Another scheme to Celestia's plan of disguising Quantum was incredibly beneficial to her. See, using the excuse to Hegese, Bow and the rest of the Herring family that 'because of his alicorn biology,' she had said, 'his flying capabilities are going to be much stronger. i don't mind tutoring him, of course,' and hey-presto, the resident Canterlot Sun Goddess had a get-out-of-jail-free card for cancelling court sessions, where she instead was able to loosen up a bit and teach one Quantum Herring how to fly.
Of course, he'd seen through her ploy immediately.
"I could be taught by normal flight teachers, couldn't I?" Her lips quirked at the usual brand of Quantum deadpan-scepticism. They walked through the Castle's hallways, towards the courtyard where the lesson would take place. The colt was still disguised as a unicorn, too, just in case somepony saw him, after all, there were a lot of students at the school with parents working in the castle. It was a bright, sunny day (the best kind of day, in her opinion) and the 'colt' didn't have school that day, so Celestia thought it the perfect time to commandeer the younger alicorn for a flight lesson.
And also the opportunity to pick his brain.
"Oh yes, without a doubt," she replied, satisfaction in her voice, "But lets be honest, you'd never take any old instructor seriously, now, would you?" The princess stared down at the blue ex-human, and watched as he grumbled and turned his head away from her. Her smile widened further. Looking down, she absently pondered why she felt strange walking next to him. Probably because he'll end up taller than me, hm? Quantum turned an unimpressed look towards her.
"I can hear your thoughts, remember?" Celestia had the decency to blush in her absent-mindedness, "And I will end up taller than you, huh? Nice. I'll make sure to rub that in some few years in the future." The sun princess felt her eye twitch, she knew he was good for it, too. Quantum smirked to himself in victory, but it fell once he pondered upon the future itself, more precisely, his future/past self.
The older voice of Quantum Senior never really spoke up when Celestia was around. He had done so once, at first, when the young Herring had performed his first Stasis spell, but upon realising that Celestia couldn't hear him, the ghostly-version of himself never spoke up when she was around. Quantum guessed that it was something to do with it hurting too much.
That was another thing he couldn't really explain though. On top of his strange aversion to music with no defined beat, Quantum often found himself rather relaxed, and (dare he say it), pleased when in the Princess' company. Even if he didn't really think of her as a Princess, much to some of the castle staff's (including his mother) horror. Hegese had almost popped a blood vessel when she first heard her son refer to the princess as 'Tia'.
Again, the younger alicorn couldn't really explain why he did it. He'd just heard his older self say it a couple of times, and he himself had ended up saying it out of instinct.
Or lack of thought, whatever floats your boat.
Not that it really bothered the Sun Goddess; she was quite content at not having the constant 'princess this' and 'princess that' all the time. It was refreshing getting a bit of slack from the constant title, and was why she decided to become a private tutor to the alicorn. She shrugged to herself, even Princesses needed breaks sometimes. Celestia came out of her thoughts to the sound of the colt's voice.
"This isn't going to be a flying lesson, is it?" It wasn't really a question; the ex-human had an idea that his parents weren't the only ones getting played by the princess. He could fly just fine, and if it was such a problem, then like Tia had said, he didn't need a specific instructor for it. In fact, there was likely only one thing that Celestia could tutor him about, and that was...
"Right," she replied, a smug grin on her face, unbecoming of the usual atmosphere she gave off, "We're going to try and explore the depths of your Time Magic, and what you're capable of right now." Satisfied with the groan of annoyance from the colt at her side, the two alicorns entered the courtyard, Celestia immediately throwing up a powerful barrier to stop any unwanted intrusions. Quantum watched with awe as a flock of birds previously flying towards the walled-off plateau made an obvious turn and flew around the barrier.
The courtyard itself was relatively simple; there were moderately high purple walls around each side, making sure that any non-flying ponies couldn't get in, and even then, Quantum suspected there was probably another barrier to stop unwanted personnel getting in. The floor was mainly paved, with small islands of green dotted around the area. There were a few benches by the wall, too, and a few other decorations littered around the place. Huh, he thought, Peaceful.
"Isn't it just?" Celestia spoke up, answering his thoughts with a playful smile, "I like to come here to think sometimes. On clear nights, this place is also my favourite spot to stargaze." Her smile turned sad at the end of her words, and Quantum felt an unusual pang in his heart. That happened often when he was around the Princess; he sometimes felt emotion that he could never really understand what had made him feel that way. The ex-human shrugged it off as one of those things he'd likely understand later on.
"So, what's the plan?" Quantum asked, turning his attention back to the larger alicorn, "I'm not exactly well-versed in Time Magic, the most thing I'd ever done with it being the Stasis years ago." And it was true; the multi-blue alicorn didn't particularly like using his natural abilities. Whenever he'd tried his hand at another Stasis (at the instruction of his older self), his natural reserves of magic just felt awkward and clunky, like he was having to force the magic out, rather than letting it flow as it usually did with normal magic. And as I keep telling you, it's because you're thinking as though Time Magic is normal magic. It's not.
Quantum sighed and ran a hoof over his muzzle, dragging it along his face. He bit back the reply to his original self, knowing that Celestia would likely want to know who he was mind-talking to. Quantum Senior, however, did not elaborate upon his comment, as usual, and simply let his most recent incarnation focus on the Princess before him.
"Well, yes, but I think I can help you with that," Celestia said, eyeing the colt suspiciously, "I do have some knowledge of Time Magic after all. We're not going to try Stasis, though, not today at least." Quantum quirked his brow.
"We're doing something else besides Stasis? Can I even do that yet?" With a strange, sort of knowing grin, Celestia made a non-committal noise.
"Ah, well, I think you'll be able to do it," She said cryptically. Now thoroughly interested, Quantum inquired further, and with no small amount of suspicion.
"How? How do you know that?" The colt pleaded, incredulity on his features.
"Because you're going to tell me," Grin now fully affixed to the Sun Goddess' face. Quantum's eye twitched.
"What do you mea-"
"She means me," He was cut off by... a sudden new and eerily familiar voice. The young blue alicorn's head snapped round to the source of the interruption, and upon seeing the cause, felt his brain cease up, accompanied by the loud guffawing of his older self.
There, from behind one of the pillars in the courtyard, walked a bipedal creature. A human. All blue clothes, oddly coloured hair, and a sadistic smirk plastered on his face. Bryan Herring stared back at his pony self.
"Hey guys," the human said, waving, "Scarce here."
Elsewhere in the moderately-priced region of Canterlot, a unicorn filly studiously looked over the materials she'd gathered from her first week at Celestia's School for Gifted Unicorns, locked away in her pale red room. Magical Studies had been particularly generous in its dealings; issuing nearly twice the homework that her other subjects had on its own. The grey-coated filly frowned. Mama and Papa were right, she thought, The school really is heavy-hoofed from the get-go.
Not that she really cared. Bender enjoyed new reading material, though, it was universal law that young ponies had to dislike homework.
Flopping onto her back, laying on her bed, the young filly smoothly hovered the Magical Studies textbook in front of her muzzle. It was basic stuff, really, more recap from nursery than new material, but there were some new elements, like the theory behind magical sensing, reserves and some other new concepts (to her, at least). Bender was, however, much more interested in the 'Manipulation' part of the textbook. With a hungry glint in her eye, she swung the book into the air by a single page, throwing it out of her magic, and letting it fall again before catching the textbook at the start of the Manipulation chapter. See, the filly in question was capable of other magic, she showed immense skill for her age in her magical dexterity and manipulation. It is the reason I was offered placement in the school, after all, Bender thought with a satisfied smile, Only the prestigious!
In her own mind and with close friends, the filly could be quite self-confident and assured. While that's not to say she wasn't around new ponies, she was certainly quieter, and kept more to herself in public. More often than not, Bender found herself more than happy to be in the company of herself. Especially with some of my classmates, she grimaced, thinking of a certain Blueblood, Yikes.
Thinking of her less-than-savoury classmate, the messy red-maned filly let her mind wander to the other new faces in her life. She remembered seeing the two from the back of the class, Quantum and Twilight, talking to each other on the first day during break time. Bender also remembered not being the only one to notice the two's argument with Ingenio. Specifically, she remembered the two fillies (also in her class), Arcana and Mirage staring at the 'fight' worriedly.
Personally, Bender was more intrigued as to why Blueblood had decided to walk away once Quantum had stepped in. She definitely remembered seeing resentment and anger stewing in the white unicorn's features as he brushed by her. The image of a very mysterious Cloak of Mystery wrapping itself mysteriously in a mysterious way around Quantum sprung to her mind, and with her previous thoughts of playground politics through the window, the grey-filly grabbed a blank piece of paper, a quill and some ink, and began writing, all within the space of seven seconds.
And with this, Bender had officially accomplished her unknown goal of procrastination, and the homework was left at her side, abandoned for more interesting endeavours.
Celestia watched in bemusement as the face of Quantum Herring fell slack-jawed, his mouth repeatedly opening and closing while looking between herself and his human counterpart of Bryan Herring. He was barely able to get more than a few words out.
"But- But I- But you- But... But..." The colt's right eye twitched, repeatedly, before he curled into the fetal position, and began rocking back and forth on his rump. "This isn't real. This whole thing is a horrible nightmare. No way, no fucking way did a human version of myself just walk from behind a pillar, and interrupt me with a fucking meme." Quantum attempted (and horribly failed) to block out his other selves (both cognitive pony version and shit-eating-grin-wearing human version) and Celestia's wild, uncontrollable laughter.
The Sun Goddess, while not exactly sure what Quantum meant by 'meme', she could certainly see the humour in the situation. Which was why she was laughing in a distinctly un-princess like manner; leaned against the nearest wall, struggling for breath while holding back as many giggles as possible. Eventually, she watched as the colt flopped onto his side, a traumatised smile plastered on his face. By this point, the human had finished his laughing, though still maintained the smirk. Bryan rolled his eyes, marched over to the colt on the floor, and yanked him to his hooves by the scruff of his neck.
"Oi," he said, "Calm down. Lets get some things straight here; no, you're not going insane," He flicked his equine self's horn, "No. we haven't ripped a hole in the space-time continuum, and no, we are most certainly not going to die because of this." Bryan sat himself down on the floor, his left knee in the air, with the flat on the floor. He slung his arm around the propped up knee. "So, take a guess. What do you think I am?"
Quantum analysed his human-self, piecing together what Celestia had said before with the strange occurrence in front of him. It didn't take a genius to figure out the basic idea.
"You're me, from the future," he started, rubbing a hoof under his muzzle, eyes narrowed in thought, "But why are you here, as Bryan? And not, well, me? Or any other version of us for that matter?" The human smirked.
"Well, firstly," He turned towards Celestia, "Yeah, I am most certainly able to do it. It'll take a few hours before I kick my flank into gear, though, so it might be worth grabbing a tea or coffee or something while I practice." The Sun Goddess smiled at the human.
"No, I think I'll stay here. Somepony has to look out for you, who knows how badly you might hurt yourself?" Celestia smiled, but faltered upon a realisation, "Well, I suppose you know how badly you might hurt yourself, but that's sort of cheating given the usual context for that phrase." Bryan smirked, and turned his attention back to his colt-self.
"Anyway, yeah, I'm here as Bryan because, one," The human raised his index finger, "It's sort of our natural go-to form for anything Time related at this point, two," He raised another finger, "Because we can't have two of the exact same physical form at one time. We can have the same magical signature," His fingers glowed blue in demonstration, "We could have the same form, but we most certainly can't have the same of both things. That's where shit starts to fall out of our jurisdiction as a Time Mage, and into somepony else's as a Spatial Mage. Laws of Physics and Magi-Physics, something to do with those."
Quantum nodded his head, acknowledging and absorbing the information as his future-human-self reeled it off. Celestia too seemed to be taking mental notes of the explanation, and was almost certainly going to be analysing them later. Suddenly, however, Quantum's attention was drawn by a trickling line of red liquid, running down Bryan's arm from underneath his blue t-shirt's sleeve. He pointed a hoof at it.
"You're injured," he said, more statement than question. Celestia too perked up from her thoughts, and moved closer to the human crouched on the floor. Bryan's eyes shot to his right arm (the one keeping him propped up on the floor) and cursed, before wiping the blood away and standing up.
"Shit," he brushed himself down, before clutching the injured arm defensively. The Sun Goddess, however, wasn't satisfied, and moved closer to him.
"Bryan, you're not telling us something we ought to know," She said, pointing a hoof at the injured arm, "Why is your arm bleeding? What happened?" Bryan's eye twitched in annoyance.
"I'm not telling you what happened, because when I was him," He pointed at his present-pony-self, "I was never told what happened. This is the way Time Loops work; I have to abide by the rules set by the Stream, and I most certainly am not allowed to tell you why my arm is bleeding. Suffice to say, my first attempt at travelling back didn't go exactly to plan," He shook his head and set a scowl on his face, "Now I really can't tell you anymore."
Alarm bells were ringing in Quantum's head, and the voice within it was noticeably silent. The alicorn colt narrowed his eyes, and watched as Celestia did the same.
The princess herself acknowledged the human's point; Time Loops were delicate little things. The Stream (or Flow) set rules for the participants, rules that lingered in the back of the mind, and caused excruciating pain for the pony (or person in this case) if the rules were broken. They usually reminded the pony of things like 'do not tell Pony X about Event Y' or 'do not be seen by Pony Z', however, she had known times when the rules had been awfully specific, and others when they had been damn right harsh.
The perks of growing up with a Time Mage in her childhood; many trips through Time to play pranks on their siblings.
Nowadays, ponies would frown upon such frivolous use of such a potent ability. Bah, she thought, thankful that the colt before her was too oblivious to notice her musings, It was worth it.
Of course, she and Quantum (of old) had stopped their regular trips once they'd accidentally broken one of the rules, leaving the colt writhing in pain for an hour. Celestia shook her head; Not the fondest of memories. The silence in the courtyard was broken by the shuffling from the human.
"Gotta go," he said, scratching the side of his head, "My limit is nearly up." Quantum peered at his human self.
"Limit?" He asked simply.
"Right," Bryan replied, "When we start a Time Loop, we have a Time Limit allotted to us. While being an almighty alicorn can certainly help extend that, we're nowhere near the level at which we can make requests to the Flow regarding Loops. She's a harsh mistress, she is." He sighed, but smiled good naturedly, lifting a glowing blue hand in front of his face, poised to snap his fingers. "Well, it's certainly been fun being on the other end of these shenanigans," Bryan nodded at Celestia, "Don't worry about the mistake he's going to make," He jerked the thumb on his free hand at the colt, who scowled back at his human self, "I'll be a little bit shaken up, but nothing I can't handle." The Sun Goddess sighed.
"I'm sure I'll be worried about you anyway, so there's really no point in telling me to not worry," She smiled at the human, "So get going, we don't want the pressure to start building in your head because you overstayed your welcome."
"Heh, right," Bryan turned back to his colt self, "And while I know you won't listen to me when I tell you this, because I certainly didn't, but make sure you listen to that voice in your head when you start getting frustrated." Bryan tapped his temple, making a not so subtle hint towards the voice of Quantum Senior, before scowling and shaking his head. "Oh, who am I kidding? You're not going to do it because I didn't do it meaning that there's no way that you would even consider doing anything else an- Oh for fucks sake, I'm just gonna go before I confuse myself and mess up the leap back."
Bryan snapped his fingers, and Quantum and Celestia watched with surprise and interest respectively as the human glowed a soft white, before dissipating into a wisps of energy, faint tick-tocking resounding from his fading form.
"Huh," Quantum said, still staring at the spot Bryan had just stood in, "Neat."