by G. M. Berrow
“Rainbow Dash?” Twilight asked, getting more confused by the second.
“She’s the captain of, like, every team at Canterlot High,” Pinkie explained.
“She’s also the captain of sayin’ she’s gonna do somethin’ for ya and then turnin’ around and not even botherin’ to show up!” Applejack crossed her arms across her chest in a huff.
First, Pinkie had put down Fluttershy, and now Applejack didn’t trust Rainbow? Why weren’t any of her friends friends?! This place was bizarre and unsettling. Twilight was going to pry further, but something told her that all would reveal itself in the next few days. Maybe with a little help from some good old-fashioned research, or maybe Twilight was actually starting to become a little psychic. Either way, she had a lot of work to do if she wanted to win the crown.
Sunset Comes After Twilight
A little while later, Twilight and Spike were across campus, walking outside in the sunshine and trying to figure out their next move.
“I can’t believe I didn’t recognize you earlier, Twilight Sparkle,” Sunset Shimmer snapped, stopping Twilight and Spike in their tracks. Sunset continued on, sizing them up. “Pinkie Pie and Applejack told me everything. That is, after I made sure they knew what an awful job they were doing on my coronation decorations.” Sunset flipped her fiery hair. “Honestly? Fizzy apple cider? It’s not a hoedown!”
Twilight and Spike exchanged a skeptical look. Unlike all the other students at Canterlot High, they weren’t scared of her.
“Should have known Princess Celestia would send her prize pupil here after my crown,” Sunset laughed. “And her little dog, too.” Spike frowned.
“It’s my crown,” Twilight said, standing firm. “If you already rule this place, then why do you need it?”
“Pop quiz: What happens when you bring an Element of Harmony into an alternate world?” Sunset Shimmer sneered. She put her hands on her hips.
Twilight was drawing a serious blank. She should know this! The Elements of Harmony were mysterious, but she’d read every single bit of available literature on them. She’d memorized each page and even created new magic after the debacle where everypony’s cutie marks had gotten switched. It was the reason why she was a princess to begin with!
“You don’t know? And you’re supposed to be Celestia’s star student?” Sunset Shimmer guffawed. “Then again, what were the chances she’d find somepony as bright as me to take under her wing after I left Equestria?” Whatever she was, Sunset Shimmer certainly wasn’t humble.
Twilight reeled with the knowledge that there was something about the Elements of Harmony that she didn’t know, but Sunset Shimmer did. Why hadn’t Celestia warned her? Unless she didn’t know, either.
Sunset Shimmer walked around Twilight, looking her up and down. “Bit embarrassing that you were the best she could do, though.”
Spike began to growl. He almost sounded like a real dog.
Twilight looked down at herself. She was sort of a mess. Her purple skirt was still stained with fruit juice from lunch. Her arms were all scraped up from trying to trot like a pony through the sticks and grass out on the front lawn that morning. And on top of everything, she didn’t even know what an Element of Harmony—her own crown—did in this realm.
“I’d keep an eye on your mutt. Canterlot High has a very strict ‘no pets allowed’ policy,” Sunset Shimmer said with a wicked smile. She pointed at Spike. “Hate for him to be taken away from you.”
Spike couldn’t keep quiet any longer. He stood upright and put his paws on his hips. “Is that a threat?”
“Of course not,” Sunset Shimmer said, her voice dripping with sugary sweetness. “But I’d cut down on the chatter if I were you. Don’t want everyone to know you two don’t belong here, now would you?” And with that she turned on her heel and headed back toward the gym.
After about five steps, she turned around and looked at Twilight. “You want to become a princess here? Please. You’ll never stand out! You don’t even know the first thing about fitting in.”
When Sunset Shimmer reached the doors, her two lackeys—Snips and Snails—tumbled out. “I want you to follow her,” she snapped, now out of Twilight’s earshot. “Bring me something I can use, just like you did with the last girl who thought she could challenge me.”
Whenever Twilight was really stumped back in Equestria, there was always one place she knew she could go for guidance. One place where she felt like she could get a real handle on things. One place that could certainly be found in any school. Even Canterlot High.
“I knew there’d be a library!” Twilight said as she stared up at the brick building in awe. A few students pushed through the doors, carrying large stacks of books. Finally, Twilight felt a little at ease in this realm. She skipped up the steps, Spike at her heels. “If I’m going to really fit in and win votes, we need to do some research.” Twilight couldn’t risk that Sunset Shimmer might just be right about her not knowing how to fit in. And apparently, it was a big deal at this high school.
“Research?” Spike said, groaning. He imagined having to help her put away all her books, just like at home in Ponyville.
Twilight pushed the big double doors open and stepped inside. It was gorgeous! A tall, domed ceiling arched over the circular room. Hundreds of books were stacked on shelves that stretched up two floors high. A golden bust of a Wondercolt shone in the center of a workstation that was surrounded by black square things. They had flat boards full of buttons in front of them. Twilight had no idea what they were even for. Some sort of musical instrument, perhaps?
Nearby, a group of three younger girls sat in front of one of the black square things, giggling. It looked like they were watching something. “Maybe this place does have magic,” Twilight mumbled to herself, marveling at the moving images dancing across the front of the box.
A woman came up to the girls and shook her head. “Sorry, Apple Bloom. School computers are for research only. Please get back to class. You, too, Sweetie Belle and Scootaloo.” The girls all groaned.
“It’s just as well, y’all,” said Apple Bloom. “Some of the comments about our music video were really awful.” She had the same country twang in her voice as Applejack.
“Bye, Miss Cheerilee,” the girls chorused before heading out of the library.
Twilight stared at the black thing quizzically. Maybe she could use one of those things for research. That’s what the woman had said they were for after all. Kind of like a book. Except not.
In a matter of minutes, Miss Cheerilee had set up Twilight with her own “computer.”
“So I just push the letters here and then words and moving pictures will come up here?” asked Twilight, staring down at the strange device.
“That’s right!” Miss Cheerilee nodded with a smile.
Twilight punched her hands into the keyboard. She accidentally applied way too much force and ended up jamming her fingers. “Ouch!” she cried. Having hands was hard. Spike raised an eyebrow. Twilight was starting to cause a scene with her awkward antics. She shook her head at him, and he stayed quiet. So quiet, in fact, that he fell asleep.
Little did Twilight and Spike know, Snips and Snails were crouched behind a bookshelf filming Twilight with a cell-phone camera the entire time. They snickered at each other. “Sunset Shimmer is going to love this!” said Snips, rubbing his hands together in giddiness. Now all they had to do was wait for that wannabe Twilight Sparkle to do something else worth watching. Then she’d learn what happened to girls who messed with Sunset Shimmer.
“I know it’s a little dusty.” Spike coughed as he led Twilight up the stairs into a lofty room at the top of the library. “But it doesn’t seem like anybody comes up here. I thought we could sleep here tonight.”
Twilight stopped herself from mentioning that Spike had already had a nice long nap under the table in the library while she did research.
Twilight batted away a cobweb and sneezed. Dust billowed into the air.
&n
bsp; “It’s perfect, Spike,” she said. “I can’t believe I hadn’t even thought about it. Too busy researching, I guess.”
“How did it go?” Spike asked as he moved some old dusty books out of the way to make room.
“I found this.” Twilight held up a large book that said CHS WONDERCOLTS across the front. “It’s called a ‘yearbook.’ It seems to be something that they use to keep a record of things that have happened at the school.” She flipped open the book and riffled through until she found a particular page. “Look!”
It was a picture of Pinkie Pie, Rainbow Dash, Applejack, Fluttershy, and a girl with violet hair all embracing one another. They were smiling. “I’m going to bet the girl on the far right is Rarity.”
“There’s a Rarity here?!” Spike jumped up. His crush on Rarity back in Equestria was no secret to anypony. “I mean… interesting photo.”
“It’s interesting because they look like they’re friends.” Twilight wore an expression of distress. “But it doesn’t seem like they are now.”
“Not so much,” Spike agreed. The way Pinkie had talked about Fluttershy being a “meanie” and Applejack had said she didn’t trust Rainbow were both good clues to that. But there had to be some deeper reason that the girls’ friendships had ended.
Twilight shook her head and sat down on the filthy floor. “I just can’t help but get the feeling that Sunset Shimmer had something to do with it.”
When Twilight went off on a tangent like this, it was often up to Spike to steer her back to her true goal. “But she wants your crown because she’s planning on doing something even worse. If you’re going to stop her, you have to focus on making allies here. You can’t worry about why these girls aren’t friends anymore.”
Spike was right. She needed to keep her eyes on the prize and not get sidetracked by the new girls she’d met here. Even if they did remind her of her Ponyville friends.
Twilight closed her eyes and burrowed down in the old books. She needed to get some rest for tomorrow. It was a big day. Tomorrow Twilight would earn the respect of everyone at Canterlot High. Well, everyone except for maybe one girl with golden hair.
The Wrong Kind of Attention
The next morning, Twilight was ready with a plan. She had woken up in the middle of the night thinking about all the kids at Canterlot High.
“Fluttershy said I’d need to win over all those different groups if I want to become princess of the Fall Formal, so I’ve compiled a list of talking points,” Twilight explained. First, she would introduce herself. Next she would sprinkle in some things she’d learned about this world into casual conversation. Maybe something about computers? Then they would decide she was really nice and want to vote for her for Fall Formal princess.
Spike ambled across the dewy grass on the front lawn next to her. “You made a list? That’s so unlike you.”
Twilight bent down to her pup and opened her backpack. “Come on, Spike. Time to make a good first impression on my fellow students. The whole world sort of depends on it.” Spike climbed in with a whimper. This hiding thing was already getting old.
Inside the school, Principal Celestia’s voice boomed through some sort of magical announcement system as Twilight navigated her way through the bustling main halls. “Good morning, students, and happy Thursday! Just a reminder to pick up your ballots for the princess of the Fall Formal today. They are due by the time the dance starts tomorrow night, so don’t forget to vote and make your voice heard.”
Twilight smiled. She was actually getting sort of excited about the whole thing. She scanned the hallway for someone new to meet. There were lots of kids around, so it would be pretty easy. Twilight spotted a fashionista girl wearing a cute dress and pink kneesocks with sparkles in them. Perfect.
“Hi, I’m Twilight!” She waved to the girl. “Love your socks. Pink is definitely the new black.” The girl gave Twilight a funny look before shuffling off to one of her friends. The two of them whispered something to each other, looked back at Twilight, and began to giggle.
That was weird.
“Hey there!” Twilight said to a burly guy in a blue Wondercolts football jersey. “Offense sells tickets, but defense wins games.” She grinned. Surely her knowledge of the game “football” would help her to connect with him. But the boy didn’t smile back. He just looked at his friends and then laughed. How rude!
Twilight looked around the hallway in confusion. It wasn’t just the fashionista and football guy who were laughing at her. Almost all the students were giving her strange looks!
“Spike,” Twilight whispered to her backpack. “Why is everybody looking at me funny?”
“Psssst!” a voice hissed from nowhere.
Suddenly, an arm adorned with a gold bangle bracelet reached out and yanked Twilight into an empty classroom. Twilight now stood face-to-face with a pretty girl. She had dark purple hair and wore a diamanté hair clip. Her long eyelashes enhanced her worry-filled, big blue eyes.
“Rarity?” Twilight suddenly recognized the girl from the yearbook picture. She wore a lavender skirt with Rarity’s cutie mark of three diamonds on it.
Rarity pulled out a wig and slapped it on Twilight’s head. “Too poufy,” Rarity winced. She pulled out another. “Too shiny!” she exclaimed.
“What are you doing?” Twilight said, yanking the shiny wig off her head. It was all hot and itchy. Besides, she liked her mane how it was—indigo with a few chunks of pink and plum running through it.
Rarity looked Twilight up and down like she was some sort of project. “We need something that says, ‘I am totally new here, and you have never seen me before.’ Everyone’s going to remember the purple and pink, darling, from the video.” She riffled through her bag, which contained a ridiculous amount of extra clothes. She found a green dress and began to dress Twilight like a doll. “This is good! No one will recognize you.”
“Why wouldn’t I want to be—?” Twilight said, her voice muffled by the green fabric.
Rarity ignored Twilight’s question and bent down to Spike, who had jumped out of his backpack prison. She gave him a little pat on the head, and his tail started wagging. “And we’ll need a disguise for your adorable dog, too. With a little work, I think I could make him look like a rabbit.”
Twilight was still trying to figure out why she even needed a disguise when Applejack burst into the room. “There ya are, Twilight.” Fluttershy and Pinkie Pie filed in after her.
“Oh, poo,” huffed Rarity. She threw her arms up in defeat. “So much for the disguise.”
“We’ve been lookin’ all over for ya,” Applejack said.
“I like your new look, Twilight!” Pinkie Pie chirped.
Rarity scoffed. “Yes, well, I do have an eye for these sorts of things. Not that you seem to care.”
The comment struck a chord in Twilight. As much as she tried not to care that these versions of her best friends weren’t getting along, it really bothered her. She wanted to say something about it, but she held her tongue. A subject change was better. “So, why were you all looking for me? What’s going on?”
By the looks on everyone’s faces, she could tell that whatever it was, it was bad. Very, very bad.
The girls showed her the screen on Pinkie Pie’s laptop and played a video. Twilight Sparkle gasped at what she saw. “But this all happened yesterday. At the library,” she protested, genuinely stumped. “How did a video of me falling over and acting like a—I mean, me acting strange get on the computer?”
The video was awful. It included all the embarrassing things that had happened to Twilight, including when she dropped a stack of books and started picking them up with her mouth out of habit. At the end of the montage, Sunset Shimmer had come on-screen and urged everyone not to vote for Twilight for princess.
“Has everyone in the school seen this?” Twilight asked. So that explained all the weird glances and whispers. Geez, high school was really rough!
Rarity sighed. “She did the same thing t
o me when I tried to be princess of the Spring Fling. Had those freshmen—Snips and Snails—follow me to the boutique where I work after school. They filmed me pretending a mannequin was a prince and asking him for a… a… kiss!” Rarity started to blush crimson at the memory.
Applejack shook her head and crossed her arms. “I tried to tell ya, Twilight.”
Pinkie Pie jumped up. “Sunset Shimmer’s got things all turned around! People are supposed to laugh with you, not at you. Duh.”
Twilight slumped. “What am I going to do? No one is going to vote for me after seeing this.”
“Not that it will make any difference, but I’d still vote for you.” Fluttershy looked up from staring at her shoes. “You were so nice to me when Sunset Shimmer was picking on me yesterday.”
Pinkie Pie walked over to Twilight and leaned on a desk. “If you still want to run, maybe there’s something I can do to help.”
Twilight was about to thank her when Fluttershy leaned in and made a big show of shielding her mouth. “Word of advice. Don’t accept her help. She doesn’t take anything seriously.”
“Why do you have to be so awful to me?!” Pinkie whined.
“Don’t play innocent, Pinkie Pie,” snapped Rarity. “You’re no better than she is.”
“Listen to y’all carryin’ on. Get over it and move on!” Applejack chimed in.
Rarity scoffed. “You mean like how you’ve gotten over what happened with Rainbow Dash? The way she said she’d bring the softball team to your bake sale and then was a total no-show?”
This was more than Twilight could handle. All four girls were dishing insults at one another left and right. The ponies she knew back home would never talk to anyone like that. Especially not their friends.
“Stop! All of you!” Twilight yelled, bringing the bickering to a halt. “I want to show you something.” Twilight dug through her backpack and found the yearbook. This was just what the girls needed to remind them of their friendship. “You were friends once.” Twilight pushed the open book toward them.
