Twilight opened her eyes.
It had been just that morning when she had gotten princess Celestia's letter and, she had to admit, had gone a little crazy over it.
Alright, mildly crazy. It was not every day that Twilight's lavender coat turned a nearly-white orange, or that her deep blue mane turned into fire... it was the pressure! There was a point that simply made her too jittery to function properly!
"Feeling better?" Fluttershy, her cyan eyes having never let Twilight out of their sight, asked at a volume that was almost drowned out by all the different sounds from the train.
"Much better!" Twilight chirped, yes, chirped, her answer. After working a kink on her neck, Twilight smiled at her butter-yellow friend.
"Uh-huh." Spike raised an eyebrow, the little purple dragon scratching his chin in mild disbelief. "No explosions, no neuroses?"
Twilight blushed - it was always embarrassing to be reminded of her overreactions. She looked towards the seat to her back, opposite to Fluttershy's, where her full-to-bursting saddlebags had been placed so that she could take a nap without their weight causing problems.
"I admit it; I was overreacting about the test." She nodded for emphasis. "But it is nothing we can't handle."
Her reassurance only served to raise even more red flags on Spike's 'Something's wrong with Twilight' list. It included all signs from the obvious 'too entranced by book/list to listen to her surroundings' to the subtler 'trying to drink her own magic while sulking' (it was hard to differentiate from juice).
The way she phrased it... she said 'it is not', which implied absolute certainty, instead of the expected 'think', 'believe' or even 'would' for a higher degree of confidence in her ability to pass the test - oh! And she had said 'we' instead of 'I'! What's up with that?
Whoop, fake alarm; Twilight began to write on a notebook, probably studying again.
The train ride continued like that... it was incredibly awkward! Everypony wanted to ask what had brought about the sudden change, but they were too afraid that she would regress into the dreadful state she had been! They made small questions, about her current study material, mostly... as it turned out, she was making a copy of the Canterlot's Royal Palace's budget for the past six moths. She worked as if from memory, but that was crazy! Who would memorize all those numbers, and why?
*****
Twilight was behaving oddly, for sure.
Instead of racing to the Palace as soon as the train stopped, as... pretty much anypony would have predicted... she just dropped a couple of letters in the nearest mailbox, and then calmly walked to the merchant's district of Canterlot for 'some last-minute order for magic supplies' and a 'meeting with an old friend'.
Which Spike, again, found suspicious.
Twilight didn't have any old friends! Well, technically there was Lyra, but they only became actual friends after both of them had moved to Ponyville; Lyra said it was a better place to raise Tootsie Flute. Any other old acquaintances-turned-friends were even more recent. That and Spike knew that Lyra was still in Ponyville (he saw her waving at them from the station). Twilight, of course, counted family as her friends, since family were the first friends one would make in their lives, but in that case she would say simply 'family' instead of being cryptic about it.
Spike knew the place; they were currently close to one of Canterlot's many, many magic shops - more specifically, Twilight's favorite...
That was not to be, apparently; Twilight instead entered a shop that looked relatively new, her accounting work in tow. The shop was called 'Yggdrasil's Root', and had a crystal ball sign hanging in front just the same as the library had its little book sign. What would Twilight want in a fortuneteller's shop was beyond him, but Spike wondered what was up with the name. The shop window had generic-looking magic-y objects but, being a mage's shop that caught Twilight's interest, it was likely it was just playing to type and there were obscure enchantments on everything; there were books that looked hoof-made, as well as stacks of cards, robes, tunics, hats, wands, gems, strange potions and all sorts of things commonly associated with wizards, all in varying degrees of decoration.
As soon as the forest-green door closed behind Twilight, however, the drapes behind the merchandise behind the window began to wave. Twilight came out after it calmed, rubbing her ears... oh! The inside was soundproof (either by design or by spells), and somepony yelled at Twilight!
...
Why would somepony they had never met yell at her?
"All done!" She declared, perhaps a little louder than strictly necessary because of her ringing ears, and cheerfully trotted towards the castle.
The questions were just piling up, tensions building up to boiling point... Pinkie looked like she would explode from curiosity alone, but even she was floored by Twilight's strange change - she really, really didn't want to ruin Twilight's good mood, having already tried everything before her nap.
She insisted on entering the castle alone, but promised that she would tell them all about her test after speaking with the princesses.
Another flag, Spike noted; Twilight spoke as if she knew she was going to talk to both princesses with absolute certainty.
Twilight came out the door, just moments before Fluttershy fainted from sheer stress... the poor mare had been thinking up increasingly fatalistic scenarios despite Twilight's confidence.
Pinkie saw Twilight's smile, and cheered. "Whoop-ee! Twilight aced her test!" She reached out behind a decorative bush and pulled out a blue cannon and quickly hit it with a hoof, causing it to fire confetti into the air as she jumped three meters straight up with little effort.
"Not yet, Pinkie." Twilight said, causing Pinkie and the confetti to pause in mid-air, a shocked look on her face. "This meeting was just to inform me about the test, not the test itself."
"Aww..." Pinkie fell down back on all fours, the cone of colorful paper bits somehow reversing its trajectory and stuffing itself back into the cannon.
Twilight smiled a soft, tender smile, the kind of smile that spoke about treasured moments and a connection deeper than what words could describe. She walked over to Pinke and hugged the pink mare tightly.
"Don't ever change, Pinkie." She whispered to her friend, tightening her embrace for a moment before releasing her. Pinkie tough confused, quickly returned Twilight's smile with a wide, ear-to-ear smile of her own.
"Okie Dokie Lokie!" Pinkie nodded, making Twilight nod herself before turning around.
"Pack your things, girls, because we are going to save the Crystal Empire!" Twilight pointed towards the train station.
"Crystal what? Alright, what's going on here!?" Dash had had enough, and even the prospect of adventure could not stop her frustration from showing.
Twilight did not seem to mind at all, and just took a deep breath of air before starting to pace about.
"Well, there is an ancient evil king that has returned from a failed attempt at a banishment, which failed because of his incredible expertise on dark magic and copious amounts of safeguard spells that caused the entirety of the Crystal Empire -I'm talking residents and all- to banish along him, freezing everything in time as they were sent beyond the reach of Normal Space; he cannot be allowed to take hold of the city again, which Cadence and Shining are defending for the time being but cannot do so indefinitely, thus requiring my help to find a way to get rid of Sombra for good. The reason is kinda complicated, but I'll do my best to explain; the Crystal Empire was the central hub of a series of magic experiments in altering the ley lines and their interactions with ponies, the weather, and plants, as well as a way to channel the results - needless to say, this turned the Crystal Empire into the first and last deliberate artificial gathering of ley lines into a Nexus, one that has an effect on the rest of Equestria which reflects the status of the city. Sadly, King Sombra - the mad unicorn I was asked to stop- took over and nearly ruined everything despite his short stay in power... although the disappearance of the Empire removed its active influence on Equestria, the lingering effects both on the rest of the country and the princesses themselves were one of the primary causes of Luna's bouts of depression that had the end result of turning her into Nightmare Moon. Princess Celestia, although well-meaning, made the mistake of banning and making illegal certain types of magic that were related to the creation of the Crystal Empire and Luna's jealousy, and then simply let them disappear from history so that nopony would know about them, going completely against many of the lessons she herself teaches about responsibility, magic, and wisdom just because she was upset about it. I am going to make things right, because I take my responsibilities as a magic scholar, a citizen of Equestria, an apprentice of the princess, and a friend seriously, and I would appreciate it if you would help me make sure that everything goes alright."
She stopped pacing and turned to her friends, some of whom even had a blank look. Five seconds... ten seconds...
Rainbow Dash shook her head to wake herself up from her stupor. "Wha- w- you know what? I don't care for the explanation; if you need my help, I've got your back one-hundred-and-twenty percent." She declared, shrugging with her wings. "That evil king won't know what hit 'im!"
Rainbow Dash pumped her hoof as she gave a fierce expression, making the rest of them shake off their own confusion.
'Of course!' 'Y'can count on me' 'I don't really understand, but count me in.' 'Well, yes, if that's alright with you, I mean.'
"And I'm going, too!" Spike jumped in front of Twilight.
"Of course! How could I do anything without my Number One assistant?" She replied, pulling him in with a foreleg to nuzzle him.
He flailed his little arms around, trying to escape the embarrassing display of affection as a blush tinted his scales. He was picked up by Twilight's magic and placed carefully on her back.
"This sounds very dangerous, darling. Are you sure that everything is fine?" Rarity was, understandably, wary of an ancient evil unicorn that made an entire city vanish.
"I am one-hundred percent certain." Twilight nodded, trotting towards the train that was waiting to send them to their newest adventure.
"Alright, that's it." Spike said, scowling and crossing his arms defiantly - it would have been more effective had he not been riding Twilight's back, thus preventing her from even seeing the gesture. "You have been acting strange ever since you woke up from that nap on the way here; what's going on?!"
Twilight stopped abruptly, almost causing Pinkie to run-bounce into her. They were moments away from boarding, and the topic had to be breached before departure.
"We have some time before we arrive, so I'll gladly explain everything. I am going to say some things that will sound really, really crazy, but I swear that every last one of them is the truth, would you be willing to believe me?" She said neutrally, in contrast to her recent cheer.
"Of course sugarcube." Applejack walked next to her and smiled, not quite turning face to face, but looking to her eyes regardless. The others agreed wholeheartedly.
Twilight sighed in relief. "Every time I hear that, I can't help but remember how great friends you are."
"Every time?"
"That... that is part of the explanation. You see, I was doing an experiment on some of Starswirl's spells and I kind of... I... accidentally broke the fabric of Space-Time."
"WHAT?!" Six voices gasped simultaneously.
"Only a little!" Twilight defended herself. "Anyways, this will have happened a few weeks from now. I've been doing time loops ever since."
"Wait, like in 'Best Night Ever'?" If there was a relation to a romantic novel, Rarity knew it. No exceptions.
"Nope!" Twilight chirped, again, as she finally boarded the train. "There is a big difference between this and that. For one, I have friends, second, I have Pinkie, third, I know a fortuneteller that isn't a sham, and fourth, I am not stuck doing loops against my will."
It took... what, five loops before the error was corrected? Merely having a way out was reassuring... it would not do for the Element of Magic to become suicidally-depressed.
That, and the matter of Blueblood's uncle kept her busy for a great many loops.