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// 24 - The Switch 
// Story: Predictions & Prophecies 
// by Kinrah 
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So many strange things happened on May 21st, in the 990th year of the Celestial Era. It was said in the aftermath that the magic of the world had anticipated its events, that the weird and wonderful had been drawn to Canterlot on that day specifically. Indeed, ponies that would never normally have come to Canterlot could be found everywhere in the city at the time of the explosions, explosions that changed so many lives. In fact, Princess Celestia had been heard to say afterwards, such was the variety of character in the city on the day that some ponies were practically invisible. While her odd choice of words left questions on her subjects’ minds, it was true that some of the stranger individuals were part of the crowd.

Invisible was good. Invisible was preferable. Because here, in the castle, if they weren’t invisible, Twilight and Rarity were going to be thrown in the dungeon forever.

It was about quarter to ten, if the clock in the parlor where they’d landed was accurate. Fourty-eight minutes, give or take, to complete a tight schedule before the sonic rainboom and subsequent magic explosion. Poor Rarity was lost right from the get-go, but for once, for the first time since this whole mess with the workbook, the prophecies and the time travel began, Twilight knew exactly what she needed to do. And she had a mental checklist for it. In the absence of an easily accessible scroll and Spike to follow her around with it, the mental one would have to do.

First, she needed to get to the Meditation Chamber. In her possession was the Iris that had spent eleven years with Reeds Melody, and in that room was the Iris that had just spent the last who-knows-how-many years suspended above the telescope. It didn’t take a genius to work out what needed to happen, and once she’d explained it to Rarity, she got it immediately.

“You have to swap out the one you have for the one that’s there,” she worked out. “Yes, I suppose that makes sense.”

It made perfect sense, because the second part of the plan was taking that version of the Iris and taking it with them to Reeds Melody, who they’d somehow convince to hold on to it for eleven years, completing the loop, and thus another circle was unraveled into a straight line.

Meditation Chamber - Twilight Sparkle - Reeds Melody - Twilight Sparkle - Meditation Chamber - Twilight Sparkle - Trixie.

After the first part, dealing with Reeds would actually be quite easy. Comparatively, anyway. It felt like cheating a little, but Twilight could now remember the shared dream she’d had with Spike, Princess Luna and Sweeping Stroke, and that meant that all she and Rarity had to do was assume the roles of the ponies who’d come to help Reeds with her experiment. Since she already knew what Reeds was going to say and do, at least up to the explosions, it was only a matter of formulating a correct set of responses - the original set of responses. When explaining it to her companion, Twilight had likened it to reading from the transcript of a conversation that you were still having.

Then both of them had realized that made absolutely no sense whatsoever and Twilight had ditched that analogy in shame. She might know what she was doing, but it was taking a toll on her sanity. After that, Rarity swore that no matter the outcome of these events, as soon as they were settled back in Ponyville she was going to drag Twilight to the spa whether she liked it or not. At this point… Twilight wouldn’t fight her. After all of this, she wanted at least a week without a Crazy Friendship Adventure.

That was planning too far ahead though.

Both stages of the schedule had some microstages. For example, the first microstage for stage 1 was to actually get to the Meditation Chamber in the first place. Fortunately, Twilight’s sudden recollection of the dream in CE611 had come with a bonus: remembering the secret passage they’d used to get from the Meditation Chamber out to where Reeds had been, via the Round Table and the Royal Portrait Gallery. This time there would be no dodging areas of unbuilt dream world. Just dodging royal guards. Her own memory of the layout of the castle was proving invaluable, though, and it had taken only a quick examination of the room to determine the quickest route through the castle to the Gallery.

Their window was limited, and every time they had to hide from a guard, it would be closing on them. No time to waste, then.

Mostly the two unicorns kept quiet as they snuck through the halls. Occasionally they’d pass a maid, or hide from a guard. Eventually they figured out that each of them had a method that actually worked: Twilight would studiously ignore passing ponies, like she’d done when she was studying here, while Rarity would trot with impunity as if she owned the place. So long as they looked like they belonged there, they were treated as such. One major thing they had going for them was Twilight’s knowledge of the day’s events around the castle, knowledge that she’d gathered when she’d started as Celestia’s student, and Twilight herself was very relieved to work out that by now Princess Celestia would be in the gardens, and wouldn’t enter the castle again until she had to deal with a certain, er… problem.

Other major players would be Shining Armor and Cadance, who hadn’t hooked up yet but he was still assigned to be her personal guard anyway, they were in the gardens too; Prince Blueblood, who Twilight was pretty sure was still asleep in his quarters; Raven, in her first month on the job as Celestia’s scribe, probably in her office; Summer Tornado, the current captain of the guard, who was out somewhere on patrol; and Mayfleet, the royal messenger, who at this point could be just about anywhere.

“Oh, her,” Rarity said, when Twilight related this. “Yes, I remember. She came to Ponyville when we had that whole Wednesday debacle.”

Twilight nodded. “That’s right. She never mentioned seeing an adult me in the castle today, but I wouldn’t put it past her to be lost somewhere around here.”

“Do you mean to say her sense of direction is…”

“Just as bad now as it is the present.” Mayfleet had quickly built up a reputation in the castle for being the only pegasus to get lost in the foyer. While she still got all her messages delivered on time - probably through that strange magic that kept the Ponyville post office afloat - it was unbelievable just how bad her sense of direction was. “This way. We can take a shortcut through the— oh, right.”

Rarity looked up at the door for which Twilight had grabbed the handle with her magic, then looked back at Twilight, who had gone very, very red. “Whatever is the matter, darling?”

“It’s the… music room.”

The last time Twilight had seen the interior of the music room, she’d been swimming in it. Of course, it had been in her mind that the room had been intact in 990, that was why she’d plotted a shortcut through it - but it was just so embarrassing. Clearly she hadn’t learned from her mistakes either, because just as with this whole thing involving Prophetia, that incident had involved just casting Rainmaker without a proper understanding of what the spell did.

Even now, though, it seemed the room didn’t get much traffic anyway. There were scant few instruments, a couple pianos here, a harp there, most of which were covered with dust sheets. Everypony, even the Princess, just attended classical concerts in the city now. Much as she was loathe to admit it, by flooding the room Twilight had given it a new lease of life. Princess Celestia actually seemed quite taken by the notion of a swimming bath in the castle, and after casting Erasure and chastising Twilight for not reading the whole book before skipping straight to the spell she had overseen the renovations herself. What Princess Luna must think of it, Twilight couldn’t even hazard a guess.

“It’s a bit…” Rarity searched around the room for a word “…dull. Could use some cleaning up.” She winced at the sound of her own voice echoing off the walls in all the wrong ways. “And the acoustics are frankly dreadful. How do you remember this room?” Instantly Twilight went bright red again. “Oh dear. Sore subject?”

“Yes, um…” Twilight stopped for a moment to rub the back of her head. “Do you recall what Spike was saying on the trip to Hoofington last week?”

Rarity too stopped, magic already on the exit door handle. “Last week…” her eyes widened. “You didn’t.”

“I did.”

“Words will be had, Twilight Sparkle,” said the other unicorn grimly, opening the door.

From the music room it was only a couple of halls to the Portrait Gallery. It was guarded, of course, why wouldn’t it be? But they found a storage closet nearby, and from there Twilight could easily teleport them, now that she had a more-or-less clear picture of what the inside of the Gallery looked like. Between now and Spike waddling around it looking for food there shouldn’t be too much that changed.

Inside, though, there was a very obvious difference; the painting of the sonic rainboom. While the other paintings in the gallery were lit and clean, the sonic rainboom painting was half-covered by a cloth sheet, almost forgotten about. Frowning, Twilight strode over and pulled the cloth off. Why? Why was this painting in particular covered? Sure, it wasn’t a portrait, but there were a few non-portraits among the many pony faces in the gallery. Why wouldn’t the Princess want to look at this?

Then she looked down at the cloth, realized something else, and her eyes widened. She hadn’t noticed when it had been hung over the frame, but now that she got a proper look at it, there was no denying what it actually was: a cloak. The same cloak, in fact, that the mystery pony had been wearing in the Meditation Chamber the last time she was there, and had subsequently been given to Trixie. Slowly, she facehoofed.

“That seems… suspicious,” Rarity said, when Twilight explained the source of her exasperation. “I mean, for one, who’d cover such a lovely painting with a cloak? And why is there suddenly a cloak when you actually need one?” Then she continued with what Twilight had actually expected her to mention. “That, and it’s an awfully drab cloak.”

It was indeed very suspicious, but they didn’t have time to go around making accusations. Twilight threw the cloak on hurriedly and headed for where the passage to the Round Table emerged; in the memory, it had been a door, but now it was behind what turned out to be a painting of a tree in one of the castle courtyards. Strange, but again, no time for speculation. Taking only a matter of seconds to locate the catch, she carefully swung the painting open, ushered Rarity in, then closed it behind them.

Taking the steps down two at a time, and nearly paying for it when she tripped on the cloak at the bottom, Twilight hurried forwards. Funny thing, with all this time travel; now they didn’t have enough of it. Ahead, the sun/moon doors were firmly shut, but moved easily under the power of two unicorns’ magic.

Rarity’s gasp drew Twilight’s attention away from the door and to the state of the room, which… wow. Her jaw hit the floor.

In the memory, the room had been pristine, aside from the empty painting frames. Today, it was a room which hadn’t been entered for a very, very long time. Above them, the domed ceiling had been penetrated by a tree’s roots, which hung down limply in the centre and crawled down the walls. Dust and dirt and grime was everywhere. Where the middle of the room had been empty was now a heap of decaying stonework. The other four doors were in varying states of disrepair, too, and one set was completely missing.

Yet it still gave off that air of Importance. Despite its age, Twilight still felt like the room was the most important one in the castle. Now that it wasn’t a dream, she could feel magic thrumming through it. If she didn’t know any better, she’d suspect the room was alive.

But as much as she wished to scratch the exploration itch, she still had no time. Oh! She wanted to explore this room so badly! What lay behind the other doors? Why was the room so Important?! The researcher inside her was going nuts. When she got back to the present… ah. Princess Luna had forbidden her from telling anypony else about them. Would Princess Celestia even let her back in here?

Too many questions, not enough time! Agh!

“Twilight, darling, I think you need to calm down. You’re hyperventilating.”

Okay, she had to get out of the room now. If she stayed any longer she was just going to stay forever. Twilight took a moment to work out where the painting to the secret passage was, unsurprisingly the frame was empty, but it made her jump a little when the frame fell off the wall as she opened it.

Rarity peered into the tunnel beyond. “Twilight, I’m afraid I must insist that I borrow that cloak of yours. Otherwise, I’m going to get filthy.”

Sighing, Twilight disrobed and passed the cloak to her companion. No time to argue.





Compared to the secret passage, the colorful glow of the Meditation Chamber was an extremely welcome relief. They couldn’t stay long, there was a clock in there and it told them they only had about twenty minutes, and they still needed to reach the school towers, but for a moment at least they could breathe out.

“You know, it’s a shame,” said Rarity.

“Hmm?” Twilight looked over from where she was trying to figure out how to perform the switch without completely shutting off the stream of magic that was holding the Iris in place.

“These windows,” her friend continued, gesturing to all of the stained glass. “In twenty minutes, these are all going to get broken, and nopony will ever see them again.” She sighed. “I know I’ve made my stance on the stained glass windows of us in the throne room quite clear, but these just have an air of… je ne sais quoi.

“I know my stained glass windows. It may be one thing to design them, but to actually construct them is a very delicate process. I can’t tell you how many times I saw designers in art school have their projects ruined completely by a tiny mistake.”

To be honest, at this point Twilight had tuned her out. Considering the strength of the Iris she had in her possession, that had spent eleven years with Reeds Melody and had fueled several time travels already, she couldn’t even begin to guess how powerful it really was. And the construct… was she actually a magical representation of the lifebearer?

She exhaled. This would require the utmost of precision. If she screwed up and let the stream dissipate, then she’d have no hope of ever getting it going again. If she screwed up and didn’t get the first Iris released in time, then both of them might get stuck. If she screwed up and… Okay. You won’t screw up, Twilight. In fact, you can’t.

You’ve already done this.

“I’ve always been meaning to look at stained glass as an inspirat—”

FLASH!

What had she done?! What was— Twilight risked opening her eyes. She hadn’t blown up, so that was a plus. Nothing in the room was damaged either. Telescope, fine, windows, fine, Rarity…

Rarity was frozen mid-sentence.

So Twilight did the sensible thing, which was panic. “Rarity?!” She waved a hoof in front of her friend’s face. No response. Didn’t even flex a muscle. This was bad. This was really… wait. Now that she looked closer, there was an almost imperceptible magic aura hanging around Rarity, and once her eyes attuned to it, everything became tinted slightly purple, a certain sign that it was also surrounding her. She pinged it. Time magic, of course, they didn’t belong here, so they’d brought back magic from the future, and… oh, that was genius. Whatever she’d done with the Iris, she’d disrupted the time travel spell, and actually stopped time completely for everypony but herself!

This time magic was drawing on her own, true, but it was so minimal, probably had something to do with Prophetia’s influence. As it were, the combination of spells were indefinitely extending what was supposed to be a temporary time travel spell, and the Iris had probably just kicked the time travel spell into remembering that it was supposed to be temporary… for want of a better metaphor.

Which meant that if she were to just fiddle with it a bit more…

Something very, very quietly went shing.

“I would suggest thinking very carefully about your next move.”

Twilight gulped. That voice meant that the construct in the fully-powered Iris had activated. That noise meant that at least one sword was pointing at the back of her head. “I…”

“You carry a copy of the Iris and you carry timeshifted magic. Explain.”

“MynameisTwilightSparkleandI’vecomebackintimeandI’mtryingtocompletealoop!” Twilight rushed out, not daring to try turning around. This instance of the construct hadn’t met her yet, didn’t know her…

The voice came right down to her ear. “Prove it.”

Know that you have not met me yet… Your future and my past are still intertwined…

She didn’t know why she said the words.

“Rest calm and remember me!”

The atmosphere in the room shifted, and very carefully Twilight risked turning her head so she could see the unicorn, who in turn had gone very still. There was a sword in the air, but it was no longer pointed at Twilight; instead it was off to one side, betraying its wielder’s uncertainty. Seeing her in person - well, in the real world, as opposed to the dream realm - the green of her mane and her cloak almost seemed to jump off into the room, they were so vibrant.

“My name is Twilight Sparkle,” Twilight repeated, feeling slightly more confident that she had the construct’s attention. “I’m the personal student of Princess Celestia, and the Iris I have is the same one but eleven years into the future.”

“You wield Star Swirl’s magic like it was your own,” the other unicorn said, slowly. “And you speak the absolute truth. I do not know how this can be, but you have at least confirmed you have no ill intentions.” Silently, the sword finally withdrew, rejoining its brothers in the scabbard.

Thank you! On the outside, Twilight was visibly relieved. Inside, she was bouncing off the walls. This could be the perfect opportunity to ask some questions! Oh! She had so many! And time was paused, so, figuratively speaking of course, they had all the time in the world for it!

So she was slightly disappointed when the construct asked the first question. “What year is it?”

It almost knocked Twilight for a loop, but of course, the Iris was a self-sustaining charm - it had no way to know what year it was. “The year is 990 in the Celestial Era—” she began.

“Celestial Era?” the construct repeated. “Celestia’s head must be bigger than I remember it.”

“Uh— I’m sorry?”

“Naming a period in history after herself. That’s so stupid it sounds like something I would do. What year is it in Equestrian Royal?”

Equestrian Royal?? Okay, now Twilight was completely baffled. “Uh, she didn’t name the time period, we did. And I’ve never heard of the Equestrian Royal Calendar.” And now she was thinking about things she didn’t know, she couldn’t keep calling the unicorn ‘the unicorn’ or ‘the construct’. “Um, I’m sorry if it’s much to ask, but is there something I can call you…?”

For a moment, the unicorn stared at her, then glanced around the room. “If it has really been that long… perhaps it is best if I do not tell you my real name…” she appeared to consider this a little longer. Then she looked back at Twilight. “You may call me Anthem.”

Anthem. Even if it wasn’t her real one, the name had power. “Okay. Anthem it is. Were you the Lifebringer?”

Anthem blinked back. “Were?” Then “Yes, I suppose… I was called that. Or at least, the real me was.” She gestured to herself. “I am sure you already know that this body is only a construct manifested by the Iris.”

“Yes, of course.” So she was right, Anthem was the Lifebringer, and this construct was essentially a copy made of her at the time the Iris was created. This was all very, very cool. And informative! There was so much they could learn, especially if she was also right in thinking that the Iris pre-dated Nightmare Moon! “So… how old is the Iris?”

“Are you sure you have enough time to ask all the questions you want?” Anthem countered. “I can see that you seek knowledge, but you might need to prioritize.”

“Enough time?” Twilight looked again at Rarity, who was still frozen. “Time’s stopped.”

“Has it?”

“Yes.”

“Has it?”

But Twilight was sure! Nothing was moving! Rarity’s jaw was open, clearly she was in the middle of saying something, and all ambient noise had ceased, so it had to… it had to be…

It was a detail so minute she missed it the first few times she looked. It was slow, ever so slow, but Rarity’s eyelashes were quivering.

“Hasn’t time stopped?”

“It is merely been slowed down to a fraction,” Anthem responded, as if she’d been waiting for her to ask that specific question. “And as it is so slow, the time magic is winding up. It cannot do so forever.”

…because then it would have to unwind and oh that would actually be bad. Rarity would be fine, but if Twilight’s time magic suddenly snapped back and catapulted her into the future without them… so there wasn’t infinite time. Now that she’d seen the magic, it would only be a work of a couple seconds to set time going again - and then actually it’d be pretty simple to dispel the time travel spell on all six of them to return them to the present - and that also removed the problem of how they were going to get back if they had to leave the Iris here.

Okay. She had to think of questions, quickly. Oh, this was nerve-wracking! She could be about to finally get some answers! But she had something more important to do first! Argh! “Right. I need the Iris to follow some instructions. Can it fuel the time traveling spell with enough magic to send the caster(s) to specific points in time?”

Considering this for a moment, Anthem looked up at the original Iris, still suspended in the magic stream. “Yes, it can.” She looked back. “But I must repeat myself, I do not know when ‘now’ is. If you were to tell me a destination, I would not know to what time you would be referring.”

“That’s okay, I’ve got that covered.” Thank goodness for all the time she put into those thought journals. “Minus three hundred and ninety years, plus three hundred ninety, minus three hundred forty-five, plus three hundred forty-five, minus eleven, that’s where we are now, then plus eleven years and minus one month at the same time…” with each number she rattled off, Anthem’s eyebrows climbed higher and higher. “Then plus eleven but the Iris stays where it is.”

“That’s… that is a lot of time traveling.” There was concern in her voice, and Twilight understood it perfectly; after all, after the first four the construct would stop functioning, and by the time it was finished pretty much all the magic would be gone. It would take a very long time to build up to what it had been, if it ever would. The real Anthem must have been an exceptional spellcaster. “It doesn’t sound very sensible.” Then she grinned, and now Twilight was somewhat unnerved, because for a split-second it was about half an inch away from becoming the smile that Pinkie Pie put on when she completely lost it. “Sounds exactly like the sort of thing I would do.”

Then again, given her blatantly reckless disregard for spell safety, as she’d witnessed first-hoof in the vault… Star Swirl wasn’t going to be surpassed as her idol any time soon. If Anthem were a pegasus, though, Rainbow Dash would be all over this.

That covered that base. Next part. “Okay. Can the Iris detect certain spells being cast?”

“Only if they’re powerful enough.”

“Prophetia?”

“If not controlled properly, yes.”

Good, because Twilight certainly didn’t control it properly when she first cast it. “When the Iris detects that in eleven years, just…” how would she describe the way it had reacted during Reeds’ visit to the hospital? “Pulse. Waiting signal, something like that. Then…” can’t forget this “…instruct the pony who’s carrying the Iris to send a letter to me so I can find her.”

The other unicorn smiled, and this time it wasn’t that crazy grin, it was a genuine, warm smile that for some reason made Twilight feel very relaxed. Princess Celestia did it all the time. “Yes, the Iris can do that.”

“Of course, probably best to warn you, when the loop finally evens out most of the magic in the Iris will be dry.” Oh, fiddlesticks. She’d just blurted that out.

Fortunately, Anthem merely sighed. “Yes, I suspected as much. Thank you for being honest about it. Still, it will not be the first time. It has survived this long; it will survive you.”

She said it as if Twilight was the ultimate destructive force. Now Twilight had to ask. “Just how old is the Iris?”

“How long ago was it formed? Aeons.”

Twilight blinked, then shook her head. “Not what I meant.” How could she rephrase it? “When were you - I mean you as in the construct - put into the Iris?”

“You see me as I appeared in real life in the four-hundred-and-sixty-eighth year of the Equestrian Royal Calendar.” Anthem rubbed her chin. “Though I suppose you have no frame of reference for that. I suspect you are about to ask how long exactly have I been in the Iris; the truth is that while it is an immensely powerful artifact, it does have its limits. Your requests for enough magic to time travel are easy enough to calculate, but after a significant amount of time, the, well, timekeeping does degrade somewhat.” She shrugged. “I can ask it how long it’s been, but it won’t give an answer greater than around five hundred years.” She paused. “Four hundred and ninety seven years, five months, seven days. And twelve minutes.”

And since it probably pre-dated Nightmare Moon, that was over a thousand years… it could be just about any time. Darnit. Twilight added a note to her thought journal to ask Princess Celestia how to convert to the Equestrian Royal Calendar. Actually, make that to ask Princess Celestia about the Lifebearer in general. Maybe she knew her real name. Oh, and she still had to follow da Colton’s request and ask about what happened in 617 too. And the painting, and the book as well now that she thought about it…

Suddenly she was startled by Anthem putting a hoof on her shoulder. Her body was only a construct, but it felt so real, and… and… Twilight almost sagged. Anthem’s touch was exactly what she’d felt when the Iris had washed that relaxing feeling over her. In a spa, those hooves would be miracle workers. It was almost as if she were focusing her unicorn magic down into her hooves like earth ponies did.

“Twilight,” she said soothingly, and it was all Twilight could do to resist melting. “Our time is just about up. If you do not release the time magic within the next few minutes, you will lose the rest of your opportunities.”

“But…”

“No buts. You must do this. Haven’t you already?”

Well, she had, but… An idea came to her. “Wait a second. You’ve been unaware of everything going on in Equestria for the past who knows how long?”

“Yes…?”

Twilight lit up her horn. If there was one last thing she could do… “Are you willing to accept my Share?”

“Twilight, I’m not a real pony. You don’t need my permission.”

Nightmare Moon, Discord, Chrysalis, Sombra, and everything in between. That was what she showed the Iris. The past meeting the future, meeting the past. Was it a good idea sharing the knowledge of such threats to Equestria to such a powerful magical charm, especially as it was going to be around when those things happened? Twilight didn’t know, but she couldn’t help but treat the construct as if she were a real pony, because she was, once. Like Princess Luna, she had lost a thousand years of history, probably much more. Even if the first time she saw Twilight was the last time Twilight would see her… Just a little something for Anthem to remember her by.

When the process finished, Anthem sat back quietly. Then she spoke. “…I see. It seems both you and Equestria have been through much difficulty.” She looked up, meeting Twilight’s gaze. “You have suffered so much… At least it is good to know that I did not fail, in the end.”

“Fail what, Anthem?”

Just as it seemed she was finally about to get a new avenue of exploration, something twinged in her horn. Oh no. The time magic was reaching a critical level… the conversation was at an end.

“Good luck, Starshine,” said Anthem, standing again, and gently removing the original Iris from the magic stream, replacing it with the future version. “Every little memory.”

“…that rests calm in me,” Twilight automatically repeated Luna’s half of the phrase she’d heard in the dream. “But… my name’s Twilight Sparkle, not Starshine.”

Anthem smiled. “They are the same word.”

Oh.

OH!

FLASH!

“—n for some sort of- Twilight? Are you alright?”

No, no she was not alright, her horn was on fire, but she knew how to fix it. “Rarity,” Twilight said, through gritted teeth. All of that time magic still had to unwind still, without throwing her back into the future, that meant she had a whole lot of magic that needed burning off… “Take the Iris, go out  that door to the left, and keep running until you reach the stairs. I’ll be right behind you.”

“I’m not sure I understand—”

Twilight threw the Iris at her. Not the best day to deal with an extremely powerful magic charm, but unless she burned it off now, she was going to cause an explosion ahead of schedule. “Just go, Rarity!” Then she grimaced, and turned to the sandstone slab. She hadn’t looked at it when they’d entered the room, but now she already knew it was going to be blank.

And she didn’t shout. She whispered, and the spell cast on her command. “Prophetia.”

No chisel. She didn’t need one. She had magic, and in that instant, her brain was working with how the spell was meant to be cast: old Equestrian. So when the day dawns on the great spark’s morn, the past will rise with a thousand eyes. When the chime is heard, fourth before third, do not put all of your faith in the star-shine that shows you everything. Though the mage opens the life-bearer’s vault, the magic unleashed will not be her fault. The circle be writ, six into three split, Cross the city of nine hundred and ninety.

When she’d been in the room… when she would be in the room in a few minutes, she’d mistranslate the last number. What she’d failed to notice was that she’d also mistranslated ‘star-shine’. It was a valid translation, but the more proper one was ‘twilight sparkle’.

It wasn’t a message for her. But she knew who it was for.

“Sweeping Stroke?” she said, softly, as the spell released its hold on her. There was no way to know if he was watching from the past, of course. “If you can hear me… I’m sorry.” Do not trust the twilight sparkle that shows you everything. Another message that was far, far too late.

From her right, the sound of hoofsteps. Go time. She pulled up the hood of her cloak, loosened the pin, and started using her magic to tidy up some of the places where the script hadn’t properly carved in. This needed to be executed perfectly.

“…where that pony is?” came Ditzy’s voice. Ten seconds. Nine. Eight. Seven. Six. Surreptitiously, she grabbed hold of the edge of the cloak in her magic. Five. Four. Three.

“Excuse me!”

Two. One. Go.

Rainbow Dash would have been jealous of how smoothly she pulled the move off. In a single motion, she swept the cloak off, hurled it at her past self, and used the two seconds where she was completely obscured to gallop to the exit door and slam it. Textbook. And for the final play, she threw the bolt home.

She had to keep herself from going ‘oh’ out loud as she realized that this was the action that Trixie had prophesized her doing. Instead, she ran off down the corridor in search of Rarity. So, back in the dream, she had been right, the pony who’d locked them in the Meditation Chamber had been her all along. Maybe subconsciously at least she had recognized herself. But back then, she hadn’t known time travel was involved. Boy, wasn’t Past Twilight in for a shock soon. How soon? Uhh…

Crud.

Hopefully neither Professor Stormy Eye nor Reeds would notice that the two unicorns who showed up to assist in the experiment were slightly out of breath, or comment on the fact that one of them was carrying a makeshift saddlebag with an extremely powerful magical charm inside. Best not to ask Rarity what she made it from, mainly because it had come from the castle and therefore was likely to be expensive. But she did have a point. Even though they were going to get Reeds to hold on to it, it wasn’t like they could go through the grounds to get to where the experiment was taking place just holding it out where anypony could see it.

Just as well, because they stepped out of the castle, Twilight saw a familiar face and hissed “(Princess!)” before scooting the pair of them into a bush.

Making it to the tower was vital, but they had to be sure they weren’t seen on the way there either. If Princess Celestia saw the two of them there, especially Twilight, then the whole thing was ruined. Fortunately it looked like the Princess was occupied; she was facing the other way, and talking to another pony, and typically as mysterious ponies did they were wearing a dark hooded cloak that obscured most of their features. Please say it wasn’t… phew. Every now and then past the Princess Twilight could see a flash of a scarlet red tail, so it wasn’t her come back in time yet again. Not that she’d risk talking to the Princess in the past so brazenly.

Then she noticed another problem, which was that Mayfleet was between them and where they needed to go, with her eyes on the Princess and staying at ‘I’ve been told to give somepony some privacy but stick around’ distance. Okay. This could get ugly. No teleporting, the Princess would detect that. But there was no time to do anything clever! They needed to get to the school tower right—

“(I’ve got this),” whispered Rarity, starting to move. “(You go while I’ve got her distracted!)”

“(But Rarity—!)”

But Rarity was already up and on the move, heading directly for the monochrome messenger. Fumbling, Twilight tumbled out of the other side of the bush. Well, Mayfleet seeing Rarity was less of a problem than her seeing Twilight, at least… she grimaced. Mayfleet was a good friend of hers, but the road to that friendship had been pretty rocky. Much of the next ten years young Twilight would spend studiously ignoring her olive branches of friendship, at least up until the Princess stopped using her to communicate with her student and started using Spike instead. After that, well, she’d stay firm friends with Shining Armor and Princess Cadance, and with Twilight’s parents, too, until Twilight herself saw the error of her ways.

She could have treated Mayfleet better.

From where she was, she couldn’t hear what Rarity was saying to her, but it was giving her the opportunity she needed to sneak around the pair of them. The problem was, Mayfleet’s memory, despite her sense of direction, was phenomenal. If Twilight were to ask her about it, not only would she be able to tell her that she’d talked to Rarity in the castle today, but also exactly what had been said and that Rarity had been carrying a hastily constructed saddlebag, which she had to admit was impressive for a pegasus who could turn ninety degrees to the left and finish pointing straight downwards. At one point, she thought she’d been spotted, and froze; but whatever Rarity said managed to draw back Mayfleet’s attention before she could turn around.

“(What did you say to her?)” she whispered, as Rarity finally rejoined her around a corner, and the two set off at a brisk trot towards the school tower.

“(I simply asked her where I might find the throne room.)”

They both looked to their left, where two distant guards guarded the very obvious entrance into the throne room antechamber.

“(Did she have any idea?)”

Rarity giggled. “(Not in the slightest.)”

Twilight had never visited this particular tower, not in real life, anyway, only in the dream. It was more of a communal space, and by the time she was old enough to be using it, she had shunned contact with her fellow students altogether. Only her knowledge of the castle grounds saved her from not being able to find it at all. Like the Maids’ Lodge, she’d just never had any reason to go inside it.

Here goes, then… she pushed open the door, and stepped into the memory.

The interior of the room was littered with weather surveying equipment, and judging from some of the furniture, it was supposed to be a student lounge. Students had certainly had their way with it, to Rarity’s disgust. There were discarded books and papers everywhere, and now that Twilight was actually there, she had to fight the urge to tidy it all up. If she was honest, this was partially why she’d withdrawn from studying with the other students of her age in the first place, some of them were just so messy.

Exactly as Twilight remembered, Professor Eye was startled to see them. “Oh! I’m sorry, I wasn’t aware there were any students in today,” he said, looking between the two of them in slight confusion. “It’s the induction today, you see. Lots of little’uns running about. Can I help you with anything?”

No hesitations. “Yes, professor,” said Twilight, instantly slipping back into Student Mode. “I’m Starshine and this,” she waved at Rarity “is Moonshine. We’re alumni. I heard that Reeds Melody is here? Could we speak to her?”

“Oh, that should be easy enough. Reeds!” The professor turned around, calling out to the tower in general. “Reeds! Where is that filly? Reeds!” Listening to music in the next room. “I think she’s around somewhere. We’re preparing for an experiment, you see. If you’d care to follow me…”

Maybe following the script of a conversation you’re still having was inaccurate, after all. It was more like acting in a play where everypony else has a script but all you’ve got is improvisation, and you still had to make sure that after you said your line, the next line made sense in context. This was all very, very weird, like deja vu in reverse. First, Twilight had lived through the memory of the event, and now she was acting in the original event. All of this was of course lost on Rarity, who was encountering the situation for the first time just like Reeds Melody would be. Darn you, temporal causality!

Turning the corner into the next room, yup, there was Reeds, head bouncing away to whatever music she was listening to, completely oblivious to both the impending event and the impending professor. Reeds Melody, impossible dream pony and coffee addict, was about to enter the story for the first time. It was nerve-wracking.

But, really, was getting it wrong even possible?

Professor Eye tutted, and rolled his eyes, as Twilight knew he would. (It would later occur to her that Reeds was paying attention to none of this - she was facing the other way, and listening to loud music besides. Was her subconscious just picking up on what was going on behind her?) “I should have known.” He tapped her on the shoulder. “REEDS!”

Reeds Melody took off in fright and— and crashed into the ceiling. “Ah!” she exclaimed, whipping the headphones off and rubbing her head. “Ouch! Don’t do that, you scared me!”

If Reeds thought she was scared, Twilight was nearly catatonic. She didn’t do that in the memory. “You’ll ruin your ears listening to it at that volume!” the professor was saying, actually taking the headphones from her and setting them on the desk. “And you have visitors!”

It took all of Twilight’s willpower to get her facial expression under control as Reeds looked between her and Rarity. No, she distinctly remembered this, Sweeping Stroke had been next to her, looking at the headphones on the floor. But they weren’t on the floor. “Are you supposed to be here?” Reeds said, coming up into Twilight’s face, before turning back to the professor. “Are they supposed to be here?”

REEDS: Is she supposed to be here?

“They’re alumni,” Professor Eye said patiently, with that practiced tone that all teachers got after enough problem students.

“Yes,” added Rarity, taking charge in the absence of any input from Twilight, who was still wondering what in Equestria was going on. “I am Moonshine,” she rattled off the pseudonym flawlessly, “and this is Starshine.”

“Oh, really?” Reeds didn’t seem entirely convinced, but she got out of their personal space anyway. “Welcome back.”

Here was a tricky part, and fortunately Twilight recovered herself enough to launch into her pre-prepared bit of the script. Rarity wouldn’t know enough about the school in general to be able to come up for a plausible excuse as to why they were there to help. This was where Twilight’s experience came in useful. “We got a letter from Professor Yorsets,” she said, hoping they’d buy it. It wasn’t like they’d be able to confirm it with him - he was about to be giving younger herself her entrance examination. Plus, he sometimes helped out with Pegasus Studies, more so than the other teachers, anyway. Personally Twilight had never met Professor Stormy Eye, not until today anyway, but he should accept that. “He asked us to come in and assist you with… some kind of weather experiment? He wasn’t specific.”

Professor Eye nodded along with her as she spoke. Good. If he accepted it, Reeds probably would. “Something like that, yeah,” the pegasus mare said, suggesting further to her later statement that she also had no idea what she was doing. Then she addressed the professor. “Look, are we going to get started, or—”

“Professor!”

Right, this was the part when, in the dream, Daffodil came in. Obviously it wasn’t Daffodil. No, it was Mayfleet again, which made things worse.

At least she didn’t come all the way into the building, and the professor went to her rather than the other way around. That would have been hard to explain, now for both of them, since Rarity had asked her for directions to the throne room. And this wasn’t the throne room. Couldn’t get much further removed from it, really. Both unicorns just settled for freezing and not daring to turn around in case they got spotted.

For her part, Reeds blew Twilight’s mind again. “Fifth time in twenty minutes he’s gotten distracted,” she muttered, rolling her eyes. “We’re never gonna get this done.”

How? How was this possible? Twilight had lived through this moment already, so why was it different?! Why were they off-script?! It didn’t make any sense! She thought she had this all figured out!

The professor interrupted her inevitable mental breakdown. “I’m sorry, ladies,” he said, poking his head back into the room, “but I’m afraid I’m needed elsewhere. I’m the only pegasus staff professor on the campus and somepony’s let their little darling play hide and seek in the gymnasium. Reeds, we’ll have to do this another time.”

Nope, you’re doing it now. “Well, Professor Yorsets did ask us to come and help,” repeated Twilight, voice a little strained, possibly overacting a little. “I’m sure nothing can go that wrong if the three of us are working on it…”

The glare that Reeds shot her would have rivaled Fluttershy’s stare, but it quickly faded into a resigned nod. Come on, Reeds, the sooner you get this done, the sooner you can get your coffee. Just, you know, after you fall in a fountain and go to the hospital. Not a big deal.

“Well, you’ve got some volunteers, Reeds,” said Professor Eye jovially. “Glad to know somepony pays attention to my lectures.” He jokingly elbowed Rarity in the side as he said so, an action with which she was not best pleased. “Are you comfortable with that?”

Wait, no, hang on. In the memory, Reeds’ expression in the next part had suggested she was disappointed that the experiment might be canceled, but now she felt the opposite?

“If you feel you don’t want to, darling—” Rarity started.

“O-kay,” interrupted Reeds, in the familiar tone of voice of surrender. “I can work with that. Both of you, follow me.” She paused. “Good luck, Prof.”

“Parents,” replied the professor, shrugging. “Come find me if anything unexpected happens.”

With that, he was gone, the door to the outside shutting behind him. Yeah, it had been a little odd in the memory that Reeds hadn’t properly acknowledged his departure… It was only as they were climbing the stairs behind Reeds that Twilight finally got it, and she had to resist the urge to whack her head on the wall a few times. She was so stupid. It was a memory. It wasn’t infallible. Even if there was going to be a big event in a few minutes, that didn’t mean Reeds was guaranteed to remember every single detail. Why would she want to remember that she hit her head on the ceiling? Maybe deep down, she did want the experiment to go ahead, and that’s how she remembered behaving?

As if mocking her, Reeds then said exactly what she was supposed to say, and it felt like an affront on her sudden realization, and that somehow made it worse. “I hope you know what you’re doing. I’m new to this too, you know.”

“Oh, it can’t be that hard,” Rarity said flippantly, completely underestimating how hard it was actually going to be. Twilight wished she’d been able to do a little research on the equipment in use, but seeing as she’d only realized that they’d be doing this in the instant that she started casting the time travel spell, there had just been no time.

So, yeah. No, they didn’t know what they were doing either.

Upstairs, there were more little changes. Not so much of the equipment was covered with dust sheets, though the machine they were using remained the only one switched on, and there were more little things that Twilight recognized. That anemometer - could it possibly be the same one she’d used just in February to measure the wingpower of the pegasi in Ponyville? It had been among the items she’d had brought down from Canterlot when she moved to the town… that, and she’d made the embarrassing habit of hoarding the magical things that she was given to work with, while all of her studies were in the library tower.

A lot of it would still be there, actually, unless anypony had gone in to find it, and even then they probably wouldn’t. Princess Celestia had marveled at her ability to get things lost amongst the shelves, some of which Twilight was sure went on for longer than the building was wide. Her mentor had joked that maybe, if she kept going, she’d end up in another library altogether; naturally, Twilight had taken the jest completely seriously and laboriously avoided the deep sections for a year.

One rather glaring addition was a table with Reeds’ bag on it, along with several empty and one full coffee cup, the latter of which Reeds swiped on her way past. It was only about half ten. Once more, Twilight found herself wondering how this mare even slept normally.

“Sit yourself over there,” Reeds said between gulps of coffee, gesturing with the coffee cup. “Let’s get this show on the road. Sooner we get in, sooner we get done.”

“What exactly are you hoping to measure?” Rarity asked, throwing Twilight completely off-script again. On the machine, the information was readable now, though not very useful, as all the sensors for it were inside.

“Eh, I dunno.” Reeds tossed the coffee cup and started untangling the balloon’s cords. “Like I said, I’m just the assistant. Well, all else fails, we can just write down what we see and the prof’ll make some sense of it. There we go.” Then she looked up, saw Rarity fiddling with the dials on the machine, and rolled her eyes. “Come on, Moonshine, if you keep doing that you’re gonna break it.”

No, that wasn’t right. That hadn’t been part of the memory, but… hadn’t Reeds said that in her sleep? So she did remember it?

Before she could even begin puzzling it out, Reeds had ducked outside with the balloon, and was holding it out some distance from herself. “It should be coming through! What do you see?”

Silently, Rarity threw Twilight a plea for help. The fashionista had gotten swept up in it and carried away, and now she needed assistance. Twilight trotted up behind her to peer at the display, which wasn’t doing a lot. “It’s still searching for the data!” she called out, looking back towards the window over her shoulder. Rainbow Dash was in the race right now. They were really doing this. They were making it happen.

“Are you sure? That can’t be right. I zeroed that thing myself.”

“(How are we supposed to know if it’s working or not?)” Rarity hissed, a little too loudly.

“You’ll know when it’s working!”

And in ten… nine… eight… seven…

“Agh!” Rarity leapt backwards as the machine roared into life with a loud buzz, and a stream of numbers poured across the display. Even though she was only paying half attention to them, Twilight suppressed a chuckle. It was giving them weather information, sure - but it was also recording a dramatic change in the ambient magic levels. If Professor Eye had been here, he would have called Reeds in immediately, and just as suddenly shot off to get the Princess. You couldn’t ignore numbers that high.

Before the storm, the world had taken a deep breath.

“It’s working,” was all Twilight said.

“At last! Now, hurry up and let’s get on with this so we can—”

BANG.

“—the hay?”

Twilight and Rarity tripped over each other trying to get to the window to watch the rainboom. Sure, it wasn’t such a rare event now that Rainbow Dash had been practicing them, but how often did you get to watch the colors in the sky that had set you on the path to your cutie mark? Well, Twilight had now watched this one three times, and Rarity twice, but that was besides the point. Somewhere far away, Rarity was about to discover that her magic had dragged her straight to a motherlode; somewhere up and to their left, Twilight was about to explode, and Spike was about to be born. Time travel… she’d thought it before, but she thought it again. Time travel was weirdly wonderful.

Unlike the dream, the windrush didn’t affect the two unicorns, which made sense, they were inside. Outside was a different story, as Reeds struggled to maintain her position while the balloon slipped out of her grasp and disappeared. “I lost the balloon!” she shouted, pointing after it but trying to watch the rainboom at the same time. “We could have gotten something from that!”

Now Twilight had to think of something to do. She’d been putting it off, hoping that a solution would present itself. Pulling Reeds back inside the window would be easy, but that wouldn’t do any good if her own magic triggered a fourth explosion.

“I had to make that balloon from scratch!” Reeds complained petulantly. She was flying closer, just as she had in the memory, but still she was too far away. Come on, come on… “We’re gonna have to do this again when the weather’s better.”

“Reeds!”

“You know, I really think—”

It was a move so stupid it would no doubt have received more praise from the Iris… from Anthem. But Twilight was out of ideas. Concentrating on the time magic that surrounded her, she nudged it, looking for the same thing she’d done in the Meditation Chamber. They were out of time… so it was time to make some more.

FLA—