Today had been a strange, but amusing, chain of events. Unfortunately, it all came at Twilight’s expense.

Naturally, the mare was skeptical about things that couldn’t be scientifically explained and Sophia would have agreed with the sentiment if it weren’t for the fact that Pinkie’s ability to predict the future using bodily spasms was tied to her Toon Force ability.

When Sophia mentioned this to Twilight, the mare raised an eyebrow as her skeptical side was running on all cylinders. “Just what the hay is Toon Force?”

“It’s difficult to explain to a culture who has not discovered artistic animation yet. Let’s say that you draw a pony on a piece of paper and have it come to life on that paper. Then you can have this pony do whatever you please, limited only by your imagination, so long as you can do so on that piece of paper. You can commit unspeakable acts of violence against this pony, even disassemble it and it will always reassemble itself as if it were part of its function. You can have this pony flattened by a boulder and it will return to normal as if its body were akin to a rubber ball.”

“Okay, gruesome examples…but what does that have to do with Pinkie?”

“Let’s say that the world around Pinkie is that piece of paper but only she can become the artist’s drawing. That would explain why Pinkie can do things that normal ponies can’t.” Sophia paused for a moment as she chose her next words. “My theory is that Toon Force is a form of chaos magic that can’t really be controlled but it can act when there is an opportunity for comedy nearby, even if it can sometimes come at another pony’s expense.”

“Are you saying that all these bad things that have been happening to me today is because Pinkie’s strange powers think it’s funny?” Twilight asked.

“That’s my best theory. At some point I want to see if it’s possible to harness her powers against the coming threat.”

“So how do I stop it from targeting me?”

“Just take the fun out of it. I told you what I know about Toon Force as best as I could. Her Pinkie Sense seems to be tied to her cartoonish powers. It seems to work by altering reality in a way that nopony notices in order to make events line up with the joke. You were subjected to what is known in the entertainment world as a running gag, a repetition of the same joke in the most impactful of moments in order to remain funny. Her bodily spasms could be a reaction to her Toon Force acting on reality. Every detail, even the order the various spasms occur, could have its own meaning, like a language that nopony really knows how to translate properly, not even Pinkie.”

“Huh, I guess it does make sense in a nonsensical way. Chaos magic has always been unpredictable but I suppose Pinkie’s body has developed a way to bring a little harmony to this chaos through her Pinkie Sense.”

“So, do you feel better now?” Sophia asked.

Twilight nodded, “Yep, I may not be able to fully understand how it works but it does. I suppose that will have to be good enough.”

After that Twilight began to take Pinkie’s twitches seriously. Since Twilight was on to Pinkie’s Pinkie Sense, her chain of painful accidents came to an end.

On a side note, Twilight placed a spell on the hinges of all of the doors in her house so that they would open slowly since Spike had an annoying habit of throwing doors open with reckless abandon. It would be inconvenient for everypony, but she wanted to break the dragon of that habit before somepony really got hurt.

“Louder!” Rainbow shouted.

Fluttershy took a deep breath and let out her best cheer, “Yaaay.” There was next to no energy in that cheer.

“Ugh…” Rainbow groaned as she fell on her back in disappointment.

“Is she trying to put together a one-pony cheering squad?” Sophia asked as she approached Fluttershy.

“She needs me to be there for her for the upcoming Best Young Flyer competition. Since it takes place in Cloudsdale, the other girls can’t come since they can’t walk on clouds.”

“I’m sure Twilight knows a spell or two that could get the others up there.”

Speaking of the librarian, Rainbow’s latest attempt at a stunt that she was performing while Sophia and Fluttershy were talking ended up with her crashing through Twilight’s window and littering the floor in books. Sophia entered the library through the window that Rainbow crashed through and lent her assistance by levitating the books back on the shelves.

“Thanks for that, Sophia,” Twilight said. “You really have one of the most impressive telekinetic abilities I’ve ever seen.” She then gave a searing look at the intruder who buried her and the rest of her friends, including Moondancer who decided to pay her a visit today, in books. “May I ask what that was about?”

“Heh. Sorry,” Rainbow weakly stated. “I’m taking part in the Best Young Flyers competition in Cloudsdale. I wish you girls could come with me to cheer me on. Fluttershy’s great support but her cheering leaves something to be desired.”

“The Best Young Flyers competition?” Twilight inquired.

As Pinkie gave her very animated description of the competition, she also mentioned her hopes on Rainbow performing a Sonic Rainboom which she described as a sonic boom and a rainbow at the same time.

“So it’s a magic-infused sonic boom?” Sophia asked.

“Yep, and I even managed to pull it off once…when I was a filly,” Rainbow explained.

“And you are currently having trouble repeating the stunt?”

Rainbow snorted, “I can pull it off in my sleep, I’m the greatest flyer to ever come out of Cloudsdale.”

Sophia didn’t need to be a mind reader to know that Rainbow was putting on airs to make herself look impressive but she also considered that this might be an opportunity to work through some of her ego. She gave a challenging smirk, “Oh, then how about a competition, Miss Greatest flyer to ever come out of Cloudsdale. Here to Mount Canterhorn?”

Just like Sophia expected, Rainbow took the bait. “You’re on!”

A few minutes later, the two were lined up while facing Canterlot in the distance. Fluttershy was designated as the starter. She nervously raised a wing while the two were in their starting positions, muscles tensed. “Three…Two…One…” She then waved her wing, “Go!”

The two took off faster than the others could blink. Rainbow was pumping her wings and pushing herself as hard as she could while Sophia kept her face forward and her limbs pinned back to make herself as aerodynamic as a missile. Rainbow left a contrail of multiple colors while Sophia left a contrail of blue light.

Rainbow noticed that Sophia was keeping up with her. She had no idea how she was doing it since she had never seen unicorns move things with their horns anywhere near as fast as Sophia was moving.

Still, Rainbow wasn’t about to lose to a rabbit. “That the best you got?” Rainbow taunted. “I can still go faster.”

“Then let’s perform a sonic boom together.” Sophia offered.

“A…a sonic boom?” Rainbow nervously questioned.

Sophia smirked, “If you are so confident in your abilities then this should be no problem.”

“Uh…yeah, sure. No problem.” Rainbow nervously stated.

“Here we go! Three…two…one…!”

Rainbow then pushed herself as hard as she could to try to quickly pull off her Sonic Rainboom but the air resistance won that battle and sent her flying backwards. She saw herself flying uncontrollably toward a tree and knew that this was going to hurt a lot so she covered her face with her wings and braced for impact.

Only the impact never came.

It took a few moments for Rainbow to notice that she was being held in Sophia’s telekinetic hold. Even though Rainbow was saved from a visit to the hospital, she was still upset that she failed to perform her legendary stunt yet again.

“You allowed your doubt to become shackles to prevent you from breaking the sound barrier,” Sophia pointed out. “That stunt has to be performed with absolute certainty that you can pull it off. I know you are capable of it but you have to convince yourself of that as well. You can have your friends cheering for you all you want but the most important pony who needs to be cheering for you is yourself.”

“Pff, cool speech and all, but I am Rainbow Dash. I don’t have any doubt.”

Sophia gave a deadpan look at the stubborn mare. It appeared that it was time to hit her ego a little harder. “Did you think I was lying when I said I had connections with the Wonderbolts? You think I haven’t met Spitfire and her squad? I could dare you to find her right now and ask her if she knew me. She knows about you because I dropped your name on her desk and I volunteered to observe you and your development as a flyer and as a pony. You want to know what she wanted me to do? She wanted me to try and break you of your bad habits. She told me that the Wonderbolts don’t allow mavericks to be part of their team and that is how you are behaving. The Wonderbolts may be a team of stunt flyers but they are also the aerial branch of the Equestrian military and, in my opinion, in better shape than the rest of Equestria’s train wreck of a military. If you want to be a part of Equestria’s air force, then let me help you; coach you.”

“How could somecreature like you teach me anything?” Rainbow asked. Despite that, Sophia knew that she had the mare’s attention now. She could sense the intrigue in the pegasus’ mind.

“Remember your friend Gilda? She was a menace the day she came to visit. She wanted to get Pinkie away from you because she wanted you all to herself like you were her property. She also frightened Applejack’s grandmother away from her stall so Gilda could steal an apple. She would have screamed at, and possibly traumatized, Fluttershy had I not intervened. I subjected her to my own personal boot camp and it worked wonders in changing her behavior. You noticed that she started acting friendly toward your friends since that day, didn’t you?”

“Wait, you’re the reason she’s been nice to my friends?” Rainbow asked.

“If you had noticed her behaving like a shameless jerk toward your friends, would you have stayed friends with her?”

“I…I don’t know…” Rainbow seemed uncertain but Sophia could tell that another part of her knew that she didn’t want to be friends with somegriff who mistreated her friends. Another part was grateful that Gilda was straightened out.

“I want to help you recreate the Sonic Rainboom, for starters. If you let me train you, the Best Young Flyers competition will be the beginning of your steady rise to greatness. I will even help you to realize your full potential.” Sophia stuck her paw out. “So, do we have a deal?”

Rainbow raised a hoof hesitantly. She wasn’t certain if this would go well for her, but something in the rabbit’s eyes told her that this was her best chance to become the pony she had always wanted to be. She finally decided to take a chance and placed her hoof on Sophia’s paw. “Deal! Now, can you show me that sonic boom you were about to make?”

With a smirk, Sophia nodded. Once she was in the air again, she continued toward Canterlot at an incredible speed which made Rainbow awestruck. A moment later, she felt the explosive force that she was expecting from her new coach which made her feel more confident that she had made the right decision.

A few days later the Best Young Flyers competition kicked off. Twilight and the others were in the stands waiting for their friend’s performance.

Thanks to some reminders from Starlight and Moondancer, Twilight remembered the cloudwalking spell that they learned in school so there was no need for any complex spells like one that would give fragile wings to a pony.

During the time leading up to the competition, Twilight also found out that another of her friends, Lyra Heartstrings, had moved to Ponyville so they spent some time together. Lyra was with them in the stands.

Once it came to be Rainbow’s turn, Twilight was surprised to see a determined look on her friend’s face instead of her usual cocky expression. Her performance also showed how hard she worked on her routine and when it came time for the Sonic Rainboom, her expression never faded as if she were concentrating on putting everything she had into her efforts to punch through the sound barrier.

Her efforts were rewarded when she punched through and her magic mixed in with the shockwave, creating a dazzling display of colors that flew outward into the distance.

Seeing this for the first time, Sophia quickly analyzed the magic in the shockwave and determined that there were some similarities to the energy that she read ten years ago. It wasn’t the same nor was it anywhere near as powerful. She had to guess that if this pony did produce the original shockwave, then something had to have amplified it to reach beyond this world. She would look into this at some point.

For now, she enjoyed the performance and Fluttershy’s uncharacteristically energetic cheer.

Author's Note

A little late, but to be fair I'm alternating between this and my collab story.