Title: The Seventh Element
Rating: T
Chapter: Chapter 2 The Palace
AN: BANANA MUFFINS!!!!! I’m on a roll writing this fic! Anyway, wanted to tell you guys, yeah, I’m okay with gay and lez pairings, but this fandom has waaaaaaaaaaaaaay too much of it. There seriously needs to be more straight couples. XD Anyway, now, onto the second chapter! WOO! DERP! FINISH YOUR OTHER STORIES! NUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUU!!!!! *ninja smoke bomb*
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Twilight gripped the edges of the letter in her hands. The princess was suffering the same fate they were. “Apparently, this is happening everywhere, all over Equestria. Maybe even farther than Equestria. But it’s safe to say that this is a huge deal.”

Pinkie Pie waved an arm, “Pffft! Of course silly! Of course this is a huuuuuge deal! I mean DUH, we all DID just turn into these weird things and ohmigosh! When I woke up, Gummy was all like me too, but I guess you could guess that! HAHAHA! ANYway, when I woke up, Mr. Rock was talking to me again and-”

At this point, no one cared to listen to Pinkie Pie ramble anymore.

“Anyway, we need to get to the castle as soon as possible.” Twilight then turned towards the door, and was about to start the journey when Big Mac stopped her

“Miss Twilight, I don’t think yall should make that kind of walk without shoes. It mighty hurts your feet to walk on those roads. Me n Apple Jack would know.” Big Mac lifted a leg to show the others his point.

“I see… But we never had to wear shoes; it was mostly just a thing we didn’t care about. Like the whole clothes deal.” Twilight turned to Rarity, “Rarity, surely you still have some shoes we all can use?”

Rarity looked to the floor.

Twilight was concerned as she placed a hand on Rarity’s shoulder, “Rarity? You okay?” She became worried when Rarity sniffed.

Rarity sobbed, “But it won’t MATCH!"

Apple Jack sighed and covered her face with her hands, “Dear Celestia… Ah’m gonna kill that girl…” She scowled, “Listen here Sugar cube, we all need shoes! I don care what y'all gonna say about it, just give us the damn shoes!”

Rarity was about to protest, but she bit it back. She turned and went to the back room of her shop, and soon, she was coming back with shoes of all shapes and sizes. “Apple Jack, Big Mac, Apple bloom, take these boots. They’re the only ones close to your sizes. Well, at first glance.” They took the cowboy boots from Rarity.

“Hey, these look a lot like them shoes y'all made me wear for the Grand Galloping Gala…” Apple Jack said as she slipped them on.

“That’s because they are, Apple Jack. They are. And don’t you dare say anything about the size. They’re meant for the feet of ponies, not… Whatever we are now.” Rarity went over to Twilight, “Twilight, take these sneakers. They were for the fillies, so they should be small enough.”

Twilight took them gratefully and gave the second pair to Spike, who was mesmerized by Rarity to actually care about Twilight shoving shoes in his hands.

“Pinkie Pie, these shoes are close to the type of shoes I gave you for the Gala. I tried to shrink them as best as I could.” She gave them to Pinkie Pie, who in turn bounced happily. “Gummy, sneakers.” Gummy took the sneakers without a word.

“Rainbow Dash, these shoes were changed a bit. They’re like Twilight's, except they’re a bit sturdier. Make sure to tighten them.” Rainbow Dash cheered and quickly went to work on tightening them.

“Flutters-”

“Butter scotch.”

Rarity took a double take, “…what?”

He smiled shyly, “I want my name to be Butter scotch. I mean…” he looked downwards and retreated a bit, “…if that’s alright…”

Rarity, shrugged, “well, it’s okay by me. Anyway, here-”

Butter scotch waved his hands, “oh no, Rarity. I don’t need shoes. I’m perfectly fine just using my wings to get around.” Rarity tried to persuade him, but he just politely refused.

“Well then, I guess I’ll just put them back then. Sweetie Belle, Scootaloo, these shall suffice for the time.” She handed them a pair of flip flops. “I’m sorry, but these are the only ones left that are small enough for you two.”

Scootaloo frowned, “but… these aren’t cool enough. Everyone else has cool shoes and I got the same as Sweetie belle!”

Rarity frowned, “well, as you can see, everyone else has the same kind of shoes as someone else, except Rainbow Dash since I know she would throw a fit like you are now.” Scootaloo pouted, “But if you don’t like them, you can give them back and ride on Rainbow dash’s back the whole trip.”

Rainbow Dash groaned, “Scoot, just put them on. I don’t want to carry you all the way there.”

Apple Jack then stepped in, “Woah, woah, woah there sugar cube.” She placed her hands on her hips, “are y'all telling me that we’re bringing them with us?”

Twilight sighed, “we don’t have a choice Apple Jack, we can’t leave the girls here unattended, and besides, none of us can stay behind, the princess wants all of us to go to the Celestial Palace.”

Apple Jack threw her arms in the air, “then why can’t we just leave em with Big Macintosh like always!?”

Big Mac glared at Apple Jack, “AJ, y'all better watch your mouth.”

Apple Jack rolled her eyes, “Big Macintosh, just leave all this tah me an the rest of the Elements.”

Big Mac cleared his throat, “now lissen here little sis. You think I want to stay home while yall go and do your whole save the world thing while ah stay behind and look after the farm? As y'all can see, ah’m as big of a victim as y'all are. We’re all on the same boat, and I’ll be damned if y'all leave me behind again.”

He crossed his arms and stared down at Apple Jack who had her mouth hung open.

“Y'all think y'all can just tell me what ah can and can’t do? Y'all might have them el-o-ments of har-mon-y, but ah’m your big brother. And if ah say ah want to go with you, then by Celestia, ah will! And that’s final!”

Apple Jack stared at Big Mac. He has never raised his voice or questioned much in his life, but now… wow. “a… alrighty then.” Apple Jack answered quietly. “B-but y'all are gon’ have to watch them girls, you get me?”

Big Mac smiled, “Eeyup.”

Many hours later…

The group had finally arrived to the Celestial Palace’s gates, but they were all out of breath.

Rainbow Dash wheezed, “jeez… was the trip to the Celestial Palace really that long?”

Twilight was leaning on Spike, who had rode on her back the whole trip and was now on the ground. “I know… It was much easier and faster when we were in our old forms…” She was drenched in sweat and breathing heavily.

Everyone else was in the same state except the young ones and Pinkie Pie. “C'mon guys! That was a good work out!” Pinkie Pie continued to bounce in place as the others looked at her like she grew another head.

This wouldn’t have surprised them much.

The Palace gates were opened, and from inside, many burly males in huge thick gold armor stood on each side in rows on the pathway to the Palace inside.

One of the males stepped forward and brought a trumpet to his mouth. He played the royal melody and another soldier stepped forward, “Princess Celestia is currently awaiting your presence in the main throne room. Make haste, for the subject matter is of heavy importance.” He stepped back in line, back to attention and to the task of guarding the castle from further harm.

“Wow. This place looks more uptight then I remember.” Rainbow Dash commented dryly. She hates rules, and this place just reeks of it.

A mousey male dressed in courtly robes was briskly walking towards them, with many stacks of papers in his arms, each stack securely tied with string. “Busy, busy, busy! I’m so busy!” He stopped in front of them, and he took a deep breath, “forgive me, let me catch my breath…” He panted heavily, his glasses were falling down his nose.

He was considerably shorter than the other men, standing almost a head and a half shorter than Big Macintosh, and had fair skin, as if he had never been outside in more than twenty years, with combed straight brown hair and chocolate eyes. He wore heavy brown and tan robes with soft velvet brown shoes and large coke bottle glasses.

Twilight nodded, “it’s okay Clockwork. Take your time.”

Rainbow piped up, “Clockwork?”

Twilight smacked herself in the head, “oh! Of course! I never had a chance to introduce him to everyone. Everyone, this is Clockwork. He is in charge of the Clock tower that is in the middle of the Celestial Palace. He’s been here at the palace for as long as I can remember, heck I don’t think he has ever been outside of the palace.” Clockwork smiled then went back for gasping for air. “As you can see, we’re not the only ones that have figured out the whole limitation on our bodies now.”

“Exactly. Instead of arriving in exactly 3 minutes, 45.678 seconds to the gates from the main throne room, it took 6 minutes, 56.9834 seconds with breaks and-”

Rainbow Dash screamed, “AAAGH! Stop it! The numbers are hurting me!” When Clockwork ceased his rambling, she asked, “and what kind of business has to do with time exactly?”

Twilight rolled her eyes and smiled, “Glad you asked that Rainbow Dash. You see, Clockwork is in charge of calculating the exact time that everything should be done. He has to come up with schedules for pretty much everything, including the weather. Why do you think you have to do certain weather conditions at certain times?”

Rainbow Dash shrugged, “I dunno, I thought we did it when everything felt right.”

“Yes and no.” Clockwork placed the papers in Twilight’s hands, “I have to measure how long each activity would last, and how it would react at different times, therefore, carefully placing the times that said activities must take place for the absolute best results regarding important events, weather, and such.” He grabbed his glasses and wiped them on his brown and tan robes. “This kind of responsibility is high maintenance and I can’t afford to be distracted for too long, which is why I am forced to live a hermit-like lifestyle. This is actually one of my very looked forward to holidays where I can leave the tower.” He chuckled, “Sometimes cleaning and keeping everything spic and spam gets boring. I even taught Twilight here all of her organizing skills when she was just a little filly- I mean… Well, certainly we can’t keep calling you girls that.”

He gasped, remembering the reason he came out for them, “I’m sorry, I digress.” He grabbed the papers from Twilight’s hands, “I may be the one deciding the times, and such, but I easily forget it when I start talking.” He chuckled.

He looked them over, “though, there are a lot more of you then we expected. We shall have to make plans for the rest of you as such.” He beckoned them to follow as he huffed and began to lead them back to the throne room.

“Please do pace yourselves, the trip is quite tedious.”

The Main Throne Room…

When the group arrived to the Main Throne Room’s doors, they all stopped and caught their breath. Clockwork was not joking when he said the trip would become tedious.

When everyone was ready, Twilight and Spike, who was riding on her shoulders, nodded to the two Pegasus Guards that were in charge of opening and closing the colossal 60 foot doors. The doors creaked open, letting light from the Main Throne Room come gushing out.

Down the long hall, on a red carpet trimmed with solid gold, was Princess Celestia on her solid gold and platinum throne.

Before the whole change, the Princess looked amazing, but now, she was absolutely breathtaking. Her skin was the same color of the purest snow, her eyes were of the lightest shade of pink, her hair was long and eternally flowing in the wind, shimmering into the three colors it is composed of, pink, periwinkle, and lime. Her body looked as if sculpted by the most adept sculptor of all time, not a single flaw on her, with long legs, arms, and a lean yet soft torso with a generous bosom.

Her clothes looked as if they were made by Jacques Doucet himself in the art center of heaven. The fabric shimmered, just like her hair, except the colors were white, sky blue, and sea foam green, with solid gold pins, decorated to look like pegasi, holding the fabric together like a Sari, and her shoes were like roman style flats with a gold ribbon wrapped around her shins and tying at the knee. Her Tiara was perched upon her head, right in front of her long unicorn horn, which was adorned with diamonds, topaz, rubies and sapphires. Even her white Pegasus wings changed dramatically. Unlike the small ones on Rainbow Dash and Butterscotch’s backs, hers were long and thick and were as long as her entire body, and covered with pure white feathers. And finally, her sun cutie mark was visible over her dress.

Twilight and the others approached her and bowed deeply at her, “Princess Celestia, we have arrived like you have requested.”

Celestia nodded, “thank you Twilight.” She nodded to everyone else, “as you know, a great disaster has happened. Overnight, we have become these forms you see now.” She sighed, “And I’m sorry to say, we have no idea what we are or why we are suddenly like this.”

Twilight straightened and stepped forward, “Princess! Surely there is some information in the library about what is going on?”

The princess nodded, “I have no doubt about that my faithful student. But the whole collection in just the northern Library is over 5 thousand books in total. All on different subjects. And that is not including the much larger South, West and East libraries.”

Twilight’s mouth hung open in shock. The amount of books has increased since the last time she was there. “there’s… that much?”

Celestia nodded glumly, “yes. In all my years on this world, the only thing I have to give me a clue of what’s happening is an old nursery rhyme I was told when my father was still alive.” She cleared her throat.

Another day, another night

Lost shall be your own fright

Close ones eyes, and stretch ones legs

And shall only be woken by the ten pegs

Fly high, and fly low

But stay away from the crow

Dream of your exciting world

Before all is cold

She finished and looked to Twilight, “Princess… that song is so… weird…”

Celestia nodded, “exactly, which is why I suspected it.” She pursed her lips in thought, “I want you to try and find out what you can about this phenomenon Twilight.” Twilight was about to object, but Princess Celestia raised a hand, “but you will have help. I have appointed Prince Lunar to aid you in your studies.”

“Prince… Lunar?” Twilight breathed out softly, unbelieving.

“Yes, Prince Lunar.”

Everyone’s heads whipped to the far door to the left of the throne. In the shadows the door would be hidden, but with the light of a lamp, it was seen easily.

The one holding the lamp was a tall lanky male with thick light blue/purple hair that frames his face, pale almost translucent skin that looks as if sun’s rays have never touched him in his life. He had dark eyes that matched the night sky, dressed in a dark blue brocade tunic, white tights, black leather knee high boots, black fine leather gloves, and black thin crown perched on his head with a long unicorn horn, that was the same color as his hair and wings, each were half the size of his body, that were the color of his hair and shimmered a darker than lighter shade.

He smiled, “though, thou thinketh wouldst remember me as Luna.”

Twilight stared at the man, “you… used to be Princess Luna?”

He nodded, “it is very pleasureable to see thine again Twilight Sparkle.”

Twilight nodded, “He is a victim to the same curse like our friend Fluttershy was?”

Butterscotch spoke, “I want to be called Butterscotch… If that’s okay…”

Celestia nodded, “like your friend Butterscotch, Prince Lunar has suffered the same fate. He has worked tirelessly with Lord Venom Mix to find out what is going on, and also for a solution.”

Twilight groaned, “Lord Venom Mix? Please don’t tell me I have to work with him as well…”

Celestia tutted, “Now Twilight, desperate times, call for desperate measures. I cannot help you figure this out, I have a country to lead and help organize. Fabric has tripled in price and clothing designers are going haywire. I have to rebalance the whole stock market and all of the sales and… so much more…”

Big Macintosh raised a hand, “Yes Big Macintosh? You may speak.”

Big Mac cleared his throat, “now miss Celestia, y'all said y'all needed all of us here. Mighty sounds like y'all only need Twi-light. Can y'all explain why we are needed here as well?”

Celestia nodded and smiled, “I’m glad you asked Big Macintosh. You see, we are short on pony power, due to most soldiers still learning how their bodies work. The reason you are here is a selfish request but…” She leaned forward, “to ask you all to help guard the castle. You have the Elements of Harmony and are some of the most powerful beings in all of Equestria. We need as much pony power here as possible. Neighboring countries might try to attack us while we are like this.”

“May you all stay until this is all sorted out?”
DONE!
WOOOOOOOO that took forever. Anyway, as you all can see, I put a lot of effort into this. Please don’t laugh at Prince Lunar’s clothing. Yes, I know… but it was all I could come up with. Anyway, let me say this:
I have made it my personal mission to pair up the main characters up with as many straight couples as possible. I don’t mind gay and lesbian couples, but I want to try and see how many couples I can make without the use of too many OCs.
Anyway, read, rate, review, and tell your friends! This is GWR, signing off for the night. *smoke bomb!*

EDIT: Alright, I fixed up this chapter a bit. Hopefully I got most of the errors. Also... I like the name Lunar...