One Final Day - Chapter 4

“Rainbow Dash!” Twilight shouted, her dream bursting into nothingness as her body launched itself up. With a slight twitch of irritation, the annoyed mare scanned over her room. Everything was... normal, to normal in fact. The dim light of the moon shone in broad shafts through the windows, casting a glow over her room. Everything was just as she had left it. Just as she liked it. She raised her hoof up to her head and started rubbing the last remnants of sleep out of her eyes.

“Spiiiiiiiike!” she called out, her raspy voice resonating across the room. After waiting for a couple moments, the dragon failed to answer. Twilight angrily mumbled something incoherent, her eyes transfixed upon the door that lead to the rest of the library. “Spiiiiiike! Get up here!”

The sound of somepony - or somedragon rather - tripping rang in her ears, followed by a sharp yell of pain.

Twilight let her body fall back onto the pillow underneath of her, creating a soft rustle of feathers being pressed against each other. The tired mare brought her hooves up to her head and started massaging her temples in a vain attempt to try to stop the pain of an oncoming headache.

The door to her room slammed open, as a baby purple dragon barged through it. “Yes, Twilight? Is everything alright? Is somet... what’s wrong, Twilight?”

Twilight groaned in response, raising her hoof and waving Spike closer.

The dragon put on an expression of confusion and cautiously approached Twilight. “What’s the matter?”

“What day is it, Spike?”

“Well, yesterday was March 31st... so I guess that makes today April 1st!... Don’t tell me you’re getting into the pranking this early, Twilight. We both know that no matter how early you start, you can never win the Best Pranker Award!”

Twilight raised her head of the warm embrace of the pillow, and latched gazes with her number one assistant. “Spike... you of all dragons should know I would never lower myself to the level of a prankster. It’s just that... I had the strangest dream.”

Spike let out an annoyed sigh, and jumped up on Twilight’s bed. He sat on the edge, slightly kicking his legs in the air as he scooted over towards his best friend. “Want to talk about it?”

“It was... strange, Spike. Not to mention the impossibility of such a spell even existing, and the possibilities that Star Swirl the Bearded made forbidden magic? Impossible! My dreams should know better than that!”

“While that does sound interesting, you haven’t really talked about the dream, Twilight.”

“Oh, yeah,” she stated, raising her hoof up to cover her mouth as she let out a small giggle. “Well, it all started off as me laying in front of this tomb...”

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“So Celestia cast the spell, and my friends were there in front of me!”

Spike twiddled his claws together, racking his brain for a proper response to the strange dream Twilight had just explained to him. “Maybe it’s a message?”

Twilight slightly tilted her head and put on a genuine look of confusion. “A message? What do you mean?”

“As saddening as it was, I think the dream was telling you to enjoy your friends while they’re still here, because you can lose them at any single day without a warning?”

Twilight brought her hoof up to her chin and started tapping on it, producing a soft clop sound with each strike. “You may be right, Spike...” Her eyes looked across the room, slowly noting that it must have been much later. “Hey... Spike, do you know what time it is?”

“It was roughly two AM when you called me up here,” Spike stated. “And you woke me up from a beautiful dream of Rarity and myself...” he whispered.

“And how long was I talking?”

“I’d say roughly fifty minutes.”

“So it’s nearly three AM? I should probably get to sleep... need to be alert if I want to avoid Pinkie’s and Rainbow’s pranks tomorrow...”

“Remember last year, Twilight? When Pinkie ended up turning the entire water system green?”

Twilight chuckled at the memory, as her eyes started to close. “Yeah...” she stated, before letting out a small yawn. “That was actually a good prank. I still don’t know how she managed to get that much food coloring for the entire water supply, or how she got rid of it all...”

“Some things are better left unknown, Twilight.”

“That’s true... anyway, good night, Spike.”

“Good night, Twilight.”

“Don’t dream of Rarity too much, can’t be having you get carpal tunnel again.”

Spike forced a sheepish smile as small sweat beads started to form on his head. “Can we please not talk about that again?” he asked, pushing himself off the bed.

Twilight let her head fall back down to the pillow once more. “Yeah, sure. Although I’ll probably pester you about it every now and then...”

“The things I have to put up with...” Spike muttered.

“What was that?”

“Oh... I said have a good night!”

Twilight lazily closed her eyes, letting the darkness take her over. “Yeah... good night... oh, and happy April Fools, Spike!”

“Same to you, Twilight!”

The sound of a door closing and the soft pit-pat of dragon feet descending down the stairs reached Twilight’s ears. A smile slowly played out on her face, as the first images of her mind’s cinema of dreams started.

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“You sure she should be feeling the effects?” Rainbow Dash asked, hovering just a few inches away from Pinkie.

“Yeppers, Dashie! I put extra ground up Dreamy-Nots into her cupcake this morning! Her dreams should be super-duper incredibly unbelievably strange!”

“I didn’t think you had the guts to do that, Pinkie,” Dash stated, playfully nudging her friend’s shoulder.

“It’s always good to get a head start on pranking, Dashie! Even you should know that!”

“Well, do you have any other plans for who you want to prank next?”

“I have one pony in mind...” Pinkie turned towards the reader, a slightly malicious smile spreading across her face that seemed to reach from ear to ear.

“April Fools, reader!” she said, clapping her front hooves together.

Dash looked at where Pinkie was looking, a look of confusion plastered on her face. “Uh... who are you talking to, Pinkie? I don’t see any ‘readers’ there...”

“Oh, don’t worry, Dashie, I’m talking to nopony at all!”

Dash brought her hoof up to her forehead, while shaking her head from side to side. “Pinkie Pie, you are so random.”

“Say, Dashie,” Pinkie said, beginning to canter away.

Rainbow Dash slowly followed her pink friend, hovering just a few inches off of the ground.

“Want to go bake some more of those Dreamy-Not cupcakes? That would be so fun if everypony woke up tomorrow after having a really really strange dream!”