//------------------------------// // L7A.2 // Story: Happily Loopy After // by FaelaArts //------------------------------// Ba bump. Ba Bump. Her heartbeat thudded in her ears as she listened, following a thin trail of magic as she threaded her way through the Everfree. How long had passed to reach this moment? Too long, she decided. Beneath her hooves, the leaves crunched. Above her head, the birds sung. Around her, creatures scurried. Bu bump. Crunch. Bu Bump. Chirp. Bu Bump. Scurry. Coming to a stop, her emerald eyes opened, looking toward the Castle of the Pony Sisters. Looking down, she spotted the small trail leading to the Element Tree, to where the thin green trail was leading her. Hoof-steps echoing, she looked around the cave, and stepped over to a snow-white cat, dozing beside the tree. “There you are, Opal.” Reaching out, Sweetie’s hoof gently nuzzles the cat, who looked to her, annoyed. “Do you HAVE to do that?” Opal spoke in a masculine voice, eyes narrowing, slurring some words as she forced her mouth to move in ways a cat’s mouth wasn’t designed for. Sweetie shrugged, “Not really no. Would you prefer I call you what you are now, or what you once were? What I say is an insult to you either way.” Lifting Opal up in her magic, Sweetie pinned the cat against a wall, staring coldly into her eyes. “Let’s just get this over with, the reason for your visit. Your ‘Cutie Mark Crusaders,’ yes?” Opal’s tail twitched in Sweetie’s magic, claws extending. Pinning Opal with more force, Sweetie narrowed her eyes. “Where. ARE. THEY!?” “Dead most likely, gone forever if not. Like us, they were not chosen to continue the loops. Simply put, we’re the rejects, the dead ends. Believe me, I’m just as annoyed as you are. Especially that a two-bit unicorn thinks she can hold me down.” With a swipe of her claws, Opal sheared clean through the magic, landing and licking her paw, cleaning her fur, tail fluffed. “You’re lying!” Sweetie stomped her hooves, sending another blast of magic toward Opal. Once more, claws shimmering with a yellow magic sheared through her spell like it was butter. An impatient sigh was all Sweetie received in response at first. “What reason do I have to lie? We’re the leftovers, tossed aside to be used as cement for the cracks in the spell.” Opal resumes cleaning herself. “Cracks?” Sweetie blinks, and pauses. “Mmmn, yes, even with the centuries I had to complete this spell, I could not erase all the...cracks, so to speak. It is why my presence in the spell Matrix is imperative, to ensure no...cracks make it into the loop. Alas, this means some of the redundancy could not be removed.” Opal sighs, clearly annoyed by this. Looking around, Sweetie sat down, bewildered. “I-I don’t understand, how is this a ‘crack’? I’m out of the loop, you’re out of the loop. The spell should be over.” A dark pit in her stomach didn’t want to see the truth, so see the reality. “True enough, ‘we’ are, but not ‘they’. Your friends, and the true version of you, and me for that matter, are still very much in those loops. We are...the leftovers. Our existence neither provable, nor conceivable to them. “Your ‘quest’ to find your ‘Crusaders’ was doomed from the beginning. As is your life. Upon the loops eventual end two weeks from now, our world will cease to have meaning. The spell will reach a singularity, and we will be no more, the divergence ended to preserve the prime timeline.” Opal stretches, and then curls back up into a ball. “But...no.” Sweetie just shakes her head. This couldn’t be what her research had meant. The years she’d spent searching for her friends...for naught? “Why?” Her head tilted forward, and she slumped, beginning to cry. “Do not think too deeply on it,” came Opal’s soft response, looking sympathetic for a moment. “We knew this was a possibility, but we decided the benefits outweighed any bad that would come from this. You need to understand, the chance of this happening was a meagre 5%. We needed some way to power the spell. I suggest you take the time you have left, and spend it with those you care for.” “...Yeah.” Sweetie rises, and leaves. “I love you Rarity.” Hugging her sister, the two ignored the tears streaming from each other’s faces. “I love you too, Sweetie Belle.”