Things were more delicate than they seemed. They always are.
Crack.
The splinter and spider-web cracks that weren’t really there, across the place that wasn’t real, were huge now. The wall was more cracks and chips than actual wall at this point. But it was fine. In the grand scheme of things, worse things by far had happened to the wall that wasn’t there. Reality wasn’t going to tear apart at the seams just because a few mares had decided to play with it. The universe is made of sterner stuff than that.
But that didn’t mean that there weren’t other consequences.
Crack.
It is difficult for a three-dimensional being to really understand what was happening. It could only have been described in metaphor, and poorly at that.
Imagine a bow, like those used to fire arrows. Only, this bow has four ends, all meeting in the middle. Two of the ends reach past the wall of reality and into one world, and the other two into the other world. Now, imagine that the bow has bent back on itself. The ends are nearly touching, all four of them. The bow can bend, but it isn’t really supposed to, not like that. Of course there is strain. Cracks along the center as the bow remains pulled taut.
Crack.
Still, things are not beyond recovery here, either. The bow has to bend for only a little while longer, and as long as any sudden shocks are avoided, it can go back to the way it was, and be repaired over time.
But if there is any additional strain added…if things go even a little wrong…
---
“In my life, I have made three great mistakes,” Luna informed Celestia several minutes later, when she had finally calmed down. “The first was failing my version of you. Being so self-absorbed with my own resentment and loneliness that I didn’t notice how ruling Equestria was beginning to wear upon her. Doing nothing until it was too late…until my sister had become Corona, and needed to be sealed within the Sun for what I thought would be forever.”
Celestia inclined her head. Overhead, the moon and stars were retreating backwards in the sky, setting beyond the eastern horizon until it would actually be their time to rise “I have similar regrets,” she said.
Luna nodded. “The second mistake is…personal,” she said. “And not relevant. The third mistake is. Nine years after banishing Corona into the Sun, I…” she looked down. “I abandoned Equestria, my Equestria, utterly.”
Celestia’s head tilted to the side slightly. “What do you mean?”
“That is why I was here a thousand years ago,” Luna said. “I had spent nine years drunk and depressed, wandering the land, trying to forget, avoiding my duties as Princess. But I couldn’t forget, no matter how hard I tried. Celestia and I, we had dwelled in Equestria since time immemorial, since before there was even an Equestria. Every tree, every rock, every blade of grass, would remind me of what I had done.” She shook her head. “So…so I arranged for the Sun and the Moon to take stable orbit. I made sure to leave behind, in Canterlot, instructions for the unicorns, lost knowledge on how to move them. They would have plenty of time to practice. And I just…went away.”
Luna looked back to Celestia. “I have always had an interest in exploration, in what lies beyond the next horizon. I had long ago discovered that my world was but one of many. I had also discovered, though, that the vast majority of worlds are barren and lifeless. And travel between worlds was only possible during limited windows of opportunity, windows that are closed for hundreds or even thousands of years at a time. An opportunity to go to an inhabitable world, however, presented itself, and…” she fell silent, looking down and closing her eyes.
Celestia pressed her lips tightly together. “And you abandoned your world,” she finished, “leaving the ponies there to the wiles of fate.”
“I make no excuse,” Luna said, shaking her head. “There is none. Once I was here, I discovered ponies, I discovered a world very much like my own…but different, and new, as well. I thought that I could start fresh.” She looked to Celestia. “And that is, of course, when you appeared. And though you did not look just as Corona had, in the end…” she shook her head. “I…saw you, and I felt a presence in the Moon, and I drew my own conclusions. That this was a parallel world to my own, where events had transpired much as they had in mine, except that you had defeated me.”
Luna scuffed a hoof. “I entered a town…I forget its name. I heard that you had become a tyrant. I witnessed a pony being placed in the stocks for a day for swearing. And…and I thought that the same madness that had taken my sister in my world, had taken you here. The same desire for ceaseless, unending control.”
Celestia stiffened slightly, glancing at Twilight. “I…did not take banishing my sister into the Moon well, Princess Luna,” she said. “Here, I was the one who failed her. The pain and loneliness you mentioned, I did not notice, and the result was her corruption by dark magic. She became Nightmare Moon, and she vowed to make the Night last forever, in order to ensure that ponies had no choice but to witness its beauty.” She looked down. “After banishing Nightmare Moon, I plunged myself into my role as the Princess. I wanted to keep ponies safe, and I wanted to ensure that nopony ever could fall into darkness as my Luna did. But…but mostly, I wanted to keep myself so busy that I could not think about what I had done.”
Luna blinked a few times, shifting uncomfortably. “I see,” she said. She offered a pained smile. “Work…drink…we each have our coping mechanisms, I suppose.”
Celestia nodded. She eyed Luna. “So…so then you returned to your world, obviously, and resumed your duties,” she noted.
Luna shook her head. “Well, I did return,” she said, “but the depression only worsened at the thought of there being no escape at all, not even the cowardly one I had taken. It was three more years before I was finally able to pull myself together.”
Celestia started at that. “I see,” she said, looking disturbed for some reason. She quickly looked away from Luna, and to Trixie and her friends. She was amongst them, nuzzling them and hugging them closely. “How did you know what had happened to her?”
“She didn’t,” the magenta earth pony, Cheerilee, said, as she finished hugging Trixie. She looked warily at Celestia, but seemed to have decided that if Luna was comfortable, then she could try to be the same as well. “At least, not at first.”
“She said you were dead,” The jasmine pegasus, Raindrops, said as she patted Trixie on the head.
Trixie started at that, looking to Luna. “Um,” she said, “why?”
Luna grimaced. “Trixie, you know that I am a very firm believer in a pony’s right to privacy,” she said, “but…I do believe that there are exceptions to that right. And the first and foremost exception are those ponies whom I have taken on as an apprentice. You remember, years ago, when I first took you into Canterlot? And I cast a location-spell upon you in case you got lost?”
Trixie thought a moment, before her eyes widened. “You said it would fade at the end of the day!” She noted.
Luna smiled a little guiltily. “I…lied,” she admitted. “But, it is a good thing that I did. I do not track your movements on a day-to-day basis, I do trust you, Trixie. But the spell would be useful, I felt, if anypony were every foolish enough to kidnap you. You can imagine my shock, however, when it suddenly ceased. In the past, there has been only one reason for that.”
Trixie put a hoof to her chest. “I’m…I’m sorry,” she said. “I didn’t mean to! I was trying to teleport, and…stupid lightning…I’m never teleporting again.”
Luna inclined her head. “I went to Ponyville. My arrival was…public, and my concern evident. Your friends caught up with me in front of Sweet Apple Acres, where I was in the process of both trying to discover what had happened, and demanding of Miss Applejack everything she knew about what had happened to you – which was, of course, nothing.” She shook her head. “I had all but given up hope until I noticed the hole you had left behind in the world, realized what had happened,” she looked to Celestia, “and realized where you had gone.”
“That’s when she got all of us together,” Carrot Top, the yellow earth pony, said. “Explained what had happened. I didn’t really believe it at first – ”
“I’m still having a hard time,” Ditzy Doo, the gray pegasus, added.
“ – but we came anyway,” Carrot Top continued. “Only…we were supposed to have the Elements of Harmony with us, in case we needed to fight Corona.”
“But they didn’t come with us, for some reason,” Lyra said. She noted the tourmaline diadem sitting on Trixie’s head still. “I guess you found the local ones, though. Um…why does that have Twilight Sparkle’s cutie mark?”
“Oh!” Trixie interrupted, stepping forward and looking at Luna. “I almost forgot! Princess, Twilight, our world’s Twilight, is here!”
Luna grimaced. “Yes,” she said, closing her eyes and setting her horn glowing. After a moment, there was a midnight-hued flash and pop, and a deep blue sphere, five feet in diameter, was hovering next to Luna. Inside the sphere, hunkering down and looking utterly defeated, was a lavender unicorn with a dark mane marred by two stripes, one purple and one pinkish, with a cutie mark of a starburst with smaller stars around it. She glanced up, gave Trixie a long look, and then cast her head back down.
“We caught her,” Luna said.
---
Crack.
---
Twilight stared at Twilight, but Twilight refused to look back.
The concept of that alone would have normally been enough to set off Twilight, but with everything that had been happening over the past few hours, she felt almost like her panic-mode was burned out.
Trixie, however – that was to say, Trixie, self-proclaimed Great and Powerful, her universe’s Trixie – seemed to be utterly fascinated.
“So if Trixie is understanding everything correctly,” she said quietly to Twilight as Luna continued to speak with Celestia, “that…tramp…is the student of Princess Luna from another universe?”
Twilight nodded. “It makes no sense,” she said.
“Trixie agrees – hey, wait a minute!” she turned on Twilight. “What do you mean by that? You think I’m not good enough?”
“No, I mean it makes no sense!” Twilight hissed, looking at Trixie. She felt annoyance rising inside of her again at this whole situation. “Didn’t you hear what the difference was between our world and theirs? Princess Luna stayed good and princess Celestia went evil, somehow. But that was a thousand years ago! Shouldn’t a thousand years of differences started to pile up? How does that Trixie,” she pointed a hoof at the alternate-universe counterpart “even exist? Do you know what the odds are of two ponies meeting and having a foal? The slightest change and you might not even exist! Then multiply that by a thousand years worth of differences!” She put her hooves to her mouth as she gasped. “It could work if free will is a lie! If all our lives are just played out on some kind of tapestry without us having any real input! We just go through the motions and – ow!”
Twilight rubbed her flank, where Spike had poked her with one claw. “Spike!” she exclaimed. “I was in the middle of an existential crisis!”
“I know. I helped,” he said.
“Trixie stopped paying attention after you stopped talking about her, anyway,” Trixie said, looking back to Twilight’s counterpart, the one stuck in the bubble. After a moment, she trotted up to it, knocking on the bubble’s outer edge. “Hello! Twilight from another world! Trixie would ask you a question.”
The Twilight inside blinked, glancing up. Celestia and Luna also ceased talking, as did the other Trixie and her friends. The Great and Powerful Trixie noticed the attention, and stood up straighter at it.
“Trixie has gathered that our two worlds run parallel,” she said, making a sweeping motion with one hoof. “Therefore, she assumes that you, too, were unfairly blamed for the arrival of an Ursa Minor in Ponyville. Trixie would like to hear you regale her about how her…other self…defeated it!”
The pony in the bubble blinked a few times. “Why not ask her?” she asked, pointing at her own version of Trixie. Her voice was tinny from echoing through the bubble’s surface.
Trixie smiled. “Oh, no reason – ”
“She wants to hear it coming from you because it’ll sound like it’s coming from that one,” the alternate Trixie said, trotting forward. She eyed her counterpart. “It’ll be like hearing her Twilight describe her.”
The Twilight in the bubble stared between the two Trixies, before her eyes narrowed. “I don’t believe it,” she said. “You really are the same. Both of you! You’re both giant frauds! And me and my own counterpart!” She glared at Twilight, pointing at her. “I thought you were better. I thought you wouldn’t make the same mistakes as me. But then…want-it-need-it?”
Twilight blanched, trotting forward herself. “I made a mistake!”
“And that mistake was that you used it on foals!” Twilight exclaimed shrilly.
The Trixie from the alternate universe rolled her eyes. “Yes, and dropping a space bear on the town is so much better – ”
“I teleported it back into the Everfree! All you did was distract it and nearly get eaten!”
---
Celestia and Luna regarded their students and their students’ doppelgängers, who were completely ignoring them at this point. They glanced between each other. “Should we…?” Celestia asked.
Luna considered. “I sense there is a lot of pent-up anger here,” she said, looking to the pony who looked so much like her sister. “It…might be best if we let them get it out of their systems. Especially my Twilight.” She inclined her head. “But this is your world and your kingdom.”
Celestia considered. “We’ll intervene if things get too much out of hoof.”
“Of course.” Luna swept a hoof behind her, at the remaining five Elements of Harmony – her Elements, in any event. They were watching their friend Trixie closely, but seemed to have come to the same conclusion that Luna did. “I should like to introduce you to these fine mares, in any event.”
---
Crack.
---
Trixie took the Element of Magic off of her head, waving it in front of Twilight. “You don’t get this just for being a good spellcaster, Twilight! That’s what I was trying to tell you before – ”
The Element was wrapped in Twilight’s horn-glow, as she pulled it back to herself. “I’d really like this back now, though,” she said. “Since, you know, we’ve figured out that it’s not really yours.”
“But it could have been mine…” The Great and Powerful Trixie said thoughtfully.
The Twilight in the bubble and the other Trixie both laughed. “You’re a fraud,” Twilight said.
“You’re like me, before I came to Ponyville, multiplied by ten,” Trixie continued.
The showpony blanched. “And what is that supposed to mean?” she asked, getting up in her other self’s face.
“It means,” she said, and then looked to the free Twilight. “What’s that about an Alicorn Amulet?”
“Leave Trixie alone,” Twilight insisted. “She – ”
“She doesn’t need help from you, Twilight Sparkle,” Trixie interrupted, holding up a hoof. “Trixie is still grateful for you freeing her, make no mistake. But Trixie can fight her own battles!”
“Ha,” the other Trixie said. “I’ll bet.”
The trapped Twilight rolled her eyes. “Are you really so insecure that you have to belittle her?” she asked. “It’s not like you’re any better.”
“Not like I’m…?” Trixie asked, stepping back, before her eyes narrowed. “Um, hello? Dame Trixie, Twilight. I didn’t get that for nothing. I helped defeat Corona, I saved Oaton. It was me at Andalantis, me at – ”
“Ice. Palace.”
Dame Trixie froze at that, mouth hanging open, before shutting it deliberately and narrowing her eyes. “That was months ago!”
---
Crack.
---
“Well it just seems to me that if you’re going to keep at this Trixie here for whatever she did – ”
“This from the pony dodging how she mind-slaved an Ursa Minor – ”
“You what? And you have the gall to call me out for using the want-it-need-it? I thought you just lured the thing into your Ponyville – ”
“Which Trixie wasn’t even responsible for here, incidentally! But no, they all blamed her for – ”
“Because it was your fault! Your boasting, your own stupidity – ”
“You’re not even from here! You don’t know what happened! The Great and Powerful Trixie only – ”
“Oh will you stop that? You’re not on stage!”
“The whole world is a stage!”
“Stars Above it’s like looking into a carnival mirror.”
“Speak for yourself, chubby.”
“What?”
“You heard me! We’re not identical. Trixie has finely toned musculature from her life on the road, but you, you clearly need to work out more!”
“Please, Trixie wouldn’t know hard work if it bit her in the flank. She shouldn’t even be Representative to Ponyville, she just used Luna to get herself a cushy job.”
“I did not! Besides, your counterpart is a librarian! How do you get easier than that?”
“Hey! Firstly, I’m still Princess Celestia’s student too, you know! That’s a job in and of itself – ”
“Sure it is.”
“You know what? You’re both jerks.”
“So are you.”
“And so are you! We’re all just broken – ”
“Not me! I’ve got the Element of Magic – ”
“Hey, give that back! It’s mine!”
“It’s mine too!”
“It could have been mine!”
“It shouldn’t be any of ours – ”
---
Stop and look, before it all falls apart.
Princess Celestia was talking to the bearers of the Elements from another world, assuring them that she is nothing like Corona. But at the sound of an actual scuffle, she has her head over her shoulder. Luna has turned around as well. Both are about to intervene.
The Twilight from Luna’s world is standing on her hind legs inside her prison, her forelegs touching the edges. She’s shouting as she stares at the Element of Magic, suspended in front of her.
The Trixie from Luna’s world has a telekinetic grip on the Element of Magic. She’s shouting, too, pointing a hoof at the free Twilight.
The self-proclaimed Great and Powerful Trixie is reaching out a hoof, trying to touch the Element of Magic. She won’t get a chance.
And Twilight Sparkle, student of Princess Celestia, is pulling on the Element of Magic with telekinesis, trying to bring it back to her.
Nopony had ever even considered that it could happen. How could they? It’s so utterly impossible. Not that that has ever stopped something from happening before.
CRACK.
---
Snap.
Everypony froze at the sound. It wasn’t even very loud. Indeed, one would think that it should have been a much louder, more intense sound, given what had happened. It nevertheless was loud enough to shock both Trixie and Twilight from letting their telekinetic grip on the tourmaline diadem go, as everypony watched it fall in two pieces to the ground. The gemstone it held broke free of its clasp as it fell. It bounced into the air once, fractures all along its surface, then fell back down onto the road and shattered apart.
There was a moment of stunned, horrified silence. Then, there was an explosion of light, followed only slowly by a cacophonous boom that threw everypony to the ground, even the Princesses – even the Twilight that had been trapped in Luna’s bubble, as the bubble was utterly destroyed by the blast.
Purple light shot from the shattered gem into the sky, and after a moment the pieces of the gemstone followed. The light was not a solid beam, nor even a curve, but a jagged, twisting thing, roiling and moving upon itself in random directions in the sky and leaving streaks of purple-tinged magic behind it, before finally beginning to descend in the far distance, its fall much more uniform than its ascent. It appeared to land somewhere deep inside the Everfree Forest.
Everypony picked themselves up only slowly. Princesses Luna and Celestia were the first to rise, moving slowly, unbelieving, towards their apprentices and their apprentices’ doppelgängers. In the center of those four ponies lay the tourmaline diadem, broken jaggedly in half – and not a trace of the gemstone remained.
“Twilight,” Celestia said. Both Twilights looked to her in shock, though she undoubtedly was referring only to her student. “What have you done?”
“It…it wasn’t me!” Twilight exclaimed, pointing an accusing hoof. “It was Trixie!”
“No it wasn’t!” One of the Trixies exclaimed. “I just needed the Element for an example, Twilight wouldn’t let go – ”
“It certainly wasn’t me,” the other Trixie said, cowering before the two alicorns, “I never touched it – ”
“It was definitely these two pulling it apart, what did they think would happen – ” the other Twilight said.
“Silence,” Luna ordered, spreading her wings wide. The four ponies cowered, Celestia’s student looking fitfully to her teacher. Celestia, however, did not rebuke Luna as she gingerly hefted the shattered diadem with a golden aura, eyes darting back and forth as her mind raced.
“Princess Luna,” Celestia said after a moment, looking to the other alicorn, “I need to speak with you, privately, for a moment.”
Luna nodded, following Celestia as she trotted off a dozen paces, already speaking in a low voice. The ponies watched the conversation in silence, glancing between each other. At one point, the Trixie of Luna’s world began to edge closer to her friends, but Luna noticed and shot Trixie a look, and she returned to where she was.
Both Luna and Celestia seemed to say things that made the other unsure, but at length, they turned around and returned to the four ponies that had broken the Element of Magic. “Trixie,” Luna said as she approached, looking directly at her student, “I do not want to hear any argument about what we are about to say. Do you understand?”
“Nor you, Twilight,” Celestia said. “Time is short.”
The two students glanced at one another fitfully – glared might have been a better term – but nodded.
“You shattered the Element of Magic,” Celestia began. “All four of you. I do not know how, but that does not matter.”
“Without the Element of Magic,” Luna continued, “disasters and monsters long held at bay in this world, may find themselves loosed one again. In fact without the Element of Magic, it is possible that this entire world may unravel. In other words, Trixie, you have endangered the lives of everypony here.”
Trixie wilted. Celestia eyed Luna a moment, but then returned her gaze to Twilight. “We have time,” she said. “That much is obvious by the fact that we are not already besieged by our greatest foes.” She leaned a little closer. “You know who I’m talking about.”
Twilight nodded. “Discord,” she said.
“And he’s only the greatest threat,” Celestia said. “Not the only one.”
“The solution is simple,” Luna said, pointing a hoof behind her at the Everfree Forest. “Go and recover the gemstone. Both of you.” She looked past the two students, at their two copies. “And you two will accompany them and aid them.”
“What?” The other Trixie demanded. “Trixie has no intention of going into the Everfree!”
“And I didn’t even do anything!” Twilight objected. “I was in your bubble, I couldn’t possibly have – ”
Luna and Celestia’s wings snapped wide open. Twilight shut up, while Trixie backed away a little and laughed nervously. “I…guess we could use my wagon?” she asked.
The two Princesses nodded, pulling their wings back against their barrels. “It must be you four only, however,” Luna said, glancing at Trixie’s other friends, and then also at Spike. “Do not ask why. Just leave. Now.”
“W-wait!” One of Trixie’s friends – Lyra – objected, stepping forward. “You mean we came all the way here, we jumped across an entire world, just to not help Trixie?”
“Unfortunately, yes,” Celestia said, inclining her head. “I am sorry, but things have to be this way. We can explain in detail later. Why have you not left yet, Twilight?”
The rapid change in subject startled Celestia’s student. “U-um,” she stuttered. “R…right! Come on!” She galloped towards Trixie’s wagon. After another moment, the other three ponies followed. Celestia and Luna both noted, with no small amount of concern, that the four ponies all studiously avoided looking at each other, and even once all atop the wagon and setting it off via magic, they left in silence, not out of determination, but from contempt of one another. Their silence was not broken even once the four were out of sight, heading towards the edge of town, and beyond that, the Everfree.
Trixie’s remaining friends, and Spike, all looked to the Princesses. “Why couldn’t we go with them?” Spike asked Celestia. “I mean, I never get to help Twilight out with saving the world!”
Celestia glanced down at him, “because,” she said, “you are Twilight’s friend already…which means you cannot help her.”
“The Element of Magic is the Element of Friendship,” Luna continued. “And I believe what we just saw was what happens if two bearers of the Element of Magic meet…and don’t like each other very much.”
“The problem may have even been exacerbated by the presence of the other Twilight and other Trixie,” Celestia continued. She grimaced. “I suspect that the Element of Magic will only be repaired if those four can become friends.”
“Oh,” Spike said. Then he really thought about what Celestia had said. “Oh…that’s not good.”
---
Nearly a hundred miles away and a few minutes earlier, a jagged beam of purple light arched through the sky over the Everfree Forest. It twisted and turned several times, doubled back on itself, ricocheted off of tree and rock and one very rudely awakened hydra, bounding randomly until it finally splashed down into a roaring river framed by thick bushes and trees.
There was a moment of calmness after that. Then, a pony’s head broke the surface of the river, gasping for air, trying to swim but sinking beneath the rapid flow quickly. She rose a second time, only to sink back down once more. On the third time, she let out a scream, the horn atop her head glowed a bright, angry purple, and magic shoved at the river, pushing the water on all sides of her backwards and away. She landed in the muck of the riverbed, getting coated in grime and sand, breathing deeply a few times before grimacing and standing. She looked at the water that she was telekinetically holding back, that had dared try to drown her. With a grunt, she sent a blast of black magic at it.
The magic seemed to coil and twist into the water, running and moving like inky lightning, upriver as far as the eye could see. When the entire water had become jet black, it ceased, leaving behind nothing but a dry riverbed.
The pony chuckled to herself as she climbed out of the river, shaking herself off. There was a puddle nearby, which allowed her to get her first good look at herself. She discovered her mane and tail were dark blue and thick, and her fur was a deep blue, or maybe purple, she didn’t know. Twisting a little, she found herself looking at a cutie mark on her flank – a lavender starburst set against a midnight-blue, crescent-shaped nebula.
“Makes sense,” the pony grunted, then raised an eyebrow. “I can talk!” She paused a moment at her own words. “I can think! I exist! That’s new! I think, therefore I am! I am…”
The pony paused. “Huh,” she thought aloud. “Who? What? Where? When? How? Why? Why?” Okay, wait, calm down. You can do this. One at a time. In a list.”
“Who…um…I’ll get back to that.”
“What? Seem to be pony-shaped. Sound like a pony. Pony, then. Ha! This is easy!”
“Where? Looks like the Everfree. I don’t like the Everfree.”
“When? Now.”
“How? Trixie and Twilight broke the Element of Magic. Duh.”
“Why?”
The pony thought. Ah, there was the rub! A purpose! A pony needed a purpose in life. Cutie marks were a good guide, but hers wasn’t, not really. She needed something more. A driving goal. Something to motivate her. Something to give herself meaning. The answer was, of course, obvious. Some ponies may have spent years or decades agonizing and philosophizing, but not her. She was only a few minutes old, but, just like how a foal instinctively knows how to walk, she instinctively knew exactly what she wanted.
“I’m going to kill Twilight and Trixie.”
She considered.
“It’ll be fun.”