//------------------------------// // Equestria: Time Heals All // Story: Fall of Harmony // by Moon-Lite //------------------------------// Equestria: Time Heals All “Wait, are you serious!?” Adagio Dazzle had seen and heard much in her long life. Kingdoms risen only to crumble. Great philosophers martyred for their beliefs. She and her sisters had sown disharmony and negativity across two different worlds. “I am.” Sunset responded, “Celestia has given me permission to bring you three back to Equestria.” Adagio Dazzle had seen and heard much in her long life. But nothing would prepare her to return to the world of her birth, one that she had been banished from because of what she had to do to survive. ********************************** Is everything in place on your end? Yup! We have moved the portal to just outside of Ponyville so as to cause little to no damage when they cross. I’ll go and let them know it’s time then. Sunset closed the journal emblazoned with her cutie mark, stashing it lovingly in her locker. “So…” Aria never seemed like she could emit such soft and quiet tones, her regular crass and blunt nature a complete opposite. “After all this time, we finally get to go back home, huh?” Sunset nodded, smile on her face as she looked at her three friends. “I’m envious of you three, y’know? You three get to experience something that CHS stole from me. Redemption.” “But we already forgave you!” Sonata said, blindly missing the point. “I think, Sonata,” Adagio interjected, “Sunset means that we are getting to go and enjoy Equestria again, free from the dark magics that we used to survive for so long.” The shortest Siren turned her eyes, much more aged than they should be, to look at the unicorn. “It’s going to be strange, going back after so long. Even though we had tried so hard to drain that cesspool of a school of it’s Equestrian magic in hopes of going back, we all sort of knew that it wouldn’t have been enough.” The other two Sirens nodded, Sunset smiling sadly at them. “Well I think we should hurry, they are waiting on us after all. I’m also envious of you three that you know so much about ancient Equestria!” Sunset was leading her three fellow Equestrians through the hallways of Crystal Prep, “I also wondered what it would be like to wake up in someplace I knew, only to find out that I had been asleep for hundreds of years! Everything I once knew had changed, and I now had to try and fit in again.” “I, uh,” Sonata said looking down sadly, “I don’t remember much about Equestria… I remember we lost and got sent here by that bearded unicorn, but I only have little glimpses of what life was during or even before that.” “We all have difficulties remembering our pasts,” Aria added, “Me and Adagio remember a little bit more, but we have a hard time recalling anything before we started feeding on negative emotions.” “The best thing to say,” Adagio added solemnly, “Is that we have no past there. We will be lucky if people don’t ask your royalty to banish us once again.” Sunset listened quietly to each of the three. This really was much more than returning home for them, this was going to be them attempting to find their pasts. She stopped in front of the washroom door. “Really? A washroom?” Aria asked indignantly, “Whose idea was that?” Sunset chuckled as she herded the three in, “Well it’s kinda hard to lock a portal location in from another world, just be happy Twilight managed to get it here at all.” She stopped in front of the closed door, watching as the three other women reacted to the Equestrian magic that was flowing from the door. “I’ll be going last, just to make sure that this room is locked up and such, you three head on through and I will be right behind you!” Sunset gave a friendly smile as she shooed the three towards the door. “Go on, don’t be scared.” “Doubt it could be worse than what Star Swirl did.” Aria shrugged as she passed through. “Not a fear in the world, that one.” Adagio commented as she walked through. Sonata went last, turning to look at the back of Sunset who was fiddling with the lock to the room. “You’ll be right behind me… right?” Sunset turned and looked at the puppy dog eyes the former villainess was giving her. How could she have ever been evil? Sunset wondered, nodding and smiling. “I’ll be right behind you.” Sonata gave one last look before she took a deep breath, before a large smile came to her face. “Geronimo!” She bellowed as she jumped into the portal door, causing Sunset to shake her head at the sudden one-eighty of the girls emotions. “Best not to keep any parties waiting.” She muttered to herself, before walking slowly through the portal herself. **************************************************** Light blinded Sunset as she was spat out from the portal, causing her to flail blindly before collapsing in a pile of limbs. Collapsing in a pile of limbs on something soft and… warm? “Ow! Why are you so big and heavy?” Shouted a naturally singsong voice from underneath Sunset. “I-I beg your pardon?” Sunset said, as she slowly cleared her vision and stood up as she continued to blink, “I am not heavy! Nor large! You’re… just…” Sunset stopped talking as she realized what she had landed on. “S-Sonata…? Is that… you?” “What do you mean, ‘Is that you?’? Did the history books not properly show what us Sirens looked like?” “I think,” Adagio’s voice came from behind Sunset, “she means the fact that we are Ponies, Sonata.” Raspberry eyes slowly blinked open, staring at the pale cerulean limbs spread in front of her. Limbs ending in hooves was not that surprising to the Siren, however she soon noticed the lack of fin-like membrane between her cannon and forearm, causing her to rapidly stand up. Or at least attempt to, as she fell again into a mess of gangly limbs. “Really?” Aria’s voice asked, Sunset noticing as a light fuchsia earth pony walked into view. “How could you fail at standing on your own legs, Sonata?” “Bwaaaah?” Sunset let out a confuzzled sound as she tried to comprehend what she was seeing. Or rather, what she wasn’t seeing. All around the clearing just outside Ponyville stood a rather strange assortment of characters. Sunset Shimmer stood closest to the portal, noticing Princess Twilight as well as both Princess Celestia and Princess Luna off to the side. Twilight looked like her mind was utterly boggled at the sight before her, while Celestia and Luna looked at the three ponies standing just ahead of Sunset, a light fuchsia Earth Pony, a pale cerulean Pegasus, and a golden Unicorn, who seemed more interested with hoof studying the horn jutting out of her head. “Well excuse me, Aria!” Sonata grumbled as she stood up, huffing at her sister. “It’s not like it’s been thousands of years since we were last here!” Sonata soon paused as she realized what she was looking at, before looking down at her own four legs standing steady on the ground. “What the hell!?” She shouted as she started dancing from leg to leg, “What’s going on? I thought we were Sirens, not Ponies!?” “I have the feeling, judging by the reactions of our hosts,” Adagio had finally started talking, walking forward and standing beside Aria, “that this was unexpected, though maybe,” her eyes peered over at the royal sisters, “not entirely so?” Everyone present, Sonata having been forced to stop moving when Sunset used her magic to freeze all four of her hooves onto the earth, stopped and stared at Equestria’s diarchy, questions filling the air even though nothing was being said. “You would be correct, Adagio Dazzle,” Celestia started, striding forth as Luna followed closely behind, “that Luna and myself had held hopes that maybe something like this would occur.” “Something like this?” Sunset asked, utterly baffled at what was starting to unfold. “Do you mean you had a feeling that they would appear like this? Did you set up the portal to give them these forms?” “We did no such thing,” Luna stated, “though you are correct to guess that mayhaps we had. Nay, this is merely the same as when you or Twilight Sparkle travel from one world to the other.” “Um, what?” Twilight said, “The portal gives you a form natural to the world you travel to such as me and Sunset turning into Humans, or Spike into a dog, but then we turn back into our natural forms when we return to Equestria. So why are they not Sirens?” “Maybe this is what they mean.” Adagio said, “though I have no recollection of our… ‘natural form’ being that of Equines.” “That is not to surprising.” Came Celestia’s calming tone, though it carried hint’s of knowledge into the current events. “Dealing with dark magics for that long can cause lasting effects.” “Can someone please tell me what Celestia is talking about?” Sonata asked lamely, “And in, like, something simple?” “She means, apparently, that we are ponies, numbnuts.” Aria stated dully, “Though like Adagio says, I’m not sure if I buy it.” Celestia looked over the three Sirens, before looking to Sunset and Twilight. “Twilight, may we borrow your library? I think it is time we talk about some ancient history.” The thought of hosting Celestia, talking about ancient history of all things, was enough to cause Twilight’s head to reach terminal velocity as she nodded. She led the delegation through her hometown, taking it slowly to allow Sonata to get used to having to walk on four legs instead of two. “Now, where to start?” Celestia started after all present had taken seats around the room. “As I am sure Twilight and Sunset are aware, there is indeed a myth about the Sirens from ancient times, of how they threatened to ensnare Equestria and how they had to be banished.” “That really hurt!” Sonata cried out, absentmindedly rubbing her head with a hoof as she remembered the pains of the event. “We do apologize on Star Swirls actions,” Luna commented, “but you must understand we had no other choices available.” “But what about the Elements of Harmony?” Twilight asked, “Couldn’t they have been used?” Luna looked down in shame, as Celestia rubbed a wing over her sister’s back. “At that time, Luna and mine’s control over the Elements were starting to waver. Luna had started down the path to Nightmare Moon, and I was blind to see it happen. As such the Elements refused to help.” “So you had to have Star Swirl banish them? Why couldn’t you two? Or either of you for that matter?” Sunset asked, perplexity crossing her muzzle. “I mean, you two are two of the most powerful beings in existence, right?” “You must understand, we were not immune to the powers of the Sirens, as I am sure that our counterparts proved on the other world.” Luna said, “They had caused us to start our own bickering, which preoccupied my sister, so we called upon Star Swirl one last time.” She turned her ethereal maned head to the three fellow ancients, “That was the last action Star Swirl took, sadly. The magic he used took his very life.” “That still doesn’t explain why we look like ponies.” Aria said with all the subtlety gravitas of a rocket launcher. “That because, Aria Blaze,” Celestia said as she leveled her gaze onto the three sisters, “just like your sisters, Adagio Dazzle and Sonata Dusk, you three are indeed ponies. Naturally born Equestrians from a time long ago.”