"hey watch that dark, she then turned to posey, (who s******ed when dark hit fire with the screwed up paper) you knowww you could gain some friends if you were kind and caring once in a while". She then turned her head round to continue listening to twilight.
Entropy was listening to Twilight's words, but as soon as she talked about them having something to do with the trials, his eyebrows shot up, his brain ground into gear, and he didn't hear a single word more. We're part of the equation... Of course! How had he not seen this earlier?! If "his" misfit band of Element couriers was part of the trial, then...what was the connection? He watched the assembled ponies as he thought. Flashbacks of words spoken, actions taken, and things that at the time seemed inconsequential came to him. Twilight feels more aware when she's talking to me... Fizz and Surprise have managed to completely miss the magnitude of this situation... Constella tried to convince Fireheart to kill Glory... Dark Shine has convinced Firefly of the value of Loyalty... He froze. I took the tiara. I took Twilight's tiara. The symbol, the element of magic. Why, I don't know, but I did. And all the others did the same; they took the element of the pony they are now connecting with in this very room. He got excited. Really excited. He grabbed Twilight by the shoulders, interrupting her with a "OH MY CELESTIA!!" and startling the daylights out of her. "I think I've got it!!" But even as he did that, his excitement faded. None of this was going to HELP them, at least not yet. He had no idea what this all meant. But obviously there was some connection, and maybe with Twilight's help, he could figure it out! After all, she WAS the pony who spent two years researching friendship, and one of only eight ponies who had ever weilded the Elements of Harmony. She had to know something, right?
Posey blew through her lips at Fireheart. "Pfft. Friends, who needs 'em?" She then continued chucking pencils into the ceiling. Surprise then leapt into action. "Posey! You're crippling the war effort!" She flew up to the ceiling and plucked out the pencils that were stuck up there. She then brought them back to Pink Fizz. Then she said to her, "Boy, I haven't had so much fun in a long time! This is great!" Twilight's eyes grew wide at Entropy's sudden outburst of emotion. "You...? You got it? What's your idea?"
Entropy had to wait a little for the thoughts to organize themselves into words; normally he didn't have a problem expressing his ideas, but this one was probably quite...far fetched and vague, shall we say. "Well...Princess Luna sent us to give you or Celestia the Elements, in the hopes that you could defeat Constella with them. Naturally we weren't expected to do anything but carry them, but we were each in charge of one; I had the Element of Magic, Dark Shine had Loyalty, Fireheart had Honesty..." He trailed off, thinking that he had made that point clear enough. If she didn't understand his idea yet, he hoped she got it after this. Otherwise, maybe he was just cracking under the stress...which was not something Royal Guards were supposed to do. "So I carried your Element here, and as you just said, you 'feel more lucid' when you talk to me. And you feel like we might be part of the test. Look around us; Fizz, who was carrying the Element of Laughter, is getting along wonderfully with......erm, Pinkie Pie. And the same goes for all the others! I don't really know WHAT it means yet, but I know it means something!"
Jhera pulled a scrap piece of paper off the table he had been standing next to. Apparently, the "war effort" had totally missed this section of the room. Grinning maliciously, he crumpled up the paper and knocked over the table. "It's not every day you get to be a child again!" he said before launching the paper ball at the desk fort on the other side of the room. Just as the ball floated into their fort, he yelled "Incoming mortar!"
As they were approaching the house the other two were at, several of the ponies resembling the mane six in color started appearing again. He frowns at how far gone they all seem if they truly are the mane 6, but the mention of Twilight still remembering Celestia brings him hope. As they start to near the area, he notices that the townsponies all seem really unfriendly, and are moving with an unusual gait. He suddenly sees Fireheart go to break one of the windows, and is about to tell them to stop, when he hears the female voice in his head again. Hearing that they failed, he wonders what will become of them now as everything suddenly goes white. Opening his eyes, he notices they all are much younger and in a classroom. Observing everything that happens, he shrinks down in his desk when the instructor asks the question. Hearing the assignment, he starts setting off to work on it. “What is despair?” one might ask. In my experience, despair is what one feels when all options set before them have been exhausted, and only a negative outcome awaits them. It is not something to be desired, and should be avoided if at all possible. There are certainly several reasons that one would feel despair. For myself, it is that the task given to our group ended up resulting in failure. I feel the reason we failed is that we were not working cohesively as a group. We constantly split up, and were unable to prevent others in the group from doing something potentially dangerous or harmful. As he writes, he listens to the conversations going on around him. At Fireheart's sudden outburst, he tears his attention away, only to see her faint. When Posey snickers and comments about Fireheart killing Glory, he reacts without thinking and snaps at her. "That isn't funny! Precious life isn't something to be joked about! Is your life a game to you? Is it just one big punchline? If I were you, I'd be ashamed!" Noticing Fizz had brought Surprise into whatever game she was playing surprised him, remembering that Surprise seemed to be acting like Posey when they first realized they were in this classroom. Overhearing Entropy's conversation with Twilight, and his theory, he feels a pang of guilt for snapping at Posey.
Posey flinched at Lightning Chaser's admonishment. For an instant, she almost appeared fearful. "You're right..." she meekly replied. "I should be ashamed. I'm sorry." She layed her head down on her desk. ---- Surprise gasped at the "incoming mortar". "Fizzie! Watch out, Changeling attack from our left flank!" She then flew in such a manner as to appear to be diving in slow motion as she leapt in front of the "mortar shell". It stuck her in the chest with a dull [size=-2]*thip*[/size]. In true Pinkie Pie style, she milked it for all it was worth. Her voice deepened as she floated softly to the ground. "~Nooooo...~" Upon hitting the ground, she whimpered, "P-Pink Fizz... You... You were always my...best friend......" With her "dying breath", a change seemed to come over her. Her wings slowly disappeared, and her general coloing seemed to change to a brighter pink. Her eyes fluttered open, and she looked around the classroom. She slowly turned her head from one side to the other. As she surveyed the room, she spied Twilight and loudly gasped. "TWILIGHT! Where's your horn?!" ---- Before Pinkie's outburst, Twilight had been mulling over what Entropy said about the Elements of Harmony. "Hmm...it's true that there are six of you and six of us... Maybe we do share some sort of connection..." Suddenly, a look of dawning fear crossed her face. "Do you have the Elements now?" "TWILIGHT! Where's your horn?!" Twilight's eyes grew wide and she immediately shifted her gaze to Surpri- Pinkie Pie. "Pinkie?!"
Twilight's question took a second to register, but when it did he frantically checked himself over. Was it in his saddlebag? He rustled through it desperately. No... His head? He felt on top of his head. No...well of course not, you dolt! he thought. Twilight could have seen that for herself! He ran over to Darkshine, frantic. "Dark!! Do you still have the Element of Kindness?!" What if Constella took them?
Dark Shine tilted his head. "I never had the element of KINDNESS I had the element of LOYALTY. And, I dont think so." He put expression on the names of the elements.
Entropy facehooved. He was letting the stress get to him for SURE, this time. "O-okay." He took several deep breaths (as inconspicuously as he could; he still had his pride, and he couldn't let them see how worried he was) and then trotted back over to Twilight. "Ah, no. I'm afraid we probably don't. Have the elements, that is. With us." He took another deep breath.
Twilight gulped nervously. "Then...that means that...Constella..." She trailed off there, too afraid to finish her thought. After taking a deep breath, she looked back up at Entropy. "First things first: We have to get everypony else back to normal. Then we have to wake up. If we try to wake everyone up too soon, who knows what'll happen..."
Firefly glanced back at Dark Shine. [size=-2]"Wh-what is it? Why are you looking at me like that?" "Is there something wrong?"[/size]
Dark Shine popped his head up, in realization. "Huh, oh sorry. Its just... You remind me of somepony..."
Jhera was surprised as Pinkie Pie returned to her normal self. He was just playing with them. Turning towards the nearby Twilight, he said "Perhaps we have to perform actions that appeal to their true nature." He looked at the other four corrupted ponies and frowned. "I...I can't tell who's who though!"
Trotting away from the wall, Fizz left her post. She waved back to Jhera. "A ceese-fyuh! Ya 'it da pega'sigh so 'ard it knockedered 'er wings off!" She threw a hoof around Pinkie's shoulders. "E'rypony's Ponyville fwiend! I izzo gwad ta 'ave ya back!"
Seeing how Posey responded to his admonishment, the guilt becomes even stronger now. In fact, the way she responded to it is a lot like... Well, one never knows unless they try. He trots over to Posey to make a formal apology. "Look, I'm sorry that I snapped at you like that. It's just a topic that I feel strongly about, and I really don't like seeing something as beautiful as life made into a joke." His attention suddenly snaps to Surprise, who looks a lot more like Pinkie Pie now, when she makes her outburst. Perhaps Entropy's suspicions were correct. Wait, Entropy can't find the Element he brought with him?! Lightning starts to search for both the Element of Kindness and the flag from Pegasopolis that he had before they were suddenly sent into this classroom.
As Jhera finished his thought, Sparkler snuck up behind him and snatched a nearby piece of paper. “Yoink!” ----- Pinkie hopped up and down, eagerly returning Fizz’s embrace. ”I didn’t know I left, but okay!” She grinned and looked around. ”So, uh…why’re we in school?” ----- Firefly glanced around at the other ponies. [size=-2]”Who do I remind you of? Surprise? Or is it a friend of yours?”[/size] ---- Posey shrinks further into her seat. "Yeah...It...Uh, it's okay." She blinks a couple times. [size=-2]"Life is beautiful... I think...I think we should be more kind, and caring... It...I..."[/size] She suddenly faints. Her Cutie mark slowly changed back into three butterflies and her wings reappeared. Groggily, she rose to her hooves, then seeing the chaos of the classroom, she immediately dove under a nearby desk. [size=-2]"Wh-What's going on?!"[/size] Much to Lightning Chaser's dismay, the banner for Pegasopolis was also missing.
She giggles and rolls her eyes like duh! "'Cuz we dweamin', Pinkie! Captuh'd by dah skeemin' Constewwa. She dwopped us in cwass an' make us awe foal again." She points back to her fort. "I waz pweparin' foe her weeturn."
Dark Shine looked to Firefly. "You remind me of my friend called Rainbow Dash. The most loyal of all ponies." He smiled after saying it.
