Birds chirping. That’s what Twilight Sparkle heard. The wonderful noise of robins sitting outside her window and singing to the sunshine aroused her. She found herself smiling widely as she took in a great breath of fresh, morning air. She kept her eyes closed, sighing with content as she lay on her bed, which was more comfortable than usual.
Wait, there was something wrong about that breath. It wasn’t filled with the scent of parchments and old books, nor the smell of the flowers she had placed on her beside table. There also was a distinct lack of oxygen, or at least there wasn’t as much oxygen as she was used to.
Before she opened her eyes, she heard an animal-like groan from the foot of her bed. Then she heard a familiar cough, one she knew well from her many Pony-Pet-Playdates. “Tank?” Twilight blinked open her eyes, only to instantly shut them. Piercing pain stung them, the pain of sitting in darkness the whole night then looking out at shining snow with sun reflecting off of it. When the pain faded, she opened her eyes again, more slowly this time.
Her jaw dropped. Clouds? Why were there clouds in her bedroom? After her eyes were fully open, she saw that indeed they were clouds, but they weren’t in her bedroom. More like she was in a bedroom of clouds. All around her was artistically shaped and decorated clouds with random posters and rainbow lightning bolts over the walls. She was lying on a particularly fluffy cloud that was shaped to be a mattress, with a thinner cloud over to use as a blanket.
Call it a hunch, but Twilight guessed she wasn’t in her library anymore. In fact, judging by the clouds hovering outside the windows, she also guessed that she was in a pegasus home. And judging by the rainbows and Wonderbolts posters, she was in one particular pegasus home.
“Rainbow Dash!” Twilight rolled out of the bed so quickly she fell onto the floor. It didn’t hurt at all; it was cloud after all. She stumbled for a moment, afraid she would fall off, but was surprised to find that she was walking on the fluffy white flooring as if it was solid. “R-Rainbow Dash? What’s going on?”
Twilight saw a nearby door. She decided to go through it. Upon doing so, she found the outside world. Despite her odd situation, Twilight couldn’t help but have the thought, Just a bedroom and a yard? This place is huge, and all she has is a bedroom and a yard? Not even a kitchen? Or a bathroom? Actually scratch that, a bathroom in the clouds would be dangerous for earth ponies and unicorns below. The yard was a big cloud ring that circled the cloud house, waterfalls of liquid rainbow dripping off the edges. That’s pretty much all it was, cloud and liquid rainbow. The important thing was that Rainbow Dash wasn’t there.
“Rainbow! What’s going on? Why am I at your house?” Twilight stepped out into the yard, looking around the sky in hopes of seeing her cyan friend flying about. She looked all around, still walking forward while doing so. This could have been tragic, as she was on a cloud and was almost walking over the edge. However, it wasn’t tragic, but for a very strange reason.
“AHHH!” Twilight cried as the cloud beneath her hooves disappeared and she fell. Plummeting, shooting towards the ground. She was going to die, she knew it. She would be a pancake on the ground, and would never know why or how she got up there. She didn’t even know how she was standing on clouds! She didn’t remember casting the cloud-walking spell.
But through her panicked scream and her thoughts of dread, something occurred to her. She didn’t feel like she was falling. She looked down, to find that the ground wasn’t racing up towards her. She was, in fact, hovering in midair! Another thing she became aware of was a strange movement on her sides. She twisted her head around… and almost fell out of the sky. However, she had the sense of mind to pull herself back onto the cloud before having a panic attack.
“Wings?!” Twilight gasped, gaping at her sides. There were two cyan wings on her sides; they had flapped open instinctively when she had started falling. Another thing that made her eyes grow wider was the fact that the wings weren’t the only thing cyan about her body. Her whole body was cyan, save for the mane and tail of rainbow and the rainbow lightning bolt cutie mark. Lastly, she touched a hoof to her forehead. Mane, but nothing else. She didn’t have her horn.
She fainted.
“Ah, such a wonderful suit, all for my little darling…” Rarity mumbled in her sleep. “Oh no, don’t worry about a thing, it’s my pleasure…” She twitched her hooves as, in her dream, she walked around Carousel Boutique. “I think I’ll just get us some tea…”
There was a small tickle on the mare’s nose. She simply rubbed her nose with a hoof and continued her dream, not even waking up. Then there was a tickle on her ear. She did the same, the tickle leaving her ear the moment she brought a hoof up to it. And then there was a tickle on both her ear and nose. Then tickles everywhere else.
Rarity’s eyes shot open, roused from her dream and annoyed by whatever was causing this tickling. The moment her eyes were open, she crossed them to attempt to get a better look at what was on her nose. It was a large-winged and colorful butterfly. “Get off.” She swatted it away, noticing several other butterflies take off from her body as she moved her hoof. “Why are there so many butterflies in my shop? Sweetie Belle!”
Obviously Sweetie Belle, who had stayed at the Boutique the night before, was doing something else crazy to earn her cutie mark and had let in some butterflies.
“Sweetie! If this is your fault I’l-“ Rarity raised her head, and choked on her words. She wasn’t in the Boutique. She was lying on a couch in the middle of a grove with what seemed like millions of differently colored butterflies around her. It was a beautiful sight, all the different colors mixing and creating different patterns of pure beauty. The dressmaker committed the sight to memory, thinking that she must make a dress based on it later.
But until then, she decided to figure out why she was here. She recognized where she was; Fluttershy’s Butterfly Grove, she just didn’t know why she was there. “Fluttershy, dear?” Rarity called, wondering if her friend was nearby. “Fluttershy? Are you about?”
No yellow pegasus pony came running through the curtains of butterflies. Despite the fact that she had no idea why she was in this place, she couldn’t help but feel relaxed. The butterflies were so beautiful and majestic, the way they weaved through the air. They seemed to sing with their colors and dance in the air. It truly was a beautiful sight; most ponies seemed to take Fluttershy’s Butterfly Grove for granted.
*thump* *thump* *thump* *thump*
Rarity rolled over on the comfortable little couch to look down, and saw an angry and familiar rabbit. “Oh, greetings Angel.” Rarity muttered. She didn’t like this pet rabbit of Fluttershy’s; he was rather rude to not only Fluttershy, but everypony.
Angel said something in an annoyed tone. This surprised Rarity so much that she nearly fell off the couch. She understood him! He hadn’t spoken in Equestrian, but she still understood it! He had told her that he was hungry and that she hadn’t fed him yet… wait, since when was it Rarity’s job to feed this little brat?
“It’s not my job to feed you.” Rarity replied. If she couldn’t understand Angel’s response, she would be content thinking it was her imagination and she could head home.
She wasn’t that lucky. Angel’s response was something along the lines of, “It’s always been your job to feed me, Fluttershy! I’m starvin’ here!”
“F-fluttershy?” Rarity pointed at her own chest. “Me? But I’m not Fluttershy! Im afraid you have the wrong mare, little rabbit.”
Angel raised an eyebrow at the mare. He pulled a mirror out of nowhere, a feat usually only Pinkie Pie was capable of, and showed it to Rarity. She attempted to take it in her telekinesis… but she couldn’t. No blue glow came from her forehead, and the mirror didn’t simply float to her as normal. In fact, now that she had tried to use it, she didn’t feel magic within her at all! Well, not the raw magic that unicorns used for spells; she still felt a little bit of magic deep inside her, like there was a powerful spell cast over her.
She instead grabbed the mirror with her hoof, and peered into it. To her surprise, the eyes looking back her were not her own. They were bright cyan and shaped much differently, and behind them was a yellow face. A long, pink mane with curls on the ends hung down from her head, and two yellow wings stretched out from her back.
She didn’t even have time to think IamFluttershy! before she fainted dramatically. She lay unconscious for a long while, Angel tapping his paw impatiently.
Rainbow Dash snored. She did every night, but she never noticed for herself. She was lying, sprawled across what she thought was her bed. Sunshine rolled across her face, but she was reluctant to get out of her sleep. Even though she had gone to sleep much earlier than usual yesterday, her body felt like it hadn’t gone to sleep until midnight, so it was forcing her to stay asleep.
“Hey, time to get up.” A voice called. A sharp thing poked at one of the Rainbow’s legs that happened to be dangling off her bed. “Wakey-wakey, I made breakfast. I already got most of my chores done, and you said if I got all the books on the top floor sorted for you that you would take me down to Sugarcube Corner for a large order of ice cream.”
The snoring choked off as Rainbow was semi-awakened. She still wasn’t willing to get up, however, and didn’t even open her eyes. She grabbed the blanket and rolled over, covering herself up and blocking her face from the sunshine. “One more minutes, Gilda, I’m not ready for classes yet…” she mumbled, brain not fully functioning in her half-asleep state. If she had her say, she would have stayed wrapped up in those blankets all day. It would have been easier if her bed didn’t seem so uncomfortable for some reason. Maybe the pillow needed a good kicking to fluff it out a bit.
“Gilda? I’m not Gilda, what kinda weird dreams are you having?” the sharp claw continued poking Rainbow.
“Knock it off…” Rainbow reached out with a hoof and swatted the tiny claws away. “I need energy for my… flying test… tomorrow.”
“Flying test?”
“No, I don’t wanna be turned into rainbows, Gilda, I swear I’ll practice….”
“Seriously, Twilight, it’s time to get up. Your breakfast’s gonna get cold and you asked me to wake you early for so you could study more in ‘A Complete History of Equestria Vol. 167’.”
“Twilight?” Rainbow Dash finally opened her eyes. They were covered by a blanket that certainly wasn’t her own. It was purple and had little stars in the patterns; she could see it clearly through the sunshine that leaked through it from the window beyond. She tossed the blanket away and instinctively tried to wave her wings and take off. However, when she jumped into the air, she simply crashed back down onto the mattress. Why weren’t her wings working?
“You okay, Twi?” Spike asked. The purple and green baby dragon was standing next to the bed with a concerned look on his face.
“What’s going on? Why am I in here? Where’s Twilight?” Rainbow asked frantically, recognizing the surrounding area as the one of Twilight Sparkle’s bedroom in Golden Oaks Library. Most of the walls were shelves that were lined with hundreds of books, Spike’s basket and Twilight’s bed sat on a sort of ledge that jutted out of the library’s side, there was a desk with quills and ink neatly sorted, and a large glass door that led out to a balcony. The floors were made out of real wood; quite literally. The entire library was in a hollowed out tree
“Um… Nothing’s going on, you live here, and you’re Twilight.” Spike scratched his head in confusion. “Should I call somepony?”
“I’m not Twilight, are you nuts?” Rainbow Dash leaped off the bed, attempting to flap her wings to make her slowly float down onto the floor. However, her wings still weren’t working and she landed hard, hurting her hooves. “I’m Rainbow Dash.”
“Okay, maybe I should write to the princess and have you checked for something…” Spike slowly walked backwards, pulling a quill and scroll from nowhere.
Rainbow rolled her eyes. “I should have you checked for something. How can I be Twilight? I’m not even a unicorn, and I’m bright blue!” she turned around to leave and go home in the hopes of finding Twilight and asking her to check on Spike when she caught a view of the purple mare. “Oh, hey, Twi, What am I-” she stopped speaking when she realized the purple mare she saw wasn’t Twilight.
It was her. It was a mirror. Upon realizing this, she stared at herself in shock. The purple mare in the mirror’s eyes widened as well. Rainbow waved. Reflection waved. Rainbow reached around to touched her back, and felt no wings, and the reflection did the same. Then the mare slowly brought her hoof up to her forehead. She felt it; a unicorn horn poking out of her mane.
Finally convinced this Twilight Sparkle pony in the mirror was her, Rainbow jumped from hoof-to-hoof in panic. “Oh no, oh no, oh no, ohno, ohno, ohno, ohno THIS ISN’T HAPPENING!” she ran in circles in the room, almost begging for her wings to appear so she could take off. “THIS ISN’T HAPPENING!” she screeched do loudly it was surprising the windows hadn’t broken. “I’M RAINBOW! NOT TWILIGHT!”
And with that last bit of panic, she smashed through the window. Okay, so in her panic she didn’t have much common sense. She obviously hadn’t added in the fact that she didn’t have wings and that she was on the second floor in this logic. She plummeted towards the streets below, and she let out a loud yelp of shock.
And then she felt herself surrounded by magic. She felt some odd sensation running through her, and a purple glow filled her vision. Looking around, she saw that she was hanging in midair, her- or Twilight’s rather- own magic levitating her in the air. Somehow, even though she had no idea how to use magic, she managed to easily float herself towards the ground. The magic flickered out the moment she told it to, and she stood safely on the street with many ponies looking at her in wonder.
Spike, looking out the smashed window above, started scribbling down words as quickly as he could on his scroll to the princess.
“Rarity, get up already!” a high-pitched voice rang in Applejack’s ears. “The sun’s up and I wanna go out with Scootaloo and Apple Bloom!”
“But Apple Bloom’s got her chores ta do.” Applejack mumbled. Who was Rarity again? Oh yeah, her friend. The one who makes the dresses and keeps annoying her about her dirty mane, she’s a unicorn. She lived at Carousel Boutique and was the older sister of… Swindle Belle? No, that wasn’t it. Stingy Belle? Scarlet Belle? Sweetie Belle? Oh, that last one. Sweetie Belle’s the one who always plays with Apple Bloom.
“How do you know?” Sweetie Belle’s voice asked.
Okay, why in the name of all apple pies is Sweetie Belle here? And she said Rarity, is Rarity here too? Did Ah just fall asleep in the Boutique? That must be it, Ah didn’t hear the rooster crow this mornin’. “Ah gotta get back ta the farm.” Applejack pulled herself from the soft cocoon of blanket she had been wrapped in and her hooves landed upon the flooring of Carousel Boutique, or more accurately, Rarity’s bedroom, although Applejack didn’t know this.
“Um… Rarity?” Sweetie Belle gazed up at the mare who stumbled towards the door, half asleep with her eyes shut tightly. “What are you talking about? Are you trying to sound like Applejack?”
“Huh? Ah didn’t hear Rarity say anythin’.” Applejack stopped walking and turned back towards the source of Sweetie Belle’s voice.
“Rarity, I think you might still be asleep.” Sweetie Belle rushed over to Applejack’s side in case she would fall over.
“Maybe Ah should just go. If I get Apple Bloom goin’ on her chores she might have enough time ta play with ya, Sweetie Belle.” Applejack opened her eyes and pushed open the door. A staircase was revealed. The stairs were made out of gently cut and perfectly polished wood while the railings (which were simply for show because nopny really need them, all four hooves being on the ground) were paint with white and blue. A few ribbons were stuck to the walls in a decorative manner and were glittered with dust that looked like smashed crystals. Applejack didn’t really have a taste for this stuff, but today it seemed as if she was drawn to the crystal-like glitter.
“Rarity? Where are you going?” Sweetie Belle raced after Applejack as she made her way down the stairs.
Applejack turned around, expecting to find a half-asleep Rarity following her, but only found Sweetie Belle. The little filly was looking at her with confusion and worry. “Is something wrong, Sweetie Belle?” Applejack asked, stopping just as she reached the foot of the stairs and looking up at the unicorn filly.
“Why are you talking like Applejack?” Sweetie Belle asked, hopping down the stairs. “And why do you want to go down to a farm? I thought you had work to do.”
“What?” Applejack blinked in confusion at the filly. “Are ya talkin’ ta me?”
“Um, yes.” Sweetie Belle raised her eyebrows as far as they would go up onto her forehead. “You are Rarity.”
“But Ah’m Applejack.” Confused, Applejack turned to leave and possibly to get an ambulance for the clearly insane filly, when she saw a full-length mirror not far away. She peered into it for several long moments, observing the white unicorn mare with blue eyes, long eyelashes, curly purple mane and tail, and triple diamond cutie mark in the mirror. She stared and stared, silent for a long time while her brain attempted to make sense of this. After a long time, it seemed to click.
Ah’m me, but Ah’m in Rarity’s body. That must be it. It has ta be some sorta magic; I have to go find Twi… and Ah should go find my body ‘cause Ah’m guessing that’s where Rarity is. Applejack turned back towards Sweetie Belle. “Why don’t cha go with Scootaloo and Apple Bloom and go crusadin’, Sugarcube? Ah gotta go see Twilight.”
Sweetie Belle blinked in silence at what she thought was her now insane sister before silently trotting out the front door. Applejack sighed with relief that the filly was gone and waited a few minutes after she left before she herself left to go find Twilight. Surely Twilight would have some explanation for all this, and she would be able to fix her all up in a jiffy.
Upon stepping out into the streets of Ponyville, Applejack’s eyes-or rather Rarity’s eyes- were flooded with sunlight. There was a small path around Carousel Boutique that had been done quite recently; Rarity had found a bunch of smooth and beautiful stones while out with Zecora in the Everfree and had asked Applejack to help her create a sidewalk/pathway up to her shop with them. It was cleaner than dirt roads, AJ had to admit, but it was more trouble than it was worth. It hurt her hooves to walk on them for too long; they were round and unlike the rough ground she was used to. Not to mention they took hours to set into the ground just the exact way Rarity liked them.
Applejack, quickly hopping off of the stones and onto the dirt road, made her way through the bright morning towards Golden Oaks Library. The farm pony would bet her first Zap Apple of the season (the best one) that Twilight Sparkle would be there. She lived there, after all.
Just as Applejack started to near the big tree, she heard a screech from inside. Curious, she quickened her pace. She was just getting near the door when there was a huge crash from overhead. She looked up, and darted out of the way. A purple unicorn mare was flying out the window, raining shattered glass all over the street below. Applejack had barely made it out of harm’s way when ‘Twilight’ landed safely.
A crowd of ponies rushed over, giving ‘Twilight’ looks of wonder and concern. However, the first to say anything was Applejack. She ran up to ‘Twilight’s’ side. “Twi, Ah really need yer help.”
“I need your help, Rarity.” The purple unicorn replied, eyes wide with panic. “I’m a unicorn!”
“Yes, ya are.” Applejack started pushing the mare towards the door of the library. “Let’s not cause a scene. We’re drawin’ more attention than a caterpillar in a pile o’ worms.”
“But you don’t understand, Rares!” the unicorn told her the moment the door snapped shut behind them and they were all alone on the lower floor of Golden Oaks Library. “I’m a flyer! Not some egghead unicorn that sits and reads books all day! What am I going to do without my wings? What if I never perform another barrel roll or loop-de-loop, or Sonic Rainboom?”
Applejack would have shoved an apple in the purple mare’s mouth if she had one, but she didn’t so she had to content herself with shoving a hoof in her face. “Yer Rainbow, Ah’m Guessin’?”
Rainbow Dash nodded. “I’m happy you figured it out, I think Spike’s upstairs telling the Princess I’m crazy. I should stop him… but the princess could come and put me back in the right body!”
“Dash, calm down.” Applejack placed a hoof on Rainbow’s back and pushed down, forcing her to sit. “Ah’m Applejack, by the way, if ya can’t tell.”
“I guessed.” Rainbow replied. “I’m in Twilight’s body, so it would make a lot of sense if you had switched bodies as well. Also, you’re used to talking in your accent so you’re pronouncing ‘I’ as ‘Ah’, but as Rarity’s vocal chords aren’t capable of your exact voice, accent, or speech patterns, it sounds quite odd. And logically, as we’ve both switched bodies, Rarity and Twilight must be in somepony else’s bodies, so our first step in solving this should be to find out where they went. Hopefully only us four were involved, or it could get much more complicated.”
Applejack blankly stared at Dash. It took several moments for Dash to realize why. “Wow, that was weird.”
“That seemed a weird way of thinkin’ ya never express yerself in.” Applejack commented.
“Maybe it’s Twilight’s eggheaded-ness. I share her brain, so I should share her knowledge.” Rainbow punched herself in the forehead for that. “If I keep talking so… logically I’ll become an egghead permanently.”
Applejack then, at that moment, noticed just how many scratches Rainbow had from the broken glass. “Maybe ya’ll should go to a hospital.” She pointed out.
Rainbow turned to look at her sides and saw the hundreds of small cuts. “Naw, they’re not bad. I could probably just go get Fluttershy to clean them out.”
“Then why don’t we go do that first?” Applejack stood and nudged Rainbow to her hooves. “If ya feel weak on the way there, don’t feel ashamed if ya have to lean on me. Not yer body after all; not as tough as yours.”
Rainbow chuckled at that the two, now unicorns, trotted out the door.
