Broken and Beautiful: A Story About Overcoming Depression

Prologue

   Crystal Prep was a private school in downtown Canterlot City. Most people considered it one of the most uptight schools in the state. It wasn't entirely wrong to assume so. Many people in Crystal Prep weren't the nicest people around. However, there were some rare flowers that bloomed in Crystal Prep- the nice students weren't as often recognized.

   Twilight Sparkle was one of these nicer students who attended Crystal Prep. The only reason she had decided to go to Crystal Prep was because her older brother, Shining Armor, and her sister-in-law, Cadence, worked at the school. 

   Twilight liked the education she was gaining from Crystal Prep. The teachers knew what they were talking about and Twilight learned a lot of information from her classes. It was merely the other students that Twilight disliked. 

   Twilight was bullied and ridiculed by her peers due to the fact that she didn't fit in with the rest of them. Everyone in Crystal Prep kept to themselves and kept their heads held high, proud and resilient. Twilight was a shy introvert who preferred to keep to herself and study anything she could get her hands on. Her favorite subject was science. Twilight loved to learn how things worked. She read books on biology, chemistry, psychology, geology, and that was merely the start of her learning streak. 

  The other students realized this. Since most of the other students in Crystal Prep found it strange to not have a certain social standing, they picked on her for any reason they could find. They made fun of Twilight's love for books and called her a "nerd". They made fun of Twilight's looks and called her "ugly". They made fun of the way Twilight preferred to keep to herself and called her "strange" or "awkward". They made fun of Twilight for being too shy to show off and called her "untalented". The bullying and teasing was beginning to be too much for Twilight. 

   A group of friends that often picked on her consisted of five girls who were considered some of Crystal Prep's brightest minds. Their names were Sunny Flare, Sour Sweet, Sugarcoat, Indigo Zap, and Lemon Zest. Sunny Flare, Sour Sweet, and Sugarcoat were the worst of the bunch as Indigo Zap and Lemon Zest often just followed the other three around and did as they were told similar to sheep. 

   However, one fateful day, there was a school assembly that changed Twilight's life. The principal of Crystal Prep, Abacus Cinch, had announced that the annual Friendship Games were upcoming and they were going up against their rival school, Canterlot High. 

   Twilight knew that no student in Crystal Prep took the Friendship Games as an opportunity to grow closer to one another. Everyone in her school was highly competitive and she knew that all of her peers only had their minds set on beating the other school. 

   During this time though, Twilight had been studying the strange occurrence she had seen happening near Canterlot High. It appeared as if there was always strange or illogical happenings at their school. Being the curious person that she was, Twilight wanted to get to the bottom of it.

   One day, Twilight was certain that she had invented the key to figuring out what was happening at Canterlot High- a small locket that detected strange energy and led her towards it. 

   The day Crystal Prep was set to leave for the Friendship Games, Twilight attached the locket to a chain, smuggled her dog, Spike, into her backpack, and ran out the door eager to get some answers. 

   As soon as they arrived at Crystal Prep, Twilight was bewildered that everybody in the school already seemed to know her from somewhere else. Students addressed her by name in the hallways and they were being friendly. Twilight wasn't used to this, so she was caught off guard. As soon as her locket found strange energies coming from a nearby room, she was startled to find six girls that seemed to know her better than anyone else in the school. Their names were Sunset Shimmer, Applejack, Fluttershy, Pinkie Pie, Rainbow Dash, and Rarity. 

   Throughout the course of the Friendship Games, Twilight's locket seemed to be stealing this strange energy from the six girls that she met. She hadn't meant for the locket to be messing with the source this way, but it almost seemed as if the locket had a mind of its own. 

   Near the end of the Friendship Games, the unkind students from her own school pressured her into opening the locket and using the strange energy to win the games. Somehow being tricked into the notion that she could use this tactic to win the affections of her peers, she released the energy into the air. 

   This backfired greatly on Twilight and the energy had turned her into a shell of her former self- Midnight Sparkle. But the six girls used the very same energy to turn Sunset Shimmer into something beautiful and sent her up to talk to Twilight in her changed form. Sunset Shimmer insisted that this energy Twilight had been studying was magic and after what Twilight had witnessed, there was no way she couldn't believe her. After turning Twilight back into her original form, the six girls offered to be Twilight's friend. 

   Twilight discovered from the six of them that the reason the entire school knew who she was before she came was because of a counterpart from an alternate universe. Twilight was skeptical to believe this at first since she was a woman of science, but she couldn't argue with them after seeing what they could do. Twilight's counterpart was a unicorn from a dimension called Equestria and it all sounded so bizarre. Her counterpart was even a princess and could communicate with them via a magical notebook. 

   Twilight decided that the kind, welcoming environment of Canterlot High was more suitable for her studies than Crystal Prep and decided to transfer to Canterlot High. Twilight was now very close to these six girls and she was glad to be a part of their group. 

   During the summer of that school year, Twilight decided to sign up and follow her friends to a campsite called Camp Everfree with the rest of the students in Canterlot High. At the camp, these strange magical incidents were happening once more, but this time, it was more intense than the last time. Twilight was convinced that it was her fault and that Midnight Sparkle was emerging from inside of her to return, but she and her friends discovered that the magic was a result of seven geodes that one of the camp counselors was using to make herself more powerful.

   After defeating the camp counselor, the seven of them each got to keep the geode that gave them their magical powers. Sunset Shimmer now had the ability to see memories through touch, Applejack now had the strength of one hundred men, Fluttershy could communicate with animals, Pinkie Pie was able to make sprinkles explode in her hand, Rainbow Dash was as fast as lightning, and Rarity had the power to conjure magical force fields in the blink of an eye. Twilight gained the power to levitate objects with her mind. As difficult as it was to get her telepathy powers under control at first, she soon got the hang of it. 

   Now when they took the geodes back to Canterlot High, they could continue using their powers for good. 

   Twilight always had a great time with her new friends. They were supportive, caring, helpful, and loving just like friends should be. However, Twilight couldn't help but feel that she didn't belong with them. She still had lingering doubts from the students of Crystal Prep that she wasn't good enough. Twilight still believed the names that the students of Crystal Prep had called her. 

   Nevertheless, Twilight was sure everything was fine. After all, she now had six amazing friends, a great high school, and one of the top students in all of her classes. How could things possibly go downhill from here?

(A/N: Hello! Another new story about overcoming a mental illness. I also have two more stories like this in mind. One is for PinkieDash and one is for AppleDash (my OTP <3). I enjoy writing stories like this when I know that they might be able to help others through their own struggles with the mental illnesses. Please keep a lookout for the other two stories and I'd also love it if you continued to support this one.

Thank you so much for reading! <3)