//------------------------------// // 22 - Stymied // Story: Reflections // by RQK //------------------------------// Crystal Faire stood facing the large, metal sphere in the center of the clearing. She looked at the lights that occasionally graced its smooth surface and she inwardly admired the way it sparkled in the sunlight. The entire thing was at least the size of several houses now. There were still sets of scaffolding situated around it, but the structure was otherwise whole. Twilight Sparkle, Sunset Shimmer, and Starlight Glimmer all stood on various parts of the scaffolding. They poured streams of magic into the metal sphere. Crystal could see with her mind’s eye that they were affecting some internal adjustments to the structure, creating linkages that ran the diameter of the structure and making further configurations on internal parts. In all reality, however, she knew that to be the case even without seeing it. A steaming ear of corn floated in her magic and she brought it close to take another bite of it. She swallowed the kernels that she managed to snatch up and hummed with delight. Chrysalis trotted up right next to her and looked up at the structure as well. “Well, we’ve finally finished it, hmmm?” “Indeed,” Crystal replied. “I suspect a few hours more and we’ll be ready to deploy it.” Chrysalis sighed. “Finally. How long have we been here? Almost two weeks?” “More or less,” Crystal replied. “I am ready to save the multiverse and be done with this whole business.” “And I as well. Not that this has been an interesting experience, but…” Crystal glanced over. “I would suppose you’ve given some thought as to what you will do when this is all over, correct?” “A little,” Chrysalis replied with a frown. “But I guess you already have something in mind for me.” Crystal shook her head. “Not at all. That is why I am asking you.” Chrysalis raised an eyebrow and turned to face Crystal in full. “You… don’t?” “No.” “So… then… you’re giving me a choice?” Crystal nodded. Chrysalis’ muzzle twitched and she turned back to the supercomputer. “Well… I don’t have a definite idea yet. I would suppose that those three will return to their home timelines.” “Yes. And I suppose that you would not want to do the same with yours.” “Not at all. There’s nothing there anymore, after all.” “Well, whatever you decide, just let me know. I’ll take you there,” she replied before taking another bite of her corn. After a moment’s consideration, Chrysalis nodded. “I appreciate it.” At that moment, Celestia came upon Crystal’s other side. She held her head high as she joined them in gazing at the supercomputer. Sunset’s cyan-colored laptop floated within Celestia’s magic. A window with a black background and lines upon lines of white text was on it. Chrysalis’ expression remained unchanged as she turned toward the laptop and pointed at it. “Did Sunset Shimmer ever get that thing to work?” “Why yes, she did. She showed me some things with it,” Crystal replied. “Chrysalis, do you remember when we did that experiment where we had you travel through time?” Chrysalis nodded. “The others and I, meanwhile, saw an alternate Starlight in possession of a time-altering device. It gave me some thoughts about how to apply time manipulation to the spell. But after doing simulations with Sunset, I’ve been convinced that I absolutely needed to use those thoughts.” After a moment, Celestia nodded. “Why don’t you tell us about it?” “We will use time dilation to speed up whatever we want to contain the effects, both wall-wise for those colliding timelines and floor-wise for those collapsing ones. And it turns out we actually need to go as fast as possible; we couldn’t even get the simulations to check out without the time dilation.” Chrysalis frowned. “Oh.” Crystal took the laptop from Celestia’s magic and brought it close. “In fact…” Crystal touched one of the keys on the keyboard and a letter appeared in the command window. Crystal pushed another key and another letter appeared on screen, and then she followed it by tapping the spacebar. She narrowed her eyes and mouthed, “Where is that hyphen key at…? Oh.” She continued pecking at the keyboard with her hoof before, after about a minute, there was a complete line. She pressed the enter key and then lines upon lines of white text flashed across the screen. The text went by faster than anypony could read, and in short order, Celestia and Chrysalis shook their heads and simply watched. Crystal, meanwhile, quietly munched on her corn. The scrolling stopped and the three leaned forward. The last few lines ended on some analysis of the simulation; the final line read, 467/500 generated timelines intact, 23 collapsed within 14 sets -> 14 collapsed within 14 sets, 10 -> 0 timelines moving, 0 timelines missed. Press any key to continue. Crystal nodded. “See? It checks out.” After a moment of silence, Celestia frowned. “I didn’t see anything.” Chrysalis snorted. “Me neither. I thought I would have been able to watch it.” Crystal blushed. “Well… the program isn’t that advanced…” “Then what use is it?” Chrysalis hissed. Crystal pursed her lips, and after a moment of staring Chrysalis down, she tried, “It works…” Celestia rolled her eyes and chuckled. “If you say so, Crystal Faire.” * * * “So, let’s review,” Twilight said. She stood looking down at six other ponies who all sat around the unlit fire pit in the center of the pavilion. “Since we’re almost done with everything, we should probably go over this one more time.” Crystal nodded and stood up. “Right. Once I start the spell, I won’t be able to do anything else for its duration, which includes protecting you. So, just to be safe, I’m going to make sure you all make it home. You—” she pointed at Chrysalis, “—are getting back to me on that. Celestia… what are your thoughts?” Celestia shook her head and looked at her own see-through body again. “I think that, with how chaotic things have been for such a long while… I could spend these next days in peace and quiet. Adamantine,” she said as she motioned to the pony next to her, “has offered a spot here in the unpony village.” She turned to Adamantine with a smile and said, “And again, I appreciate the offer tremendously.” Queen Adamantine, who sat on one side of Celestia, smiled. “Not at all. I would want you to be comfortable in your circumstances.” Sunset, who sat on Celestia’s opposite side, lay a hoof across Celestia’s withers. Twilight couldn’t help but avert her gaze but tried to keep a smile on her muzzle all the same. Celestia chuckled. “Of course. But that should be easy knowing that existence is safe… and that you’ve succeeded.” She looked at all of them, including Chrysalis, and said, “I am so proud of all of you for all of the hard work that you’ve put into this.” Chrysalis merely nodded in response. Twilight cleared her throat and turned to Crystal. “Once that’s done, you’ll head off to deploy the spell. Everypony understands what happens then?” “Perhaps go over it one more time, just for clarity,” Adamantine suggested. Starlight nodded and straightened up in her cushion. “So… that thing over there will, for the most part, tap into Crystal’s ability to see reality. It’ll use that to see which timelines are collapsing and moving about and whatever, and what timelines you’d have to mess with in order to stop all that.” “Right,” Crystal replied. “After that,” Sunset began, turning to Crystal, “the spell will make use of your travel ability to disperse itself to all of those timelines. With the way we’ve quantum entangled the entire machine, it’ll be like having a single spell across timelines, which is like existing across them all at once, and you’ll be able to crystallize them all at the same time. You’ll use that time dilation mechanic you were talking about to do it all relatively quickly, too.” “Again, correct.” “And the debris…” Chrysalis began. She spoke no further than that, opting to glance around the group instead. Crystal levitated a stuffed toy snail over. “Well, if what happened with Whammy was any indication to me, I have to be in a timeline that’s in the process of collapsing in order to do anything about that. I can’t get a hold on any debris unless there’s a direct path between me and it.” Chrysalis nodded. “Of course…” “As I perform the spell, I’ll establish a hold on all the interversal debris and, using the travel ability, I’ll be able to distribute all of that debris safely into other timelines.” Celestia frowned. “You’re going to dump this material into other timelines? I would assume this will cause some damage to them.” “To their continuities, yes. That’s why I’ve selected just ones that I can’t fix anymore,” Crystal replied. “That way, it’ll have the smallest amount of negative effects.” Celestia nodded. “I see. So, with that being the case… what about all of the ponies that are out there right now? What will happen to them?” Twilight sucked in a breath and nodded. “Yes… What about your people? What about your mother?” All eyes turned to Crystal. Crystal kicked the dirt and turned to consider Celestia. After a moment’s thought, she replied, at length, “Well… if what happens to them is anything like what’s happened to her…” she said, “then there really is nothing that I can do for them. If I clear the interversal space of all debris, they will probably fade just like Celestia is now.” Sunset shook her head and stood up. “There’s gotta be a way to do something for them. Somehow…” “They can’t survive here,” Chrysalis said. “I doubt they could survive in any timeline.” “Then maybe we shouldn’t. Crystal, couldn’t you just leave them alone? Take care of all the debris but leave those ponies alone?” Crystal went to speak but sighed and shook her head instead. “I… I couldn’t tell what’s what unless I was physically there with them. And if I’m out there…” She looked at Celestia again and said, “Chances are that I wouldn’t be able to come back.” After a moment of silence, Chrysalis chuckled. “Then maybe its in your best interest to just stay out there with them.” Crystal sucked in a breath and replied, “You… suggest that I… lose myself to the interverse like they have?” “You can’t,” Twilight interjected. “Crystal, you can’t. If you stay out there, then… what about the rest of the multiverse? What about those timelines that still need help?” “Twilight…” Twilight grimaced and continued, “What about… me? Would I never see you again?” “Twilight Sparkle,” Chrysalis said, “wouldn’t you say that she would get what she’s always wanted if she stays out there?” “That’s certainly important too,” Adamantine muttered. “But…” Twilight tried. “Really, she’s in a position where she could actually make it happen if she really wants to. She could be with her people if she wants to.” Chrysalis smirked and crossed her forelegs and said, “Who are we to deny her happiness?” Twilight shuddered and hung her head. Starlight and Sunset reacted similarly. “Yes… I could do it, I guess… But…” Crystal went silent and opted to scratch her head instead. Celestia sighed. “It is your choice, Crystal Faire. I just hope… I suppose we all hope… that you choose wisely.” Crystal met Celestia’s gaze and nodded solemnly. “Of course.” * * * Crystal stared at a small, circular hole in the side of the large, metallic structure. She lowered her head and inserted her long horn into it right to the point where her head touched cold metal. It fit perfectly within the aperture. The metallic sphere hummed as energy swam through it. She could feel magic swirl around her horn before flowing into it and then through to the rest of her body. Crystal, in turn, could feel herself extending past the boundaries of her own body. She could feel leylines within the metallic structure. She could feel power surges and she could feel currents moving for the first time. She felt connected to the machine. She felt like it was a part of her. After a moment, the flow between herself and the supercomputer ceased, but her awareness of all its internal intricacies did not. She took that cue and pulled back, her horn slipping smoothly out of the hole. She turned to face the several ponies watching her. Her main four all stood together. Celestia stood with Adamantine and a few of her charcoal-colored unponies toward the rear. She glanced between all of them and nodded. “I can feel it. I’m connected with it now.” Twilight clapped her hooves together. “Good.” Sunset nodded. “Buck yeah. Now we just have to do those last bits of work and we’ll be good to go.” “If you all don’t mind,” Crystal began, “I think I will run the computation just to see what it outputs. We should at least check to make sure that that is working.” “Very well,” Chrysalis replied. She pointed toward a small collection of lights to the immediate right of the hole and said, “Those controls there should be working.” Crystal turned to those lights and nodded. She walked up to it and started to push on some of the lights. Let’s see… disable the other functions. Let’s run the computation only. The lights flashed once, and then just before she pushed the final button, Crystal paused. For this to work… I have to turn all of my filters off. I have to see the entire multiverse. Her mind’s eye winced as infinities of timelines appeared within her vision. Crystal tried to suppress the shiver that ran down her spine but to no avail. She then pushed the button. The metallic sphere in front of her continued to hum, and she could feel her mind’s eye pulling and distorting and twisting this way and that. She could see timelines disappearing one by one although that meant nothing when there were uncountably many. She could feel currents running through her entire body, and she couldn’t help but convulse against their pull. Starlight gasped. “Crystal! Are you okay!?” Crystal quickly looked over her withers and replied with a pointed, “Yes! I am okay!” “Is it working?” Sunset asked. “I think so!” Crystal replied. Now a few dozen timelines disappeared from her mind’s eye at a time, and then a hundred, and then a thousand. The pace in which they disappeared rapidly picked up, and soon enough, Crystal could no longer guess how many were disappearing in the span of a second. Her internal vision shifted around and continued to pull, effects which manifested in more bodily convulsions. Entire sets of timelines, infinite in size, disappeared in a flash. More and more and more left her vision and Crystal wasn’t sure if or when the process would stop. Eventually, however, it did. And it did so suddenly that Crystal had to take a moment to confirm to herself that her view was no longer changing. The machine’s hum died down, and that was her actual cue that it was finished running its calculations. She knocked the last bits of dizziness out of her head with a rap to her temples and then focused on the timelines that remained. She could see many timelines. She could see more than she could count. The timelines were everywhere and stretched in every direction. But, on a little more searching, Crystal found an edge where the collection of timelines ended. She found more edge and followed it with her mind’s eye. A small smile graced her muzzle as she did so. She then moved her mind’s eye away from it all. She tried to see it all wholesale. And sure enough, after a few moments, the astronomical amount of timelines sat bunched together like a small but infinitely tall cornfield. She couldn’t help but grin. So, the affected area is finite. Thank goodness. She turned to the others and, with a smirk, declared, “We’re in business.” “Nice!” Sunset exclaimed. Chrysalis smirked and exchanged glances with Starlight who smirked back. Crystal walked back in their direction. Her physical eyes lay on them. Her mental eye, however, scanned all the timelines again. She sifted through them, mentally sorting them out. She read the states of a few of them. She watched how they evolved. She watched lives from start to finish. She watched paths diverge as choices made affected continuities that came after. She watched as some timelines contained short crystallized bits where she had been before. On closer inspection, Crystal found herself in those timelines and watched as she, a younger she, went about solving problems. Crystal chuckled. The memories themselves were gone, but the record was still there. She ran her mind’s eye over more timelines. She observed the small bits that came off some as they collapsed. She observed the way some of the timelines seemed to move and she even caught one as it collided with another timeline. She watched the collision closely, noting how the collision tore the respective realities to pieces. She ran her eyes over a set of timelines that was in the process of crystallizing on their own. She then turned her eyes toward some more timelines and watched those as well. Crystal paused. In the real world, she tripped and fell flat on her face. The others cried out and, one by one, raced to her side. “Are you alright?” Twilight cried, skidding in the dirt right next to Crystal. Crystal remained silent and still for a few moments. Her mind’s eye turned back toward a few of the timelines that she had just observed. She saw them. It was a random collection of timelines, each relatively separated from each other, all in the process of crystallizing. What? “Crystal!” Twilight screamed. Crystal frowned and pushed Twilight away. She then stood up and dusted herself off and stared into the distance. She tried to convince herself that she had just seen it wrong. She tried to convince herself that she, in her daze, had read it wrong. But no, the collection of timelines within her mind’s eye was still crystallizing. It was slow and steady and almost imperceptible but there it was. “I don’t understand…” she wheezed. Chrysalis shuddered and pushed her way up to Crystal. “What is going on? What’s with that sour look on your face?” Crystal shook her head and said, “I don’t know what I’m looking at.” The rest of them visibly shrank at that. Even Chrysalis, who was nearly muzzle-to-muzzle with Crystal, shuddered. “I do not understand…” Adamantine wheezed. “You… don’t know what you’re looking at?” “No.” “Then… The calculation—” “The calculation was fine,” Crystal interjected. She saw all six of them relax at those words and she added, “It went off without a hitch.” Twilight pulled at her mane and glanced around at the others. “Then what happened!? Tell us!” “What did you see, Crystal Faire?” Celestia asked. Crystal glanced between them and solemnly nodded. “Well…” * * * “So there are timelines out there, right now, that are crystallizing,” Twilight said. “Why?” Crystal scratched her foreleg and said, “I don’t know.” “Then what is doing it?” Chrysalis asked. “There has to be something that’s doing it.” “I am aware,” Crystal replied as she shifted on her cot. “But it isn’t by my doing. And I can’t say what’s causing it.” “That’s assuming it’s one, singular thing to begin with,” Adamantine said as she paced around the six sitting around the unlit fire pit. Crystal nodded and buried her face in her hooves and let out a long and drawn-out sigh. “Well,” Sunset began as she sat up straight, “I guess if we’ve learned anything else from what just happened, we actually have a pretty good idea of what the actual damage is. Honestly, I thought it was going to be much more.” Starlight also sat up in her seat and, as some color returned to her face, she nodded. “Yeah, you’re right. That’s a pretty big relief.” Twilight smiled. “Yes, it is.” “I thought it was going to be to the point where the spell wouldn’t have been able to pull it off,” Sunset continued. “I mean, well, not completely.” Chrysalis turned her eyes toward the large, metallic sphere in the center of the clearing and hummed in thought. “Well, naturally. You would think that with the attention we’ve given this thing, it would work.” “Exactly,” Sunset said, slapping the dirt with her hoof for emphasis. “Once we get that spell going, it will work. We’re going to save the multiverse for sure.” “Yes, we will…” Crystal swallowed. “But it would seem whether or not it will work is not the problem anymore.” All heads turned to her again. “I am afraid to ask…” Celestia began with a sigh, “but… what exactly do you mean by that?” “These timelines which are crystallizing on their own for some reason pose a significant problem.” “Which is?” “When Twilight and I ran some experiments on the multiverse before this business even came to our attention, we determined a few things. When I sustained a spell across timelines, both of them crystallized at the same time. But we found out that if I wanted to travel between these crystallizing timelines, I had to hit the moment exactly. Otherwise, I would exist in two different time periods on the same timeline, and that’s just not possible.” Crystal quickly swiveled toward Chrysalis and added, “And yes, I can hit that moment. I’ve done it.” Chrysalis shrank back. “I see. That was what I was just about to ask.” “The thing is that is only a small part of the actual issue,” Crystal continued. “Altering the supercomputer algorithm so that it selects that exact moment is one thing, and it can be done, but I won’t be able to time dilate and crystallize these timelines as fast as I need to.” “Oh… the algorithm that we have depends on us being able to go from start to finish in a matter of seconds,” Twilight said. She glanced up and said, “How long would it take in this case?” Crystal shook her head and said, “Months. Years.” Sunset swore. Oh, by the stars! Twilight thought. Starlight threw her hooves into the air and sputtered for words. “So… so… No, it’s not like we can’t recalculate in the middle of all that.” “That’s correct,” Crystal replied. She pointed toward the supercomputer and said, “Once that thing performs its initial calculation and disperses, it’s done. We cannot do anything else with it. So, unless the entire process happens quickly, it will go beyond the scope of the algorithm and we would be done.” Crystal crossed her forelegs as her features scrunched together. “And that is if the supercomputer doesn’t try to time dilate anyway and destroys itself in the process or causes something much worse to happen.” Starlight shook her head. “We can’t ignore those timelines, can we?” “No. They came up in the computation.” Crystal replied. “If we did, there would be loose ends, and this whole collapse could start up all over again.” Twilight groaned. “Ooooooh, this is bad. This is really bad!” she said as she clutched at her forehead. Sunset shot to her hooves and looked down on Crystal. “So… What? Where do we go from here?” Twilight hopped to her hooves and pressed herself against Crystal. “We have to look into it. We have to! We have to!” “I know,” Crystal replied without batting an eye. Twilight spent a few moments trying to bring her hyperventilation back under control. She tried to swing her foreleg in and out in a well-practiced motion (she had learned the move from Cadance, after all) and while that helped to ease herself, she still needed breath. “Crystal, if we can’t…” Crystal shuddered. And then another cloud appeared out of Crystal’s horn. This cloud, although a dark blue like the one that they had seen yesterday, had tints of yellow to it. The others shied away, flipping between staring at Crystal and the cloud. Bits of color disappeared from Crystal’s face. She lit her horn and another glass jar appeared. She uncorked it, funneled the cloud inside, and then sealed it. The bottle and the contents inside disappeared with a loud bang. With a sigh, Crystal straightened herself and nodded solemnly. “Yes, I know. If I can’t resolve what’s happening with the timelines, then we can’t deploy the spell, and all of existence is doomed.”