//------------------------------//
// Chapter 10: Sounds Of Victory 
// Story: The Lives of Doctor Whooves 
// by GrandSpellcaster 
//------------------------------//

	The Doctor's TARDIS materialized in an ally way just off a busy rode. Then the grey old stallion strode out, and taking a moment to look at his fob watch shook his head. "I don't know how we ended up here, but it looks like we're back in Canterlot" He said replacing his watch.
"Oh, when are we." A stallion asked stepping out of the police box behind him. 
"About a week and a half after you came along with me to teach Starlight" The Doctor said with just the tiniest hint of remorse. Then cheering up he said, "You should return the books you took while we're here, I'll just be- Aaaaaahhhhhhahaaahhahahah" He grabbed his chest and winced with pain. 
"What's wrong?" Tender asked running out of the TARDIS.
"It's nothing" the Doctor said as he reached into his coat's inner pocket and pulled out the, now burning hot, feather that Death had given him.
"Doesn't look like nothing to me." Lecture said looking at the feather.
"No I suppose not." the said as the feather cooled down allowing him to hold it. 
"What does it mean?" Lecture asked.
"It means that something with great magical power is nearby. Makes sense when you think about it." 
"It must be Princess Celestia" Tender offered.
"Her and Discord." The Doctor said as he began to replace the feather in his pocket. 
"Who is..." Lecture was interrupted by another shout of pain from the Doctor as he pulled the feather back out. 
"Cursed thing doesn't want to be put away." The Doctor Grumbled.
"Maybe it wants to go somewhere. I know some artifacts have a mind of their own and try to accomplish certain goals" Lecture suggested completely forgetting his original question. 
"Perhaps..." The Doctor said waving it around and measuring the intensity of the golden light it gave off. "Why don't I follow it why'll you two put those books back?" it was more of an order then a suggestion.
"You sure you don't need any help?" Tender asked worried about the old stallion.
"Yes, yes. I'll be fine on my own." He said shooing them away with his hoof.
"Fine old stallion, we'll leave you to it, just don't get in any trouble." Lecture said heading back into the TARDIS to get the books. 
The Doctor turned around and began to fallow the trail the feather marked by shining it's brightest. He followed this trail for a good ten minutes when he found himself in front of a music shop. He rubbed his chin wondering if the feather was leading him here or if it was leading him to somewhere behind the shop. The latter would make more sense in his mind, after all the shop was in between him and the Canterlot Castle, but as be started to move around the shop the feather became dimmer. It was clear that whatever the feather wanted was in the shop. 
He walked to the door where a wooden sign declared 'Open'. He entered and saw exactly what he thought it would be, various instruments hanging on the walls and on special stands. The mare behind the front desk said in a cheerful, slightly sophisticated accent, "Welcome to Notes!"
She didn't seem to register the feather and the Doctor gave a partial wave as he moved on to the back of the store where a display case was set with a golden violin in it. The feather seemed to be pointing right at it, then a cheerful voice surprised the Doctor, "You have good taste." it was the grey mare who had greeted him. 
The feather dimmed and he quickly shoved it into his breast pocket before replying, "Yes I like to think so. But tell me about this piece, would you?" The Doctor said giving a slight smile.
The Mare smiled, "Certainly sir. This violin was crafted over five hundred years ago by a now forgotten pegasus violinist. This violin was when played by a pony of who truly loves music will produce a sound that could make the heavens themselves weep with joy, but when played by a pony who doesn't love music so it will produce a sound that will anger the ground and ground and cause it to attack indiscriminately."
"A pegasus created this and gave it such power?" 
"Yes sir." 
"If this violin is so dangerous then why is it here?" The Doctor said slightly concerned that the ponies would allow such a dangerous instrument to just lay here behind a glass case that had no magical protection.
"Because the owner is a very superstitious stallion, since this was his first Notes Music Shop he thinks it will bring the company good luck if it stays here."
"He isn't worried somepony will steel it and use it?" 
"He has it ensured, and it's useless without its golden bow, which is in the Canterlot vaults." 
As soon as she said that there was a tremendous buzz so loud that the glass in the front of the shop shattered. Then a second one happened, this time the glass in front of the Violin cracked. 
The Doctor ran as fast as his old legs could take him and went out the front door. Looking up he saw a very weird sight. There were seven tall slender figured floating above the city. Six of them formed a hexagon around the city why'll the seventh was slightly higher and positioned in the center of them. Another loud buzz hit the city then it turned into different sounds, then into words, "We know your here!!"
The Doctor couldn't fathom what these creatures were, they seemed to be bipedal, and they also wore cloaks of red and blue. That was all he could make out from this distance, it was hardly enough to begin to name their species.
Then they said something, "You cannot hide Time Lord!" 
To any other Time Lord the announcement would have been slightly disconcerting and would have meant that it was time to get out of dodge. However to the Doctor the announcement that they knew he was here only helped him narrow down the suspect species.
Then a weird humming sound began to play and an enormous glass dome began to encase Canterlot. That was the one thing that the Doctor needed to see, "Archon's!" He shouted once he had the realization. 
"What's going on?" the mare said looking up to the glass dome that was encasing the city.
"They're trying to trap us" The Doctor explained in reference to him and his TARDIS.
The mare looked horrified and asked, "Can we still get out? I mean the glass hasn't completely covered the city yet." 
"You can." He said as he set a brisk pace towards the castle.
"Where are you going?! You can't get out that way!" 
"I'm not trying to escape." The Doctor said with a flash of realization, "Can you get me that golden violin?" 
"I will not steel my boss’s prized possession for a stallion I just met." the mare looked disgusted by him.
"Then don't, do it to save yourself, because I know how to beat them. We need sound and that violin will be perfect, certainly better than the giant bell I was going to use." 
"What do you mean, how could sound work" 
"Can't you hear it, that constant humming, that's them singing the glass into existence, and if we can disrupt that sound then we can save everypony." 
The mare wasn't certain that this stallion who was right, but she figured if it gave her a chance she might as well give it a shot. She quickly turned around and ran back into the store as the Stallion continued towards the castle. When she got back to the display case she turned and summoning all her earth pony strength she shattered the thick glass and retrieved the violin. 
When she caught up with the stallion she had the violin resting on her back and said, "The violin won't make a sound without its bow." 
"I already thought of that, the Canterlot vault is magically locked, which means I can open it!" he said through heavy breathing as he strode along at the fastest his old body would allow. 
"You can? The vault's supposed to be impregnable by everything in Equestria."
"It is, but that's the fault I'm going to exploit. The vault door can only be breached by great magical power or no magical power. I've got the latter."  He planned to use his lack of magical ability, to open the doors.
"What do you mean?" The mare asked.
"Nothing important but we'll need to hurry." He said to the mare who was several feet in front of him.
"I agree!" She called back to him.
"Don't get snarky with me young mare." He hollered at her.
By this time they had reached the now empty castle gates. They pushed the gates open and continued inside. They quickly saw why there had been no pony to stop them from entering, before them stood two guards frozen mid gallop. 
"What happened to them?" The mare asked. 
"It's the dome, once it was completed they used its shape to create a series of temporal disturbances and freezing time for all the ponies in Canterlot."
"What?"
"There frozen in time, all of them. Everypony in Canterlot is frozen."
"Then why aren't we frozen?"
"Proximity to me I'm afraid." The Doctor said his mind drifting to his companions. He kept moving
The mare arched an eyebrow, "And what does that mean?"
They passed a few guards that were lined up in a drill formation, "We'll I'm the one they're looking for. By singalong me out like this all they have to do is look for any motion in the city. It's much more effective then searching a bustling city filled with thousands of ponies."
"Then are we in danger?"
"No, we're inside. They won't see or hear us as long as we don't go breaking any windows." 
They had made their way to the vault. The impressive golden doors were all that were in there way. The Doctor placed his hoof on the door and gently pushed. That was all it took as the massive golden doors magic seemed to evaporate allowing entrance.
Once inside it didn't take the ponies too long to find the golden bow. "What do we do now?" The mare asked placing the bow next to the violin on her back.
"We'll go to the derelict tower" the Doctor announced pointing in its general direction.
"Why there?"
"We don't want any ponies to get hurt." He said setting his brisk pace towards the tower.
It didn't take them long to get to the tower, but the Doctors old body did have some trouble with the stairs
Once at the top the Doctor said, "Stay inside and hide for now. When I give the signal start playing. It should break their control on this space."
"Why not simply start playing now, if it will help save everypony."
"I want to give them a chance to surrender." He said then walked out onto the balcony and fiddled with a loose bar on the railing. Once he got it free he began to smack and drag it along the other bars.
It didn't take long for the seven figures to surround the tower they moved in front of him and spoke in unison, "You are the Time Lord. You all will die."
"You don't have to do this, return these ponies back to the way they were and we can go to my home world and you can seek retribution for the near extinction of your race."
"The Time Lords destroyed our race, they sacked our cities, they destroyed our worlds, and now you insult us by offering a pitiful retribution!! We will kill you and all of your race!!" The Archons began to move in.
"Wait! Why here!? Why attack me here!?" The question was more a ploy to see if he couldn't change their minds then legitimate concern.
"A traitor told us the way, a Time Lord who realizes that your kind are week and need to be destroyed." They boosted as they closed in.
One of them lifted a crablike claw and reached for the Doctor. Another let five tentacles escape from under his rags and they moved in.
The Doctor raised his hind leg considerably further then was conferrable before stepping back. The most beautiful sound he had ever herd filled the air with a soothing melody. It was a different case for the Archons, several of them started to screen while a few more tried to match the sound and cancel it out. The larger one in the middle hummed to keep what they had already made stable.
But as the melody picked up more and more of them lost focus until it was just the large one holding everything in place. The Doctor gave a low whistle and the final archons concentration broke along with the glass dome. 
Before the glass could crush anypony and before the frozen ponies were free, the larger archon said, "You win again Time Lord." 
As the archon faded away the Doctor felt a slight tinge of pain in his head. The mare behind him stumbled over to him holding her head, "What's going on, my head hurts."
"Time's resetting to right before the Archons appeared. I suppose they must have been sustaining a separate timeline so they wouldn't attract too much unwanted attention."
The mare looked over the edge of the rails of the tower and saw that everypony below was acting as nothing had happened. "So nopony remembers what just happened?" 
"Only you and I." He assured her.
"Okay, so we're the only ponies who know we saved everypony. I have just one question, how are we going to explain what we're doing here and why we have both the golden violin and its bow." 
The Doctor's face dropped noticeably, "We'll leave it all here." He said a slight smile, "Then we'll just walk out." 
"Can we do that?" The mare asked.
"Of course, all we have to do is act like we belong and no pony will suspect a thing." 
This time the mare's face dropped, "You can't be serious." 
He gave a simple smile and the next thing the mare new she was walking down the elegant corridors of the castle side by side with the old stallion. As they walked they passed several guards that did nothing more than give sideways glances. It wasn't long before they had left the castle entirely and were on the streets.
Suddenly something seemed to don on the mare, putting her hooves to either side of her head she shouted, "We had to leave the violin in the castle! I'm going to get fired for sure!" 
"Don't worry Even though the actual thing is in the castle he'll have no proof that it was you that took it." 
"Even if he didn't think I stole it, which I did, it disappeared on my watch!" 
"Well then..." He stroked his chin as if he had a beard, "You'll need something else to do..."
"Why are you giving me that look?" 
"Do you want to travel with me?"
She asked the first question that popped into here head, "Is it always like this?" she asked skeptically.
"It's happening more and more recently." He answered honestly.
Realizing that she probably should have just said no because lived with her parents and probably wouldn't be able to justify leaving with a strange old grey stallion to them, she shook her head and said, "No, I simply can't even if I lose my job I still have my family and schooling to worry about."
The old stallion smiled and as they rounded the bend to face the TARDIS he said, "Did I forget to mention I journey through time?" 
He reached out to open the door only for it to swing away from him as Tender exited, "I'm sorry but we..." She stopped as her eyes focused on the mare with the Doctor. "Who's this?" She said with a cheerful smile that completely covered her supersize.
The Doctor paused for a moment "That is a wonderful question." he said realizing that the thought to ask had never crossed his mind.
The mare poked out her hoof and said, "I'm Octavia. Do you two travel together?"
"Yes, well..." She turned towards the Doctor, "You see Lecture and I were chewed out by the principal and if we don't start work again we will lose our jobs. So we kind of need to stay." 
"I see..." The Doctor said. "And this is what you two want?"
"Yes, we really shouldn't have neglected our duties for so long. Lecture is back at the school grading worksheets as punishment for disappearing and I really need to get back. I only came here to tell you what was happening. I certainly didn't expect you to already have a replacement." 
"Oh...Well...I see. Yes...um okay." The Doctor said unable to think of what to say.
"Goodbye Doctor, I hope you and Octavia have fun in your journeys." She said this as she walked past the Doctor. As she passed Octavia she whispered to her, "Don't let him do anything that'll get him killed." 
"What?" 
"He needs some pony to make sure he doesn't do anything too crazy." 
"What exactly am I signing up for?" Octavia asked having a flashback of the weird creatures from before.
"I think you can handle it" and with that she walked away.
The Doctor said, “shall we go inside?" He said raising his hoof in a way that suggested 'ladies first'.
"The box?" She asked a little confused and worried.
The Doctor have a knowing smile and made the gesture again.
She pushed the door open and found herself in the main consul room. The stepped back out and examined the outside as best she could. She finally walked back in and said those words, "It's bigger on the inside!"