Time is up, Twilight

by Dream Whisper

Epilogue

Sometimes ponies get lost in the streams of time, never returning. Sometimes the consequences of their actions are infinitely small. Sometimes however, the whole world changes as a consequence of their actions.
Equestria had dark ages, but none had been as dark as these. It had always been some force of evil trying to bring Equestria down, always somepony to blame, always a clear definition of an enemy. What had caused our downfall after all? There is no clear answer here, just a lot of arguing.

It may have been Twilight herself, it may have been the paradox of time, it may have been the hatred.
Twilight's studiousness caused her to invent the potion in the first place. Of course she only wanted to help us, to create something that would forever unite us and not divide us. The paradox of time forced Twilight to do what she has done already. However, the hatred of Nightfall's Radiance was what destroyed her friends and caused Twilight to transform.
Looking at it from the distance, we can finally see the interconnections we couldn't see before. All had been inevitable, impossible to happen in any other way. Every single detail was mapped out from the start.

It creates a certain feeling of sadness, seeing how she had been chained to the rules. Loosing the free will is something I can hardly even imagine.

This was her story and I hope you have learned well. I will continue raising the sun and Luna will continue raising the moon. Life is going to continue as if it had never happened. Maybe not from today on, maybe it will take hundreds of years, but at some day it will be forgotten. This is the reason why I write it down here in these very words. May the lesson be learned and never repeated.

---

Celestia looked up. She had written so long, it made her sad seeing that she had finished. Could she just let go of it? She hovered the pages over to her desk, where pieces of yarn were already waiting to be bound with the pages. She remembered. All those memories, all those thousands of years, a whole eternity of lessons to be learnt. Another book in her library, another chapter of her life and yet there was no end, no success, no goal. The yarns flew through the beautifully ornamented holes in the royal paper. Could this all just be another chapter? Could she really put it all back into her shelf? She had loved her. She had loved Twilight as her child and she could still not believe that she had become Nightfall's Radiance. She could still not believe that Twilight would be gone for the rest of her life, she would be gone forever. Could she really put it all back into the shelf? Could she just end the chapter, which has been her love and her life, maybe the closest to a daughter she would ever have? Trying to put that story into her library was killing a part of herself. It would be impossible to ever forget.

Luna slowly trotted by her side. She didn't say anything, word had lost their necessity so long ago. Luna slowly hovered the book into the air, slowly turning the pages until she reached the end. There was a deep sadness inside of her voice, a sadness that reminded Celestia of her own:

"It is a nice story isn't it? A story speaking to you and yet you will continue living on while the story will have ended. Maybe you will continue your life like nothing had happened. Maybe you will start to think what can happen if you try evade the inevitable. Maybe you will see that we all have our secrets and we are not all the same, no matter how similar we seem. Maybe you will see that we are not so different, no matter how alone we feel. There are thousands of stories with thousands of lessons and thousands of unfortunate writers.
Every story has a writer after all. Somepony has written this story only for you to read these very words. And even after they are dead, their story may continue to be told. It is a nice thought, isn't it, sister of mine?"

"I just wished it had been just a bit longer, a bit more of happiness and a bit less tragedy to be told. Every second longer with her would have been worth the thousands of years to come."

A single tear dripped of her chin, falling to the wooden ground of the library. She had mourned for days and yet she couldn't find her piece even after writing a story that would live on forever, just like her.

"Let us lower the sun together today, shall we?"

Comments

[lordofmyth]

ponders the story........... shrugs, not bad, fairly tragic. not bad.

though to get technicaly this fate was only fated because time was altered. pertty much just like in the series, the only moment of any predestination was when someone screwed with time.

[Dream Whisper]

3440734

That is actually true

The time traveling however, is also a metaphor for not being able to cherish every single moment of your life and wanting to "skip" through your life. I know, I know! I am not very good at conveying deeper motives and ideas, but hopefully this story was at least worth the read

(Should have seen it before editing )

[twitterdick]

The follow review is off the books, written at the request of the author. For more reviews like this one, visit Zero Punctuation Reviews.

Y'know, the guy (or gal) that invented the whole concept of yin-yang must be pretty pleased with his/herself while they're not busy burning in Hell, the non-Christian fuck! If you're unfamiliar with the concept, congratulations on making it out of your mother's vagina, you new-born baby; Yin-yang is the symbol used to encapsulate the idea of interdependent, contrary forces within nature - i.e. every natural concept has its opposite. And so, enter Dream-Whsiper-Story (a tale with awful presentation that I thought was pretty alright) and "Time is Up, Twilight" (a tale with pretty alright presentation that I don't like so much).

Alas, but this is not the good kind of 'I dislike this story' where I get to feel all smug and superior by pointing out the crucial flaws in the stories design and presentational philosophies, but the bad kind of 'I dislike this story' where every waking inch of my handsome figure is desperately trying to like it, but there is something so off - so uncanny that it grains away at me the more I think on it. "Time is Up, Twilight" is a beautiful lass with long, sandy hair and a sweet motherly voice but she's an overbite, her eyes don't align properly and she's a loud chomper. I tried to overlook such things for the sake of our love, but the chomps, the eyes, the teeth, they eat away at me - at my very core. Look what you've done to me, Dream-Whisper-Author, I am a shell of a man doomed to wander this empty universe now. You've turned me into a nihilistic Cain - but I don't have a brother to murder, so I can't even be that.

The ideas behind "Chime's Cup, Twilight" are as commendable as the one's in "Dream-Whisper-Story" but the latter's problems were purely in presentation - it did everything right on the story-telling front. But "Lime's Lump, Twilight" is trapped within the storytelling equivalent of the uncanny valley; Its so close to ascension that its inherent flaws are bursting to the forefront, corroding its good nature and good intentions.

As encapsulated in the title, "Time's Up, Twilight" is a tale of time travel. In parallel to Dream-Whisper-Story's well developed dream mechanics, the mechanics of time travel in this tale are well thought out and well implemented. But trouble arises quickly as the swirly, maladjusted eyes of this heifer lack focus. Whereas that one previous story I'm obliged to stop talking about maintained a tight focus on the actions, reactions and the consequences of actions of its eponymous main character, "Rhyme's Blight, Twilight" can't decide what its about. First its about time travel, then its about Twilight, then how Twilight's prolonged absences affect the world around her, then Twilight's actions and desperation. The story is blurry and frantic like that naked man the shouts Epicurean philosophy at me whenever I visit the mall.

Speaking of souls dying with the body, another misstep comes from the delightful realm of character - my personal favorite aspect of storytelling. Coupled with the lack of focus comes an equally disquieting disjunction in Twilight's character arc. It exists, but its frenzied and schizophrenic, much the same effects writing this review is having on me, and it shifts about much to rapidly. Twilight herself is no Dream-Whisper-Character (that is actually a bad thing). I really connected with Dream-Whisper-Character for she had a distinct personality, goals, thoughts and flaws and everything about her was integral to the story. But Twilight strikes me more as a prop than a character for she lacks the subtleties the define a character. Without a strong lead all of us emotionally codependent reader dullards can attach to, the ride to story-land is rendered meaningless. Like it or not, readers will project onto the protagonist and study them - and they need to be interesting and flawed and so goddamn vital to the story that they are irreplaceable. Twilight could be replaced by a rock with goggly eyes that secretly hates Christians and the story would have the same effect.

The other characters are just kind of there. None of them really get a part to play, and they also lack the quirks and subtleties that would bring them to life. The supporting cast harbor no trace of sentience - no will, desire, personality, perception or thought. They feel like cardboard cutouts of human beings scattered and seated at a plastic table, being served tea by a fat toddler. Their expressions are fixed, their eyes lay unblinking. They are things of paper, not life. It is like they haunt the story, like specters of something greater. They are stillborn ideas that never took their first breath...

::Let's breached the slog of unfunny, depressing emptiness to praise real quick. Presentation is a little exposition-heavy and there's too long a pause between dialogue and action but overall a vast improvement! Great job! Alright, back down we go.::

Lastly, everything just feels so empty, meaningless and forgettable - like ever single relationship I fostered in high school. There's no tangible theme or message I can grasp onto, everything feels like a wax museum - like hollow effigies of the dead; all staring without eyes, watching without faces. It looks real and parts of me says its real, but its so still and bloodless that it can't be anything more then a shadow of what was. That's what "Time's Up, Twilight" is. Its a beautiful idea trapped in a wax body, on display but never moving, never breathing. It feels no sun, no warmth and transmits nothing to anyone. Goddamn this got bleak really fast. Sorry I'm not feeling very funny about it.

Breathe some life into this thing, motherfucker!! Its very close to being something great!

[Dream Whisper]

3757268
This review of a review of a story by an author is brought to you by that author, yet the review of the story is brought to you by the reviewer.

Damn you, twitterdick! As I, the Dream-Whisper-Author or just Dream Whisper, although that might be confused with a certain story, read the review, I was personally torn apart between laughing and crying. Well not really crying, but definitely a certain feeling of sadness, liquid pride I guess. So why was there this split in my emotional reaction, you might ask. Well, to fully answer that question is to describe my entire character - which no brony here wants to hear - , so I will at least try to make it reasonable if not fully answer it.

As could really be expected by a twitterdickian review, I was seriously not disappointed by the amount of humor in that review. So that explains the laughing part. And to be completely honest, I had enough laughing for probably the rest of the week. So, thank you for that already, you have stolen the ability to laugh, since there will be nothing similarly humorous and exciting in the rest of my week.

The sad part is much harder to explain. To be honest, I should really not even be bothered and yet I am. As you probably don't know, I am as successful as I can be in real life. Basically writing stories is nothing but a hobby of mine, and not even my only one. I write, I draw, I program and I play video games. Saying that, I should really not care about my stories that much. The truth is, I do for some unknown reason of my strange self, that not even I can fully explain (And to underline that, let me use a graphic representation) . So, there is a reason for me to be sad when my work gets crushed into pieces and yet there is another problem: It doesn't, at least not really. It is true that some points are very hard to take, but just the more true. I think, I get myself another author who does nothing except putting my ideas down . Because while I write, it can happen that my ideas develop into other directions than what I had planned and what results is TIUT (Prime is cup, Twilight). A story with one idea in mind and then another one and another one ,and suddenly a giant mix of ideas about what characters should or shouldn't do and a certain suddenness of character development.

So, still there is no real reason for my sadness. I see my problems and had a lot of fun reading the humorous review. The only reason I can actually can come up with is that my newest story (FOTC - Fall of the Changelings) goes in a similar direction and I feel like the good presentation is slowly fading into a shaithole of exposition and bad character-writing. And I feel terrible about that and have no idea how to stop it.

So while I go into my corner now and think about my newest story and slowly cry make liquid pride until I fall asleep, I will try to figure out how to avoid the inevitable destruction of my newest story. And with that, I am signing off and wish you a wonderful day/week/month/year/aeon/whatevertimeunityou'dlike.

The author or story or character Dream Whisper.

[twitterdick]

3759857
"I am as successful as I can be in real life."

No, you're not. There is always more ground to cover, more to gain. If you're not getting better at something, you're getting worse at everything. Yeah, being criticized is tough to handle but it's all for the best. I do not mean to make you feel sad or discouraged, but play a hand in making your work better - beyond the humour and the callousness, that's all I am striving for.

Here are some words far more inspirational than any I can conjure.

Best Wishes,
twitterdick