You walk out the front door of your house with Spike and Star Swirl in tow. You stop, taking in the black nothingness that surrounds you. Being out here, it hits you that this is really where you are, floating in a void, just you and Spike and a floating purple sorcerer who you just met. You take a deep, shuddering breath, then another, using the breathing exercise that Cadence taught you until you stop shaking and can continue on with your task. You look back at your companions, one of whom looks petrified, the other almost bored. You guess that, being an ancient sorcerer sprite, Star Swirl isn't fazed by much. You walk back to Spike and nuzzle him comfortingly.
"It will be alright Spike. I'm going to go look around. Will you be alright here while I do that?"
Spike nods and puts on his brave dragon face, and you return your attention to the void. You take off and fly towards the edge, checking to make sure that flying does in fact work the same way here that it does on your own planet. Oddly enough, the gravity appears to be exactly the same as it is back home. You fly over the edge and down, looking at the piece of floating earth holding your home, which gradually tapers down to a point as if the chunk of earth had been ripped from its planet, which you guess it kind of was. Looking down, you think you can almost make something out below you, and you make a mental note to ask Star Swirl if you are in fact not in a completely desolate void, among other things.
You return to your chunk of land/home and land right in front of your two companions.
"Star Swirl, do you know what this game's objective is?"
Star Swirl let out a short laugh before answering. "I think for now, the simple objective would be to get to that gate above you."
You look up at the "gate" in question, which appears to actually be an ethereal circle hovering high above your home. You nod to Star Swirl and reenter your home, Spike in tow, and make your way to the computer, scanning the lengthy, erratic conversation that took place via pesterhorse in your absence, and begin typing.
CA: I'm back girls.
AG: twilight where in the hay are you?
AG: nothin' that pinkie rd and flutters have told me makes a lick of sense
GC: ~I'm not sure I understand either darling~*
GC: ~Are you really floating in a, umm, a void?~*
GC: ~Is that even possible?~*
CA: It certainly appears to be.
AC: SEE?! I TOLD YOU!
AC: SHE'S FLOATING IN SPACE, I CAN SEE IT RIGHT IN FRONT OF ME!
CC: (Umm, excuse me…)
CC: (I don't mean to interrupt, but)
CC: (Did you maybe find anything out about where you are, Twilight?)
CA: I did, but not very much. I think that there is something below me, like you said, and there's a sort of gate hovering far above my home.
CA: Well, that's what Star Swirl called it at least.
AG: who?
CA: It's a long story…
CA: Anyways, I don't know where that gate leads, but I'm going to find out.
CA: I don't know what will happen, or when I will be on my computer again.
CA: I suppose I don't know when I'll see you again either.
AG: you'll see us soon enough twi
AG: i reckon we'll all meet up in that game before ya know it
AC: AND I'LL STILL BE ABLE TO SEE YOU!
AC: I'LL BE RIGHT HERE TWILIGHT, SO IF YOU WANT TO SAY ANYTHING TO THE OTHERS I CAN TELL THEM FOR YOU!
CA: Thank you Pinkie Pie.
CA: I would really appreciate if you could keep everyone informed on my activities in-game, if you don't mind.
AC: SURE THING TWILIGHT!
GC: ~We're all here for you darling, even if you can't see us~*
CC: (And I've seen us together in the game before, so I know we can all get to each other once we enter)
CC: (Which we should probably do soon, to avoid the meteors…)
CA: "Meteors"? Has there been another one?
CC: (There have been several, actually…)
CC: (The one that hit your house was the biggest, but some small ones have fallen too)
CC: (We're all ok though, so don't worry about us. Just do what you need to in the game)
CA: Thank you, all of you.
CA: I'm going up to the gate. Pinkie Pie, please let everyone else know if and when I go through, and where the gate leads to.
AC: OKIE DOKIE LOKIE!
You move away from your computer, your eyes settling on the saddlebags you packed just in case you had to go anywhere for this mission. You smirk and look over at Spike.
"And you thought I was being silly when I packed these." You say, grinning smugly.
Spike sticks his tongue out at you. "Just because your over-planning helped one time doesn't mean it isn't silly."
You simply maintain your smug expression as you levitate your saddlebags towards you, realizing as you do this that, given your new modus, you don't actually have to carry these. You captchalogue your saddlebags, causing all of their contents to spill out onto the floor in front of you, which you weren't expecting in the slightest. You facehoof and stare at Spike.
"Not one word Spike." You say to him. "Not. One. Word."
Spike complies, not saying anything but still giggling to himself.
You let out a sigh and try to come up with a rhyme to get your bags back. "This sylladex is such a drag, give me back my saddlebag!" you say in a clearly irritated tone. You wait but nothing comes to you.
"Why isn't it working?" you exclaim.
"Maybe you need to ask for your saddlebags, since there's two of them." Spike offers.
"Well how am I going to make a rhyme with that?"
"How about 'When I wear them my back sags, give me back my saddlebags!'"
"That sounds even worse than the last one." You grimace. "Flourish Prose must be turning in his grave right now."
"They don't have to sound pretty Twilight, they just have to rhyme."
You sigh and nod your head. "When I wear them my back sags, give me back my saddlebags." Your saddlebags appear above you and fall to the floor. With that taken care of, you decide to captchalogue the things that are most important to keep them safe, since you don't know what might become of your house and your belongings. You start with the box given to you by the Tree of Harmony. Although you have no idea how to open it or what it contains, you assume it's important enough to deserve a spot. After some consideration, you realize that the rest of your most important possessions are all books, and that your favorite books will likely be completely useless to you. Despite this, your sentimentality wins over and you captchalogue four books in the remaining slots; a book of basic spells your parents gave you as a filly, the first book of the Daring Do series, your copy of Super Naturals filled with Zecora's notes, and the journal you've been keeping with your friends since becoming a princess. You then repack your saddlebags and set them on your back before heading towards the door.
"I guess that's everything." You say, mostly to yourself.
"Umm, not quite everything…" You hear Spike say behind you, nervousness in his voice.
"What do you mean?" You ask, turning your head towards him.
"You might want to do something about that." He answers, pointing a claw at a black, nearly featureless, equinoid creature standing by your bed. The creature has a corner of your bedspread in its sharp-toothed mouth and is shaking its head in a dog-like fashion, tearing it up.
"Stop that!" You shout at the creature, equally surprised and agitated. It doesn't let go but raises its head to look at you from under the brim of its pointy wizard hat. It growls at you.
"I said stop it!" You shout, shooting a beam of magic at it. The creature explodes, releasing a few oddly-shaped blue objects and something that looks like an enlarged version of your Element of Harmony.
"I, umm, I didn't think that would happen…" you mumble.
"That must be an enemy or something." Spike says. "All games have enemies or monsters to fight. Well, all the good ones anyway."
"Hey! Most of my games don't have monsters in them!"
"That's because you play boring puzzle games, like that portal-making one that you played for a week straight."
"That game was an excellent test of wits and puzzle-solving skill with a deep story and an inventive mechanic years ahead of its time!" you exclaim. "And I did not play it for a week straight. I took plenty of breaks. I just enjoyed it enough to devote some more free time to it than I usually devote to gaming is all."
"Free time, and sleep time, and meal time, and work time." Spike retorts.
You glare at your dragon companion. "Well, in your oh-so-wonderful monster-killing games, do you do anything with that stuff that appeared when that thing exploded?"
"That's some sort of treasure. You can usually use it to get items and power-ups and stuff. You should go collect it."
"Ok…" you answer, still fairly confused. You fly over to your bed and touch one of the blue objects, causing it to disappear. This happens with everything the creature dropped, even when you try to use your magic to levitate one of the objects. Hoping you collected whatever that stuff is, you go to your computer to ask Pinkie Pie if she knows anything, reopening the chat between you and her.
CA: Pinkie, this might be a weird question, but did I just collect anything that you can see on your end?
AC: YOU DID!
AC: YOU HAVE MORE BUILD GRIST NOW, WHICH MEANS I CAN BUILD MORE STUFF!
AC: YOU ALSO HAVE THIS NEW STUFF CALLED MAGIGRIST. I DON'T KNOW WHAT IT'S FOR BUT IT LOOKS LIKE YOUR ELEMENT SO IT'S PROBABLY REALLY SPECIAL!
AC: OOH! OOOH! AND YOUR STRIFE SPECIBUS SET ITSELF TO MAGICKIND! I DON'T KNOW WHAT THAT'S FOR EITHER! MAYBE IT'S LIKE YOUR CLASS, LIKE YOU'RE A MAGE NOW OR SOMETHING!
CA: Thank you Pinkie. I'm still pretty confused, but I'm glad you can at least tell me something about what's going on in this game.
CA: I'm going to go investigate the gate. Keep an eye out for any more changes and tell me about them the next time we talk.
AC: WILL DO TWILIGHT!
AC: GOOD LUCK!
AN: And with that this story has an official point at which it splits off from the cannon. If it wasn't clear, this story takes place somewhere in season four, meaning that Twilight recently became an alicorn, the box is still locked, and the Elements of Harmony are gone.
Thank you to Majin Hentai X, LunarDangerScratch, Mariah Sarona, Dawns stories, and KaluaTheRathling for your favorites, follows, and reviews, and to everyone who's read my story up to this point. You all keep me writing.
