DISTORTED RESONANCE

A My Little Pony: Friendship is Magic Self Insert

By Tangent

PREREADING AND EDITING ASSISTANCE BY:

None, currently…

DISCLAIMER: 'My Little Pony: Friendship is Magic' and all characters therein belong to Hasbro. This fanfic has been produced for my own enjoyment and to pass on without profit. Other characters that come into play in this fanfic may or may not be pulled from other sources (including other fanfics, RPGs, manga, anime, literature, or possibly even gasp American comic books!).

TAGS: Self Insert; Alternate Universe (close-to-canon subtype: events already in motion prior to the point of insertion haven't changed noticeably, but subsequent events won't necessarily happen as they did in canon); Deconstruction

PROLOGUE (in four parts):

I don't actually remember much about how I arrived in Equestria. I have vague memories of being in a car wreck, but after being in more than my fair share of those, I get enough nightmares about being in even more of them to cast doubt on whether I'm remembering a memory or a nightmare. It may have been some other horrifically painful event.

On the other hand, for all I know, I simply transitioned over while sleeping peacefully in my bed. Or in the middle of a crowd in the mall. Perhaps I had a bad case of the hiccups or belched so hard I booted myself out of reality? Still, pain on arrival at least implies a traumatic event on departure, and my arrival in Ponyville was certainly dramatic enough for narrative causality to almost require that my exit from my previous existence be appropriately traumatic.

Unfortunately, I may never know for sure.

Oh, I do know some things about my arrival in Ponyville. It was accompanied by a flash of lightning right out of the clear clue sky, and I apparently popped up right where it struck the ground. There was even a scorched outline of my body where I appeared, but that had been cleaned up long before I ever woke up in the foals' ward of Ponyville General Hospital. Fortunately, I did manage to wake up before they transferred me over to long term care.

I'm not sure who named me Crystal, or why. I certainly wasn't in any condition to tell them otherwise at the time, and I wasn't exactly very communicative for a while afterwards. By the time I did start talking to other ponies, I had been Crystal long enough that I just didn't see the point of correcting anypony about it, or (more likely) using Tangent instead.

It also took about that long for me to recover some semblance of mental clarity and emotional stability, during which time I had withdrawn into a shy, introverted fugue. Which was just as well, because it kept my random babbling from being audible as I struggled to come to terms with my new situation.

Tartarus, it took me half a year to realize that I was not only a pony, but specifically a unicorn, which was when they finally removed the inhibitor ring that had been placed around the base of my horn to prevent uncontrolled magic flairs from burning out my immature horn.

Suffering from a combination of a bad concussion and being electrocuted was apparently bad for my young neurological system. Who knew?

*Time Skip*

Once I could safely access my magic, I immediately started in on figuring out just what I could do with it. Which, as a filly, wasn't a whole lot.

Seriously, that episode where Pinkie first babysat for the Cake twins? The one where Pumpkin comes across as some sort of unicorn wunderkind? That's actually fairly normal - for a unicorn foal between one and six months old. After that, the developmental process overbalances in the other direction while the body transitions past the foal stage.

Once a unicorn filly or colt regains access to their magic, it starts out as a weak trickle of power. Maybe enough to lift a pebble or turn a page. Left alone, this will gradually improve on its own to a limited extent. Doing more than just lifting and simple manipulation requires a certain level of focus, and most young minds lack the patience to learn how to properly multitask with their magic until they are older.

That, and apparently, most young fillies and colts find the levitation exercises to be tediously frustrating and boring, because until they get the hang of splitting their focus they generally end up stuck in one spot while they try to do anything at all with their magic. This can be very frustrating for an energetic youngster who mainly wants to run around and play rather than sit around trying to do a task that can be done quicker and more easily with a hoof or mouth.

Well, good for them. I have the opposite problem in that I didn't spend my early formative years learning how to use my hooves and mouth to accomplish anything. I had to learn how to do all those things after already being past those critical developmental years. Which basically amounted to me being a bit clumsy whenever I tried to do anything but the most basic of tasks without using magic.

Seriously, the doctors still think that I suffered some sort of brain damage from whatever magical event brought me to Ponyville. They also don't seem to realize that I can understand them when they start talking to each other about my case like I'm not there. I certainly never bothered even attempting to convince them that I hadn't been born a pony.

I'm getting better though.

Really!

For a given definition of better anyway…

*Time Skip*

Two years.

Two.

Years.

That was how long it took Crystal to learn how to manipulate objects with her mouth and hooves as well as the average filly of her apparent age.

Two years of being called 'Clumsy Crystal' or 'Crystal Klutz' by Lollypop and Vanilla Swirl, two fillies whom Crystal assumed to be the equivalents of Diamond Tiara and Silver Spoon.

Two years of scheduled physical therapy sessions as she 'relearned' how to intermingle the minor level of magic and specialized frogs that most sapient ungulates had, and how to properly handle objects with her lips, teeth and (if absolutely necessary) tongue.

On the other hand, two years of essentially having to rely primarily on magic to do even the most mundane tasks other than just moving around put Crystal in the top tier of unicorn fillies her apparent age group. Which put Crystal more or less on par with her foster sister, Rarity, and Lyra Heartstrings, with Rarity having a sleight lead on fine control while Crystal had the edge when it came to capacity and Lyra being better than either of them in the part they were weaker in.

Two years of school plays and talent shows to drive Crystal nuts. Mostly because Rarity, beloved foster sister though she be, reacted with the same overblown sense of drama to her role as costume designer every single time.

Honestly, Crystal had given up on trying to be there for Rarity during the Sonic Rainboom three plays ago.

Instead, she had once again wandered off to the outskirts of Ponyville to experiment with her magic. Today's idea was to see if she could form a ring or loop from her aura and spin it as a way of building up and storing thaumic energy that could be used for another spell later. She already knew that magic could be coiled as a way to amplify a spell before it was fully cast, but the possibility of actually forming a sort of mystic 'fly wheel' that could be separate from any single other spell and put to multiple purposes was intriguing.

Tartarus, Lyra would have loved this problem. Granted, Crystal could have asked to apply to Princess Celestia's School for Gifted Unicorns, but her experience with living in a crowded barracks in her first life (that she knew of) pretty much soured her on the idea of spending even part of the year in a boarding school. And Rarity wasn't interested enough in expanding her magical versatility to really want to go herself, although Crystal knew her Foster sister most likely would have if she herself had insisted on going.

Crystal didn't know whether to feel relieved or guilty about that, really.

Besides, it was bad enough she was already living with one of the Mane Six as Rarity's foster sister. Crystal could adequately imagine what might easily happen if she had insisted on applying and ended up causing Twilight Sparkle's turn in front of the entry exam board to be delayed. Quite frankly, most of the alternate futures depicted in the season five finale were horrifying enough to make her want to avoid possibly screwing up Twilight Sparkle's affinity with and for magic in general.

No. Better to leave off the possibility of encountering Twilight Sparkle for another eight years, which was when she'd eventually arrive in Ponyville for the pivotal Summer Sun Celebration. Crystal could then help Purple Smart make friends then. Well, at least be a friend, anyway.

Or, at the very least, have preparations ready for a party of seven mares intent on entering the Everfree Forest under extended nightfall, because dammit the only one of the Mane Six who actually knew anything about even basic woodland survival was Applejack, and Crystal wasn't about to let her foster sister go off into a dangerous situation without her!

Thus, the Thaumic Flywheel spell that Crystal was trying to form. A way to store up mystic energy prior to and between encounters so that she could respond swiftly without having to gather her mana on the spot.

Thus far, the experiment was yielding some promising results. Crystal had at least managed to get her aura to form into a loop. A bit wobbly at first, but applying a spin to it had smoothed that out in short order. Carefully, she nudged more mana into the aura hoop, causing it to spin faster as it accumulated more thaumic energy.

A little more…

A little more…

Hold it…

Okay, time to see if she could draw mana back out of the hoop…

Nothing complicated for the first attempt - just a simple spark should do…

Careful…

Careful…

BOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOM!

"SWEET MOTHER OF CELESTIA! WHAT WAS THAT!?" Crystal shouted as the unexpected thunder from the clear sky caused her to lose control of the thaumic flywheel, which in turn fed all of it's collected energy into the tiny spark she had been oh so carefully trying to form.

The resultant shockwave and beam of raw magical energy from that was not quite as impressive as the fiery rainbow colored sonic shockwave in the sky.

"Oh, Tartarus! I hope I didn't hit anything important!"

It wasn't until she encountered her foster sister, who had also been on her way home after her own unexpected misadventure, that she discovered that she had acquired a Cutie Mark. Which was apparently a double hoop or shockwave the color of her own magic. Rarity, naturally, acquired her own Cutie Mark later that night at the school play.

The double Cutecinera was fun.

Being grounded for a month for attempting an unproven and possibly dangerous spell without supervision was not.

*Time Skip*

Crystal Synergy looked around her as she drank the pint of lager she had ordered. Everything looked exactly the way she had imagined it would. Tartarus, even the proprietor's name was the same, as well as the names of his three grandchildren. Barley's Diner was real.

Barley's Diner & Delicatessen, a hypothetical establishment she had thought up as a world building exercise, that had no basis at all with show canon other than the fact that it was possible within the context of the setting, was real.

It had been eight years since her arrival on Gaia (and what an interesting revelation just the name of the world was), and she was having difficulty trying to keep what she remembered of My Little Pony's canon and fanon from blurring together. The two years it had taken her to learn how to write legibly, whether with her mouth, the unfamiliar way her hooves worked, or with her magic, had not helped matters. As the indecipherable scribbles of crayon and intermittent ink smudges in her early journals could attest to.

Journals that were now probably worse than worthless, given that the attempt to keep canon and fanon separated in her memories might just have been six years worth of wasted effort.

Buck it. Forget the one drink limit for once. Crystal needed something stronger, because she certainly did not want to be sober at the moment. Paying Barley for the meal and the drink and tossing a bit into the tip jar, she left the diner and headed home.

Time to see what was in that liquor cabinet. The unicorn foal proof lock shouldn't be too hard to figure out. Her foster parents didn't need to use a key after all…

"Tell ya what. For two bits you can have the lot," Applejack stated.

"Why, thank you, I think I'll take that offer," Rarity replied as she purchased the last six apples and put them in her saddle bags.

"Not like I would want to keep the stand open with just two apples left."

"Even so, I-"

"Rarity!" a blonde maned grey pegasus with yellow eyes flew over. "Come quick! Pinkie found Crystal wandering around aimlessly and babbling all sorts of nonsense, so she sent me to find you. We think she might have been drinking. Her breath smells like whiskey…"

"Oh dear…" Rarity ran off after… Muffin? Crystal called her Muffin anyway, even though most other ponies tended to call her either Derpy or Ditzy instead. Rarity was sure that her name was actually something else instead, but it had been so long since she heard anyone use it that she wasn't sure what it really was. Babbles perhaps? She'd have to ask.

Later.

Right now her sister needed her!

"I'm comin' too!" Applejack called out as she flipped the stall's sign over and galloped after them. "Some mares get down right ornery when they've had a few. I'll come along in case you need a hoof reining her in."

They found Crystal in short order, sitting near Sugarcube Corner alternating between crying and laughing hysterically as she leaned against Pinkie Pie. The pink mare sat there next to her with a foreleg around her shoulders comfortingly, her own expression a mix of panic and concern.

"She won't stop," Pinkie told them as they approached. "She keeps babbling about King Sombra, Nightmare Moon, the Crytal Empire, and some really randy mare named Molestia. And a bunch of other stuff too, but most of it was really hard to understand. And she keeps laughing and crying at the same time, but not in the good way! She's really really sad and I don't know what to do-hoo-hoo!"

Crystal stiffend, and seemed to sober up in an instant (only seemed, mind you - she was still three sheets into the wind).

"Don' be sad, Pingy," Crystal slurred. "Yer the happy one. You make ponies ha *hic* happy, and makin' ponies happy makes you hoppy. Happy. Wha'ever. Iz wrong to make you sad. Who made you sad, Pingy? Ima beat 'em up…"

"Crystal, dear, please stop. You're upsetting Pinkie Pie."

"Hiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiii, Sis!" Crystal called out cheerfully, then scowled. "Waitaminit… I upset Pingy? She's my bes' frien… I can' upset my bes' frien'! Ima beat me up!" And with that declaration, she hoofed herself in the face.

Hard.

"Wuz tha' it?" Crystal growled, bleeding from her lips and one of her nostrils. "I di'n feel a thin' ya wuss! Ima gonna have to hit me harder!"

"Hold on there, Sally," Applejack stated as she restrained Crystal's forelegs. "You're upsettin' your sister and friends, beating yourself up like that!"

"I am?"

"Please don't hit yourself, Crystal," Pinkie requested desperately.

"Allrigh'" Crystal nodded agreeably and relaxed. "Yer a gud pony, Pingy. Don' be sad…"

A sad guitar tune seemed to start playing without any discernable source.

"Is that a Heartsong starting?" Rarity asked, looking around for whoever might be playing the instruments.

"Not just a Heartsong," Applejack stated, abruptly letting Crystal go and taking several cautious steps back. "A drunk Heartsong! Watch yourselves, everypony - no telling' what'll happen!"

And then Crystal Synergy started singing a song from her memory to Pinkie Pie…

"When your rife with devastation,

There's a simple explanation;

You're a toymaker's creation,

Trapped inside a crystal ball!

"And whichever way he tilts it,

Know that we must be resilient!

We won't let them break our spirit,

As we sing our silly song!

"When I was a little filly,

A galloping blaze overtook my city.

So they shipped me off to the orphanage.

Said ditch those roots if you wanna fit in!

"So I dug one thousand holes,

And cut a rug with orphan foals.

Now memories are blurred,

and their faces are obscured,

But I still know the words to this song!

"When you've bungled all your bangles,

And your loved ones have been mangled,

Listen to the jingle jangle,

Of my gypsy tambourine!

"'Cause these chords are hypnotizing,

And the whole world's harmonizing.

So please children stop your crying,

And just sing along with me!"

And with her very first Heartsong finished, Crystal Synergy kissed Pinkie Pie full on the lips then fell over sideways and started snoring.

"Well, that just happened," Applejack observed dryly.

"That's so sad," Pinkie cried, her frizzy mane drooping as tears welled in her eyes.

"We never knew," Rarity said. "Crystal never talks about her past."

"Wait," Applejack looked between the two white unicorns. "I thought she was your sister?"

"Foster sister, actually," Rarity corrected. "We kept waiting for someone to come to eventually show up looking for her, but I guess that day will never come. We the only family she has left now."

"Well, come on," Applejack began as she shifted Crystal off of the ground and onto her back. "I'll help you get her home and into a bed. Wouldn't be the first time I hauled a drunk pony to their house…"

A few weeks later, in Canterlot:

"Pardon me, Princess. It's another package from that anonymous source in Ponyville."

Princess Celestia smiled and bid the guard approach with a beckoning hoof, wondering what the mysterious young artist in Ponyville had sent her this time. The chosen medium was always the same, and the accompanying writing had thus far proven to be completely illegible, but she thought it was sweet, and had set up a small gallery to display the submissions whenever they came. And then Twilight Sparkle had found out about it, leading to her making her own submissions, soon to be followed by submissions from her study lab partners. And thus the display had become the Gallery of the Young.

Then the submissions from Ponyville had become less frequent for a while, but each time the quality of both the art and the writing had shown improvement. This time the gap had been nearly three years, and though they were still rendered in colored wax, the improvement in skill was striking.

The first depicted a rendition of the Cerberus guarding Tartarus running free above ground while a frail looking centaur was shown in a cave beneath, leaving shackles and cage behind. The legend under it stated only 'Beware.'

The next drew a gasp from the princess as she saw a lovingly beautiful rendering of the Crystal Empire. While hardly perfect, it was far far more accurate than any of the attempts to depict it made by various artists over the past few centuries. The legend for this one said 'We Shall Return.'

Celestia noted with interest that the next picture was of none other than King Sombra, again with the simple legend of 'Beware.'

"A seer," Celestia commented. "Our mysterious young artist is a seer."

The one after that was a startlingly accurate rendition of a changeling queen and several changelings, with the caption stating 'We Hunger.'

The next page only had writing on it. 'The last two pictures comes first.'

Almost hesitantly, Celestia lifted it to reveal none other than Nightmare Moon in full regalia flying underneath a pristine moon without the mare's head crater pattern it had bore for almost a millennia. The legend for this one was the ominous 'It shall be Darkest before the Dawn of Hope.'

And the last one brought tears to her eyes…

"What is it, my Princess?"

The image, lovingly rendered in colored wax, depicted herself and Luna sitting side by side, with the legend 'Sisters Once More' inscribed beneath it.

"It is a message of hope, Sergeant. It is hope…"

END PROLOGUE…