• Published 8th Jul 2015
  • 318 Views, 1 Comments

Time! There's Never Enough of it! - GrandSpellcaster



Doctor Whooves finally cracks time travel, too bad really.

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Chapter 1: Waking Up

When the Blackness that had covered Twilight finally faded she was in a large bed in a lavishly decorated room. There was a small table with some hoof sandwiches set out and a steaming pot of tea. Realizing just how hungry she was she got out from under the magenta covers and walked over to the food. She levitated the little sandwiches to her mouth and poured herself a cup of tea.

Once she had finished her third sandwich she stood up and walked over to the door instinctively opening it with her magic. But as soon as it was a few inches open it slammed shut again and she had to flail open her wings and give a quick beat of them to keep from smacking her face into the door. She tried opening it again to no avail. Finally she used her front hooves to push open the door and she got it all the way open before it slammed back and would have hit her in the face if not for her horn.

As it was, it still hurt but she was more preoccupied with what she had seen on the other side of the door. It had been a stallion wearing full body armor decorated with national colors she was unfamiliar with. More importantly to her he had been the one who slamming the door.

She Decided to call out to him, "Hello, why am I here?"

There was the sound of the armor shifting and then a noble and stoic voice replied, "Forgive me your Holiness, but his Highness has ordered me to not allow you to leave this room." His voice was quivering slightly now, "Please forgive me."

Twilight had only heard the term 'Holiness' as an old term used to address the Princesses thousands of years ago. One of the important things about the term was that it was one meant to be used on those that were above royalty. She could use this, "Tell me why his Highness is keeping me trapped in here?" She asked hoping that pulling rank was the right thing to do.

"I'm sorry your Holiness but it is because of your servant that you are in this position. His Highness is worried that since you appeared to us with a mud pony that you may be here to attack us."

"What servant?" Twilight asked, wondering how she ended up in this position.

When Doctor Whooves woke up he was in a dreary room made out of stone bricks. He was resting on a bed of straw and he could hear the sounds of moaning ponies from the other side of the heavy wooden door. He called out, "Hello! Anypony out there willing to explain the situation?!" He waited a few seconds then said, "I figured not!"

He looked around the cell and found a stray piece of metal on the ground of his cell. It wasn't big, just the size of a pencil. "Well maybe I could use it to lever open the bars of the window." He thought aloud as he moved over to the bared window.

He started by testing each bar with his hoof, once he found out which one was the loosest he placed the metal rod in between two of them and began the work of prying the bar out of its place. It didn't take long for his hooves to slip and he dropped the metal to the ground outside.

"Darn, if only I had one of my inventions with me I could get out of here..."

The door flew open and a guard wearing full body armor walked in, "You will fallow!" He ordered.

Doctor Whooves raised one eyebrow, he recognized the colors and armor. If his time travel had worked then this guard worked for the Great Unicorn King, the one that started the events that would lead up to Hearth's Warming. Based on this Whooves chose a safer course of action. "Yes, Yes, very well." the guard turned and he fallowed.

"Care to tell me where we're going?" Doctor Whooves asked.

"No!" The guard snarled.

"Didn't think so."

Twilight had been brought to a lustrous dining hall where three unicorns were seated at the head of the table. The stallion, was dressed in a purple cloak with a golden crown encrusted with sapphires, he had a short beard and a well-polished horn. The two mares were dressed similarly except where the King had gold they had silver. The King smiled, "Greetings your Holiness, we are the Unicorn royal family may we invite you to supper?"

Twilight knew better then to decline his offer and took a place next to the Queen. "May I ask what you did with my companion?"

"Do you mean the Mud Pony?" The princess asked and got a displeased look from her mother.

"Now Platinum, we are in the presence of an alicorn. Surly you don't mean to imply that our guest is a third mud." At that moment all of Twilight's suspicions were confirmed for certain. She first suspected that she had traveled backwards in time when she remembered the armor and colors from several history textbooks she had read. Then she had seen portraits of this unicorn family in the Palace at Canterlot.

"Sorry mummy, its habit." Princess Platinum said looking down and interrupting Twilight's realization.

"It's not me you should be apologizing to." the queen said still agitated.

Princess Platinum turned towards Twilight and said, "Forgive me your Holiness, I spoke out of turn."

"Don't worry about it." Twilight said trying to give the same warm smile she had seen Celestia give ponies who thought they had messed up a thousand times before. Secretly to herself she thought I'll be returning home soon anyway, she remembered that time travel spells had time limits.

"Good" The King said before the princess could reply, "Now that that's dealt with, I think it would be prudent to answer your question your Holiness. He is being brought here as we speak. I beg your forgiveness but when the two of you appeared the guards had already hauled him off to the dungeon by the time they informed me.


Doctor Whooves was a little worried. In his youth he had traveled all of Equestria and beyond, he had seen many forms of ancient torture. He was especially worried since he appeared to be in a unicorn castle in pre-Hearths Warming times.

They stopped at a very fancy door where the guard pushed it open with his magic. He had expected an imposing throne room where he would get a chance to grovel at the feet of the ruler. What he saw utterly confused him. It was a dining hall where the ancient royal family of the unicorns and the princess of his time.

"Doctor!" Twilight was clearly surprised to see him here.

He however wasn't too surprised to see her here. "Right, I guessed as much." He pointed his hoof at her, "You ruined my experiment miss Sparkle." He accused.

"Bite your tongue!" The guard commanded, "You are in the presence of your betters!"

Doctor Whooves had done this song and dance before with diamond dogs, minotaurs, griffons, buffalo, and even Princess Celestia herself. His outburst was one of frustration and he realized that he probably wasn't doing his race any favors by accusing an alicorn of stupidity.

Before he could apologize for the outburst Twilight asked him, "How exactly did we get here Doctor?"

He had expected that she would be a little confused by it all but he wasn't about to discuss temporal physics in the presence of ponies who still thought Equistotle was right. "Surely we shouldn't speak of such boring things when we are in the presence of the royal family." He said trying to gage the reactions of the three unicorns in the room.

Twilight started to say something then thought better of it and said, "Okay, but can you tell me later?"

"Sure..."

He was going to say more when the king interrupted, "It’s perfectly fine your Holiness if you wish to speak with your servant here."

Whooves and Twilight made eye contact and she replied, "My friend doesn't wish to talk about it." Then wanting to change the subject she said, "Will you invite him to dine with us?"

This got her a distasteful look from the queen and princess Platinum but the king hid his discust behind a kind smile. "Yes I think I will." The turning his attention to Whooves he said, "I heard her Holiness refer to you as 'Doctor', so Doctor would you join us for supper?"

Doctor Whooves smiled slightly and said, "Yes, I'm famished. You didn't leave me anything to eat in that cell." This remark caused Twilight to noticeably cringe. "Where do you want me to sit?" He asked walking up to the table.

"You may sit next to our daughter." The queen said pointing to the spot opposite of Twilight. Whooves understood the power play, and shook his head, "If it's fine with you, I'd much rather sit next to her Holiness." He used the term 'her Holiness' to ensure that these unicorns would see his meaning.

Twilight seemed oblivious to what was going on and allowed Whooves to sit next to her.

Whooves took his seat next to her and he remembered the last time he was in this position. It was at one of the formal balls in Canterlot, he had been invited because he had attended the University of Trottingham with the party hostess. He had been told to sit at the end of the table by the hostess's mother, but had made sure he was sitting next to the hostess by the end of it. He didn't enjoy being told what to do and by ignoring the suggestion it was like saying 'you have no power over me' to the suggester.

"You're a doctor, are you?" The king asked, bringing Whooves back to the present...err...past. "Are you her Holiness's personal physician?"

"I'm not that kind of doctor." Whooves said ready for the question. "Mine is the realm of science, I have doctorates in general physics, biology, alchemy, magical entanglement theory, temporal physics and many more." He said listing off just a hoofful of degrees he had earned because he learned that most ponies loose interest after the first five or so.

"An impressive resume" the queen retorted with the slightest bit of annoyance in her voice.

"I've had a lot of free time ever since I stopped traveling." Doctor Whooves replied as one of the servants set down a plate of vegetables in front of him.

The servant then went over to the king and said, "Forgive me your Highness but He has arrived."

The king gave a weary look then said, "And who is He?"

"You know your Highness, him."

"Just tell me who him is!" The king ordered.

He leaned in close and whispered the name into the kings ear. Then the king asked, "Why has he come?"

"He said he felt a disturbance at the palace and rushed here from his tower to see if we needed any help."

"Well then send him away." The king said with a wave of his hoof.

Before the servant could get three steps away a golden glow covered the doors to the hall and they flew open to reveal a grey stallion wearing a cloak of constellations that seemed to move and flow as he walked. The bells on his hat and cloak gave a soothing twinkling sound. His short trimmed beard was slightly unkempt and he appeared to be roughly the same age as Doctor Whooves. He looked over in the direction of Twilight and without taking his eyes off of her he said, "So this is what you were trying to hide. You found one of the ascended."

The king stiffened and said, "Yes we did Star Swirl, and no you can't have her."

Author's Note:

Oh, you knew he was going to be in this.