//------------------------------//
// Forty-Two B.E. 
// Story: The Creation of Harmony 
// by Time Ponies are cool 
//------------------------------//

Chapter III: Forty-Two B.E.
In the middle of the Sweet Apple Acres corn field stood a mysterious object. A tall wooden blue box. The box had white windows on all four of sides that gave off white light amidst the dark rain. It had a set of doors on one side and on the left door was a white poster with instructions in black letters saying, 
"Pony Telephone. Free for use of public. Advice & assistance obtainable immediately. Officers & cabs respond to all calls. Pull to open."
Above the doors was a black sign with illuminated white letters saying, "Pony Public Call Box." 
The box was twice as tall as the Doctor, and each side was only about four and a half feet wide. A box that size could only fit at most three ponies, and they would be packed like sardines.
"Aw, what in tarnation? Doctor! Your box thing crushed my corn!" Applejack complained when she saw corn stalks flattened underneath the blue box and immediately went down to retrieve what corn she could.
"Sorry! I was in a bit of a rush to park. It is a bit of an urgent mission we're in."
Rarity took slow, hesitant steps as she traversed the muddy cornfield, taking the utmost care not to dirty her hooves, though ultimately her efforts were to no avail. When she saw the blue box, she stopped. "Are... are we going inside that thing? All of us? It's going to be awfully crowded and I refuse to crowd inside a box with dirty, mud-covered ponies."
"No need to worry, Rarity." The Doctor said, "You can have your bedroom and you don't have to share bathrooms. I just had renovations last week - or last century, I never can tell - and I added a few new ones!"
Everypony but Derpy and Pinkie stared curiously at the Doctor, baffled by his strange words. They had no idea what he was talking about. How could a little blue box have a restroom? Applejack approached Twilight and asked, "So, uh, Twilight... are you going to tell us who in the hay this fella is?"
"I don't really know all that much, to be honest," Twilight replied, "But I've read a few stories and legends about him. He's appeared throughout all of time, from the beginnings of recorded history to recent history, but he never stays in one place long enough for anypony to know anything about him. All that anypony knows is what he looks like, that he brings his blue box with him wherever he goes, and that the box can travel anywhere in time and space. And wherever he goes, there's always trouble, but he fixes it."
"That's some crazy stuff," Rainbow Dash said, "I wonder if it's true."
While the others conversed, the Doctor busied himself with getting his keys and unlocking the doors of the blue box. He pushed the doors open, entered and invited the others inside. Everypony was hesitant to crowd into the little box, but Derpy and Pinkie eagerly entered. Twilight approached the box, inspected the exterior and then looked inside. She gasped in delight and immediately entered. Rainbow Dash, Fluttershy and Applejack, curious as to what Twilight saw, followed. Rarity stared with her jaw dropped and eyes wide upon seeing everypony somehow easily fit inside the blue box. She still hesitated to enter, but after seeing how dirty her hooves were getting and how wet she was getting from the rain, she finally went in. The sight that greeted her was beyond shocking.
"Welcome to the TARDIS!" The Doctor shouted.
Inside, the blue box, which the Doctor called the TARDIS, was a massive open room with a big complex console and glass column at the center that reached from below the floor to the ceiling and glowed a gentle cyan light. The walls and ceiling formed half a sphere around the console. The walls were dotted with rows of hexagons and oddly shaped stone columns supported them. Several hallways and staircases led to various other rooms. The TARDIS was a complete home as well as a spaceship, with bedrooms, restrooms, a swimming pool, a library, a kitchen, a dining room, and so on.
"Alright!" The Doctor said as he rushed to the TARDIS console and began typing in navigational directions. "Now, we'll be going back to the year 42 B.E." He then pulled the temporal opening lever and cranked the engine pump as he continued speaking. "That's two-thousand sixty-four years ago. At that time, ponies lived in the kingdom of Ponytopia, ruled by King Concordius, and the kingdom was locked in a war against the kingdoms of Drakonia and Hoofrica..." As the Doctor went on talking incessantly about the history of the time period and the complications of time travel while pushing various buttons and operating a myriad of mechanisms, the TARDIS began making a strange whooshing sound, the sound Twilight heard from the barn.
The Doctor spoke on and on, but nopony was listening. Everypony was staring in amazement - jaws dropped and eyes wide - at the TARDIS interior. It was like nothing they had seen before. To them, what they were looking at was an impossibility.
"It’s…" Applejack stuttered.
"It’s…" Rainbow Dash stuttered.
"It’s…" Rarity stuttered.
"It’s…" Fluttershy stuttered.
"Cool! It’s bigger on the inside!" Pinkie shouted as she hopped around.
"This. Is. Amazing!" Twilight yelled as she turned and twisted her head and neck and walked around everywhere, looking at everything in the TARDIS. She observed the lights, the columns, the floor, the console, the chairs, and whatever else she could find.
The Doctor finally finished navigating and ran back to the others, who were still standing by the doors staring at everything around them. "So, now that we're - oh, right. Yes, bigger on the inside. Uh..." The Doctor looked at Derpy and pulled her beside him. "Derpy, you take care of them."
"Right, Doctor, sir!"
The Doctor walked past the others, opened the doors and went outside. The others looked at Derpy and waited for her to explain. "It's the TARDIS. It's bigger on the inside," she said
"I don't get it." Applejack said, scratching her head.
"Oh, Applejack." Pinkie replied, "It's just your basic trans-dimensional engineering. Due to the varying spacial properties of the dimensions inside the TARDIS and outside the TARDIS, one can achieve a space of greater size within the dimension transference center."
Everypony awkwardly looked at Pinkie for a few seconds before Rarity broke the silence. "All this is making me dizzy. I'm going to head back to the barn and- Oh, but no! It's still raining."
"Don't worry. I can clear a spot of sunshine for us," Rainbow Dash said, "This thing may be bigger on the inside, but still not big enough for me to fly around. Let's go outside." 
They went outside and saw that they were in an empty courtyard. The courtyard was in a mighty castle built on the base of a mountain. The castle's grey stone towers stood tall and its granite walls were high and strong. The perimeter of the courtyard was marked by elaborate marble columns adorned on the top with statues of the Old Gods of the Pre-Classical era, such as Queen Faust, the supreme creator goddess, Sibsy the Wonderful, goddess of thought and love, and Ingram the Melodious, god of song and friendship. On the North side of the courtyard were magnificent silver gates. At the center of the courtyard was a great fountain with marble sculptures of royal alicorns. In front of the eight ponies and the TARDIS was a pair of massive wooden doors. The sky above was tinted pink as the sun began to rise. The Doctor stood in front of the castle doors and shouted to the others, "Welcome, everypony, to Castle Equites! Home of Starswirl the Bearded and King Concordius! Heart of the kingdom of Ponytopia."
"Now this is really starting to get at my head. What just happened? We moved," Applejack said as she looked around her, "I must've had one too many mugs of cider today or something."
"Silly Applejack." Derpy replied, "It's the TARDIS. It can go anywhere!"
"Well, this is... rather bleak looking." Rarity said as she observed the architecture around her. "A castle like this should be more majestic. The gates are nice, though. But the rest of the castle looks like a war zone."
"At this time in our history, ponies were locked in the Five-Hundred-Year War." Twilight explained. "So the castle would look like a war zone. You remember when we performed that play on Hearth's Warming Eve? This was the unicorn tribe's castle."
"Wait. We're in the past?" Applejack asked. "We're really in the past? You weren't just spitting out a load of manure with all that stuff about the Doctor and time-travel?"
"Silly Applejack," Derpy replied, "It's the TARDIS. It can go anywhen!"
"Come on, everypony!" The Doctor called from the massive doors where he stood, "Starswirl is waiting for us!"
The ponies, leaving the TARDIS behind, gathered in front of the doors, which then opened outward as the unicorn guards inside used their magic to push them. Inside was a long hallway with a red carpet and lining the walls were stained-glass windows with images of past pony kings and queens. Servants trotted through and across the hall attending to the guards and cleaning the windows. The eight ponies entered, with Twilight hopping in excitement and Pinkie hopping in unison with her. Shortly after passing by an intersection, they reached the end of the hall and met three doors. The door in front of them was enormous and magnificent. It was made of the finest cedar wood, lined with silver and studded with rubies. The plain wooden doors to the left and right were not as beautiful, but nonetheless impressive because of their size. The Doctor led everypony to the doors to the right. 
"Aww, I was hoping we'd go through that gorgeous door over there." Rarity whined, "Whoever's behind it must be a pony worth knowing."
"King Concordius doesn't have time for us right now." The Doctor said, "Politics these centuries is bloody ridiculous."
The doors opened to reveal another hallway with stained-glass windows. The images on the windows were ancient texts and poems written by mighty sorcerers. As the ponies made their way down the hall, Twilight was amazed to see the words translate before her eyes from an ancient dialect of Equinese to the modern dialect. The texts were all the poems, speeches, sayings and proverbs Twilight loved when she was a filly. The TARDIS was at work in her mind, translating any language she encountered right in her head.
The Doctor stopped them halfway down the hall, in front of a door to their left. It was an iron door. On the center was a glowing swirling star. The door had no knobs and seemed to be a door that needed to be pulled. The Doctor stood in front of the door and recited an incantation. "Iuro ego sequi magicam amicitia."
A doorknob then appeared. The Doctor turned it and pulled the door open. Inside was a dark room lit only by candles and a skylight at the center. The walls were covered with full bookshelves and various magical contraptions and cauldrons were scattered throughout the room. By one of the scrolls was an old unicorn who's clothes were all too familiar to Twilight. The old unicorn wore a dark blue cape with star and moon patterns on it, and bells lining the end. He wore a hat with the same color and patterns and bells around the rim and on the pointy tip. He had a long flowing white beard that nearly toughed the floor. He was looking through the scrolls on the shelf and a pile of scrolls had already accumulated beside him. The old unicorn turned to look at who entered.
"Ah, Doctor. Thou hast found them, I presume." Starswirl the Bearded said.
"Yes." The Doctor replied. "The vision was a vision of cutie marks, it turns out, and these are the six ponies who had them: Twilight Sparkle, Applejack, Rainbow Dash, Rarity, Fluttershy and Pinkie Pie."
"Greetings, my little ponies." Starswirl welcomed each of them with a bow. "Art thou aware of the task upon thy hooves?"
"I have no idea!" Pinkie answered.
"I see." Starswirl said as he gave the Doctor a disappointed look and sighed. He paced in front of the ponies as he explained the situation "As thou knowest, this land hath been locked in disharmony and chaos of five-hundred years. But, these past nights, I hath had most horrid nightmares. I hath seen an alicorn using the divisions betwixt the three kingdoms to sow discord and conquer all the land. And all throughout the dream, I saw the name, Tympanus and I hath heard a frightful sound. The sound of drums."
"Pfft! Drums?" Pinkie interrupted. "That's not so bad. I have drums stashed all over-"
Twilight stuck her hoof in Pinkie's mouth and scolded her. "Pinkie!" She looked at Starswirl and gestured for him to proceed. "Please, continue, Starswirl the Bearded."
Starswirl started pacing again as he continued his story. "One day, I hath remembered a prophecy I read in the Eldest Scrolls. It spoke of Derpy, who, in the time of our greatest need, shall find the key to vanquishing the evil forces that rise up in a time of chaos and bring harmony to the three kingdoms." He stopped pacing and looked at the six ponies when he finished.
"If you need a hero to vanquish evil, you've come to the right pony!" Rainbow Dash said as she stepped out from the group and put on a proud pose. Twilight quickly pulled her back in line.
"Looks like this might be a job for the Elements of Harmony, Rainbow." She said, "We should return to Equestria and ask Princess Celestia for the Elements."
"Yeah, let's go back," Fluttershy said, "and you can all just leave me behind in Equestria and not bring me back here where there's evil and drums and dragons. I'm sure Angel needs feeding."
Everypony looked at Fluttershy and rolled their eyes.
"Doctor. If you don't mind giving us another ride." Twilight said.
"If Starswirl doesn't mind us leaving for a moment." The Doctor said as he looked at Starswirl.
"Do what thou must."
"Alright," Twilight said, "come on, everypony."
The Doctor pushed the door to the hallway open and everypony galloped out the room. After, they had gone, Starswirl closed the door and looked at his scrolls. He stroked his beard and thought deeply.
"Hmmmm... Elements of Harmony. I know I hast heard of those before, but where..."
~~~~~
The doors to the courtyard opened as the Doctor, Derpy, Twilight, Applejack, Rainbow Dash, Rarity, Fluttershy and Pinkie Pie galloped through. The Doctor talked as they made their way to the TARDIS.
"Now, if I'm correct, the date we came from was Neigh 24th, 2012... Wha-" The Doctor stopped when he beheld the shocking sight before him.  "The... the TARDIS! It's gone!"
Everypony gasped and looked at each other.
"How are we supposed to get to the Elements now?" Applejack worriedly asked.
Suddenly a shadow appeared before them and a voice came from above.
"You won't!"