Make a Wish Upon a Sue - Chapter 2 - Feelin' a Bit Franz Kafka

Spike felt groggy to say the very least. He was used to a nice basket, a nice warm basket with a pillow in there, and not forgetting his lovely thin blanket. That was a good point when he thought about it. Twilight slept in a nice double bed and he got a basket. Like an actual wicker basket, not a sleeping basket. Do they even make sleeping baskets? Twilight had a lot of explaining to do after SHE apologised. The young dragon hadn't changed his standing on that point, all though it was more of a lying at the present moment. He tried to sit up and was met with a sharp pain in his…well in his everywhere. It felt like his entire body had been roughly forced through a printing press. With much effort he pulled himself up of the sodden ground.

A thought occurred to him, the grass around him was wet, so why wasn't he? The answer came from above, in the form of a tree. The leaves the branch above him perfectly resembled his own sleeping form, and had thus sheltered him in the night. 'Weird' Spike thought to himself, he didn't even remember falling asleep next to a tree. Taking another look at the leaves, the dragon realised something. He also did not remember looking about 7 foot high and being built like a Minotaur.

Spike took a look down at his body, and gasped, he couldn't see his legs for his bulging, rippling sheet of rock hard torso muscle. He tentatively poked them with a finger and recoiled; he didn't remember being made of cast iron. There was a niggling thought in the back of his head, some sort of doubt that he couldn't place his claw on. After a few more minutes of gawking at his new chest though, it became clear. He used to have purple scales, and his softer underbelly and spines were pale and dark green respectively.

This, however, was the case no longer. His underbelly was a golden yellow, and the now regal looking spines on his arms were the same colour. However they looked like they had been literally forged from gold. They shimmered brilliantly in the sun, the light danced playfully off the surface. His baby spines were floppy, and easy to manipulate, but a fully grown dragon's were used for battle. His now looked as if they could fulfil the same purpose. They were razor sharp, and hard as stone.

His scales had also received a mysterious new paint-job. No longer were they a calming lavender, but a striking bleach white. They reflected the morning light differently between each individual mosaic of armour. It was like each scale had been covered in varnish, as he moved he glittered. Spike now had a similar effect to a disco ball, but an intimidating disco ball if such a thing existed. And the colour was just…amazing. The most pure white he had ever seen before now was Rarity's coat. She practically illuminated a room just by being present. But Spike, he was making the entire field dance with light. He could justifiably say that compared to his new set of scales, Rarity's coat looked like a sewage covered corpse. THAT, was just how beautiful his new skin was.

"Woah," he said, and took an immediate double take. Spike was a baby after all, as a child his voice was that of a, you guessed it, child. High-pitched and ever so slightly scratchy was the order of the day. Not unlike an angle-grinder as Twilight had once joked. Spike hadn't found the joke to be so funny, but as he recalled he was too busy fetching books and cleaning quills to put up any sort of fuss.

But he now spoke in a voice which simply could not be his own. Have you ever had liquid silk poured into your ears? Liquid silk that had been blessed by Celestia and bathed in by Luna? Liquid silk that shimmered and rippled in a glorious cascade of never ending colour? An infinite, polychromatic surge of acoustic perfection? Of course you haven't, that's ridiculous, that's never happened to anypony ever because that's impossible. Spike wondered why such a stupid thought had even gone through his head.

But back to the original point, Spike's new voice was the closest he had ever come to experiencing the nonsense he had just conjured. It was like a God was cradling you and personally destroying all of your fears, whilst simultaneously cementing and granting your innermost desires. Orgasmic seemed like a good word to describe it, Spike had no idea what that word meant but Rarity had once used it to describe a weird gift Twilight had given her. The way she had said the word assured Spike that it meant something good.

"Orgasmic," Spike said again in that immaculate tone, and had to supress a shudder. The fact remained however, that he had changed overnight into something…well put it like this, it was either really good, or really bad. The young dragon wasn't quite ready to deal with this emotionally yet, although when he did, Spike expected outrage, sadness, misguided joy and vanity in equal servings.

So rather than deal with the personal crisis of waking up as a different drgaon, he devised a plan of action, he needed to get to something reflective and see the extent of his sudden metamorphosis. Well it wasn't really a plan, more a checklist. Another thing that he needed to change when he got back were all the checklists. He had once, with no exaggeration, had to make of checklist of things Twilight needed to make a checklist of steps needed to prepare a checklist of the different checklists she needed for national Equestrian checklist appreciation day. He could haves worn she made up that holiday anyway, checklists don't really seem like the things that ponies get excited over. Psychotic, cannibalistic, nocturnal alicorns sure, have a whole night about them, but checklists?

This was good, reminiscing about possibly fabricated bank holidays distracted him from the sly voice in his head whispering…'You've probably gone completely mental Spike'. He needed a clear puddle, or a lake, or a mirror. The sound of a carriage shattered his thought track. Spike turned to see a wooden cart trundling steadily down the road adjacent to his field. It was being pulled by an earth pony, and they had a companion riding on the top. The two were both similarly-aged, brown-coated, brown-maned earth ponies. The most average of the average, Spike presumed they were a couple, simply because they were arguing. They argued all the way down the road. It wasn't the arguing of people with different views. It wasn't an argument of passion or of honour, it was simply the constant bickering of two ponies who have been together so long that they have nothing left to talk about.

"Harold, remember when you called my mother a mule? I think that is what gave her the first heart attack," The pony riding on the top of the carriage spoke, and thus revealed herself to be a mare. The stallion pulling the contraption, whom Spike presumed to be Harold, immediately bit back.

"Well Shirley I'd like to find the pony responsible for her last heart attack; he had the decency to put her in that box. Which, may I remind you, cost me two thousand bits!" Shirley snorted upon hearing this, and retorted.

"Cost US, two thousand bits Harold. You're not the only one who works our mirror selling carriage you know?"

"Of course not, I'm just the only one who pulls it and makes any kind of sale," He replied sarcastically. Spike had gone from a casual eavesdropping to a state of determination. They definitely mentioned 'Mirror selling'. That did seem too good to be true, but, considering his present circumstances, the jury was out on what was true right now. Propelling himself across the field at Rainbow Dash rivalling speeds he reached the road and drew two very confused looking stares.

"Excuse me," the dragon panted, "I heard you sell mirrors, and I really need to use one. Could I just have a quick look at my reflection?" the two earth ponies shared a shocked glance. "It's just because I think overnight I've changed slightl-" the shrill voice of Shirley cut him off.

"You don't need to tell us anything dearie, I mean why wouldn't you want to look in a mirror?!"

"Erm, excuse me?" Spike asked, not quite understanding what the mare meant.

"Look at you! You're a perfect specimen my boy, what type of mirror do you want?!" To Spike's even greater shock, this voice came from the stallion, who had already started digging around in the back of the carriage.

"Well," Spike began, slightly bashfully now, "I only need to have a look in one mirror, any will do," The couple blinked stupidly, as if his simple request was too much to comprehend.

"Oh I get it, he needs all of the mirrors!" Shirley yelled excitedly,

"Yes honey, that makes more sense than what I thought, I thought for a moment that he didn't want all of our stock!" The couple laughed frantically, in a way that suggested his request had been somehow absurd.

"No, that is what I meant, I don't want to take all of your mirrors. It's not like I'm mugging you, I just want to look in a mirror, just for a second…if that's OK?" Again they gave him that look. It was not at all unlike the one Snips and Snails had given the dragon yesterday.

"Well…erm," Shirley was rubbing the back of her head with a hoof, and Harold was scratching his chin thoughtfully. Both of them continued until finally the stallion seemed to think of something .

"Aha! Such humbleness…if anything, he deserves all of our stock now, doesn't he dear?" his wife considered his point, and then nodded her head enthusiastically. They both wore smiles that looked purely unnatural. Their mouths were stretched to ridiculous proportions, and all of their teeth were showing. They looked almost like Pinkie Pie whenever something that could be mildly described as 'alright….sort of' happened to her. Spike shuffled uncomfortably as the stallion unloaded all of his stock onto the road. His wife cheered him on and all the while they had those obscene, toothy grins plastered on their faces.

"Erm…I don't have anything to pay you with, just the scales on my back," he laughed uncomfortably, but to his shock they both snapped their heads to meet his eyes immediately.

"Could you…I mean if it's okay with you…maybe give us, a scale?" They looked at him like children asking their parents for sweets at the supermarket. If he wasn't before, and he was, Spike was suddenly very creeped out.

"Ok?" he agreed, without even looking he yanked a scale of his arm. It caused him no pain, and yet the couple on the carriage winced as if he might break like what they were peddling was wont to do. Spike handed it to the stallion; who, with all the care of Twilight when she devised the perfect ways to make Spike's chores just impossible enough, put it in his saddlebag. Harold and his wife giggled like toddlers and thanked Spike, before taking off down the road and animatedly talking about how much fun they were going to have with their new scale.

Spike was having severe trouble wrapping his head around what had just happened. He had woken in an entirely new body, and for some reason two ponies just gave him what looked like upwards of twenty mirrors, in exchange for merely one of his scales. He replayed the conversation in his head, and as he had thought at no point had he asked to actually keep even a single mirror.

The drake was almost angry at his extreme good fortune, was this some stupid hidden camera show? Was a stallion in a stupid trucker cap going to emerge and declare Spike had been 'Ponk'd'? Would the couple come back in a few seconds and say 'Haha! How stupid of you, how can you be this thick you empty headed moron. Did you really believe we would give you all of our stock?!' Would they then retrieve the mirrors and then proceed to violently rob and kill Spike? And nopony would care because they would all think Spike had been so stupid to fall for such a petulant trick that he deserved it?! Granted, these things probably wouldn't happen, but they still seemed a mite more plausible than two ponies giving Spike over twenty mirrors for a measly scale of his arm.

But there was no point in standing still whilst slowly descending into insanity. He had the mirrors now and he might as well make good use of them despite the possibility that he just robbed somepony. Spike walked over to the massive pile of reflective glass in the road and went to pick up one of the panes. It was a particularly large mirror with a gold frame, needless to say it looked very heavy. Spike wrapped his powerful new hands around the gleaming edges and braced himself to lift. Now the dragon had indeed seen his new set of muscles, so logic stands that he be considerably stronger now. However he was not prepared for just how much might was stored in his tree-trunk like arms. The mirror felt as light as a feather, and due to Spike's over-zealous attempts at lifting it, the vanity accessory slipped clean out of Spike's grasp and went hurtling 100 yards in the air.

It pierced several rectangle shaped holes in the clouds, before it reached its Apex and started to fall. The mirror smashed into a nearby tree in a visually appealing firework of leaves and glass fragments. The impact took out about nine pigeons, their last squawks being ones of surprise and outrage. Spike winced, and reminded himself to never, ever mention what just happened to Fluttershy.

He was considering saying a few words at the new, avian-mass grave. However considering the amount of times his food had been pinched by pigeons just like these, a little karmic payback felt almost satisfying. Deciding there were more pressing matters than the winged martyrs in the nearby wreckage, Spike turned his attention to another mirror. To avoid slaughtering anymore birds the dragon lifted this one with one of his arms. It took almost no effort to lift the thing of the ground and set it upright.

The formerly purple reptile took a deep breath before he looked into the glass, and his reflection proved he had been right to. He was at least seven, maybe eight feet tall now, and that height was further extended by the metallic looking row of spines on his head. His body looked like a sculpture, a perfect specimen, almost Adonis-like. On his hands there were a wicked looking set of claws, much sharper than his old ones. With a flex he could retract them,

"That's gonna make a lot of things, a lot easier," he snorted. Another thing stuck out to him, he had a cutie mark. Not just a henna tattoo or one of those awful transfers you get in cereal boxes, but an honest to goodness cutie mark. He didn't quite know what it represented. It was needlessly complex and colourful, as if an artist had snorted paint and then sneezed on his thigh. It looked something from one of Twilight's astronomy books. It was a colourful swirl, with twinkling points of light that seemed to change colour in the sunlight.

No, it wasn't a trick of the light. The cutie mark was actively changing colour by itself. It wasn't consistent either, it would phase from red to green to purple to red again, to lavender to ochre to brown, then red then ochre then hazel then green again. Then purple then yellow then blue then yellow then orange then yellow and then back to red. It was at this time that the dragon realised he had been gawking stupidly at the cutie mark for around five minutes.

Spike had gotten a good enough look at his front, and so shimmied awkwardly on the spot, trying to manoeuvre himself as to see his back. After much flexing he realised he was standing next to a literal PILE of mirrors. Again with next to no effort he positioned one behind him and facing the first allowing him to see his rear, and for the sixty-seventh time that day he gasped. Upon his back lay a pair of folded, golden reptilian looking wings. Up until today he had just crossed his claws and hoped that one day, like other dragons, he would be able to fly. So here he was with the ability now in his lap, or rather, on his back.

It was odd at first, trying to flex muscles he had only just acquired, but soon he was able to extend the right wing half of the way to full extension. The bones holding fixing them to his back extended the full length of the appendage and had parts that jutted out at a ninety degree angle. These were all covered in his new, alabaster scales, and fixed to each boney structure was a taut flap of gleaming golden skin. There were no feathers like that of a Pegasus, and they were a lot bigger. They would dwarf those of any avian resident of Ponyville, for example Ditzy Doo. Upon thinking of the grey Pegasus both wings immediately snapped out to full extension.

"That was weird," he said to himself. Spike found the relevant muscles to control, and moved them. Both wings raised upwards, he tried a different motion and they were pulled back. When Spike released that tension they both shot forward with a powerful gust of wind. The mirror in front of him was thrown forward and shattered upon the pile of its fellows. Spike tried to angle his wings downwards and, when he had succeeded, gave them another flap. He was propelled around a foot of the ground, so he continued the motion and found himself raising. Spike let the power ebb slightly and was able to hover, albeit clumsily.

"Okay, I've woken up immensely strong and attractive, with huge wings and the ability to make mirror salesponies fall in love with me," he summarised. Twilight would have dealt with the situation sternly, making a concise list of all she needed to do to right the heinous wrongs that had occurred. However Spike was not Twilight, he was not a magical, studious to the point of obsession, pupil of the princess. He was Spike, he was a baby dragon and his reaction was one of a juvenile. Spike laughed, he laughed uproariously and felt giddy with excitement. Sure, he had seemingly skipped about a century of his life, but dragons lived for tens of thousands of years. A century was just a pit-stop.

With an ariel blast of his flying appendages he sent the massive pile of glass and ornate framing off the road and into the field. At least twenty five mirrors were sent tumbling and smashing over each other in a glorious cacophony that no amount of onomatopoeias could adequately describe. Spike allowed his chest to puff out, feeling suitably powerful. Ponyville, it sat there in the distance, it was only around a kilometre away, maybe two at the very most. The bleach white dragon didn't yet feel confident enough in his flying ability to take the sky bound route, and so he decided to land and stroll back to his home. It was only natural to feel jilted about the behaviour of everpony yesterday, and this new body may just be what he needed to finally get a little appreciation. Every step brought him closer to his goal, every step widened his smile. This, was going to be fantastic.

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It had been a normal day for Celestia. The princess had arisen at 5:30 AM from her preferred 15 minutes of sleep. Of course Alicorns didn't need to sleep, but she enjoyed the relaxation all the same. After meeting Luna for some tea both had performed their respective celestial duties, and then had some more tea. Then it was time for the sister's to get ready for day court. It would most likely be almost exactly the same as the night court only 6 hours prior, and yet royal custom dictated both be carried out. The two alicorns proposal of simply combining them into 'Evening Court' was met with uproar and so the old ritual had stuck. Day court lasted from 6:00 in the morning until 11:00, at which time both sisters reviewed some legislation and royal documents with some much needed tea. They had quickly adjourned to again, make themselves more presentable, and then, after a well-earned tea break, they set to carrying out the more social aspects of the day. This mostly consisted of sitting on their thrones and greeting agents, ambassadors and the occasional tourist.

"We must say Celly," Luna began in between sips of coffee…just kidding, it was tea, "These 'PG tips' are much nicer than the old strainer-based beverages we used to partake with," Celestia chuckled.

"A thousand years of pony development dear sister, and you are concerned with the great leaps in tea?"

"What can we say Celly? We find ourselves more moved by this refreshing concoction than those awful 'sock' inventions you showed me," Luna teases

"Why ever not Lulu?" Celestia giggled,

"They make it look like you have had your legs dipped in pink paint," both sisters snorted most unregally in their mirth. The elder of the two recovered and asked,

"I must say Lulu, you're never usually this animated, do you have some good news to share?" Luna looked her sister up and down in mock suspicion,

"Did we not warn you against using mind-reading magic on us Celly?" The white alicorn grinned knowingly,

"Call it sibling intuition Lulu, I don't need mind magic to read you like a book." Luna considered this with a smile,

"Well, we always feel good after granting one whom we owe a great deal a boon." Celestia wore a mask of uninterrupted calm, but her insides had just cooled slightly.

"Luna, you do know that 'boon-granting' isn't the traditional custom anymore?" whereas Celestia knew her sister would never intentionally do wrong, the time in which she had grew up was vastly different to Equestria now.

"Why ever not sister?" Luna looked slightly affronted.

"Well," Celestia knew that Luna was quite a fan of granting boons, and so she had to put this delicately, "Ponies started asking for more and more outlandish things Lulu, I had to cease granting such favours when one pony literally asked me for the moon,"

"I hope you refused them!"

"I did Lulu, you know I would never give away your moon, but I found that ponies became corrupted when given greater power," Luna looked calm in the face of this news,

"Well we wouldn't worry Celly, we don't think he will do much harm, he's a friend of your student's anyway,"

"I didn't know Twilight was friendly with any stallions," Celestia exclaimed, making her sister giggle,

"No Celestia, not a stallion, he was a drake." Luna assured

"Spike?"

"Yes, we believe that was the little fellow's name. We had taken a break from out duties to have a nice relaxing fly, and when we came to rest on a cloud, we could hear a voice from below. There was the baby Drake, we heard him wishing that ponies would appreiciate him more," Luna told the story to her sister, who listen with a raised eyebrow.

"Spike was outside at that time? And why does he feel unappreciated?"

"We don't now Celly, he didn't say. However we knew that he was a friend of Miss Sparkle's we are indebted to Miss Sparkle and all of her friends for rescuing me" Celestia narrowed her eyes,

"What did you do to him?" Luna looked taken aback, and immediately retorted,

"If you are implying we hurt him sister, then you are being ridiculous. We simply granted his wish, he certainly seemed like he needed it. Plus, what harm is simply helping ponies appreciate him a bit more?" Celestia mulled her sister's words over and seemed to relax slightly, but she had one niggling question.

"Luna, what was the exact spell you performed?"

"We didn't perform a spell," Luna replied nonchalantly, "As you know sister, magic can never be outright destroyed. When one dies, all of their magic and enchantments simply fade into the aether, and ponies like us can tap into them. So we simply took the magic of one who had passed on years ago and gave it to…was it Spike?" Celestia racked her brains trying to work out whose magic she had given to Spike

"Surely taking a dead pony's magic and giving it to another would be very difficult Lulu?"

"If it was their innate magic Celly, if we wanted to grant Spike all of Starswirl's magic for example, yes that would've taken months." Luna corrected her elder sister, "But this pony's magic had been granted by a boon, so we simply found the relevant enchantment and bestowed it on the drake. Just like performing the spell twice but with less effort." Celestia suddenly felt her insides drop from a gentle chill to absolute zero, surely her sister couldn't be talking about…

"Which pony, Luna which pony do you mean?!" Celestia all but begged of her sister, who was too deep in thought to notice her the white alicorns sudden change of disposition.

"We can't remember Celly, she was an earth pony with a parchment cutie mark, a clerk in her village court we think. Anyway we remember she did something the two of us, and so we granted her a boon. She asked to be more appreciated and noticed, we simply made it happen." Luna continued to tap a hoof to her chin in deep thought, Celestia on the other hand was staring at her, mouth agape.

"Aha!" Luna suddenly exclaimed, "We remember she had a creme coloured coat and a red mane…or at least she did at first," Luna chuckled at the memory, Celestia on the other hoof had just had her worst fears confirmed, "We never did find out what happened to her, we were exiled beforehand."

"Mary-Sue," Celestia muttered, her face a mask of horror,

"Ah yes, that was her name Celly! Hold on, why are you looking at us like that?" Celestia was glaring daggers at her sister. If looks could kill, Celestia may as well been firing machine guns, that were wrapped in barbed wire, that was on fire, at her sister.

"You gave Spike the same power we gave Mary Sue?" Celestia growled,

"That is what we just said is it not?" Celestia rose from her throne,

"Come on Luna, we need to find him, and fast."

"Why? It isn't as if the drake would harm anypony," Luna snorted, only to be met with her sister's fierce glower once more.

"If you've given Spike the power we gave Mary Sue, then the whole of Equestria may be at risk."