The Chronicles of Summer Rain, Vol. 12 -- Sweep of Time

by shysage

Chapter 13, Bad to Worse

The actual trip through the passage created by the Portal magic is not instantaneous. And during the half a minute or so passage takes, I worked first at trying to recoil from the sea of pain we had just left. Leaving Cel (Princes Celestia) alone, in the Past, was never easy for us. That just hurts, but there is no solution. We can't stay there and help Cel through almost a thousand years until she got her sister back. That most surely would change the future. We could not bring her past all that for the same reason. Leaving her there, by herself, and knowing some of what she would face until Princess Luna was finally rescued... Still, I tried to leave that behind. We couldn't solve that...

I dimly realized that we were maybe seconds away from our present... We had broken out of our jail cell in Canterlot (literally), and were on the run anyway, when we made this mad dash for the Portal and to the Past. Now we were coming back to our present, and whatever problems it still held...

Well, we had the statue of Princess Luna that Cel had given us. This small statue was surely treasured by Cel as a means of coping with Lu's absense. Still, she gave it to Shysage to try and see if it would help us here in our present. What a great sacrifice... I slowly began to work through... We would need to get to Canterlot, somehow get to Cel, to give Cel in the present, that statue, a gift to us from Cel in the Past... How confusing... And we could only hope it would help, somehow... We had no clue what was even going on, much less how this statue of Princess Luna would make any difference...

We arrived in the Library in Princess Twilight's Castle, facing the Portal just like we were when we had left the Past. My hand was still wrapped around the now rough, aged, wood border of the Portal surface. I recognized from the dull reflection that... We had been gone scarcely minutes, maybe seconds... Shyna was off in the distance, still watching, eyes large in fear. She gasped right away as we re-appeared. Looking at my feet, I also saw our Shield Necklaces. Our Ankle bracelets were likewise on the floor below the Portal, but had rolled away, and were still on their way, helter-skelter, to find a resting place. And that awful tune had followed us here...[1]

Shysage gasped right away too. This was not good. "Summer, the statue..." he said quietly. I looked right away; it was not with us. Shysage wasn't holding it... It wasn't on the floor around us... Evidently, that statue, our only hope in trying to find our way back to Princess Celestia of Equestria... The Portal had not allowed...

Now what... I began to cry... And I could tell from her reflection in the Portal surface that Shyna was now crying too. She started to say something. I am not sure what she said.

Shysage had already realized... "Summer, just go through..." He wanted me to take he and I through the Portal to the Equestria Girls world. Well, we had nothing here. And, without that statue, we were in as bad a pickle now as when we had left, maybe just a minute ago... And we were very vulnerable just standing here; somepony important might see us...

Shysage and I, holding hands and together, we walked through the Portal, crying, and were soon in the Equestria Girls world...

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Author's Note:

1. 'The Serpentine Labyrinth', from the Forever Today add-on to the OST for the Seekers of Adoulin expansion for FFXI, everything copyright by Square Enix.