Ranma saw the familiar sliding wood doors of a traditional japanese styled home she was well acquainted with and didn’t even stop to think before racing over to throw them open. Collapsing to the floor in relief, “I’m back,” she exclaimed happily to the assembled group who looked to be sitting down for a meal at the square table.
“I don’t know how it happened--,” she sighed in relief choosing not to question her good fortune. Her father Genma and mother Nodoka were seated next to each other. Akane, her fiance was next to her two older sisters Nabiki and Kasumi while the trios father Soun sat off by himself. “It’s only been a few weeks, did you miss me?”
“Who invited the horse?” Nabiki asked shattering Ranma’s euphoria.
“I’m not a horse,” she corrected, looking down to find that she still possessed the body of a pony. “Well I’m a pony but it’s me, Ranma!”
“It’s cute how it looks like its trying to talk,” Kasumi sweetly remarked.
“Why aren’t you listening? I am talking,” she would have stomped her front hooves in frustration but her ears caught the tail end of a whinny, and that stopped her cold. “But I can talk,” she tried again but it was only a long neigh. ‘Why is this happening? Have I been talking like this the whole time without realizing?’
“Don’t worry, I’ll take you someplace where you’ll fit right in,” Akane soothingly as she appeared at Ranma’s side, gently stroking a hand along her neck and through her mane.
Before she could plead with Akane, something was slipped over her head, a single band wrapped around her muzzle linked to another ring that went up around her jaw and behind her ears. “What’d you put on me?” she tried to back away but her head jerked painfully as Akane held tight a rope leading to a ring by her muzzle.
“Akane, get this off me now!” she demanded, raising a front leg to try and push it off but it wouldn’t budge. Akane made no move to listen to her so she tried her next option and closed her eyes to try and get it off with her magic.
Another quick painful jerk broke her concentration and when she opened her eyes she found that she was no longer at the Tendo home but the pig farm of Akari Unyru. That is if the giant form of her prized sumo pig Katsunishiki being ridden by Akari herself was any indication.
“Look what showed up at our house,” Akane declared happily and thoughtlessly jerked the rope holding her head again causing a sharp spike of pain in her neck. “Right away I thought she’d be perfect as a gift for your and Ryoga’s kids.”
“I’m sure they’ll love having a pony,” Akari gushed, sliding down Katsunishiki’s flank to land on the ground.
“I’m not some kids plaything!” Ranma jerked and pulled straining to pull herself free, creating deep ruts in the dirt but Akane held the rope easily and paid no attention to her efforts.
“And if the kids don’t want a pony, we could always sell her to that nice Kuno Tatewaki boy, I hear he was looking for a new broodmare,” Akane added, oblivious to Ranma’s increasing panic.
Ranma screamed and felt a sharp jolt before she fell out of bed tangled up in her blanket.
zx
Luna spread her wings and launched herself off of her balcony into the brisk night air. Giving a few hard flaps, she glided lazily around the tower dedicated to her. She had barely raised the moon an hour before and already the castle grounds were silent and empty. Like most nights she welcomed the quiet solitude, often feeling overloaded by all the activity of the day. And like most nights she found the way everypony shunned the wonders of her night en masse upsetting. But if she had patience then eventually they would see the beauty in the darkness.
But now was not the time to focus on the negatives, finding the right window, she hovered outside long enough to telekinetically open the glass window before she went through. Inside was the barren room Ranma had been given upon her arrival. It wasn’t a room fit for an alicorn but it was one of the better guest quarters that they had available, and they weren’t yet convinced Ranma would be around long enough to justify a proper room.
Closing the window, she silently made her way over to Ranma’s bed and sat down next to it. The red equine was sleeping turned away from the window, legs occasionally twitching underneath the covers. Being able to sense when ponies were dreaming was an ability she had slowly grown into since gaining her cutie mark. And judging by how strongly she could feel the reddish alicorn’s mental state recoiling, it must be a nasty nightmare.
It stood to reason that if she was capable of sensing the state of a ponies dream, then she may grow to be capable of influencing them. The temptation to experiment on a perfect subject was strong but she knew Ranma was having regular nightmares, and she felt too protective of the displaced creature to use her in that way.
“Ranma, wake up,” she whispered, prodding at the girl with a hoof to wake her up.
Her touch, along with her desire to know what was troubling Ranma, zapped her with a shock of static that made her recoil her hoof. A shiver passed over her whole body like a wave and she had to shake herself out to get her fur to stop standing on end. “Woah,” she gasped and wavered side to side feeling dizzy.
She had seen Ranma’s nightmare, just a flash of an image, blurred like she was looking at it from underwater. There had been a room with several indistinct human figures lacking details, the only one who did was a human mare with a short mane of dark blue hair who was directly next to Ranma’s point of view. Luna thought it was a she who was tugging on a rope tied to Ranma’s muzzle.
Luna didn’t know the full context of the scene only that Ranma was terrified and the humans were the cause of it.
She reached out to more forcefully wake Ranma from her nightmare, wondering if her touch would cause another vision. Ranma screamed, and the next thing Luna knew she was being knocked to the floor flat on her back by a blanket wrapped pony.
“Um-- are you up?” she hesitantly asked the moment she came to her senses, unable to remember the last time any pony or beast had been able to overpower her.
The little alicorn began speaking rapidly in her language, kicking and struggling to get out of the fabric wrapped around her. Luna heard the sound of fabric tearing instantly as Ranma’s monstrous strength ripped it apart. Having never been in such a situation, she panicked herself, wrapping her forelegs around Ranma, and trying to make soothing noises as best she could.
“It was just a nightmare,” she gently whispered, struggling to actually hold onto the smaller alicorn whose bucking was becoming too much.
Ranma’s wild blue eyes finally focused and her heavy breathing slowed to a normal pace. With one last long breath the red alicorn relaxed fully. “Luna?” Ranma asked in a small voice, continuing on in words Luna could no longer understand. But her body language said a lot, sinking into herself and trying to hide within the remains of the blanket.
“It’s alright,” she shifted to get out from underneath Ranma. The other alicorn was hopelessly entangled in her blanket, her limbs sticking through multiple layers. So Luna did the only reasonable thing and magically cut out the material from Ranma’s neck down past each leg to free her. “Blankets can be replaced,” she joked more for herself, seeing that Ranma was not wearing the pendant so she couldn’t cast the spell to communicate properly.
‘I didn’t think she ever removed it,’ Luna raised an eyebrow and stood up to look for the necklace, needing to know more about Ranma’s nightmare. Finding it on the small table against the wall, she levitated it over intending to place it back around Ranma’s neck but finding the little alicorn moving her head out of the way. “We need to talk,” she augmented her voice briefly with magic to speak with authority, drawing Ranma’s attention long enough to slip the necklace on her.
She was in the process of casting the spell but Ranma was trying to use her hooves to push the amulet off. A ponies front legs were quite dexterous but Ranma didn’t seem to be thinking clearly, and was merely trying to push upward making the movement awkward and ineffective.
“Calm down, I just want to talk about the nightmare you were having,”
“And I don’t!” Ranma growled, horn beginning to glow a blindingly bright white. “Who asked you to butt into my dream? I took this off for a reason.”
“Ranma, calm down,” she pleaded, looking away and shielded her eyes with a wing from the overpowering light.
“Wha-- what’s going on?” Ranma’s anger vanished into fear as her aura continued to expand, pushing Luna with enough force to slide her along the floor. “I can’t stop it!”
“It’s like a foals magic surging! You have to relax!” she called out, buffeted by a wall of mana that threw the few pieces of furniture in the room crashing against the walls. Luna took one step forward, then another, surrounding herself in a protective bubble as she slowly trudged her way towards Ranma.
Foals having a magic surge were ultimately a nuisance, too weak to cause any real harm. Ranma however was on the cusp of being an adult mare, transformed magicless biped or no, she was now cleary an alicorn beginning to grow into her powers. An errant thought was all it would take to cause devastation. “Keep your mind clear don’t think about anything happening!”
Suddenly the light and unrestrained release of mana stopped, causing Luna to slam forward on her muzzle. She allowed her barrier to dispel and ignored the small amount of pain in her nose to quickly look up to Ranma who stood frozen, head turned downwards where he necklace was glowing white.
“I thought about taking it off,” Ranma admitted with a nervous grimace.
The magically enchanted item dissolved like it was a cloud being dissipated.
“Oh no,” Luna gasped. Her horn flared, teleporting Ranma to her side, leaving the uncontrolled magic remained in place midair where it had been hanging around the red alicorns neck.
It was all she could do before all that built up power, released from the item holding its structure, was released.
Zx
Celestia’s eyes snapped open, her ears pinning back in vain to muffle the explosion that shook the castle around her. Up and out of her bed, she dropped down to the balcony a floor below, and slid to a stop outside at the railing. She immediately spotted the two story tall gaping hole in the guest tower, the top floor and roof beginning to topple inwards.
Taking to the sky, she cleared the distance with a single powerful flap of her wings to come to a stop beneath the falling tower. Her horn glowed and a yellow aura sprung up around the structure as it picked up speed. Struggling against the massive weight, she grunted as it forced her down towards the castle below. Wings flapping and horn glowing brighter, she struggled to arrest the momentum. She was nearly driven to the roof below before she slowed the towers fall to a crawl.
Sparing a glance below, she grimaced at the dozen ponies who had gathered to see what the commotion was, inconveniently putting themselves right where she needed to divert the tower remains. ‘Hopefully there’s no pony in this part of the tower,’ she fretted, and began to loosen her hold to divert part of her attention to the ponies below.
There was no room for error, the ponies below weren’t moving away fast enough, and she would not be able to hold the heavy load much longer. Altering her hold, she began to direct the falling portion of the tower towards the open courtyard putting the ponies below in great danger. Her eyes began glowing white, the nearest side of the courtyard rose up with a yellow wave traveling away from the impact zone, sweeping any pony in it’s path safely away, and holding them in a protective aura at the far end. Only then did she fully release the tower to crash into the open space, the roof breaking free to crush the outer wall.
Letting all her magic fade away, Celestia closed her eyes, and released a ragged breath. “That was quite draining,” she sighed, looking down briefly to see that the ponies below were already checking the wreckage, so she turned her attention upwards.
“Steward, are you alright?” a guard pegasus rose up to hover next to her.
“Not yet,” she answered worriedly, shooting upwards with a flap of her wings. “Where is Ranma? How did this explosion happen?” she asked, landing on a portion of stone that still appeared stable. Ranma should be incapable of such a spell so who could have?
“There was a bright light from the window and then it exploded,” another guard pegasus answered, the pair floating just in front of her. “I saw your sister enter through the window shortly before,” he added quickly.
“We must find them. Moon Shower, lock down the grounds, we can’t rule out this being an attack of some sort,” she commanded.
“Yes, Steward,” Moon Shower nodded, diving over the edge of the ruined tower.
“(guard 2), come with me,” Celestia launched herself back into the air to see if she could spot her sister and Ranma. ‘Is it possible that one of the nobles attempted to assassinate Ranma?’ she considered in horror. They had always been leery of her power over the sun and ultimately the power she held over them. Was the appearance of a third alicorn too much in their eyes? Did they fear an attempt to take over Equestria? Even after all they had done to remain neutral?
‘I can dwell on that later, for now I need to find my sister.’
zx
Deleted section cause I decided to heck up the castle.
Ranma “Luna-- am I making pony noises right now?”
Luna “Technically all thy noises are-- pony-- noises.”
Ranma blushing “Specifically like-- ya know-- a-- *whinny*”
Luna “thy made such a noise right now but no, not normally.”