Moondancer’s Dilemma:
One day in Canterlot, Moondancer was in her house, working on some spells and practicing her magic like usual. While searching for spell books, she finds one that states that it can make anything disappear. She wondered to herself how she got the book in the first place, must’ve been a long time ago but regardless, she sits down and reads through it. After finishing it, she thought that she could try it out so she placed an apple on a desk and blasted magic at it, causing it to vanish successfully. She practiced it a bit more, causing other objects to disappear and even using it to do some cleaning around her house. Satisfied with learning a new spell, she walked to put the book back but not seeing where she was going, she tripped on a pile of books on the floor and accidentally fired off the spell, hitting her shoes by the doorway and causing them to vanish.
When she recovered and saw her shoes missing, she started to panic, realizing that it was all of her pairs of shoes that she zapped into thin air. Usually she doesn’t wear shoes in her house, but when she has to go out she has some pairs ready to put on and now they’re all gone. She frantically read through the book again and was disappointed to find that there was no counter spell. She flipped through the other books in a hurry to find something but to no avail. Now staring at her now permanent barefeet with red and purple toenails, she sat on the couch and pouted, unhappy about her clumsy blunder. She liked her shoes and felt like a fool making it all go away by a reckless act of klutziness. Suddenly, it dawned to her that maybe in the Canterlot Library, there could be a book with a counter spell that she can use to bring it back. The only problem is that the library is a lengthy walk from her home and she doesn’t have anything to put on in her feet. She was never into the barefooter lifestyle and she weighed her options on what to do. Eventually, she gave up and realized that she had no choice in the matter and has to walk to there. The thought made her blush in embarrassment, but not affording to waste any time, she grabbed her book bag and took a final look at the spot where her shoes usually were, sighing that she wish she still had them. Then, she walked out the door.
She looked out at the bright sunny day and saw that there weren’t a lot of people and felt hopeful. She looked down at her feet and grumbled that she couldn’t believe that she was going to walk out in public without shoes just to find a book. With her head up and her sight onto the direction of the library, she began her walk. She started to blush a little bit realizing that she was in public without shoes like a hippie, and started to feel the heat beneath her soles on the sidewalk. Never having been accustomed to walking barefooted outside, the heat hit her with full impact and she started to feel a little pain. Walking faster to pick up the pace, she spotted a store front with an awning acting as shade and she sprinted to there, breathing a sigh of relief as her soles cooled down. A young couple walked by and saw her standing in the shade as they looked down at her barefeet and all the poor girl could do is wave back and say hello while blushing even more. The couple just stared for a bit and continued on as usual. She put her hands on her face and groaned at the realization that she has to repeat the process again and again until she makes it to her destination and having to handle other people looking at her as if she was mentally insane. It made her really embarrassed but she knew that there was no turning back now so she continued. The next couple of minutes was the same process of dealing with the hot sidewalks, cooling them off in the shade and having to awkwardly face the people walking by but slowly overtime her soles started to become more accustomed to the heat so she was having less and less trouble walking in the cement. With the library now in her sight, the one thing she had to do now was cross the street, which was made of cobblestone. With her destination in front of her and with no one else going down the road, she started to cross it but by the first two steps, a blazing scorching heat like never before hit her soles so she began to run until she got to the other side, panting heavily like she ran a marathon. She wanted it all to be over so she sat down on the steps in front of the entrance and examined her soles. She was horrified to find it red from the heat and a tiny bit gray with pebbles from her journey. She put it down and took a deep breath and marched straight into the entrance.
She walked inside and felt a shiver down her spine as her soles touched the cold ceramic floor, but to her it was a better feeling than the hot asphalt she was subjected to earlier. She looked around the building nervously and was relieved to find everybody distracted so she began to walk around close to the walls and shelves away from the tables so that nobody would look to get to the front desk. She looked around and still saw that nobody looked her way until someone by the aisle caught a quick glimpse of her and looked at her. She just looked at him like normal trying to conceal her embarrassment and made it to the desk. Still trying to hide her shame and humiliation, she asked her where the book on disappearing and reappearing spells are, and she was distraught to see it being pointed in the other side of the building. Moondancer gave her thanks and continued on, glad to see the librarian go back to her paperwork so she won’t be able to see her walk away. Unbeknownst to her, the librarian looked up as she was walking away and saw her bare soles slapping on the floor and was perplexed. Now having used to the cold floor of the library, she peeked at the aisle where the spell books are and saw that there was nobody there and started reading the catalogues on where they were. Finding out that there were close to the top shelf, she pulled up a rolling ladder and began climbing up, the wooden rungs feeling a bit slippery under her soles. She thought to herself that she really wished she had shoes on so she won’t suffer an accident and eventually made it to the shelf. Looking at the titles, she found a thick, leather-bound hard copy book on spells and used her magic to pick it up and flip through the pages hoping to find the spell that she wanted. She smiled and breathed a sigh of relief when she found it so she walked down the rungs carefully and walked back to the desk. At checkout, the librarian looked at her with a funny expression with her eyebrow raised and the poor barefoot girl continued to play it off as normal and told her that it was simply for spell practice. Not wanting to question one of her valued patrons, the puzzled librarian checked out the book and gave it to her. Moondancer simply gave her a thank you and walked off to the exit, with the confused front desk worker staring on with many questions swirling on her head.
Finally back home after hailing a cab instead of walking through the city again, she was relieved to feel her carpeted floor, the small bristles lightly tickling her soles and toes. She flipped through the pages and got to the page with the spell on how to reappear objects and began to read it carefully in the hopes of not wanting to mess it up. Confident that she had it, she aimed at the area where the shoes were and blasted a beam of magic at it, and saw that slowly, her shoes began to magically reappear. She collapsed on her sofa breathing the biggest sigh of relief she’s ever had and began to laugh to herself a bit that the nightmare was finally over. She now hopes to never make the mistake ever again, but another thought popped up about her experience. She disliked the sweltering hot concrete floor and the stares of others, but deep inside she had a bit of an appreciation of walking outside of her home without her feet trapped inside some tight shoes for hours on end. She looked down and wiggled her toes and chuckled to herself. It was an episode that she’ll likely never forget and she’ll still prefer wearing shoes, but it certainly was a mind opener for her and a new experience like no other.