Magic on Mobius: Chapter 9

Location: Mountain overlooking (or underlooking) Angel Island

Twilight looked down in the general direction Sonic was pointing, looking for an island of some sort, but all that she saw beneath was more mountains and a small valley running the length of the pass.

“I’m not really seeing an island down there, Sonic. Just more mountains,” she said, slightly worried about her friend’s (oh how she loved that word!) sanity.

Sonic glanced over at where she was looking, then chuckled. “That’s cuz you’re looking in the wrong direction,” he said. He set her down and made sure that she was balanced. Then, placing both hands on the side of her head, he angled her head upwards until he was sure that she would be able to see the island in the distance. “See, right there. That tiny little speck in the air is Angel Island.”

Twilight saw the miniscule dot and turned to look at Sonic in amazement. “You have cities in the sky too? How do creatures get up there? I mean, I guess there are some Mobians that have wings to get up there, and there are always hot air balloons, but they seem awfully inconvenient to use frequently. Of course, I’m assuming that all creatures are able to stand on Angel Island. For all I know, only certain creatures would be able to stand on it. And, based on how far away it is, it looks incredibly massive. How do you manage to get a cloud to stay together like that for so long? Is it similar to how we do it? Or is it even a cloud? If not, how does it stay up in the air? And how does-“

“Twilight, you’re doing that thing with your words again that makes my head hurt,” Sonic groaned.

“Sorry, sorry! But since neither of us have wings, how are we going to get up there?”

“That’s easy! All we gotta do is…” Sonic trailed off. “Huh, what do we gotta do?” he asked himself, scratching his head. “Me and Tails usually use one of our planes to get up there. I probably shoulda thought this one through a bit more. Darn, and I was hoping you’d get to meet my frenemy.”

“Frenemy?”

“Yeah. You know, a guy who’s your friend and enemy at the same time? Like a rival, sorta.”

“Oh. I never knew that had a technical term for it.”

“Well, it’s not the term for it, per se, it’s just… what’s the word for street lingo that’s used pretty often, but isn’t in the dictionary?”

“Slang?”

“That’s the one. Yeah, it’s slang. I’m sure you two would really hit it off great. He’s cool with brainy people. Not very brainy himself, but he's good with people who are. But how’re we gonna get up there…”

Twilight closed her eyes for a moment, thinking hard. Sonic did similar, although his thinking involved tapping his foot impatiently. A silence descended between them, only broken by the steady rhythm of Sonic’s foot tapping. “I got it!” Twilight exclaimed. Sonic jumped back, startled, and wobbled on the edge of the peak for a moment, one foot on the ledge and the rest hanging over. He wind-milled his arms, attempting to regain balance, but it was no use.  Just as his foot lost purchase and he was about to go falling down, Twilight grabbed one of his arms and, with some difficulty, hauled him back onto the flattened peak.

“Well, that was a close one,” Sonic laughed jovially, looking down the cliff-face. “So, what were you gonna say?”

Twilight looked at him questioningly. “You almost died just now. You realize that, right?”

“Well, I wouldn’t say ‘almost died’. Maybe ‘almost fell’, but not ‘almost died’. I would’ve just flipped over and run back up here, that easy.”

“Uh huh. I’m sure that you would’ve done that. Now, as I was saying before you almost tumbled to your death-“

“I wasn’t going to die!”

“-if you could get us closer to the island, I think I would be able to teleport us up there.”

“Whoa, you can teleport!? Way past cool!”

Twilight’s ears flattened and she looked away, kicking around a rock with her foot. “N-not really. It’s just basic unicorn magic.” She looked up intently. “Although, my magic may work differently not that I’m in this body,” she speculated, more to herself than to Sonic. “Give me a moment, let me make sure that I can still use my magic the same way. I did it before with that metal, but that was more subconscious. Let me see if I can do it willingly…”

Twilight glanced around for something to test her magic on and happed upon a decently-sized rock about half as big as she was. Her eyes narrowed the tiniest bit and focused on flowing energy into her horn. A magenta aura surrounded her horn and the rock as it levitated from the ground and performed figure eights in the air.

“Good, I can still levitate things. Now, how about…” The rock stopped whizzing about and came to a stop in front of her. With a small poof, it turned into a large, delicious-looking pie. “Okay, now for the final test.” She shut her eyes lightly and the orange disappeared altogether! Sonic, who had been standing to the side watching in amazement, began to slowly clap.

“Wow… that was amazing! You made that orange disappear!”

“Did I, though? Look above you.” Sonic looked up in time for a lemon meringue pie to splatter across his face. “I always wanted to know what it was like to prank somebody. It’s really fun!” Twilight laughed as Sonic wiped the pie off his face and tried a bit.

“Hmmm. Not bad,” he said critically. “Could use a bit more sugar.”

“Noted. Next time I change the molecular makeup of an orange into a pie, I’ll make sure to add a few more sucrose molecules to it.”

“Uhhh…”

“It was a joke.”

“Oh.”

“Nevermind,” Twilight sighed. “I think I’ve got a hang of my magic now. Shall we see if it’s up to par?”

“Sure thing,” Sonic replied. He scooped up Twilight once more and the two took off through the mountain range. Well, not exactly “through” the mountain range. Sonic, to Twilight’s astonishment, somehow managed to leap from mountain point to mountain point. True, they were only several hundred feet apart, but it was a feat that seemed to require wings to do so.

“Do you have wings that you’re not telling me about?” Twilight asked as Sonic leapt a remarkable distance to another mountaintop.

“No, why?” he responded, landing lightly on one leg before leaping to another.

“It seems almost impossible to go so far without touching the ground unless you have wings.”

“It does seem like that. Guess I’m just that awesome,” Sonic said smugly. He felt Twilight shiver slightly. “You okay, Twi?”

“I’m fine, it’s just a little bit colder up here than it was down there,” she responded with another shiver. “D-don’t you feel it?”

“Not really, no. I’ve kinda gotten used to it after all these years. If you’re feeling really cold, I can take us down and run through the valley. It’ll take a little longer, but it’ll be warmer,” he said with concern.

“Thank you for the consideration, but I think I’ve got an idea. Keep going.” Sonic looked down at her, using his peripheral vision to keep on moving forward. Twilight had her eyes shut tight. Her long, flowing dress turned back into the casual wear that she had on earlier, making her shiver even more. But something seemed to be growing out of it. It started around her stomach and snaked loosely around the rest of her body, covering up her outfit, but not changing it. The blue-purple of her shirt was covered up by a strip of blue-purple… material, Sonic was no good with naming fabrics, that slowly wrapped around her stomach and moved up to her chest, splitting off into three to continue wrapping around her arms and her head. Her hair, before being pushed about wildly in the wind, was pulled back into a neat pony tail by the material. It was then pulled into a hood of sorts that let her hair continue to whip about behind her, but covered most of her head, excluding her face. It simultaneously finished covering her arms and head, then took up wrapping around her legs. As it did so, the colors switched to a more white-pink mix, still in the vortex pattern, and white fur started to line itself along its edges. Twilight’s cutie mark appeared above her left breast just as it finished wrapping around her legs, revealing it to be a fluffy winter coat. All of this happened in a span of seconds, Sonic only being able to see it so clearly due to his super speedy eyes. To most others, it would have appeared that the coat-for that was what it appeared to be- had simply popped out of nowhere.

“Nice coat. You’ve really got the hang of that dress thingamawhosit now, huh?”

She opened her eyes and looked down with a smile. “I guess so,” she said happily. She settled back into Sonic’s arms, feeling warm and cozy.

“Can ya make it blue?” Sonic asked.

“Why would I want to make it blue?”

“Because True Blue is the most radical color ever, and, coincidentally, the color of yours truly,” he responded, as if it were the most obvious thing in the world.

“I don’t see why not,” she giggled. She blinked and the coat went from white-pink to, to Sonic’s surprise, a mix of his True Blue and the color of his Classic-self. “How didja know that’s the color I was back in the day?” Sonic asked.

“It is? I didn’t realize. I just thought ‘blue’ and these were the two colors it came up with. Peculiar. Maybe it responded with your biological wavelength.”

“Whatever you say, Twi. Hey, do you think we’re close enough now?” Sonic asked. Twilight looked forward to see that they were a little less than a mile away from the looming Angel Island.

“At the speed you’re going, we should be close enough in a few seconds. Hang on for teleportation!” Twilight yelled. Sonic gripped her tightly. As soon as she thought she was in range, Twilight squeezed her eyes shut and concentrated on her horn. A flash of magenta surrounded them and they disappeared in midair, just after Sonic had performed his last leap.

-----On top of Angel Island-----

“AAAAAAAAAAAGH!” A cacophony of branches breaking and leaves being smacked erupted from the forest atop Angel Island. A blue blur smashed through the overhanging foliage and hit the ground hard. He lay there for a moment, not moving, then sat up with a groan. “Well, I’m sorry to say that that wasn’t the worst crash into land that I’ve had, although it’s up there. You okay, Twilight?” He dusted himself off as he waited for a reply. When he didn’t hear one, he looked around. His Unicorn companion was nowhere in sight.

“Twilight?” he said a little louder. Still no response. “TWILIGHT?” he shouted. Nothing.

Oh man, did something go wrong with her spell? he thought worriedly. I’ve gotta find her, fast! Who knows what that chucklehead’ll think once he sees her. Sonic picked a random direction and took off, hoping that he would find Twilight before someone else did.

-----On a different part of Angel Island-----

“AAAAAAAAAAAGH!” A purple and blue blur landed hard on top of a giant red mushroom that sunk heavily down, absorbing the impact of her fall. Then, with a small boing, it bounced her off at a considerably reduced speed. She jumped into the air high enough to see that she had made it onto Angel Island before falling back down to the ground. She landed hard on her hooves, but being a pony, her legs absorbed a good deal of the impact, leaving only a slight stinging sensation at the bottom of her hooves.

“Well, that was quite a fall. Are you okay, Sonic?” She too received no reply. “Sonic?” She looked around. There wasn’t an ounce of blue in sight. “That’s strange. We must’ve been separated from the teleportation combined with Sonic’s momentum. I’ll keep that in mind for the next time I teleport.” Twilight looked up thoughtfully.

“Well, I know nothing of this terrain, but Sonic seemed to, and they say that the best thing to do when you’re lost is to just stay put. I’m sure Sonic will find me soon if I just wait here. Maybe get to a little higher ground so I can see what’s around here better.” She paused. “And change my outfit. It’s surprisingly hot up here.” With almost no effort at all, she retracted her coat, leaving her in her jeans and t-shirt with her hair still pulled back.

“Still too warm.” Her jeans unraveled up to her knees, leaving her in shorts. The sleeves of her t-shirt folded back again and again, maintaining their thickness, to leave her in a tank-top.

“Much better.” After a slight moment of indecision, she chose a route that seemed to have a path sloping upwards and began walking.

After several minutes of walking through the mushrooms and a forest, Twilight arrived upon a small clearing. In the center of the clearing was a large stone altar surrounded by seven pillars, all decayed and covered with moss from age. Twilight could barely see a green light glowing from atop the massive altar.

“What could that be?” she asked curiously. I really need to stop talking to myself. She approached the altar slowly. A twig snapped behind her. Twilight froze. A slight growl seemed to be coming from the bushes behind her.

“Just what the heck do you think you’re doing on my island?”