Twilight Sparkle awoke to the sounds of ponies running about in the streets of Ponyville. Some were screaming in terror at the top of their lungs, while others were excited and jubilantly jumping about.

“Spike, what is going on?” Twilight inquired as she quickly rolled out of bed and jostled Spike with her hooves.

He awoke in surprise with a wide look in his eyes, completely confused as to what Twilight was trying to talk to him about. He yawned and opened his mouth to respond, but by the time he had, Twilight had already left the room to investigate whatever it was that was occurring outside. Spike shrugged from the comfort of his bed and pulled the blanket back over himself and fell immediately back to sleep.

Outside, everything looked normal to Twilight at first glance, but there was something that she just couldn't put her hoof on, besides the occasional scream from a pony far off in the distance. Before she could spend another moment to try and figure out what was happening, Fluttershy trotted up to Twilight, completely out of breath.

“Twi...Twilight...” Fluttershy panted heavily.

“Fluttershy, what's wrong?” Twilight replied with concern in her voice.

“It's...terrible...I...” Fluttershy took a few more moments to get back her breath.

“Did you run here?” Twilight looked at her, confused. “Why didn't you just use your...” Twilight looked at Fluttershy's sides where her wings should have been, “...wings? Where are your wings?”

“That's...what I'm trying...to tell you...I woke up this morning and they were gone!”

“Gone?”

“Yes,” Fluttershy replied softly, her eyes looking downward. “Also, I have a horn...”

Twilight looked at Fluttershy's forehead. “Holy Celestia, you have a horn!”

“Yes, I do...” Fluttershy replied softly, continuing after several moments, "and you...don't?"

"What?" Twilight replied. "Of course I do, I--"

Twilight crossed her eyes and looked up, and instead of seeing the familiar purple horn in the middle of her vision, all she saw was crisp, blue skies and a couple stray clouds floating above her. "What--What is going on?"

Suddenly, they heard a crash far off in the distance. “CONSARN IT!”

Twilight tilted her head towards the voice. “Applejack?”

“I'm a comin'!” Applejack replied hurriedly. From behind a distant house, Applejack appeared in the air with a pair of vibrant, orange wings at her sides. She tumbled around in the air like a leaf caught in a windstorm until finally making her way over towards Twilight and Fluttershy, landing with a thud into the dirt beside them.

“You too?” Twilight inquired.

“How do y'all use these darn things, they're so flimsy!”

“Well,” said Twilight, “you just have to make sure you use equal force on both wings at the same time to ensure your thrust vector is properly aligned and--”

“That was a rhetorical question,” Applejack replied as she got up from the dirt, not bothering to dust anything off. “Can y'all tell me why I woke up with a pair of wings this mornin'?

“Well,” said Twilight, “Fluttershy woke up without wings and has a horn and--”

A familiar voice echoed from the Carousel Boutique. “OH MY. OF ALL THE THINGS THAT COULD HAPPEN, THIS IS THE. WORST. POSSIBLE. THING!”

Applejack rolled her eyes, and the three ponies hurried off towards Rarity's home. Inside, they saw a mound of clothes piled up in the middle of the room and Sweetie Belle standing awkwardly beside it.

“Sweetie Belle,” said Twilight, “where is Rarity?”

Before she could reply, the mound of clothes began to move as Rarity sobbed underneath them. Sweetie Belle rolled her eyes.

Twilight walked up to the mound. “Rarity? Are you alright?”

“NO,” Rarity replied, followed by several pathetic sniffles.

“Do you want to come out of this mound of clothes so we can figure out what's going on around here?”

A moment of silence followed by a couple more sniffles passed until Rarity replied. “Okay.”

She emerged from the mound of clothes with her face stained with tears and her mane full of knots and tangles, and an obvious vacancy where her horn should have been.

“Isn't it absolutely terrible?” Rarity asked. “I'm nothing without my horn. What am I supposed to do without it? I'll have to quit my job as a dress designer. How will I eat, with my hooves like some sort of savage animal?”

“We earth ponies get by just fine without fancy unicorn horns, thank you very much,” said Applejack. “I'll just pretend I didn't hear that savage animal remark.”

“We need to see if anypony else was effected by whatever this is,” said Twilight.

As if on cue, Rainbow Dash burst through the door. “EVERYPONY, GUESS WHAT?” she said excitedly. They all looked at her, expecting her wings to be gone. Instead, their eyes drifted up towards her forehead, where there was now a rainbow-colored unicorn horn. “I'M AN ALICORN!”

Rainbow Dash flew around the room, practically bouncing off the walls and shooting rainbows from her horn in the process. “Isn't this the coolest thing ever? Just imagine all the awesome tricks I could do now!”

“Rainbow,” Twilight said, trying to calm her down.

Rainbow Dash stopped flying around them and skidded to a halt in front of them. “Yeah, Twilight?”

“We need to figure out what's going on right now,” she said.

“Why? This is amazing!”

Rainbow Dash readied herself to fly up into the air again but Applejack held her down with a wing. “Simmer down, sugarcube. Some ponies drew the short straw for this crazy catastrophe.”

“Whoa, you have wings? That's awesome, you should totally let me teach you how to fly!”

Twilight slapped her forehead with a hoof. “Rainbow...”

“Oh...sorry,” she replied with an embarrassed smile.

“It seems the only pony left is Pinkie Pie,” said Twilight

Twilight opened the door to Sugarcube Corner and it creaked open slowly. Inside, all the lights were turned off. Everything was oddly silent. “...Pinkie Pie? Are you there?”

“...I'm upstairs...” Pinkie Pie replied with such a lack of emotion that they weren't even sure it was her until they opened the door to see her lying down in the middle of the room with her mane wrapped around herself.

“Pinkie Pie, what's wrong?” Twilight asked. She didn't have a horn, and she didn't have any wings, so everything seemed normal.

“Everything...” she replied dejectedly, followed by a long, drawn-out sigh.

“Could you be a bit more specific, darling?” Rarity asked politely.

Pinkie Pie sighed depressingly. “I lost my Pinkie Sense...”

“Nonsense,” said Rarity. “You can't lose that!”

“Oh yeah?” Pinkie Pie replied, “Somepony knock over that vase over there.”

“This one?” Rainbow Dash inquired, pointing a hoof at a vase sitting on the shelf.

“Yes, knock it over.”

“Alright,” she replied, knocking over the vase onto the ground. It shattered and sent a pile of dirt pouring over the floor.

“See?” Pinkie Pie said. “I didn't even sense that coming.”

“But...you told her to knock it over, darling. Surely, you must hav--”

“I DIDN'T SEE IT COMING,” Pinkie Pie replied and began sobbing uncontrollably.

“Oh, my...” said Fluttershy.

“And I thought I was the drama queen...” muttered Rarity. "What in Equestria is the reason for all this?"

Twilight stood and pondered thoughtfully for all but a few moments until she knew immediately what was happening. A certain Draconequus always seemed to be the culprit behind moderately annoying, yet not overly bad antics in and around Ponyville. The others looked at her as she thought until she opened her mouth to speak.

Then, they all spoke at once. "Discord..."

In Canterlot, Twilight and her friends walked into the throne room up to Celestia. If Twilight still had her horn, she could have teleported them all at once. Instead, they had to take the train, since the only other ponies with horns were Rainbow Dash and Fluttershy, neither of which were capable of such advanced magic.

Celestia smiled as she watched the six of them trot towards her. It always brought a smile to her face to see all of them together. But as they drew closer, her smile receded and was replaced by a look of puzzlement. "Hello Twilight and friends," she said awkwardly. "Is there something...different...about all of you? I don't recall Applejack having wings, or Rarity being an earth pony...or...Rainbow Dash...being an Alicorn?" Celestia reared her head backwards.

Rainbow Dash stood majestically with a look of pure pride on her face.

"And where is your horn?" Celestia continued.

"Good question..." Twilight replied with mild annoyance. "My best guess would be that this is Discord's doing. Some kind of harmless prank." She made quote marks with her hooves.

"Well, we mustn't assume--"

"--Somepony rang?" Discord poofed into existence to the right of Celestia, holding a disconnected telephone receiver in a claw against his head.

"Discord," Celestia said, "is this your doing?"

He turned away from Celestia and surveyed the six ponies in front of him, taking his time to observe. "Well, I'm not one to toot my own horn," he replied as he honked a horn two times, "but I am rather proud of this one."

Twilight steamed. "Proud? I thought we've agreed that messing with other ponies' bodies and swapping their horns and wings is a definite no-no!"

"Have we?" Discord replied innocently. "I don't recall that specific example. Really, Twilight, we ought to work on our communication skills."

"Well, let me make it really clear," Twilight replied angrily. She looked like she was about to blow a fuse. "If you ever do something like this again, I'm going to rip--"

A yellow hoof delicately pressed against her mouth from below, causing her to immediately stop her angry outburst. Fluttershy looked up at her meekly.

"Thanks, Fluttershy," said Twilight. Getting angry wasn't going to solve anything.

Celestia broke the short silence. "It seems that something needs to be done, and I don't think a lack of communication is the issue." She glared at Discord. She thought for a moment, and then a smile appeared on her face. "I have an idea," said Celestia. "Discord, since it seems you are incapable of determining what is and what isn't acceptable for pranks, I think it might be a good exercise for you to see the world from a different point of view."

"Oh, 'Tia, I see the world from every point of view. You know, master of chaos, manipulator of the universe, that sort of thing."

Celestia ignored his reply. "Guards, retrieve the Elements of Harmony."

"Elements of Harmony?" Discord said with the faintest hint of fear in his voice. "You're not going to turn me into stone again, are you? What good would that do? We all know that didn't work."

"No, I have something else in mind," she replied as the guards brought in the Elements of Harmony and distributed them to everypony.

"What is that, exactly?" Twilight said as she placed the crown on her head.

Celestia smiled. "Discord is going to learn what it's like to be a pony."

"A what?" He said, this time with definite fear in his voice. "You can't turn me into a pony, I've been a draconequus for thousands of years!"

Celestia continued. "And you will remain a pony until you accomplish this decree: do one hundred good deeds. As soon as you do this, you will be turned into a draconequus again."

Twilight and her friends stood in a circle around Discord, with Celestia filling the only empty spot.

Discord panicked. "Can I at least be a unicorn?"

"No," said Celestia, "you'll be an earth pony. No magic."

"Pegasus?"

"No."

The Mane Six and Celestia powered the Elements of Harmony and magic, shooting seven colored beams of magic into Discord. His body glowed pure white and contorted into several shapes as he rose into the air. Rays of light bounced off in every direction for several seconds until the display of magic waned, leaving a light brown earth pony with a black mane and tail laying on the ground with all four hooves.

Discord stood up and looked at himself. His cutie mark was a dark, swirling vortex of chaos. "Well, at least I still look like a rebel." Next Chapter: Discord's Doubtful First Deed Estimated time remaining: 7 Minutes