//------------------------------//
// Prompt #474-The First Turning 
// Story: Ponywatching 
// by ThunderTempest 
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The world has stopped, they said. Equestria does not change seasons on its own anymore. But yet, the animals kept trying to adhere to a seasonal cycle that was no longer there. Part of me wants to blame the pegasi, or the earth ponies. It would be so very, very easy. It would also bring the windigoes back, and as most of my magic was already tied up in monitoring for any signs of their return, it would be horribly, terribly ironic were a stray thought of mine to summon them. 

A solution, they said. Give us a solution, Clover. My first thought, as it often did, leapt to magic. Enough magic, and the unicorns could force the season shift on the country. We already moved the sun and moon, how much more difficult could the seasons be? Almost immediately, I pushed the thought back into the depths of my mind. Cookie wouldn’t have wanted such a simple solution. No, for this to truly work, the races had to work together. A collaborative effort.

The pegasi were the easiest. With their control of the weather and clouds, it was an obvious solution to simply tell them to make the weather for the different seasons. The earth ponies and the unicorns, therefore, would have to divide up the ground tasks. Clearing the snow in winter, planting the new seeds for spring, making sure the animals woke up at the right time...there was much to do, so much to take into account for changing the seasons.

I glanced out the window, a mere square gap in the stone hovel of the town we were building, and I see earth ponies, pegasi and unicorns working together. I blink, and I can see, overlaid over their forms, Princess Platinum, Commander Hurricane and Chancellor Puddinghead. Another blink, and they’re arguing, and a third, they’re frozen statues.

Yes, we must work together, or we are doomed to repeat our previous fate. 

And that thought chills me to the bone in a way that the windigoes never could.

A flare of magic summons a quill and paper to me, and I begin to plan. Everything must go exactly right. I think I heard Pansy come in, and ask me if I was okay. She’s so considerate, almost sickly kind sometimes. I told her I was fine.

----

I look out the window. The leaves are drying, and turning the forest into a sea of orange and brown, as they should. Ponies run to shake the ground to make them fall down as they should. I hear the calls of the pegasi as they move the clouds. We are scheduled for a medium storm later today. Everypony seems to understand that this is how things must be from now on-true cooperation between the three tribes. It is the only way that turning the seasons will work as efficiantly as it needs to. There are bumps, as Pansy tells me, but they are simply the usual ones that come from conflicting personalities working together. She asked me if I was feeling alright again. I told her I was fine.

I think I was lying.