Twilight shook her head and blinked her eyes at Time Turner, who was now walking down the stairs, pulling a blue suit jacket over his shoulders.
“How did-? When did you-? I don’t want to sound rude, but what in Equestria are you doing here?”
Time Turner, now at the foot of the stair, stopped and winked at me, then rounded on Twilight, removing her glasses and placing them instead on his nose.
“Never you mind just yet Miss Sparkle, why were you wearing my glasses?” Turner stretched toward the unicorn’s face and dropped his voice to a bewildered whisper, “you don’t even wear glasses… anyway, you’ve let me get distracted, where were we..? Ah, yes.”
Time Turner now spoke softer, his eyes scanning the room. “Everyone stay calm, this shouldn’t take too long, try not to get hurt; Dash you’re fastest, go and tell the Mayor where I am, she’ll know what you mean.”
Dash leapt up and without a word, vanished out the nearest window. Turner paced in front of us, scratching his chin then turning.
“Right, now er… what next? Oh yes, of course!” Turner rummaged in the inside pocket of his jacket, producing with a flourish… a screwdriver. The ticking continued.
Time Turner whispered around the screwdriver held in his mouth as he pointed it around the room, “This may unsettle you both a little, so please stay calm and don’t make and sudden movements.”
I was, at the time, fixed by utter confusion about what was going on and why everything had apparently become more serious, and so making sudden movements wasn’t something I had planned.
A sharp blue light then drew my attention to a gemstone fixed into the handle of Turner’s screwdriver, which then began emitting a nagging whirring.
“Ah-ha, there it is,” The brown earth pony said, again with the strange implement still between his teeth. “Slightly out of synch… thirty seconds? Maybe a minute? Either way that’s clever, or cheating… Shouldn’t see this coming.
“Remember what I said; Do. Not. Panic. Twilight, when you get surprised I want you to cast a shield around the library.”
Twilight had clearly had enough of all the unexplained instruction giving and situational dominance, and stamped a hoof, demanding Time Turner explain what in Equestria was going on.
Time Turner wheeled around, smiling a devious smile, dissolving into a far more blank expression, as he said flatly,
“Here’s your explanation, Twilight Sparkle. Surprise.” The stallion flicked the screwdriver behind him, wincing slightly.
The corner of the room the screwdriver was pointed at exploded with blue-purple light and all of a sudden standing there, not three metres away, was a monster of metal. The new arrival looked about itself for a moment, its head darting from side to side before settling on Twilight, Time Turner and myself.
From within its wolf-skull head, the beast’s green eyes flashed, and it stretched its jaw wide, uttering forth a roar that was at once guttural and screeching.
Twilight screamed and in an instant, a purple sphere materialised at the tip of her horn, rapidly expanding to surround the library, sealing us in.
“That’s it, gotcha!” Time Turner shouted triumphantly, then directed his head to the ceiling, raising his voice again, seemingly addressing the air. “Minuette? Give me twenty seconds!” He turned back to me. “Torchlight, take my hoof!”
Without hesitance I complied, and for a moment everything was gone, replaced by oppressive blackness. My surroundings then reappeared, shadowed and greyscale, all except Time Turner, who now grinned at me inanely. The ticking sound was now gone. Behind me, Twilight still stood but she was now barely moving, her face still stretched from her scream, her mouth closing so impossibly slowly, and emanating a weird, deep sound.
“Oh I love doing this! This is the fun part, haven’t done this for ages!” Time Turner said, looking between myself and the metal wolf-thing. “What I want you to do,” he continued, “Is to get a good hold on that thing’s shoulders so I can mess around with it, without it moving too much.”
Despite my impulsive hoof-taking, I was now rooted to the spot, attempting to make sense of exactly what had just happened.
“What was that!?” I shouted, “Am I dead? Is everyone else dead? What have you done?”
Time Turner shook me, chiding, “Come along Torch, we haven’t all day, please, help me a while, then I will explain as much as I can, I promise.”
Turner patted my shoulders once, and with a nod of his head indicated the wolf-thing, still there despite the absence of ticking, which was very slowly turning toward us.
“Shall we?”
Together Time Turner and I sprung once, twice toward the metallic beast, and with outstretched hooves I plunged down onto its steely haunches and forced it downward. Time Turner leant across the beast’s now lowered spine and pointed his strange screwdriver at its back and neck, frowning as the screwdriver’s blue gemstone whirred. Was he looking for something?
Apparently, such action finally elicited a response from the wolf. Beneath my hooves, the previously incredibly slow ticking began to increase in pace, accompanied by a vibrating thudding coming from the wolf’s core. Turner’s frown was replaced by surprise, then something close to wide eyed terror.
“It’s speeding up… Let go, now! Get back!” Time Turner pushed himself off the beast’s back and barged into me as I withdrew my own grip on its shoulders, pushing me away.
I could understand what was happening now, but it shouldn’t have been possible and it made my head hurt to think of it. Time had somehow been slowed, and we were supposed to have used that to an advantage against the wolf, but now the wolf had somehow… caught up with us.
“Celestia damn it, time’s up.” Time Turner said through his teeth as he steadied himself.
The ticking still increased in pace, and now the wolf-beast looked up at us, its head moving first slowly then almost too quick, and it was upon us in a single bound, throwing us aside and across the room. In that moment, all the darkness that had swum around us before washed away; vivid colour returning to the library; Twilight’s scream returning to its original pitch from the low rumbling that had been background noise a second earlier, and then ending abruptly with a gasp.
Though we had been moving at the same speed the whole time, as Turner and I collided with the walls and shelves we were forced into, I seemed to accelerate marginally, and the impact was fast and hard, knocking the wind from me. The steely aggressor turned back toward us, its movement however carrying it into the library’s front door, from which it was repulsed with a shudder of pink and purple energy from Twilights shield. The beast roared again, and I saw Time Turner pull himself from a pile of displaced books to charge it down.
Twilight ran to me as I got myself up, but I was watching the wolf, which now opened its blade-clawed paw to meet Time Turner’s charge with a vicious swipe. The brown stallion, screwdriver between teeth, however, was apparently unfazed, and instead turned his head into the attack, blocking the bladed claw with the screwdriver, and turning it away.
Turner then went on the offensive himself, whipping around and bucking the wolf back into the library door. Apparently, though I knew little of unicorn shield spells, a surface which is in direct contact with the magic barrier, acts as part of it. This was revealed when the wolf hit the door with a bright purple flash, rebounded, and was sent sprawling forward; the armour plating of its left shoulder hanging off at an angle, the metal joint yelping in complaint.
The wolf halted for a moment, and with its left foot began to knock the damaged pauldron clear. Rather than attack, Time Turner asked Twilight, who wore an expression of disbelief mixed in with fear and dumbfounded-ness (which didn’t seem to suit her at all), for an empty jar. Twilight managed to put her facial expression into a vocal format as she replied, waving a hoof about randomly.
“Why in all of Luna’s darkest nights do you need an empty jar!? Surely a sword would be better to deal with… whatever that is!”
Time Turner could not fashion an answer however, as with a clank the wolf-beast-thing’s ruptured armour fell to the floor, making him whirl around and again adopt a fighting stance; the metal monster mirroring him, crouching low and scraping deep cuts into the wooden library floor with its bladed feet.
As the metal beast crouched, the ticking from its core dramatically increased in pace and in a flash of green light from its eye sockets, it shot past Time Turner and skidded to a halt in the library kitchen, gouging more floor away as it went. Turner had managed a tripping jump aside when he realised what the wolf was about to do, but when he wheeled around to stare it down once more, I saw three slices torn through the right shoulder of the earth pony’s blue jacket, and he held the corresponding leg off the ground.
I rushed to Time Turner’s side to steady him, but he twisted to push me behind him, and with a gasp Twilight joined us, her magic holding a large stoppered vase beside her head. The wolf now paced in front of us, joints clanking as it twisted; in its exposed shoulder joint, gears meshed where the leg met the socket, jolting ever so slightly while they turned, the knife-claws on the corresponding foot twitching as they stepped and rose and fell. The ticking quickened once more, and the metal beast crouched, ready to pounce.
With another, brighter green flash, the wolf vanished, then reappeared a leg’s length in front of our noses, fully extended in mid-leap, eyes burning bright, its claw-blades swinging around seeking flesh.