Plain Old Chaos

Twilight was shocked by both the contents of the book and the letter she had received from the Princess, after years of having absolutely no interest in the Grand Galloping Gala, the Princess had decided that sending her an extra invitation would be enough to convince her to go to it and the book Spike had gotten was an old history book that just barely  mentioned how Nightmare Moon led a war and a few ponies died, it didn’t go into detail or mention Princess Luna at all!

Placing the letter and invitations back onto her bedside table, Twilight took the book and went back downstairs to re-shelve it. Making her way down Twilight saw Pinkie Pie walk inside with Rainbow Dash following closely behind her, ignoring them, Twilight walked over to the shelf and levitated the book onto it, she turned to Rainbow and Pinkie. “Hey girls, it’s good to see the both of you, it’s quite a surprise actually, since you didn’t do anything crazy, like knock on the door.”

Rainbow looked slightly abashed but Pinkie seemed to take it as a compliment. “Thanks Twilight! We came over, just like I said we would!

Rainbow Dash spoke up. “Hey Twi-.” Whatever the Pegasus was going to say was cut off as Pinkie started to shout over her.

“Twilight! What’cha doing?” The pink pony rushed up to Twilight and when she stopped she could feel her hot breath on her.

Feeling a bit violated, Twilight quickly distanced herself from her; the pink pony seemed to take the hint and did not attempt to invade Twilight’s personal space again.” I read a book, about Equestrian history, it wasn’t very good, apparently Nightmare Moon killed a few ponies during her uprising, that’s fine, but it also seems like Princess Luna didn’t exist, no mention of her anywhere, I’m fairly sure that Princess Luna exists”

Rainbow Dash seemed to lose interest completely at the mention of a book and fluttered her wings in irritation, but Pinkie looked vaguely interested. “Y’know, Twilight, Sometimes books are a bit biased, or maybe Luna doesn’t exist, you ever think about that?  Anyway, you’re the Princess’ student; did you get an invite to the Grand Galloping Gala? Maybe you can bring a guest too?” Rainbow Dash perked up when she heard this and her expression went from one of disinterest to a look of hunger at the thought of getting into the prestigious event.

“No.”

Pinkie pressed on. “I bet you did.”

Twilight wasn’t really surprised that her new ‘friends’ had already started to exploit their positions and leech off her status and prestige as the student of the Princess. “Pinkie, I did get an invite for the Gala and I got a second one so I could bring a guest, but I could never choose between my friends, it would be wrong of me, I would feel so guilty.”

Rainbow Dash spoke up. “Twi, I bet you could ask the Princess to invite all of us, I’m sure that she would send extra tickets for us, we did stop Nightmare Moon, we’re heroes!” The Pegasus fluffed her feathers and puffed out her chest in a victory pose.

“Rainbow, I’m sorry, that’s a really great idea, but the Princess said that I can’t get extra tickets, sorry.” Twilight replied in the saddest tone she could manage while she inwardly celebrated at being able to avoid going to the Gala.

“That sucks, but if the Princess said that you can’t get extra tickets then I guess none of us can go.”

“That’s the idea; I will sacrifice my chance to go to the Gala to show solidarity with my friends. So, how about to take our minds off it, we go drink some tea?”

Rainbow extended her wings. “That’s a terrible idea Twi, How about we go outside and you can watch me fly around for a few hours, a live performance of my magnificent flying skills, you’ll have the time of your life.” Her wings were twitching in excitement at the prospect of either flight or having an audience.

Twilight was unsure if Rainbow was serious about that idea. “Well, that sounds… fun.” She turned to Pinkie to see what she thought of Rainbow’s idea, but the pink pony had a blank expression on her face and was staring at a shelf of books

“Pinkie!”

Pinkie gave off a startled gasp and turned to Twilight. ” Oh! What did I miss? I just kinda’ drifted off a bit.”

Twilight sighed in exasperation. “We were just talking about Rainbow’s idea about watching her fly, what do you think about that?” Twilight winked at Pinkie, desperately hoping that she would catch on.

“Sure, that sounds fun, let’s go do that!”

Twilight sighed.

Four hours later and Rainbow Dash had finally decided that she was too tired to continue her underwhelming aerial performance and went back to her home in the clouds to rest. Pinkie pie had left about an hour after Dash had started flying, saying she had to go see Applejack and help her at the farm.

Since Rainbow did not seem to care about where she flew they had only gone a short distance from the library and Twilight intended to head back to the library to read a book and pretend that she had not watched a vain Pegasus fly for almost four hours.

Just before she went into the library Twilight saw Lyra walking just down the path, Twilight figured that this would be the perfect opportunity to question Lyra about her somehow living here when Twilight was certain that she had lived in Canterlot at the same time.

She shouted to Lyra to get her attention.” Hey! Lyra! Over here!”

The mare looked she was about to run, before she quickly made her way over to Twilight. “H-hey Twilight, how’re you doing?”

Twilight ignored Lyra’s comment. “I want to talk, come inside to my library, we can drink tea and catch up on all the stuff we did in Canterlot”

Lyra glanced around nervously. “Oh, ah, o-ok Twilight, I have some spare time, sounds great to spend that time with a friend from Canterlot, hehe.” She went into the library when Twilight opened the door and beckoned for her to follow.

When Lyra was inside the library Twilight slammed the door shut and advanced menacingly toward her. Lyra backed away and knocked several book off a shelf that was against the wall when she ran out of space.

“Spike! Get over here, I need you.”

The purple dragon quickly ran into the room after Twilight called him. “Good, you came, Spike, I need you to help me with Lyra here, if she attacks me, you have to jump in the way and slow her down enough for me to kill her.” Twilight turned back to Lyra, who was cowering in the corner. “So, who are you? You’re clearly not Lyra, she would have at least known that I never talked to anypony back in Canterlot.”

Lyra bolted toward the door, Twilight began to cast a spell as Spike jumped at her to slow her down. He landed on her head and Lyra shook him off, sending him flying through the air before he landed on the ground in the middle of the room, Spike’s sudden weight on Lyra managed to put her off-balance and she tumbled before sliding into the library door.

That was all the time Twilight needed to finish her spell and a purple light from her horn and hit Lyra, knocking her out. Ignoring her for the moment, Twilight ran over to where Spike was lying on the ground and frantically began nudging him with her hoof. ”Spike! Wake up! Oh not good, not good, Wake up Spike!”

The dragon groaned and Twilight was ecstatic to see that he was not bleeding, “L-Lyra.” The dragon groaned out.

Twilight panicked, feeling torn between dealing with the green mare and making sure that Spike was not in any immediate danger. “O-ok Spike, you just w-wait there, ok?” Twilight turned toward where Lyra had fell, A black creature that resembled a pony had taken the place of the green mare, luckily, Twilight’s spell had worked and it was unconscious , having no time to think on it, she grabbed the creature with her levitation and dragged it towards he basement. Opening the door she carelessly threw the creature inside before slamming the door and locking it with her magic.

Looking back to Spike, Twilight saw that the dragon had managed to get up and was now swaying slightly on his feet and was slowly moving toward Twilight, she rushed over to him and let him use her neck to balance. “Spike, you should just go sit down now, I just put Lyra in the basement.”

“Okay Twilight, but… were you actually going to kill her?”

Twilight picked Spike up with her magic and gently moved him to a chair in the kitchen, “No, I wasn’t going to do that, it would have been going too far, but it looks like it scared Lyra, I was just hoping that she would tell me what she was doing in Ponyville. I guess I messed that up, but I do remember a myth about creatures that resembled ponies and killed them, then replaced them to feed off of love, I have no idea what to do with her though, she clearly didn’t kill Lyra if I saw her in Canterlot.”

Twilight shrugged. “We have a few hours before she wakes up, I’ll go see what I can find about changelings, you just wait here and rest.”