• Published 8th May 2014
  • 3,693 Views, 48 Comments

We Can't Turn Back Time - Titanium Dragon



What if Cadance hadn't stepped in and stopped Twilight from thinking about breaking the laws of physics and causality to spare Spike a little embarrassment at the Equestria Games? Nothing good.

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We Can't Turn Back Time

She was alive; of that, she was sure. But what was that noise? Was that... cheering? And why was she on the ground? Since when was there grass in the library?

Her eyes opened at the sound of Spike's voice. "I guess."

"You guess?" Cadance joined the chorus of voices as she rose to her hooves. In front of her were Twilight and her friends; beside her, Celestia and Luna, whole and unharmed. Where was she?

"I just saw what needed to be done and reacted. It just so happens I can breathe fire, and, if any of you could do that, you'd have done the same."

"Forgive me for bein' blunt, Spike," Applejack said as she stepped forward, "But you're not makin' a lick of sense."

With their attention turned on Spike, Cadance was able to get her bearings. She was at the Crystal Coliseum, at the Equestria Games. Her heart leapt as she saw Shining Armor standing out on the field, resplendent in his armor, and she almost flew out to him. But she stayed her wings. She couldn't, not yet.

"Well," Spike looked down towards the ground. "It's just how I feel."

She looked back to Twilight. What was she supposed to do? When would Twilight cast that spell? She reflexively took a calming breath, drawing a glance from Princess Celestia. What if this was what caused Twilight to think of the spell in the first place? What if she gave her the idea that she could do it?

"Wait a second. I think I get it!" Twilight said, swooping down to point her hoof at him. "You keep saying you let everypony down, but we all keep saying you didn't." She leaned down towards him. "You know who's disappointed in you, Spike? You. And only you an make it right with you again. What would that take, Spike?"

"Meh, I don't know. Can you turn back time? 'Cause I'd sure like a do-over on that opening ceremony."

Cadance could see it; the hoof on Twilight's chin, the narrowed eyes. She knew this was the moment - the exact moment - she should step in. But what should she say? What could she say? She couldn't just tell her what happened, that might make it happen in the first place. Why did time magic have to be so complicated?

The silence lingered a second too long; she could feel the moment slipping away, disaster rearing its head. She couldn't let it happen again. She had to do something, now. "We can't turn back time," she said, speaking quickly as she put on her best smile, looking straight ahead. What could... of course, that box! "But, would you do me the great honor of lighting fireworks in my place at the closing ceremonies tonight?"

"Come on, Spike! You saved the Crystal Empire! Twice! I think you can light some fireworks," Twilight added, a hint of laughter in her voice as she smiled down at the dragon. Twilight really had grown, hadn't she? This was three times now that she'd saved her. But she couldn't tell her; she had made a promise.

Cadance closed her eyes and nodded, joined by the princesses standing beside her, trying to add as much warm approval to the gesture as possible. Would it be enough? Did anyone notice her knees trembling?

"Mmm," Spike paused for a moment, putting his claws to his lips. "Well, I guess I have to at least give it a shot."

Cadance felt a surge of elation, and let her cheers join that of her friends. It was over; the danger past. All she had to do was find that horn... and try not to celebrate too much.

She wasn't sure she had it in her to explain why she was so excited about fireworks.

Author's Note:

Thanks to DbzOrDie and RainbowBob for prereading and advice on the story.

Comments ( 42 )

What? The word count says zero?!

4359598
I dunno why that's the case. There are certainly words in the story, and all the chapter word counts seem to show up just fine.

4359606 it's fixed...

4359612
Clearly I went back in time and changed the word count so it was correct all along. It would be terrible if I allowed an incorrect word count to stand! :pinkiecrazy:

4359682 you know, I was really frustrated with the Equestria games. At least they weren't the season finale.

4359690 I swear to molestia... if that was the season finale... someone would be hurting right now :flutterrage:

Yessssssssss, this pleases the Bob.

4359986 "I wouldn’t ask too much of her," I ventured. "You can’t repeat the past."

"Can’t repeat the past?" he cried incredulously. "Why of course you can!"

Perfect ending! And it ties in with the episode!

4360157
Of course it does. There's no Alternate Universe tag on the story, now is there? :moustache:

Above the 2,500-word limit for the Short Stories group. I'll remove it.

*throws all of my yes at you*

Have you ever considered submitting this story to Equestria Daily? You can find out how to do so here.

4368744
It is in their queue. :twilightsmile: I'm glad you liked it enough to suggest that I submit it to them, though. Always nice to hear.

That was a good read! I do so enjoy a good 'going back in time to save the future' story. :twilightsmile: (Unless they involve hedgehogs and the number 06 in some way... but that's another story)

It would have been cool to see a bit more, but I've enjoyed myself, so it's all good. Bravo, good sir! :moustache:

Pretty clever. Time travel can be fun when it doesn't get confusing. It must take some deep thought to accurately write one that fits the episode's events like a puzzle piece.

Unfortunately, this one relies on Spike failing to take to heart the best friendship lesson/journal entry the show has ever delivered. Either Twilight pressured him into giving the anthem another go, or it wasn't until he lit the fireworks that the lesson of his experience fully sank in.

4444598
I'm glad you enjoyed this story; it really didn't get many views on release, though the folks who did see it seemed to enjoy it.

The idea I had in mind was that in the original timeline, Spike wasn't given the additional encouragement by Cadance, which (in the show) helped him realize that what he needed to do was to just move forward, rather than look back - no matter how much you mess up, there's always tomorrow. Instead, Twilight was given a problem to solve with magic, and she "solved" it and sent Spike back in time to "fix" things - a very attractive idea to many people. That had other unexpected consequences, which lead to the timeline seen here, which was then averted by Cadance stepping in and interrupting Twilight, thus preventing it all from happening in the first place.

First I watched the new X-Men movie and then I read this.

What is it with me and time travel in order to prevent a terrible future?

4458638
I'm glad you enjoyed. :twilightsmile:

4449759
Time travel can be enormously fun if it is done right.

Love this story. But you already gussed that.

On a completly unrelated note, you guys remember that Spike based Anime, right?
Yeah, that is oming out once we have... Say, 230 more people to sign the petition.
LINK

Still, love the story.

Pretty hilarious.

That time travel though, I don't feel like it makes a lot of sense. How do you go back in time to approximately the present but in a universe where a previously cast time spell hadn't happened?

That is all? I feel like you only tell only the middle part of the story and you left the intro and the final

4523550
4523560
That's pretty much why I wrote it the way I did; it was the way it had to go. And while it is a little bit weird that she sent her directly over to the same point in time in the original timeline... eh. Time travel is funny like that, and it needed to end with that scene, and it flowed much more naturally that way. Plus, who is to say that isn't how magic works? :raritywink:

I'm glad you thought the story was interesting enough to follow me after reading it. :twilightsmile:

I'm probably a bad boy for hoping that King Sombra actually returns in Season 5 through similar means as depicted in this story. Not only did we not get much real screen-time with him, nor get to see him really do anything evil like we did with Tirek, but i'd really love to see how he'd react to the fact that the baby dragon that helped thwart his return was now so revered in his old kingdom.

This story was a very sweet twist on the Equestria Games ending and i got a real kick out of reading it. Most Excellent. :twilightsmile:

¡Timetravel is headaches!:

Time is not 1-dimensional but multidimensional. In this story sideways (an infinite number of sideways exist) is the way Princess Mi Amore Cadenza moves. At least it is not diagonal travel:

Nothing like trying to travel 4 year into the future, but finding oneself 2 years in the future, but in a timeline which diverged 2 years before one left (one traveled 4 years, but 2 into the future 2 sideways). Even if one travels only to the past or future, one can encounter about 100 distinct temporal paradoxes.

4777826
Ah, the joys of the many, many, many possible forms of time travel.

4778131

All of this talk about infinite dimensions of time and traveling diagonal timetravel reminds me about the description of an Heinlein-Book I have not gotten around to reading yet called “The Number of the Beast”. Inside it, our universe is spatially infinite, but has only a finite number of temporal dimensions. That number is 6^6^6:

6^6^6 = 6^46,656 = 10,314,424,798,490,535,546,171,949,056

Too many books and not enough time for reading them. One should make a TwilightZoneEpisode about the problem of too many books and not enough time for reading them being solved and then have an ironic twist at the end. Going with the theme of time, we can call it “Time Enough At Last”. :twilightblush:

4778324
But Twilight doesn't wear glasses.

Though I DO have plans for a story called "The Changelings Are Due in Ponyville".

4778453

> “Though I DO have plans for a story called ’The Changelings Are Due in Ponyville’.”

“The Monsters Are Due On Maple Street”

Ponyville will tear itself apart with paranoia. Being wary is wise (else, the changelings will just walk into Ponyville and eat all of the love, leaving the ponies emotionless slaves), but paranoia is stupid, leading to the ponies turning against each other in an equicidal masspanic. Let me guess:

It is centered on Maple Street in Ponyville and the changelings are behind the panic tearing apart Ponyville, but from afar, with no agents in Ponyville.

Okay, I know this has nothing to do with the story but, can you still edit the story after you submit it?

I find it incredible how talented authors like you and CiG can create entire cohesive stories off of just a couple lines from the show. Truly impressive work.

Also, I think I recall seeing Princess Luna at the Equestrian Games as well. Shouldn't she get a mention in the story as well? (Unless she wasn't actually there. My bad then.)

5180197
Luna was indeed at the games, but, alas, she didn't have any lines. :ajsleepy:

I did actually mention her presence in the second chapter of the story, as she was indeed there.

I did not mention her in the first chapter at all, IIRC the implication being that she had already fallen to Sombra, but the story never really mentions her at all in chapter one (not that the show would ever be guilty of forgetting about Luna, no sir. *cough*). I suppose I could rather easily insert a mention of her in the first chapter; I'll make a note of that. I'm planning on cleaning up the story a bit at some point for resubmission to Equestria Daily, so I'll keep that in mind when I do the revision.

I'm glad you enjoyed the story, and I'm flattered to be compared to Cold in Gardez. :heart: I really liked the idea behind this story, though I guess I'm kind of a sucker for time travel. :trixieshiftright:

Introducing a complete alternative timeline with dark future, making multiple characters time travel, then reverting it into a 100% canon universe without a stumble. Well done, sir. :moustache:

5308082
Glad you approve. I had fun writing it. :moustache:

5479236
Because Twilight doesn't have enough on her conscience as-is, huh?

I'm glad you liked it! :twilightsmile:

Before I read this, what is the Dark tag for ?
And how bad does it get ?

8181427
The dark tag is for a dark timeline in which Sombra took over the Crystal Empire. Nothing graphic.

Well it looks like Cadence made it to the past where the moment that Spike felt really bad about the national anthem and if we're about to use the undo spell but Cadence stop them in time instead of that she wanted Spike to let the fireworks in the closing ceremony with that avoided the problem now she has to find the red Crystal before King Sombra returns that was a pretty short story but it's cool to see Cadence doing something like this keep up the good work

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