Truthseeker

by RB_

Thrilling Days of Yesteryear 1

Lyra wiped the towel across her mouth.

“I’m, uh… really sorry about that,” she said.

“Yes, well,” Starswirl said, nudging his discarded robes away with a hoof. “We’ve both done regrettable things today, it seems. Here, come along—you can leave the towel there, I’ll have the boy clean this up.”

Lyra discarded the towel as instructed and followed Starswirl as he turned around and headed for the stairs, taking in her surroundings as she did so. They appeared to be in some sort of circular structure, built of stone, and lined with bookshelves. Looking at the staircase that spiraled up the side of the building and the wooden ceiling above them, Lyra guessed this was only one floor of many.

They passed by a window as they climbed, just a carved-out hole in the stone, and through it Lyra could see the tops of trees. Evergreens; they appeared to be in a forest. The sky was covered by heavy cloud.

“Notchleaf!” Starswirl yelled out as he reached the top of the stairs. “Boy! Where are you?”

A little colt, no more than ten years old by Lyra’s reckoning, scampered out of a side room. “Right here, sir!”

“Put some tea on for us, boy,” Starswirl said. “And then there’s a mess downstairs that needs cleaning up. You’ll need a mop.

“Yes, sir!” the colt said, running off. Starswirl, meanwhile, walked over to one of a few wooden chairs on a rug in the middle of the room and sat down. “Come. Sit,” he said, beckoning to Lyra; she did so, sitting in the chair across from him.

This floor appeared to be more of a living quarters, with a small table with several books strewn atop it in the middle of the chairs and an empty fireplace set into the nearby wall.

“I suppose introductions are in order,” Starswirl said. “I am Starswirl the Bearded, the Mage Magnificent, Wizard of the Equestrian Court, Banisher of Evil and Protector of the Realm.”

He took a pause, his weary eyes running over Lyra. “And you,” he said, “are not Ditzy Doo.”

“Er, no,” Lyra said, “I’m not. I’m a friend of hers, though!”

“Well, supposedly so am I, but that does not make us the same pony. What is your name?”

“Lyra Heartstrings,” Lyra said. “And, sir, it’s an honor—”

“Yes, yes, an honor,” Starswirl said, twirling a hoof. “Everypony says that.”

It was then that the colt returned, a tray on his back with two porcelain cups full of steaming liquid atop it.

“Here you go, sir,” he said as he levitated one of the cups over to Starswirl, who nodded as he took it. He then floated the other over to Lyra. She took a sip. Dandelion. Pleasant.

“Thank you, Notchleaf,” Starswirl said. The colt nodded and turned to go, but Starswirl stopped him with a word. “Have you checked in with your mother recently?”

“She’s in bed,” he said. “Resting. She said she didn’t want to be disturbed.”

Starswirl frowned. “Right. Be off, then.”

Lyra watched as he scampered off. “Is he…?”

“My apprentice’s,” Strarswirl said.

“Your apprentice? As in, Clover the Clever?”

Starswirl nodded.

That’s odd, Lyra thought. I don’t remember ever reading about Clover having children.

“Who’s the father?” she asked. Starswirl’s expression soured further.

“I wish she’d tell me,” he said. “But enough about that. You are a friend of Ditzy Doo’s, you say? Do you then share any of her expertise?”

“Expertise? You mean with time travel?”

“Well of course,” Starswirl said. “Why else would I have sent for her? Her expert baking skills?”

“I wouldn’t judge you for it,” Lyra said. “But no, I don’t.”

“Then you are useless to me.”

Lyra blinked.

“Well, I wouldn’t say I’m… totally useless,” she said.

“You’ve yet to show any indication otherwise,” he replied. Lyra frowned; Starswirl took a drink of his tea. “You are a bard, judging by your name and your mark?”

“More of a musician,” Lyra said.

“Close enough. Perhaps you could compose a ballad of my plight, then. Tell me, how did you come to be here? I assume you received the scroll I sent instead of Ditzy, through some set of circumstance?”

“Yes,” Lyra said. “Your scroll came through at the same time as… someone else. It made the time travel thingy go all wonky.”

Starswirl raised an eyebrow. “Wonky.”

“Look, I’m doing my best. It messed up Ditzy’s vision, so she asked me to read the scroll, and—”

“And it pulled you back here,” Starswirl finished. He rubbed his face with a hoof. “I knew something like this would happen… resorting to such cumbersome methods—darn it all!”

He brought a hoof down onto the side of his chair. “Darn it all!” he repeated. “I’ll never be free of this! My last tempearl, wasted on, on, on a bard with paint down her leg!”

“Hey! It’s not like I chose to be here! And I’m not just a bard!” And what was that about paint?

“I don’t care if you’re Bagatelle himself!” Starswirl said, whipping his head in her direction, “You’re not Ditzy Doo, and if you’re not Ditzy Doo, then—”

He stopped himself, took a deep breath, and then took a drink from his tea. He set the empty cup down on the table and sighed. He turned to face Lyra, and suddenly the wrinkles and the bags under his eyes seemed far more pronounced.

“I’m sorry,” he said. “That was rude of me. The truth of the matter is that I am in a very… difficult, situation at the moment, and I fear it is unraveling me to my last nerve. I was hoping that, with Ditzy’s help, I could sort this all out, but it seems I will have to do so without her.”

“Maybe if you told me what the problem was, I could help?” Lyra said.

“Doubtful.”

Lyra frowned. “Well, why don’t you just send another scroll, then? If the only one who can help you is Ditzy Doo, then…”

Starswirl sighed. “The spell I used to send the scroll to the future was… primitive, by all standards, including my own. It relied upon a tempearl, a naturally forming anomaly in the timestream, as a reagent. A reagent which is destroyed upon direct interaction with temporal magics, and one that is very rare. I do not have another.”

“Then… how were you intending to send Ditzy back?” Lyra asked.

“Ditzy herself is also an anomaly,” he said. “It is the reason why anything travelling through time tends to find its way to her eventually. I could have transported her back easily, and safely, using her own nature.”

“Well, I’m an anomaly, right?” Lyra said. “Being from the future. Can’t you use me to do whatever time-magic stuff you need?”

But Starswirl shook his head. “You may be anomalous,” he said, “But you are not an anomaly.”

“W-wait,” Lyra said, her throat suddenly growing dry. “Then how are you going to send me back?”

Starswirl looked at her with surprise. “Oh,” he said. “Well, I… suppose I can’t.”

“Y-you mean I’m stuck here?”

“Yes,” he said. “It seems you’re stuck here...”

He clapped his hooves together. “Until midnight, that is! Ha! It seems you are in luck, Miss Heartstrings, as my problem may just be the solution to yours!”

He hopped off his chair and began to pace. “Yes, it’s simple! We just need to set you up with lodgings in the village—then, when the change-over happens, you’ll be gone, and I’ll work out a better way to contact Ditzy so that you don’t get pulled back instead—it’s perfect! No harm done at all!”

“Um, wait,” Lyra said. “I’m confused. I thought you said you couldn’t send me back?”

Starswirl glanced at her over his shoulder. “I can’t,” he said, “but I may not have to. Listen—I’ll explain on the way.”

─────

“It’s been happening for two months now,” Starswirl said as he led Lyra down the dirt path through the trees. “But I only discovered it twelve days ago.”

There was a chill in the air, icey and biting. The occasional breeze only made it worse as it rustled through the branches above them. Fallen pine needles carpeted the path, crunching softly underhoof.

Lyra shivered, but it wasn’t because of the cold.

“I first discovered it when I went into town to restock the tower’s pantry,” Starswirl continued, before Lyra could say anything. “Normally I’d have the boy do it, but I had just reached a break in my research and had the sudden desire to stretch my aching legs, so off I went.

“The first indication that something was wrong came when I entered the town to find them taking down decorations,” he said. “It looked as if there had been a festival the night before, but it was the middle of January; I knew of no festivals that would be taking place at the time.

“So, I asked one of the townsfolk. He looked at me like I was an idiot and told me that the day before had been the seventeenth anniversary of the founding of Equestria, the Hearthswarming. Well, of course, I laughed in his face, because The Hearthswarming’s celebrations had taken place several weeks prior. Something I knew personally, as Notchleaf and I had attended the festivities ourselves!

“But then I took better notice of my surroundings. The decorations being removed did, on inspection, match those I remembered from Hearthswarming. And then I began to ask the other townsfolk, and they, too, believed it to be the day after Hearthswarming.

“And then,” he said, “I discovered that this condition was not unique to the village. Clover and Notchleaf had both lost time, as well. Ah, there’s the village, you can see for yourself.”

They’d just come up to the edge of the forest, then, the last few pines dropping back behind them as they exited onto a hilltop. Lyra looked down from the top of the hill; she could, in fact, see for herself the village that lay ahead of them.

It wasn’t a very large village, perhaps a third the size of Ponyville (and not nearly as homely). Trails of smoke rose from the chimneys of the couple dozen or so timber-and-mud buildings, arranged seemingly at random around a haphazard series of earthen streets.

“Needlewood,” Starswirl announced. “It’s not much to look at, is it? It can’t be, for someone from so far in the future.”

“You’d be surprised,” Lyra said. “It’s not that different from home.”

“My apologies, then. I only chose to build my tower here because it’s the farthest settlement away from the capital. My home-away-from-court, if you will.”

“Why’s that?”

Starswirl snorted. “If I lived any closer, I’d have nobles and chancellors and whatever-else at my doorstep asking for my assistance in every trivial matter, and then I’d never get any work done. Out here, it’s such a bother to contact me that they only ever do so when all of Equestria is at stake.”

He lead her down the hill. As they entered the village, Lyra could see what he’d been talking about. Ribbons and banners hung from the tops of some of the buildings, spanning the streets; several pegasi were working above them to take them down. Wreaths of holly hung on several of the houses’ doors.

“So, everypony still thinks it’s the day after Hearthswarming?” Lyra asked. “What does that mean?”

“Well, that’s the thing,” Starswirl said, nodding to a passerby who had greeted him. “It’s not just that everypony thinks it’s the day after Hearthswarming—because as far as I can determine, it is the day after Hearthswarming!”

“You mean the day is… repeating?” Lyra asked.

“Precisely! At the stroke of midnight, every night, the world resets to how it was the day prior, no matter what I’ve changed, and I wake up back in my bed in the tower. After much investigation, the only conclusion I could come to was that time itself had come… unstuck. That the day was, in fact, repeating itself on endless loop.”

“Which is why you sent for Ditzy Doo,” Lyra said.

Starswirl nodded. “Which was why I sent for Ditzy Doo. I fear this situation is beyond my ability to comprehend; I was hoping that she might be able to assist me.”

“How do you know Ditzy Doo, anyway?” Lyra asked.

“That is a story for another time,” Starswirl said, “as we’ve arrived.”

He stopped, and Lyra stopped too. They were outside the largest of the houses, with a wooden sign over its door announcing it to be an inn.

“You can stay here,” Starswirl said. “Tell them you’re a guest of mine, and that I’ll cover your expenses. They shouldn’t give you any trouble if you tell them that—they might even give you a free supper for it. At midnight, when time resets itself, I have no doubt that you will be reset as well—reset to your own time, that is.”

“You’re sure?”

“Well, it only stands to reason,” Starswirl said. “Now, I must get back to the tower—I’ve got to come up with a better means of getting in touch with Ditzy Doo, one which won’t retrieve random strangers in her place. Goodbye, Lyra Heartstrings. With any luck, we will never meet again.”

And with that, he turned around and walked away.

Hmph, Lyra thought as she watched him go. For being Equestrai’s savior, he’s kind of… bleh.

She reached out with a leg to push open the door to the inn, and it was then that she noticed something peculiar: the markings Winter Bell had placed on her earlier still adorned her leg.

That’s odd… I thought she said those would fade?

She shrugged. It certainly wasn’t the weirdest thing to happen today, and she had far bigger things to think about.

─────

There were no problems with the innkeeper; she seemed oddly pleased to be housing an ‘honoured guest’. And Starswirl had been right, the old mare had given her a free dinner… free for Lyra, at least. Cheese and pickled cabbage, which the Innkeeper had apologized for, saying they’d used most of their perishables in the previous night’s feast. Lyra hadn’t minded.

Not that it mattered. All of this would be wiped clean when midnight came.

As Lyra laid down onto the lumpy sack of feathers that was her bed and stared up at the bare thatch above her, she thought about what that would mean.

Will I even remember any of this? she asked herself. She shivered. The thought disturbed her more than she’d have liked.

I guess it won’t matter in a few hours, she thought. One way or the other, it’ll work itself out.

She rolled over onto her side. Pillows had apparently not been invented yet, or at least, the inn hadn’t had any.

She sighed and let her eyes drift shut.

Man, Bonnie must be tearing Ditzy apart by now, she thought. Is that even how that works? Maybe I should ask Ditzy when I get back, if I even remember to—

—yra? Lyra? Can you hear me?

Lyra’s eyes flew open.

“Winter Bell!?”

Lyra! Yes! It worked!

Lyra laughed, rolled off of the bed and stood up. Oh man, you’re a sound for sore ears! How are you doing that? We’re a thousands years apart, how can I hear you?

The entanglement enchantment, from earlier! Momma and I were able to get it open again!

That’s fantastic! Lyra thought. What’s happening over there? Is Ditzy alright?

She’s fine. Her future-vision's starting to come back, but slowly. We’re on a train right now!

A train? Why a train?

I’m not sure—Ditzy Doo said she might be able to get you back, but she needed to visit someone. Bon Bon nearly killed her when she found out—

Bonnie! Is Bonnie there? Does she know I’m alright?

She’s here, Winter bell said. I haven’t told them that I’m talking to you yet, hang on…

Winter Bell went silent for a full, agonizing minute, and Lyra had just begun to worry that the spell had broken when:

I’m back! They’re both happy you’re okay, and they both want to know what happened to you.

Lyra recounted what had happened, starting with when she had read the scroll and ending with the inn. She was met with several seconds of silence, and then:

Bon Bon says she wants to strangle Starswirl if she ever gets the chance. Ditzy says she’ll provide the rope, and… hang on…

A few more seconds of silence.

Ditzy’s saying it doesn’t make any sense… stuff like this happens sometimes but it gets… closed off? Huh?

Ask her what that means, Lyra said.

She says it means that Starswirl shouldn’t have been able to send the scroll, Winter Bell said. Something about the timeline? It’s confusing, and she’s talking fast.

Lyra frowned. Yeah, that’s normal. But he did send the scroll—I mean, I’m here, aren’t I?

Ditzy says she’s not sure what’s going on. It’s not supposed to work like this.

That’s concerning. What about me getting home?

She’s not sure… but she thinks it might work!

Well, that’s… reassuring, Lyra said. Was there anything else?

Silence.

Winter Bell?

Sorry, just… Bon bon wants to know that you’re okay. In a lot of words.

Tell her I’m fine. And that if everything goes well, that I’ll make breakfast tomorrow.

Okay, Winter bell said, and then after a moment’s silence:

She says, ‘not on your life’.

Comments

[Nyperold]

8670072
You find out fairly near the beginning. Like, within the first couple of chapters.

[FanOfMostEverything]

Hmm. Time not behaving according to Ditzian laws? This could be much worse than just a Hearth's Warming Groundhog Day, and I doubt the reset will be as clean as Starswirl expects. Looking forward to finding out.

[Nyperold]

8671374
Looks like it, though I wouldn't fault anyone for thinking it was Trixie.