The Vice Principal in the Moon
Disclaimer: Equestria Girls is the property of Hasbro.
Okay, well, here's a brief fic designed to burn off the inspiration that Equestria Girls provided for me. At least it'll be brief in comparison with my current MLP fic, the season-2-based Romance and the Fate of Equestria, which has recently achieved official "epic" length of 100,000 words, and isn't done by a long shot.
So, to reiterate, this is just something minor and fun for me to write alongside my real opus, the destined-for-greatness Romance. Of course, since I've said that, I've probably jinxed both stories, forcing this one to become a fandom classic and Romance to fade into obscurity. And since I've said THAT, that'll probably reverse the jinx and make things go the way I want them to. And since I've said THAT—well it's a vicious cycle.
Now that you know what kind of rants you'll be getting into, please sit back, relax, and enjoy The Vice Principal in the Moon.
Chapter One
-0-0-0-0-0-
Rarity and Fluttershy strolled up to the nacho stand at the city mall, laden with shopping bags and giggling to each other.
"Hello," Rarity said brightly to the boy behind the counter. "Just the big nacho basket for the three of us."
The boy looked a bit confused, but punched in the order. Suspecting the reasons behind his puzzled look, Rarity and Fluttershy looked around.
"I said the three of us," Rarity called over her shoulder. "Would you get over here?"
Sunset Shimmer emerged from behind a large potted plant and joined them, rubbing her own arms reassuringly and her eyes downcast.
"Still don't like to be seen with us?" Rarity said coldly.
"No," Sunset said hastily. "No, no, no, that's not it at all… I'm afraid of being seen in general…"
"Oh," Fluttershy said softly, pulling Sunset into a comforting hug. "We understand. Come on, let's take a seat."
They sat down at a food court table, Sunset continuing to glance all around nervously, trying to keep her face covered.
"Sunset, darling, what are you hiding from?" Rarity asked. "You've been jittery for the past few days. Haven't all of our months together eased your mind a bit? No one blames you anymore."
"I'm not hiding from anything," Sunset insisted. "I've just been… wondering whether I made the right decision in—gah! Hide me!" She ducked under the table.
"Hide you?" Fluttershy said blankly. Sunset's arms darted up and pulled the other two under the table with her.
"What's gotten into you?" Rarity hissed.
Sunset didn't respond, just pointed, wide-eyed and with shaky hands, at someone who had entered the food court. Rarity and Fluttershy followed her gaze to the purple-haired girl laden with a heavy backpack.
"But… but that's Twilight!" Fluttershy said eagerly. "How's that possible? Oh, this is wonderful! Hey, Tw—"
Sunset Shimmer clamped her hands over Fluttershy's mouth. "That's not the Twilight we know," she whispered. "That's the Twilight native to this world. She wouldn't recognize you."
"Ohhh," Rarity said with dawning comprehension.
"But she's not who I'm hiding from," Sunset went on. "I mean, her too, but… look."
Another girl joined Twilight, one who overshadowed her greatly with her more upright posture and commanding presence.
"It's you!" Rarity blurted.
"Sure is," Sunset said, hiding behind Rarity. "I don't run into her often, but I don't want to think about what would happen if we actually met. Can you imagine if the whole Fall Formal thing had made the news? There'd be a lot of awkward questions…"
"What would happen if you met?" Fluttershy whispered. "Would the world fall out of balance or something?"
"No, it'd just be embarrassing," Sunset muttered.
The alternate Sunset and Twilight chatted animatedly for a moment, then hugged, before bypassing the food court and heading off together.
The three came out from underneath the table and watched the retreating girls.
"Huh… looks like those two are friends," Sunset said blankly. "That's… encouraging." She sighed and stared at the table.
"Are you okay?" Fluttershy asked.
"I don't belong here," she said through gritted teeth. "I should've gone back to Equestria with Twilight and faced justice."
Rarity put a hand on her shoulder. "Well, you didn't, and there's no sense in wasting time wishing you had. It's another two years before you can go back, and you'll just drive yourself crazy if you spend all that time thinking about it."
Sunset blinked. "Two years?"
"Thirty moons, that's thirty months, right? Two and a half years?"
"Oh, I see," Sunset said, laughing slightly. "No, no, that's how things work here, yes, but in Equestria, the phases of the moon are entirely artificial. The portal opens roughly every three months. In fact, it's open right now."
Rarity looked shocked. "Then what are you doing…?"
"I said I should go back and face justice, not that I want to," she mumbled. "Equestria justice can be rough sometimes. Princess Celestia is nothing if not fair. If I went back to her now, after all I've done? She'd be merciless. And, you know, I have a date, so… yeah." She grinned awkwardly. "Can't miss a date just to pop back and take what's coming to me. That just wouldn't be cool."
"And you're all about 'cool', aren't you?" Rarity said softly.
"Hey, it's all I have left," Sunset said with desperation. "It's all I ever had."
Rarity didn't speak, just placed her hand atop Sunset's.
"I wonder if Twilight will ever come back through the portal," Fluttershy said, still staring in the direction the other Twilight had gone. "Our Twilight."
"Why would she bother?" Sunset said. "She's got another set of you guys back home."
Rarity snorted. "Well, be that as it may… that doesn't mean that she… that she doesn't… um… you still have a lot to learn about friendship, Sunset Shimmer."
-0-0-0-0-0-
"And as chairman of the school board, it is my honor to present the award for Principal of the Year… to Celestia of Canterlot High School."
Celestia walked up to the stage to the polite applause of every teacher in the district, and accepted her golden plaque from the chairman of the board. The chairman was a tall and skinny man, gray-skinned and bald-headed with bushy white eyebrows and beard, bulging red eyes and oddly pointy ears.
"Thank you, Director Discord," Celestia said gratefully, taking the podium. "I'd like to thank the board of education for this award. I haven't been a principal for very long, but every teacher who came before me and encouraged me on my way has inspired me to be the best principal I can be. And I especially appreciate the support I've continued to receive from the board, even in light of the… mysterious events of the Canterlot High Fall Formal. I certainly could not have gotten through that alone. Thank you."
The audience applauded again.
"Well said," Discord said softly.
Celestia extended her right hand to him, but he responded with a derisive smirk and the extension of his left arm which, peculiarly, was much thinner than his right. Celestia awkwardly retracted her arm and shook his hand with her left. She returned to her table, where her sister offered a congratulatory pat on the back.
"Well done, sister," Luna said. "How does it feel to be the youngest principal in the district ever to win Principal of the Year?"
"Oh, like it's just the beginning!" Celestia said, smiling at her plaque. "I don't really care about the award… just so long as it means I'm making a difference to my students."
"Yes, you have been quite the influence," Luna said quietly.
Celestia blinked, then smiled and touched her sister comfortingly. "Listen, Luna… soon you're going to move up. In a few years, you'll be getting the Principal of the Year award. You might even beat my record for the youngest."
Luna looked away. "That would be something, wouldn't it?"
Director Discord watched that exchange, then disappeared behind the stage curtains.
"You were right, there's jealousy there," he said thoughtfully. "We can use that."
"I told you," said a smarmy female voice from the shadows.
"We must use everything we can," Discord said, pacing back and forth. "Principal Celestia has to go. She's set the bar far too high for the rest of the district. We cannot afford to pay for all of those fantastic innovations of hers, especially not when other schools start clamoring for them. We need to get her fired so a less free-thinking mind can take over Canterlot High… probably that jealous and incompetent sister of hers."
"I completely understand, Mr. Discord."
"Are you prepared to handle the task I have given you?" Discord said seriously, staring into the shadow.
The familiar Canterlot High student stepped out into the open, her spangled cape held menacingly in front of her face. "The Great and Powerful Trixie is more than ready to dig up enough dirt to topple the tyrannical regime of Principal Celestia!"
She clapped her hands and was enveloped in a cloud of pale pink smoke. When it cleared, she was still there, motionless, her face smeared with pink dust. Discord raised an eyebrow.
"Um…" Trixie said nervously, before clearing her throat and coughing. "Snips! Snails!"
The two freshmen popped out of a janitorial closet and tripped over themselves, scrambling to Trixie's side.
"Are you boys ready to serve the new queen bee of Canterlot High?"
"Ready and able-bodied, eh!" Snails proclaimed.
"You are so much cooler than Sunset Shimmer, oh great and powerful one!" Snips gushed.
"Ha! Pwned," Trixie said through a vicious smirk. "We're prepared to tear her as far down as necessary, Mr. Discord."
"For what I'm paying you, I expect only the highest level of cunning and ruthlessness," Discord said dryly. "Now clear off before someone catches us plotting."
The boys saluted, and they and Trixie scampered off into the back passages behind the stage.
~0~0~0~
"So, this is it, then?" Queen Chrysalis sneered in her reverberating voice. "After months of intrigue, it finally comes down to me against the Elements of Harmony."
"That's right!" Twilight declared, spreading her wings and standing tall to display her crown.
Chrysalis stood on a hilltop in the Everfree Forest, Twilight and the other five Element holders surrounding her and bearing the necklaces.
"What'll it be, then?" Chrysalis asked. "Turned to stone? Shattered into pieces? A new kind and loving personality forced upon me against my will?"
"Well, that's the fun part," Rainbow Dash said. "We don't really know."
"Fine, clearly I'm licked," Chrysalis said pleasantly. "Do as you will, I just hope your conscience can live with it."
"Fire 'em up, girls!" Twilight commanded.
Twilight felt the energy flowing into the Element of Magic that decorated her crown. All around her, she saw the others' necklaces activating as well… but something was strange.
One-half of each gem was glowing white, while the other half remained normal. There was no other effect; none of the ponies went floating into the air, no sparkling rainbows or glowing eyes, just a weak white glow on half of each gem.
One by one, the ponies started noticing each other's gems failing, then looking down at their own. All eyes turned questioningly toward Twilight.
Exasperated, she whipped off her crown and levitated it in front of her face, inspecting the gem. Like the others, it was only half alight—and with Twilight's concentration broken, the light faded, as did all the others.
The six ponies and the changeling they had pinned in stood in stunned silence for a moment.
"Twilight, sugarcube, what just happened?" Applejack said in a strained voice.
"I'll tell you what just happened," Chrysalis said brightly. "The queen of the changelings heads for the hills and lives to fight another day!" Her wings started buzzing and she shot into the air. "You've torn down my empire, but you haven't seen the last of me! Sleep with one eye open, my little ponies!" She vanished into the distant sky.
Rainbow Dash spread her wings. "Should I…?"
"Oh, let her go," Twilight muttered. "We've spent two months foiling her scheme, all that was left was her. What's she gonna do out there in the forest all by herself? The bigger question here is what in the world is wrong with the Elements of Harmony?" She tapped the star-shaped amethyst with her hoof. "It's like… it's like only half of their power was activated. But what could have caused that?"
Rainbow ground her teeth. "Ooh, I've got a baaaad feeling…"
"Come on, everypony," Twilight said. "Let's get back to Canterlot and tell Princess Celestia about this. Maybe she knows how this can be fixed."
"I hope so," said Pinkie, examining her necklace. "'Cause let me tell you, I speak from experience, half a balloon just plain doesn't work."
"Indeed it doesn't," Twilight said under her breath. "And the Elements of Harmony at half capacity, that's just begging for something terrible to happen…"
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Endnotes
There we have it, first chapter of a new tale… my only ending remark is that "~0~0~0~" means the following scene takes place in Equestria, while "-0-0-0-0-0-" means it takes place in the human world. And also, I only just discovered this after breaking scenes that way for years, each one of those zeroes adds to my word count. Makes me wonder how many words total I've actually submitted…