//------------------------------// // Equestria Z-544 // Story: The Many Sparkle Interpretation // by chillbook1 //------------------------------// The first thing that Twilight noticed about Equestria Z-544 was the air. There was a stale, putrid stench to the air. Death and decay floated throughout the town square that they found themselves in. Twilight and Spike gagged on the very air, while TX merely just crinkled her nose slightly. “Ooh, you never quite get used to that smell,” said TX. “Oh boy, this place looks worse than when I was last here. Not that it was a vacation destination before, mind you.” “What happened?” asked Twilight. She looked around at the square; the few buildings that remained were crumbling, the windows boarded or the doors completely torn off. It looked as if the entire town had been ransacked. “Where are we?” “Ponyville,” said Spike, pointing off in the distance. “Look.” Twilight directed her attention to where Spike had pointed, her eyes going a bit wide. A massive tree stood overlooking much of the town, devoid of all leaves and life. It was shrivelled and rotting, but was unmistakable, even in its derelict state. “Oh my god… That’s the library,” said Twilight. “That’s Golden Oak Library. What happened to it?” “What happened to yours?” asked TX. “It was destroyed by a magic-sucking goat demon named Tirek.” “Well, that’s not what happened to this one, I can assure you.” TX glanced over her shoulder, surveying the area cautiously. “We should head there now. We don’t wanna get caught out here.” “Caught by what?” asked Twilight. “Twilight Z-544 was something of a mad scientist,” explained TX. “And not particularly good at her job. She started the apocalypse. And we need to get to safety before we die.” TX led the way through town and to Golden Oak Library, the short jaunt eerily quiet. Ponyville C-317, despite being referred to as a quaint and quiet village, was normally bustling with life. This world’s Ponyville was hauntingly silent. It made Twilight’s skin crawl. It filled her with dread, terror, uncertainty. TX tried the door of the library, just to find it locked. She tapped it with her hoof to test the sturdiness of the wood then turned and kicked it in. The door splintered around the lock and lazily swung open. “I feel you judging me C-317,” said TX. “And I'd like to remind you that you can't trespass on your own property.” “This isn't your property,” noted Twilight. “It's Twilight Z-544’s.” “But the lease doesn't say ‘Z-544’. The lease says ‘Twilight Sparkle’. That's me. And if I want to break down my own door, even if it’s me from a different dimension, I feel like I’m within my rights to do so.” “Aren’t we supposed to be getting to safety?” asked Spike. “Come on, you two, let’s go!” “After you, TX,” said Twilight cautiously. TX nodded, then crossed the threshold of the library. Twilight and Spike followed closely behind her, keeping their eyes peeled for whatever threats that inhabited this world. The circular room that Twilight had, in her reality, once called home was in a state of disarray that she would never allow. The shelves that lined the wall were falling apart, and mostly bare of all books that used to sit in the room. Twilight surveyed the area with a horrified awe, this visit to her home making her truly miss the tree as it was in all of its glory. “I doubt she’s here right now,” said TX. “But, if we head upstairs, we might be able to find out where she’s been and, more importantly, where she’s going next.” “So what exactly happened here?” asked Twilight, following TX up the stairs. “I don’t know all the details, but, from what I can tell, Z-544 got herself a God complex,” explained TX. “She became obsessed with immortality, and she reasoned that the best way to go about that would be to create life. And she did, to her credit. Changelings live much longer than ponies, so she took some changeling DNA, spliced it with a pony corpse, and charged it with a ton of magic, then scraped the resulting DNA into a petri dish, which she grew into a full pony in her lab. But… There were complications. The new lifeforms started off normal, but they kinda devolved into something kinda… Ponenberg-esque, I’d say.” “And the townsfolk?” asked Spike. “Did they evacuate?” “Some of them. Maybe. I wouldn’t be too hopeful for that, though.” Twilight shook her head, perplexed at how any version of her could possibly be that careless. If Z-544 would’ve done any research at all, she would’ve known that changeling DNA was dangerously unstable, and it didn’t react well to pony magic. This could have easily been avoided if Z-544 just showed some restraint, thought things through, and ran her numbers more carefully. “That was reckless,” murmured Twilight as they reached the clearing. Compared to the bedroom, the downstairs area was pristine and orderly. The bed had been turned up and leaned against the wall, with a mess of what appeared to be Z-544’s research notes. The windows were boarded up, and the floor near the closet was covered in blood and some unidentifiable green goo. “Gah! What smells?” asked Spike, pinching his nose. “This whole dimension,” said TX. “That’s what happens when death fills the streets.” TX looked around the room, murmuring quietly to herself. “She doesn’t have any of her equipment about…” “Hey, TX,” said Spike. “If Z-544 is the Rogue Twilight, and she can jump from dimension to dimension, how come she doesn’t just move to a dimension where she didn’t mess up the whole world?” “It could be a few things. Maybe she has somepony here she doesn’t want to leave behind,” suggested TX. “Or maybe she’s just obsessed with solving the problem she caused. I know I’d be.” “But she could just go to a Twilight smarter than her to get some help.” “The problem with your reasoning, Spike, is that it makes the assumption that Twilight Z-544 is a logical mare, and we’ve already established that not to be the case.” TX poked through the papers littering the floor, finding more evidence that Twilight Z-544 was a bit off her rocker. Her numbers and calculations were fairly accurate, but they had mad scribbles in the margins. The more recent the notes, the less stable she seemed to be. “TC, start looking around what’s left of her books. They might give us some clues as to where she went off to.” Twilight nodded, hovering over the few dozen books that still remained in the room. Had the library still been in operating condition, she’d have triple that amount to look through, perhaps even more. The pages Twilight skimmed were annotated much like the research notes, the messages growing wilder and less sensible the further she went. “Seriously, what the heck is that smell?” demanded Spike. “Are you guys seriously not smelling this? Blegh! It’s in my mouth!” “Dragons have a better sense of smell than us ponies due to the way your tongues pick up particles in the air,” said Twilight. “Your sense of smell has always been more sensitive than ours.” “I don’t think I’ve ever regretted that more than I do now,” said Spike, sniffing the air. “It smells like it’s coming from the closet…” While the Twilights searched through the documentation, Spike followed his nose to what he perceived to be the source of the smell and pulled the door open. Something heavy fell out of the closet and onto Spike, knocking him to the ground with a clumsy “oof”. He tried to push the thing off of him, but it was a bit too heavy for him, whatever it was. It was cold, clammy, and brought with it an intensely rancid odor. Some thick, sticky liquid dripped onto his face, bringing a heavy, metallic smell with it. Twilight Sparkle Z-544 had a small hole in her head, from between the eyes and tunneling all the way out of the back of the skull. Spike panicked, squealing in fear and trying to squirm out from beneath the weight of the corpse. Twilight quickly turned and lifted Z-544 off of him, then dropped her to the ground beside Spike. He scurried backwards, raking the blood from his eyes to get a better look. Z-544 was missing her right ear, which seemed to have been gnawed off. Her eyes were wide open, devoid of all life. Her skin was beginning to decay, peeling away around her mouth to reveal the rotten, greying flesh hidden away beneath. “Oh my god, oh my god!” Spike clutched his chest, the air in his lungs exiting and entering his body in short, sharp breaths. “She’s dead!” “Damn it!” TX rushed over to Z-544, pushing her body onto her back. “It wasn’t her…” “What happened to her?” asked Twilight, unable to tear her eyes away from her own corpse. “What could make a wound like that?” “Some sort of laser or plasma weapon,” said TX. “Damn it, I was certain this was her… The Rogue must’ve killed her and taken her tech…” “Oh man, this is seriously messed up…” Spike collected himself, standing up and doing his best to stop trembling. “If… If she’s not the Rogue… Then how do we find her?” “We need to find out what the Rogue wants,” said TX. “Then, we can head her off. I say we keep searching for clues, then head back to R-322 and do some research.” “I’m gonna… I’m gonna check downstairs,” said Spike. “Might be some good clues. And… That smell… I’ll be back…” And, with that, Spike all but stumbled down the stairs, leaving Twilight alone with TX. Twilight watched her other self carefully, a feeling of unshakable suspicion clinging to her being. She wasn’t sure why, but something about TX just didn’t sit right. Whether it was the uncanny feeling of conversing with herself, or the fact that TX seemed to know more than she did that made Twilight uncomfortable, she wasn’t certain. All she knew for sure was that she didn’t like the idea of being alone with herself. “You don’t trust me,” said TX, inspecting Z-544’s body a bit closer. “I can sense your tension.” “No disrespect intended but, no. I don’t,” said Twilight. “You’re clearly insane.” “Perhaps. But, if I’m crazy, we need new words for Z-544.” TX prodded the body one last time, then, having gleamed all she could from that rudimentary examination, returned to her notes. “I might be a bit eccentric to you, but at least I never started the apocalypse, or went on a killing spree of my fellow selves.” Silence descended, a silence that caught TX’s attention. She looked away from her notes to face Twilight. “Wait, you don’t really think I had anything to do with this, do you?” “I don’t know what to think. You haven’t exactly been super clear with me. And you effectively kidnapped me to help you solve a murder that, for all I know, can’t be solved.” “I did not kidnap you,” said TX. “I didn’t force you to do anything.” “You gave me no options, which is effectively the same thing. I didn’t want to do this! I’m not a detective, I’m not some inter-dimensional superhero, and I’m not ready for this!” “No, but what you are is a Twilight. And Twilights do what needs to be done for the benefit of the majority,” said TX. “Even if what needs to be done brings us displeasure. I don’t go patrolling the multiverse and meeting with the others because it’s fun or glamorous. I do it because it needs to be done. Because there are Twilights that could use our help.” TX tapped her Container, which displayed a large map of the many realities on the floor. “I’ve made friends with countless of these realities’ Twilights. I’ve helped them, and they’ve helped me. And if you think that I’d do anything to hurt anypony, especially our other selves, then you are delusional.” “Then be upfront with me. Why me? Of all the other Twilights, of the ones you already knew, why’d you pick me?” demanded Twilight. “Why did you make me endanger Spike? Why do you seem to be enjoying this?” “I’m not! Why would I possible be enjoying this?” “Your voice says one thing while your actions say another. We find out that Z-544 is dead and you don’t really seem to care!” “I value all life, but forgive me if I have less sympathy for the death of an unethical, selfish maniac who brought about the deaths of countless ponies in her reality!” TX found herself, for the first time since meeting Twilight, becoming properly angry. She thought they had wasted enough time on explanations, and now she had to defend herself from these baseless accusations. “You know that Celestia and Luna are dead here, right? Cadance and Shining and Flurry, too. Your friends? Nopony knows for sure. Z-544 thought they died. But she didn’t care. She thinks they got what they deserved, for doubting her. She’s killed so many ponies, and she was happy about that. So, no, I don’t particularly care that this poor shell of a Twilight is dead, because Z-544 represents Twilights at our worst. But just because I’m glad she’s gone does not mean that I killed her.” “She may be the worst parts of us, but she’s still us,” countered Twilight. “And you should feel a bit of compassion.” “TC, you’re thinking too small,” said TX with a sigh. “There are so many of us that caring about all of them equally is impossible. That’s not our job. Our job is to eliminate the threat and return things to normal. If I wanted to kill some Twilights, the last thing I would do is bring a Twilight along to help me track the killer.” “That… Actually makes a lot of sense,” admitted Twilight. “That would be pretty stupid of you. Sorry. I just… I don’t know what to do. I’ve battled my fair-share of bad guys but never myself.” “I understand. Just try to remember that I’m on your side.” “T-twilight? I n-need some h-help down here!” Twilight glanced to TX nervously, who seemed not to have even noticed Spike’s voice. Realizing that she was alone in this endeavor, Twilight set down the books she was inspecting and headed downstairs. “Spike, are you okay?” asked Twilight, descending the staircase. “Is everything… alright?” Spike stood stock-still, terrified to move. A pink earth pony held a knife to his throat, her scowl growing as Twilight made herself visible. She had no mane, and her right eye was covered with a dirty, bloody rag. The one eye that was visible was was a faint baby blue, and had a tired dullness to it. Her face was marred with dirt and scars, and there was what appeared to be an acid burn splattered across the right side of her face. Twilight stared, transfixed. She was entirely unrecognizable, but she looked strangely familiar. “Finally, you show back up, you crazy bitch,” she said. Twilight’s eyes immediately went wide, the voice instantly recognizable. Twilight heard that voice nearly every day. She had just spoken to her the day before in her own reality. “P-pinkie?” Twilight couldn’t believe what she was seeing. What could have happened to her? She looked so battered and beaten, like she had just emerged from a warzone. “I’ve been looking for you for a long time, Sparkle,” said Pinkie Z-544. “Move and the dragon dies.” “Don’t hurt him,” said Twilight. “What happened to you? You—” “Shut up. If I hear that horn light up, I’ll slit his throat. I swear to god, I’ll do it.” Spike whimpered as he felt the knife press tighter against his throat. “I can’t believe you stuck around. The others thought you ran away with your tail between your legs when those damn abominations got too wild for you. But you stayed. I gotta thank you for that.” “Pinkie, I’m not… I’m not who you think I am. I’m not your Twilight,” said Twilight. “I’m from another… This isn’t making sense. Let Spike go and I’ll explain everything.” “I’ll let Spike go. I’ll let him go when you come with me,” said Pinkie. “Do exactly what I say and nopony gets hurt.” “What do you want?” asked Twilight. Pinkie beckoned with her knife for Twilight to come with her, following behind her out of the library. “You made this problem, and now you’re gonna solve it.”