“STOP!”
Twilight Sparkle’s magically amplified voice boomed, cutting through the chaos and silencing everypony about to be involved in what was sure to be the mother of all fracases, the fight that would go down in history books as being worse than Princess Celestia and her sisterly squabble with Princess Luna. Residents in both Canterlot and Ponyville could hear Twilight Sparkle as clear as day.
Shining Armor’s shield was smoking, but it had held. Princess Cadance had delivered a good zap to Princess Celestia, but there seemed to be no serious injury; Princess Celestia was smouldering a bit and her feathers were ruffled.
“I know what is going on here,” Twilight Sparkle said. She watched Princess Celestia blink at her. Cadance’s horn was powering down. Princess Luna still had a shield bubble around her. Twilight Sparkle thought about her magical analysis on Adora’s hair. “Our love is getting the best of us.”
“What?” Cadance asked, flapping her wings, and hovering over Adora and Shining Armor. She looked at Twilight, who landed on the narrow ledge.
“Adora… she’s making us love… but this isn’t something that can be blamed on her… it’s us,” Twilight replied. She cleared her throat and took a deep breath. “Adora magnifies all of the chaotic aspects of love… for Shining Armor, who loves you, Cadance, I think he’s consumed by crazy, jealous love. For Princess Celestia, who loves her ponies more than anything—” Twilight looked her former teacher right in the eye. “Your love for them is being magnified to the point of being an overprotective mother… which is exactly the sort of love that Cadance is feeling right now.” Twilight pointed a wing at her sister in law. “That’s the sort of love where you will do anything to keep what you love safe, even crazy things.”
A dawning look of realisation spread over Celestia’s face and the alicorn looked at Adora.
“Adora can’t make us feel these things… she can only work with what is already there… for whatever reason, Luna is not affected by all of this and seems to be the only sane pony left.” Twilight made a gesture at Luna, who was hovering a few yards away. She saw Luna shrug. Twilight took another deep breath, closed her eyes for a moment, and steeled her nerves.
She opened her eyes, looked around at each pony involved, and then focused on Spike. “Even Spike felt it. Look at him. You can see how much he loves.” Twilight paused and looked at Adora for a moment before lifting her head. She gave herself a shake. “Now apologise… all of you… and admit that you love one another!”
Shining Armor could hear soft words of apology being spoken all around him, but ignored them, focusing on Adora. He felt terrible. He had hurt Cadance’s foal. A dull heaviness settled over his heart. He didn’t know how to fix this. He sat down beside Adora, who was curled up in misery.
“I’m sorry—”
“You’re a meanie-head!”
The stallion gave a reluctant nod. “I suppose I am.” He reached down and tried to pick Adora up, grabbing her by the neck, but Adora could not be picked up. Her neck stretched out like rubber, leaving her head on the ground, growing longer and longer as Shining Armor struggled to scoop her up.
“I really am sorry though… I was jealous… I was so angry… and I took it out on you… I don’t know what came over me… I love Cadance so much… the thought of her with Discord, having you… the thought of her happy with somepony else, it ate me up inside and made me a very unhappy, very hurt pony. Can you understand?” Shining Armor, who hadn’t given up trying to hug Adora, settled for hugging her scooped up loops of excessive, rubbery neck.
“Adora, I think he means it,” Spike said, reaching out and touching Adora’s side.
Lifting her head, Adora’s neck shrank, and she allowed her head to be cradled in Shining Armor’s forelegs. She looked up into his eyes and saw tears. The meanie-head was hurting. She was still hurt and angry herself, but Adora couldn’t bear seeing another pony hurt. She wrapped her forelegs around Shining Armor and gave him a hug. He had tried to protect her from Auntie Celestia, who had become a meanie-head herself.
“Can we start again?” Shining Armor asked.
Adora nodded and then gave Shining Armor a squeeze. She felt him squeeze back, his embrace growing ever tighter, and then Adora looked up and saw Aunt Celestia, the meanie-head.
“I want to tell you both that I am sorry. I let my emotions get the best of me. I was wrong for this, and I shall not let it happen again,” Princess Celestia said in a low, soft voice. “I love my little ponies a great deal, they are my primary concern, and I allowed my love to slip into obsession.”
“Jealousy isn’t much better… I didn’t know that I could be such an awful pony,” Shining Armor said to Princess Celestia. “I feel so ashamed of what I did.”
“Me too.” Celestia averted her eyes, unable to look at Shining Armor, Spike, and Adora for a moment. She cleared her throat, her wings fluttering as she did so, and then with great effort, resumed looking at the trio. “There is a lesson to be learned here. We are lucky to have Adora here to teach us.”
Cadance, unable to hold back any longer, lunged forwards, shoving Celestia aside, then tackled Adora and Shining Armor. She kissed both of them over and over. She squeezed them, her eyes closed, and tears streamed down her cheeks. “I finally have you both together, I feel so happy, let me love you both.”
Twilight Sparkle looked up into her former teacher’s eyes as Cadance loved on her reunited family. Twilight’s wings fluffed for a moment, and then Twilight inhaled, feeling a bit nervous. “Obsessive love is like obsessive friendship… both of them take a relationship and push it too far.”
Saying nothing, Princess Celestia stepped forwards, wrapped her wings around Twilight, and gave her a hug. Celestia, grateful, closed her eyes and was thankful that once again, Twilight Sparkle had restored order to a situation that had spiraled out of control.
Luna, who stood watching all of this, shook her head. “I just want to be the Princess of Bedtime… why must things become so complicated?”
While the others had returned to sleep, with the exception of Princess Luna, Twilight Sparkle paced the confines of her study. She felt unsettled, perturbed, and could not relax. Adora’s effect upon ponies was somewhat worrisome, but Twilight was afraid of what would happen when Adora met Discord.
She could not help but to imagine all of the nightmare scenarios. Discord loved chaos. While Discord was being somewhat well behaved as of late, nopony was quite certain what the draconequus was up to, or even where he was.
There was still the task of figuring out more about Adora and discerning her nature, the ever driving need to discover. There was also time travel to understand. Twilight glanced around, almost as if she was guilty. She had her own love, a powerful love of knowledge. But knowledge never hurt anypony, knowledge brought ponies together. Knowledge dispelled superstition and brought clarity. A love of knowledge had never lead anypony astray. One could do no wrong with a love of knowledge.
Twilight, with the look of a foal who was about to raid the cookie jar, moved towards the stack of tomes that contained the books she wanted. Spike was sound asleep and unable to lecture her. Twilight wasn’t going to do anything that might cause any explosions—just a little bit of light reading because she couldn’t sleep.
It wasn’t like she was breaking her promise to Spike. She wasn’t doing that at all. She wasn’t being irresponsible. She wasn’t going to cast any spells. She was just going to read a book, and there was no activity that could be safer than reading a book and passing the long hours that existed just before dawn.
As Twilight Sparkle pulled some books from the pile, there was a bright flash of light.
Future Twilight, feeling annoyed, stared down at her prone body, shaking her head and clucking her tongue. She raised one eyebrow, her ears perked forwards, and she said, “And I had such high hopes for myself.” Twilight had felt the time stream change yet again, and not for the better.
It seemed that all of her fears were coming true and that she was going to have to uproot Adora and take her further back in time. It pained Twilight a great deal. She had of course, tried to reason with herself once more, but Past Twilight was not a reasonable pony, at least not about this, and insisted that there was no harm in knowing. Future Twilight had once again been forced to put herself down.
She whinnied in frustration, hating herself. “Such an annoying little pony… I can’t believe myself sometimes.” Twilight Sparkle rolled her red and yellow eyes, not quite knowing what to do next.
“I do not know what is going on, but you have mere moments to explain everything before I blast you into oblivion. I will then resurrect your ashes and kill you again, and again, and yet again, until such a time that I tire of killing you and scatter your ashes among the stars, so they can be retrieved later and I can resume destroying you for my amusement.”
Future Twilight froze. This was unexpected. Everypony was supposed to be asleep. Somehow, the past she remembered had changed somewhat. The cool, calm, collected voice behind her was a credible threat. Twilight could take on her past self with no trouble at all, but Luna, any Luna from past, present, or future, was the very textbook definition of dangerous. Twilight herself had included a small portrait of Luna in the dictionary to accompany the definition of the word ‘dangerous.’ Future Twilight had no doubt she could win the conflict, she had Luna’s powers, but the fight itself would be hazardous to others here in the castle.
Cringing, Twilight realised that she had goofed.
“Princess Luna… allow me to explain…”
“I see.” Princess Luna stood, almost statuesque, looking at Future Twilight and Past Twilight. Her teal eyes blinked. Few ponies could be as cold and logical as Luna, for when she wanted to be, she could be as cold as the vacuum of space. “Every word you told me was the truth, yet not every word was the whole truth.”
“Not everything remains true as the future shifts and changes.” Future Twilight paused and looked Luna in the eye. “As for the other things, I told you what I felt you needed to know. The rest of the details are either too troubling or are trivial.”
“Hmm, yes.” Luna’s ears perked forwards. “What strikes me as important is the fact that I trusted you and gave you the entirety of my power. That speaks volumes. I suppose I didn’t have much choice, yet it seems that I did the right thing.”
“I don’t know why you trusted me, not after the mistakes I made… this is all my fault. I led us all down the road to ruin. I took love and turned it into base chemistry… I tried to discern the true nature of magic and unravel its mysteries… and things took notice… they woke up...” Future Twilight’s words trailed away in a exhale of weary fatigue.
Luna, still calm, still cool, still collected, nodded. “Dreadful.”
“I’m starting to worry that I can’t fix this,” Twilight admitted. “What do you think, Luna? Should I take Adora further back? Should I disrupt my own ascension? How do I fix this?”
Princess Luna stared at Future Twilight, reflecting on how little Twilight had changed. “Do not give up just yet.” Luna cast a shifty glance around Twilight’s study. “I think I can help. You were right to trust me. You must be made to change your thinking.”
Snorting in frustration, Future Twilight kicked her own rump. “You stupid, stupid, frustrating little mare!”
“Perhaps what she needs… is a little nightmare therapy.” A frigid, cruel smile spread over Luna’s muzzle, a smile devoid of any warmth, a chilling smile that was as cold as the emptiness between the stars.
Future Twilight shivered as she began to have memories of a very vivid nightmare.