Cutie Entanglement · 1:57am Nov 9th, 2014
This is what happens when I spend the early morning playing WoW with the Back to the Future trilogy in the background. I get bored and crap out a oneshot about adoracute ponies and time travel. No, I said ponies. Not elephants.
If this fic's cruel for being a oneshot, it's because it's a sliver of a vague idea I've had for an ongoing series. I lurve the concept of Time Travel, but--and maybe this is just me--but I'm sick to death of time travel always having to be some super-stressful situation where everything's coming down to the wire and all of existence hangs in the balance. Wouldn't it be nice to fantasize about hopping around through time just to... y'know... vacay beyond the boundaries of history? I mean, assuming one can overcome all of the nasty crud like microbiological pathogens and spatial incongruousness and rapid aging... it'd be fun to see a story about a pony going back in time just to hang out with Princess Platinum or chill with Clover the Clever.
Imagine such a laid back story feeling like a game of Myst... or being portrayed through journal entries of a pony who just happens to have a time machine in her back yard and decides to go prancing about through time on the weekends? Does a lack of conflict mean a lack of provocativeness?
F'naaaaa. I think I already know the answer to that question. And I also know when a fantasy must stay a fantasy, especially since I already have enough long-form stories to be concerned about.
And in speaking of Long-Form stories, yes, I do intend to get started on those this month.
Just... r-right after I take a quick shower...
Yeah...
-SS&E
Nope, it is not just you.
Bwarp
Bwarp
Bwarp
vrooooom
Sure -- write a long form time travel is fun story... Just don't change the migratory path of any butterflies, or Fluttershy while you are at it.
this must be done!
and don't forget the minor changes to the present that are neither good nor bad
If you want a short story where Time Travel is just kinda a thing, check out This Minuette just keeps getting worse by Fimbulvinter.
Ah... yes the Butterfly Effect or someone prefer to call it it Chaos Theory. Hope to see your new fic soon
There are much worse things than Cinderella III, fortunately.
You aren't alone in feeling that way about time travel stories, SS&E.
Yes.
Well then you're in luck! A recent issue of the MLP FiM comics had Discord take the CMC back in time. Granted, they end up getting in trouble with a pharaoh, but that's Discord's fault and that's the only threat. They literally explain that NOTHING they do will affect time at all, because it's already happened!
You could still have conflict, but without raising the stakes to stressful levels. Little adorable problems for little adorable ponies.
I wrote a story that was at least not as bad. Mostly it's just Dinky being adorable/strange with the Doctor and Derpy around, but in some cases they at least seemed to be in real danger. It's a little odd in that stressful things were allowed to happen but the Doctor was never the one to actually fix anything, even if he was trying. To give you an idea of the actual level of danger they were trapped in an oversized bowl full of greenery because a malfunctioning chef robot decided they should be served as a salad instead served a salad as it was originally programmed to do.