Is Spike's fire a result of his unique hatching?

[ggg-2 3,553]

By which I don't mean the color. technicolor dragon fire is nothing new. What I mean is his seemingly unique ability to send and receive scrolls via flame. Could this be a side effect of his magical hatching?

[Thrond 3,263]

You know, I haven't thought about Spike's weird teleport-fire in a good while. Since we don't know exactly what the hatching spell was, it could easily be possible. I think it's equally possible that there are just many types of dragons, however, or that it was a spell cast on him some time after hatching. 

[Gamer Pizza 91]

Well, he WAS hatched using magic instead of incubation from the mother. If this is the case, then there’s a possibility that he has more power than we give him credit for.

[Truffles 2,033]

Not only is there a mystery about his hatching being related to his ability to send scrolls, we don't even know if it's him who has that particular magic ability. It could just as easily be the scrolls themselves are enchanted with a return spell that is activated by dragonfire.

We do know from the latest Princess Celestia short that dragons have their own magic (she states it explicitly) but we don't know what it is. It could be related to their fire breath, however.

It might then be a combination of a return spell on the parchment that is powered by the magic of dragonfire. This would mean any dragon could send these special scrolls if they used their own dragonfire. The scroll Garble tossed away back in his debut landed in lava so that scene isn't a useful indicator of how the spell works.

But if the scrolls are not enchanted, then it is indeed Spike and only Spike (so far) who has this ability, and he may be capable of sending things besides scrolls to the princesses.

However it works, it is more useful to use Spike than to teleport scrolls directly, since Twilight can be anywhere on the planet and as long as he's nearby she'll get the message. It isn't clear whether the scrolls he sends always appear next to Celestia or if they are enchanted to return to a specific part of Canterlot Castle. It may even be the spell can read the scroll since the message addressed to Luna in "Do Princesses Dream of Magic Sheep" seemed to go straight to her rather than Celestia. That indicates it's more likely the scroll targets the addressee directly and not a fixed geographical location. An interesting experiment would be for Spike to address a scroll to Twilight and try sending it and see if she gets it or not.

[Ganondorf8 11,322]

I'd like to think of that as a magical ability that was granted to him by Celestia, or perhaps the scrolls themselves are magical and their magic is activated by the fire breath of a dragon such as Spike.

[Fhaolan 4,484]

Well, there's a lot of weirdness around that fire.

Twilight seemed to be already familiar with the ability and it's reliability in the beginning of the show, so it's something she'd already had the time and opportunity to 'dissect' and analyze as a young student. Given her personality, there's no way she'd just let that kind of ability slide without extensive study. But that also means it would be something Spike had when he was younger, and more distractable, so given it's reliability it's unlikely to be a consciously developed ability.  

Because we've seen this 'send a scroll to Celestia' happen automatically without Spike paying attention (RD's prank spam attack), but it's been shown that it *can* send scrolls to other recipients (Luna, with which he really doesn't have much familiarity relative to Celestia). Yet, his flame can be used as normal flame on occasion (Well, as normal as melting iron within seconds is)... Maybe he has to concentrate for it to be *just* fire?

My best guess is that it's a spell effect put on Spike. Perhaps Twilight found a 'send a letter via fire' spell in her studies with Celestia and applied it to Spike simply because he was convenient (being young herself and more likely to do such a potentially invasive spell on Spike). And since his fire is magical in and of itself, the spell interacted unexpectedly and became 'permanent'.

[sweetolebob18 728]

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Well, for what it's worth: In Dragon Quest, Garble seems to have at least heard of it (He mocks Spike for belching up a letter from Princess Celestia) This implies that the ability isn't unique to Spike

 

[Will Guide 21,360]

I always considered it obvious that Spike being able to send and receive letters with Celestia was from being raised by her in his early years. We actually saw at the end of S1's "Griffon the Brush-off" that she had a special message tube installed so the letters no longer drop on top of her. You don't have to be Sherlock Holmes to figure that out.

As much as I wish that my Head Fanon of how Spike's egg came to be before the Entrance Exam for Twilight to be canon, I am willing to accept whatever the showrunners come up with if and when they are going to show it.

[Mortar 143]

I wouldn't be surprised if this ability was bestowed on him by Celestria.  After all, Twilight is her pupal and now fellow Princess, so she would need a way to get megs to her ASAP.

[Altastrofae 933]

We've seen that Celestia can send letters and has her own dragon with the same ability. I dont think its anything special

[Truffles 2,033]

6 hours ago, sweetolebob18 said:

Garble seems to have at least heard of it (He mocks Spike for belching up a letter from Princess Celestia) This implies that the ability isn't unique to Spike

Garble knew it was from Princess Celestia because her name and title were on the letter. I'm not sure how that says anything about the ability to send scrolls by fire.

6 hours ago, WiiGuy2014 said:

We actually saw at the end of S1's "Griffon the Brush-off" that she had a special message tube installed so the letters no longer drop on top of her.

Ha, that was a great inside gag! XD

However it seems by the time of "28 Pranks Later," she uninstalled it.

5 hours ago, CrystalBloodMoon said:

We've seen that Celestia can send letters and has her own dragon with the same ability. I dont think its anything special

I think if Celestia had her own dragon we would have seen it by now, especially when you consider all the times Twilight has lacked dragon knowledge. She certainly would have wanted to talk to this dragon if it were around.

[Altastrofae 933]

2 hours ago, Truffles said:

Garble knew it was from Princess Celestia because her name and title were on the letter. I'm not sure how that says anything about the ability to send scrolls by fire.

Ha, that was a great inside gag! XD

However it seems by the time of "28 Pranks Later," she uninstalled it.

I think if Celestia had her own dragon we would have seen it by now, especially when you consider all the times Twilight has lacked dragon knowledge. She certainly would have wanted to talk to this dragon if it were around.

We have seen it. I cant remember what episode, but I can try to find something

• • •

Okay, I guess we never saw it. I swear I remember her having a dragon, but I guess not. Still, she's sent letters, and they appear in flames. By way of logic, she has "something" with the ability

[Truffles 2,033]

9 hours ago, CrystalBloodMoon said:

Still, she's sent letters, and they appear in flames. By way of logic, she has "something" with the ability

Well, that's something is that she's magical. I mean, she can raise the Sun and Moon, so it stands to reason she should be able to teleport a scroll that triggers a dragon's gullet to emit flames and rematerialize that scroll for the recipient.

It does make me lean towards the idea that whatever spell is on Spike was cast by Celestia, and this is not something that was caused by Twilight hatching him as was speculated in the original post.

[Altastrofae 933]

5 minutes ago, Truffles said:

Well, that's something is that she's magical. I mean, she can raise the Sun and Moon, so it stands to reason she should be able to teleport a scroll that triggers a dragon's gullet to emit flames and rematerialize that scroll for the recipient.

It does make me lean towards the idea that whatever spell is on Spike was cast by Celestia, and this is not something that was caused by Twilight hatching him as was speculated in the original post.

Why cant this just be a normal draconian ability?

[Truffles 2,033]

6 minutes ago, CrystalBloodMoon said:

Why cant this just be a normal draconian ability?

It could be, but we just haven't seen any other dragon perform the same trick. Since we are getting a new recurring dragon character for season 8, perhaps we shall find out once and for all how this ability works?

[cuteycindyhoney 13,307]

The writers could clear it up by having Ember send Spike a letter via flame.

[sweetolebob18 728]

13 hours ago, Truffles said:

Garble knew it was from Princess Celestia because her name and title were on the letter. I'm not sure how that says anything about the ability to send scrolls by fire.

Ha, that was a great inside gag! XD

However it seems by the time of "28 Pranks Later," she uninstalled it.

I think if Celestia had her own dragon we would have seen it by now, especially when you consider all the times Twilight has lacked dragon knowledge. She certainly would have wanted to talk to this dragon if it were around.

Sure, that's how he knew who SENT it. What I meant was "if it was absolutely unheard of for dragons to be able to send and receive things that way, surely one of them would have been at least a little impressed"

As to Celestia having a dragon....maybe in the comics?

[Truffles 2,033]

15 hours ago, sweetolebob18 said:

What I meant was "if it was absolutely unheard of for dragons to be able to send and receive things that way, surely one of them would have been at least a little impressed"

I'm not sure there's anything about "pansy ponies" that would impress Garble and his ilk. Except maybe having the sun dropped on their heads?

[Karnak 187]

On 3/3/2018 at 1:41 PM, ggg-2 said:

By which I don't mean the color. technicolor dragon fire is nothing new. What I mean is his seemingly unique ability to send and receive scrolls via flame. Could this be a side effect of his magical hatching?

Actually, yes.  He does things other dragons can't, basically infused with certain magic.