//------------------------------// // Epilogue // Story: What Didn't Happen // by Zeg //------------------------------// What Didn't Happen by Zeg Epilogue The doorway to Twilight’s private library opened with a quiet creaking sound. The darkened room was lit at first by only the long beam of light cast across the floor from the adjoining room, and then brightened as torches around the perimeter of the room lit in a counter clockwise cascade just as Twilight stepped hoof across the threshold. Her hoofsteps echoed throughout the quiet room as she walked past the first few columns of bookshelves, and then she paused for a few seconds, tilting her head as she glanced down one of the narrow spaces between the shelving. She turned to make her way between the shelves, glancing up and down at the rows of books to her left as her lips silently mouthed the titles that her eyes caught as she scanned them. After passing by nearly half a dozen full bookshelves, she squinted at one of the lower shelves she was standing in front of, trying to make out the titles on the book spines. She lowered her head and began to crouch to get a better look, but as she shifted her stance, her right flank bumped into the shelving on the other side. The unexpected touch caused her to and flinch away, and she stood so quickly that her shoulder caught under one of the wooden shelves on the shelf to her left, unseating it from the wooden pegs that it laid upon and causing it to tip forward. Before she knew what was happening, a small cascade of books toppled from the shelf and landed in a messy pile at her hooves. “Shoot,” Twilight quietly cursed. Her magic lit and began to lift the books from the floor one by one, closing the ones that had fallen open and stacking them together in floating stacks around her. As she was cleaning up the mess, her mind wondered why the shelves seemed so close together. She could have sworn that there had been more room between them before. She hadn’t grown that much. Though, it had been a few decades since the library had last been redone, something she had been putting off. She let a light sigh escape from her, resigned to the fact that another renovation was probably unavoidable. After adjusting the shelf to reseat it properly, Twilight’s magic began to take the books one by one from the floating stacks and quickly reshelve them after she glanced at the covers. When she was down to the last few, she did a quick double take when her eyes came across one of the titles. She pulled it back quickly to look at the cover again, her magic flipping the book over once as she looked over the seemingly very plane cover before reading the title once again. What Didn’t Happen She had recognized the journal right away as the record of events she had created after returning home from the alternate Equestria. However, she was a bit confused as to why it had ended up on the shelves among all the rest of the books in her library. This was one of the few that she normally kept hidden away in a safer place. She furrowed her brow deeply as she tried to remember the last time she had seen the journal. It had to have been at least over a century, perhaps coming up on two. Though she would never admit to forgetting about her time in the other world, she had put it out of mind for a while after she had realized that it would be quite a while before she would be ready for the next step. Perhaps she had removed it from the vault for some reason, and then somehow not noticed it getting mixed in with the rest of the books the last time the library had been reshelved, or perhaps she had simply been tired one evening long ago and placed it upon the shelf without thinking. Either way, she found it rather uncanny that she had happened to nearly trip into it by chance. She placed the remaining books upon the shelf before turning her attention back to her old journal, and after inspecting the cover once again for any signs of wear, she opened it to the first page. The bindings creaked as the book’s pages opened for the first time in over a lifetime, and Twilight’s eyes began to scan quickly back and forth as she read the first entry. A few minutes soon turned into a few hours as Twilight read entry after entry in the journal. She eventually settled into laying on the floor there between the shelves as she continued to read with the journal propped against her crossed forehooves. She finally came to the last of the written journal entries as she turned a page. All of the records of events contained within the pages of this journal will never be found within our own history books. These events are from an alternate history that our world will never know, a record of what didn’t happen. But, for our world to exist, this other history must also exist. I know that this other history will happen, that the other Equestria and all those who live within it will exist. Someday, I will make sure of it. Twilight’s eyes lingered on the last sentence of the final entry on the page before glancing to the next page. The next page was filled from edge to edge with notes on temporal equations. Her magic turned the page over to the next, and there she found a construction diagram of a staff, with various notes written in around the components. At the bottom center of the page was carefully written a single name. Dusk Twilight’s eyes lingered on the page that depicted the yet to be created artifact for a moment longer, and then her magic lit as it closed the journal, causing a dull thump to echo quietly through the room. Her eyes closed as she spent a moment in thought, and then slowly opened again. She stood and turned to walk back down the row of shelving, her magic holding the journal just to her right as she made her way to the exit. She stopped once she made it to the library doorway, turning to look back in the room, and then down to the journal. The journal hadn’t been what she was looking for. She had just stumbled upon it by chance, but even so, it now felt like this was the real reason why she had ventured into her library this evening. Sometimes, when looking for something, you find something else even more important. Twilight smiled as she tucked the journal away under her wing, and turned to leave the library. Perhaps it was finally the right time to make something happen. The End