Broken Symmetry

by Trick Question


A Mysterious Mare

I didn't notice Twilight Sparkle until she was standing right in front of me.

"Moondancer?" said Twilight, gingerly taking her seat on the other side of the small cafe table.

My hooves were jittery. I was pretty sure I'd have spilled my coffee if I were holding it by hoof instead of magic. I telekinetically set the mug down and looked up to my former and once-again friend. I wasn't good at reading faces, but Twilight Sparkle seemed concerned. Maybe it was obvious I was on my fourth cup.

"Thanks for coming?" I said. I tried to hide the surprise from my voice, but I probably failed. I wasn't good at that sort of thing either.

"Of course! That's what friends are for," smiled Twilight. I waited while she ordered a hay smoothie from a passing waiter. All the while, I felt a certain tension creeping up my spine.

"Well, you're a princess," I finally replied, "so I assume you're really busy. I appreciate you coming on short notice."

Twilight shrugged. "It can get busy sometimes, but with the boundaries of my kingdom still sketchy I've been able to dodge a lot of responsibilities so far. Besides, your note sounded urgent, and there wasn't a lot of information—"

"Sorry about that," I interrupted her. "But now that we're talking, there's another reason I didn't expect you to show up. Can you tell me who this is?"

I pulled the photograph from my saddlebag and slid it across the table. Twilight leaned in and examined it curiously. The image had already been burned into my retinas: a bright white flash in the profile shape of a unicorn mare, standing in front of a shiny metal door.

"What's wrong with... wait, is she teleporting?" asked Twilight.

"Sure looks like it." I pushed my glasses back up to the bridge of my muzzle with magic.

"Moondancer, now I have to ask. What is this about?" As Twilight spoke, a waiter dropped off her smoothie and left without saying a word. That was fast, I thought. Being a princess clearly has its advantages.

I took a sharp breath. "Somepony is sabotaging my research, which I'll be happy to familiarize you with later, if you like. I set up an automatic camera, and it took this picture of her."

It took only a moment before it dawned on her.

"Moondancer, you don't think this is me, do you?" she gasped.

"Not anymore," I admitted, feeling a great weight lift from my withers. I exhaled a huge breath of air before continuing. "Naturally, I didn't want to believe that in the first place, but the picture is rather damning."

"She has bangs just like you and I," Twilight whispered, shaking her head in disbelief as she studied the image. "But the aura's impossible to match. This must have been taken right at the peak of the mana surge, and the light overwhelmed your camera's chroma thresholds."

"Yeah, I figured. But it's clearly a mare, relatively young, with straight bangs, don't you agree?" I asked. "I was hoping—if it wasn't you, of course—that you might have some ideas on who. Even among mages, teleportation is a hard spell to master on command."

"That's an understatement," said Twilight, and she leaned back in her chair to think. "Unless I misremember, you and I were the only two ponies in our graduating class to pull it off in time for commencement." She held the smoothie up in her right forehoof to drink from it, which struck me as odd.

"Correct; and ours was an exceptional year. The modal number of graduates who can teleport is zero, and there haven't been any 'porters in the two years following our class, or the three prior," I said, then paused as my curiosity got the better of me. "Um, this is rather off-topic, but can I ask you something personal?"

Twilight blushed, which also struck me as odd. I had no idea what that might mean, but I decided then to stop worrying about reading her behavior. Even if she used to be bad at friendship, you probably don't become the Princess of Friendship by being untrustworthy, right? Besides, I kind of liked her. We had a lot in common, and we even looked similar. Staring at Twilight Sparkle was almost like looking into a funhouse mirror: there was just enough symmetry there that I could recognize my own disturbing reflection looking back at me. Minus the glasses, of course.

"S-sure, ask away," Twilight said, and smiled weirdly. Then she nervously licked some congealed hay from her teeth.

"You're holding your cup in your right hoof," I said, pointing at her hoof.

"Oh. Well, I'm right-hooved. Aren't most ponies...?" she asked.

"I mean you're not using telekinesis to hold your cup. I'm just curious why."

"Oh!" said Twilight, and the muscles at the borders of her muzzle relaxed. "That's just, well... I try to use my hooves as much as possible in public, these days. It seems to put other ponies at ease," she explained. "Especially in Ponyville, with all the earth ponies who live there. Being a princess means some ponies look up to you like you're not even a real person, and it gets awkward."

I nodded. "I see. Anyway, I can't get records from Celestia's School from further back than 996 without leaving a paper trail, so I haven't tried yet. I suppose it could always be a grad student or an independent study, but those are kind of rare," I said. "To be perfectly honest, aside from the older ponies who teach at the School, I don't know anypony else who can teleport. Although, have you heard of a pony named Trixie Lulamoon?"

Twilight rolled her eyes. "Ah, Trixie. Yes, we've crossed paths. I'm not sure what you've heard, but Trixie can't teleport—she uses illusion magic to fake it. Even if she could, she'd never cut her forelock that short." She paused for a moment to take a sip of hay. "Until recently, I've only known one other mare who could do it. Celestia's protege before me, Sunset Shimmer."

"Could it be her?" I asked. I rocked a little in my seat, impatiently waiting for the precious knowledge in that thick purple head to come spilling out onto the table.

"No. She was evil, but she's been reformed for quite a while. And she doesn't even live in this dimension anymore," said Twilight.

I blinked a few times in rapid succession. "I'm... just going to assume that makes sense," I said.

Twilight grinned sheepishly. "Sorry. It's a long story. I suppose Sunset might have an evil counterpart in the other dimension who somehow wandered over to our world, but she'd have no motive. Besides, her forelock doesn't match," she said, levitating the picture up close to her face. Then, Twilight Sparkle gasped and her eyes drew open wide.

"What is it?" I asked, as my hoof nervously tapped at the table leg.

"Oh no. It could be her," she whispered. "No... I can't believe it."

"Who? Don't leave me in suspense!" I begged.

"Okay, okay. So there's a friend I made recently, who used to have some major issues. Her name is Starlight Glimmer and she's the most powerful unicorn mage I've ever met. She's as adept as I am, and she's only a unicorn. Er, no offense," said Twilight.

"None taken. Less polite, more detail," I demanded.

"Well, she tried to kill me once, and last week she came pretty close to destroying all of Equestria..."

I reacted out of pure shock. "Holy Celestia, Twilight! And you made this pony your friend? Wow. I guess you really are the Princess of Friendship," I said. As is often the case, I regretted the words as soon as they exited my stupid mouth. "No wait, I didn't mean..."

"No, no, it's okay," said Twilight, shaking her head. "It sounds dumb because it is dumb. But she matches the picture. Starlight is older than we are, but she looks fairly young and her bangs are just like ours. I just can't believe she would do something like this without a good reason, though! She spent last week with us in Ponyville, and it really seemed like she'd learned to let go of all the hate inside of her."

I sighed. "Well, the damage was done two days ago. Does that fit?"

Twilight winced. "It might. She left Ponyville three days ago to take care of what she said was 'unfinished business'. We all assumed she was headed back to this little village called 'Our Town' to continue making amends with the ponies she used to govern," said Twilight. "I just don't want to believe it. I really thought she had changed."

"Well, why would she come after me?" I asked. "I mean, it's nice you're my friend and all, but we don't really know each other that well."

"She knows you're a friend of mine. She was here in Canterlot spying on me the last two times I came to visit you. She might be using you to get to me... but that still makes no sense. She left on such good terms with all of us," said Twilight, with her muzzle scrunched up. She bit at her lower lip, and her eyes started darting back and forth as though she were reading an invisible book right in front of her face. "Oh, horsefeathers," she murmured, and her cheeks paled.

"Spill it, Twilight," I said. I suppose I was getting a little bossy, but I was tired of all the suspense.

"Moondancer, something strange happened a little more than a week ago. Starlight Glimmer used a magic item called the Cutie Map to send us both back in time in an attempt to alter the past," she said. "Then she sent me back to the present alone, and I used the same spell to return to the past to confront her again. We did this over and over, and finally I forced her to come with me to the present to see how the changes she was making would destroy Equestria. That ended up changing her mind, so we fixed the past and everything returned to normal."

I furrowed my brow in frustration. This was, by far, the stupidest, most ridiculous story I had ever heard in my entire life. If this were any other pony, I would have stood up and trotted away right then. But this was Twilight Sparkle, my former lab partner, and she was as precise as I when it came to the details. So I thought carefully through what she was saying, and after a few moments I realized the implications.

"You think there might be a second Starlight Glimmer because of the time travel," I said.

Twilight nodded. "Bingo. Each time I returned to the past to stop her, she was there waiting for me, ready to change things again. But she remembered our previous encounters, which means the Cutie Map kept sending her back in time along with me: each time I went back many years, she went back only a few minutes. But the last time I cast the spell, Starlight Glimmer was already in the present with me..."

"So this 'Cutie Map' could have targeted a copy of Starlight Glimmer shortly before she followed you to the present, and sent that version of her back by only a few minutes?"

"Yes, exactly. I don't think the Cutie Map would make that kind of error, but it's entirely possible. I don't know why I didn't realize it sooner. The other Starlight Glimmer could have returned to the present right after we left the castle."

"And this second Starlight lady would still be evil, and tied for the most powerful unicorn in Equestria," I said, and groaned. "Well then. That's comforting."

"It is? Wait, you're being sarcastic," realized Twilight.

I chuckled. "You don't have me fooled, Princess," I said. "You're a real pony just like the rest of us." I stood up, re-bagged the photo, and tossed several bits on the table.

Twilight stood up. "Are we going to your lab?" she asked. Her eyes lit up like a Hearth's Warming tree, and I felt an instant kinship there.

"Just follow me," I teased. "I have something amazing to show you."