[Silver]

“Everypony grab your bags, and we can get started,” Midnight said. She floated her own bags over to herself and started stuffing them full of books she thought might be useful.

“Isn’t it going to be hard to travel with such heavy books?” Inspire suggested.

“I can’t risk not having the right information once we get there,” Midnight said.

“Here, I’ll help you carry some,” Sunrise said, taking some of the books out of Midnight’s bag and putting them into her own.

[Silver]

“Thanks,” Midnight said, sighing with relief. She didn’t know what she would do without such good friends around to help her.

Cider was wrapping up a lasso while Magenta tried to stuff some snacks into her packs. Whisper already had some bird seed and first aid items in her bag, so she was mostly floating around making sure everyone else was okay. Prism wasn’t really one for preparing or weighing herself down, so she was lounging around waiting for everyone else to be finished.

[Silver]

Sunrise and Midnight had already stuffed their bags full of as many books as they thought they could carry. It was finally time to go ahead and see what was going on.

“Is everypony ready?” Midnight asked. The various girls nodded and gathered near the door to the library.

“Well, here goes nothing,” Sunrise said quietly to herself. It looked like Inspire heard her, but she didn’t make a comment.

Together they traveled to the edge of the forest. It was dark and ominous and full of strange foliage. Even though it was right at the edge of their little town, they very rarely travelled into it. The place was full of strange magic that they didn’t want to mess with.

[Silver]

Everything in the forest was different than the rest of the world. Like it had long ago been corrupted by some strange force of magic. The weather went along on its own with no help from the pegasi, and it was always the same light level despite the time of day. Weird plants and mysterious magical pools dotted the landscape.

At the heart of the forest was a castle, and Midnight wondered if the castle was the centre of the problem. It seemed likely, considering the castle’s ancient and magical origin. If a weird magic fog was escaping from anywhere, that seemed like a likely place.

[Silver]

“We should split up and look for Precious,” Prism said. She reached out and yanked Whisper closer to herself. “You’re on my team. Team flying.”

Whisper squeaked a startled squeak, but she went along with it. She liked Prism and they were good friends. Plus, she knew that Prism could help to protect her. Not that she thought any of her other friends would fail at such a task. She just felt… safe with Prism around.

Cider and Inspire met eyes and grinned. They knew they’d be on a team together. Even though they were complete opposites in almost every way, they made a great team. For some reason they often ended up together, and they finally stopped resisting it.

[Silver]

That left Midnight, Sunrise, and Magenta to form the last little group. Since Sunrise had joined them, the groups always ended up uneven. They should find another crazy powerful magic lady to be their friend. Maybe someday…

Magenta started skipping into the forest humming a cute little tune. Sunrise and Midnight looked at each other for a second before running off after her. Prism grabbed Whisper by the hoof and zipped away through the trees. Whisper squeaked in surprise.

“Can we slow down?” she asked. “I’m not sure I can see Precious like this…” Prism pretended not to hear her.

[Silver]

“After you, darling,” Inspire said, bowing and letting Cider lead the way. Cider rolled her eyes but was happy to take the lead.

After a few minutes, Inspire thought to cast a light spell on her horn so they could see in the darkness of the forest.

“Ah, that’s much better,” Cider said. “That little scamp has to be aroun’ here somewheres. If only I had ol’ Windie around to help.”

“I don’t think Pearlie would be of much help,” Inspire mused. “Could you imagine?” The thought of her obnoxiously selfish pet cat trying to help them out made her smile. She really loved the little thing, but she was hardly very helpful like Windie was.

[Silver]

Meanwhile, Midnight was wandering around looking at every detail on every branch to see if she could find any clues. Magenta was popping her head into tree hollows and under logs to see if Precious would be in any of those places. Neither of them were very successful.

Sunrise was racking her brain trying to think of a spell that they could use to help them locate the rabbit. There had to be something in all of her studies that would help them out. When she couldn’t use her magic to help, she felt totally useless. It was the one thing she was really good at.

[Silver]

“Wait, what was that?” Prism asked. She dove toward the ground, shaking the leaves off the trees behind her.

Whisper never was very good at flying, so she followed Prism slowly. Eventually she got to the ground just in time to see Prism stuff her head into a bush. “Come back here, you little…”

“Prism, calm down, I think you’re scaring it.” By ‘scaring it’ she meant ‘scaring me’.

“Ugh, I think I saw him, but he went off into the bushes.” Prism explained. She ripped her head back out of the bush and a branch scraped across her face, causing her to bleed.

[Silver]

“Oh my gosh, Prism!” Whisper said. “You’re bleeding. Are you okay?”

“What? Yea. I’m fine.” She brushed the scrape with her hoof, smearing the blood around. It must look worse than it was, because she barely felt it.

“Wait, let me get you a bandage.” Whisper said, rummaging through her pack to find one. “No, too big, too tiny,” she went through many different things before she finally found the one she was looking for. Prism impatiently tapped her hooves on the ground the entire time.

[Silver]

“Here it is,” she said. She gently placed the bandage over Prism’s cheek where the cut was. “All better.”

“Thanks Whisper.” Prism sounded exasperated, but she knew better than to yell at Whisper. She was only doing what she thought was best. Whisper just wasn’t rough and tumble like she was. “Now about that bunny…”

“Oh, right! Where do you think he got off to?” Whisper looked more concerned than ever.

“I think he might be around here somewhere. At least, something was. Who knows what kind of crazy monsters live in a place like this.”

[Silver]

“M-monsters?” Whisper squeaked. Now normally she did well at taming all varieties of magical and mysterious creatures, but Prism’s reference to monsters made her nervous. Her imagination was running wild with the possibilities.

“It’s alright, you’re with me. I’ll smash any monsters who try to touch you. You know it.”

Whisper wanted to laugh at Prism’s bravado. It was something she admired about her friend. She wished she could be brave like that, sometimes. It would surely make things like this easier. Maybe that’s why she was always so close to Prism. They complimented each other perfectly.

[Silver]

“Woah! Did you see that?” Prism said, darting off into the bushes again.

“W-wait!” Whisper said. She floated above the bushes and tried to watch the rustling to see if she could spot what Prism was after. All she could see was Prism’s rainbow tail flicking around in the leaves.

“Come here, you little…” Prism continued to crash around, throwing leaves everywhere. Whisper covered her face and hoped that everyone was okay in there.

“You have got to be kidding me,” Prism growled, shooting out of the bush. Now she was covered in little cuts and scrapes from the branches.

[Silver]

“Sorry, Whisper. It was a squirrel. I thought it might be Precious, but it was just a stupid squirrel.”

“Oh no, is it okay? Did you hurt it?”

“Of course I didn’t hurt it! I’m not crazy.”

Whisper blinked a couple of times and resisted saying anything at all. Right now, covered in twigs and scrapes from the bushes, Prism looked mighty crazy. She wasn’t sure who she was more worried about: her friend, or the apparently scared little squirrel.

[Silver]

“Squirrely. It’s going to be okay little one, nobody is going to hurt you. I’m sorry if my friend scared you, but she’s just worried about our lost friend.” Whisper floated around the bushes, talking down into them and hoping that the squirrel could hear her.

“I’m hoping you could help us. Have you seen a little bunny around? I’m afraid that he’s lost and probably scared too. I can give you some lovely peanuts if you come out of hiding…”

Prism frowned. She knew what Whisper was doing, but she didn’t think it was going to work. That squirrel looked crazy. It must have been some kind of insane magical squirrel or something. This forest wasn’t known for its cute, harmless little animals after all. But if anyone could convince it to help out, it was probably Whisper. She gave her the benefit of the doubt.

[Event posts end here]