175.1
The strange, black alicorn spread her wings, like great black cuts out of the world. "Trepidate metu!" she laughed. "Nocte in perpetuum manebit!"
Twilight gasped.
After a moment, she blinked. Wait, what?
"What did she say?" someone asked.
Nightmare Moon blinked. "Cur autem se non prostratus? Quid dicis?"
Twilight cleared her throat. "Mutata in lingua. Et nemo ex eis possunt intellegere te."
"You can speak to her?" Ivory asked. "What's she saying?"
"Non possunt comprehendere me? Et interpreta sermones, monocerōs!" Nightmare Moon said, at about the same time.
There was a pause.
"Pardon?" Twilight asked. (She then turned to Nightmare Moon and added a quick 'Quid dicis?')
"If you can understand that strange alicorn, please, tell us what she's saying," the Mayor said.
"Twilight, what's going on?" Spike asked.
"Quid est hoc garrulitas?"
"I'm confused."
"Where's the Princess gone?"
"One pony at a time!" Twilight said, loudly. She turned to Nightmare Moon. "Principissa? Ex principio si ames?"
Nightmare Moon sighed deeply. "Ego Somnum Luna, princeps Equestriae," she said, slowly and loudly.
"What did she say?" somepony near the back called.
"She said she was called Nightmare Moon," Twilight supplied. "The ruler of Equestria."
"Quid dicis?" Nightmare Moon asked suspiciously.
Twilight sighed. This could take a while...
The only reason she didn't get out the universal translator was that there was a pretty good chance Nightmare Moon would just give up and go home if faced with this for long enough.
175.2
"Lord Vader, we only use this facility for carbon freezing," Lando protested. "If you put him in there, it might kill him."
Vader frowned, invisible inside his mask. "I do not want the Emperor's prize damaged. We will test it... on Captain Solo."
There was a cough.
"What is it?" Vader asked, turning to the purple Twi'Lek standing behind him. "You have something to say?"
"Yes, actually," the alien said, checking her datapad. "I wanted to inform you that there's no reason to bother testing."
"What?" Lando asked. "I mean, this is a dangerous process—we don't even know if a human can survive it."
He refocused. "Who are you, anyway?"
"Darth Archivus," the Twi'lek explained briskly. "Now, I wanted to bring up some records..."
Vader sighed—it was going to be one of those discussions. "Must we?"
"Of course," his fellow Anchor replied, tossing a lekku out of the way. "Now, firstly, carbon-freezing was the preferred method of interstellar hibernation during the great diaspora ages of the Galaxy—the second and third ones, that is, before the Hyperdrive."
Grifting Cloud City Administrator and Dark Lord of the Sith exchanged a glance.
She made a note on her datapad. "There's also multiple recorded instances of individuals carbon-freezing themselves, such as Lorn Pavan, and Carbonite guns are attested to by multiple sources."
"Those are mere legends," Darth Vader said severely.
'Darth Archivus' pressed another button on her datapad. "There's also a record of one Anakin Skywalker using the technique to sneak into an enemy base," she finished, looking up. "Twice."
...damn it.
"Far be it from me to tell you to carbon-freeze your own notepad, Darth Archivus," Darth Vader intoned. "But perhaps you should expend your energies on activities more befitting of a Sith."
"Like what?" Archivus—Twi'lek Sparkle, damn her—asked. "I'm not very good at this."
"Try kicking some puppies," Vader suggested, cloak swishing as he turned his back. "It can be quite therapeutic."
175.3
"What sort of proof do you have for these wild allegations?" asked one of the congressmen. "The very idea that another world exists is preposterous, let alone that the first reaction of Grogar Industries was to start strip-mining!"
Twilight cleared her throat. "Well, if I may, there's several pieces of evidence—many of them ones we've already examined in my leadup."
She turned to the side, rolling back through her slides. "In slide fourteen, we have an internal memo retrieved from the site directors' office which shows that Grogar Industries was operating through a cut-out."
Murmurs filled the room.
"Secondly," Twilight went on, advancing four slides. "This is the initial survey report—note that it describes a 'portal' and that the land around it should be purchased immediately... and thirdly, we also found a profit balance statement for the next fiscal year which includes a large credit for 'supernormal technologies'."
As that filtered through, Twilight presented her clincher. "Also, I'm a talking flying purple unicorn. Which you'd think would be some kind of proof of magic."
175.4 (ORBSyndicate)
Gravity Falls: Friendship is Magic 8: In Which a Treasure Hunt takes place…
“AAAAAAApppplejaaaaaaack…..” Rainbow Dash said, pointing at the Journal. “Don’t you hate Pacifica’s guts????”
“I don’t hate ‘er.” Applejack responded. “I just want her to realize she’s not queen of the world. She needs to be knocked down a few pegs.”
“Then we can prove that her family is a fraud using this lead right here!” Rainbow Dash said, pointing to the Journal’s page vigorously.
“I’m not out for revenge Rainbow, and I’m not in th’ mood to go on a crazy treasure hunt.”
“Who said it was a treasure hunt?”
“Your expression.” Applejack rolled her eyes. “You can go if you want, I’m going to try and change her rather than just beat her up with embarrassing secrets.”
Rainbow Dash grumbled as Applejack walked off.
“Dashie….” Pinkie said. “I’ll help you!”
Rainbow Dash turned to her friend. “As long as you don’t just use your Pinkie senses, Eldritch powers, Force powers, or anything else I’m not thinking of to just find it automatically. I want this to be a fun treasure hunt!”
Pinkie nodded vigorously. “Of course! TO ADVENTURE!”
The two friends left the shack to go treasure hunting…
Advisor Celestia stood up quickly, her sister, Advisor Luna, looked concerned. “What is it?”
“Someone has found the trail.” She said, peeking out of the blinds. “The Mayor is no longer in a position to protect this town’s secrets…”
Luna sighed, dramatically taking the headphones off her head. “Can’t we just let them get it? I’ve almost beat the enderdragon…”
“Your games can wait, Luna. This is a matter of national security.” She squinted. “I wonder if they’ll manage to lead us to it…”
“That seems silly. If we want it hidden the best thing is to not even know where it is ourselves.” Luna remarked.
Celestia sighed. “We still have to find out what is going on. Come. We must find some people who look like they are investigating.”
Lyra Heartstrings took out her binoculars and watched closely.
9 AM, RD and PP left the building. Left observation post to pursue. She recorded. The “observation post” was just a really densely leaved tree.
As the two walked away Lyra noted that Rainbow Dash wasn’t using her wings, and Pinkie Pie wasn’t… just appearing places randomly. Good. That made them easy to track.
She scribbled more notes, making yet another note to try and figure out why the regular citizens never seemed to notice (or care) about the wings… She looked at her watch, realizing she hadn’t written a date down.
Huh. Was it Pioneer Day already?
This could be interesting.
Stan was driving into town. “Play it cool Stan.” He kept muttering. “It’s just Pioneer Day. Loop after Loop you do this, over and over. It’s not that bad. It’s just another stupid holiday in a stupid town…”
Fluttershy, who was in the back seat of the car, blinked. “Stan? Why are you so… tense? Do you need a massage or something?”
“NO I DO NOT NEED A—wait you can do that?”
“I’ve calmed down a bear with a simple wrench of their neck before.”
“Huh. I can respect that.” Stan frowned. “Nah, this isn’t anything. This is just Pioneer Day. And I have to drive into town…”
“WHY do you have to drive into town?” Applejack asked.
Stan blinked. “Reasons.” He said. “A certain ventriloquist dummy needs to be put in his place.”
“Ah. Say no more.” Applejack said, leaning back in the car.
Minutes later Stan was running for his life from the woodpecker that married the creepy guy (Stan wasn’t even sure if he had a name). Stan had a grin on his face despite this. If he got this correct, the plan would occur seamlessly. The little Gideon twerp would be arriving shortly and would insult the bird in his presence, resulting in fake psychic boy ending up in the stocks for insulting a woodpecker!
What he wasn’t expecting was to trip over Celestia.
“AUGH!” He yelled, falling over, and conveniently landing right into the stocks. “What? HEY! THIS ISN’T SUPPOSED TO HAPPEN!”
Celestia stood up, mud all over her nice official Advisor suit. She glared. “Stanford Filbrick Pines, how interesting.”
“Look, lady.” Stan said, realizing that this was someone important. He checked his loop memories. Really should start checking them in more detail soon as I Awaken… “…Advisor Celestia, can you just help me out of here? I was-“ The woodpecker took that moment to hammer at his skull.” OW! OW! HEY! HEY! OW! HELP ME!”
Celestia smirked. “It’s Pioneer Day. Putting an innocent man in the stocks is a common occurrence.” She yelled out. “HEY EVERYONE! THROW SOME TOMATOES!”
Luna came up behind her sister. “Celestia… There’s no need to be cruel—“
“He knocked me over into a pig sty.”
“That was the street.”
“Might as well be a pig sty.”
Luna sighed, looking at the now-tomato-covered Stan with sympathy. Celestia marched off, and Luna followed, planning to come back and release Stan later.
Stan grumbled. He was in the stocks. Again. He had really tried to avoid this and—
Oh no. That meant…
“Why hello there Stanford Pines!” Gideon said, walking up in a strange cowboy outfit. “I reckon you must’ve done something mighty nasty to get into the stocks here!” He observed the quickly emptying bowl of fruit. “Such a shame not to give you yer full experience… Howsabout we do this?” He stood up on a crate. “Ladies and gentlemen, the Tent o Telepathy is donatin’ a dozen barrels of fruit for the express purpose of peltin’ this here man!” Gideon began to cackle.
“I don’t think so.” Applejack said, stepping into the confrontation. “Y’all should just go home. This man did nothin’ wrong.”
“Oh but that’s where you’re wrong little miss Pines.’ Gideon said, his eyes becoming full of hatred. “Ya see, your uncle here has been scamming this town for as long as anyone can remember!”
“Yer like, what, ten?” Applejack said. “How can you be sure ‘bout that?”
“I AM PERFECTLY CAPABLE OF KNOWING THE HISTORY OF THIS TOWN THANK YOU VERY MUCH!” Gideon yelled, before calming himself down. “Now… you just be on your way and we’ll complete our pelting of the sleazy scum.”
“Ah… no.” Applejack said, walking up to the stocks, intending to simply break them with a kick.
“You dare go against the will of the town?”
“Ain’t my town.” Applejack responded, readying a kick. Gideon simply pointed. “There’s your target.”
The fruit went flying.
“Pinkie.”
“Yes Dashie?”
“Why are you folding the ancient scroll into a paper hat?”
“It just seemed like the right thing to do!”
“Follow up question. Why is there now an obvious map on the hat?”
“Probably because whoever made this scroll wanted someone to fold it into a paper hat!”
“Pinkie. Do you have any idea how many types of paper hats there are? What are the chances that you folded the right one?”
“Almost a hundred percent. Seriously Dashie, I expected you to be more aware of plot necessity at this point.”
“Yeah. Okay. I’m just going to roll with it. I think it goes to the museum. TO ADVENTURE!”
Lyra picked up her notebook and followed them. She scribbled down “Cloud Cuckoo-lander skills?” into her notebook, and created another table for “weird things Pinkie Pie does.”
She followed them into the Gravity Falls Museum of History. The receptionist offered them a balloon, but Pinkie just produced several out of her Pocket and passed them out to everyone. Smiles were had and a receptionist was ticked off. Rainbow Dash and Pinkie Pie fist bumped and continued to look at the art in the museum.
Pinkie quickly did a number of cartwheels, did one of her trademark extreme gasps, and flipped Rainbow Dash upside down. “Look! It’s an angel pointing!” She said, solving the puzzle before Rainbow Dash even saw the upside down art.
Rainbow Dash blinked. “Wow. That was fast. Uh…”
Pinkie ran out, dragging Rainbow Dash with her.
“Hi Lyra! Bye Lyra!” She said, leaving Lyra a bit dumbfounded. The minty girl quickly shook her head, continuing on with her investigation of them. She wondered what they were trying to uncover…
Behind her Celestia and Luna poked their heads out from behind a statue.
“Why are we following children, sister?” Luna said, obviously annoyed with this whole extravaganza.
“Luna, you should know that children are the ones with the best ideas. The minty one is obviously investigating the other two. The other two are probably on the trail…”
“Or they could just be enjoying Pioneer Day.” Luna mumbled. “Like I should be, at home, playing Super Amazing Wagon Adventure.”
“…Oregon Trail?”
“Good grief no that’s a horrid game.”
Celestia rolled her eyes. “We just need to follow them.”
Minutes later, Lyra was writing down most unusual and convoluted locking mechanism ever devised: hanging your nose off a statue’s finger. How on earth had Pinkie thought of that?
She shrugged, watching as the two unusual siblings walked down the suddenly-visible staircase into the depths of who knows where.
Lyra followed. What she saw astounded her.
As the traps of the hallway triggered, Pinkie just started… teleporting around everywhere, seemingly without any focus at all. An arrow was about to hit her? ZIP suddenly elsewhere. Rolling boulder? NOPE on top of the boulder. Some kind of bear trap? Suddenly there’s a stuffed bear in it.
Oh and Rainbow Dash took on her “harpy” form. Not as interesting.
Lyra blinked, scribbling down what she understood… and what she didn’t. Then she continued on, cautiously. The two of them had triggered all the traps. Eventually she came to a chamber. Rainbow Dash was reading from a scroll.
“Let it here be recorded that Nathaniel Northwest, famous in his native Gravity Falls for standing in the park and hitting himself with a large boating oar until he blacked out, was chosen to become the patsy mayor of Gravity Falls. Northwest spoke in a series of grunts and screams and often yelled his trademark phrase: "I am going to eat this entire oak tree because I am a powerful wizard!"
The fabled founder of Gravity falls was, in fact a fraud. His last moments on Earth were spent choking on a giant piece of bark, attempting to live out his beautiful dream. He was hated by everyone that knew him. He will not be missed.
Rainbow Dash stopped reading. “Well, that’s what we came here for. TAKE THAT PACIFICA!”
“She’s not here right now Dashie. Keep reading.”
“Thomas Jefferson was actually just two kids in an overcoat standing on each other's shoulders. The current and forever President of the United States is actually Santa Claus. Under the reign of Mr. Claus, America is not a democracy, but a jollyocracy. The statues at Mount Rushmore are actually gigantic presidential-faced robots that will be called into action when America needs them the most.An enormous, evil, time-traveling baby from another dimension is frozen in an Atlantic glacier. Fortunately, glaciers never melt, so we should be fine. Writing jokes for cartoons is more important than sleep. If you recite the pledge of allegiance backwards, you'll gain secret wizard powers! (This one is true, kids! Try it at home!)”
Rainbow Dash and Lyra took a moment to pause at the sheer amount of absurdity this document contained.
“How many people do you suppose actually read all of this?” Rainbow Dash asked.
“Not enough!” Pinkie said, grinning. “That’s why we’re reading it! For everyone!”
“For who?”
“Just keep reading.”
“The true founder of Gravity Falls was: Sir Lord Quentin Trembley III, Esq.” The ‘harpy’ blinked. “Who on earth is Sir Lord Quentin Trembley III, Esquire?”
“Exactly who you weren’t supposed to find out…” Celestia said, coming out of the shadows.
Lyra yelped. She’d been followed. Crap. She should have been watching her back.
Celestia walked towards them slowly. “Now since you’re here I suppose we might as well tell you what actually happened… now that you know—“ She was interrupted by a series of beeps behind her. She turned around to see Luna playing on a gameboy. “Luna!”
“Gotta catch Rayquaza…”
“Ugh…” Celestia muttered, returning to the three children. “Watch this.” She said, readying a reel of film.
“Actually I have a pretty good idea what you’re going to show us!” Pinkie said, grinning. She took in a deep breath. “Sir Lord Quentin Trembley III Esquire was an amazing man who ended up being the eighth and a half President of the United States due to all of his opponents being crushed in a landslide and then made several amazing things like the negative twelve dollar bill and the depantsipation proclamation and appointed babies to the supreme court and fought a war against imaginary man eating spiders all the while founding a town named Gravity Falls in his crazy endeavors and grinning like a cute madman while he researched a way to immortalize himself in peanut brittle and he succeeded look over there!” Pinkie pointed at a giant block of peanut brittle with a man from pioneer times imprisoned inside.
Rainbow Dash blinked. “He looks like Han.”
Lyra stared in disbelief at Pinkie, then at the block of peanut brittle, then at Rainbow Dash, then at the two Advisors. “Uh…”
“By the way…” Rainbow Dash turned to Lyra. “Why were you following us?”
“Simple curiosity, Rainbow Dash.” Lyra said, smiling. “You are most interesting.” She pointed at the blue girl’s wings.
“Oh those. Those are normal.” Rainbow Dash said, completely serious.
Pinkie giggled. “Actually they’re only normal when you’re a pegasus. Silly Dashie!”
Rainbow Dash shot Pinkie the death glare. “Pinkie. I thought you had fixed your keeping secrets problem.”
“Yes! Yes I did! I just thought it’d be fun to see Lyra’s reaction!”
Lyra was scribbling notes profusely.
“Anyway.” Celestia said, folding her arms. “We’re going to crate you off to Washington D. C. and let the higher-ups deal with you.”
“Crate?” Lyra asked.
Minutes later…
“Oh.” Lyra said. “An actual crate.”
“I think we’re being loaded onto a train…” Rainbow Dash observed. “I shall save us!”
Pinkie leapt up. “How about we simply—“
“No Pinkie. I want to do something on this treasure hunt other than just follow you and your intuition around!”
“It works doesn’t it?”
“It isn’t really that fun.”
“Oh. In that case I won’t tell you to break the peanut brittle.”
Rainbow Dash face palmed. “I’m just going to get out of this a fun way.” She grabbed a chainsaw from out of her Pocket and began to cut through the box.
“Luna do you hear something?” Celestia asked.
“Nope.” Luna said, completely engrossed in the boss music.
Rainbow Dash lifted the chainsaw for another swipe, hitting the peanut brittle that encased Trembley. The sweet candy broke apart into a million pieces, revealing a perfectly healthy man.
“And now I shall lead us all in a daring escape!” Trembley said, grinning. He took out his president’s key. “I shall unlock this crate!” He bashed the key into the wood. “Hrm… wood… my age old enemy…”
Rainbow Dash blinked. “Oh my gosh. Not another one. The Doctor was enough.”
Elsewhere in the Loop, the Doctor Awoke. He felt like there was some stupid one-time-joke reason why. He hated that feeling.
Back on the train, Rainbow Dash was about to slice down the box when it simply fell apart for seemingly no reason.
Trembley shook his head. “No good. We didn’t escape through the hole. Let’s rebuild the box and try again.”
Pinkie squealed. “I like you so much right now!”
Lyra sighed. “Can we just get off the train?”
Celestia stood in front of them. “No. No you may not. LUNA!”
Luna sighed. “What?”
“They got out.”
“As I expected.”
“As—wait you expected this?”
“We’re obviously fitting into the “amusing villains” trope here, sister.”
“What?”
“There’s cake in the next car.” Luna said rolling her eyes.
Celestia hesitated all of four seconds before rushing to the next car. Luna turned to the others. “Sorry about that girls. She’s a bit… forward. Nobody will believe that there’s an eight and a half President of the United States anyway. And Trembley?”
“Yes?”
“Thomas Jefferson wants his salamander back.”
“No. I’ll never release him!”
Luna blinked. “That was not the response I was expecting… You all better go before Celestia gets back here once she realizes it was nothing but muffins from the diner. Now back to my game…”
Lyra, Rainbow Dash, Pinkie, and Trembley all leapt off the train and hit the ground hard.
“That… that was stupid.” Lyra muttered.
“IT WAS SILLY.” Pinkie and Trembley said at the same time.
Rainbow Dash simply glided down to them. “Well. This has certainly been a day.”
They all paused as Celestia’s cries of rage rang out across the country.
“That’s quite the variant of her there…” Pinkie noted.
“I think she was better than some of them. Remember that time she was basically king Sombra?”
“Oh! What about that time when…”
Lyra took this moment to slip away before they had time to question her. She’d have to be more careful. They knew about her now…
In the distance, a top secret agent stood on top of the train, watching. The agent was supposed to be watching Trembley, but she was actually watching Lyra much more closely. This just got complicated…
Pinkie Pie and Rainbow Dash returned to the mystery shack to find Applejack and Stan covered in bruises.
“It had to be pineapples.” Applejack muttered.
Pinkie and Rainbow Dash decided not to tell her about embarrassing Pacifica with what they had found.
Djhqw Vzhhwlh Gursv
175.5 (Vinylshadow)
Pinkie Pie twirled her drumsticks, staring at her drums thoughtfully. Something was off about them, but she couldn't quite place her finger on it.
She tapped her floor tom lightly and rolled her sticks on the snare. Her foot hit the pedal—
"Ouch!"
Pinkie jumped up in surprise as her bass drum spoke.
"...Sunset?" Pinkie asked warily.
"Pinkie? Where am I?"
Pinkie looked over her drums carefully, noting the red and yellow color scheme before she started giggling.
"What? What's so funny?"
"You're Drumset Shimmer; that's hilarious!" Pinkie hooted, falling off her chair with a gigglesnort.
175.4 continued (ORBSyndicate)
Gravity Falls: Friendship is Magic 9: There is no pig.
“Have you seen any time anomalies around here?” The very bald time traveler known as Blendin Blandin asked Twilight.
Twilight had half a mind to respond with “The entire existence of this world here is dependent on a time anomaly the likes of which you could not comprehend” but decided against it, as the official time-travel types tended to never stop with the questions. She simply responded with “aside from yourself, no.”
Blendin sighed, putting his face in his hands. “I-I-I gotta find them…”
“I suppose I could help.” Twilight offered. “But in order to do that I’d need to know how your time machine works.”
“Your mind could not possibly comprehend this technology!”
Twilight recited an entire textbook’s worth of knowledge on Quantum Mechanics in two minutes. Blendin simply stared at her in disbelief. “I... I suppose you can understand. Maybe we’ll even recruit you… B-but I c-can’t promise anything!
Twilight walked up to Rainbow Dash. “I just got a portable time machine.” She said, grinning.
Rainbow Dash looked up from the Journal. “Seriously? Cool! How functional is it?”
“It doesn’t seem to have any location selection, only able to make sure you don’t end up in space. But it measures out time for you to travel.” She said, producing a tape measure. “I am now basically an apprentice time traveller to this… Blendin Blandin. We went to see the founding of the town by Mister Trembley. It was just as weird as you made it out to be.” Twilight blinked. “He really did have a weird fascination with peanut brittle…”
Rainbow Dash grinned. “So now we have a time machine. What are we going to do with it?”
“Dunno.” Twilight said. “Time Travel within the loops is always strange. Outside of the Doctor’s loop it tends to become really easy to cause a crash… And I would ask Stan but he’d probably just swindle me or something.”
“Swindle you for what?”
“That’s the thing. I don’t know. He’s really good at getting what he wants…”
Rainbow Dash shrugged. “How about we experiment? Find a small event and change it a little. Possibly make the world a better place…”
Twilight Sparkle looked out the window at Stan’s makeshift carnival that had been set up yesterday. There were obviously several rides that he kept in his Pocket, and a few Pinkie had donated. It was actually somewhat impressive. Of course the “fair” was likely absolutely crappy and lame in a true baseline. She’d ask Stan about that later. If he actually talked about the loop. Ever.
Soos ran across the fair screaming. “THE GIANT STUFFED CATERPILLARS ARE ALIVE! RUN FOR YOUR LIVES EVERYONE!”
Rainbow Dash and Twilight blinked, looking out the window at the fairgrounds. Sure enough, the giant stuffed caterpillars were alive, crawling all over everything. They were destroying the fair.
Stan, of course, was nowhere to be found. As usual when all heck broke loose.
As the fair was destroyed, a lightbulb went off in Rainbow Dash’s head. “Let’s try to stop the caterpillars from attacking!”
Twilight shrugged. “I don’t see why not. Since the time machine exists going back a day shouldn’t be a problem.” Shouldn’t…
Twilight grabbed Rainbow Dash and pulled out the tape of the time measure, going back a few hours. They vanished in a puff of light. They re-appeared as Stan and Soos were setting up the fair.
“Ah there you two are.” Stan said. “Hammer this post into the ground would you?”
Rainbow Dash narrowed her eyes. “You most certainly have a hammer in your Pocket.”
“Where’s the fun in that?” Stan responded, grinning. “SOOS! Give them your hammer!”
“But Mister Pines! That’s my prized possession!”
“Last time it was a screwdriver.”
“…Last time?”
“Nevermind.” Stan said dismissively. “Now set this fair up!”
Twilight and Rainbow Dash re-set up the fair, watching out for the Live Giant Stuffed Caterpillars. They didn’t have to wait long. A few hours later the fair was in full swing, and everyone was playing the games. Some were riding the double ferris wheel, and then… there was the bottle game.
Sunset was in a rage for some reason. She grabbed a tennis ball and threw it at the bottles, knocking them all down. They shattered into a million pieces, sending strange magical dust everywhere. This caused all the Giant Stuffed Caterpillars to come to life, attacking everything.
Twilight nodded, heading back in time with Rainbow Dash. She simply went to the bottle game, took the bottles, and placed them in her Pocket. No more problem. She turned to her friend, smiling. “Easy as cake.”
The two walked off, so happy of themselves.
Then they heard something shatter behind them. Somehow, Sunset had managed to step on a shard of glass, causing the magic to disperse into the air. And the Caterpillars attacked again.
Twilight’s eye twitched. This was going to be one of THOSE wasn’t it?
“Attempt thirty-seven…” Twilight spoke into the recorder. “Bottles and all glass shards have been placed in a sealed box within Pocket. The Giant Stuffed Caterpillars have been buried underneath the volcano. I am observing both using remote trans-dimensional video surveillance. I will find out what’s activating these things…”
The video feed went fuzzy, and suddenly there was a on top of her head, eating her hair in time with “It’s raining tacos.”
Her eye twitched.
Rainbow Dash had long ago stopped helping Twilight with the caterpillar problem, and was instead spending every time back in time embarrassing Robbie in extremely more interesting ways.
She had already gone through the classics: a whoopee cushion, sudden appearance of a dress, pants becoming really tight, hair turning a bright pink, and ice bag down the pants. She had gotten the last idea from that time they were at the convenience store. Poor Thompson.
She grinned. This time she took something Malon had invented when her branch’s other Loopers weren’t around to mess with her.
“Freeze-dried cucoo! Just add water!” Rainbow Dash grinned deviously, opening the pouch and pouring out the powder. She then put a single drop of water on the powder, and suddenly a full-grown white cucoo was sitting in front of her, clucking.
Rainbow Dash gently lifted the cucoo and placed it in front of Robbie’s path.
“Out of my way stupid chicken!” He said, kicking it.
The swarm descended.
Rainbow Dash broke out into hysterics as Robbie ran away screaming.
“Attempt one-hundred and seventy-two…” Twilight said, hair a mess and completely mental at this point. “The stuffed caterpillars were burned, locked in an alternate dimension, tossed into a singularity, enchanted with the most powerful magic known I know, and the glass bottles have had magic locks placed on them before I tossed them into deep intergalactic space. Then I set temporal locks around them using the Time Measure! There’s no way—“
A Live Giant Stuffed Caterpillar ran into her.
“SON OF A—“
Rainbow Dash grinned again.
Let Robbie flaunt his tight pants.
Let Robbie take dramatic poses.
Let everyone stare at him because while he thought he was wearing tight pants, he was just in his pink underwear with pink ponies all over it.
Hehehehehhehehheh.
Twilight threw her hands in the air. “THREE HUNDRED AND FORTY TWO: FAILURE. WHAT. AM. I. DOING. WRONG?”
“Twiliiiiiight….” Pinkie said, walking up. “You should realize at this point that this universe operates under “you cannot change anything” time rules, at least for this event.”
“But… but… but…” Twilight twitched. “There has to be a way to stop such a simple event—“
“Oh the easy way to do it is to simply make sure Gravity Falls never existed by going back to the foundation of the town and altering the geographical formations so that Quentin Trembley didn’t fall off a cliff and found the town. Easy.”
Twilight slowly turned to Pinkie. “…I’m just trying to change a little thing…”
“I know. I know all three hundred and fifty.”
“I’ve only tried three hundred and forty-two—“
“You forgot to count six and tried two times without recording anything.”
Twilight didn’t even ask how Pinkie knew all this. “Just… It’s got to be solvable…”
“No.” Pinkie said, grinning. “No it doesn’t. You should know that from being around me so long.”
Twilight sighed. “Fiiiiine….” She put down her recorder. “Let the stupid fair get eaten by caterpillars…”
Pinkie grinned. “Good Twilight. Now let’s go get RD and stop all this…
“Yeah…” Twilight said. They found Rainbow Dash quickly, who was unleashing a giant cat on Robbie.
Rainbow Dash grinned. “This is going to be fun.”
To her surprise, Robbie actually manned up and punched the cat across the face. The giant cat fell to the ground, knocked out.
Wendy walked up to Robbie “That was so cool dude!”
“Yeah I suppose it was.” He flexed his arm. “So… I’ve been meaning to ask you… We’ve been hanging out a lot… I was wondering if you’d like to go out with me?”
“…Sure.”
Twilight and Rainbow Dash’s jaws dropped. Pinkie just snorted.
Rainbow Dash blinked. “That’s… that’s not right. That guy’s a jerk.”
“It’s… her decision Rainbow Dash…” Twilight muttered.
Pinkie snorted again. “He gets the sub-standard balloons.”
Blendin appeared. “YOU THREE! YOU HAVE BEEN CAUSING TIME ANOMALIES LEFT AND RIGHT!”
Pinkie raised her hand. “I haven’t been traveling through time at all!”
“THEN WHY HAVE I DETERMINED THAT YOU ARE THE TIME ANOMALY?”
“Oh. Nature of being, I suppose. Silly willy I’m not dangerous! Well, unless you ruin a party or break a pinkie promise…”
Blendin growled. “You are going to give me that Time Measure!” He yelled, holding out his hand.
“There’s still so much we can discover with it!” Twilight retorted. “Let us study more!”
“No! You cannot, not while that close to a living time anomaly! Plus, y-you’ve been abusing the power. S-so HAND IT OVER!”
Pinkie grabbed the Time Measure, pulling out the tape to a random time. “Sorry. Nope. Bye!”
The three of them appeared in front of a hungry T-rex.
“Huh.” Pinkie said. “Fluttershy would be useful right about now.”
Blendin appeared on top of the T-rex. “G-give it back!”
Twilight simply grabbed the machine and went to another time. They appeared in front of the Mystery Shack, though it was snowing and it appeared to be newer. The words “Mystery Shack” weren’t even on it.
A man opened the door. He blinked. “Who are you three?”
Pinkie took a deep breath. “We are from the future and we are here to—“
Twilight shut her up. “Sorry to bother you…” She took a closer look at the man, cocking her hand.
Rainbow Dash gasped. “Stan?”
“Hrm?”
“You are Stanford Pines right?” She asked.
“Yes.” The man narrowed his eyes. “Why are you asking?”
“Just well—“ She blinked. “Wait. You aren’t Awake are you?”
“What on earth are you talking—” He stopped talking, drawing his crossbow. “I have no argument with the Time Baby, Blendin. Leave me alone.”
Blendin, who had appeared behind him, held up his hands. “W-w-woah hey hey! K-keep it cool man! I’m j-just here for these three!”
“Take them and leave.” He said, gesturing with his crossbow. “Go on.”
Blendin quickly grabbed their Time Measure and took them back to their time. “Now, you three should know full well that—”
Two beefy Time Agents appeared behind Blendin Blandin. “BLENDIN BLANDIN. YOU ARE UNDER ARREST FOR CAUSING TIME ANOMALIES!”
“What? No! I’ve been framed! It was those three kids!”
“Those are technicolor ponies Blendin.”
“Them— wait WHAT?” Sure enough, before him were three technicolor ponies. He blinked. “I’m losing it.”
The time agents vanished, and the three equestrians returned to human form. “Pinkie…” Twilight said, turning to her unusual friend. “Why did you do that?”
“Do YOU want to go to time jail?”
“But why—never mind.” She shook her head. “Let’s just continue on with the Loop…”
She looked at Stan, who was playing with Soos, laughing his head off. He seemed so jovial now.
Yet, his unAwake self seemed… scared. Terrified. A bit crazy.
Almost as if they were completely different people…
Stan chuckled.
They would never find out that HE was behind the Live Giant Stuffed Caterpillars.
He put his Time Measure back into his Pocket.
Well. That was fun.
Not really baseline, but totally worth it.
Wkh pruh Vwdq wkh phuulhu!
175.6 (Vinylshadow)
Twilight stared at her daughter and the unicorn DJ.
"You two do realize that it's only out of the infinite kindness of my heart and the fact your Wubbergy is usually hit-or-miss that I'm not sending you both to the moon, right?" she said as she paced in front of them.
"I don't recall giving either of you permission to use my library in your experiments and then you don't even bother telling me about it so I could've helped. Or at least asked Apple Bloom for assistance."
Twilight sighed heavily and stared at the scorched remains of her library.
"At least there wasn't anything important on the shelves."
Vinyl cleared her throat. "Actually, there was some weird book of magic that I'd never seen before. Had Starswirl's logo on it and was signed by all the Equestrian founders."
Twilight turned her head like something out of a horror film to glare at the unicorn.
"It's only because I don't want your Wubbergy anywhere near the moon that you're not there now. Plus, Luna would kill me if someone started doodling on the moon again."
"You mean the time Discord went there and he wrote bawdy love poems for Berry?" Nyx asked. "That was funny. I took pictures."
Vinyl pricked her ears. "Can I see?"
Twilight's eye twitched. "Fruit flies, the both of you," she grumbled.
Both mares looked at her blankly and Twilight snickered.
It wasn't until later, after both had painstakingly regrown and remade the library (paying for the books out of their own pockets) that they realized what Twilight had meant.
"My attention span isn't that bad," Vinyl grumbled. Nyx looked past her shoulder and grinned, waving.
"Hi, Octavia!"
Vinyl whirled. "Octavia? Where?!" Seeing no one, she turned back to see Nyx grinning. "That's not...oh, hey Lemon."
"I'm not falling for that," Nyx said firmly.
"Falling for what?" Lemon asked, stopping behind Nyx, whose face turned a funny shade of red. "Did I miss something?" he wondered, staring at the strange sight of Vinyl doubled over laughing while his fiancé simply sighed and hugged him.
"No. Just the usual Looper shenanigans."
175.7 (Gym Quirk)
(Note: A while back, the Trek loopers decided to relax their "Mandatory Stealth" policy in light of several more of their number being discovered. They are now free to interact with other loopers in situations where interference from Federation or equivalent bureaucracies is unlikely.)
Hikaru Sulu signed the drinks bill before turning back to the others at the table. "Well, that happened."
Anakin Skywalker nodded. "It certainly did. Should we call it a conclusive result?"
The sometimes captain of the USS Excelsior nodded ruefully. "As much as I'd like to cry foul, I really can't dispute the result. Jim and Jean-luc might quibble, but it's exactly the sort of thing that I’d expect to happen."
Anakin offered a sympathetic pat on the shoulder. "So in an even battle between vanilla Imperial Stormtroopers and Starfleet Security…"
"...The Stormtroopers, despite their inability to hit the broadside of a bantha, prevail over the redshirts, thanks to the latter's tendency to die at the drop of a hat," sighed Sulu.
"In this instance, after the Stormtroopers exhaust their ammunition, the Starfleet force gets crushed under a random falling piano of all things," said Anakin with a shake of his head.
"I'm really sorry about that," repeated the gray-coated, wall-eyed third occupant of the table. "I honestly have no idea how it happened…"
175.8 (Evilhumour)
The pegasus founder of the Cutie Mark Crusaders was not enjoying this loop.
"Hey now, you shouldn't count your Scootaloos before they hatch," a forepony lectured his worker as she walked past them, causing her ear to twitch.
"Hey, why did the Scootaloo cross the road?" A colt asked his friends, causing the filly's face to twitch as he said, "To get to the other side!"
The filly didn't think the joke was that funny, nor she did enjoy hearing somepony call another pony a scared Scootaloo just because they didn't want to dive bomb from the clouds above the town.
Chicken sighed, really not amused at all.
175.9 (Kris Overstreet)
Mutsu rubbed her temples and shook her head. "Oh my, oh my, oh my, oh my," she repeated, having been unable to say much else after discovering that every single stores warehouse at the base had emptied itself. The phrase had increased in frequency when she and Nagato had found out why the stores had vanished. A janitor had been singing some sort of American nursery rhyme thing about horses. Summoning did NOT work that way!
And now that she saw the results of... of... whatever had happened... well, her vocabulary remained stuck at two syllables. For the amount of supplies that had been expended, she'd expected a whole fleet of new shipgirls in need of training. What she got, instead, was six... well, they were female. And they might all be ships.
But girls had two legs, not four.
Mutsu forced herself to take several deep breaths, letting the last one out with a sigh. Nagato stood beside her, stoic and still as ever, waiting for her sister to take the lead. I have to pull it together, Mutsu thought. I can't blow up in front of Nagato.
"So," she managed. "So for whatever reason you have been summoned here-"
"A larger than usual malfunction on the part of the computer running the multiverse," the purple pony said.
"Er... right. Let's go with that," Mutsu agreed. "Why don't we begin by introducing ourselves? I am one of the legendary Big Seven, Nagato-class battleship Mutsu, at your service."
Nagato stepped forward about ten centimeters. "Secretary to the Admiral, first of my ship class, one of the Big Seven; I am Nagato."
"Wait a minute," the blue one with wings and multicolored hair said. "Are you saying you two are ships??"
"Um, Dash," the yellow one whispered, "I'm pretty sure we're ships too."
"Yeah," the one with the American hat drawled, "check your Loop memories."
"That reminds me, Twilight," the white one with the horn and long curled purple mane said, "there's a question I've been meaning to ask you..."
"Later," the purple one growled.
"Huh? Oh... wait, what? What?" The blue pony grinned stepping back and rising up on her hind hooves. Rigging formed around her... a kind of rigging Mutsu didn't recognize. Two cylindrical pods with glowing spheres on the ends rode atop the pony's already improbable blue wings. An immense round saucer-like shield with blinking lights appeared on her left foreleg. Her right hand gripped some strange double-barreled pistol... or torpedo launcher, possibly.
"Wow, this is SO COOL!" The pony rose into the air, struck a pose, and announced: "Constitution-class heavy cruiser Enterprise has arrived! My specialty is exploration, scanning, and sheer raw speed!"
Mutsu turned to look at Nagato. "I thought Enterprise was a carrier. Or was there a Monitor-class named Enterprise?"
"Different ship," Nagato muttered, and nothing more.
"Oh. Um." The yellow winged pony stayed on four hooves, manifesting a garish, gun-spiked gray armor that covered her almost from nose to tail. "Er... Imperium of Mankind battleship Hrafnkel... I guess?" The pony seemed to shrink in on herself until her armor almost touched the warehouse floor. "I'm more of a transport ship for elite ground forces, actually," she lied blatantly. When the orange pony with the hat shot her a glare, she disappeared entirely into her armor. A whisper echoed out through the metal: "I'm sorry."
"And I am... what, really?" the white one muttered to herself. "I've never been a protoss! Oh well..." Immense rounded golden wings spread from her back. A blue crystalline sphere appeared on her chest as she also began to hover in the air. "Er... prototype mothership Moratun. Fleet defense unit."
The orange pony didn't hover, but a wooden ring sprang into existence around her. Formal robes similar to, but somewhat different from, Kongou's appeared on her barrel. (The hat, however, stayed put.) "First-generation tree-ship of Jurai, Shojiki. Heavy battleship."
The pink one, who had been randomly exploring the empty warehouse, trotted back over to the rest of the group. A pink sphere with a divot taken out of it orbited her body at a discreet distance. "Mobile space platform Party Star!" she introduced herself. "Morale and psy-ops!"
The purple one had raised a hoof to her head. "Let me level with you two," she said. "None of us are normally ships. But for some reason, when we came here, my friends either became ships they possessed, or ships they had personal experience with, or which matched their personality." She sighed. "Interstellar spaceships, that is. Not surface warships. And definitely not IJN ships."
"Spaceships?" Nagato asked.
"Then which one are you?" Mutsu asked. "Where's your rigging?"
"Well... um..." The purple pony shuffled on her hooves. "I've actually been a ship once before. But I don't remember much from the experience. I'm afraid I don't have any guns to show you. Only this."
It took several seconds for Mutsu to realize that the pony had summoned her rigging, mostly because there was so little of it. A blue fez with a pattern of white rectangles hung from her horn, the knob on top glowing white. A small device rested on the pony's extended right forehoof, its tip glowing a faint green. And... that was all.
"Type 40 Mark 1 exploration capsule, TARDIS," the pony said. "I guess you could say my mission profile is making bad guys really, really cranky."
Thunderous footsteps echoed from outside. The warehouse door slammed open.
"My England-sense is tingling!" the newcomer shouted. Looking at the ponies, she gasped and pointed at the purple one. "Soniicu dess!" Rushing over with the same thunderous steps, the battleship Kongou wrapped her arms around the purple pony and said, "TARDIS! TARDIS! At last, a TARDIS! Those Abyssals are SO screwed now, dess!"
"Um," the purple pony said, struggling with the hug and fez and tool-thing, "I'm pretty sure I can't time-travel in this—"
A hand reached down and plucked Kongou off of the purple pony. Nagato set Kongou back on her feet beside Mutsu before saying, "You are all immediately assigned to Special Task Force Nagato."
"Whaaaaa??" Kongou protested. "You're going to take them all? How come, dess?"
Nagato gave Kongou a Look. The look made a sound: shiiiing. "Reasons," she said with deadly finality.
Mutsu took hold of the back of Kongou's collar and began pulling her away. "I think we should go take care of other duties."
The pink pony's mane suddenly swished, slapping her on both sides of the face. "Wooo!" she giggled. "Swishy mane! That means somebody's about to get a surprise hug!"
Mutsu noticed the faint blush in Nagato's cheeks and quickened her pace towards the warehouse door, Kongou fighting her all the way.
(Harry Leferts)
Having escaped from Nagato, Twilight, Applejack, and Rainbow had decided to explore around the base a little. As she walked, Rainbow raised an eyebrow at her old friend. "Wait, you really didn't know about this place?"
Slowly nodding as she watched a group of what looked like four girls rush by, Twilight frowned. "I've heard of it, but didn't know much about it..."
Of course, it was right then that a voice behind them caused all three to jump. "Well, I think that we can help you there." Turning, they were confronted by both Kongou and a smirking blonde woman. "Name's Enterprise, CV-6 of the United States Navy. Twilight Sparkle, right?"
Her eyes slightly widened, Twilight reached over and shook the offered hand. "That's right."
Kongou then nodded. "And I'm the battleship Kongou, name of my class. I'm also the Anchor for the Shipgirl Branch."
Part of Twilight noticed the frown on Applejack's face before the cowpony introduced herself as well. Noting that they needed to talk later if the glance from Applejack was anything to go by, Twilight waited until Rainbow introduced herself to speak up. "Since we're new here, can you tell us anything about how this Branch works? We didn't exactly get much from Nagato..."
Smirking, Enterprise gave her a once over. "I can see why." The next moment though, she frowned. "Well, you see—"
And promptly got interrupted by Kongou. "Cute battleships doing cute battlethings, Dess!"
For a moment, Enterprise just gave her a tired look before she shook it off. "Anyways... To make a very long story short, evil spirits formed from the anger, hate, lust for violence and revenge from the World Wars rose from the abyss. Having taken the form of old warships with bodies of corrupted flesh, metal, blood, and oil they then attacked shipping, military and civilian across the world as well as the coastlines. Humanity eventually managed to find a way to summon us, the spirits of warships from the past, as we're the only thing able to fight the Abyssals on their own level."
With a sigh, Twilight closed her eyes as beside her, Applejack tilted the brim of her hat. "Eyup, one of those loops..."
As she frowned, Enterprise sighed a bit before she reached into her Pocket and pulled out a book. "Here, this is something I wrote up on the various Abyssals if you want it."
Just as she soon as she finished though, the book was already gone and Twilight was flipping through it. "Huh, interesting..."
Even as the other ponies sighed, Kongou snapped her fingers. "Right, Dess. You wouldn't happen to have food supplies on you?"
That got her a raised eyebrow from Applejack who just nodded. "Sure do, why?"
Clearing her throat, Enterprise grimaced a bit. "Us shipgirls consume a lot of resources. The larger and more powerful we are, the more we eat. If we're active, patrols and such, we eat even more."
Flying up to the level of Enterprise's head, Rainbow crossed her forelimbs. "How much are we talking about here...?"
The grimace on Enterprise's face grew a bit. "If I'm doing a lot of patrols or moving around, I can pretty much be able to eat my whole body weight in food with some loops having us able to drink oil and eat metal. We need it to replenish ourselves... And with the only source of resources being what convoys bring in..."
Looking up, Twilight had a frown on her face. "You don't have a lot to spread around. And with how all of us are big and powerful, we might consume a lot." Once she got a nod, Twilight just closed the book and put it away in her Pocket for later. "Well, it won't be the first time and I'm sure that we can come up with something to help..."
175.10 (Kris Overstreet)
The first thing Twilight Sparkle noticed upon Awakening was her own voice as she read from that all-too-familiar book of Equestrian legends.
"... but while the elder sister kept regular daylight hours and worked with other ponies, the younger sister worked at night, keeping irregular hours and often going days without seeing anypony at all."
Twilight blinked, looked around herself at an otherwise normal-looking park in Canterlot, then back at the book. Okay, she thought, obviously a variant, but how is this going to play out?
The book continued: Until one day, while the elder sister was preoccupied with her work, the younger sister did say, Lo, for I goest out to yonder market for milk and some crisps, and I shalt returnest directly. And the elder sister did reply, Uh-huh, and thought no more on the matter; yet never again did the elder sister lay eyes on the younger. Indeed, the elder sister did not notice the younger was gone for nigh unto a full week.
And though the kingdom was searched high and low, the younger sister never was found, and thus with sadness did the elder sister take up the responsibilities of the younger, as it has been unto this day.
And yet legends say that now and again, in scattered locations across the world, ponies and other beings have seen the younger sister wandering the world, lost and confused, asking for directions; and prophecy states that, on the one thousandth anniversary of her snack run she shall return, and the stars shall guide her.
"Um... oooooooookay," Twilight said slowly. "I guess that explains why my Loop memories associate Nightmare Night with soda pop and cheese puffs... I guess..."
The stars, as it turned out, were not subtle. On the night before the thousandth Summer Sun Celebration, the normal constellations were replaced by a single giant arrow pointing towards Ponyville. To make it even more explicit, the stars twinkled in sequence, like an immense stellar neon sign.
And so, just as Twilight stood in Ponyville Town Hall waiting to see what would happen, Mayor Mare's speech introducing Princess Celestia was interrupted by somepony bashing in the doors of the hall.
In stepped a dirty, weary-looking alicorn, her midnight-blue pelt turned gray by the dust of the road, her wings bound under a backpack four times as large as the pony herself. To Twilight's eyes, the only resemblance between this alternate Luna and Nightmare Moon was a battered, scratched war-helmet that perched awkwardly atop her head, with bits of a black bandanna peeking out here and there.
"I beg your pardon," the alicorn said in a raspy voice that matched her road-worn appearance, "but is this the right way to Everfree Castle?"
The curtains behind Mayor Mare rustled, and Celestia's head poked through. The princess's eyes widened. "Luna!" she gasped, leaping from the balcony and gliding over the heads of Ponyville's citizenry to land in front of her long-lost sister. "At last you have returned to me!"
"Oh, hi, Celly," Luna groaned. With a flicker of midnight-blue magic she opened the backpack and levitated out a bottle of milk and a bag of potato chips. "I'm afraid nopony sells roast chestnuts anymore, and Palomino Lay's last descendant went bankrupt four hundred years ago. I hope potato crisps will do." The magic rustled a bit more in the contents of the backpack as she added, "I also picked up a few souvenirs along the way."
"Er... oh, never mind the snack run!" Celestia took her sister in her forelegs and hugged her tightly. "I've missed you so, my sister."
"Er... and I've missed you," Luna said lamely. Then her eyes lit on Twilight Sparkle, widening. Silently her lips formed the word: HELP! A Ping, which to Twilight's imagination felt frantic, accompanied the silent plea.
Somehow, someway, Twilight managed to pry Luna away from the incredibly clingy Celestia (and from a group of Canterlot historians who praised the collection of perfectly preserved cheap convenience store knick-knacks collected over a thousand-year global odyssey). In a small, private chamber in the royal palace at Canterlot, she asked, "Okay, Luna, what's going on?"
"Well... the good news is, two Loops ago I visited Ranma Saotome's home universe," Luna said. "I've undergone the most intense martial arts training imaginable, and I've learned many new techniques to unleash on the nightmares that plague Equestria's dreams."
"And the bad news is?" Twilight asked.
Luna's eyes teared up. "My name that Loop was Usako Hibiki."
Twilight shrugged. "So? Moon-bunny, that fits. And Hibiki's not an uncommon—"
"As in, replacing Ryouga Hibiki," Luna said insistently. "And I had the Hibiki family curse of misdirection. Eternally lost, and somehow able to go from Tokyo to Cairo in a week. On foot. Without swimming. By way of Buenos Aires." With a shuddering gasp of breath she continued, "And last Loop I was Usako Kuramitsu. Mihoshi's mother. Mihoshi from Tenchi's universe. Do you know her?"
"I've seen Mihoshi once or twice," Twilight nodded. "I'm pretty sure her mother isn't Looping, though."
"She has the Hibiki curse, except she can drag others along with her. Across interstellar distances. Instantly," Luna gasped. "And now I discover my unAwake self has been just as bad for a thousand years! Three Loops in a row! It's not coincidence!"
"Er... maybe it is?" Twilight replied, not believing it herself. "Yggdrasil does do this kind of thing, you know."
Luna grabbed Twilight by the shoulders and shook her. "You've GOT to help me, Twilight!" she cried. "I can't keep going like this! Not when it takes me four days to find a bathroom! Not when I can step through a door and end up a thousand light-years away! Can't you DO something?!?"
Twilight very gently removed Luna's hooves from her shoulders. "Let's go talk to Celestia," she said. "We can have her send us on a quest for the Elements of Harmony, the girls and I will get them, and we'll let the Hibiki Curse talk to the Rainbow Firehose, okay?" She reached her own hoof up to touch Luna's shoulder reassuringly.
"Very well," Luna said, a little more calmly. "But I insist on being tied to you or some other trustworthy pony, so I don't go astray for another thousand years."
"I don't think that'll be necessary," Twilight said, opening the chamber door and walking Luna out. "So long as one of us keeps an eye on you at all times, I don't see how—"
"HOW PONIES GET INTO YAKYAKISTAN?"
Twilight froze, looking at the giant yak royal guardsmen facing them, glancing around at the decidedly different castle decor, looking back for a door that was no longer there.
The largest of the three guards blinked, leaned forward, then lifted a hoof to raise its long, gray-streaked mane out of its eyes. "Oh, it's you, night pony," he said in a quiet voice. "Good to see again. Did you find mighty Yak Snak Shop?"
"Er... yes... eventually..." Luna muttered, trembling slightly as she rolled a frightened eye towards Twilight.
"Of course, I could be wrong," Twilight said. "This might be tougher than I thought..."
175.11 (Anon e Mouse Jr.)
Twilight blinked Awake to find herself in some kind of theater, surrounded by hundreds of other people, all of whom were chanting "We want the show!". They had apparently had been at it for at least a few minutes already, and it looked like a riot was about to break out.
Fortunately, that was when the music began to play, and the curtains rose to reveal a group of men in white suits, one of whom began to sing:
"Hey folks, here's a story 'bout Derpy the mailmare
The one with wings and the soft blonde hair
So lovely and kind, but by no means frail
Miss Derpy had a heart as big as a whale.
Hi De Hi De Hi De Hi! (Hi De Hi De Hi De Hi!)"
As she listened, Twilight smiled. Know her well, he does. Then she mentally shook her head. And talking like Yoda this Loop I apparently am, though know the reason why I do not.
Resolving to worry about it later, she settled in to watch the rest of the performance. Sing and play very well, they can.
175.12 (Harmony Choas)
The Rainbow of Harmony washed over Discord........ and did nothing to him. He opened his eyes and pat himself up. Before breaking out into a wide grin and shouting "IT WORKED! IT WORKED! IT WORKED! AHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA!"
"What worked?" Twilight asked, frowning as a portal opened up behind Discord.
"You see—hehe—when a creature gets 'Discordified' they can't EVER truly re-harmonize. I guess Celly forgot to mention that." Discord said still giggling. "And now! Your world is mi—"
He got cut off by Tom landing on his head.
"Ow!" Discord yelled, rubbing his head with a loaf of bread. "Who dares to fight me?!"
"I do." a voice said from behind him.
He turned around and got a face full of Celestia's favorite cake.
When he cleaned himself of the frosting and cake he saw himself.
"Oh great." Discord said as he pulled out a tennis racket, dressed for football. "Another one of you wants to turn me good."
The other Discord looked at the girls and rolled his eyes. "Just one moment please. I really hate the Mikasa Glitch. I'll be back."
With a clawsnap, he teleported both himself and his counterpart away.