Before Him

Normally, Twilight Sparkle did not wake up with Celestia’s daily sunrise. Though by no means a late sleeper like Shining Armor had become lately, she enjoyed rising an hour or two later than usual after secretly reading books or trying to talk with Smarty Pants into the wee hours of the morning.

However, today was not a day just like any other.

“Today’s the day for the Gifted Test!”

Normally, Nightlight was the first to get up in the morning. As the stallion of the house, he would prepare a pot of coffee for his wife Velvet and perhaps go down and pick something up from the deli for the family’s breakfast.

Today however, Nightlight woke up not to the usual quiet household, but to a repeated bouncing feeling from somewhere on the bed.

“Mmh, Twilight? You’ll wake your mother,” he mumbled.

“Hmm? What is it honey?” asked a now conscious unicorn mare.

“But today is the day is the day is the day!” Twilight loudly declared to the sleepy duo.

“Twilight…”

Twilight Sparkle’s bouncing slowed down from a quick tempo to a more occasional beat and then, finally, ceased altogether. Twilight didn’t want to make her parents grouchy, especially since they had gone through so much trouble to help this happen.

“Honey,” said her mother, “maybe you should practice your magic brushing your teeth and getting washed up before breakfast.”

Twilight Sparkle gasped. She hadn’t used her magic yet today at all! What if she forgot how to levitate things overnight? Then she would have gone to be tested, have been humiliated by the teachers, and have embarrassed her parents. There was not a moment to lose! In a flash, she was in the bathroom, furiously brushing away.

Nightlight looked over to his wife.

“Do you ever worry that she’s a bit too intense about this sort of thing?”

“It’s a Twilight family trait. We get intense about everything. Looks like my genes won out this round.”

Minutes later, Twilight and her family, including her parents, big brother, and Smarty Pants were gathered at the table. As today was a special day, Nightlight had prepared haycakes with syrup. In retrospect though, this was a bad idea. It turned out that Twilight, though theoretically aware of Smarty Pants’ status as a doll, still insisted on trying to feed him an oat cake covered in syrup. As for her brother, despite being the greater part of a decade older, he was scarcely more mature. Before the parents could take control of the situation, the haycakes became the center of a speed-eating contest.

In the end, Twilight Sparkle was the winner, but the victory was shallow and short-lived. For one thing, her best non-brother friend, Smarty Pants, had come in dead last, having eaten barely anything save for some syrup in her fabric. For another, part of the collateral damage was her cleanliness. Twilight Sparkle, usually a neat filly, was now messier than she had been for ages. This required a trip back to the bathroom, with parental assistance to make sure they wouldn’t be late.

As her mother helped clean out her syrup-stained fur, Twilight Sparkle heard her father lecturing Shining Armor in the other room. Her mother had only given her a look of modest shame, but the disapproval combined with her brother’s trial made Twilight a very remorseful filly.

An hour later, Shining Armor had gone off to school, while his sister and parents were just approaching the gates of Celestia's School for Gifted Unicorns.

Inside the school, the trio passed through hallway after hallway. At a glance, it seemed like an ordinary enough school, albeit a well kept one with the occasional monument. But to the well trained eyes of Twilight Sparkle, she was stepping on the grounds of the greats, regularly passing by national treasures.

“They say that this is where the very best unicorns learn and teach magic! I heard that Savory Sweet the Wise founded the biology department in 277! She was the inventor of lupobiology! And this is where the Equestrian National Medal of Technology and Innovation is given every year! They’re usually just called the ‘Buggies’ though, because back in the old days, a bunch of buggies carried the new inventions and stuff here! And-”

The little pony’s parents had learned nothing new from this lecture. After all, Twilight had shared everything she learned about the school ever since she heard that they had signed her up for testing. But they didn’t mind. This could end up being one of the greatest days in their daughter’s life. And even if their talented little genius were to somehow end up having trouble… well, they already had some new Smarty Pants accessories wrapped up back home as a prize for her doing her very best.

Twilight Sparkle and her parents had been waiting outside the testing room for what felt like forever. It couldn’t have been that long: the Canterlot School for Gifted Unicorns Gifted Admissions Test was notorious for having merciless proctors, and stories about foals leaving the exam in tears, regardless of their outcome, were far from unheard of. Twilight, through an accident in alphabetical ordering, was the ninth of ten foals being tested that day.

As she looked at another filly going into the room to take the test, a lonely blue thing with a silver mane and a magnificent hat, Twilight reflected on something she had read. Out of the ten of them, there was a chance that none of them would pass the test. In fact, it was almost as likely as not that none of them would pass. Admittance rates based on this test were roughly 12%, and even out of those select few, many students simply couldn’t keep up with the sheer load and complexity of the coursework.

According to that book, only 4% of ponies applying via the test would be able to not only pass but stick out the intense years of schooling that followed.

And as Twilight Sparkle saw the blue filly quietly leave the room, hat covering her expression, she began to doubt that she would have what it took.

“Twilight Sparkle”

It was her turn. Twilight’s parents went in with her, as Twilight knew they would be allowed to. In the room were four proctors. Oddly enough, they didn’t seem as tall and intimidating as she was afraid they might be.

Then they stared at her.

Twilight Sparkle was no stranger to being stared at. As the resident bookworm in magic kindergarten, other foals stared at her all the time. And even the occasional parent of said foals would stare at her, sometimes in disapproval.

But teachers, librarians, scholars… they had never stared at her like that before. They might be surprised that such a young filly knew so much and was so eager to learn. But they would soon smile, and help her learn her fill.

These four proctors stared at her, not only with disapproval, but with disregard. It was as if they were saying “You have already wasted our time by bothering to show up today. Just hurry up and fail so we can go on our lunch break.”

In years to come, Twilight Sparkle would come to realize that those four ponies were not villains. They probably weren’t even being hostile. If anything, they were slightly bored.

But as a filly, Twilight Sparkle felt betrayed and terrified by such looks. It was almost as if failure was the only option they’d accept.

How could she possibly succeed?

Half an hour later, Twilight Sparkle was feeling… not confident. No, she was definitely still far from confident. But that feeling of imminent doom had subsided somewhat.

The oral section of the test had been simple enough. Magical auras, uncontrolled magic, the differences between telekinesis and other natural magic versus spells, the magical color spectrum, and enchanted artifacts were easy as pie to remember and recite information about. Sure, Twilight stumbled a bit when asked about wild magic, but was able to recover quickly enough.

The practical section was slightly more difficult, but still manageable. Twilight’s telekinesis proved to be more than strong enough to lift most of the objects presented to her. Oddly enough, one of the few things she had trouble lifting was a shard of stone resembling obsidian. However, her ability to levitate three small books and levitate them independently did seem to impress the proctors.

As one of the proctors pulled a distant switch with his telekinesis, a pony came into the room via a second doorway. He was towing what appeared to be a small wagon, with some large object covered by the sheet.

“Twilight Sparkle,” said the proctor, “for the last portion of your practical exam, you are tasked with channeling your magic into another object.”

The sheet was pulled off of the wagon. Twilight Sparkle’s mouth dropped at what she saw.

“This is a statue of a creature called-“

“The Crying Human!” Twilight squealed with glee.

How could they not think that she’d know what this was? The Crying Human was an ancient piece of pony artwork, portraying a mythical species of the pre-Equestrian era. It had been the property of Celestia’s School for centuries, and was the best surviving artifact portraying the original interpretation of the mythical species.

Looking at it now, Twilight saw just how well the Crying Human had been made. Although its bipedal figure was strangely alien, it was obviously curled into a fetal position. Its face, though carefully carved, was mostly hidden underneath the figure’s arms. Scholars had been debating how ponies were able to carve such intrinsic details as individual hairs such a long time ago.

“Ahem!” said the proctor, upset at having been interrupted. “As I was saying, the final part of your test is projecting your magic into The Crying Human. As you can see, the surface of the Crying Human is currently jet black. However, when enough magic is projected into the statue, it will temporarily change colors. That is your goal. If you succeed, we’ll be glad to accept you into our school.”

Twilight gulped. Magical projection? She’d only read a few books discussing the practice. In theory it was simple enough, but she was not prepared.

Turning to her right, Twilight saw her parents. They did not seem the least bit afraid. In fact, they were both beaming. Had Twilight been a bit older, she might have recognized those grins as being at least partially forced, made to comfort her. However, Twilight was still just young enough so that a smile from a loved one could convince her that she had everything she needed.

For the next two minutes, Twilight circled The Crying Human. She did everything in her power to put some magic into the statue. Her horn flickered on and off as she repeatedly tried to push the magic out.

But it was in vain. The Crying Human showed no reaction to any of her efforts.

From behind her, Twilight Sparkle could hear pens and pencils scratching away at paper.

“Sorry for wasting your time…”

And there was light.

Twilight Sparkle only had a moment’s warning, a flash of rainbow out of the corner of her eye, before her surroundings disappeared. The world around her was covered in fog, except for her and the statue.

I need to put magic in the statue.

Drawing from wells she didn’t know she had, Twilight poured gallons of magic into the statue.

It’s not enough.

The fog around Twilight started to clear a bit, but instead of the room she was in, there were lights. Dull ones scattered about, bright ones shining like the sun, in an array of colors.

But the statue was dull. For all the light shone on it, not a single particle seemed to be reflected off of it. If anything, it seemed more dull and colorless than ever before.

If only I could spread that light to it. Then it will have magic.

And as soon as the thought occurred to her, Twilight Sparkle noticed that small speckles of light in the area, almost timidly, approached the statue.

Yes! C’mon…

Twilight focused again, not just on her own magic, but on the lights around her. Using her own magic as a net, she drew the light towards the statue. As the statue flickered for a moment though, it almost immediately went dull.

No! I need to get more of it…

And so Twilight cast another net with her magic, pulling the light from around her, and pulling it into the statue, magical net and all. And this time, the statue had a hint of color for another moment longer. But was it enough to pass the test?

Another net, and for the first time, Twilight saw that she was starting to overdraw from the light around her. Some previously sparkling spots were bare, and the shining pillars here and there were far less radiant than only a few moments ago.

The little filly suddenly felt a wave of exhaustion. Her legs threatened to collapse beneath her. Looking down for the first time, Twilight saw that she too was a source of light, at least as bright as any of the others in sight.

Maybe if she pushed a bit more of her own light into the statue?

Twilight created a final net, one that not only covered the surrounding area but also herself. With it, she slowly dragged the net, leaving as little behind as possible. Entire swathes of space were left dull, their shimmering sparkles caught by the net. Something trickled down her neck, but now was not the time to look down to see what it was. The net slowly surrounded the Crying Human statue, until it was only a foot away... six inches away… barely apart…

And then the statue finally, slowly, began to shine. Not brilliantly, especially compared to Twilight herself, but as the moments went by, it continued to gain strength and glow.

But before Twilight could see the final result, all went dark.

Author's Notes:

So yeah, I'm writing fanfiction again. This time it's a HiE, but I plan on adding a few twists.

Feel free to point out anything that bothers you. Other than that, I hope you have as much fun reading this as I am having writing it.

A Birth of Sorts

As she looked out the window of the Canterlot suburban house she was in, Vinyl Scratch reflected that she had a very interesting relationship with her tutor.

On one hoof, she and her tutor had a relationship going back a couple of years now. Since they had met back then, the two had become rather close, and were almost like family. Despite the tutor’s formal background, Vinyl had a gregarious, occasionally casual relationship with her. On the other hoof, her tutor’s background sometimes came into play, making their relationship more complicated.

But what else would you expect when your tutor was Princess Celestia?

“Now Vinyl, take a look at this gem.”

Vinyl turned away from the window, looking back at the room she was in. Like many of the Royalty’s other parlor rooms in other buildings across Equestria, it was a well furnished space. In this situation, the theme of the room was definitely the color red, as shown in the rose-covered wallpaper and ottoman furniture on the wooden floor.

Celestia herself was resting on her belly on the room’s largest ottoman, sharing the space with a tiny purple dragon. Said dragon, still only a fraction of the size of even the filly Vinyl, was clasping onto a light blue diamond. The diamond, though apparently shined and polished at one point, now sported a number of tooth marks.

“The diamond’s cool,” Vinyl said, “but why am I looking at Spike’s lunch?”

Princess Celestia smiled. For some reason, she often did that when Vinyl acted regularly around her.

“This is not an ordinary diamond. Most of them are mined from deep under the Earth, be it by Diamond Dogs or other species, including some ponies. However, this diamond was not found, but made.”

Vinyl looked up from the diamond and into Celestia’s eyes with a puzzled look on her face. Diamonds could be made now?

“Your next question for today,” the Princess continued, “is to figure out how a pony could do that.”

The filly snorted. Celly was a great tutor, not to mention a totally awesome sun goddess, but she liked to do this sort of thing. She’d give a piece of information, turn it into a question, and let Vinyl figure out. As often as not, Vinyl wouldn’t be able to figure out the question. When that happened, sometimes she wouldn’t even share the answer, instead asking the same question again a few weeks later. There was this one riddle involving toast that had been a recurring nemesis for months now.

That said, Vinyl felt a bit more confident about this one.

“Well… a while back, you talked about how diamonds are made of the same sort of stuff as coal and whatnot. Except it’s been exposed to a lot of heat and pressure and stuff. So if a pony did a really good job at getting the right stuff out of, I dunno, a big chunk of coal, and then put it under heat or pressure, would that do it?”

“Very good memory,” Celestia replied. “For bonus points, figure out how a pony could get that much heat and pressure.”

Vinyl was starting to feel stumped. She didn’t know about heat and pressure! What, did some earth pony light the coal on fire and then stomp on it?

“Well… I guess if you used a forge… or maybe a volcano’s magma… but how would you crush it?”

“Don’t worry about it,” said the princess. “It was sort of a trick question. Yes, a pony made this diamond, but that pony was me. And it wasn’t easy. I left that piece of coal tucked beneath the sun’s surface for a couple of centuries.”

“…why the buck would you carry a lump of coal to the sun?” Vinyl exclaimed.

The alicorn looked sternly at her pupil, who looked down embarrassed. Celly was very cool, but like most adults in positions of authority, she didn’t react well to fillies cursing in front of her.

Relaxing a bit, Celestia began to explain. “I spent a lot of time traveling back and forth from the sun in my early days as a ruler. It became a place to escape to when I was feeling overwhelmed. I planted a lot of coal as sorts of time capsules, something I could look forward to finding again. Naturally, by the time I was able to collect any diamonds, I barely looked forward to them anymore. Hence, why I have no problem with sharing one with Spike here.”

Princess Celestia nodded toward the little dragon sitting beside her, who had begun sucking on the edge of the diamond again. He was still only a couple of years old, meaning that his teeth couldn’t crush diamonds quite yet, but his saliva did a good job providing him with valuable carbon.

Looking up from his treat for a moment, Spike asked Celestia “Wanna piece?”

The ruler smiled at the tiny dragon.

“No thank you. We will have lunch in a little while.”

“Lunch is good,” Spike solemnly confirmed.

Vinyl walked over to the pair, putting her head next to Spike’s.

“You know Spiky bro, you already have this diamond,” Vinyl whispered. “You sure you’ll need lunch?”

Spike jumped back from Vinyl, shocked by her suggestion. Before he could protest though, Vinyl began laughing. And before long, Spike and Celestia joined in.

Just as the laughter was winding down, two guards, seemingly identical white unicorns in golden armor, burst through the doorway into the room.

“Your highness!” they declared in union, an urgent tone in their voices.

Celestia’s laughter disappeared, and the ruler of Equestria quickly stood up.

“What’s the problem?” she asked.

“Some sort of giant rainbow appeared to the east of here, seemingly around Cloudsdale,” the guard on the left replied. “There may have been a major accident at the rainbow factories, or there-”

The guards, Vinyl, and Spike were astonished to see Celestia, in a fraction of a second, go from an alert yet regal pose to a combat-ready one. As she crouched while flaring her wings, her horn began to glow. A golden bubble popped out of her horn, rapidly expanding to engulf the group.

“What’s going on?” Vinyl shouted.

“Gentlecolts,” Celestia began, her tone graver than Vinyl had ever heard it. “Watch my student and her companion. Tell your comrades to retreat to this room if they feel weaker than usual or otherwise strange. I’ll be back as soon as whatever the situation is has been contained.”

And with barely even a flash from her horn, Princess Celestia had disappeared.

“Vinyl, I’m scared,” said Spike, toddling over to her forelegs.

Looking at the guards, whose confusion and alarm was apparent despite their years of training, Vinyl had to agree.
------

Princess Celestia’s first action was to teleport a few miles into the air. There was no notable weather formations scheduled for the area today, meaning that she could see around for miles. Just as importantly, this was well above where most pegasi would usually fly, giving her the space to perform some of her more dramatic spells if necessary.

Closing her eyes, Celestia focused on what she had felt on the ground. There was something, not too far away, that was draining magic in the area. Objects that did this were far from unheard of, but such items were uncommon outside of law enforcement, itself a fairly limited field, and had limited range. Whatever this was had an incredible range, suggesting some kind of very powerful creature.

The princess had a poor history when dealing with very powerful beings. Discord was the most notorious, but there was also Keshi, Sombra, Ixion, Tirek, Nightma- she was not going to think about that last one. In any case, it was likely that whatever this threat was, she would have to fight it, possibly by herself.

Allowing a modicum of magic to leave her body, Princess Celestia opened her eyes. A hypothetical witness would notice that her eyes were all white, as she focused on the bit of magic. A few moments later, she saw that it was slowly floating in the direction of Canterlot.

The diarch took a moment to sigh. For some reason, the big bad guys tended to target her capitol city. Even though there were plenty of other cities, many of them more populous or strategically valuable, they just had to target the one she was personally attached to.

Celestia teleported a few miles over to Canterlot before gliding the final few thousand feet to her castle. She rushed past a few meandering pegasi, hurrying to one of the castle’s many courtyards.

Descending, she saw that one of the lieutenants was already there, yelling at nearby soldiers to assemble. This was both good and bad. Good because it meant she didn’t have to go hunting down her military command, bad because whatever was going on had been noticed here too, despite her only noticing it a few minutes earlier.

“Your majesty!” the officer called out, as Celestia came to a rather hurried landing next to him.

“What’s the situation?” she asked him.

“Approximately four or five minutes ago, several unicorn members of the guard noticed that there was some sort of disturbance in the air. More and more of them have been reporting sensing abnormalities as well. We assumed that there is something happening with the magical field in this area. We mobilized in case this is a prelude to an attack on the castle”

“It’s worse than that,” Celestia interrupted, slightly relieved that whatever was happening hadn’t escaped her notice for long, but worried that even regular unicorns were feeling the effects when whatever it was remained out of sight. “Some being or object is absorbing magic, and from what I’ve seen so far, its covering much of the Canterlot region. I need any talented spell casters here to make themselves known immediately.”

Several guards stepped forward. Without any explanation, Celestia asked them to spread out throughout the courtyard, telling them only to “try to emulate the spell I’m about to cast.”

Celestia cast a spell similar to the one she had cast earlier. This time, she made note of the unicorns copying her spell to the best of their abilities. They were mostly failing, but by noting the minute differences in the flow of their magic and hers, she would be able to precisely locate where the draining thing was coming from.

There! It was a couple of miles away, at her School for Gifted Unicorns.

Either that, or several thousand miles in the opposite direction.

She decided to check the school first.
------

Professor Penworthy, one of the senior members of the school staff, had started his day with the usual expectations. Get up, have some coffee and croissants, go to teach a bunch of ungrateful youths, so on and so forth.

However, in the middle of his classical Equestrian literature class, he noticed that several of his students were fidgeting. Which was not unusual, except that they usually wouldn’t be this restless until closer to the end of class.

Pausing for a moment to figure out what was distracting them, he noticed that his horn was feeling… unusual. In fact, upon further introspection, it was as if he was casting some sort of spell, even though he wasn’t holding onto any chalk at the moment. Which meant that something was drawing the magic out. Which meant…

“Class, stay seated until I come back. Anypony who I catch out of their seats will risk demerits.”

With those parting words, Penworthy practically fled out of the room.

In the hallway, he heard galloping in the distance. Realizing that whatever was doing this was probably in that direction, he followed the sounds. Soon, he was running alongside two other professors, a mare and a stallion, as well as a female upperclassman.

“Anypony know what’s going on?” the young mare shouted over their galloping.

“No,” replied Penworthy, “but whatever it is will probably be dangerous. If you think there’s any danger of your fellows getting hurt, I’m trusting you to help start an evacuation.”

The student opened her mouth as if to protest being told to run away, then closed it, thinking better of the situation.

Finally, the four ponies reached a hallway where a crowd of teachers, staff, and strangely enough, a couple of fillies, colts, and presumably their parents had gathered. They seemed to be forming a mob around a closed doorway, which Penworthy remember led to one of the older classrooms.

Oh Celestia. This must be where they were holding placement testing today. Which meant that whatever was in that room was probably attacking a foal.

“Alright everypony, listen up!” shouted Penworthy. Some of the others turned to face him. Good enough. “I’m going to blast that door down. Whatever’s in there is absorbing magic, and if it can do so through solid objects, that means it’s probably intense in there. I want everypony to grab something and fire it at whatever is doing this. C’mon, there are some folding chairs over there! Right, on the count of five, I’ll blast the door open. One… Two… Three… Four… Five!”
------

What is the first thought a living thing has when they’re born?

For many baby ponies, it was something along the lines of “wow that’s bright!” Other popular choices included “Suddenly I’m feeling agrophobic,” “Somepony just slapped me!” and a more ambiguous “Bwuh?”

Unlike baby ponies, however, the thing inside the room had no memories of being in a womb to easer them in. It was thrown into life much more abruptly, but not without prior circumstances.

Therefore, the Crying Human’s first thought was “Why am I crying?”

It took a little while to have this thought. Everything was moving at a glacial pace. As things sped up though, the human began to realize that his first thought had a logical answer.

“I’m hurting. Ouch! Celestia damn it this bucking hurts!”

Like many thoughts in the minds of young beings, this one led to yet more questions.

“What is a Celestia?”

“How do I know words?”

“Why am I hurting EVERYWHERE?”

As the world sped up, the pain only got worse. The human wanted to thrash about, but their limbs were being held still by something. As the world got faster and faster though, and the pain got worse and worse, freedom came. The human’s muscles clenched, his arms holding his legs to his chest, as he began whimpering and rocking back and forth.

It didn’t take long for the human to become curious though. Where was he? What exactly was hurting him? He only had to open his eyes…

The human’s eyes opened. For possibly the first thing he ever saw, he was not impressed. There was a little purple unicorn (how did he know what a unicorn was?) floating in front of him, glowing purple. Some distance behind her were two larger unicorns, but something was wrong with them. They were collapsed, with only the white one’s eyes open. The mare (how could he tell the difference?) was staring at the purple filly, her left foreleg stretching out.

That was when things became crazy.

The door in the background, which the human barely even noticed earlier, flew in his direction. Fortunately for him, the purple filly was in the way, taking the blow from a large, hard piece of wood. She was knocked down to the ground, the glowing starting to fade.

Before the human could consider what this meant, he saw a multitude of things coming out of the doorway. Desks, chairs, potted plants, bundles of papers; all were covered in some shining color or another, all seemed to be moving independently. But with a single purpose.

To head in his general direction at as high a speed as possible.

The human had never stopped feeling the pain, but as the first chair slammed into him, knocking his limbs aside, he knew that his knowledge of pain would only expand from here on out.

The Diarch's Puzzle

“Alright,” Princess Celestia said, “is there anypony else that should be included here?”

Celestia was currently standing at the end of a table in a small conference room in her School for Gifted Unicorns. A dozen other ponies, including the four test proctors and Professor Penworthy, sat around the table.

Other than the princess, they were not the most impressive looking group. The proctors in particular looked like they’d just run a race after not sleeping for a day or two. They’d already had first aid, and were currently sipping on potions to regain their magical strength, but the doctors nevertheless protested their being out of bed.

Princess Celestia would normally abide by the wishes of doctors and medical professionals; despite her literal ages of knowledge and learning, she was admittedly not as skilled as even the typical healer in many respects. However, after arriving, learning that the crisis was past, and sending a messenger back to Vinyl and Spike to tell them all was well, she felt that it was better to get a complete picture of what had happened as soon as possible.

As nopony spoke up to request anyone else be included in the meeting, Celestia nodded.

“I’ve already heard Professor Penworthy’s account of what happened,” she said. Nodding at the test proctors, whose names she could not for the life of her remember, she asked “Would any of you like to explain what happened, from your point of view?”

Celestia listened to a scattered report from the for proctors. Apparently, today was the weekly merit-based admittance test. During one filly’s test, a rainbow had appeared in the distance, after which the test-taker began levitating and pushing huge quantities of magic into the statue of the Crying Human.

“We tested foals in that room because it was originally its own building,” said one of the mares. “It was originally a laboratory for alchemy, meaning that the walls were designed to repel magic, preventing an explosion. I guess in this case, that actually made things worse, since it prevented ambient magic from replenishing us and the filly’s parents.”

“Speaking of the filly and her parents,” interrupted the princess, “where are they now?”

A yellow coated stallion, who up until now had remained silent, spoke up.

“We brought them to the medical wing. You know, where we teach medical fields to older students. It’s not too far from here, has all the up to date equipment, and a well-trained and experienced staff.”

“How are their conditions?”

“The parents were unconscious, last time I checked, but other than magic withdrawal, they’re fine. We’ll have them drinking ethers for a week and tell them not to run around. As for the filly… getting hit by a flying door wasn’t exactly god for her. That said, her body took most of the impact, rather than her head, so she shouldn’t suffer any brain damage.”

“Incidentally princess,” the yellow-coated stallion interjected, “I think we’re all curious about why you were nearby. It only took you a few minutes to get here. Where were you that you heard the news so quickly?”

The Ruler of Equestria softly sighed. The part of her which harbored secrets had considered hiding the filly’s power, but too many ponies had seen her flying around to keep this a secret.

“I noticed the magic in the air starting to flow towards the university while I was tutoring my student.”

This seemed to satisfy most of the princess’s companions. However, Penworthy’s ears perked at this news. Oh dear. He knew where Celestia typically taught her students.

“You mean that this filly was affecting the magical field five miles away from here?!?!?”

Mentally, Celestia facehoofed. She had been hoping to keep the magnitude of the foal’s powers a bit more under wraps.

Now the room was silent. One of the ponies muttered “that’s about eighty square miles of territory at least.”

The princess sighed.

“What in Tatarus do we do with a filly that can do that? And that’s not even taking what she did to the statue into count…”

“What about a statue?” Celestia snapped.

The four proctors, despite their weakness, shifted in their seats. This was not going to be fun.

“Well, your majesty,” started one of the mares, “remember how up until a few years ago, the practical magical prowess test was to hatch a dragon egg?”

“Of course. My student Vinyl was able to hatch the egg, and she’s been learning from me ever since.”

“Well… we didn’t exactly have any more dragon eggs lying around. So we decided to use the statue of the Crying Human as a substitute.”

Now Princess Celestia was confused. “That statue is a part of pre-Equestrian pony history! And transfiguration can be done by even some amateurs. What possessed you to use the Crying Human?”

“Princess, have you ever touched the statue?”

The princess paused. She had known about the statue for years, but had always viewed it from behind a glass case or something of that sort.

“You see, there was a reason we always kept the statue behind a case, out of most ponies’ reach. The Crying Human… was made of Slenderstone.”
------

Through her closed eyes, Twilight Sparkle could make out that there was light coming from somewhere. What puzzled her was why her eyes were closed. The last thing she remembered, she was taking the test for magically gifted students. But not doing very well at it. Then there was a light, and now she was here. Wherever she was. Maybe she had fainted from the pressure? Oh no! What if she fainted and embarrassed her parents and now she had failed the test and embarrassed them and it was all her fault?

With great effort, Twilight opened her eyes, to be greeted with the sight of a white ceiling. Odd. She thought the testing room’s ceiling was more of a pinkish-tan. Honestly, she hadn’t given that ceiling more than a quick look though, so maybe she was still there?

No, she realized. She was lying in a bed. A bigger bed than she was used to at that.

“Sweetie?” a familiar voice quietly called out.

Twilight saw her mother leaning up in another bed a few yards away, seemingly exhausted.

“Mom!” she cried, leaping out of her bed and scrambling over to her mother. She leaned onto the bed and the two ponies embraced.

“Told you we wouldn’t need to worry,” came her father’s voice from the other side of the walkway. He had been hidden from her sight by a curtain, but was readily visible from her mother’s bed. He also looked exhausted, but otherwise fine.

Wait a minute…

“What happened? Why are we in a hospital?” Twilight asked.

She noticed her two parents sharing a look before her mother answered.

“Something strange happened during the test. We think a pony had a magical accident and we were all caught up in it. Fortunately, none of us were hurt. And before you ask,” she continued, interrupting what Twilight was about to say “yes, we sent somepony to get Shining so he knows what happened and can come to visit.”

“Did I pass the test?”

“I don’t know dear. Everypony is still trying to figure out what is going on.”

“Excuse me!” said somepony behind Twilight.

She looked around to see a blue unicorn stallion with a syringe for a cutie mark, looking at her with... was that worry?

“You were hit by a piece of furniture during the incident, and it would be best if you lied down for now. We wouldn’t want you to over-exert yourself and risk a serious injury.”

Twilight pouted for a moment, but caught her parents giving her certain looks. She knew these looks. They didn’t mean trouble for her, but they suggested that the best way to avoid trouble was continued obedience. She decided to comply.

As she walked back into her bed, the little filly realized something.

“Where are all the other doctors?” she asked.

“Whatever do you mean?” asked the sole medical professional present.

“Well, there are three of us in here, and I was out, so why wasn’t there a doctor around to make sure everything was okay?”

As if in response, a piercing scream came from outside the room.
------

Slenderstone. Whereas the rest of the room had been shocked by the range of the filly’s magical grasp, Celestia was shocked by the knowledge that the Crying Human was composed of Slenderstone.

Princess Celestia knew all about Slenderstone. She had known about it for centuries. Slenderstone, also known Everfree Shards and lock-rocks, was a very valuable substance. Although it was brittle and hard to build things with, even substances with a small amount of this black material were resistant to magic. Entire areas, like the nearby Everfree Forest, from which the material got one of its names, largely rejected lawful magic because of widespread trace amounts of the stuff.

As for the name “lock-rock,” it came from the old days of unicorn nobility. Locks were always an artform in societies with unicorns, as even a fairly weak unicorn could manipulate a poorly made lock with ease. “Lock-rocks,” though brittle, could be incorporated into larger mechanisms to make them impossible to open through magic alone.

The problem with lock-rocks was that they were expensive, on account of the fact that the rocks themselves were rare. Slenderstone was a bit of a misnomer, as no individual piece of the material had ever been found that was larger than a pebble.

Or so Celestia had thought.

“Are you sure that the Crying Human wasn’t just unusually rich in the substance?”

The unfortunate mare that the princess was now focusing on sighed.

“Yes your majesty. In the centuries since it was discovered, we’ve occasionally tested for other substances and could find none. In theory, there could be a core of some other material, but even then, well over half of the statue would have to be pure slenderstone.”

Celestia was silent for a moment. She was a very hooves-on ruler, and was barely covering her shock at discovering a long-held secret at her own school.

“I suppose that this must have quite an impact on our knowledge of the world’s composition,” she calmly remarked.

“Well, yes,” said Professor Penworthy. “The discovery of the Crying Human’s composition meant that we had to rethink what was chemically possible. We estimate that about 20% of the world’s supply of lock-rock is found in the Crying Human. Or at least, was found in it.”

“Was?”

For the umpteenth time today, Celestia noted that several of the ponies, including the four test proctors in particular, looked particularly anxious.

“Well, remember how the filly transfigured the Crying Human into an actual human?”

“Ah yes. I heard that was what she used the magic for. How long did it take for it to revert anyway?”

“Well… you see…”
------

He didn’t know that much about what was going on. First he noticed that he was in pain all over, then the pain subsided somewhat, then a whole bunch of stuff flew at him. He felt like all four of his legs were broken, except that the ones closer to his head didn’t quite meet the definition of legs. And come to think of it, he didn’t seem to have hooves like a regular pony. Odd. Maybe he was actually a griffon?

At first, he had wanted to get somepony to make whatever was creating that racket to be quiet. As he felt himself being physically hoisted up into a stretcher and carried through a hallway though, he realized that he was the one making the noise. Apparently, he’d been screaming nonstop for a while now.

And now he was on a table, limbs held down with clamps. For some reason, a lot of the unicorns were having trouble using their magic. He wondered why.

He tried to stop thrashing about, slowly realizing that it would only serve to aggravate his damaged limbs. But as hard as he tried, he could not get control over his own body. He wondered what being able to control one’s own body was like.

Perhaps he was an amnesiac? He sort of remembered some things. Like the language that all the ponies were frantically yelling at each other in. He seemed unable to form his own words though. Was there something wrong with him? Was he a mute? No, wait. He just couldn’t control his mouth for long enough to stop screaming.

He barely felt needles being jabbed into his veins, barely felt being held down by a team of ponies who had seemingly given up on magic and the restraints to do the job adequately. Ah, of course. The restraints were made for ponies, and he was most likely a griffon. No wonder the restraints were the wrong size and shape for keeping him still.

It occurred to him that he shouldn’t be thinking this clearly. Ponies in pain weren’t the most coherent thinkers. At least, to his knowledge that he got from somewhere. Perhaps griffons were better at being rational? How would he know? He wasn’t even entirely sure what he was.

It sounded like the yelling was starting to dim. That was odd, since his limbs still felt broken. No, wait. He was yelling again. He wished he could tell the ponies around him how sorry he was for being such a nuisance. Hearing him yell this much must not be very good for their nerves.
------

Princess Celestia briskly walked down the hallway to the room where the filly and her parents were. She had to make sure of several things by the end of the day, but the top priority at the moment was the filly.

Twilight Sparkle. A seemingly innocuous name for a little filly. Except for the fact that the Twilight matriarchy was centuries old, and Celestia was pretty sure that this filly in particular had been foalsat by her niece. And now she boasted extraordinary magical prowess.

Sometimes, Celestia hated her duties as princess. They would not allow her to view the situation from the kind, optimistic point of view that came naturally to her. No, she was forced to wonder what the implications of a new power in Canterlot would be.

Clearly the filly could not be left unattended. Best-case scenario, she used her talent to become an outstanding citizen. Worst-case scenario, she used her immense power and reportedly great intelligence to gradually build an arsenal of spells capable of bringing down cities and nations.

The typical pony, were they privy to her thoughts at the time, would have asked Celestia whether a single unicorn could do all of that. Celestia, however, had more than just wild speculation on her side. King Sombra was proof that even a regular unicorn, and one not even as powerful as this filly seemed to potentially be, could ruin countless lives.

Thus, the next few minutes would be critical. Princess Celestia would meet Twilight Sparkle for the first time today. Depending on her analysis of the filly, the shape of not only her life but that of countless others could be changed, for the better or for the worse.

These were the Solar Diarch’s thoughts as she entered a room where three unicorns were lying in hospital beds.

The smallest unicorn, Twilight Sparkle herself, was the first one visible from the doorway. She turned her head away from her parents and towards the princess, eyes widening as she realized who had arrived.

“Princess Celestia!”

Said princess heard gasps from two other ponies, a mare and a stallion, before going further into the room and seeing the filly’s mother and father.

Celestia put on her smile, the one that she was forced to wear when she wanted to avoid causing any alarm.

“At ease, my little ponies. I came to see how you were all doing after today’s events.”

“But what did happen princess?” asked Twilight.

Celestia briefly looked at the filly’s parents before answering, considering their reactions. Apparently, they’d been hiding some information from their daughter. This could be good or bad. Optimistically, this meant that the pair could be responsible parents, not delivering a message to their young daughter that they weren’t certain of. On the other hand, it could be a sign that they were hoarding what they did know, and were planning on using their daughter as a tool for possible gains.

As much as Celestia knew that hearing the full story from her parents would be the optimal solution, she needed information about this filly fast. Telling her more than she already knew could provoke a telling reaction.

“During your test,” the princess began “there was an unknown magical incident in the Cloudsdale area. I’ve assigned my best ponies on finding out exactly what it was and how it happened. Regardless, said event seems to have made you lose control when you were trying to put magic into the statue of the Crying Human. You began to draw magic from the area around you, including from your parents and the teachers. It took a team of university staff and students to get you to stop.”

There. Now to gauge her reactions.

Twilight Sparkle’s eyes, already wide from meeting the princess, had only grown wider as she explained what had happened.

“I hurt my parents?” she whimpered.

Good, her first reaction seemed to be remorse.

Celestia nodded somberly as the little filly leapt out of bed and ran over to her father’s bed, tears forming in her eyes. The reaction seemed genuine enough, and the fact that she ran to her father first, rather than to her mother who would presumably have more family ties, was a nice bonus for reassuring her.

Twilight, after a few moments in her father’s forelegs, muttered something.

“I’m sorry? What was that?”

The filly looked up towards the princess, tears in her eyes.

“Did I hurt anypony else?”

Celestia could have spent a moment analyzing the question, but she felt confident enough to skip to the facts.

“Your test-givers were the only other ponies directly affected, and they are perfectly fine. They’re just tired.”

Twilight didn’t respond verbally, but seemed content with the answer.

For the first time, Celestia noticed that Twilight still lacked a cutie mark. Technically, she had noticed nothing before, but only now did it truly register in her mind. Usually an event of this magnitude would be an obvious candidate for the mark’s appearance. However, despite an extraordinary feat of magic, Twilight Sparkle was still bare.

This, as much as anything else, relieved the princess. Cutie Marks were notoriously hard to interpret and understand, but if a filly didn’t get a mark for something like an extraordinary surge of power like that, it meant that they had another future to choose from. That, to Celestia, was encouraging.

After a couple more minutes, just as the Princess was considering leaving for her next important stop, Twilight asked a question carefully avoided until now.

“Did… did I make the statue glow? Did I pass the test?”

Author's Notes:

Originally chapter 4, which will go over truly meeting the human for the first time, was going to be included in this chapter, but I felt that it would stand better as its own thing. So have another "Switching Points of View" chapter.

I'm not going to make any promises about this story's update schedule. I'd say I'm aiming for weekly updates, but that's already doomed, so let's just settle for "as frequent as possible."

Please comment. Even if it's something simple like a reaction or a question, it helps me figure out how to write better.

I hope you're enjoying the story so far. The best, including meatier chapters, is yet to come!