Chapter 3: Power

Another morning, another awakening from a restless night of sleep. The first rays of dawn shone through Twilight’s windows. The little filly tried to kill some time by reading books. So she sat on some comfy cushions in her own little library and thought about what book to choose from her sheer infinite fountain of knowledge. Her tower in Canterlot Castle had not much to offer though. On the first floor, she had a bed, a counter with some chairs and her wardrobe. All of the little fillies more important possessions were stored on the second floor. For example, her technical equipment, like telescopes or a small seismograph. However, her most important belongings were most definitely her books. They were stored in 6 bookshelves of the same height, alphabetically ordered and meticulously cleaned every day. Oh yes, her precious books. How many hours had she spent inside reading and studying? How many days had she spent reorganizing them? What would she do without them?

In the last few days everytime she wanted to read a book or study something her mind wandered over to the lessons with Morning Blaze. Why was Twilight left in the dark about all of this for so long?

“This can’t be right…”

No it was official, Twilight went insane. Two days with Morning Blaze and she lost her mind, at least that was what she thought had happened. It started after Morning Blaze saved her from the explosion. A voice started talking inside her head and it was most definitely not hers. First she couldn’t understand the whispering but with her exhaustion from the lack of sleep, it was getting louder. That thing was really getting on the little fillies nerves.

The purple unicorn hadn’t noticed until now that she was pacing around in her tower. At least the sun had risen by now. That would mean the cooks would be up as well and this would lead to Twilight finally getting something to eat. The little filly didn’t like to bother the royal cooks so early in the morning, but on the other hoof she couldn’t do anything else anyway. After last night’s ‘accident’ training by herself was not an option anymore. Also, she wanted to avoid being tardy for her lessons with Morning Blaze if possible. Sooner she got there the better. Being occupied and busy meant that she would not have to worry much about thinking.

Twilight had hoped she would meet Princess Celestia during breakfast. Normally the princess always had time for her student. At least in the morning and after sunset, but now the little filly hadn’t talked with Celestia for a whole day! That never happened before, in the few years Twilight was the princess’ personal protege, she spoke with her at least once a day. Sure Morning Blaze was a fine teacher and honorable guard, but nopony could compare with Celestia. She decided to pay her a visit after training. Provided that the purple unicorn would return in one piece. Twilight could not be sure with all this crazy new magic she hadn’t known about before. One thing was certain however, it would never get boring.

Like last time Morning Blaze was already waiting for her. Twilight had no idea what they would be doing this time. She could never know with a teacher like Blaze.

“Good Morning, Miss Sparkle,” Morning Blaze greeted her little student. “I hope you are ready for some practical lessons today.”

“Of—,” the little filly couldn’t hold back a yawn, interrupting her answer. “Course I am.”

“Indeed. I can see that. I presume that you haven’t gotten much sleep. Am I right?”

“No,” Twilight answered while avoiding the gaze of her teacher.

“Oh really? Come on, my student. You know, misery loves company.”

“No, it does not. Can we please just start with today's lessons?”

“Very well. Today you will learn how to cast a basic elemental spell. You can decide with what element you want to start. All of them will be relatively simple, so don’t worry, they won’t contain much chaotic energy,” Morning Blaze said. Something was definitely going on with her student, but she figured it wouldn’t help much to push her. Also, she couldn’t watch her all day, Blaze had duties to fulfill after all.

“If I have a choice...hmm let’s start with…uhh, let’s start with earth.”

“A fine choice. I will give you a brief introduction to the element. Earth is the most stable element. It stands for safety, endurance and persistence. It is important to know that you can’t just rip a chunk of rocks out of a mountain or even lift a pile of dirt without replacing the void you create with taking something from the earth.”

“Replacing it? How am I supposed to replace it if I remove the stones or the dirt?” Twilight asked curiously.

“You have to fill the void you created with more earth. For example, if you want to grab rocks from a mountain, you would have to lower the whole mountain to replace the stones you have taken away. Or push the stones from the other side into the hole you created. Taking something without replacing it, would be the same as battling the whole planet for control over a small pile of dirt. It is possible, but most destroy their minds in the process.”

“Uh-huh... Well then, where should we start.”

“For earth magic, I will have to teleport us into the fields below Canterlot. We can’t do that here obviously. Just climb on my back and grip tightly, first time teleportation isn’t nice.”

Twilight climbed onto Morning Blaze’s back and wrapped her forelegs around her teacher’s neck. Before she knew it they were gone.

Teleporting was horrible, it felt like she was crushed by the air around her. Unicorns were clearly not meant to defy physics like that. She didn’t know how Morning Blaze could brush it off so easily. Just as she wanted to cry out, the feeling was gone and their destination ‘zapped’ into existence.

Her teacher was right about their new training location. It was perfect. On the simple grass fields was literally nothing that could be damaged should anything go wrong. Twilight couldn’t help but wonder, why was there was nothing? The gentle hills and the open fields would provide a perfect spot for a new home. Anyways, the little filly deemed it not important enough, her training was more significant right now.

She let go of Morning Blaze’s neck and steadied herself on stable ground once more. “So, what do I have to do?”

The yellow mare closed her eyes for a few moments to think and to regenerate her magical reserves. She had teleported herself and Twilight an immense distance after all. Morning opened her eyes again and said, “Hmm… It would be useful if you could create your own statues to train with. Let us begin with simple manipulation of earth. Now watch closely.”

Blaze lowered her head and steadied her hind legs, it looked like some sort of battle stance. Her horn glowed in a relatively normal shade of red again. She focused it on a circular patch of dirt about three metres away from her. The ground around the circle began to sink in and from the center rose what looked like a pony head made out of stone.

After her teacher finished her spell, a pony about the same size as Morning stood on a small pedestal. The earth around it formed into a deep artificially created trench. “I hope you observed carefully, my little student. It’s not really difficult. Just remember that you have to compensate everything you take from the earth. And then imagine the statue being formed in your mind, you have to see it clearly. Well then, how about you give it a try?”

Twilight nodded and lowered herself into the same battle stance-like pose. She focused her magic on a circular patch of stones a little bit farther away. Her magic wavered as the little filly tried to replicate the spell of her teacher.

“I know you can to do it, Twilight! Imagine the statue rising out of the earth and push the dirt around it into the ground with your will.”

...more power…

The voice in her head returned and urged her to use more of her magic. The little filly however, didn’t need any advice from her crazy mind. She closed her eyes to focus on it.

“Go away!” Twilight thought to herself. “I don’t want a voice inside my head, telling me what to do.”

We can help you…

No! Be quiet!

Thou have the power, use it!

“But...but what if I lose control?” even her inner voice began to tremble. She couldn’t trust it or could she?

We’ll help.

M-maybe just a little help so that I can do this spell.

As thou wishes.

Morning Blaze observed her student quietly during her first attempt on pulling this spell off. Most of her previous trainees were not able to do it on first try. She started to worry as Twilight closed her eyes and began to frown. Doing that while trying to channel magic was never a good sign. Especially not with chaos magic. The magic of chaos could easily overtake the mind of ponies without a strong will. The yellow mare gained a troubled expression as her student opened her eyes again. One of them was glowing in a strong white light and the little filly began to smile faintly. Her horn and the patch of dirt that was currently targeted by the purple unicorn also glowed much more intense than they should.

“Twilight! That’s too much chaotic energy!” Morning Blaze shouted while running towards the little filly.

Just as she reached Twilight, both were blasted backwards by a massive magical shockwave. Morning was not able to concentrate enough to teleport the two of them somewhere safe. She landed on her back in the grass several meters away from where their original position was. Twilight however was not quite so lucky, the little filly crashed head first into a medium sized stone that was poking out of the grass. It left a deep gash on top of her head, deep enough to bleed profusely and knock her student unconscious.

She spun her head around to see what caused the shock wave. Her eyes went wide open as she stared at her opponent. It was twice as tall as herself and had a vaguely pony-like stature. A living rock golem. How was that even possible? It shouldn’t be. Was it a side effect of Twilight’s strange chaos magic?

Blaze considered retreating with Twilight, risking the life of her student was not an option. As the yellow mare tried to stand up, a head-splitting pain coursed through her right foreleg. Judging by how intense the pain was her foreleg was probably broken. She could again not concentrate enough to teleport, all of her willpower tried to stop her from screaming her soul out at the moment. Her eyes narrowed in pain as she bit her lip to hold back the cries of agony.

No. She could not fail her princess right now. She was the captain of the fifth division of the Solar Guard. She was Celestia’s personal bodyguard and long time friend. The princess told her to protect Twilight Sparkle, her beloved protege and Morning Blaze would sacrifice herself without a second thought if that meant the little filly was safe.

It costed her an immense amount of effort, but she stood shakily on her three healthy legs. The wound around her injured leg also started to bleed now, she had to do something very quick otherwise Twilight and probably herself would be killed by the stone golem.

She looked around hastily. The golem… where was it?

The answer came to her in form of a stone hoof connecting with her face. Her left eye was now black and swollen along with the entire left side of her face. Even though it was made out of stone it was surprisingly agile. Morning Blaze landed on her back again wincing in pain. Her good eye looked shocked as she saw the golem again. She rolled to the left, far too close for her taste, one second later and her skull would have been smashed. The yellow mare struggled to get back up again but succeeded before the golem could attack her again. Blaze ducked under another kick from the living rock. The situation she found herself in was rather tricky. Now with her broken leg and a restricted field of view doing ordinary magic was momentarily out of question. Not even the thought-sending spell worked right now, it could take a while before somepony would be looking for the two of them. Also, attacking the golem would be quite futile as normal attacks with her hooves wouldn’t work against a creature made out of stone. Her only option was to lure the thing away from Twilight in the hope that somepony would find her.

Twilight was still unconscious. Her mind wandered over what just happened. The little filly was getting angrier and angrier by the second. It wasn’t her fault, this strange voice, her own crazy voice...whatever it was, wanted the purple unicorn to use a power she couldn’t control. She floated in a pitch black space of nothingness, all on her own.

It’s all your fault! I never should have trusted you!

Suddenly the strange voice replied. Keeping the little filly some company in her unconscious mind.

We were not the one at fault. Thy own inability is the one to blame.

You said that I should use the power!

Thou agreed that we activate thine inner strength.

The little filly stopped for a moment to think about how insane that was. She was having a conversation with herself.

“Whatever. I shouldn’t have used the magic. I do not even know what the hay it is,” the purple unicorn stated still a bit agitated. “So… Are we... am I dead?”

No, but it was quite close. Be careful the next time thou uses this magic. We will stay at thy side and aid thou.

We? Are there more of you? And what means thou?

Excuse me. Would it be more bearable for you if I use your modern language?

“Uh… Yes?” Twilight was confused. Maybe she wasn’t crazy after all. She didn’t even know what those words meant.

Very well. To answer your question ‘we’ and ‘thou’ were old terms for I and you. The Equestrian language changed quite remarkably.

Okay, then to my other questions. What are you? And what are you doing inside of my mind?

You will find the answer to your first question in due time, but for your second I have a explanation. You seemed interesting enough to not waste my time. It’s as simple as that, powerful and intelligent, just like myself at your age.

Before Twilight could complain about these very unsatisfying answers, she felt her consciousness tugging at her. The dark room faded away, she could almost see the light of the day.

Keep an open mind Twilight Sparkle. I will stay at your side if you need me.

As Twilight opened her eyes, she immediately noticed two things. The first was that her head felt like it had been crushed under a ton of stones and the second that Morning Blaze was fighting a big rock pony. Well, maybe fighting isn’t the right word for it. She was losing against it, half her face was bloody and swollen and her teacher tried to limp away with only 3 legs. The other one was twisted in a very painful looking manner and bled severely.

Twilight saw Morning Blaze retreating again narrowly avoiding another hit in the face. The yellow mare could dodge all attacks so far. Even with her injuries her teacher seemed to be very skilled in hoof-to-hoof combat. The little filly also so that Blaze could not keep this up forever. Her movements started to get slower and her whole body was littered with scrapes and bruises.

The purple unicorn wanted to help her. She couldn’t hold herself back and shouted, “Morning Blaze, watch out!”

This distraction caused her teacher to trip over her own hindlegs. The rock golem noticed the yellow mare’s error and tried to crush its opponent with a swift and aimed foreleg punch.

This was it. Morning Blaze could never dodge in time. What a pathetic way to die. She closed her remaining eye and waited for her end...but it never came. The golem’s forelegs were petrified mere inches away from her face. It was wrapped in a thin layer of dark purple magic.
She looked to the left and there she was. Her rescuer, Twilight Sparkle. The little filly was conscious again and both her eyes glowed intensely this time. Twilight’s horn shone in the same colour as the magic around the golem.

Her student slowly raised her hoof, pointing at the stone creature. The layer of magical energy around the golem went darker and darker by the second. The air around it began to waver and got distorted by the massive amounts of chaos magic. As it was totally encased in pitch black energy, Morning Blaze heard the familiar ‘sucking’ noise and the golem vanished.

Her good eye went wide. Chaos magic! Twilight Sparkle had used chaos magic to save her. Not even that, but a completely spell that was completely new to the yellow mare. She had imprisoned the golem in another dimension without the need of vortex-spears.

The injured Morning Blaze limbed over to her student as she saw that the filly had fallen to her knees, her eyes no longer glowing. It was too much for her, but she had to admit that Twilight saved her from that thing. She went into a fight unprepared and had to suffer the consequences now. Blaze sat down next to her student.

“That was...quite the performance, my student. I have to thank you for saving me,” the yellow mare said exhausted.

Twilight couldn’t reply instantly, she was simply too tired. At least the wound on her head wasn’t bleeding as bad as before. After a while she caught her breath and answered, “You saved me in the first place. You tried to occupy that...thing, whatever it was. Thank you Morning Blaze.”

“Come to think of it. How did you save me? I’ve never seen this variation of a darkness spell and as I recall you were quite reluctant of using chaos magic.”

“I have absolutely no idea. I just saw you struggling against this rock thing and I wanted to help you. It just came over me.”

“I don’t know either. Maybe we can research it later. For now, we will wait for our reinforcements to pick us up. We both need some medical attention and some well earned rest,” her teacher explained. She simultaneously used her thought-sending spell to inform the other guards of their situation and location.

Not even five minutes later about ten solar guards came to their rescue. After they provided first aid, Twilight fell asleep. The magical exertion was too much for her. Morning Blaze however, had one other thing to do before returning to her home. Explaining what had happened to Princess Celestia. She hoped her old friend would understand. They also had to talk about Twilight’s general condition. Something was going inside the little filly that was rapidly spiraling out of control.

Morning Blaze and Celestia retreated into a more private environment to discuss what exactly happened earlier this day. Nopony would dare to disturb a meeting between the Princess of the Sun and one of her highest ranking guards.

“...and then the rescue team picked us up,” Morning Blaze said summing up her report.

The princess would never show emotions on the outside, a side effect of being a leader for more than one thousand years, but the yellow mare could tell that Celestia was shocked. It was no surprise for her. The worst possible outcome for this conversation would have been a punishment because of the unprepared training and the danger her beloved student was in.

“Also, your Highness, something is definitely going on with Twilight. You told me about her strange magical surge, but that was… different. She looked very upset as she closed her eyes, like she was arguing with herself. It was downright creepy as she opened them and only one of them glowed. You should have felt it yourself, there was so much chaotic energy, it was incredible.”

Hard to take in, even for a millennia old demi-goddess. “And the outburst of chaos magic you mentioned?”

“Oh yes, that. First she animated a rock statue and then invented a new chaos spell? Not even Starswirl the Bearded had such deep insights on Isfet to create a new spell in mere seconds. It was crazy, she pointed at it with her forehoof and imprisoned it into the void. You know what insane amounts of power would be need to do that without the vortex-spears or at least something familiar.”

“Yes, I am very well aware of the fact that this should not be possible. We have to watch her even more carefully. I think it would be best if you talk to her again. You are the one who saved her, maybe she will tell you something. The way she acted in this kind of situation is indeed suspicious.”

“Of course, your Highness. I may have to take special precautions in case her magic breaks out again.”

“Do whatever you deem necessary. She has to learn how to control her magic at all costs,” Celestia finished. She was genuinely concerned about Twilight. Something like that had not happened in quite some time. “But that can wait until you two have recovered. With the healing magic of our royal doctors your broken bone and your face should be fully healed in a few days. In Twilight’s case it isn’t as bad, a simple flesh wound should be closed after some sleep.”

Twilight woke up in a white painted, very sterile looking room. All sorts of magical empowered machines were standing next to her. The little filly was not a common patient, but she still knew this room, the first aid room of Canterlot Castle.

She lifted her right forehoof and tried to carefully touch the injury on her head. To her surprise, it didn’t nearly hurt as bad as before, a little sting at best.

The little filly looked around in the room. There was not much to look at, other than the bed she was currently laying in and a comfortable looking couch. A few strange pictures for like psychological tests and a small flower pot on the window ledge, but that was it.

Since she had nothing to do and no books to read, the little filly got bored pretty quickly. Just as Twilight wanted to get out of the bed, she heard the door knob turning. The visitor was none other than her new teacher, Morning Blaze, who now sported a simple white cast around her broken foreleg.

“Hello, Miss Sparkle. I just came by to ask how you are feeling,” the yellow mare stated softly.

“Good morning. I’m fine, really, but I see you still have the cast. Sorry about that,” Twilight frowned on the thought that she caused Morning Blaze’s injury.

“Oh, no need to worry, Miss Sparkle. I will be back on track in a few days.”

“You can just call me Twilight… umm, if you want.”

“Very well. There is another thing that needs to be addressed, Twilight.”

“You mean my magic?” the little filly still cursed herself mentally, for using it. What if Morning Blaze found out about whatever it was that resided inside her head.

The yellow mare nodded shortly and said, “Yes and since it’s the first thing that came to your mind, I presume you have been thinking about that a lot lately, right?”

“Uhh...yes exactly, crazy isn’t it. Hehe,” the purple unicorn avoided her teacher’s eyes nervously.

“Twilight, I know something is going on. Come on, you can trust me,” Morning Blaze spoke while lifting her student’s chin to look her in the eyes.

“Well...you know… it’s sort of complicated. There is some str—“ she stopped for a moment, hearing the familiar voice of her sort-of-companion.

I suggest that you do not speak any further, Twilight. You know you need me to control your magic. Who will help you with that then?

B-but she said I can trust her. She won’t take you away, right?

Maybe, maybe not. Is it really worth taking the risk?

That was apparently the end of their bizarre conversation. Twilight started anew, “N-nevermind, it’s nothing really. I’m just tired.”

Morning Blaze sighed and said, “If you say so, Twilight. My offer still stands though, if you need somepony to talk, I’ll be there for you.”

“Thank you. I hope you get well soon.”

“Yes, goodbye. I should be fine in a day or two, after that we should pick up where we left as soon as possible. I will ensure that nothing will go wrong next time.”

With these words, her teacher left the purple unicorn alone in the white painted room of infinite boredom.

She silently groaned in frustration. “What am I getting myself into?”