-or- What Do You Do 'Bout A Shrunken Stagemare?
With squinted eyes and stuck-out tongue does Twilight Sparkle inch a pair of tweezers forward in painstaking fashion. Between the pincered tongs of the tool is held a book of miniscule proportion, one of dozens in a range of exactly nine different colors. Some sit already in their proper position on equally diminutive shelves, though a majority even now await proper placement amidst their meticulously organized brethren. Beads of sweat would be rolling down Twilight’s brow, blurring her vision as they drip into her eyes, were it not for the precautions she took against precisely that, a spell to temporarily suspend that particular homeostatic process, a ward against distraction, for hers is a task requiring the utmost focus, care, and fine motor control.
“TWILIGHT I NEED YOUR HELP!”
“BWAH!”
Or, y’know, Starlight Glimmer could bust into the room and completely blow her concentration.
“Starlight,” Twilight says through teeth grit so hard they threaten to break into osseous (or rather, osse-ish, for indeed teeth are not bones, a technical distinction Twilight Sparkle takes great joy in sharing whenever possible) sand, “what have I said about startling me when I’m working on my models?”
“No, I know Twi, and I’m sorry but- wait-“ Starlight cuts off when her eyes flick to Twilight’s work, “-Ooh, is that the-“
“The Limited Edition Maven of the Stacks playset featuring twelve dozen to-scale books in nine different colors and three distinct tome sizes in addition to a special, uniquely-molded Parchment Maven figurine with real page-turning action?” Twilight answers her unfinished question with the particular sort of smug pride that may only be felt by nerds, among nerds, “Why yes! Yes it is.”
“Wow, I can’t believe you actually managed to get your hooves- wait, no time for that now! Twilight, I need your help finding Trixie.”
“Trixie’s missing?” Twilight gasps into her hoof even as her train of thought switches tracks on a pinhead, bound now for Serious Business City rather than Playtimeburg, “Do you have any idea where we should start looking?”
“Er- well, I wouldn’t say she’s missing, per se, I mean she is a… mostly capable mare who can usually take care of herself and it’s not like anypony abducted her or anything,” Starlight limply bats a hoof at the air with a non-nonchalant laugh, “I’m sure she’s fine! I just… don’t… know where she is, right at this moment.”
Twilight’s eyes dart sideways to her in-progress model as a look of consternation crosses her face.
“O…kay? What’s the problem then? You do know friends don’t always have to be in touch with each other every second of the day, right? Do we need to do a friendship lesson on that one?”
“Whaaat, no, no, I- pfft, of course I know that! It’s just, uh…”
Twilight Sparkle and Starlight Glimmer have always had many things in common even before they first crossed each-other’s paths and became mortal-enemies-turned-lifelong-companions. Many in their mutual group of friends would say that said companionship exacerbated many of these qualities in the both of them, for better and worse. There is of course their habit of catastrophizing, which holds the dubious honor of being the most extreme of their shared quirks both in terms of how much it tends to impact their circumstances and the degree to which being in each other’s company has deepened its ingrainment. Experimentation into matters both magical and mundane, homoerotic tension with all of their friends, and an alarming disregard for the continued stability of the space-time continuum have also experienced rather significant cross-culturation between the two archmage-types.
And, of course, it is often said that creatures’ vocabulary and mannerisms of speech tend to bleed into each other as they spend more and more time together regardless of how similar those things are or are not to begin with. The company we keep reflects back upon us, in short.
All this to say, in rather roundabout fashion: Twilight Sparkle is intimately familiar with what it looks like for Starlight to stall and avoid having to face the music.
“Alright, what’s the actual problem?”
Starlight sighs heavily.
“I shrunk her to one-tenth her usual size,” she says, mostly to the floor.
“Ooh, you two were finally going to try that thing Pinkie and I told you about?”
“Ehehe, not quite, still working up to that one."
“Oh. What were you trying to do then?”
“…I don’t wanna talk about it.”
Twilight sighs heavily. “Fine. Okay, okay, one-tenth… that’s not that small though, how’d you lose track of her?”
“Wellllll… I was trying to turn her back to normal size but she was kind of freaking out about it and honestly so was I a little bit which was really bad for my concentration and then a random explosion happened nearby which was REALLY weird- well I guess not that weird because this is Ponyville after all but-“ Twilight places a meaningful hoof on Starlight’s shoulder, and she pauses to take a deep breath “-I might have. Accidentally. Teleported her instead of restoring her to normal size. Just a little bit.”
“And you don’t know where, do you?”
“You know, I hate it when you ask questions like they aren’t really questions like that.”
“And you need my help because…?”
“I was hoping you’d know a tracking spell or something?”
“Well, I do, but I couldn’t use it to track Trixie. It needs a certain level of… familiarity to work, and she and I just don’t have that. You probably could, though!”
“Great! Where’s the book with it?”
“Let’s see…” Twilight trots over to one of the many bookshelves, peering across spine after spine for her quarry, and then: “Ooooh, right. I lent it to Rainbow Dash.”
Starlight’s face scrunches, “Why would you lend a spellbook to Rainbow Dash?”
Twilight’s face, in stark contrast, relaxes and opens up as her eyes unfocus a bit with misty affection, “Well, I was rambling to her the other day about spellcraft, using all the formal terminology ‘cause I was super wrapped up in it, you know how it goes, and she somehow got it into her head that she needed to try and impress me by taking a greater interest in the field. Before she went home that day she took a random bunch of textbooks with completely random reading levels with her,” A small smile graces her lips, and she even blushes, “It was actually kinda sweet, even though I know it’s gonna go over her head.”
“You two have such a weird relationship.”
“Oh hush, like you’re any different with your blue idiot. Let’s see, quill, quill…” Twilight hunts for writing supplies.
“My blue idiot would theoretically be able to cast the spells, at least…”
“Yeah, well,” mentor does not so much as look up as she counters student’s argument, “my blue idiot is the one that’s going to help us find yours.”
“Touché.”
“Anyway, I’ll need to get my copy of that particular text back from her. Let me just…” Twilight quickly composes a letter to the pegasus and teleports it off to her, “There, that should do!”
~~~~~~~~~
Elsewhere, a missile-like missive appears directly in front of Rainbow Dash in mid-flight, practically a potent projectile against her current speed. The scroll whaps her in the face, eliciting a cry of alarm and sending Equestria’s best flier careening out of the sky.
~~~~~~~~~
“And now we wait! It should only take her a moment to come by with it,” Twilight closes her eyes as she says this, face beaming with smug pride in the superiority of her blue idiot over Starlight’s.
As the seconds tick into minutes, however, her grin gradually draws downward and inward, smugness turning to consternation, her brow mirroring the motion. As above, so below.
“…She’s not here yet,” Starlight supplies helpfully.
“She’s probably napping somewhere,” she waves a hoof in dismissal, “Oh well, in the meantime you can always try searching for her the old-fashioned way! Ask around, look for clues - you never know, you might get lucky.”
“Good idea, Twi. You’ll let me know if Dash stops by with that book, right?”
“Actually, I’ve modified my messaging spell so that my friends can send the original paper back with a response if they need to! If Dash comes by and can’t find me here, I’m sure she’ll do just that, so I suppose I might as well come with you. Two heads are better than one, after all,” the smile Twilight directs at Starlight is wide and guileless, with but a soupçon of energetic twinkle in her eyes betraying her true feelings before she breaks out into a squeal and rapidly taps her hooves in place.
“Ooh, who am I kidding, this is so exciting! I’ve always wanted to be part of a mare-hunt!”
“I’m not sure it’s a mare-hunt unless she’s a suspected criminal… actually, wait, how have you never been part of a mare-hunt? You have more arch-nemeses than anypony else in Equestria – maybe put together, once you exclude the rest of The Girls."
“Well typically my enemies tend to come to me, Starlight.”
“…Point taken.”
~~~~~~~~~
On the exact other side of town, Trixie B. Lulamoon struggles her way up the intricately metal-worked side of a sewing machine as the vibrations coursing through its frame try to shake her off like an ornery manticore. Her hooves and limbs buzz numbly, threatening with each motion to slip away entirely and send her tumbling back to the floor so far below. Only having one arm hooked through a hole in the lattice keeps her anchored for the moment, and as the roaring whoosh of the needle above assaults her eardrums she feels less confident in her ability to hold on with each moment.
Oh, Trixie’s in a pickle now! Trixie thinks.
When the machine stops it does not immediately register to Trixie, overwhelmed as her hearing is by the just-ceased cacophony. Only once she realizes she can hear a ladylike humming rather than the all-consuming machine does she snap out of her despairing reverie and scramble to summit the obstacle before it can be re-awakened. With great difficulty, she pulls herself up over the edge, onto the horizon-broad length of fabric covering the main table, and lays there panting up towards the high, high ceiling for a moment.
“Waugh!” Rarity exclaims as she looms above the miniaturized pony, dealing further damage to her poor sensitive ears, “Oh! Oh, it’s just you, Trixie! You startled me, you really oughtn’t sneak up on ponies like that, it’s polite to announce oneself.”
Trixie shoots her the dirtiest look she can in her bedraggled state, “I tried to! You couldn’t hear me over the sewing machine, you-“
“Ohhhhh my goodness!” Rarity squeals, and Trixie can’t even summon the energy to wince at the sound this time, “your voice is so adorably squeaky and high-pitched!”
“Trixie thinks her voice sounds perfectly normal right now, actually,” Trixie pouts.
A marshmallow-white hoof covers a poorly suppressed grin, “Oh, yes, yes, whatever you say! Ah, but more importantly, whatever are you doing here? And why are you so… teeny?”
Trixie grumbles something rendered doubly incomprehensible by her current size-based predicament.
“Beg pardon?”
“Starlight shrunk me and accidentally teleported me across town while trying to reverse it.”
“Why did she send you here, of all places?”
“I don’t think she meant to send me here. Or anywhere, really, kind of just a blind throw. I’m a little surprised I didn’t end up inside a wall or something.”
“Well-“ Rarity stops abruptly, then gives Trixie a sly grin, “Oooh, were you and Glimmy trying out that thing Twilight likes to do with Pinkie Pie?”
“…Trixie doesn’t want to talk about it.”
“Hm-hm!” Rarity intones smugly, the fact that her assumption is wrong making not the slightest bit of difference, “Well, I’m more than happy to give you a lift, so to speak, back to Twilight’s so you can-“ Rarity cuts herself off suddenly, furrows her brow, peers at Trixie, who feels a little sliver of dread tap-dance its way along her spine. “Idea!”
“Uh oh.”
“You know Trixie, I’ve been thinking lately about branching out into certain… extra-petite markets, shall we say, and you happen to be just the perfect size to serve as a test model at present.”
“That sounds utterly humiliating.”
“Oh, please,” Rarity draws the word out in her very best and most pathetic whine, “You have no idea how hard it’s been to get my hooves on ponyquins this size! Just for a little bit, then I’ll bring you straight over to the castle!”
“Nuh-uh, Trixie’s been through this song and dance before: She agrees to model for you one time, next thing she knows she winds up covered in peppermint and edible party string every other Saturday while you try to sweep her off her hooves to Las Pegasus.”
“Wait, tell me more about that.”
“The answer to both things is no, Rarity! Trixie is not some dress-up doll, despite how perfectly lustrous and brushable her mane is!”
“But you’d be helping spark a fashion revolution for all the small folk of the world!”
“No!”
“I’ll tailor a brand new stage outfit for yooooou~”
Pause.
“…Trixie does enjoy indulging in a bit of vanity now and then…” Trixie understates.
“That’s what I’ve always liked about you, Trixie, is your sense of presentation. Nopony truly appreciates good showmareship except other showmares, I say!”
“Very well, Trixie shall allow you access to her perfect figure for this little experiment.”
“Oooh, thank you thank you thank you! Now, where did I put those extra-fine needles…?”
Trixie feels another twinge of dread pluck at her vertebra but misattributes it to the ordeal she just volunteered for, unaware of the sinister green gaze fixed upon her from a high corner of the room.
~~~~~~~~~
“Thanks anyway, Pinkie,” Starlight says, and a moment later steps glumly down the front stoop of Sugarcube Corner.
“No luck, huh?”
“Nope. She’s been working the counter all day and nopony who came in said anything about Trixie,” her cheeks color and she feels like scrunching her bones in on themselves for a moment. “The worst part is I had to convince her this isn’t because we were trying that thing you told us about…”
“I don’t know why that insinuation bothers you so much, there’s no shame in it and-“
“HAHAHA, hey, Twi, I have an idea, let’s talk about THAT later! Maybe, oh, I don’t know… after the heat-death of the universe? Right now I just want to find Trixie and get her back to normal size.”
“I’m surprised nopony had any leads we could follow! I’d have thought Trixie’s first instinct would be to try and get somepony’s attention. It’s her first instinct in any other situation…”
“She might’ve wound up somewhere without anyone nearby. Oh crap, I hope I didn’t put her in a wall…”
Twilight barks out a laugh, says, “Oh, I’m sure that’s not the issue!” and completely fails to reassure either of them.
“If only we could cover more ground…”
“Wait! Ground! That’s it!”
“What?”
“Or rather, that’s the opposite of it! If we searched from the air, we’d be able to scout much more efficiently!”
“But there’s still only two of us – and we wouldn’t be able to see her if she was inside somewhere.”
“Well it’s better than nothing! Besides, it wouldn’t just be the two of us! We just need to find Fluttershy first…” Twilight begins to cast her gaze around, as if by simply speaking her name she might appear at just that moment.
By some divine providence, she does in fact come ambling around a nearby corner, saddlebags stuffed with groceries.
“Fluttershy!”
“Oh, hello girls,” Fluttershy says placidly, long since acclimated to random shouts of her name trying to get her attention, “Lovely day, isn’t it?”
“Yes, great, grand, just peachy!” Twilight takes a moment to nuzzle her with genuine warmth, a small moment of lovely, affectionate normalcy before the coming SNAFU. As she pulls away, her expression hardens quickly into Business Mode, eyes steely and severe, hoof laid firmly upon Fluttershy’s withers. “Fluttershy. We need a favor.”
“Oh, I’d be happy to help, Twilight, what is it?”
“We need you to ask the local bird population to help us look for Trixie.”
Fluttershy tilts her head to one side, several questions coming to her lips at once. The one she goes with is “Why do you need help finding Trixie? She’s a grown mare, I’m sure she can take care of herself, wherever she is.”
“Normally that would be-“ Twilight obliquely raises an eyebrow at Starlight, so she hedges, “-ahem, mmmostly true, but I kinda shrunk her down with a magic spell and teleported her somewhere in Ponyville but I don’t know where so I need help finding her before she gets eaten or trampled.”
“Hm…” Fluttershy hmmms, adopting a thoughtful expression, “Well, I can ask, but… I can’t promise they’ll be willing to help. The birds around Ponyville don’t exactly like Trixie very much.”
“What? Why not?”
“It’s her fireworks, mostly, the noise is very disruptive to all my little feathery friends, not to mention it makes the airspace where she’s setting them off very unsafe.”
“Ah, so pretty much the same reason anyone doesn’t like Trixie,” Twilight remarks, earning a glare from Starlight.
“Still, it can’t hurt to ask, can it?”
“I suppose not…” Fluttershy says uncertainly. Nevertheless, she glances around, walks over to a nearby tree, and clears her throat. “Excuse me, Mister Passerini?”
On the lowest branch of the tree, Mister Passerini stops preening himself. With a genial caw and a courtly bow, he greets her and asks how she is on this fine day.
“I’m quite well, Mister Passerini, thank you for asking! How are the chicks?”
Mister Passerini croaks several times in rapid succession, gesturing outwards with his wings.
Fluttershy giggles. “My, that’s wonderful, you must be very proud!”
Mister Passerini puffs out his chest and caws, once, eyes closing in smug satisfaction.
“Mister Passerini Jr. always has been quite talented, it’s really no surprise that she-“
“Fluttershy.”
“Hm? Oh, right! Mister Passerini, I was hoping you might be able to help my friends here with something.”
Mister Passerini cocks his head and hops side-to-side twice.
“Well, it’s about Trixie – you know Trixie, don’t you?”
Mister Passerini narrows his eyes, which is of course a very firm ‘yes, of course I know Trixie, all the avians know Trixie’.
“She’s had a bit of a… an incident, and we’d very much appreciate if you could spread the word to everybirdy to keep an eye out for her. She’s a good bit smaller than she usually is, so-“
Mister Passerini squawks twice, followed by a series of rapid tongue clicks.
“No, yes, I understand that, but-“
Mister Passerini ca-caws, and Fluttershy gives out a tiny scandalized gasp.
“Mister Passerini! Mind your language, there are young fillies and colts about!”
Mister Passerini’s wings flare outward in a very ‘what-do-you-want-from-me-it’s-true’ type gesture.
“I’m sure I can ask her again to try and rein it in some, but I won’t be able to until we find her, and we’d really appreciate you and everybirdy else’s help looking.”
Mister Passerini turns his back petulantly on Fluttershy.
“Oh, don’t be like that…”
Mister Passerini rapidly clicks his tongue several times.
“Pretty please? For me?”
For a moment it seems Mister Passerini has made up his mind, but then he wavers, starts to shift a little uneasily on his talons, before rolling his eyes and groaning while turning back to face Fluttershy. His posture looks just a little bit defeated, not that Starlight or Twilight are experts on avian body language.
“Thank you so much, we all really appreciate it!” Fluttershy nudges Starlight in the side with a wing as she says this.
“Oh, uh, yeah! Thanks Mister Passerini, I don’t know what we’d do without you!”
A low grumbling rises out of Mister Passerini’s chest before he takes to the air, off to spread word of Fluttershy’s request.
“Thanks Fluttershy,” Twilight gives her another little nuzzle, “We really do appreciate it. We’ll see you later, let us know if you hear anything, okay?”
“Of course Twilight, it’s no trouble. I’ll see if I can’t get the squirrels to keep an eye out too, but no promises.”
“You’ve already done more than enough.”
“Good luck girls!” Fluttershy waves before turning down the path which leads, eventually, to her cottage.
“Thanks!” Starlight calls after her, “Something tells me we’re gonna need it!”
~~~~~~~~~
“…and so I said to him, ‘MISTER Thimble, for shame! You ought know better than to cast such aspersions upon a lady, particularly at your age!’ and do you know what he said to me? He said, and I quote: ‘Oh, far be it from me to cast aspersions, but I’m merely repeating what I heard through the grapevine!’”
Trixie gasps, “No! And after everything with the Duchess!”
“I know! The sheer temerity!”
“So what happened next?” Trixie asks breathlessly, the only thing keeping her from leaning forward into the suspense of Rarity’s tale the need to stay still for the delicate tailoring work and also the jury-rigged array of pins that threaten to jab her if she doesn’t.
The two of them have been at it for two hours and twenty-four minutes now, and after testing out several designs on Trixie, Rarity is presently designing a brand-new cloak and hat made of material that shimmers eye-catchingly but not obnoxiously in the light. When Trixie questioned the wisdom of doing it then as opposed to after she returns to normal size, Rarity had insisted she could use all the practice she could get, and that Starlight would ‘probably be able to grow it with you, yes?’ Regardless of whether this is true or not, it made sense to Trixie.
“Well, needless to say I-“ the ringing of the boutique’s bell downstairs interrupts Rarity, followed shortly a posh voice calling out ‘hello, is anypony here? I have a petticoat emergency on my hooves!’
“Ah, pardon me, dear, it seems I’m needed downstairs. Be back presently!”
A brief note on the inhabitants of The Carousel Boutique: Opalescence, like the great majority of felines, hates hates hates not being the center of attention. Due to Rarity and Sweetie Belle’s busy and fulfilling careers, this often leads to her – again, like the great majority of felines – acting a little demon to draw as much attention to herself as possible. Her methods are fairly standard, as far as cats go: knocking things off tables, being as loud as her little lungs will allow, shoving her butthole in the faces of anypony nearby, and on rare occasions chasing down any small and unfortunate creatures that step into her parlor to great ruckus. Little feline brute that she is, Opalescence takes quite a bit of enjoyment from this last. She will take every opportunity to indulge those predatory instincts that no amount of domestication will ever be able to fully quash, and as it happens Rarity has for the better part of an afternoon been occupied – the nerve! – with the sewing of unusually small garments for an unusually small and unfortunate creature.
So. Yeah.
Incidentally, it’s difficult for one to truly conceptualize how purring can sound “demonic” or “monstrous” until one happens to hear it while roughly the size of a mouse.
A shiver not so much tap-dances as does a finely choreographed rhythmic gymnastics routine up Trixie’s spine as some ancient, near-forgotten prey instinct awakens in the presence of a predator’s murderous drive. A moment later, Opalescence the cat jumps on silent paw-pads up to the table in front of her.
“Uh. Hi, kitty. Nice day, isn’t it? Your coat looks especially… floofy, today!”
Opalescence drops her head low the tabletop, wiggling her hindquarters about in the air as the musculature near her shoulder blades tenses.
“Okay, Trixie knows she looks good enough to eat – as always – but Rarity will be back very soon, and I doubt she’ll appreciate you chowing down on one of her friends. You wouldn’t want to disappoint her, would you, uh – Oh, what was your name again? Obol?”
Opalescence’s irises narrow to jubilant slits, and Trixie swears she feels the chill approach of death – the unicorns in her family have always been very attuned to that sort of thing, you understand. As carefully as she can, Trixie wraps her horn in aether, trying to keep the tell-tale glow as dim as possible so to not alert her feline adversary. Opalescence notices anyway – because magic is not subtle and neither is Trixie – and the shift of her haunches pauses as calculations run in the little walnut-sized brain residing within her cranial cavity. A bead of sweat rolls down Trixie’s forehead, alighting on the end of an eyelash like a droplet of morning dew ‘pon the edge of a sheet of gossamer. Pony and cat sit at a stalemate, an impasse, a standoff, neither seeking to invite their annihilation by making the first move.
The doorknob across the room turns with a clack, and the door begins to glide silently open.
“Smoke bomb!” Trixie screams, disappearing with a pomf! half a heartbeat before Opalescence launches herself forward, thumping with an uncharacteristic lack of grace against the backboard of the desk. Simultaneously, Trixie reappears in a teeny and tiny poof! on a shelf across the room, knocking several spools of thread to the floor far (three-and-a-half-feet) below.
The door continues to open with a dramatic torpor.
Opalescence whirls around, eyes darting around the room in search of her quarry, and when she spots Trixie she leaps to the floor with a trill and trots to the shelving unit. Just as she leaps up to the shelf Trixie is on, Trixie leaps desperately to a fabric table, landing with all four hooves upon a bolt of fine chartreuse. She tries to gallop away but succeeds only in sending a great length of her perch shooting towards the floor as she stays in place. A scant moment later Opalescence tries to follow but lands with only her front paws upon the bolt, and as she slips backwards she flails out with her paws, claws grasping at the already unspooled fabric, yanking it down with her weight as gravity asserts itself, making the bolt spin even faster. Too fast, in fact, for Trixie to keep up, and she slides backwards with a cry, bonking her chin on the way down and being sent shooting across the floor as she lands upon the still-moving fabric below, as might a foal launch out of a waterslide.
“Terribly sorry about that, darling! Now, where wer- HEAVENS TO CELESTIA WHAT IS GOING ON IN HERE?!”
“YOUR CAT WANTS ME FOR LUNCH!” Trixie shrieks while she weaves between the metal poles of a cluster of ponyquins, Opalescence hot on her tail and knocking over another of the poor unsuspecting forms with each juke.
“Opal! Bad kitty-cat! Do not eat Mama’s specialty models!”
“Grab her grab her GRAB HER!”
“Oh, but she hates when I do that!”
“AND TRIXIE HATES BEING EATEN ALIVE!”
Rarity makes a keening sort of noise in her throat. While she hesitates, Trixie and Opalescence cross the length of the room, one just barely keeping ahead of the other until Trixie abruptly stops. Opalescence’s momentum takes her forward, claws scrabbling against the smooth floor of Rarity’s workroom, as her quarry turns sharply towards a nearby window. She hops up a conveniently-placed stepstool, into the windowsill, pushes the pane open with a hercuneighan effort.
“Come on, pussycat, Trixie’s right here!” Trixie taunts.
Opalescence leaps up after her. Trixie ducks at the last moment, and at first it seems as though her gambit will work – right until Opalescence slams into the glass which Trixie did not push open enough for her to sail cleanly past. The cat lands, momentarily, on the windowsill which is not nearly wide enough for her to find unplanned purchase on, and in her doomed scramble to establish a foothold one of her back paws catches Trixie in the barrel. The paw carries Trixie out the window with Opalescece, and they both go into freefall.
“EEEEEEEEEK!” Screams Trixie.
“Mrrow-rowl!” Yowls Opalescence.
“Opal, precious!” Cries Rarity, hoof reaching impotently after them.
Seemingly out of nowhere, a large-ish swallow swoops in and grabs Trixie in its talons. After she recovers from the sudden lurch, Trixie barks out a loud “hah!”, followed by a raspberry blown in Opalescence’s direction.
“You may always land on your feet, but you’re still down there and I’m up here!” Trixie taunts.
Trixie’s new circumstances sink in a moment later. She looks up at the swallow’s face, as impassive as a bird’s can be and completely ignoring its cargo, focused instead on its flight path. She briefly considers shooting off a firework into its eye in a bid to get free, but unfortunately she can’t quite remember the principles of mass and gravity well enough to be certain she wouldn’t reach terminal velocity from this height; to say nothing of the hungry cat still prowling around somewhere down there.
Well, Trixie thinks, looks like this might be the end for ol’ Trixie. Carried off by a bird. Not the most surprising way I could’ve gone, I guess. Time to face death with composure and dignity befitting of my Great and Powerful station in life.
Trixie goes right back to flailing her legs about and screaming at the top of her lungs.
~~~~~~~~~
“What was that?” Starlight stops in her tracks, cocking an ear towards the panicked, desperate shrieking carried on the breeze.
“What was what?” Twilight asks.
“It sounded like…”
“…I don’t hear anything.”
“Sorry, I’m probably just a bit on edge.”
~~~~~~~~~
Later, Trixie will recount that her flight lasted hours, and upon being told this couldn’t possibly be the case insist she was experiencing a dilatory temporal effect on account of her shrinkage. The problem with this is that the effects of one’s size upon their perception of the passage of time are negligible at best; the truth is that Trixie is simply scared out of what few wits she possesses.
She does eventually return to her senses, but not until the swallow deposits her at a round table sitting on a particularly girthsome tree branch. Across the round from her sits Discord, scaled down to her current size.
“Oh, thank you very much, Coconut, I knew I could count on you to find her, not like those lazy bluejays,” one of Discord’s eyelids says while his mouth sips daintily at a cup of rosehip. Coconut the swallow puffs his chest out proudly.
“Discord! Oh, I can’t believe I’m saying this but it’s a huge relief to see your ugly mug right now.”
“Why thank you, Miss Lulamoon, I’ve been trying out a new morning coatcare routine lately,” he flutters his eyelashes at her and large, slightly glowing boils fill up like water balloons all across his face. To her credit Trixie only recoils a little bit when they pop open and an aromatic blend pours forth, drawn magnetically into another teacup sitting on the table. He pushes the saucer it sits on towards her, and the cup even goes with, “Thirsty?”
“…Trixie’s good, thanks.”
“Suit yourself. It’s really quite the excellent brew, if I do say so myself.”
“Uh-huh, listen, Discord, I need your help before-“
“Yes yes, I know all about your little problem with Starlight’s magic practice, Fluttershy’s little birdies passed along the deets. And I do intend to help you, really! But you simply must try some of this rice noodle salad before you go off on your way!”
“Er…” Trixie regards the salad in question with suspicion. The noodles are each as thick as her head, although it does look perfectly normal and delicious otherwise.
“You don’t need to worry about the carbs, it’s actually a very light dish.”
A chipmunk scurries up the trunk of the tree and out onto the branch, transitioning into a more leisurely bipedal gait closer to the tea table. She assumes a dignified air when she reaches the little tea party – aside from shooting Trixie a dirty look that one needn’t be an animal expert to pick up on – and seats herself across from Coconut.
“Madame Zipper, how good to see you! Fashionably late as always,” Discord wags a playful digit in the chipmunk’s direction, an insincerely scolding expression on his face as he very normally pours her a cuppa from a brightly decorated and completely inanimate teapot.
Zipper squeaks something out. Discord throws back his head, howling with laughter, and Coconut covers his beak with a wing as he titters. Zipper picks out a noodle from the salad with her weird little grabbers and feeds it into her cheeks like one of Trixie’s scarf tricks in reverse, looking supremely satisfied.
“Ah, what a card,” Discord wipes a tear from the corner of his eye, still coming down from the end of his laughing fit, “are you sure you won’t partake, Trixie? The more the merrier, as you can see.”
Trixie manages to tear her gaze away from the entrancing sight of the noodle’s slow disappearance long enough to give Discord a flat look.
“Oh, right, the language barrier. It’s so easy for me to forget none of you other ponies seem to share Fluttershy’s gift for communication.”
“Hello? Discord? Are you here?”
“Ah, speak of the draconequus!” He says without a hint of irony, “We’re up here, my dear, up in the tree branch just to your right- no, your other ri- yes, there you go!”
Despite not augmenting his voice in any way, nor indeed even raising its volume, Fluttershy seems to hear Discord just fine. Before the displace air from her wingbeats have a chance to upset the delicate arrangement of the tea service, Discord snaps, and suddenly Fluttershy is the same size as the rest of them, alighting at the table with her typical grace.
“Oh, this all looks lovely, Discord, I- oh! Trixie! There you are, Twilight and Starlight were looking for you earlier, they were worried sick!”
“Really?” Trixie asks doubtfully.
“Well… Starlight was, at least, but Twilight was helping! That counts for something, right?” Fluttershy gives Trixie a reassuring smile. It is utterly unconvincing.
“Oh, who cares about Princess Nerdicorn? She still doesn’t like me either. Me! After all this time!”
Trixie feels very proud of herself as she keeps her expression carefully neutral.
“Well, anyway, I expect if you’re not going to stay for refreshments you’ll be wanting that help now.”
“Trixie would appreciate it, yes.”
Judgemental chittering draws a frown from Fluttershy.
“Now, Zipper, just because Trixie won’t be staying doesn’t mean we should be discourteous. I’m sure she had other plans today before… all this happened.”
“Coconut, would you mind-?” Discord doesn’t even have time to finish the question before Coconut does a little hop-and-chirp, which Trixie assumes to be an answer to the affirmative as Discord then says, “Wonderful! Trixie, Coconut will take you back to the castle. He’ll even let you ride on his back this time, you lucky so-and-so, you!”
She gives a concerned look at the lack of any sort of seating on Coconut and asks “How is Trixie supposed to not go sailing off him as he’s flying?”
“By holding on, obviously,” Discord rolls his eyes, and a dunce cap materializes over top of the hat she’s already wearing. She quickly takes it off and throws it at him, but he smoothly catches it down his throat with a single mighty gulp.
“Don’t worry, he’s a very careful flyer,” Fluttershy places a reassuring hoof on Trixie’s withers, and that at least does inspire some confidence. “I suppose I ought to go find Starlight and Twilight, let them know you’re on your way.”
“That’s fine, all this will keep until you get back,” Discord says dismissively. The noodle salad responds by rapidly decaying into a mush of unappealing color, then evaporating into a sickly-sweet smelling haze. Trixie feels vindicated. “Or I can just make some more later. Whatever works.”
Coconut makes a ramp with his wing and lets Trixie settle on his back, both of them just a bit uneasy but being so very brave and trying not to show their misgivings. Belatedly, something occurs to her.
“Wait a second. Couldn’t you just turn me back to normal?”
“Oh don’t be ridiculous, of course I couldn’t!” Discord snaps his claw, and Fluttershy grows back to her normal size, “What would possibly give you that impression?”
As Coconut takes off, carrying his cargo-slash-passenger off towards Friendship Castle, an enraged shout of “DIIIIIIIISCOOOOOOOOORRRRRDDDDD” carries across the breeze, growing fainter by the moment.
Unbeknownst to all save Discord, a floofy white tail glides, periscope-like, through the tall grass beneath the winged shadow.
~~~~~~~~~
“There it is again! I swear it sounds like-“ Starlight’s mouth falls open as she spots something in the air above.
“I still can’t hear it. Starlight, are you-“ Twilight is cut off when Starlight places her hoof under her chin and roughly jerks her head towards the teeny and tiny blue unicorn screaming her teeny and tiny lungs out from the back of a regular sized swallow. The two most powerful wizards in Equestria look at each other wordlessly for a moment before galloping off in hot pursuit.
~~~~~~~~~
Trixie’s legs tremble like a newborn fawn’s (and rather unlike a newborn foal’s, thanks to Equestria’s robust health care infrastructure) as she steps onto a side table in Twilight’s library. She turns her thousand-yard stare sort-of-on Coconut, sort-of-past him. He looks quite pleased with himself.
“Why does Trixie get the feeling she’s peeved you off in some manner?”
Before Coconut can make any sort of vocal or gestural response, a low feline growl sends the icy claws of primordial terror grasping at their brains. They slowly turn around, casting their eyes upwards to the top of the chair the side table is aside of, to where a fluffy and pampered monster, contemptuous of both order and mercy, perches like some classical grotesque. The two prey animals dare not move save to cast their eyes sidelong, gazes meeting in a moment of shared understanding as Coconut seems to silently beg Trixie’s forgiveness for what he is about to do. If Trixie were an even slightly more forgiving mare, she might just grant it.
Opalescence’s tail flicks, and the spell is broken.
“YOU COWARD! GET BACK HERE AND HELP TRIXIE!” Trixie shrieks at Coconut after he takes off and flees the room, staying well out of Opalescence’s pouncing radius once he initially clears it. Trixie turns and runs, tries to jump to the arm of the chair on the other side of her little landing pad. The vibrations of Opalescence’s own landing prove disruptive, and so Trixie instead slams headfirst into the fabric, horn lodging in the stuff and keeping her right up against the piece of furniture as she slides some distance downward, gouging a ragged line into it. When her descent halts, she flails her hooves about in panic, managing to push herself free but consequently going far enough in the other direction to slam into one of the side table’s legs, bouncing off and sent rolling under the chair like a pathetic living pinball once she lands.
The impact dazes her momentarily, which is just long enough for Opalescence to jump down after her. In a rare twist of luck for Trixie, the bottom of the chair clears the ground only just enough for the fiendish beast to stick her paw under. In a more typical twist of luck, this is enough for her to bat blindly at her prey, outstretched claws catching a few of her tail hairs before she can come back to her senses.
Trixie crawls as much away from the claw as she can, casting her gaze around for anything she might be able to use to her advantage. Nothing under the chair with her, but- there! On the wall over there, a mouse hole, the perfect size for Trixie to hide in. She starts to crawl towards it before she pauses; that furry demon is sure to catch her if she just makes a break for it. She needs to be smart about this, like Starlight or Maud.
Fortunately, she has an idea that falls perfectly within her wheelhouse.
Her horn glows briefly before a silent image of herself appears at one of the other sides not blockaded by Opalescence. It’s not perfect – certainly not up to her usual standards, she’d be absolutely mortified were she to show off such shoddy work in front of a crowd – but it should be enough to buy her precious seconds. As the illusion appears to finish crawling out from under the chair and gallop in the other direction, Opalescence’s claw retracts from the space. Before she even hears her start to scrabble against the crystal floor, Trixie emerges from her own side, making a break for the mouse hole.
She almost pulls it off, but within inches of safety sharp little teeth clamp down around the cape Rarity made for her.
“Ack!” Trixie cries as her throat jerks against the clasp holding the garment in place and her back hooves skid forward from their momentum. She tries to keep running, but alas! Opalescence’s oral grip is simply too tight, and as she starts to be dragged backwards in spite of her struggling in the opposite direction Trixie thinks for the third or fourth time that day (she wasn’t counting) that this could be the end!
…At least until she thinks to unclasp the cape and goes tumbling forward into the hole in the wall.
“Hah! Try to catch me now, you shhhtupid cat!” Trixie shouts victoriously and a little unsteadily. Her elation is interrupted by angry squeaking off to her left.
The current resident of the hole, a little brown mouse with a bald patch at the very tippy-top of its head, stands on its hindlegs with its forepaws placed confrontationally against its hips. Astoundingly, Trixie has not learned to speak the language of small rodents in the past fifteen minutes, but the mouse’s gestures make its meaning clear enough all the same.
“Ugh, give Trixie a break! She’s not trying to muscle in on your home, she just needs somewhere to lay low for like ten minutes!”
The mouse continues to squeak at her, now slapping the back of one forepaw against the other.
“Look, I- Agh!” The two of them scramble backwards as Opalescence’s paw sticks its way searchingly through the hole, forcing mouse and pony both to press themselves against the farthest reaches of the interior of the wall. They stand utterly still for a moment until the furry white appendage retracts.
The mouse looks with alarm between Trixie and the hole, then nudges her off the wall and tries to push her out into the waiting jaws of the predator outside.
“Wh- hey! Don’t push me out there you stupid rodent, there’s plenty of room in here!”
“Squeak squeak squeak!” goes the mouse, continuing to try and sacrifice Trixie.
“Okay, that’s it! You’ve left me no choice!” Trixie’s horn ignites with aether as she casts an old, reliable favorite of hers for getting out of scraps: Animate Cell’s Whirling Dervish. In an instant, she and the mouse are pulled into a cartoonish dust cloud along with a nearby button, four bits, two and a half gumdrops (strawberry flavored), a crispy desiccated leaf from last autumn, and a spontaneously generated miniature kitchen sink. After several seconds of boinks and whumps and various limbs and heads emerging from the veil of dust for but a moment before being pulled back inside, the mouse ejects wholly, sent sliding out into the library and towards near-certain doom.
“Haha! Sorry-not-sorry, friendo, but it was you or me! And you made those the stakes yourself, so hah! Karma!” Trixie yells triumphantly, pointing a hoof at the unfortunate rodent.
From where she stands, she can just make out the mouse cowering before the great white hunter, who… actually isn’t doing anything. Her cold green eyes regard the mouse with disdain for a long, tense moment, before flicking back towards the hole, fixated on the quarry she chased across Ponyville twice over. Opalescence ignores the mouse entirely as it scurries off.
“Oh come on!” Trixie cries out, then with a leap backwards, “Waugh!” as Opalescence pounces and tries to hook her claws into her once more.
Okay, thinks Trixie, unconsciously folding her ears flat against her skull, Trapped in a mouse hole by a bloodthirsty demon. Trixie’s been in stickier situations. Like, um… oh who is she kidding, Trixie is going to starve to death in here!
But then, her ears prick back up as soundwaves of hope pierce the fug of her despair.
“That’s weird, I could’ve sworn that bird flew in here, but I don’t see Trixie…”
“Starlight!” Trixie exclaims, heart leaping in her chest with an intensity of love she usually only feels towards Starlight on special occasions or when she’s just a little tipsy and they- well, plenty of time for that later! More importantly, there will be a later! She’s saved!
“…Is that Opalescence?” Twilight Sparkle’s voice asks, and Trixie supposes she’s even glad to hear her, under the circumstances.
“Aagh!” Starlight shrieks when she sees the teeny and tiny star-spangled cape hanging out of Opalescence’s mouth, “Opal, no! You spit her out right this instant!” and so saying, she picks her up in her telekinetic grasp to shake her up and down like a filly would with the can of soda she’s trying to make explode upon opening.
Seeing her chance, Trixie darts out from the mouse hole, cantering towards the two relatively giant forms of her friends.
“Glimmy! Sparkle! I’m down here!” Trixie shouts as she runs, and while it’s not loud enough for them to hear over the yowling cat caught in Starlight’s telekinesis, the motion does catch Twilight’s eye.
“Starlight! There she is!”
“Wh- oh thank Luna,” Starlight sighs, just before Opalescence twists her body around in that distinctive feline way and wrenches free of the magic.
Everypony starts screaming at once. Trixie makes a hard turn towards the nearest shelving ladder.
“HOW DID SHE GET OUT OF YOUR TELEKINESIS?!”
“I DON’T KNOW JUST HELP ME KEEP HER FROM EATING TRIXIE!”
“AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAGH!” Trixie elocutes.
With the combined efforts of an alicorn princess and one of the very few beings on Equus that can outmatch her for raw power, Trixie is able to stay just barely ahead of one very determined house cat. She reaches the shelving ladder which sits at an angle shallow enough for her to run up. In the heat of the moment it seems like a great idea and a very good way to put some distance between herself and Opalescence, but then Twilight knocks into it chasing after the cat and sends it plummeting backwards away from the shelf. Trixie hooks her legs around the side pole, hanging on with every last bit of strength in her little pony body and – you guessed it! – continuing to scream.
When the top of the ladder slams into a table towards the center of the room, Trixie maneuvers herself to be on top of it again and goes back to running, albeit on shakier legs. Somehow she manages to make it onto the tabletop, upon which rests some sort of model of a library. Were she not running for her life, Trixie might take a moment to tease Twilight for building a tiny library inside the real library built into her home. As it stands, she doesn’t even check behind her to see where Opalescence is before diving inside.
As the sounds of ponies trying to wrangle a cat continue beyond the thin walls of Trixie’s temporary sanctuary, she heaves a sigh of relief. A casual turn brings her face-to-face with the vacantly smiling eyes of an artisanal wood-carved figurine representing the protagonist of the niche Maven of the Stacks series of novels.
“BUCK!” Trixie shouts, and lashes out with a forehoof. It bops the figurine on the snout and it rocks back and forth a little before falling over onto its side. She sighs in relief and gives a weak chuckle.
“Trixie!” Starlight's voice makes her start again, letting loose a second, more vulgar oath, “If you can hear me, I need you to come out so I can unshrink you! Twi’s got Opal under control for the moment, but we should probably hurry!”
“Are you ready to cast it right now? As in cast-it-the-moment-I-come-out-there right now? Trixie isn’t keen on the idea of being swallowed by that demon while you channel!"
A long gap hangs in the air, silent save for the continued sounds of a Princess of Equestria swearing furiously at one of her marefriends’ pets.
“…If you said anything just now I didn’t hear it, Trix. Just- just come on out if you’re good to go and I’ll turn you back to normal. The spell’s all ready.”
With a deep breath, the hopefully-not-teeny-and-tiny-for-much-longer Trixie steps through one of the to-scale doorways, out into the light of peril one last time (for today). True to her word, Starlight Glimmer’s horn is enveloped in that tell-tale glow, and a moment later it flashes brighter then winks out. Trixie feels a slight tingling sensation, but nothing else happens.
“…Nothing’s happening!”
“Well give it a second!”
“Opal, no!”
Both unicorns whip their heads around to where the nearby alicorn’s voice came from, and sure enough Opalescence has managed to wriggle free once again. She wastes no time charging with that same single-minded focus towards her prey. The prey yelps and dives back into her hidey-hole.
“Wh- Wait, Trixie, don’t-!“
With something akin to vertigo, Trixie expands all at once to her usual size and fortunately is not crushed by the unaccommodatingly small space she occupied. Unfortunately, this causes said space to burst outwards, meticulously-crafted to-scale walls and books and pieces of model pony flung across the room at high velocities. Some of them embed themselves in walls or furniture, so great is the force of the playset’s complete demolition.
The table doesn’t collapse under her weight, at least.
“Auugghgh,” groans Trixie.
“Auugghgh,” whimpers Twilight.
“Auugghgh…” cringes Starlight.
“Mrrrr,” grumbles Opalescence.
Soft blue eyes dart nervously between two mares stunned for quite different reasons, and a choice is made who to check in with first.
“Trixie…? Are you…?”
“Triskie’s okayyyy!” the newly restored normal-sized pony proclaims in wavering tones while her eyes stop spinning around in their sockets.
“Oh thank goodness. I’ve been worried sick all day,” Starlight helps her marefriend off the table and to her hooves.
“How do you think I’ve felt?”
“Eh-hehe, yeah, well…” she flushes, very pointedly not looking at her wide-eyed, slack-jawed former mentor, “I’m just glad everything worked out okay in the end!”
“My playset…”
Rainbow Dash chooses that moment to streak chromatically through the window. A thick didactic tome is clasped between her teeth, of which there are presently three fewer than usual. She spits it onto the floor, along with a fourth tooth lodged firmly in its cover.
“Twi! Sorry! Just woke up, your letter hit me in the face and then the ground sucker-punched me, I might have a concussion, it’s fine!” Rainbow Dash shouts, breath coming in heaving gasps, and then she stops, eyes flicking between different points of the scene before her. “Oh, hey, you found Trixie!”
~~~~~~~~~
“I truly cannot apologize enough, everypony, I feel simply awful about all of this!” Rarity throws a hoof up against her forehead, then drops low to the ground to glower into the cat carrier at her side, “You are in big trouble little missy, scaring mama running off like that!
“Oh, a-and trying to eat my friend, of course! Very naughty!” she hastily adds after sensing Trixie’s eyes on her.
“Hmph,” hmphs Trixie.
“Well, no harm done in the end, right?” asks the slightly desperate arch-mage next to her, just before following it up with the even stupider statement, “All’s well that ends well!”
“Well I guess that means all must be pretty crummy in this case…” grumbles the pouting demi-god nearby.
“Hey, Twi, it’s alright,” Rainbow Dash says with a rare tenderness in her tone, one wing folded comfortingly across Twilight’s barrel, “We’ll get you a new playset, yeah? I mean, how hard can it be to find those things?”
Four pairs of eyes variously glare at Rainbow Dash or find flimsy excuses to look anywhere else. A ways down the road to Ponyville Fluttershy trots into view, still on her quest to find Twilight and Starlight. She stops when she sees the small crowd of her friends gathered on the steps, reads the vibe in the air, slowly turns and walks away.
“Uh,” Rainbow Dash senses that she has, once again, said something very stupid, “Ah, haha, I mean, whoops! Silly me, this concussion is really messing with my head! Ooh, ouch, I really hope my beautiful and loving and patient marefriends take good care of me while I recover!”
Twilight glowers a moment more, then lets out a heavy sigh. “You’re lucky I love you so much…” and, turning to her student: “Now, what have we learned from this debacle?”
“Uh.”
“When you find a friend who’s been involved in a magical accident, take her to the appropriate authority instead of taking advantage of the unique opportunity it presents?” Rarity supplies, at least having the decency to act abashed.
“Don’t borrow spellbooks you’re probably not going to read anyway?” supplies Rainbow.
“Learn more combat spells,” Trixie’s eyes are fixed intently on the cat carrier.
“I suppose I can’t even be incensed at your implication, really,” Rarity sighs, “I mean, I could, but I oughtn’t.”
“…Maybe ‘always keep a cool head when you mess up to avoid random accidental teleportations’?”
“Y’know? Good enough,” Twilight Sparkle turns around, opens the door to her castle, and nudges Rainbow Dash, “Now come on, let’s go do some reading while I keep you under medical observation.”
When the door shuts, Rarity picks up the cat carrier, prompting its cargo to hiss, and trots off without another word.
“…What a day, huh?” Starlight says nearly a minute later, only then starting to climb down the stairs with Trixie by her side.
“Never a dull moment,” Trixie deadpans. After another several seconds, she glances furtively around and, seeing nopony nearby, leans over to whisper in Starlight’s ear, “You know… I wouldn’t mind trying out that thing Pinkie told us about, now that I’ve kind of had a little taste of it.”
