212.1 (Wixelt)
"Let us hope the three of you will be enough for my plans.” Grogar grunted, eyes falling upon his remaining three pawns as he stepped back out of the shadows. The trio of villains shared looks of confusion, before one of them spoke up.
“And what of King Sombra?” Queen Chrysalis asked warily.
“Was he successful?” Lord Tirek added.
“Hah!” the former emperor barked, before gesturing to his scrying sphere, expecting it to show the king’s demise.
...only for it to flicker with static.
“I... what?!” Grogar scowled at the orb, slamming it several times with his fore-hooves. “What witchcraft is this?” he snarled. “Who has the audacity to think themselves capable of blocking me?”
“Magical EMP, ya’ll.” Apple Bloom grinned, leaning proudly on her latest creation, which came in the outer form of a rather simple looking set of steel casing, the occasional bolt of lightning arcing inside. “Extreme long range, tuned to the specific frequency Grogar’s seeing thingamajig uses.” she giggled. “Gonna have him stumped til the end of the loop with this.”
“Impressive. Will be fun trying to see the others top this.” Applejack whistled, then chuckled. “You get the other Crusaders’ help with this?”
“Nah, we’ve got something else planned to do together.” the younger Apple shrugged. “Y’know, the usual tree sap routine. Seems to jam up just about everything else, so why not this?”
“Fair enough.”
212.2 (Vinylshadow)
Twilight let out a series of Grumpy Horse Noises as she trotted into her Friendship School Office.
Spike frowned, looking up from his careful claw-clipping. "I know those GHN. What're you jealous about now?"
"I'm not jealous that the Student/Young/New Main/Insert Other Objectifying Descriptor Here have a tree-shaped crystalline structure!"
Spike arched an eyebrow. "That's… oddly specific."
Twilight blushed, tossing her mane and sat down, letting out a deep calming breath. "It's nothing," she assured him with a tired smile. "Honestly, at this point, I'm either able to save the library, regrow it, have any number of countermeasures to Yggdrasil's demented obsession with destroying my house, so getting worked up over something utterly unrelated is pointless!"
"Your mane begs to differ," Spike replied.
Twilight blinked, then pulled a mirror out of her Pocket. Several strands of mane were starting to pop out of place and curl dangerously.
"...I see your point," Twilight said, sitting down, before flopping onto the floor. "Still, it's nice to see that the tree is ultimately more-or-less fine. Not like we needed it, since the magic of friendship never needed physical objects to be channeled in the first place," she added under her breath.
"They're like magic wands," Spike said, flexing his fingers as he buffed his claws. "They help focus and aim the power where it needs to go, and by now, you've moved past aim assist and lock-on."
"Har har," Twilight said dryly. "What's new with you?"
"Typical Dragon/Changeling Ambassador stuff. Remarkably boring, considering it involves dragons. How do you make dragons boring? Politics!" Spike said, rubbing his temples. "Still," he added. "Helping the Changelings acclimate to a more civilized way of rule is a lot of fun. Good practice for political sparring."
"Political… what?" Twilight asked blankly. "What, you mean like what Padmé and Leia do? Or anyone involved in the messy world of government?"
"Exactly," Spike said with a grin. "When I told Padmé about the new Changelings, she lit up like a Hearth's Warming Tree and asked for everything I had on them. Which… wasn't much at the time," he said sheepishly, rubbing his fins. "So now whenever I get involved with Ember and Thorax, I've been taking notes." He scowled at Twilight. "You're a bad influence on young impressionable dragons, you know that, right?"
Twilight shrugged. "I'm not apologizing."
"Good, because that'd probably mean you've been replaced by a Changeling. Again."
Twilight scowled at him. "One time! Baseline," she grumbled, avoiding Spike's flat stare.
"The many, many, many photographs and evidence proving a couple thousand loops worth of Changeling Replacement Variants says otherwise," Spike teased.
"Hmph," Twilight said, sticking out her tongue. "Don't you have a school to clean?"
"Yes, and I'm glad I've replaced Filch a few times, because it feels like I'm the only one who even tries to keep the school clean," Spike said, rolling his eyes.
"Sorry," Twilight said, ears going flat. "I've been meaning to hire more staff. And guards, and maids, and… a whole lot of things."
"It's fine," Spike said, waving a hand dismissively. "Really," he added, when Twilight didn't look convinced. "Would you rather I sit around and become fat like other typical dragons?"
"You raise a fair point," Twilight admitted. "Now get back to work!"
Spike gave her a sarcastic single-finger salute on his way out the door.
212.3 (Wixelt)
"Okay, so let us lay out the evidence.”
With a resounding whumph, Trixie dropped a large binder full of disparate papers onto the table in front of her, throwing up a small cloud of dust. Though the folder’s contents would not be read today, she was a show mare first and foremost, and it helped to get the ball rolling if you showed you’d done the work, which she had.
“First of all,” she began, “we have the matter of the creation of Twilight’s castle, and the functionality of the Cutie Map therein, which shows a degree of self-awareness and general omniscient perception of the world at large, down to the details of specific inter-individual relationships on the part of the individual.” the blue-maned unicorn looked to the changeling queen stood next to her. “Chryssy?”
“Second,” Chrysalis picked up the train of thought with a nod, “we can note that the subject in question was capable of contacting the ‘Young Six’ of their own volition via an apparition of our dear Anchor to test their mettle as a group of close-knit friends, likely in preparation for the foreseen outcome of Cozy Glow’s plans coming to fruition.”
“And leading from that, we now have the newest expansion.” Trixie continued. “Despite destruction at Sombra’s hand, they were capable of sustaining a presence after ‘death’, long enough to again contact the students so they could be rebuilt and resurrected into a new form.” she clicked her tongue. “This further corroborates our prior thoughts, and also infers a certain amount of precognition, as the change in form of it and the Elements of Harmony is apparently in aid of some yet unknown end.”
The duo fell silent, letting that one sink in. The other loopers present, constituting about half the branch population, muttered among themselves for a moment, before one of them spoke up.
“Well, that’s all well and good, but we all already knew the Tree of Harmony was a conscious, thinking entity.” Cheerilee noted from her seat, humming a little. “And whilst your research is impressive, I'd grade you down for stating the obvious if you were one of my students.” she quirked an eyebrow. “Somehow I feel as if this wasn’t your entire point, though.”
“Quite.” Trixie rolled her eyes, sharing a thin smile with her marefriend. “We are aware that the Tree is already known to be aware of the goings on in the world at large, and is capable of acting on what it sees by sending others to deal with it, this awareness often being so acute and precise that it can accurately predict and subtly prepare for disasters, up to and including its own destruction, ahead of time.” she paused, taking a breath. “What Trixie is instead proposing, in a roundabout way, is that we investigate the possibility that the Tree may, in fact, be loop aware, albeit in a limited fashion.”
The noise in the room rose again, as everyone took that in. Again, though, before anyone else could really get a dialogue going, a looper spoke.
“I, uh, speak from experience, but...” Derpy coughed. “I usually remember things that happened in loops I wasn’t awake for. If the Tree shares that, then why isn’t it, y’know, doing things?”
“A fair question.” Chrysalis nodded, then smiled. “Simply answered, though. We believe we are instead looking at an entity who, though not carrying anything from loop to loop, is capable of recognizing that a time loop is indeed happening, either through observation of us as loopers and our activities, or simply due to it recognizing the occurrence as a fundamental part of the world it exists in.”
“So, it knows time is looping but doesn’t have the means to do much outside of that because each iteration’s Tree is separate.” Cheerilee pondered, then nodded. “I can believe this.” she looked to the Anchor sat next to her. “Twilight?”
“Me too.” Twilight nodded, already jotting down notes with expediency. “This is definitely a matter we ought to look into. I’ve personally had a few moments where, though subtle, it feels like things were nudged slightly by factors such as the timing of the Cutie Map’s calling being slightly earlier or later. The Tree recognizing us as time travelers and tweaking it’s signals to us accordingly would... not be unthinkable.” she giggled. “Star Swirl didn’t know just what would grow when he planted the Tree’s seeds, after all, so who knows what other mysteries it contains.”
“Could be looping.” Derpy suggested.
“No, I don’t think so. Sleipnir would have told us by now, and we haven’t gotten new loopers in eons besides. Also, there’s plenty who’d loop before the Tree did, given what it is.” the Anchor’s eyes suddenly darted to one side. “No offense.”
Immediately, all eyes shot to a nearby open window where, to the surprise of some and the amusement of others, an almost holographic apparition of Twilight was crouched quietly, trying not to be seen. Almost blank, it looked among the gathered loopers, one after the other, before letting out a flat sigh.
“I suppose it should come as no surprise that sneaking up on a being far older than I would not be possible.” the Tree intoned levelly.
“If it is any consolation, you have very much proven Trixie correct.” the magician in question grinned.
“I will consider that.” Treelight nodded, before abruptly vanishing in a flicker of light. All present stared at where it had stood for more than a few seconds. Eventually, though, Chrysalis coughed.
“So...” the changeling monarch sighed. “I suppose that negates the investigation portion of the research, but it is nice to be proven correct, at least as far as this loop’s Tree is concerned.”
“We can still look into it, I think.” Twilight returned to her note-taking, then glanced around the room with a questioning gaze. “Alright, next order of business. Did anyone else have something to speak about?”
“Trixie... had another point planned after this about the possibility of the Tree becoming classified as an undead abomination upon its restoration, thus making the students accidental necromancers.” Trixie suggested, then shook her head. “But... awareness noted, she would not wish to offend any potential listeners-in by making any form of loose comparison between their chosen and Grogar...”
212.4 (Vinylshadow)
Sandbar and Smolder sat in the library of the School of Friendship, puzzling out one of Pinkie's weirdly self-aware textbooks' questions for their homework.
Smolder put down her quill and rubbed her eyes. "You save Equestria once and they triple your homework. What kind of reward is that?"
"The amount of work the teachers assign hasn't changed," Sandbar pointed out. "It's just gotten more complicated."
"Seems a little weird that our teachers assign us homework then never show up to class," Smolder said with a huff, crossing her arms as a small gout of smoke escaped her nostrils. "If they're never there, then what's the point of doing the work?"
Sandbar checked his answers for a moment before glancing at Smolder. "You know they're time-traveling, right?"
She stared at him in disbelief for a few seconds before shaking her head. "That's absurd. And impossible."
Her pony companion arched a brow. "Were you not listening when Starlight explained about the time she time-traveled and was stopped?"
"I have no recollection of the events she was talking about, and if all the various time travel theories are even vaguely correct, you'd think there'd still be some changes and records of an alicorn popping up at Cloudsdale one day all those years ago, interacting with the past or not," Smolder said dryly. "Or are ponies so unobservant that they missed it?"
Sandbar's lips twitched. "You'd be surprised," he said. "I overheard Rarity and Fluttershy talking about something called a Loop the other day without a care in the world about who might overhear them."
"Are you sure they weren't talking about fashion?" Smolder asked dryly, rolling her eyes. "Plenty of loops in that industry. Or so I've heard." she added hastily.
"The way they were talking was definitely related to time travel, and probably parallel dimensions, like Time Turner said when he gave a lecture on space." Sandbar insisted.
"You know Turner's about as nutty as a fruitcake, right? About what I'd expect from someone willingly living with a Changeling," Smolder said. "The fact that it's not like Ocellus and Thorax is creepy, yet nobody ever confronts it or reports it."
"To what guard?" Sandbar replied flatly. "Ponyville is weird enough, what with having a school that accepts all species."
"Ah yes, who can forget the lively day when professor Lulamoon brought in a member of the Storm King's army, and his right-hand pony to boot?"
Sandbar tilted his head. "But… Fizzlepop… is a pony? What does that have to do with Ponyville being a melting pot of species?"
Smolder flicked a claw dismissively. "Never mind. Got my words screwed up. Doesn't matter."
"Most rambling conversations don't, I've noticed." Sandbar said, returning his attention to his studies, missing Smolder sticking her tongue out at him.
212.5 (Wixelt)
With a start, Luna’s head shot up from slumber, her eyes instantly wide despite the daze of waking. Glancing around, she got her bearings, recalling quickly where she was as Twilight Sparkle’s concerned expression, contrasted against the dancing light shining off the crystalline structures of her castle, which had become Luna’s sanctum after butting heads with a particularly stubborn unAwake Celestia this loop. The Princess of the Moon took a deep breath, before letting it out again...
...followed by another, and another. And another.
Within seconds, Princess Luna was hyperventilating.
Rolling her eyes, Twilight unpocketed a bag, which was promptly snatched up by her fellow royal, the crinkling of paper signifying its use. Eventually, her panic slowed, and the bag’s work was done.
“Rough dream?” Twilight queried softly.
“Not so much mine...” Luna grumbled hoarsely, summoning a flask full of strong coffee from her pocket. She peered at it, giving the container a shake. “Hmph. Almost out...”
“This is related to the new expansion, I guess.” the purple alicorn sat next to her hummed, nodding to herself. “The students’ dreams?”
“Not the ones the Tree intruded upon, but yes.” the deep blue dream-walker grimaced, looking downcast. “When this latest expansion dropped, and we saw the contents of those dreams, I became curious about the slightly odd nightmares a couple of the young ones were experiencing, especially Sandbar’s cupcake dilemma, which seems a tad silly.” she giggled slightly, but quickly righted herself, seeming sheepish. “I suppose the Tree’s intervention stopped my Baseline self seeing such dreams, so I felt obligated to at least look in when I could.”
“And?”
“And it was...” Luna shuddered. “I have not encountered any of the dreams from baseline just yet, but those children...” her left eye twitched. “Their dreams are... odd, verging on disturbing and genuinely terrifying at times.”
“Should we be worried?” Twilight asked, worried, but Luna merely shook her head.
“No concern is required, I suppose.” the lunar mare placated. “I imagine this is just Yggdrasil having a laugh at my expense. I will endure it, and conduct my investigations properly once it grows bored with this charade.”
“The best course of action, then.” the Anchor giggled. Luna looked at her for a moment, curious.
“By the way.” she mused. “That was a highly convenient paper bag you just so happened to have on hand.”
“My baseline self and at least one of my baseline students, namely Silverstream, hyperventilate in recent expansions and resolve it via paper bag.” Twilight shrugged. “Honestly, having one on tap felt like a logical precaution.”
212.6 (Namar13766)
Twilight Sparkle stared at the Earth Pony Bowlers in shock.
"Let me get this straight. You've been using the portal in my castle to get furniture from the human world. Specifically, to get rugs that really tied rooms together."
The Trio looked utterly unrepentant as they nodded. Twilight just facehooved.
"That's crazy."
The apparent leader looked mildly miffed.
"Yeah, well, you know, that's just like... uh... your opinion, mare."
212.7 (Wixelt)
"Excuse me? Sir?”
Blinking in confusion, Gallus looked up from his work. He was pretty sure he hadn’t put out the word about his Tree of Harmony memorial museum just yet, so who was this?
Glancing to the cave mouth, he got his answer in the form of a mildly annoyed looking Mayor Mare of Ponyville, looking over both him and the various segments of his new business with confusion and annoyance. He briefly considered that perhaps Sandbar had tattled on him, but there was nothing to that, the earth pony not having moved from his weird plant sapling this entire time.
“Erm... yes, Mayor?” the griffon flapped over, a frown of concern masking his features, “Can I help you?”
“Look, Gallus, I'm going to be blunt, because I expect you’d want me to get to the point.” the mayor sighed, then spoke again, authority in her tone. “This... museum of yours has to be torn down. This is effective immediately.”
“...why?” Gallus quirked an eyebrow, ignoring Sandbar’s distant laughter of victory. “Everything’s in order.”
“It really isn’t, I'm afraid.” the pony politician shot back sternly. “For such a structure, you are required, by law, to submit a request for an operations license, which I have found no record of in Ponyville’s recent government filings. In addition,” she continued, “you should also have submitted a request to build on what is considered a culturally and historically significant Equestrian heritage site. Not doing so incurs fines and potential lawsuits-”
She was cut off as a pair of heavily detailed, multiple signature documents were shoved at her. Staring at them for a long moment, Ivory blinked several times.
“...and just what are these, exactly?”
“My license to build here, and my permissions to build on a heritage site.” Gallus deadpanned, raising an eyebrow. “All submitted in triplicate. I’m a griffon. You really think I wouldn’t get these before literally anything?”
“...right.” the mayor’s eye twitched, eyes scrolling over the sheets. “These were submitted in Canterlot.”
“Which, being the capital, means they also hold sway here, if I'm not mistaken.”
“That they are.” the grey-dyed earth pony’s eye twitched. “For a child, you’re surprisingly well read on your legal procedure.”
“...I mentioned the part where I'm a griffon, right?”
“Honestly, what were you expecting to happen?” Berry Punch giggled, sliding another glass the mayor’s way as she worked behind the bar. “You of all people ought to know you can never outdo a griffon in legal affairs unless you’re actively prepared for it.”
“I thought I was. Never had to tackle Gallus before.” Ivory Scroll down her entire drink, shuddering. “I do it at least once every time a situation like this comes up in Baseline, to test the waters, but maybe I shouldn’t have been so heavy handed about it. Dropped the ball on diplomacy...”
“Eh, we all have our moments.” Berry shrugged, cleaning a glass idly. She paused, then grinned. “Y’know, he got things signed in triplicate in Baseline for a permission slip. That really should’ve clued you in.”
“...just get me another birch-damned drink, Punch.”
212.8 (DrTempo)
Final Baseline Expansion Celebration: Forgotten Friendship #2
Wallflower Blush was surprised as Sunset Shimmer talked with her friends. She had used her magic artifact to steal the memories Sunset's friends had of Sunset being their friend, and yet nothing had happened. It had worked every other time she’d taken away other people's memories, so why not now?
A familiar voice then said, "Next you'll say, 'Why haven't they lost their memories of Sunset Shimmer being their friend?’”
Wallflower Blush, confused as to what was going on, said, "Why haven't they lost their memories of Sunset Shimmer being their friend?" Suddenly, she realized what had happened. "WHAT?!"
She turned around to see Sunset Shimmer, smirking. "Guess your magic artifact isn't working anymore. And now you'll say, 'How do you know it's magic?'"
Wallflower Blush, shocked at how fast Sunset had moved, replied, "How do you know it's magic?...Huh?!"
And once again, she realized that Sunset had predicted what she'd say, and this surprised her enough to allow Sunset to grab the artifact in question. Sunset then said, "I saw you use it to remove someone's memories of meeting you. And now..."
Wallflower Blush ran away, and Sunset shrugged. "...You'll run away." She laughed.
‘I love doing the 'your next line is' trick!’
212.9 (Wixelt)
“Okay, okay... You called?” Spike sighed, wings flapping a final couple times as he lowered himself into the chasm that represented the entrance to the Tree of Harmony’s cave, where... an odd sight greeted him. He frowned at it for a moment, eyebrow raised, before looking to the looper next to him. Slowly, said individual tore their eyes away from the sight with a sigh, looking to the new arrival.
“This is... something, isn’t it?” Sunset Shimmer shifted uncomfortably, though the fact that what they were seeing had mildly impressed her was apparent. “She did this all on her own, too. Couldn’t remember what the Tree looked like, so she tried from memory.”
“And somehow, despite not being a looper and this being a completely standard loop, Smolder came out with...” he peered again at the other dragon’s recently finished statue. “...a perfect rendition of Madoka Kaname?”
“I know.” the bacon-haired unicorn shrugged. “I don’t get it either. I just had some free time at the end of the loop and thought I'd cross over. See if giving the students supervision would speed things along.”
“Fair enough.”
“So, uh... what do ya think?” Smolder flew over, looking hopeful, an expression that quickly faded as she saw the pair’s bewildered faces. She sighed. “Yeah, I know. Didn’t really capture the Tree, huh. Honestly, I'm not sure what this is.”
“Well, um...” Sunset hummed, “Why don’t you try again? Nothing says you have to give up after one attempt, right?”
“Yeah.” the orange dragon perked up, grinning again. “I’m on it. That’s like what Yona says Yaks do. Smash and rebuild.”
“This can only end badly.” Spike snarked dryly as Smolder shot off to find another rock, causing Sunset to giggle slightly.
“Okay... so that’s...” Spike’s eye twitched visibly.
“A scale model of the USS Enterprise, Spike.”
“I’m aware. How did she get all the window details in just by kicking it?”
“Probably better not to question it.” Sunset frowned.
“A perfect visual recap of the entirety of the Kingdom Hearts franchise, that makes sense, somehow.”
“You sound surprised, Sunset. I thought you’d like this one.”
“I would, but somehow it just feels... wrong.” Sunset almost looked like she wanted to throw up.
“...okay, I'm not even sure what this one is.” The dragon of the duo admitted defeat.
“I think it’s from... Star Control? Called a... ‘Spathi’, or something like that?” Sunset tilted her head, then shrugged. “Not too sure...”
“...you loop there when you were travelling, Sunset?”
“To be honest, I really don’t remember...”
“Crescent Rose. She made a statue... of Crescent Rose.”
*click*
“Wait.” Spike blinked, looking across to see Sunset holding a camera. “What are you doing?”
“Taking a photo.” Sunset said flatly. “C’mon. Ruby would kill me if I didn’t show her this statue of her weapon.”
“...eh, whatever.”
“Hey, uh... guys?” Smolder called over nervously as the giant stone scythe started making mechanical noises. “Are rocks meant to do this?”
“...and it’s entirely functional, somehow.” Spike deadpanned. “Great.”
“Sans.”
“sup.”
“Quiet, you.”
“The Thinker peeling a potato.”
“The TARDIS. Including the inside.”
“The Magic School Bus.”
“Chuck Norris riding the shark from Jaws-- Okay, that’s it. I’m done!” Spike threw up his hands, stalking off in mental defeat. “I’ll be at Mac’s.”
“...okay?” Smolder blinked in confusion, before looking back to where Sunset was peering with disbelief at the hunk of rock riding a shark. “Is... Is Spike alright.”
“I think he just needs a break.” Sunset rolled her eyes. “Good likeness, by the way.”
“Of the Tree?”
“No, sorry.”
“Damnit!”
212.10 (Wixelt)
"Ugh.”
With a grunt of annoyance, Twilight slumped into her chair, face-planting in exasperation against the map table. One seat over, a certain rainbow pegasus frowned, watching her friend with concern.
“You, uh...” Rainbow Dash smiled weakly. “You alright there, Twi?”
“Just... just mentally overworked.” the Anchor forced herself to sit up, visibly twitching. “Almost that time of the loop again.”
“Do I want to know? Or is this some horrific disaster?”
“Not quite horrific, but it’s grating on my nerves.” Twilight sighed, unpocketing a bottle of cider. “For my past few loops, towards the end, whenever Silverstream has suggested thinking ‘really strong friendship thoughts’ to try and restore the Tree of Harmony, it’s worked.”
“...I mean,” the technicolor flier tilted her head, curious. “That sounds like it should be fine, but I'm guessing it’s not a big party or anything good, since this feels like an Yggdrasil joke gone too far.”
“Right on the money.” The vein on Twilight’s forehead pulsed. “The first time, it turned the Tree into an unstoppable eldritch abomination of pure chaos that destroyed everything in its path. The second time, it turned it into a memetic song that played at full blast everywhere in the known universe. The third time...” she shuddered. “Well, you get the idea. It pretty much continued with that trend. Caused a loop crash by accident trying to stop the last one.”
“This really puts a damper on the whole ‘Tree might be loop aware’ thing, huh?” Rainbow laughed nervously. “Guess that one time was a fluke.”
“No, it isn’t.” Twilight shook her head. “I’ve run into multiple loop aware iterations of the Tree of Harmony since then.” she hummed, sipping her cider in an effort to soothe herself. “My theory so far is that these things either mean the Tree wasn’t aware for that loop, or whatever happens just twists its ‘mind’ beyond recognition. Kind of sad, in a way...”
“Yeah... I guess.” Dash shrugged. “Maybe you’ll get lucky and nothing will happen this loop.”
Almost immediately, the ground shook.
“...you just had to say it.” Twilight deadpanned.
“Yeah, yeah. I know.” The pegasus face-hoofed herself for tempting fate, then with a flap of her wings she rose into the air, flying up to one of the upper windows of the chamber. Immediately, she gasped.
“...what is it?” the Anchor below her groaned.
“Well...” Rainbow mused. “Good news first. You don’t have to worry about giant eldritch creatures or music that won’t go away... in theory.”
“Why does that not fill me with confidence?”
“Eeeeh...” Dash chuckled warily. “Because it might have turned into a perfect crystal-based version of Gurren Lagann.”
There was a long moment of silence.
“T- Twi?”
“...of course it has. Of course.” Twilight ground her teeth together, before slumping again, this time in defeat. “I think I'm going to spend the rest of this loop in my pocket, if you don’t mind.”
“Better make it fast.” Rainbow Dash blanched. “‘Harmony-Gurren Lagann’s coming this way, and fast at that.”
“Yep. I’m out.”
212.11 (Wixelt)
Blinking Awake, Spike yawned to himself, the ceiling of his and Twilight’s tower in Canterlot coming into focus. Stretching, he sat up, sending out an immediate ping on impulse, receiving more than a few back. Smiling to himself, he reached inward, pulling his lightsaber from his pocket.
New loop, new opportunities. It’d been a while since he’d founded the Jedi in Equestria, so maybe he’d do that. He usually took that route in loops where he Awoke in the time of the Pony Tribes, or thereabouts, but putting a more modern spin on things was something he’d not tried in some time.
He nodded to himself, and moved forward, plans for the iteration laid out.
He made it all of two steps before, in a flash of teleportation, Twilight appeared in front of him with a flat expression, flanked by an unsurprisingly unreadable Pinkie.
“Expansion. Meeting. Now.” the Anchor deadpanned. It wasn’t a suggestion.
“Okay, so, uh...” Spike glanced around the central foyer of the Golden Oak Library nervously, taking in the loopers present, consisting of, himself aside, the baseline Element bearers, Shining Armor, Celestia and Luna. “Anyone want to tell me what this is about?”
“I have an idea of what this may entail, but by and large I would have to agree on this one, Twilight.” Celestia added.
“I think most of us do, sugar-cube.” Applejack rolled her eyes, then looked to the purple unicorn at the head of the meeting. “Twi, I'm your Second, as well as the Bearer of Honesty, but that don’t mean I automatically know what you’re thinkin’ at all times. You know this.”
“Of course. And I'll be happy to discuss it in just a moment.” Twilight nodded, then with a wide smile, turned to the jittering and excitable pink presence next to her. “But first: Pinkie? Would you mind?”
“On it!” The party planner abruptly whooped in delight, before pulling on a previously unnoticed cord.
Streamers, cake and balloons instantly decorated the room. Spike gawked, often unready for when their resident Chaos Goddess did such things, before his eyes were drawn upward to a fancy looking banner atop the celebration.
‘Happy 200th Episode!’, it read.
“200?” the dragonling found himself laughing in surprise, any former worry at being dragged here lifted immediately. “Neat! I hadn’t been keeping track, with all the movies, specials, shorts...”
“Music videos.” Rarity added flatly, giggling at her husband’s list.
“Same over here.” Rainbow Dash nodded, in equally high spirits. “Man, we’ve really been going that long in the Hub, huh?”
“I think it’s been almost a decade, now.” Fluttershy considered, smiling softly. “We’ve really gotten quite lucky.”
“We have.” Twilight affirmed, pulling a sheet of paper, a screenshot of all ponies present, plus a few extras, standing in the Canterlot throne room in various outfits, printed onto it. “I looped there right after I went through this latest expansion with Shining.” the brother in question nodded, before his sister continued. “Apparently, over there, it was written using ideas given by our Hub voice actresses about what they always wished we’d been able to do.”
“Oh, this ought to be a gaggle.” Luna chimed in, smirking. “I imagine it was only the actresses for our six heroines-”
“And Spike’s.” Shining supplied. “That’s gonna be at least a little relevant in a minute.”
“-but I can already imagine this will be quite the tale.”
“Very much so.” the Anchor cleared her throat. “Alright, so apparently, when Shining and I were young, we used to compete over everything, and to keep it fair, our parents awarded us gold stars, and the pony with the most stars at the end of each week won the crown of the Sibling Supreme.”
“Think I remember this from my loop memories now, actually...” Spike mumbled. “Thought it was just a variant. Never did get to take part...”
“Sounds nifty.” AJ hummed. “So this crown...?”
“...is literally just a tinfoil hat.” Twilight remarked dryly, before giving her sibling a flat look. “Which someone decided to take with them to guard training and never give back.”
“In my defense...” the blue maned unicorn coughed. “We were both much older by then.”
“True, but what happened in the expansion somewhat voids that argument.” the Princess of Friendship persisted. “Anyhow, in the wake of Sombra’s brief return, Celestia, despite Luna’s disagreement, decided the royal palace’s security needed something of an upgrade, and brought Shining in to look it all over and implement a variety of measures to see what worked and what didn’t in beefing it up. Then, he invited me, joined by the others, to try and break into the palace to test his designs.” she snorted. “He opted to use the Sibling Supreme crown as the ‘heist object’ we had to steal from the throne room. If we got in and out with it, I won it forever, but otherwise it stayed with him.”
“Oh, I can see where this is going...” Luna snarked, shooting a knowing look in her sister’s direction. The Solar Monarch averted her gaze, looking mildly sheepish. “What manner of ‘measures’ did my sister approve of Shining implementing?”
“A mixed bag in how good or bad an idea each actually was.” Twilight pulled a list from her pocket, looking it over. “He had Star Swirl embed recovered fragments of Chrysalis’ throne around the chamber to prevent ponies from teleporting in, had doors that required magical ‘key-cards’ held only by members of the royal guard, bricked up a number of the old passages under the complex-”
“I did always wonder just why we still had those...” Celestia muttered faintly.
“-giant fans placed everywhere to stop intruders flying in-”
“Aw, c’mon!” Rainbow grumbled. “That’s just inconvenient!”
“-and filled the throne room with an alarm system consisting entirely of loud geese.”
“...run that one by me again?” Applejack blinked. “I think I might’ve misheard.”
“Alarm geese.”
“Okay, I didn’t then.” the farm-pony shrugged, unsure of what else to say. “Just so we’re clear.”
“This is all well and good, dear.” Rarity considered, turning the concept over in her head. “But somehow, I'm imagining whatever plan you came out with went somewhat awry, as tends to happen when your opponent knows you so well?”
“Funny you should mention that, actually.” Twilight chuckled, then thrust a hoof in the white unicorn’s direction. “We came to my plan later, but because it would be obvious to my brother, you were initially the mastermind behind the first attempt.”
“Oh, and you let me?” Rarity tittered. “Poor dears. Alright, what did I have everyone do?”
“Mind if I take this one?” Shining asked. When Twilight nodded, he smiled, before picking up from her. “Well, you tried for things I wouldn’t entirely expect from each of you, at first. Applejack broke out ‘Apple Chord’, her lightly well-known country singer alter-ego, retired years before, to distract the guards and steal a ‘key-card’-”
“Aw, cornsarnit. Was hopin’ that was just a variant.”
“Want to explain that one, AJ?” Dash sniggered.
“Not particularly, no.” Equestria’s Second went slightly red in the face. “Give me time to process the ‘entire aspect of my young life’ I've apparently been missing up ‘til now. Maybe then...”
“Ugh. Fine.”
“-you got Fluttershy and Spike to be super spies and break in with true heist fashion, which backfired horribly when they fell down the pit trap I placed directly in front of the thrones-”
“Again.” Celestia sighed. “I don’t understand my baseline self’s logic for not having those sealed up sooner, beyond Luna and I finding such things amusing when we were younger...”
“Well, I think I'd find the whole spy thing rather exhilarating, if a little scary at times.” Fluttershy beamed. “You know, what with all the small spaces and all.”
“-had Pinkie airlift those two in the hot air balloon, because apparently she wanted to go to space-”
“Space, darling?” Rarity looked to the pink earth pony in question. “I wouldn’t have taken your baseline self for such a dream, but it actually makes a whole lot of sense when you consider it for long enough.”
“Yep!” Pinkie giggled, then sobered a little. “I think she might have an unrealistic expectation of what space is like, though. I mean,” she stuck out her tongue. “Planets don’t talk, silly.”
“Oh, like that would stop you making it work for you anyway.”
“Touche, Belle. Touche.”
“-had Twilight do literally nothing to throw me off-”
“And playing lookout, in a way.” Twilight amended.
“-and finally, you went with Rainbow to rustle up information on where the bricked-up passage entrances were-”
“Seems legit.” Rainbow grinned, pounding her hooves together.
“-only to discover that Zephyr Breeze had been hired as a royal guard, and was guarding the entrance. She had RD distract him. Or rather, you dressed her up in fancy clothes and had her ‘seduce’ him away whilst you broke down the bricks.”
“...aw, that Tree joke of him turning up everywhere again?!” the pegasus balked, brow creasing. “C’mon Yggdrasil, that got old ages ago!”
“That’s what we thought too, actually.” Twilight barely suppressed her laughter, “But when I got hold of the Hub episode, we watched it, aaaand...”
“...oh no.” Dash went deathly pale, “Oooooh no...”
“Oh yes. It’s baseline.” Shining cackled. “Yggdrasil is gonna tease you so hard about dressing in-”
“Don’t! Don’t you dare finish that sentence, Armor!”
“Did he get fired again?” Flutters grimaced, seeming slightly annoyed at her brother’s antics. “But he was doing so well...”
“I think he probably still has his job.” the Prince of the Crystal Empire assured. “You’ll likely see why that is shortly.”
“Still, though...”
“Well...” Rarity cut in, avoid further awkwardness. “I take it from the descriptions thus far, my plan ended in tears?”
“We’ll let the episode speak for itself when you watch it, but yes.” Twilight confirmed. “We eventually went back to my original plan of playing to our strengths, even if Shining would expect it.”
“And?”
“He expected it.”
“Yeah, can’t see that ending any other way.” Spike slumped, managing a light laugh. “Alright, so Shining won, then?”
“No, actually.” Twilight lit up, so to speak, with a sort of pride. “My other brother did.”
“...other broth-” the looping dragon blinked, eyes widening. “Wait, you mean...”
“Yes. As of this moment, you, Spike, are the Sibling Supreme, for now and all loops to come.” the scholar smiled warmly, lifting a somewhat weathered looking tinfoil crown from her pocket and hovering it across the room to its new owner. “It was touching to see that both mine and Shining’s baseline selves consider you their little brother, as we do.”
“Heh, thanks.” Spike actually blushed a little, taking the crown in his hands. “That means a lot, you know.”
“It was actually somewhat amazing to see you dupe us all, actually.” the Anchor praised. “You teamed up with Luna to completely undermine the entire thing by having her act like the geese were giving out false alarms, as well as hiring Zephyr on freelance with the knowledge he would be easy to distract with Rainbow Dash, then got her to teleport the crown to you whilst Shining was boasting about how he’d won.” she chortled. “They never expect the insider. Palace security’s probably going to be through the roof, now.”
“As I said, I could see exactly where this was going.” Luna gave Celestia another look, the sun-maned alicorn merely rolled her eyes good-naturedly. “Our baseline selves have… communication difficulties at times, and still butt heads even after Starlight’s intervention, so convincing me to act as a mole inside my sister’s system would be relatively easy if it was in good fun.” she paused. “Honestly, however, I was somewhat expecting it to be an aspect of the primary plan, rather than a gambit by Spike.”
“Guess that’s why it worked, then.” the reptile in question offered, grinning as he donned the crown.
“That does rather suit you, my dear.” Rarity sidled over to her significant other. “It feels somewhat well earned.”
“Thanks, Rare.”
“Anytime, darling.”
212.12 (Wixelt)
“Applejack?” Shining Armor stared incredulously at the guitar wielding farm-pony atop the stage that'd mysteriously appeared in the castle courtyard. “What are you doing?”
“Applejack? Who’s that? My name’s Apple Chord.” ‘Apple Chord’ laughed nervously, before strumming up her instrument. “And I've got a couple of songs to play for ya. Clap your hooves if you know ‘em!”
There was a pause, the gathering audience of guards-ponies waiting with baited breath.
“And a one, and a two and a-
I GET KNOCKED DOWN, BUT I GET UP AGAIN!
YA’LL AIN’T NEVER GONNA KEEP ME DOWN!
I GET KNOCKED DOWN, BUT I GET UP AGAIN!
YA’LL AIN’T NEVER GONNA KEEP ME DOWN!”
The audience promptly found themselves, much to their surprise and alarm, repeatedly falling over and getting up again to the tune of Apple Chord’s overbearingly loud singing.
Shining Armor face-hoofed.
212.13 (Wixelt)
“Dash, I thought you were against this joke.” Rarity frowned, looking at the adjusted plan before her.
“I was, but, well...” Rainbow frowned, making circling motions with one hoof. “Yggdrasil’s probably not gonna drop this one for a while, so I might as well try and have some fun with it, at least.”
“Fair enough. Shall we begin?”
“Oh, definitely.”
“Wha...? Rainbow!” Zephyr Breeze instantly perked up, abandoning his guard post at the sight of his beloved. Smirking to himself, he adjusted his armor, then walked over to greet her. “I knew you’d come running when you heard I got this job! The mares love a pony in uniform, am I- uh...” he stopped in his tracks, frowning in confusion as he finally noticed just what his mark was wearing. “...and ...just what is that you’re wearing?”
“What does it look like?” Dash smirked teasingly from behind the helmet of her guard armor, almost identical to Zephyr’s. “What, don’t like a mare in uniform?”
“...not so much that...” Fluttershy’s brother hemmed nervously, actually looking a little hot under the collar. “But I do worry one of us might have to change...”
“Everyone’s wearing this, though.”
“Even worse!”
212.14 (Wixelt) [MLP/Portal]
Two of a Dream
“SPAAAAAAACE!”
Rolling her eyes, Twilight watched with some amusement from behind her oxygen mask and helmet as a certain pink pony spun past in the empty void, doing a floating cartwheel with a look of manic glee plastered across her features.
“I’m... honestly surprised this worked.” AJ mused from aside the Anchor, raising a curious eyebrow. “I mean, Pinkie thought using the balloon would get her to space in Baseline, and here we are, but even with Looper whatsits, this feels a tad improbable.” she glanced sideways nervously. “Also, I don’t rightly feel too good about Pinkie being dead on about space this loop, Awake or not. Damn ringed planet won’t stop laughing...”
“Yes, well, it is what it is.” Twilight giggled, finding a certain pleasantry in watching Pinkie fulfill a dream of her Baseline self so soon after the expansion that had revealed it. “I’m more interested in our guests, myself. I didn’t realize this was a fused loop.”
“SPAAAAAAACE!”
As she spoke, a white metal sphere with a singular, frantic yellow electronic eyeball shot past like a comet, screaming happily. She watched it for a second, frowning, before looking to the jumpsuit clad earth pony and robotic alicorn on her other side.
“Are you sure Space Core isn’t looping?”
Chell and GLaDOS shared a conversive look for a moment, then both shrugged, neither truly having an answer to that question.
212.15 (Wixelt)
“Applejack? Who’s that? My name’s Apple Chord. And I've got a couple of songs to play for ya. Clap your hooves if you know ‘em!”
There was a pause, the gathering guards-ponies waiting with baited breath.
“And a one, and a two and a-
SOME-BODY ONCE TOLD ME THE WORLD WAS GONNA ROLL ME,
AH AIN’T THE SHARPEST TOOL IN THE SHEEEEED...”
With a squawk of alarm, the audience scattered as a veritable rain of work tools descended rapidly from the heavens onto their position, coming out of seemingly nowhere.
Shining Armor grumbled to himself, making a mental note that he would likely have to make the security measures entirely Discord-proof, just to be safe.
212.16 (Wixelt)
“Wha...? Rainbow!” Zephyr Breeze perked up, abandoning his post at the sight of his beloved. “I knew you’d come running when you heard I got this job! The mares love a pony in uniform, am I- uh...” he stopped, frowning in confusion as he noticed just what his mark was wearing. “...and ...just what is that you’re wearing?”
“What does it look like?” Dash answered flatly from the giant, deranged mascot-like costume of herself she had donned from Pinkie in a variant so long ago. “This do anything for ya?”
“...can I, uh, get back to you on that?”
“No dice, lover boy. Answers. Now.”
Zephyr meeped as Rainbow leant over him, her outfit’s head slumping forward towards him in a disturbing manner, only now noticing that he was unconsciously cowering backward toward the floor at the sight of the monstrosity his dearest was testing him with.
212.17 (Wixelt)
“The crown will be mine!”
“Never!”
High above the Canterlot-Ponyville valley basin, two veritable banshees of magical power, one purple and the other blue, clashed in an explosion of force that sent ponies fleeing in terror, arcs of energy blasting in all directions. In the center, two unicorns, siblings collided. One would not be judged for mistaking the battle as the logical conclusion of some bitterness between the two.
No-one would believe it was merely the result of competitive spirit.
“So... I suppose this is happening now.” Rarity observed Twilight and Shining’s conflict from a distant mountain top, frowning deeply. “Whilst it would be hypocritical for any of us to complain about their going overboard, I do wish our dear Anchor and her brother had picked a more suitable venue, such as over the ocean. Or space, for that matter.”
“Eh, it was kind of short notice.” Spike shrugged at his wife, eyes narrowed as he honed his Force senses in on the situation. “Though Twilight has enough plans that it really shouldn’t make a difference...”
“True. Very true.”
“Not to rain on things, but...” On Rarity’s other side, Sweetie Belle raised a confused eyebrow. “Does this have something to do with that 200th Episode expansion? I mean,” she looked to her brother-in-law. “You are wearing the crown, but I thought it was yours forever now.”
“Yeah, but...” the dragon rubbed the back of his head, wings twitching nervously. “I might’ve made the mistake of offhandedly inferring, as a joke, that the two of them fight for second place.” he grumbled. “I didn’t realize they were both Awake.”
“So, whoever wins this gets the glory, then?” Sweetie asked, sounding mildly concerned.
“They’re locked in a competitive stalemate as of now, so I'd imagine, yes, that will be the case.” Rarity confirmed her sister’s suspicions, then sighed irately. “I imagine the loser will want an immediate rematch, however...”
“They’ll get over it eventually.” Spike opined, pulling a tinfoil crown, physically identical but slightly smaller than the one he was wearing, and also spray-painted gold. “Twilight said herself it’s ‘just a tinfoil hat’. I just think they were kind of bored, really.”
212.18 (DrTempo)
Trixie sighed as Twilight sat down next to her. Twilight, seeing Trixie seemed worried, smiled. "What's bothering you, Trixie?"
Trixie frowned. "It's Starlight Glimmer. Trixie is surprised she isn't Awake yet. She is my friend, and I want her to be among us. But, it is not just that."
Twilight knew instantly what Trixie meant. "You mean her overworking herself as the student counselor in baseline, right?" Trixie nodded.
"Indeed. She was overdoing things. I mean, I understand why. She wants to help everyone, much like you would. But that doesn't mean she can't have any time to spend with her friends. At least she figures that out in Baseline."
Twilight smiled. "Thankfully. But I do agree on one thing. It has been ages since we had a new Looper Awaken. Either way, make sure Starlight realizes she's overdoing things sooner than she did in Baseline."
Trixie grinned. "Of course. What are friends for?"
212.19 (Wixelt)
“Applejack? Who’s that? My name’s Apple Chord. And I've got a couple of songs to play for ya. Clap your hooves if you know ‘em!”
There was a pause, the gathering guards waiting with baited breath.
“And a one, and a two and a-
What’s new pussycat, whooooooaaaaa,
What’s new pussycat, whooooooaaaaa oh...”
The audience quickly cheered, perking up happily at the tune.
Shining Armor narrowed his eyes, not buying this distraction for a moment.
“What’s new pussycat, whooooooaaaaa,
What’s new pussycat, whooooooaaaaa oh...”
Forty straight minutes of the same song, over and over, later, only interrupted by one other number, a rendition of 'It's Not Unusual' of all things, amd many of the guards were on the floor begging for Apple Chord to stop, pleading for mercy, or simply screaming in rage, yet found themselves unable to look away from the song they'd never heard before today.
Shining Armor simply sighed, somewhat indifferent to the whole charade at this point.
212.20 (Evilhumour, Anon e Mouse Jr.)
"Hold the sapping tree Sleipnir, are you serious!?" Scootaloo was still struggling to comprehend what her Admin just said.
"I have been keeping my eye on the latest expansion and their data has been solid for some time, so yes, you finally got your-" before he could finish, an orange rocket launched itself at his neck with an ear splitting squee of utter joy.
Nearby, Rainbow Dash smiled happily.
"Congratulations, little buddy," she said quietly. "Your aunts are cool, and it's nice to know they're with you for good now. But after all these eons of having to put up with bad versions and mediocre versions, and never being certain what your folks were really like... you more than deserve to know the truth about them."
"But you'll still be my big sis!" Scootalooo called from Sleipnir, taking off from his barrel and flew over to Rainbow Dash to hug her as well.
212.21 (Misterq) [MLP/Star Wars]
The Phantom Muffin
The pony, now human, who was best known as Derpy Hooves sat and smiled. She had always been a cheerful individual, but these loops made everything even more amazing. There was always something new to discover, even if it was just a Baseline loop.
This was not a Baseline loop. Here, she was Derpakin Skymuffin, and she was sitting in her pod racer waiting for the start of the Boonta Eve Classic race on Tatooine. There was one slight problem, though. Derpy had talked with Pinkie Pie before on the phenomenon they had termed as negatively reciprocal power interaction. For Pinkie Pie, it meant that Hogwarts magic and 40K Chaos powers did not play well with each other at all. The results were as unpredictable as could be expected. One time, they both supercharged the heartsong phenomenon until Pinkie Pie was living in an actual live musical. Another time they displaced the entirety of Hogwarts castle into Moya, the living ship of the Farscape loop.
For Derpy, however, it seemed that her natural accident-prone aura did not like the Force. At all. Every time Derpy tried to use the Force, something awful happened. When she went into the desert alone to practice levitation, everything ended up on fire somehow, including the sand. Later, she attempted a Force trance when assembling C-3P0. The scrap trader said the droid core came from a protocol droid so how was she supposed to know that that particular HK model also doubled as an insane assassin droid. In retrospect, she probably shouldn't have installed those rapid fire eye blasters.
After that, she worked hard to suppress her Force sensitivity - up until this race. Derpy knew that she needed to use the Force to win, or even survive. She spotted Sebulba messing with her pod racer earlier, but couldn't find anything wrong when she looked it over. As she put on her helmet, she was sure Qui Gon had said something inspirational, but she wasn't really paying attention. She just smiled and nodded, and that seemed to work.
Jabba the Hutt spit out the head of some small animal he was eating right into a gong, signifying the start of the race.
Derpy took a deep breath and reached out with the Force, but unlike other times, she immersed herself as strongly as she could in the Force's ebbs and flows. Then, her own aura touched it. To every Force sensitive in the galaxy, it felt like the energy of the Force was suddenly transformed into an ocean of gasoline - and Derpy had just thrown a match right into the center of it. Being so close to the epicenter, Qui Gon and Obi Wan simply fainted into their seats. Everywhere across the galaxy, every Force sensitive individual turned and looked towards the area of sky where Tatooine was located.
Derpy hit the accelerator and her pod racer's engines surged forth. Her pod remained stationary, however, as the cables connecting it to the engines simply snapped.
"At least this is as bad as it's gonna get," Derpy said to herself as she sat in place, watching as her engines shot forward on their own. To the left of her, the alien Quadinaros - whose four engine pod was currently having a technical problem, waved sheepishly.
Without a chariot to weigh them back, Derpy's engines rocketed far faster than the next pod racer. In a rare chance, the disconnected engines locked connecting currents with their cabled counterparts. The resultant mix of forces flung the pod racing chariot off the track while the four severed engines continued on, connection beams sparking almost randomly between the four machines. The engines intercepted several more pod racers and stripped their engines away until there was a rolling mass of futuristic turbines and connection lighting gaining on the few panicking riders still in the race.
Sebulba glanced back and immediately wished he hadn't. The roaring mass of chaotic machinery was almost upon him. Even when he tried to dodge, the blasted conglomeration followed him as though magnetized. Moments before being overwhelmed, he did the only thing he could. He drifted sideways while uncoupling his own engines. The roaring ball of flaming machines and lightning accepted his sacrifice and rocketed past, leaving his chariot slowly drifting. Deep in depression, Sebulba only noticed the deadly cliff he was coasting towards far too late.
The chaotic engine ball bounced and roared across the track until it approached the starting line for its second lap. There, the magnetized mess ignored Derpy in her pod completely, and instead impacted the four troublesome engines of Quadinaros' pod racer. The poor alien and his chariot was flung into the stands, as the ball of engines and lightning pulsed like an angry swarm of bees. Then without warning, all the engines flew off in random directions like a firework gone wrong. One collided with the VIP box before exploding, showering the stands with tiny bits of Jabba the Hutt and his assorted companions.
Another engine flew off only to loop back and detonate several meters behind Derpy's floating pod, causing it to inch forward.
Most of the other engines exploded against the landscape or the unfortunate Tuskan Raider, but one flew off towards Mos Espa's spaceport.
An enterprising pirate turned slaver decided to reduce costs by only installing just one nav computer in his main frigate while the unmanned freighters would use the main ship's hyperspace calculations. He didn't have to waste space and money on nav computers so he'd have plenty of room for cargo. This captain was congratulating himself when a pod racing engine flew out of nowhere and struck his ship and exploded. His shields managed to prevent the ship's destruction, but the cheap power system caused energy spikes to slam into the hyperdrive navigation computer just as it was giving out coordinates.
The captain and his frigate went into hyperspace far earlier than they were supposed to and were never seen again. The automated freighters, however, all received different coordinates. One reentered normal space about ten inches away from an open docking port on the Trade Federation's main Lucrehulk droid control warship while still traveling at full speed. The people of Naboo rejoiced, right up until burning battleship fragments started to rain onto their planet.
Another freighter reappeared in the air speeder lanes above the capital Coruscant, causing many of them to veer off course or crash into nearby buildings. This explained why Senator Palpatine sadly perished in an explosive 3 air car pile-up despite being asleep in his bed at the time.
One freighter destroyed a defense satellite belonging to the Chiss Ascendancy. Another exploded in the midst of the Yuuzhan Vong exodus fleet, causing them to jump start their invasion of the galaxy so much sooner.
Then came the appearance of a new automated Infinite Empire fleet created by a backup Star Forge that was reactivated when a freighter collided with it.
This happened at the same time as a new droid rebellion was occurring which was led by a very polite silver protocol droid with blaster eyes.
Meanwhile Derpy coasted to a stop a few feet from where she started. The announcers looked at each other and proclaimed that, despite only traversing a distance of about 4 feet, as the only pod racing competitor left on the track, Derpakin Skymuffin was the winner.
Derpy cheered along with the crowd.
A week later, the galaxy was on fire as the Chiss, Vong, Infinite Empire and Droid fleets fought each other across known and unknown space.
Derpy still had no idea just what went wrong.
212.22 (Vinylshadow)
Scootaloo paced restlessly around the Cutie Mark Crusader clubhouse, ears and tail twitching this way and that.
Every few seconds she'd lift her head and look around at the pictures littering the walls, showing some of the moments from the Crusader's cutie mark crusade over the past several years.
Apple Bloom and Sweetie Belle watched her patiently, knowing she was organizing her thoughts on whatever was bothering her. Soon, Scootaloo stopped and sat down.
"Is it weird that I'm slightly disappointed in my parents?" she asked. "I've had so many different takes on them over the past eons to the point that regular parents couldn't even begin to compare. And that's not taking into account the times I've had Loopers or one of the main six as parents. Heck, I've even had other species as parents!"
"I do seem to recall Cthulhu being a popular choice," Sweetie Belle remarked. "Slenderman, too."
"I'm impressed people still remember him. I haven't had to collect scraps of paper in a forest for a very long while." Apple Bloom said. "Haven't heard anyone mention Sunny Town either."
"Feels like things have settled down, for the most part." Scootaloo agreed. "Still, at least we now have one more thing in common."
"Sisters who love us, cutie marks, and parents who are barely in our lives?" Sweetie Belle ticked off.
"Well, when you put it that way, it sounds incredibly depressing, and my parents are dead." Apple Bloom said dryly.
"I meant no offense, of course," Sweetie Belle said sheepishly, and Apple Bloom chuckled.
"Still," Scootaloo mused. "One interesting thing that's come of this particular expansion is that I've gotten a lot of seemingly Baseline Loops, but different ponies come by to make sure I have enough food, drink, and company during the week while Holiday and Lofty are out of town. Even Rainbow Dash drops whatever she's doing with school or the Wonderbolts to make sure I'm alright."
"I imagine you're over the moon about that," Apple Bloom snickered.
"I haven't had a lot of time with her recently in Baseline, so of course I am," Scootaloo said cheerfully.
There was a knock on the door, and Sweetie Belle opened it to reveal a very purple filly foal.
"Erm, hi," she said shyly. "My name is Violet Spark, and I was told this is where to go to possibly get help with my Cutie Mark?"
The CMC exchanged glances before grinning and getting to work.