2 The Witching Hour
Starlight found herself wandering the halls of the castle late at night. Her eyes ached with exhaustion, but she felt the need to familiarize herself with the layout beyond what one set of memories was telling her. “Oh come on! This is the fifth hallway that led me back to the map room! What is going on in this place?”
Her exasperated shout echoed in the building, still coming back a full second later. She walked closer to the map to examine it in more detail, or at least to see if the top remained a mass of magical ink, oil, or clay. Her left forehoof prodded at the surface, prompting a swift retreat as it almost seemed to suck at her frog. “You probably should leave the map alone. It’s clearly broken, and you’re just going to make it worse if you keep fiddling with it.” The voice of her new student chimes in from right behind her, for once not containing a trace of anger or resentment.
“You’re probably right, Twilight.” Starlight pulled away from the map, turning with a smile. She almost felt bad for Twilight’s new disposition, almost. It wasn’t like the mare hadn’t brought it on herself. “How was your day with Rarity?”
Twilight shifted her posture into one that was practically prancing on the tips of her hooves while mocking Rarity’s speech pattern. “Well I’d say it was absolutely delightful, darling. The trip to the spa was simply smashing, and I haven’t felt this relaxed since before I started obsessing over books. My back has never felt so good in the entirety of my life.” She theatrically threw a hoof over her eyes while leaning against Spike’s smaller throne and eased back on the mocking after clearing her throat. “She’s a nice mare, but what a drama queen.”
From across the room another Twilight walked into view. “Did you say something to me, Starlight? Who’s Rarity?”
Starlight froze, glancing between the two Twilights. “What? I-I don’t..” She lit her horn up, getting into a stance. “Twilight, this isn’t funny. I don’t care what spell this is, knock it off.”
“Funny?” The Twilight leaning against the thrones stood up straight, her eyes narrowing as she began to walk around the map table. “Is that what you thought your actions would lead to? A few laughs on your end and everything turns out fine with rainbows and smiles?” Her hoof came down on the table with a solid thunk, as if the surface were still crystal, while she came to a stop in front of Moondancer’s throne. “Because I’m not laughing, Starlight Glimmer.”
The other Twilight began to circle the map from the opposite direction, looking from it to the princess. “Starlight, I think you’re just stressed out and you need some sleep. Moondancer even said I wouldn’t be able to do anything more complex than brush my teeth for a couple days, remember?” She slowed to a halt in front of Lemon Hearts’ throne, her hoof also coming down to rest on the table’s edge in a more reserved manner. “How could I possibly be casting any spells that would make you hallucinate?”
“Or is one of us a changeling?” The first Twilight asked, gesturing to her doppleganger. “But then, how would I know who Rarity is? What do you think, Twilight?”
“Well, I have a hunch that one of us in the room is certainly a liar, and a mare who shouldn’t be here. The question thus becomes, who is that mare, and how would I know about what Moondancer said if I wasn’t the real Twilight?”
Starlight tried to put herself an equal distance from the other two mares without leaving the circle of thrones, edging left from her own throne to stand in front of Minuette’s while carefully not touching the map again. “I-I don’t understand…”
“Well, see there's a very simple solution here, Starlight Glimmer,” the first Twilight spoke, giving Starlight a smile. “Which one of us actually got into Celestia’s School for Gifted Unicorns? I know my answer, how about you ask her for hers?”
Starlight swallowed nervously, her ears laying back flat against her skull as she looked to the second Twilight. “W-well, fine then. Which of us managed to pass the entrance exam and hatch Spike?”
The second Twilight answered almost immediately, and it took a moment for Starlight to register that the two unicorns spoke in perfect unison this time. “I did, you cheating little liar. Better not touch that throne you’re standing in front of right now, you might implode from the depth of the lies you’re telling.”
“No! You can’t remember!” Starlight shouted, stamping her hooves on the ground. “This is my world now! You were stupid enough to let me alter the spell! You never deserved your wings, and now they’re mine!”
Both Twilights began to grin at this, their smiles broadening to a degree that was completely unnatural. Again, they spoke in perfect synchrony, “And so the truth shall set you free…” Thunder boomed through the castle, or something else much like it since it had been heralded by no lightning strike.
“Why can’t you just be a good filly and lose!?” Starlight hissed, her horn shining brightly. “Do I have to erase you entirely?! Make your mother miscarry?! Get it through your thick head that I won!!”
A tendril of blackness shot out from the surface of the table and wrapped around Starlight’s horn, followed by the deepest growl the poor mare had ever heard in her life as something began to pull on her magic. Three voices rang in her head now, both Twilights and something else, some other indescribable thing. “Selfish mare, that power is revoked by divine right of the Timekeepers.” The two Twilights began to dissolve into the blackness covering the table, their coat and skin sloughing off and leaving bare skeletons behind, which continued to talk. “You shall wreak no further changes for us to correct in the past. Your victories will be hollow. Your future is grim. You have as long as it takes us to clean up your mess to contemplate how wrong you were, and you will then be judged accordingly.”
Starlight jolted awake with a scream of terror, her eyes wide and furtively darting around the room. “I-It was just a nightmare, Starlight,” she assured herself, clutching her blankets close. “There’s no way she remembers. This is reality now, and no one can change it back.”
A knock sounded from her door before Spike cracked it open. “You okay, Starlight? Sounds like you didn’t sleep very well either.”
Getting out of bed, Starlight shook her head. “It was just a nightmare, Spike.” She gave him a reassuring smile. “We were stuck in the Nightmare Moon world, it was pretty awful.”
Spike blinked before shrugging as he opened the door completely. “I thought the one with all the changelings was scarier, myself, but it’s your dream, not mine. I made waffles with raspberry whipped cream for you, and Twilight is in the map room with a sack full of crystal tools looking at the table.”
“Thanks buddy.” Trotting over, she wrapped him in a hug. “You know how to treat a mare.” Pulling away, she poked his pudgy belly. “Moondancer’s gonna need someone to take care of her~ You know how she gets when she starts researching a project.”
“Oh, was she starting work on something new then? I don’t remember her mentioning anything like that to me, but you are a little closer to her on the day-to-day things. Maybe I can bring over a care package with some warm oatmeal and apple slices?” He was clearly trying not to blush, or look directly at Starlight, and his claws were poking against each other as he tapped his hands together. “You know, if that’s okay?”
“I know she’ll love it.” Ruffling his spines, she pulled him onto her back and trotted out of the room. “Twilight hasn’t started working on the map just yet, has she?”
“Not as far as I know. She said she was going to have to set up a set of octarine lenses and a bunch of other tools just to examine the part that holds all the spells together since she can’t really cast anything yet.”
“Did she give you any problems?” Starlight walked into the kitchen, letting him hop off. “Or is she still insulting you?”
“Eh, I can’t really say it was insulting, but she did tell me to keep my greasy claws to myself when I offered to help her carry the tools. Granted, they were actually greasy at the time since I had just started cleaning up the dishes from last night and someone had left a full plate of vegetable stir-fry underneath everything.”
“Well, that’s good I can’t have her giving you a hard time.” Patting his head, she took her seat and grasped her utensils in her magic. “Hmm..., think an insult jar would help curb her tongue?”
“You’ll have to start paying her before she can afford to put anything in it to begin with.” Spike shrugged in response. “Besides, she’s mellowing out a little bit already. I honestly think she was more worried about having to clean the tools than about me damaging them just by being close or something.”
“I’ll have a talk with her after breakfast.” Levitating over a small bag, she dropped it into his claws. “Here, a little reward for being such a good assistant.”
Spike tossed the pouch up once to catch it again, feeling the gems inside settle. “Seventeen, really? Did the stipend for my heroism from Cadance and Shining Armor up in the empire increase lately or something?” One hand reached in and pulled out three stones, with two being dropped back inside so he could pop the small emerald into his mouth to suck on. “Not that I’m complaining...”
“Think of it as compensation for having to put up with Twilight’s attitude,” Starlight explained, taking a bite out of her own breakfast. It amused her to no end to see the state Twilight was in. If she could, she’d rub it in Princess Twilight’s face. “I know she’s a bit rough around the edges, she just needs some guidance.”
“So rough around the edges that licking sandpaper sounds more appealing than being around her.” Spike began methodically opening cabinets in the kitchen and pulling out the pans and bowls he needed to mix up the perfect oatmeal for Moondancer.
Starlight had to stifle a laugh. Not that long ago, the little reptile was saying the same sorts of things about her. Now, he actively loathed his former big sister figure. Oh how loyalties sway when temporal mechanics come into play she thought to herself, hiding her smile behind her fork.
“AAAAAH! No, no that can’t be right.” Twilight’s shout carries far from the map room, followed by the clatter of crystal on crystal. “Oh buck me to the moon and back…”
Setting her fork down, Starlight arose with a sigh. “Spike, would you mind keeping my breakfast warm, I’m going to see what’s got Twilight so upset.” Not waiting for a response, she trotted out of the room and made her way to the throne room.
Starlight ended up walking in on Twilight hunched over a satchel about half her size with a helmet assembly of some kind sitting on the floor next to her flank. Not even a foot away lay a bunch of shards with a color beyond description to them. “Spare lenses...spare lenses. There HAS to be a case of spare lenses here!”
“Twilight, calm down.” Starlight stepped over, putting her hoof on Twilight’s back. “Here, I’ll fix it.” Lighting her horn up, she cast a renewal spell, mending the shards back into one whole lens. “See? Nothing to worry about.”
Twilight’s ears twitched at Starlight’s voice and her hurried moves slowed to a near halt as a sigh escaped her mouth. “Drat, and here I’d hoped I’d be able to finish triple-checking my findings and validate the fix I’d calculated after my second examination before you woke up.” the glance Twilight sent in Starlight’s direction over her shoulder was a few steps above the glares she’d been giving yesterday in terms of warmth, but it at least lacked the open malice.
“How are you feeling?” Starlight asked, taking a seat next to her. “Still have a headache? I don’t want to push you too hard on our first day together.”
“I’m fine, thank you for asking.” She took a deep breath and pulled six tools out of the bag one after the other, each one appearing nearly identical. “I still feel mostly drained, but it’ll take a few days for me to get my energy levels back up to normal after using as much magic as I did. I also learned that I was exceedingly lucky to have backlash as mild as this considering the layers of protection this map has based on the readings I was able to understand.”
“It certainly is something,” Starlight agreed, getting to her hooves. “So, trusty apprentice, shall we determine what exactly is wrong with the map?” Shooting Twilight an encouraging smile, she offered a hoof.
“Um, no offense, Princess, but do you know the difference between a resonance wrench and a corus tuner? I only scratched the surface of the enchantments in this map before I found a simple solution, but the wrong tool could embed my skull halfway through the base of Mount Canterhorn.”
“Celestia always did say teaching was a two way street.” She took a step back while gesturing to the map, “How about I let you take the lead and we go from there? That sound good?”
Twilight thought to herself for a moment, then carefully arranged the tools in a row. “I’ll just ask you to hand me one by position instead of expecting you to recognize the name and know the tool by sight. Not like you had to carve a set of magic receptacles into a wall with no help from your cutie mark to force you to learn the hard way of fixing spells.”
“Right.”
Twilight gave a nod in response before crawling under the table as much as she could and lighting her horn up with a dim, but steady, glow of power. “Okay. Third one from the right should be where we start, the eightfold stasis spanner.”
Starlight levitated over the tools as Twilight asked, making sure to memorize her work. “So, how was your night? I trust you slept well?”
“Like a rock, actually. Last night was the best sleep I’ve had since I was run out of town.” She groaned and a thud could be heard as she apparently dropped her head to the floor. “That’s unfair of me to keep bringing it up, I really should stop. I’m going to need you to touch the rim of the table and tell me if the next thing I do makes anything happen, okay Starlight?”
“Right.” Starlight nodded, putting her hoof on the table. “Ready whenever you are, Twilight. She watched as Twilight set a tool on the table, feeling the oil covering it ripple from the impact.
As Starlight focused on the surface of the map and her hoof stayed in contact with it she began to hear music. It started out faint before climbing in volume as a point began to rise out of the oily mass in the center of the map.
“Twilight, get away from the map.” Starlight backed away, her eyes wide. “Now,” she ordered, grabbing the unicorns tail in her magic and dragging her along. Before her eyes, the mass took shape, crafting itself into a solid being.
“Starlight, NO!” A screech came from the tool Twilight had been using under the map, and she immediately moves to dive back under. “I can’t stop just like that, I need to either reset it or continue calibrating unless you want to spend the bits to get a professional crystal empire technician down here to see if they can even begin to understand spell weaving this complex when 90% of them are earth ponies.” She acts like she can’t even see the rising mass.
One huge portion of the mass jerked up and to the left, oil oozing off of it before the shape resolved into a malformed feathered wing. An identical mass snapped back and to the right, flinging enough of the toxic-looking fluid around to completely cover Starlight’s throne. Then eyes opened up and flared with pure white light. Purple smoke began to leak from the sides and upper portion of those eyes as the black ooze covering the creature began to slide away.
“Twilight! There’s an ooze monster coming out of the map! Get away from it now!” she all but shouted, lighting her horn again. She fired a blast of magic at it, blanching when it didn’t even so much as flinch.
“An ooze monster? Resetting! Resetting with great haste!” the glow from Twilight’s horn intensified before the tools were seen on the other side of the table.
As the fluid flowed off of the creature emerging from the map, color began to become discernible. That top point that had first exposed itself above the surface went from black to a shade of purple slightly darker than Twilight’s coat, and what had looked like a huge head immediately underneath that point could be distinguished as two oddly-curved black horns originating from the sides of the creature’s head and intersecting to create a sideways figure-eight shape. The tip of the horn on the left side of the creature’s head crossed in front of the centered, more unicorn-like horn, at the base while pointing upwards. The horn on the other side came out lower and curved around upwards, ending with its point behind the central horn.
“You need to hurry up! Magic doesn’t seem to be doing anything!” Starlight shouted, zipping into the air and pelting it with another round of magic bolts.
“Em truh ton lliw cigam,” the creature spoke, its voice low and distorted. Her ears not quite picking up what it was saying. “Gnihtyna od t’now ti, ekil d’uoy sa hcum sa yrt.” A sound much like laughter erupted from the entity as one arm swept out to the left and the other went right, both of them dripping fluids as more dark purple flesh was revealed. Lines of silver became visible as well, runes writing themselves onto the flesh of the being as it was exposed to the open air.
Twilight’s head poked up from the other side of the map table, surrounded by a tiny cloud of sparkling particles of crystal. She looked left, then right, her eyes crossing right through the space occupied by the being without any sign of recognition. “A monster, hmmm? It’s a bit early in this...living arrangement to be pulling pranks, Princess.”
It gripped the sides of the map, pulling itself out. It’s lower half ended in a pair of hooves, like some kind of nightmarish minotaur. “Won rof su dna uoy tsuj s'ti .Tey ton tsael ta ,thgilratS ,em ees t'nac ehs.” Dropping to the floor, it rose up to its full height, towering over Starlight. “Eltsac ruo gnidliuber erofeb noitadnuof eht hctap tsum ew. Thgilrats, smaerd ruoy gnitisiv eb lliw ew. Su wollof ot yrt ton od, su rof kool ton od.” It then leaned down slightly, one finger quickly flicking out and barely brushing Starlight’s horn. Something was pulled out, something that...she could no longer remember.
“It’s right there, Twilight! How in Tartarus can you not see it?!” Starlight demanded, reeling back from the creatures touch. “Fix the map! Maybe we can send it back to where it came from!”
Twilight blinked for a few seconds, then looked down at the map to see if her work had made any discernible change to the surface. A small ring of color inside the edge showed that she had been on the right track, with some progress retained even after resetting the spell matrix back to how it had been. “I think I might have hit you a bit harder than I thought with one of my spells in our fight...there’s nothing there, Starlight. Maybe you should go see a doctor or to the hospital? Hallucinations are not a sign of a healthy mind.”
“I am not hallucinating!” Starlight screamed, flying close to the ceiling. “It stole one of my memories, who knows what else it could do!?” Her blood boiled as the being laughed at her, tilting its head mockingly. “Give it back!” she roared, diving at it.
“Sdneirf ruo ot enod evah segnahc ruoy tahw fo kcots ekat og ot deen ew. Kniht ew ,won rof lla s'taht.” The dark purple monstrosity laughed again before heading for the large doors out of the map room, leaving behind pools of the black substance as hoofprints. It turned around to give Starlight a mocking wave before stepping back through the solid door as if it weren’t even there to begin with, followed by the sound of the already-closed door...closing.
“What?” Starlight asked, pulling up before she collided with the floor. Staring after the creature, she dropped to her hooves, chest heaving. “What the buck was that thing? How did you not see it, Twilight?”
Twilight responded with a look of confusion. “How am I supposed to know what it was if I couldn’t perceive it? I mean...you’re obviously reacting to something, but I have no way of knowing if it was real or not with no frame of reference! For all I know you’re still pranking me.” She held her gaze on starlight for a few more seconds before sighing. “Can you put an image of it down on paper or something? I might be able to use that to look through some reference books on the various creatures of Equestria and other lands, see if I can find a match of some kind.”
Starlight took a breath, letting her anger bleed out of her. “Well, I can try anyway. Never been a very good artist, but, I know one or two spells that should work.” Nodding to the door, she took a seat on her throne. “Would you mind getting me some paper?”
Twilight placed the tools carefully on one of the thrones, holding one of them up to examine it for a few seconds first. “You’d have to tell me how to get to where you keep it. Paper isn’t something I was thinking about when I asked Spike to show me around earlier.”
“Well, just ask Spike where it is, then. I’m pretty sure we keep some nearby, but I’m busy trying to remember every detail possible so I can get the image right.” Waving Twilight off, she stared at the map, burning the image into her mind.
Twilight walked out of the room, nodding to herself as she thought of how best to not cause the young dragon to panic. “I’ll be back as soon as I can. Try to relax?”
“I don’t understand, why is Sweet Apple Acres only half the size it should be? Even without Applejack being around to help, it couldn’t have been that big a difference...could it?” The altered princess stood tall at the edge of the property, looking at the dilapidated farmhouse and ramshackle barn with concern.
As I said before, Honesty is now a miser. Without a love of family, there was nothing to make her appreciate hard work. Why waste money on something that wasn’t worth it?
“Well, do you at least know where she is, then? I thought for sure she’d be here with her family at the very least, since living with others would be more cost-effective. And why did we only see Big Macintosh on the farm? I know Applebloom would be on her way to school…”
Honesty never left Manehattan. She refuses to pay for more than what she sees as necessary to get her more bits. Which, is none now as she sees it. Soon, the farm will leave the Apple Family.
“We can’t let her do that, though. Her family needs this farm, Ponyville needs this farm!” Twilight looked to the sun, and then spun to find the best landmarks and got herself pointed towards the far-off city. She felt her wings flex strangely as she gave then a tentative flap, but then most things about this new body were a little on the strange side.
You are thinking linearly, this present does not matter. Nothing that happens now matters. What matters is fixing the past. To do so, we must revert your companions to their original selves. Only then will time begin to correct itself.
“Well I’m going to start with her, then. This is the most hurtful thing she can do to her family, and I’m going to make it so that it can never have happened, that she could have never even thought to do such a thing!” One mighty leap and a hard flap of their wings propelled Twilight into flight, and three sets of ghostly trees collapsed on the other side of the fence as her haste sent ripples through a dozen other possible timelines.
Her body locked up, held in stasis by Dahaka. We cannot restore Honesty now, that version of her cannot exist yet. We must start with the foundation that bound you all together before. Without it, there can be no other fixes.
“The foundation? What in the world are…” she trailed off, then tried to shake her head at her own clouded thoughts. “Of course, the rainboom! You’re saying we need to fix Rainbow’s present self before we can even interact with any of the others?”
Yes. The rainboom is the event that linked all your destinies together. Reestablishing it will allow us to begin our work in full. Though, you should brace yourself, you will not like what you see.
“How much worse could it possibly be than the Apple farm being so...lifeless? I mean, even the trees didn’t look particularly healthy.” She took a few deep breaths to calm herself down. “Right, so, Rainbow Dash should be in Cloudsdale, right? No rainboom means she probably never left the city with ambitions to become a racer, or a Wonderbolt.”
She is, indeed, in Cloudsdale.
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I am such a fan of psychological torture and torment over physical. Much more fun to watch their mind and sanity crumble than the blood run out their veins.
I approve of this direction.
Starlight’s lucky, you know? Lucky that the Twihaka is focused on trying to fix the time stream right now. Gives her some time to maybe figure out a plan.
For all the good it will do, that is. After all, there is no Empress to save her.
8763620
The one problem with Starlight figuring out a plan? How do you fight, let alone defeat, a creature that exists only to correct the timeline? I assume the Dahaka's mission is divinely given, in a sense.
Well Starlight's nightmare are just starting. I can't wait until the Dahaka/Twilight fully manifest physically into this reality to chase Starlight wherever she goes.
Though I also like this course of action to restore Twilight's friends destiny.
Also Dahaka's backward dialogue is gonna take a while to get use to.
Mistakes found:
her
gnidliuber
8763665
I believe you may have answered your own question.
8763707 Thank you for finding these! I do my best to proofread everything intently before posting it, but sometimes stuff still slips through.
Did Starlight get full set of Twilight's memories? (Also she's pretty nice to Spike a bit later).
If so, then why she has trouble finding her way in the castle?
Interesting so far. Will track and see how this develops.
One thing to watch out for though,
This is just one example, but the tense fluctuates as times. Don't know if that's deliberate since it's with present and past tenses, but it's very jarring when it happens.
8763919 Rrrrgh. I thought I caught all of those.
That's due in part to the fact that I tend to write in present tense whereas Shagohad writes in the past tense, and I have to keep reminding myself to use past tense as we write.
Honestly, this entire work so far is us riffing off of what the other writes and generally just having fun with it. we're treating it seriously, but it just happens so naturally that we're already six gdocs pages into the next chapter.
8763908 Starlight obtained a full copy of memories of what would have happened to her if she had been in Twilight's place, with events varying as befits the other changes to the timeline as things go on, however, she retains her own memories from her native timeline as well. Starlight thus has two conflicting sets of memories, only one of which includes MUSCLE memories, so she can't even just autopilot herself around like some people do when they're half awake and need to use the bathroom.
Also, the first half of the chapter is a dream that's being influenced by the Dahaka-Twilight gestalt entity, and is meant to both confuse and terrify Starlight to keep her off balance.
This is turning out to be more amusing than I expected.
8763943
*Finishes reading the last part of the comment* Your cruel.