//------------------------------// // Hypothesis I: Where do they go? Only that's not really the question addressed but I needed that title to make the joke work for the next chapter. // Story: Excitement = Twilight * Death^2 // by Needling Haystacks //------------------------------// It was a few hours and one meal later before Sunset Shimmer and the other Twilight Sparkle appeared. Twilight had quickly realized this and the trio had resorted to brainstorming other hypotheses to test. Without the critical data, however, they simple could not risk testing them. Spike had by this point returned, and was somewhat relieved to see the pile of dead Twilights had not significantly grown in his absence. ****************************************************** After a modest dinner of carrot-and-hay sandwiches, Twilight sent Spike to gather a few things before the shops closed. Twilight, Sunburst, and Starlight then went to the portal room to await their extradimensional colleagues. It was not long before an orange unicorn with a red and yellow mane emerged from the portal, standing on her hind hooves. After a moment, she plopped down on all fours and checked her saddle bags. "Hi Twilight! Hi Starlight! Twilight should be right behind me," Sunset said. Indeed, very shortly thereafter, a purple (or possibly lavender) unicorn wearing glasses emerged, also standing on her hind hooves. This arrival, however, took several unsteady steps on two hooves. Sunset reached out and steadied her friend, helping support her weight as she lowered her front hooves to the ground. "Now THAT is something tha takes some getting used to," Twilight who's not from Equestria said. Don't worry, they will get easier names in a moment. "Hello! I think this is the first time we've met," said Sunburst, pushing up his glasses, "I'm Sunburst." He held out his hoof. Twilight-from-Canterlot-High looked unsure what to do, so Sunset took the initiative and bumped his hoof. "Hey," she said with a smile, "I'm Sunset Shimmer. I've heard about you from Starlight." "Twilight Sparkle," Twilight Sparkle who wasn't a princess said, repeating the gesture the other two had shared, "Starlight was right... you two really do look alike. Are you sure you aren't related?" "I don't think so," Sunburst said, pushing up his perpetually-falling glasses onc more, "But then I don't know all my cousins on my Father's side of the family, so maybe?" Twilight Sparkle's own glasses had gotten a bit out of place in transition, so she awkwardly attempted to mimic Sunburst's movements to push them back into place. "Hi umm... Twilight," Princess Twilight Sparkle said, "Did you bring the thing?" "Oh right!" she said, nearly standing up before she remembered. She glanced back at her saddlebags, which a few minutes earlier had been a backpack. "Oh right," Sunset said, "Hold on..." "No wait, I've got this," Twilight said, "It's like the telekinesis stone magic, right?" "I don't know... Probably?" Sunset said. "Stone magic?" Sunburst asked. "I'll explain later," Starlight told him. It took three tries, but Canterlot High Twilight managed to use magic TK to open one of her bags. She began pulling items out and placing them on the floor. "Thermometer... no... Air pressure gauge... no... Hall probe... no..." "Where were you planning to plug that in, anyway?" Sunset asked. "I've got a miniature generator in here somewhere," student Twilight said, "Multimeter... no..." "Wow you two really ARE alike," Starlight said. "We are not!" both Twilights said simultaneously. They blushed and student Twilight went back to her examinations. "Say it might be kind of confusing to call you both Twilight," Sunburst said, "Maybe we can find something else to call you?" "How about Twilight 1 and Twilight 2?" Sunset suggested. "No way!" Twilight 2 said, "Then I'd be 2!" "Not necessarily..." Sunset began. But Twilight had her number. Which was 2. "You met me second, it's only logical," Twilight 2 said. "I agree with Twilight," Twilight 1 said, "We need a way that's fair. Calling one of us Twilight and the other Twilight 1 wouldn't work, either. Hmmm... How about I be Twilight 1 and she can be Twilight A?" "For Alternate?" Twilight A asked, "I don't know that I'm thrilled about that, either." "Actually I was just thinking A is the first letter of the alphabet," Twilight 1 said. 1 Twilight A thought about that for a moment, ceasing her rummaging. "I can accept that," she said. She went back to it, switching to her other bag. "And all that's in here is the mini-generator. Now I KNOW we packed that magic detector!" Twilight A said, "Sunset, is it in your bag?" 2 "Uh, let's see..." Sunset said, removing her saddle bags. She was about to turn it over and dump it out, but seeing the look Twilight gave her in stereo, she decided against it. Instead she set them gently on the ground and opened them up. "I think this is it," she said, "But isn't this different from the one you used at the Friendship Games?" It was a somewhat bulky hand-held device with two anntenae and a screen. "Yes, it's a lot easier to modify than the compact version," Twilight A said. "Let me see!" Twilight 1 said excitedly. She took hold of the device with her magic and held it in front of her. "So the needle showed the direction of magic and the screen shows concentration?" she asked. "More or less, but it's calibrated for our world so..." Twilight A began. "Hey, let's see which of us has higher magic!" Starlight said, taking hold of the device and flipping the obvious switch. The needle flipped back and forth rapidly lazily, not actually pointing anywhere. The readout on the screen showed a flat line. Starlight shook it a bit, before Sunset used her magic to grab it and return it to the table. "As I was trying to say, it's currently calibrated to detect Equestrian magic. But there is so much Equestrian magic around here that it wouldn't know what to do. I've got to tweak it to detect dimensional frequencies first," Twilight A said. She then added under her breath, "Assuming Starlight didn't damage it..." "Right, let's get to the lab," Twilight 1 said. She closed her eyes and her horn glowed. With a 'pop' sound, they were all in her lab, along with Twilight A's equipment and Sunset's saddlebags. "Wow, you've gotten good at that," Sunset said admiringly. "Oh that's nothing!" Twilight 1 said, "You should see... well that's why I asked for your help, actually." "Yeah I wasn't clear on that. You said you die and respawn?" Sunset asked. "Oh right well... Oh wait I can't do that until we test this. Ok, let's try this..." Twilight 1 said. *********************** Twilight A had set the detector on the lab bench (which is a type of stabilized table) and was sorting through the tools in Sunset's bags, when suddenly she found herself outside. Staring at a pile of her own pony-form's corpses. "AAAAAAHHH!" she yelled. Sunset was a bit more prepared, but was still clearly startled. "Oh, hey Twilight, hey other Twilight," Pinkie Pie said happily, "Here for the 'Twilight's dead but not really so let's all eat cake' party?"3 Sunset blinked. That phrase was, in fact, written on a sign above a stand that Pinkie now sat behind. It said "Cake, 5 bits. The baker is IN" on a paper sign taped to the front. Behind Pinkie was a table of cakes frosted in black with little tombstones sticking up out of them. "This is a party?" she said, looking around, "I don't see anyone... err anypony else here." "Yeah, the pile of corpses scared them away," Pinkie said non-chalantly, "Oh well, more for me!" Pinkie opened her mouth wide and stuffed a piece of cake into it. "Also we should probably figure out what we're going to do with these before they start to smell," Starlight said.4 "These are all RECENT?" Twilight A exclaimed. "Uhh, let's go back to the laboratory for now," Starlight said, igniting her horn. With another 'pop' they were back in the lab. ******************* "So yeah," Starlight said once they were back," Turns out Alicorn immortality works by forming a new body when their old one dies. And apparently it can be done repeatedly." "Huh..." Sunset said, unsure what else to say. "So umm... what did you want us to test?" "Well we're a bit worried that Twilight might be taking those bodies from other Twilights in other dimensions," Sunburst said, pushing his glasses up yet again. Teleporting with Starlight always managed to shift them juuust far enough down his nose to need correction, for some reason.5 Twilight A shook herself out of her shock on hearing this. "Hmmm, that is a possibility," she said, putting a hoof to her chin and accidentally hitting it. How DID they manage without fingers? 6 "Hence the need for a dimensional detector," she continued, "Well, I can't gaurantee it will detect any dimension, since they all might act differently, but we can at least test those like the ones we know. I'll need some sort of dimensionally sensitive object. I'll also need some way to boost the output so it's still readable over the electronic background. We'll just have to hope the physical friction doesn't damp it too much." "Oh! Were you using the electric-magic resonance for that detector?" Sunburst asked. "That's a thing?" Twilight A said, surprised, "That would have made things a lot easier." "Well, yes," Sunburst said, "I didn't go into electro-magic engineering, but I know it's used in Unicorn communities when there isn't a river available to dam." "So your civilization uses entirely green power?" Twilight A asked, "Fascinating." "Green? I don't know that it's green," Sunburst said, "The water is mostly blue and the magic is..." "No green as in..." Twilight A began. She stopped on seeing Starlight's uncomfortable look. "You know what? Never mind," Twilight A said, "We have more pressing issues to deal with. Anyway, no that's now how this works. After I found a stray bit of magic-infused grass, I discovered it would vibrate just a little in certain areas." Twilight A at this point stopped fiddling with the device and slipped into lecture mode, standing (as much as she was able) up straight, facing the general direction of those she was talking to, and projecting to the back of the room. I hypothesized it was reacting to the presence of other magic. Hook that to a piezoelectric circuit and you've got a signal. Put two of them at angles and you have direction.* Of course around here, everything is magic, so I'd hypothesize that the effects cancel out, much like how Newton's law shows that the gravity inside concentric spherical shells depends only on the mass inside the shell youre on.**" "You have Fig Newton in your world, too?" Sunburst said, interrupting. "Ours is called Isaac, but he's basically the same," Sunset supplied. Twilight A looked irritated at having her lecture interrupted. Sunburst looked abashed and waved with his hoof, motioning for her to continue. "Now, Since we know the mirror portal reacts with the magic detector, and the portal is dimensional, Equestrian magic must relate somehow to dimensional variance," Twilight A continued, "We just need something with more dimensional than magic to test it with." "What about the mirror?" Starlight asked, "It's dimensional. Could we break off a little piece of it without breaking it?" "I don't know about the mirror itself," Twilight 1 said, "But the crystal frame isn't just for show.*** They've been resonating with the dimensional magic whenever the mirror is used, so we could remove one of them. We'd just need a replacement first. Starlight, think you could ask Maud?" "Sure thing," Starlight said. She eyed Twilight A warily before teleporting away. "And there were other mirrors, according to Celestia," Twilight 1 said, "I can probably have Spike send a scroll. It wouldn't be as fast as dying but..." "Right, don't want to accidentally kill your parallel self," Sunset said. On seeing Twilight 1's look she added, "Probably shouldn't have mentioned that." "The point is we'll then have more than one data point! Oooh, this is so exciting!" Twilight 1 said. She stopped her squeeing abruptly. "Um, assuming I'm not killing other Twilights of course." "The rest of us can help you out," Sunburst said to Twilight A. "Not sure how well that will work," Twilight A said, "Too many people on something this small tends to result in getting in each other's way." She turned her attention to the detector as she spoke. She flipped it over with her magic and picked up a screwdriver with the same. She stuck out her tongue as she concentrated on maneuvering it to undo the screws. Sunset gently took control of it and turned it effortlessly. Twilight A smiled sheepishly. "Ok, maybe I could use a little help," Twilight A said. "Then let's get this dimensional detecting whatever built!" Sunset said with some enthusiasm, albeit less than either Twilight. *Piezoelectric systems are those that emit charge in response to mechanical stress. Some microphones use piezoelectric materials as their pickup, as do some electric guitar pickups. With the right material and a lot of experimentation, it is in princple possible to use a piezoelectric set-up to detect anything that produces movement in the receiver. The notion here is that Sci-Twi found something infused with magic (I can't find where Friendship Games actually showed what) and through a combination of math and trial and error rigged up such a system to detect magic. The directionality is obtained by setting up 2 such systems, each corresponding to one of the antennae on her original device. This is similar to how stereo audio is recorded: 2 mics are used (either literally or with some clever use of a single mic) to get not only pitch and volume, but also the relative direction. The best part is that while the components are not necessarily cheap, neither are they absurdly expensive, and they are easy enough to find via cannibalizing what are more commonly called 'crystal' microphones. A student who can afford Crystal Prep probably has the resources necessary to procure these. **It's true! To first order at least. In this case we have to suppose that because magic is permeating their world but with little appreciable effect on most applications, SciTwi's instrument, being intended to pick up single large spikes sticking up from zero, reacts to random blips that occur rather than a single identifiable source. It's a signal-to-noise ratio (SNR) thing, similar to trying to discern what song is on a radio station that is almost-but-not-suite coming in. Actually without doing the math I'm not sure the SNR works as it would need to, but it's at least plausible that it could. The effect here could, interestingly, manifest as a high magical creature like Twilight having objects 'stick' to her. This will lead to comedic potential at some point, I'm sure. ***The most commonly used piezoelectric materials are crystals, so this is doubly convenient. Sometimes the universe gives you one for free. 1 She also felt that numbers trumped letters in the heirarchy of labels, but she didn't want this debate to drag on forever. 2 This is the most common use for research assistants: Moving heavy things between labs and field locations. 3 This had replaced her previous idea for that day's party, the "Anniverary of 5 days after the Cake twins first burped in a way that kind of sounded like language" party. It was a slow day for parties. 4 The pile only represented about half of the corpses. Twilight 1 had donated the first 20 to the local hospital for organ transplants, but had to stop when she was informed that they had neither the immediate need for the organs nor any way of storing that many. It was clear that a better distribution network would be needed. There were also further difficulties that would arise, but Twilight 1 wouldn't find out about those until the next day. 5 It was because Starlight thought the gesture was cute, but she wasn't going to tell him that. 6 The answer was 'surprisingly well, all things considered'.