//------------------------------// // Chapter12: July 19th part 2 (unpolished) // Story: Mandatory Motherhood // by dargondarkfire //------------------------------// Mandatory Motherhood By Dargondarkfire Ch. 12 July 19th continued. “Chris… um, are you still hungry? You have been staring at me for a while without saying a word.” Colgate gave me an awkward smile from across the table as she levitated the dishes over to the sink. ”Well, are you going to keep staring at her, or are you going talk things out with her?” I sighed and closed my eyes briefly. “No, I’m not hungry anymore Colgate. I’m just distraught.” I turned to look at Starla sleeping soundly, curled up against Amore. “I don’t know how to take… all of this.” I waved my hoof towards Starla and then motioned to myself. Colgate grimaced. “I don’t know how to respond, Chris, I only know so much. Most of the ponies sent to earth don’t know about the inner workings of the spell let alone help make it.” I kept staring at her before what she had said donned on me. “And… why do you know?” Colgate’s eyes shrunk and she tried to look away as my gaze drilled a hole into her. She eventually gave in and sighed. “Because I was given an offer in exchange for helping develop the spell.” That had caught me off guard. “You made the spell that saved yet totally messed up human life on earth?” Colgate waved her hooves in a panic. “No, no, well kinda… I only helped out, and only on a portion of the spell.” She looked down at her thigh and pushed her hip up onto the tabletop and pointed at her cutie mark. “Remember that I told you that I make a living as a dentist but that isn’t my special talent?” I nodded, I was still upset but curious. “I remember, but you avoided telling me what that talent is.” Colgate nodded and frowned. “My special talent is actually… in a restricted field of study and practice of magic.” Well, that was not what I expected, what kind of talent would be taboo? “My talent is time and space magic.” My eye began twitching rapidly. “Say what?” Colgate nodded. “It might seem far-fetched but yes, my talent makes me good at manipulating time and potentially time traveling, and also it made it easier to cast the spell to travel from Equestria to earth.” She let out a deep sigh before continuing. “When I was a filly I got my special talent when I accidentally activated a pocket watch that theoretically paused time. And I ended up breaking the pocket watch trying to unpause it.” “Uh…” I closed my mouth and thought for a moment. “So wait that pocket watch you had to get back in Gillette?” Colgate nodded. “Since it was broken Princess Celestia let me keep it as a memento of discovering my talent. Later on, I found out that It didn’t pause time but dilated it, putting me outside the flow of time. After that however I was watched and scrutinized because it’s a rare talent, but time magic is restricted because it can potentially cause a lot of damage to the universe. Eventually, they deemed I wasn’t a risk but my grades were not high enough to study time magic so I decided to follow my hobby instead.” I was really confused and my face made evidence of that. “So wait how did you get pulled in to help with this super spell then?” She gave a sly smile. “My friend, Twilight Sparkle was Celestia’s personal student and had access to everything in the libraries and the sealed archives, she would sometimes take scrolls and books out and leave them lying around wherever she was studying. I noticed a few were on-time magic and she said I could look through them while she studied. I don’t think she realized that I was there or what she had let me do.” She gave a triumphant pose raising a hoof in the air. “I managed to learn how to look backward in time, a total of five seconds into the past, as well as dilate myself as well as other ponies and objects I’m in contact with letting myself and what I bring with me move outside of time.”  I tilted my head in confusion. “So you could let time travel faster around you?” She shook her head. “No not that type of dilation. Think of it more like a super speed spell. Time moves much slower around me so I can appear as if I’m teleporting; however, I’m just moving through time faster than everypony else. Oh and no, I don’t age faster from it… at least as long as I don’t spend long periods dilated out of time.” I couldn’t help but smile a little. “Sounds really useful but also really draining.” Colgate nodded. “And it was when I first started messing with it, but eventually it became easy as breathing.” She sat back down and waved a hoof. “Turns out Celestia knew or at least figured out that I studied stuff Twilight had taken, and because the talent is so rare and so few unicorns can even attempt to cast the spells; the princesses made me an offer to officially learn and study time magic if I helped out.” her smile faded slightly. “And during the process, I only really learned how to displace out of time and let time move faster which was the goal of the spell in the first place. Not many personal uses in my opinion, unless you need to say avoid or get away from a situation or something bad until it passes.” I thought about it for a while and tapped the table with my hoof. “Why did you choose to come to earth then?” She rolled her shoulders and chuckled. “The pay is excellent and Twilight offered me one of her prototypes of a magic bag she was developing. It’s really cool, I can store tons of stuff in it and it can only be opened by me I have almost a full dental lab in this bag, I’m just missing a chair and lighting system, they are too big to get through the opening.” I couldn't help but chuckle. “... That's is very handy. heh, you're a bit of an egghead when it comes to a subject you love huh?” Colgate blushed while pouting. “I’m not an egg head… but I guess your right.” I couldn’t help but think she is super cute and I love it when she gets flustered. ”Why don’t you try kissing her then?” I grunted and looked to the side. “Can it.” Colgate frowned. “Chris I’m sor-” I shook my hooves toward her. “No, not you Colgate.” I wave off to the side away from everyone in the room. “I’m talking to that voice I keep hearing.” Colgate looked at me worryingly. “I don’t hear anypony else Chris, are you sure you are ok? Do you need some more sleep?” I face hoofed and groaned. “I hear it in my head, Colgate, I don’t think sleeping or taking any medicine will help… whatever keeps talking to me.” Colgate gritted her teeth. “Ok then, I’ll take your word on it…” She suddenly smirked at me. “What did the voice say then?” I grumbled out. “It’s embarrassing… let's forget the voice for now and…” ”I’m not going away that easy Chris, we are sorta stuck together.” “And focus on the bluebird in the room.” We looked over at Archy who had been switching between scribbling on paper with a pencil, and eating from a bowl of seeds on the table while listening to us talk. Archy dropped the pencil and squawked. “Spell, awk! Spell protect baby, explain!” He whistled. I looked to Starla and sighed. “Yeah, about that, can you explain it please?” Colgate sighed and lay back in the chair. “I honestly don’t know much about it. Princess Luna, Twilight, and a professor from school worked on that system in the spell. As I told Archy when a foal, er baby, or child comes back it will bring an adult back to take care of them making sure the adult is brought back in the best way to care for them, while also leading them to find the foal, er oh you know what I mean.” I looked down at the table before something came to mind. ”Have an idea?” I shook my head before locking eyes with Colgate. “What do you mean brought them back in the best way to care for them?” Colgate blinked in confusion and thought for a moment. “I’m not sure, They didn’t elaborate to me but.. Um… Let me explain something About equine gender ratios. In Equestria, there are roughly about two or three mares to every stallion so the spell, well it tends to change a portion of male humans into females.” I was speechless, I felt my eye rapidly twitching, and as my mouth hung open. Archy squealed out. “Theory, in equa- equi- in hoof species the female raises the young.” I smacked my head on the table and grunted “Are you telling me it made me into a female just to take care of Starla?” Colgate looked around worriedly. “I honestly don’t know, but… that is a likely possibility. There are various things that decide what species and the possible gender a human will return as. Like the soul, the personality, and the mental state. But it was also made with the idea to fit things as… the princesses thought right so some males will become female… and I guess that potentially means all the child protectors will always be female? I glared at Colgate and snorted. Colgate gulped. “I’m sorry Chris, none of that is my doing, I only helped to make sure the displaced humans would return within the ten thousand year period from when the spell took effect and that no humans would… well…” She gulped. “Dissipate into the time steam ceasing to exist…” That would be bad. I let out a defeated sigh. “I understand Colgate… but that doesn’t explain these nightmares.” Colgate looked at me sadly. “I’m afraid that would be princess luna and threstals and a couple of unicorns who were knowledgeable in the field.” Archy chirped and scraped his talon on the table, good thing the table is stone and not wood. “Spell decay, awk. You said merge awk.” Colgate nodded. “Yes, certain portions of the spell merged into different things to keep operating properly and maintain their tasks. Like the hazard and environmental stabilizations merged into the planet, and the displacement and return merged into the time stream.” I raised a hoof. “There are so few people around, I don’t know how we can manage things as it is. Is there a way to bring more people back sooner?” Colgate shook her head. “Unfortunately no. It would take another super spell to pull more humans back sooner and that would take months to develop then bring the necessary ponies here to cast it in a controlled manner to work properly. And unfortunately, there isn’t a lot of time left before our worlds will have moved too far apart to be able to establish travel between without a great deal of energy. That is why we have deadlines. I can potentially wait longer than others to go back, especially with the mana crystals I brought with me; but after a certain point, it would be impossible for a chosen leader to return with the gifts from the princess. Archy stopped scribbling on the paper and threw the pencil down. “Theory. Awk. program to protect foal.” He whistled. “I s separate from the displacement program” We gave Archy an odd look. Colgate twisted her head unsure of what he meant. “I guess? I’m not sure what you mean.” I thought for a moment. “I think he means that it’s separate despite that it should be connected. Like… say a meal. You have your main course, sides, your drink, and dessert. You eat everything except the dessert, you may want the dessert but you don’t need it to sustain you. Colgate thought for a moment and chuckled. “I think I see what you mean…” She looked back at Archy. “What are you trying to say. He pointed a wing at me and squawked. “Possible that it.” He whistled. “Merged in Chris. Attempt to make Chris take care of all children. Rawk” Colgate and I looked at each other, our pupils shrunk to pinpricks. “I—is that possible?” Colgate looked confused and scared. “I don’t know. I meant it shouldn’t be technically speaking as it was connected into the portion of the spell that displaced the humans.” She bit her lip and closed her eyes for a moment. “I suppose it could potentially have happened, and I guess that it might be causing your nightmares but it shouldn’t go that far, only guide you to where a child is located not torture you for not finding them in time.” She opened her eyes and gasped. “Chris, calm down please, you're going to hurt yourself doing that!” I was hyperventilating and shaking in the chair while pulling on my ears by pinching them with my fetlocks. I had kinda tuned out everything as Colgate was trying to console me I think. Archy made things worse. “Awk, The spell decaying may have.” He whistled. “Corrupted that part of the spell.”  She glared at Archy as she pulled me from the chair to the floor and tried to get me to release my ears. “Archy, really not the time.” Archy screeched and flew off. “Fine! Meltdown now, theorize later awk!” I’m not sure what things Colgate tried to do to calm me down, she told me she was going to slap me until Amore growled at her, which I guess caused Archy to laugh. She finally pinned my hooves to the floor and laid herself on top of me for a while which I guess only made me thrash about. When I finally came to my senses I found Colgate was kissing me. In shock, I threw her off of me and flung myself into the support leg of the table. The impact hurt and it took me a bit to get my bearings back. Colgate wasn’t hurt but, she was apologizing to Amore because she had landed on the dog’s butt. “W—w—why did you k—kiss me?!” Colgate blushed and looked away from me. “Well you were losing it and I needed to shock you out of it Chris. The alternative was to slap you and I didn’t want to risk Amore biting me for it.” I grunted angrily while blushing. “Well, that is uh… you… arg! You stole my first kiss, Colgate!” Colgate looked at me from the corner of her eye with confusion. “Wait your first kiss? Uh.” she shuffled a bit and sighed. “Look I’m sorry Chris, I couldn’t think of anything else.” She looked down at Starla who was somehow still asleep. “Look, I’m sorry alright. It’s not like I can reverse kiss you and take it back..” I huffed. “I didn’t even get to experience it... Wait.. could you reverse time and undo it?” Colgate’s face grew pale. “What? No! Nopony can reverse the flow of time,  everypony who tried didn’t have the magical event attempt it and most who tried… it didn’t end well.” I thought for a moment. “Travel back in time?” She groaned. “Do I need to explain paradoxes or just what could happen from doing either thing you suggested? Look I can’t undo what I did and we have more important things to worry about. I huffed and turned away. “Like what?” She growled then took a deep breath. “Listen I know your feeling are completely out of whack right now, but you probably don’t even know that today is July nineteenth, and my deadline to go home and take somepony with me is creeping closer. Also, I have been stretching out Starla’s food but we are almost out of food and I’m pretty sure no matter what you might think of your situation, you don’t want Starla to starve do you?” I froze up. I guess I would have to ask her what I had been screaming about later. (turns out that the recording of that part was a bunch of unintelligible wailing.) “How much do we have left for her?” Colgate sighed. “I’m not sure, about half a day? Maybe day and a half if we water it down?” She pointed a hoof at my teats which were big enough to make walking awkward. It could be the reason your teats keep getting more prominent is that the spell is making your body try to produce milk because of Starla trying to feed off of you so often, but unless you suddenly start outputting milk we need to find an alternate source fast.” She sighed and walked towards the driver's seat. “Listen you may have just woken up but I’m sure you’re still tired especially after your outburst so just… take care of Starla alright? I’m going to get us to Cheyenne. We can go hunting for food in the morning.” I nodded toward her and went to pick up Starla who had somehow slept through my entire episode but stopped. “Wait you said it’s July nineteenth?” She looked at me with a raised eyebrow as she was about to hop up into the driver’s seat. “Yes… why? Was there something special about today?”  I waved a hoof dismissively. “No today wasn’t special, just something about yest-… you know it doesn’t matter.” I fake laughed. “Come on Amore, let's take Starla to the bedroom.” I scooped Starla up with one hoof and carried her walking on three legs to the bedroom Amore happily following behind. ”I the atmosphere is a bit tense.” I whispered in a low grumble. “My best friend kissed me to break me out of a panic attack. I would say things are a little awkward right now.” ”You have a point you two should sit down and talk it out, hopefully soon. Otherwise, you will just grow distant from one another.” I sighed as I shut the door after Amore entered the bedroom. “Thank you for the great words of advice voice inside my head. What next? Are you going to tell me the winning lottery numbers?” ”No as the lottery of your world doesn’t exist any longer. But I could make up some random string of numbers if that pleases you.” I sarcastically laughed. “Har har. A tulpa with a sense of humor.” There was a humph in my head towards my comment. I am not a tulpa or some other imaginary voice, I am very real. I pushed myself up onto my back legs and laid Starla down on the bed. “Ok then, what are you?” The voice was eerily silent for a while. So long in fact, that I thought the voice had gone to ‘sleep’ again but then it finally spoke up in a way that felt like it was whispering. “I… don’t remember.” I raised my eyebrow as I looked towards the ceiling, not that it would let me see whatever it was talking to me. “Aright then… can you at least tell me your name?” All I got back was a ”No.” in response. I gritted my teeth but let it go. “Can you do anything?” The voice seemed louder and happier at that question. Yes. I’m going to go back to studying your memories and work on fixing your nightmare issue. That caught me off guard and creeped me out. “Wait what?! You are reading my memories?!” I listened for a bit and got no response. “I feel violated…” I groaned and slammed my head into the edge of the bed. I felt a sensation in my horn just before Starla woke up and started crying. Out of everything that could wake her up that did it? “Shhh shhh, I’m sorry Starla, don’t cry. I didn’t mean to wake you.” Some food (Colgate is right, it's almost all gone) with a fresh diaper later and Starla was a happy baby again. As I watched her run around the room I caught myself holding a hoof to my lips. “GaH! Colgate…” After a few moments, I let out a heavy sigh. “Come on you little jitterbug let's see if we can get some real sleep shall we?” Starla didn’t go to sleep for several hours and Colgate didn’t sleep in the bedroom that night. Colgate pulled into the large truck stop at the edge of Cheyenne, she was very tired and the four or so hours driving had given her time to think things over. “Why did I kiss Chris? I could have dumped water on her, or shocked her, or… something! Gah! Stupid Colgate!” She laid back in the chair for a while before hopping off and making her way to the living room section. “I’m going to blame this on Lyra, she kept teasing me to do things with Chris.” She stopped when she noticed Archy standing on the table holding something flat and shiny in his beak. He dropped it onto the floor and flew off to his perch. Colgate was curious and picked it up in her magic to find it was Chris’s drivers' license. After a minute of inspecting it, she sat on her haunches and face hoofed. “That explains why she seemed off about what today is. Yesterday was her birthday…” She placed the card on the table and groaned. “Well, I’ll figure this out in the morning. Maybe I can find her a cake in town.” She walked toward the bedroom and stopped. “Maybe I better sleep out here tonight, it would feel odd to share a bed with your friend after kissing her out of the blue.” She hopped up onto the armchair and curled up into a ball as a cat would do. After a few minutes her head show up and she yelled out what just dawned on her. “Where am I going to find a cake with no one left to bake and sell them?”