in her behavior. She'd woken up this way every night since the experience with Princess Celestia, and still had no idea what was going on. She'd tried reading through her spell books, but after less than ten pages of reading she'd felt as if she was going to throw up. The worst part was that everything inside of her was aching for banana pancakes. She seriously couldn't get the taste out of her head. Despite how tired she was some part of her brain still managed to function and everything inside of her was screaming that something wasn't right, and Twilight knew what it was. Pushing herself into a standing position, she decided it was time to write to Princess Celestia.

"Sthpick, shtashk a nothe" she mumbled as she vainly tried to balance herself. She was disappointed to find that her number one assistant was still sound asleep. And snoring. She staggered towards his bed and managed to get her hoof caught on one of her blankets. She stumbled around swaying left to right before finally collapsing in front of the sleeping dragon. "Sthpick, Canth you heawrh me? Sthpick, I thneed you thoo thtack a nothe. Sthpick, Washe up!" She coughed a couple times before yelling one last feeble "STHPICK!"

There was still no response from the sleeping dragon, so Twilight found a piece of parchment and a quill. She began to scribble down a quick note to her dear Princess Couch Potato.

Dear Princess Celestia,

Lately I have been having the weirdest dreams,
as well as strange nightmares. I'm not sure why,
but I would appreciate it if you would relay any similar
symptoms you experience to me.

Your faithful student,

Twilight Sparkle

It was pretty impressive that Twilight had enough determination and strength left to write the letter, but she wasn't quite strong enough to read out loud as she normally does. Instead, she read out loud like she doesn't normally do. It sounded something like this.

"Dear Printheth Thelethtia,

Lathly I hath ven hafing the weirtheth Dweamth,
ath wehl ath stwanth nighmars. I'm noshure why,
Buth I'd apreshate it if you wolth welay any thimilar
thympthomth you ethperienth to me.

Yure thaithful thtudent,

Toilet Spurkle"

If Twilight Sparkle had looked back on this small incident, she would have realized it was a good thing she didn't have Spike jot down what she was saying. Even so, Spike still had one other job besides writing the letter. Creeping over to the small dragon, Twilight managed to get into a position which allowed her to partially lay on the ground while having one hoof dangle over the side of Spike's bed. Using her horn, she tickled Spike's nose with the feather side of the quill while holding the letter above his nose. It was a matter of seconds before he sneezed and the letter was sent.

Princess Celestia was busy swimming in the swimming pool when a letter from Twilight Sparkle arrived. She was so surprised she screamed something around the lines of "SHARK!" but nopony seemed to hear her except the guards, who looked over quizzically before deciding nothing was wrong. Princess Celestia sheepishly lifted the soaking letter out of the water, and began to read. The letters may have been soaked, but she could still sort of understand what it meant; something about Twilight having the same sleep problems she'd been experiencing before their little 'incident'. Deciding she'd deal with the letter in a minute, she flew back up to her room, feeling happier than ever before. Walking over to a few open books on her desk, she began to read 'The Guide To Spell Reversing'. She smiled to herself as she read, realizing she was enjoying this a lot more than she should be.

You see, Princess Celestia already knew what was going on. She'd managed to read through quite a few books in the Canterlot library, and she'd even had access to restricted sections. Luna had made fun of her, and called her an 'Egghead' (an expression she seemed to have picked up from some Ponyville citizens) but Celestia was determined to expand her knowledge of the world. In the process of reading so many books, she discovered that the spell Twilight used was a simple soul-changing spell, and reading further she discovered they mentioned a simple mistake that caused souls to intertwine and even switch bodies every now and then. This had delighted her, because whatever sort of side-effects soul switching had she was now extremely eager to switch bodies with Twilight in order to learn more about different ponies and situations. Turning her attention back to Twilight's letter, she wrote a quick response claiming nothing was wrong with her whatsoever. Grinning wider than she had in quite a while, Princess Celestia turned to look through her books for a spell that would keep things waterproof, so she could read while swimming.

Twilight Sparkle had finally managed to get to sleep, but it wasn't long before she was interrupted by a letter falling on her face. Opening her eyes again, she carefully unrolled it in order to read it's contents.

Dear Twilight Sparkle,

I am fine. Perhaps you should make sure you aren't sick, Nightmares can be terribly unhealthy. I hope you are doing better soon,

Signed,

Princess Celestia

Twilight sighed, deciding she was getting nowhere. If the Princess really wasn't having any weird symptoms, it really wasn't logical to assume it had something to do with their 'accident'. As she was trying to decide whether to go to a doctor or not, she heard a loud knock at the door.

"Uh, come in?" she said, a little confused. Isn't it a bit early for visitors? The door was pushed open by none other than Pinkie Pie, and pretty soon she was bouncing around in Twilight's face.

"Hey Twilight!" she giggled. Twilight stared horrified at her new visitor- Pinkie Pie was the last pony she wanted to see this morning.

"Why are you even here?"

"I came to see how you were doing, 'cause my right hoof was a-twitchin', and when that happens it means Twi-twi has a problem!" she laughed.

"You have a special Pinkie sense just for me?" Twilight asked anxiously.

"Uh-huh! It goes off a loooot, especially lately! But most of the time it happens when you're asleep, but this time I knew you were awake! So I brought all your other friends to come and see you!"

"You... WHAT?" yelled Twilight.

"Hiya, Twilight!" Twilight's five other friends walked in through the door, with the exception of Rainbow Dash, who sort of floated inside while yawning.

"What are you even doing here? I'm fine, and I'm tired!" Twilight yelled.

"We're taking you to breakfest, silly!" yelped Pinkie, "Come on!" Twilight decided she was too tired to argue, and they began slowly walking down toward the middle of town. "See, you've been really down lately. Not like down as in you fell down, but like down as in you're sad. And sad is no good, 'cause then you're not happy, and happy is good! And if happy's good and happy is the opposite of sad, then sad must be bad cause bad is the opposite of good! You know what my least favorite thing is? It's when ponies say it's opposite day! Because then that means that what they said was the opposite of what they meant, which means it's not opposite day! And if it's not opposite day, then what they said is true! It makes no sense! Speaking of holidays, I really like Nightmare Night cause you get lots of candy! I wonder what I'll be next year... maybe I'll dress up as a human! Humans sound really super cool, even though you all say they don't exist. Nopony ever proved they don't, and I have reason to believe that the-"

"Well, it looks like we're finally here..." Rarity said, and motioned for Twilight to go inside. "After you!" Twilight wandered inside and sat down at a table while her friends all came in after her.

"So anyways," Pinkie continued. "I have like a Pinkie sense for everything! I mean, figuring out what my right hoof twitching meant was really hard, but it happened so many times it was so funny! There was that one time when you were sleeping and Spike stole your ice cream, and then there was that time when you turned partially into Celestia in your sleep! And if you're wondering how I knew, that's cause my back hooves clacked, and that was what happened when you changed the first time! Also, there was that time when you were walking and you almost stepped into poison joke that Zecora had dropped, but I yelled at you to stop and you got mad!"

"PINKIE!" Rainbow Dash yelled. "I don't need to hear everything that happened to Twilight in the past week! We're trying to cheer her up here!"

"Rainbow Dash?" asked Rarity. "You can understand her?" Rarity was looking at Rainbow Dash with a disapproving expression, as if understanding Pinkie Pie was something she didn't really admire.

"Well she's talking all the time, you at least pick up some of it," Rainbow replied. "But seriously, I'm not sure whether it actually is worth listening too. I mean, Twilight obviously didn't turn into Princess Celestia in her sleep."

"She did too!" yelled Pinkie Pie, and glared indignantly at Rainbow Dash.

"Pinkie. Tell the truth," said Twilight. "This could be important." Pinkie didn't answer however, instead her eyes widened and she fell backwards off of her chair and onto the floor. There was a long silence as Twilight and her friends waited for her to respond, but after a while they went back to their normal chatting.

"Um. I was just wondering. How um, how weird was it being Princess Celestia?" Fluttershy asked.

"Well," Twilight began. "It was re-"

"OH. MY. GOSH." Rainbow leaped from the table and pressed her face against the window. "Look at that! Can you believe it!?" Outside the restaurant was a large cart carrying a large Daring Do outfit. "I can't believe it! That's the limited edition, they must have brought it in from Canterlot! CANTERLOT!"

Pinkie Pie got off the floor at this, and glared at Rainbow. "Rainbow, you're getting your script messed up, Rarity's obsessed with Canterlot, not you."

Rainbow was still staring out the window, and then suddenly flew out of the restaurant to have a closer look. Naturally, her five friends followed her. "You know Rainbow, I've always wanted to tell you something," said Rarity. "That hat that she wears is atrocious. It looks like an egg is on top of her head!"

"Egghead," giggled Applejack.

As Twilight was watching her friends she felt a strange tingling sensation in the top of her head, and squeezed her eyes shut. When she opened them she was in an entirely different place, standing in a familiar room. Raising her hoof to eye level, she wasn't too surprised that it was a beautiful shade of white.