A Witch in Equestria

“Breathe in, breathe out. Feel the magic all around you. See how it is all connected. Center yourself completely. Don’t focus on any one thing. Let your awareness drift away.. drift away..”

The vegetation in the clearing suddenly withered and died rapidly, leaving a miffed redhead to sigh with frustration. “I can’t do it, Giles! Every time we meditate, I can’t stop myself from stealing the magic around me.” She held up a lock of her hair, which had turned black. “See? It’s so..so.. ugh, annoying!” Her eyes flashed before she took a moment to cool off. “I’m doing it again. I’ll never be able to get better at this rate..”

Giles smiled gently at Willow. “You’re doing fine, Willow. Nobody expects you to master your powers in less than a month.”

Willow looked ruefully up at Giles. “I know, I know.. it just feels like we haven’t made any progress.”

Giles looked thoughtful as he sat down in the grass next to her. “I wouldn’t say that. You’re a unique case, Willow, so you can’t really measure progress by just the effects.”

Willow crossed her arms behind her head as she laid down. “I guess so..”

As she watched the clouds pass idly by her eyelids started to droop. The ground was soft beneath her, and she’d had trouble sleeping recently. It would be so nice to just.. take a nap..

--

Willow slowly awoke, stretching languidly and rubbing the sleepiness from her eyes. “Giles..?” she called softly. Looking around, she couldn’t see her English friend anywhere in sight. She wondered briefly where he went, but shrugged it off quickly. It wasn’t all that far to where they were staying.

As she got a better look at the landscape around her, she started feeling inklings of panic stirring in her chest. The immediate vicinity was a great deal like the clearing she had fallen asleep in, but the mansion she was staying that should have been plainly visible in the distance was nowhere in sight, and now that she looked more closely, there were other discrepancies in the terrain; a tree out of place, a hill where there shouldn’t be. The panicky feeling rose and the foliage around her began wilting. “No!” She fell to a knee and took deep, calming breaths. The pressure on the surrounding environment lifted.

I need more information.. all I know is that I went to sleep one place, and woke up in another. Heck, this could be a really lucid dream for all I know. The sun was high in the sky; it looked to be afternoon, and there was nothing but wild nature in every direction.

She sat down again and started preparing to cast a spell before she halted momentarily and bit her lip. She had often been chastised for going to magic to solve all her problems, but she didn’t really think this counted as a frivolous use of magic. Things had changed, anyways. The infusion of Gaea magic Giles had hit her with had made her unable to not use magic. If she went long enough without casting a spell, it simply started manifesting randomly around her in dangerously unpredictable ways.

Willow took a meditative pose and opened her awareness to the planet. She almost lost her concentration as she immediately felt a difference in her connection. Her link was more tenuous, and it had a slight alien feeling. Furrowing her brow in concentration, she extended her senses to search for other people. She smiled slightly as she found a clump of sentient life not too far from where she was. She had been slightly worried that she was alone in some kind of bizarre hell dimension. Again, the feeling of the people was slightly off, but she couldn’t tell exactly what was different about it.

She rose and headed off in the direction of the civilization she’d detected. She admired the scenery and the fresh air while she moved. It distracted her from her predicament, and she desperately needed a distraction. As she padded along, the sight of a rural town started becoming visible on the horizon. She smiled slightly and increased her pace.

She was shocked into stillness when she became close enough to discern the residents of the town. They were, every one of them, ponies trotting about, looking like nothing but people going about their daily business. Looking at the sky, something she had thought was a bird was in fact a winged pony (pegasus, her mind said). She recalled conversations with Anya and the troubles they had with her vampire self. Is this an alternate Earth where ponies are the dominant species..? Do humans even exist here?

She was struck with a sudden inspiration. I bet I can blend in with the locals with a transfiguration.. all I need to do is tap into that alien feeling I sensed earlier. She began a Latin chant as she focused intently on the subtle difference she could feel between a human life-force and a pony life-force. She finished her spell with a self-indulgent dramatic wave and an explosion of light covered her person as she felt her body twisting and changing rapidly. Somehow, the entire thing only took a couple of seconds. When she finished, she could feel a couple new appendages. She had a horn (like a unicorn, she thought giddily) and wings that she experimentally unfurled. Her coat of fur was dark with streaks of royal blue, and her wings were midnight black while her mane danced on a nonexistent breeze. She nodded with self-satisfaction and began trotting over to the town of ponies.

As she walked casually down the street leading into town, it became quickly evident that she had made a miscalculation somewhere, judging by the hushed whispers and awed stares.

“Who is she..?”

“Is she a Princess..?”

She started moving faster, thinking furiously. They’re all so tiny! Did I get the spell wrong? No, I did it right! Ahh, darn it! Her horn started glowing and the grass started dying as she passed. The ponies who had been watching started panicking.

“Ahh! Nightmare Moon is back! Run for your lives!”

Willow’s power continued destabilizing and the aura of decay started growing, serving to further panic the residents of the town. Argh! Well, if blending in is out.. Willow’s voice suddenly reverberated loudly, “Will you all SHUT UP already?” She glared at the townsfolk who were frozen in horror. “You!” She pointed at a random pony. “Take me to your leader.” She giggled slightly. The ponies backed up slightly from the possibly-insane alicorn. Willow looked more fierce. “Well?” The singled out pony started frantically moving down the street, and Willow followed.

--

Mayor Fairbright had a nice, easy job. Her secluded rural town never had anything too troubling happen to it; unlike Ponyville, which seemed to attract trouble like a magnet. She couldn’t imagine what Mayor Mare had to go through. At least, until now. A pony had darted into her office screaming that Nightmare Moon was attacking the town and demanding to see her. Not entirely believing the panicky colt who had burst into her office, she humored him as she trailed after him.

She was brought up short when she came face to face with a majestic ebon alicorn looking down at her. She was grand and terrifying, and the Mayor had to fight to keep a tremor out of her voice. “W-what do you want from us, Nightmare Moon?”

The alicorn’s head cocked sideways in an inquisitive gesture. Her voice echoed loudly, “Why does everyone keep calling me that? My name is Willow. I’m trying to find someone to help me figure out how I got here.” She pawed the ground nervously, and her voice stopped reverberating. “Um, I’m sorry about the plants. I didn’t mean to.” The Mayor suddenly noticed the hideously scarred ground that carved a path behind Willow.

There was a tangible silence. The colt that had burst into her office spoke up, “S-so, you’re not here to kill us?”

Willow looked shocked. “What? No! Why would you think that? I swear, you kill one guy and suddenly everybody thinks you’re a crazy axe murderer!”  At the ponies’ mortified expressions, she became embarrassed. “Eheh.. can you forget I said that last part?”

The Mayor mumbled unintelligibly, “This is so out of my paygrade..” She cleared her throat and spoke to Willow, “Ah, you can probably find help over at Ponyville. They’re always dealing with.. things.. of this nature. Just follow the road out of town.” The other ponies nodded to each other. Willow couldn’t help but feel that these ponies really wanted to see her gone. From what they said.. I wonder if Ponyville is like Sunnydale? Maybe they have a Hellmouth too? She addressed the Mayor, “Thank you for your help.” She trotted away briskly in the direction the Mayor had indicated.

The ponies collectively sighed in relief as they went back to their everyday lives. Leave the excitement to those crazy ponies in Ponyville, they thought.

--

That could have gone better.. Willow pondered her predicament as she walked along the road indicated by the ponies in the last town. She wasn’t entirely sure why they had kept referring to her as ‘Nightmare Moon’ at first. Maybe I have an alternate pony-self who's evil? That might make things difficult.. The sun had set by the time her destination came in view. She spied a quaint little sign reading ‘Welcome to Ponyville’ as she entered the town. Most of the residents appeared to be asleep, as the roads were deserted. There were some truly bizarre architectures amidst more normal looking dwellings. The last town she had been in had looked normal enough, if a little primitive, but she could definitely see why this place might have a reputation for oddness.

She couldn’t find anywhere with a light on, until she reached a house built into a tree, with a sign on it reading ‘Ponyville Library.’ She raised a hoof and knocked on the door. It creaked open to reveal a small purple and green lizard creature. Its eyes widened in alarm as it saw its visitor. Willow decided to take initiative.

“No, I am not Nightmare Moon. I don’t know who that is. My name is Willow.” The tiny lizard rubbed his sensitive ears, and Willow grinned sheepishly. “Sorry. My voice keeps doing that.”

A purple unicorn took that moment to arrive at the entry. “You!” she cried as her horn started reflexively glowing.

Willow sighed in irritation. This was really getting old. “Like I told your friend here, I’m not whoever you think I am.”

The unicorn looked suspiciously at her. “..Really?”

Willow laughed. “Really really.”

The glow of her horn died down as she calmed. “Well, you don’t act like.. like the pony I knew. I’m Twilight Sparkle, nice to meet you.” She extended a hoof.

Willow was bemused at the familiar gesture but shrugged it off and had the novel experience of shaking hooves. “I’m Willow. I have a problem, and I was hoping somepony around here could help me. First though.. why does everypony keep calling me Nightmare Moon?” Wait, somepony, everypony? Why did I say that..?

Twilight gestured at her assistant to close the door and Willow to follow her in. She said as she walked, “Well, you look exactly like her. As you can probably guess, she wasn’t a nice pony.” As they entered the library proper, Willow looked appreciatively at all the books she saw.

Twilight’s look softened as she took in the alicorn before her gazing with fondness at her library. Surely someone who treasured books couldn’t be a bad pony, right? Even if she did look like a clone of her former nemesis. “Ahem. Well. Yes, we need to get to the bottom of this. Let’s start at the beginning. What brought you here?”