//------------------------------//
// X 
// Story: The Influence 
// by GMBlackjack 
//------------------------------//

"Oh! IT'D BE FUNNY WOULD IT!?" Twilight twitched. "Fluttershy's missing and all you can think about is how FUNNY THIS IS!?" She twitched - she didn't even know which of them that was. It could have been any of them...

She shook her head - she could think about it later, right now she needed to find Fluttershy. She lit her horn, attempting to diffuse any illusions as suggested. She felt her magic tug on something, but there was no visible effect. She tried a direct teleport-to-Fluttershy spell - and just appeared in a different area of the grassy field. She knew the spell worked - she was where the magic thought Fluttershy was. But Twilight saw nothing...

...The voices were right, she was probably at the lake. With that shark... But what about what Ponygood said? Whoever 'they' were, wanting to kill her, manipulate her, be sadistic... Or that Fluttershy wasn't as real as she was... Or....

She grabbed her head. "Agh! Agh agh agh! Stop - find Fluttershy. How could you get back into the lake... Or... find whoever they were... Ponygood, you better explain that next time. Why 'They.' What's the deal... The star creature? The thing I saw in the forest? The thing I saw in my dreams?" She galloped around the grasses, scanning the magic everywhere she could - she was tugging on something, just out of reach, just beyond her capabilities. She growled - this just wasn't going to do. "Ponygood... Why? Just... I don't know, why would anyone do those things? Why would you THINK that, jump to it as the first thing you think?"

She scrambled around for several minutes, finding nothing. Nothing to do, nothing at all. She sighed, falling into the grass, tears in her eyes. "Why... Why didn't I think of this... She could be just fine, looking at the lake for me... Or she could be in danger..." 

She looked up at the sun, frowning. She was in the past - after Discord's reign and defeat, but before Nightmare Moon, seeing as the moon had looked normal. She thought about what Akumakami had said - had she just caused the future? Had she changed the future she knew? Or had she done nothing, and she was just looking far too deeply into things? Should she be paranoid, or was there nothing to worry about?

She'd experienced time travel twice before... Once she couldn't change anything no matter how hard she tried... And the other time the world was essentially destroyed. She didn't have enough information... She couldn't know. 

She hated not knowing. She hated not being able to find Fluttershy.

Perhaps she should just wait... Fluttershy would look around, and find her own way out. 

Lacks any of the interface marks to indicate this will end poorly...  If Nickel was right, this wasn't a tragedy. It would end well. Which meant - Fluttershy was going to be fine. Right? ...Probably. 

"Dark has a point, you know. You are all doing his job for him. Driving me maaaaaaaad..." She laughed. "Not sure I'm the same pony I was two days ago... You are all influencing me pretty hard, aren't you?" She looked out at the grass, a frown coming to her lips. "And you're all doing the same to each other... Threats.... That other Spike - I think - freaking out... Key... Flooding worlds together. This just looks like a recipe for madness, right now, utter madness..."

She stood up. "We need to start working as a team, people. All of us just bicker, fight, yell, scream, and contradict each other. That's fine, we have disagreements, we all believe different things, and we are all perceiving this world differently - which makes me think none of us are seeing this for what it truly is. No offense to you Miss K, or Zen, or Akuma... I don't think any of us can make any calls about what's going on. This is new for all of us. Am I real? Am I not? Are you real? Are you not? Are parts of this world real or not? Not only does it not really matter at the moment - none of us have the right to make that call, do we?"

She blinked. "I'm rambling. Great. One of the first signs of madness." She shook her head. "...We're in this together, whatever that means. I think we should focus on the goal - get home. I'm... open to ideas on how to do that. Stuck in the past and on the other side of the planet... And with Fluttershy..." She frowned. "...Should we - I - that's confusing - go to the leaders? Or would that interfere with the timeline too much? I'll... I think I'll wait for what you say on that." 

She started pacing. "...Also, K? ...Thanks for taking the time to talk to me. I appreciate that, if nothing else. I hope to see Key in better spirits next time."

She plucked a piece of grass out of the ground, looked at it, and set it on fire. "There. Happy? ...You should probably see someone about your... burning tendencies if you can." She blew out the fire. "Man, that smoke smells disgusting..."

Then Fluttershy appeared a few yards to Twilight's right, a smile on her face.

"Fluttershy! Oh my gosh I was so worried-"

"Oh, I'm sorry, but I found the lake, and I didn't want to leave until I'd looked at it all..."

"I... I know." She rushed her into a hug. "We should have planned that better. Talked it through."

"Yeah, that would probably have been a good idea... But I met some nice animal friends in the lake! There's was this very helpful shark creature named Mildi..."

"...I'm pretty sure he tried to eat me."

"Oh, that's just what sharks do. You shouldn't take it personally." She smiled. "There was this gazebo thing on top of an island, completely empty, but filled with strange glowing markings."

"Yeah, I saw those - that's where I appeared. Didn't know what to make of them... Except my cutie mark was on the ceiling."

Fluttershy nodded. "Well, it was completely empty - Mildi told me much more than I could have ever found on my own. The lake, apparently, is over a thousand years old, and he's been there the entire time, guarding it. He said he was placed there to attack anything that showed up - even me, but I calmed him down. The lake is apparently bottomless as well, he's never swam to the bottom. And uh..." She frowned. "I'm... Sorry, this really isn't helpful, is it? He doesn't know much, and there wasn't anything else for me to look at..."

"...It's okay, Fluttershy, at least we know it really is here now and can be gotten back to... By ponies who have never been here."

"Oh! He did mention that a starry creature had been hanging around a lot lately, which was bizarre since he rarely sees anything come in more than once."

Twilight twitched. "...It's that thing that I keep seeing out of the corner of my eyes, I know it. ...It might be responsible for me being here..."

"I thought that was Blackjack?"

"He creates worlds, right? Surely, he wouldn't just drop me into a situation suddenly - he'd have provided a reason, a method... Like how you were drawn here by that machine in the forest..." She blinked. "...We should go check that out again, by the way. See what if I can figure anything out now that I'm thinking a little clearer..."

Fluttershy nodded. "I won't vanish this time, promise."

Twilight hugged her. "Thanks." The two of them took off to the sky. Twilight took one last look at the lake, frowned, and flew into the Bluemish forest...


~~~


Twilight thought she saw the stars of Alderan a few more times on the journey to the machine, but she was never sure. He was probably being careful. Twilight and Fluttershy landed in the middle of the machine, and Twilight performed a scan - it seemed to have power restored to it, but it wasn't reacting to her presence anymore. Nor Fluttershy's, for that matter.

"I don't get it... Why make this thing? It communicates with anything across space and time, and drags them here... I think," Twilight said. 

"Maybe we're looking at it wrong? Maybe that's not it's true purpose, or something."

"Maybe... We'd have to talk with the ancients who built it to figure that out though." She lit her horn, prodding it again with her magic. "...No response. At all. It's like I used up my one free call."

Fluttershy stepped into the center, pressing down with her hoof. "And it just doesn't like me."

"Maybe you need a horn to use it..." Twilight frowned. "Or maybe it just has to sense something about you..." She frowned, her magic flowing in an unusual pattern. "...That's odd.."

"What?"

"I think I've picked up on a magic trail... This structure is drawing power from somewhere else... Somewhere far to the... North." She pulled out the map. "Probably in that northern desert." 

"We're being provided a lot of branching paths."

"Maybe that's intentional..." Twilight muttered. She felt the Eye warm up again. "Well, here it goes. See you in a minute or so." She sat down in her meditative state, ready for the input...