“Why me?” Spike asked with a sigh.

“Because I really wanna test this new spell I learned out,” said Starlight eagerly, “and Twilight’s not back from the Fillydelphia conference for another few hours, and everyone else in Ponyville seems to be avoiding me for some reason.”

“I wonder why,” Spike muttered under his breath. Out loud, he said, “Why can’t you test it on yourself?”

“Because if I don’t know if I’m casting it correctly, then I can’t account for the thaumaturgical flux of my own arcanic fields, which, considering the spell originated from me, could alter its metaphysical structure in unexpected ways that an external power source couldn’t, resulting in wildly chaotic effects such as-”

“Magic. Got it.”

Starlight’s ears dropped. “…Rrrrright,” she said, pouting slightly. “But if it works, you’ll be an omniglot for a few hours!”

“A whozawot?”

“No, omniglot. You’ll be able to understand anything said to you in any language.”

“You’re already speaking Equestrian and I can barely understand you,” said Spike. “And I’ve lived with Twilight for ninety-five percent of my life.”

“And this spell will change that. Come on, Spike, please?” Starlight said earnestly. “For me?” She grinned as sweetly as she could, which was “not very”. Her past hadn’t given her much reason to develop sweet grins as a social skill.

“Are you just gonna keep pestering me until I say ‘yes’?”

“…Yes.”

Spike rubbed his forehead. “Fine, fine,” he said. “Let’s just get this over with. Omniglottolize me or whatever.”

“Alright! Now hold still.” Starlight’s horn glowed and a pale sapphire mist trailed from it to Spike. Spike stood ramrod straight, his arms at his sides and his tail stiff and his wings clamped tightly to his back, as he took deep breaths through his nose. The glow pulsed, and the mist wrapped around Spike. Suddenly, with a loud pop, the mist exploded, engulfing them both in thick smoke. The shock of it broke Starlight’s control over her magic, but fortunately, there was no magical backlash. Maybe the spell had worked?

“So, Spike?” Starlight asked through the haze. “How do you feel?” She waved away some of the fog. “Any different?”

Spike hacked up a lungful of smoke (which normally wouldn’t’ve been strange, except that it was blue instead of black). “Nt rlly. My thrt’s lttl sr, thgh.”

“Uh… what?”

“Wh?” asked Spike. “ ’M spkng prfctl- M vc!” His ears frills stuck straight out as he grabbed at his throat. “Wh d snd lk ths?!”

“I don’t know! The spell must’ve gone wrong somehow!”

“Cn’t tlk ths!” yelled Spike. “Npny wll ndrstnd m!”

“Uh, okay,” Starlight said as she hopped from hoof to hoof. “I can fix this.” She teleported out of the throne room and returned a moment later, levitating a book in front of her and fanning through the pages. “I just need to find the spell, reverse its key components, and-”

In spite of having his wings for less than a month, Spike was already using them quite reflexively. He was hanging from the chandelier before Starlight was done with her sentence. “N! N mr mgc! Y r nt sng mgc n m! N wy!”

“Spike, magic’s the only way-”

“Sd n mgc!”

“But then how-”

“Lt’s wt fr Twlght.”

“Twilight? You want to wait for Twilight?” No. Starlight couldn’t bear the thought of Twilight’s reaction when she heard that her number one assistant had lost the ability to communicate properly.

“Ys!”

“But I’m right here!” Starlight smiled winningly. “What’s the worst that could happen?”

Spike stared down at Starlight.

“…We’ll wait for Twilight,” Starlight conceded with a sigh.

“Spike, will you please stop pacing?” asked Starlight halfheartedly. All things considered, he’d earned the right to annoy her by pacing. All she could do was hope that Twilight better find a way to remove the spell from Spike.

“N!” yelled Spike, beating his wings. “Nt ntl cn sy thngs crrctly!”

“I told you, I can-”

“W’r wtng fr Twlght!” Spike’s nostrils were smouldering.

Starlight groaned and planted her face in her hoof. Just a few more minutes, she told herself. Then she could finally tell Twilight about all this. It wouldn’t’ve been nearly as bad if she could reverse it before Twilight got back, but since-

Like a sign from heaven, Twilight pushed open the door to the throne room with a spring in her step. “I’m back!” she said, much to the delight of Captain Obvious. “Fillydelphia was great — I had no idea you could put so much stuff on a carrot dog — but I’ll get to that later. Anything new and interesting happen today?”

“I tried to use magic and it backfired on me!” Starlight blurted.

Twilight tilted her head as she looked at Starlight. “But that’s neither new nor interesting.”

“…Oh, ha ha,” said Starlight. She rolled her eyes.

“Strlght cst spll n m,” said Spike, “nd nw cn’t stp tlkng lk ths!”

Twilight twitched. “I-I’m sorry, what?” she asked. “Could you repeat that?”

“Lrdy tld y wht hppnd,” grumbled Spike, crossing his arms. “Shldn’t hv t sy t gn.”

“…Ah,” said Twilight. “Hmm hmm.” She frowned at Spike and stroked her chin. “Starlight, was the spell language-based, by any chance?”

“Yeah,” said Starlight guiltily. “There was, ah, a spell that was supposed to turn whoever you cast it on into an omniglot-”

“Oh, that one,” said Twilight vaguely. “Yeah, that one’s a bit tricky. It took me three whole tries to get it right.”

“But when I tried it on Spike,” Starlight said quickly, “he started speaking all funny and he won’t let me use magic on him to try to turn him back.”

“Nd dn’t wnt t b spkng lk ths fr th rst f my lf!” yelled Spike.

“Don’t worry, you’ll be fine,” Twilight said, waving a hoof. “The spell’ll wear off in another few hours. It’s just a close variation on the original omniglot spell, after all, and that one wore off sooner or later.”

“Bt wht’s wrng wth m?” asked Spike. “Why m spkng lk ths?”

“It’s common mistake; that spell is pretty finicky,” responded Twilight. “Starlight probably just messed up a few vital components, so rather than becoming an omniglot, you just got disemvoweled.”