Twilight continued her pursuit of the of unicorn, despite how hopeless it seemed. She was gasping for breath, the chase having exhausted her. Thankfully, the unicorn had ceased to teleport to maintain his lead now.
As Twilight pushed herself to keep running, the unicorn glanced over his back to her, and strangely stopped. Twilight attempted to skid to a halt, only to fail and skid close to the unicorn as he kicked at her with his hind legs.
She was sent backwards by a foot, and lay on the ground, stunned by the kick as the unicorn laughed and drew near her. He placed a hoof on her neck, and slowly applied pressure to her throat and neutralized her magic as he leaned in.
“Tell me, were you the last of the six?,” the unicorn paused, staring at Twilight his right eyelid twitching, “I don’t know myself yet, but it’ll be SUCH fun to see the rest of the events.” he chuckled nervously.
“W-what... do you... mean?” Twilight struggled for every breath, even the attempt to speak back was beginning to get hard.
“Oh it’s simple. Some ancient pony named Starswirl made a spell to travel in time just once, I merely found the loophole not only for infinite travel to the past, but to see all possible futures. Tell me I come up with some good ones for your other three friends, that brainless blue pegasi, just as brainless pink earth pony and the unicorn who frankly it amazes me that she can even live, strung up on physical objects like she is.” he grinned, his right bottom eyelid still twitching.
“But...” Twilight begun to say, stopping as the unicorn above her actually growled like a beast.
“Time is a complex thing. I’m sure my future self knows what is about to happen next, but fact is, I’ve seen three of you element bearers in the past now, that means I either succeed here, or have to mess around with the other three next. To make it simple, if you are the last to step through, then you already know what I am about to learn,” he held his head up and glanced down at her, regarding Twilight as some trash that had gotten stuck underhoof, “and frankly, I don’t care much for failing in my plans.” the snarl in his voice made Twilight shudder.
Twilight tried to struggle free, feeling as though life was about to be removed from her body.
“Tell me, what happens next?” the unicorn questioned, pushing down on Twilight’s throat just enough to fully cut off her air supply but not snap her neck.
“You won’t... win here... history... has to... take place...” Twilight struggled to get out.
The unicorn regarded her for a moment, and as the world begun to turn black in Twilight’s vision, something clearly clicked in his head.
“Of course... a rule of time is that established points in time can’t change. Minor events around them can. If I steal the elements here, before they stop this Discord, then Nightmare Moon, how will I have heard of them to know when to come back and steal them?”
As the unicorn pondered this, he hadn’t noticed he had completely removed his hoof from Twilight’s neck. She took this moment to roll on her belly and catch back her breath, listening to him carefully.
“That said... I could try to find a loophole here, so I can still steal them, then ensure I hear of them to come back and steal them in the first place... but how to do this? If I go ahead and use them as they’re supposed to be, I’d be a hero and I certainly don’t want that, it’d more than likely deny me my birthright...”
He was insane, that much was certain. Birthright? What birthright could exist that would drive this pony to steal the elements before they were used in two historical events? Twilight shook this from her head and slowly got up.
She had feared as she stood up that the unicorn would attack her. However, to Twilight’s surprise, he simply regarded her with disdain.
“You’re not a threat anymore, I’m sure I’ve weakened you too much. Now if you will, I have to plan how to ensure my theft of these items will remain mine without losing them to a paradox.” he sneered, using his right hoof to write in the dirt.
As the unicorn before her muttered to himself and wrote in the dirt, rubbing the ground every so often, Twilight thought back to everything her friends had mentioned. Rainbow had said all unicorns in her portal had become twisted and corrupted, something not affecting the one before her. Fluttershy and Applejack and indeed mentioned a unicorn matching his description, meaning he had been planning this for some time as suspected.
Pinkie Pie, she had mentioned meeting a unicorn, dark blue, who had worn a black cape. He had the same description as this one before her. Rarity too had met a unicorn also identical in description. Both times he had given them a name, Ulysses.
Was this because he believed they were too stupid to remember the name? Was that even the name of the unicorn before her? It was something she had to believe, and Twilight decided to distract him to buy herself more time to stop his plans and ensure the past went unchanged.
“Ulysses,” she said softly. The unicorn opposite her froze, slowly looking up at her as though she were now Death himself, “that’s your name, isn’t it? Ulysses.”
“How did you know that? Not once have I mentioned it.” he said in a tone just above a whisper.
“You mentioned it...” Twilight begun, stopping as he swiped at the air.
“Don’t say it! If you say it, it means it HAS to happen! I will NOT allow you to ruin what I’ve worked so hard for!” Ulysses hissed.
Twilight grinned.
“You’re going to tell my friends Pinkie Pie and Rarity your name, because for me, those events have already happened. And you tell them because you’ll assume they are too stupid to remember the name!”
As Ulysses yelled in anger, Twilight felt pride wash over her. Her telling him a future event meant that he now had to fail right here. But one thing didn’t make sense to her.
“I just have to know though, how do you not know these events take place?” she questioned.
“It is easier to travel in the past than to create a future and travel to it. So when I heard of the elements, I decided I would try to steal them from the ancient past. If I failed, which you’ve now doomed me to do, I would need a lot of energy not only to cause a loophole three times into the future, but to make it an alternate future. That’s why I didn’t know I’d told your friends my name, because I’m still at the part where I’m attempting to steal these from the past.” Ulysses explained, pointing at the wood box beside him.
“That makes sense. But now I’ve told you, you can just give those to me, I’ll take them back and all of this will be over.” Twilight smiled.
“Think again. You can take these back as a ghost! You’ll never touch them while alive!” Ulysses shouted.
Twilight was blown back by a magicial explosion that had been cast before her. As she hurried to her hooves, Ulysses was preparing another attack. One that would, however, never land. Before he finished preparing it, two beams of magic, one golden and the other navy blue, struck him in the side, throwing him far from the wood box holding the elements.
As Twilight sat down, letting out a sigh of relief, the two unicorns from Canterlot arrived. As dark blue one examined the box and its contents, the white one walked over to Twilight.
“Are you alright?” she asked.
“I’m fine. I tried to stop him taking the box, I really did.” Twilight muttered.
“I can only assume he was sent by Discord to keep an eye on my sister and myself. If not for you, Discord would have the box and what rests inside,” the white unicorn held out a hoof, “my name is Celestia, what is yours?”
Twilight cautiously reached out a hoof, thinking carefully, and doing her best to conceal the shock of learning her mentor could have been an ordinary unicorn. If she told Celestia her name, would that then allow the future Celestia to warn her of these events? But if she lied, Celestia would one day see her grow up, and realise who had spoken to her at this moment, and realise she had been lied to.
“I’m Twilight Sparkle, and I’m just glad I could help you recover that box. Can I ask what’s inside?” Twilight asked, having decided it would be better to be truthful to the pony that could possibly be her future teacher.
“Well, do not let this get around, but the items in the box are called the Elements of Harmony. It is my sister’s and mine’s hope that they shall bring peace to Equestria and free all ponies here from the tyrannical rule of Discord. I am sorry to leave on such short notice, but we must go and attempt to use them upon him now. Thank you for retrieving them, Twilight Sparkle.” Celestia bowed, making Twilight feel awkward that the possible future ruler of Equestria had just bowed to her.
As she watched the two sisters leave, walking resolutely into the distance, Twilight begun to think once more. She wondered how it came to be that Celestia and Luna gained their wings, if they hadn’t been born with them. Were the Celestia and Luna she had just met even the future rulers of Equestria? Or were they just two normal unicorns that just so happened to have the same names?
Beside her, a portal appeared, similar in oval shape to the one back in the library basement. Twilight turned to face it, and felt uneasy as she looked into it. She had expected to see the library basement, the faces of her friends and Spike waiting for her return, but instead, a black void lay beyond it.
With nothing else to do, Twilight let out a worried sigh and stepped through.
Still, all there was to see was darkness. There was no silence, though. There was laughter. Not a happy, joyous laughter, but a laughter of an evil plan succeeding by the one who had it planned. Twilight shook her head and strained her eyes in the darkness, as the laughter increased in volume and drew nearer. From the darkness, Ulysses appeared, his eyes wild, and staring directly at her.
“Why, thank you, Twilight Sparkle. All of them. All six elements. All of your bonds to them, broken. All of them corrupted, and ready!” He proclaimed in a soft voice. She watched as he stomped his left front hoof down, and she collapsed to the floor.
As she stared helplessly, struggling against a magical pressure, Ulysses’ face turned into a look of anger. He yelled loudly with annoyance, and released his hold on her. Reacting on instinct, Twilight turned and begun to run, with the scene of her friends in the library basement approaching as she ran away from Ulysses.
Behind her, Ulysses didn’t look angry, or happy. He displayed no emotions as his horn glowed gold.
“You will corrupt it for me, Twilight Sparkle. And you shall do so right now.” he said, releasing the magic.