Reflections

by RQK

20 - History

Twilight Sparkle poured some more tea into Princess Celestia’s cup and then folded her hooves together. “I think that should be everything up until this point,” she said.

Princess Celestia sat on a cushion opposite her. The cushions themselves ringed around the unlit fire pit that took up the center of the pavilion. The shadows had shifted to afternoon angles, but the skies above were still as blue as ever.

Celestia took a sip of her tea and nodded. “I see. I think I understand it. Or… perhaps I don’t,” she said with a chuckle. “It’s hard to say.”

“It’s a lot to take in, I’m sure,” Sunset Shimmer, who sat on a cushion right next to Celestia, said.

Celestia glanced over. “Well, if there is one thing that I can take away from this… it’s very heartening to know that, in some reality out there, you and I made up. It’s… what I always wanted.”

Sunset shrugged. “Well, from what Twilight told me about her reality… your reality too, I guess, I did pretty okay for myself. I know you were probably worrying about me for a while.”

“Every day,” Celestia replied.

“I don’t know what it’ll be worth considering we’re from different realities and all, but I have so many stories that I could share with you. Maybe we should sit down and chat later?”

“That sounds lovely,” Celestia replied. Her eyes drifted upward toward Chrysalis who watched from the outer edges of the pavilion. “I am, however, very interested to hear how she came about. I would have never considered her an ally in any way.”

Starlight Glimmer, who sat on a cushion between Twilight and Sunset, giggled. “You and me both, Princess.”

Crystal Faire stood up. “It is, no doubt, a product of these precarious circumstances. It has brought us all together.” She paced around the outside of the group while keeping her eyes on Celestia as she said, “And it is those same circumstances which have now brought you here.”

Adamantine, who sat next to Twilight, frowned. “Perhaps that also has something to do with why you are faded.”

Celestia looked at her own body and how it looked slightly translucent. It gave an impression of her being only mostly there. She sighed. “Yes, I don’t understand this at all.”

“After spending so long in interversal space,” Crystal began, “it’s a wonder that you can even be here, in a timeline, at all. I just wonder if you will persist, or…”

“Absolutely. Hopefully, I will. Not just for my sake.”

Crystal nodded. “Indeed. And now, Celestia, I must ask you exactly what you have experienced. What… did you see out there?”

“And how did you survive?” Twilight seconded.

Celestia nodded and shifted her forelegs around. “Well, when the… timeline collapsed, I was sucked into those black masses. The next thing I knew, I was floating in a void. I could see in all directions.”

“And were there others?” Crystal asked.

“Yes. The rest of Twilight’s friends were there with me along with the citizens of Ponyville. Miasmus was there too.” Celestia scratched her head and added, “There were strange creatures there as well. I would suspect that many of them were from other worlds.”

“Humans?” Sunset abruptly asked.

Celestia nodded. “Humans. At least, I think. I don’t really remember much else of it. I think that everypony was trying to figure out just what had happened.”

“So, there were many others who survived the collapse,” Crystal said.

“What was it like?” Twilight asked. “What did you feel like?”

Celestia stared off into space. “I felt… nothing. I-It didn’t hurt… But I remember… I remember being so terrified that I just could not think of anything.” Her voice drew toward a whisper. She shook her head and sighed. “I’m sorry… I should have been more careful and—”

“It’s not your fault,” Twilight cut in. “There wasn’t anything you could do. I promise…”

“And here you were thinking that we had all perished. I am so sorry, Twilight…”

Twilight frowned and shook her head again. She shifted over to Celestia and wrapped her hooves around her. “I’m just glad you’re okay. You have no idea how much of a relief this is.”

Celestia smiled and returned the embrace.

“What else did you find out there? You must have encountered others,” Crystal said.

Celestia nodded. “Yes. As a matter of fact, I did. She came and collected us. She called herself the Queen of the Multiverse. Tongue and cheekly, of course.”

“And… who was she?” Crystal tremulously asked.

“She was aged, somewhat, but I have no doubts in my mind…” Celestia looked Crystal in the eye and said, “It was Cadance, Crystal Faire… Your mother.”

Crystal’s expression didn’t change, and she kept herself standing, but all color disappeared from her face regardless. She opened her mouth to say something and then shut it again.

Celestia ran a hoof through her mane. “And, actually, after what happened in these past few hours, we got to talking, and we wanted to try some things. We started pushing those things in,” she said as she pointed to a few equally translucent objects lying to the side. “And now I’ve fallen in too. So here I am.”

“By the stars…” Twilight gasped. “So that’s how you got here.”

“But how did you get out there?” Sunset asked.

“She… Cadance told me…” Celestia said, “that she’s been watching the collapses for a while, and yet we were the first ones ever to survive.”

Adamantine hummed. “That is curious. Surely, there has been an uncountable number of timeline collapses before. Why would you be the first?”

Celestia paused for a moment and took a sip from her teacup. After stopping to admire its taste, she said, “She described it as a clean collapse.”

One of Crystal’s hooves drew backward toward the edge of the pavilion.

“I really hope that I can correctly remember what she told me...” Celestia continued. “She said that most timeline collapses are very messy affairs where everything is torn apart. But what happened to us… was different. That got her attention. It was the first clean timeline collapse that she had seen.”

Crystal backpedaled even more.

“And then, supposedly, there was another about an hour ago—or maybe it was more than that, I can’t actually tell—and…”

Adamantine raised an eyebrow. “That is very interesting. Then, there are now more survivors?”

“That would seem to be the case,” Celestia replied.

“That’s interesting. I kinda wonder what causes a collapse to be clean,” Starlight mused.

“Were there others?” Crystal suddenly cut in.

Celestia looked up. “Hmmm?”

Crystal’s expression was long and she practically stared Celestia down. “When you first arrived there in that interversal space… were there others?”

Celestia rocked from side to side as she thought. “She didn’t have many followers,” she replied. “I would imagine a thousand or so. All crystal ponies, at that.”

Crystal swallowed and replied, tremulously, “So then, she and her people… my people… they’re still…”

“They’re all still out there,” Twilight said. “Crystal! Do you know what this—”

Crystal had turned around and was now stumbling away. She passed Chrysalis without even so much as acknowledging her presence. Chrysalis watched as Crystal departed and then looked at the group with an inaudible “Huh?”

Twilight watched as Crystal ambled off. This… definitely has to be a hard pill for her to swallow. Goodness…

She turned her eyes toward Celestia. I… I thought that Celestia… my Celestia was gone forever too. And now here Crystal is… And after so long…

Twilight stood up as well and turned toward her mentor. “Forgive me, Princess, but I think I should go to her.”

Celestia motioned Twilight on. “By all means.”

Twilight nodded and dashed away, chasing after Crystal.

* * *

Twilight trotted down the dirt path and arrived at another intersection. She finally found Crystal trudging along one of the adjacent streets and immediately galloped in her direction. Crystal didn’t even bat an eye, even as Twilight came up right beside her.

“Crystal?” Twilight asked as she leaned in close. “Are you okay?”

“I thought that you would be with your Celestia,” Crystal mumbled.

After a moment of thought, Twilight shook her head. “Princess Celestia is fine. …I think. I hope she’ll survive because then we could bring everypony home.” She looked up at Crystal and said, “But right now, I’m worried about you.”

Crystal stared into the distance. She didn’t pause in her stride even though her stride was strained to begin with. Her eyes flicked about as she searched for words. “Clean collapses are survivable…” she wheezed.

Twilight frowned. “Crystal…”

Crystal glanced over her withers at Twilight. “I saw it, Twilight. I looked into the multiverse. I looked at it more closely than I’ve ever looked at it before. And I saw it. I saw the Crystal Empire. I saw home.”

Twilight nodded and said nothing.

“I’ve been doubting it. I’ve been trying to doubt it. But I can’t anymore,” Crystal continued. “My… people… my mother… they’ve been out there this whole time… And I didn’t even know it.”

“They survived… just like my people did.”

Crystal nodded solemnly.

Twilight shook her head and teleported into the middle of Crystal’s path. “Crystal,” she began.

Crystal stopped and looked down at Twilight.

“How… how did your timeline collapse? I want to know.”

Crystal didn’t respond. She just kept staring down at Twilight with a sad frown on her face.

Twilight trembled and added a tremulous “Please?”

Crystal’s expression remained unchanged. She, for a few moments more, still did not respond.

She eventually sighed and closed the distance between herself and Twilight. Right as they were nearly muzzle to muzzle, the world shifted and folded together into a single point.

When it folded back out, Crystal turned and trotted toward a nearby wall. Twilight glanced around; the room was decisively wooden with several large masks scattered about and shelves upon shelves of potion vials and flasks hanging on the walls. A large cauldron took up the center of the room. Twilight recognized the place right away, and she looked around but found no trace of its zebra inhabitant.

Crystal plucked a flask off the top shelf. Said flask had a golden seal on it with a red-eyed pattern around it. The potion actually within was a purplish color.

Twilight recognized that potion too. She had used it before.

Crystal wordlessly trotted back up to Twilight and then the world folded together again. When it folded back out, Twilight found herself standing on trimmed grass.

Crystal sighed through her nose and trotted toward a nearby bench. Twilight took a quick glance around and discerned the pristine whites and smooth surfaces that made up Canterlot’s architecture. The few ponies milling about the street, all of whom wore expensive suits and dresses, stared for a few moments and then continued on with their idle conversations.

Twilight trotted over to the bench and took a seat right next to Crystal where she eyed the potion in silence.

Crystal lit her horn, but instead of the light yellow aura that was her usual, the magic that came out was bathed in toxic purples and greens that bubbled and burst. Her expression remained unchanged even as her horn shot a blackened beam at the potion. The liquid within the vial changed into a purely white color.

Crystal then levitated the flask over to Twilight who, in turn, took it within her magic. And Twilight knew what came next.

Twilight lifted the flask to her mouth and took a few gulps of the potion. It was just as tasteless as she remembered it. Once she was sure she had enough, she set the flask onto the bench between Crystal and herself.

A few seconds later, her world went white, and she was nothing more than a consciousness in the void.

When Twilight came to, she was standing in Canterlot again. Or, at the very least, it was a spacious garden in Canterlot. Her eyes turned toward the sky where she found the sun and the moon hanging on opposite horizons. The lights produced by both melted together in an orangish-bluish glow. Several stars, brighter than usual, dotted the sky.

There were many ponies gathered around her. She guessed at least a thousand. All of them were dressed in black; some even wore veils over their faces. She could see many familiar faces throughout the crowd, but each of those faces had gained a few wrinkles since she had last seen them. She spotted her parents in the front of the crowd; their manes had greyed considerably, and they looked like they were numb to everything. She spotted Princess Celestia and Princess Luna who looked similarly distant, even while they embraced each other.

Twilight turned as it occurred to her that somepony behind her was speaking. She found Sunset Shimmer standing on a raised platform. Sunset, who looked taller and more definitely built than she remembered, stood tall despite the layers of black clothing covering everything below her neck. A small tiara sat atop Sunset’s head. Spike, who was taller, leaner, and more rugged than she remembered him, stood next to her. He looked like he was Celestia’s height now.

The two of them stood next to a closed casket. A large portrait of Twilight Sparkle flanked the casket’s other side.

Twilight gasped. “Oh, goodness…”

“Thank you all for attending the service today,” Spike said, addressing the crowd. “I hope that all of you will follow us to the site for the… burial service. I-If the pallbearers could please stand and come forward…”

Twilight whirled and watched as a few ponies on the front bench stood up and made their way over to the coffin. They passed right through her as they went, just as Twilight expected them to. She looked over each of them. Applejack still had the same old stetson and Rarity’s curled mane was still as elegant as ever. Fluttershy had convoluted braids in her hair while Rainbow Dash looked shaved. Pinkie Pie’s mane had gone limp, but Twilight could tell that it had been done-up regardless. Starlight Glimmer, on the other hoof, aside from the stray hairs all around, looked a lot like Twilight remembered.

She watched as the six of them, her six friends, turned the coffin, lifted it onto their backs, and then carried it down the aisle toward an exit at the head of the garden.

“This is…” Twilight croaked.

She turned her eyes back toward her parents in the front and let her eyes glide down the row. She found her brother, Shining Armor, falling into tears, just like their parents. She found Cadance sitting right beside him; she too started to choke on her own air.

Twilight’s eyes finally fell on the mare sitting with a blank expression right next to Cadance. Said mare had a clear, pristine face, punctuated by the vibrant gradient of cerise and violet that was her mane. An arctic blue stripe completed the pattern.

“Crystal Faire…” Twilight quivered. “It’s…. you…”

“When I was younger, yes,” Crystal Faire’s voice said. The voice itself seemed to come from all directions.

Twilight glanced around, looking for the source. “Wait… you can hear me?”

“Remember that I am sitting right next to you in the real world, Twilight.”

Twilight nodded. “So… this was the day of my funeral?”

“Yes.”

Twilight swallowed and centered her eyes back on the younger version of Crystal. “This… was when you lost me.”

A pause. And then, “Yes.”

Twilight watched as the casket reached the edge of the garden. She watched as, on the altar, Sunset broke down into sobs. Spike knelt down beside her and she, in turn, cried into him. That, in turn, provoked some tears in his eyes and he whimpered too.

“This was… one of the most important days of my life,” Crystal’s voice said.

Twilight swallowed. “This was when everything changed. You told me… that Equestria fell off a cliff after this.”

“This was the last that I ever saw of Auntie Sunset before she ran away,” Crystal’s voice said.

Twilight considered Sunset in full. She thought about the Sunset that she had been spending the last few days with. “…I see.” She turned and studied her mentor and how pale she looked. “What about Princess Celestia?”

“Locked herself in the castle for a month. Do you remember?”

Twilight hung her head. “I think I believe it.” She trotted over to where her closest family members sat. Her eyes fell on Shining Armor, and she regarded him with a frown. I remember… Crystal, you told me… you lost him not long after this… She reached out and stroked his cheek, even as her hoof passed right through him. I’m so sorry…

In the next moment, Cadance stood up. She cast one hardened glance at Crystal and then led Shining Armor toward the aisle. Crystal didn’t even bat an eye or so much as even respond.

“I think that my parents had their ideas about how it happened,” Crystal’s voice said. “My mother more than my father. They thought that I might have been what caused Auntie Twilight’s death. They thought… that my predicting it had made it come true.”

Twilight watched as Cadance and Shining Armor filed into the line of ponies now making their way toward the door. Sunset and Spike stepped off the stage and joined them.

The younger Crystal remained sitting down.

“And did you?” Twilight asked.

After a moment, Crystal sighed and stood up. Most ponies had already filed or flew out of the garden. She, however, took the rear of the ponies on the ground. She stared forward without a hint of any change in her expression.

“I think about that a lot. I didn’t fully comprehend my ability to shape the future back then. It was not by my hoof, I promise you… But I saw a future where it happened, and it came true.”

Twilight walked right behind Crystal. Her eyes shifted between her and Cadance further up. “I can see it. Cadance…”

Twilight’s world turned white and she was a consciousness again. A split second later, she suddenly could feel herself again and she had to shake the residual effects of the potion out of her sight. She blinked through blurred vision and found herself standing in one of the rooms in the Crystal Empire.

Twilight turned to find Crystal Faire sitting in silence on a singular cushion in front of an unlit fireplace. Daytime sun streamed through the tall windows and lit her face. An open notebook lay in front of her. Crystal paused to jot something down into it and then resumed her quiet pondering.

The decorations had been changed around, but Twilight recognized the room nonetheless. She trotted over to Crystal.

The door opened and Cadance stepped through. Twilight got a good look at her; Cadance stood tall and regally and every step that she took was smooth and graceful. It wasn’t like the casual stride that Twilight knew Cadance for. Her eyes turned toward Cadance’s golden regalia which was large and ornate and practically sparkled in the light.

Crystal briefly glanced up from her notebook. “Mother.”

“Crystal,” Cadance replied. She closed the door behind her and trotted toward the window. “I went and visited your father. The flowers from last month were still in the headstone.”

Crystal vacantly nodded.

Cadance adjusted one of the window curtains, redid a knot, and then sighed. “You should have gone.”

Crystal returned her quill into the inkwell right beside her notebook and said nothing.

Cadance paused and stared in thought. It seemed like at least a minute passed by. And then Cadance shook her head and trotted forward. “Crystal, I’ve been thinking that it’s time we got you out of the castle.”

“I don’t want to go out of the castle,” Crystal curtly replied. “You know this.”

“But you can’t just stay here all day and night,” Cadance replied. “We have to get you out of this castle.”

Crystal groaned and fixed her gaze on her writings.

“You’re not happy here,” Cadance continued. “Everypony can see that.”

“But every bit of good that I can do, I can do from right here. And besides… there’s still nothing for me out there.”

“There’s nothing for you out there because you haven’t gone out there to find things for yourself!”

“I already know what’s out there!” Crystal exclaimed. “I can see it all just fine from here. And you know what I see? Terrible things! Unspeakable things! I see disasters and atrocities on the horizon, and no matter what I do to try and take care of them, it’s not enough; there’re always more.”

Crystal snapped the notebook shut with her magic and stood up. “And that’s a thing all in itself. Now say I go out there and I find something or somepony. Ignoring the fact that I could already see myself losing them well before it even happens, what’s not to say that yet another atrocity comes along… or that I see another atrocity and thus make it so? Would I then lose them just like I did with Father? Just like I did with Auntie Twilight?”

Cadance narrowed her eyes. “That wasn’t your fault.”

“It could have been,” Crystal countered. “They could be dead because of this cursed power…”

Cadance stomped her hoof. “Crystal, you know that I don’t blame you for it. You can’t help your power. I know that better than anypony.”

Crystal stared for several moments. She quivered. Her eyes drew toward a nearby shelf where several bottles, all arranged in a neat row, idly sat. Dark blue-colored clouds swirled about within them. She considered those clouds for a few moments and then finally sighed and trotted toward the door, levitating her notebook, quill, and inkwell behind her.

Cadance, after a slight pause, considered the bottles as well and then whirled around. “Crystal! Please! Just listen to me! Power or no power, that doesn’t change the fact that you’re not happy here.”

Crystal paused.

“I know you’re trying to use the power to help out however you can, and I have no doubt that you’re doing good. But you have to have a life, Crystal. You need friends.” Cadance threw her hooves into the air with an exasperated groan. “What would Twilight say if she were here?”

Twilight nodded. “That’s exactly what I would say, huh?” She turned her attention to Crystal and studied the movement of Crystal’s face.

Crystal turned just enough to consider Cadance out of the corner of her eye. “Mother…”

“My highest priority has been your happiness. You know that I’ve tried and tried and tried what I could to help you deal with your problems. I think I’ve done a good job,” Cadance said as she pointed to herself. “And you need help again. Please, Crystal, let me help you.”

Twilight watched the two for a few more moments before her world went white again. When it faded out again, she found herself back on the bench in Canterlot. She blinked the disorientation out of her eyes.

She looked back up to Crystal next to her. This Crystal had all the features that she remembered. Crystal was glancing toward the middle of the street, and so Twilight turned as well. There, she saw two ponies making their way across.

She recognized Princess Luna. The other was a bright-eyed and bushy-tailed earth filly with a pink coat and a purple mane. The both of them glanced over at Crystal and Twilight and paused.

Twilight gave a meek wave and Crystal nodded. They nodded back and then continued walking.

Twilight frowned. “Princess Luna…”

“And her apprentice,” Crystal replied.

“Wow, imagine that. She’s come a long way from being Nightmare Moon,” Twilight said. She paused for a moment. “I want to imagine she didn’t have many friends before she turned. Maybe that’s part of why she turned bad in the first place.” She paused again. “That’s why Starlight turned. It could be why Sunset turned... I’m sure there are others, too…”

Crystal didn’t say anything. She averted her gaze instead.

Twilight’s expression hardened and she glanced up. “Friends are so important, Crystal. I know I would have taught you that.”

Crystal sighed through her nose. “Well… after losing you, I could not be of that mind anymore.”

Twilight opened her mouth to speak but found nothing to say. She deflated instead and nodded solemnly.

Crystal shook her head. “But perhaps… turning my back on your advice, and my mother’s advice… was what set the stage.”

Twilight raised an eyebrow. “How so?”

After a moment, Crystal gave the flask sitting between them a nudge.

Twilight sighed and lifted the flask with her magic again. She took a few sips like she had last time.

A few seconds later, Twilight’s world went white again. When her senses came to, she found herself standing in the Crystal Empire again. Twilight felt the hard street underhoof and turned to find a hoofful of ponies standing underneath the legs of the palace.

The Crystal Heart idly hung in place. It, however, contained some colors that Twilight knew weren’t normally there; shades of green and purple swirled around its insides and the crystal itself had a reddish tint to it. The colors fused together to create a ghastly effect, and Twilight inwardly thanked the potion for not subjecting her to its aura.

Twilight swallowed and trotted into the fray. Cadance spoke with a few of her guards plus, judging from his starry cloak and his long and vermillion goatee, Sunburst. Their tones were hushed, and they kept close together.

And Twilight could see flickers of that same green and purple light in their eyes.

“What is this?” Twilight asked aloud.

“Watch,” Crystal Faire’s voice replied.

“Mother!” called a voice from above. That young and fair Crystal Faire who Twilight had seen before touched down amongst the crowd. “Mother, stop!”

All eyes turned to Crystal, and all conversations large and small died off.

“You must already be aware of what we’re dealing with, Crystal,” Cadance said as she stepped forward. “There is something wrong with the Crystal Heart. We have to fix it.”

“I know! I’ve seen it,” Crystal replied. “But you can’t do it like this.”

“Firing it off will get all of the contamination out of it,” Cadance countered. “We have to do this, or the Crystal Heart will go inert, and this land will succumb to the frozen north!”

Crystal stamped her hoof. “Yes, but firing it off will spread all that negativity to the rest of Equestria instead! The country is ruined enough as it is!”

“As you would know, Crystal Faire, as it is your fault that it is this way!”

Both Twilight and Crystal gasped.

“She did not just say that…” Twilight croaked whilst pulling on her own mane. “She didn’t… Cadance wouldn’t say that…”

Crystal’s eyes darted toward the Crystal Heart and she swallowed. “You… you would never say that.”

“She’s right!” Twilight exclaimed. “That’s not the Cadance that I know! The Cadance that I know is sweet and kind, and she’d never say anything like that to her own daughter.”

“It’s the Heart, Twilight,” Crystal’s voice said. “It infected Mother’s mind and the minds of everypony else. They aren’t thinking correctly at this moment.”

“Listen to me!” Crystal cried. “You still can’t! I can see what’s going to happen! It doesn’t end well for everypony!”

Cadance frowned again and stood at her full height. “That simply is not true.”

“It is! You know better than anypony.”

Cadance frowned. “Crystal… I do know better than that. You would have seen this coming. And if this was a disaster and you actually didn’t want it to happen…” Cadance leaned into Crystal’s muzzle and said, “you would never have let it happen to begin with.”

A few others nodded as well.

“N-no, you don’t understand…” Crystal stammered.

“I understand perfectly well!” Cadance replied, now starting to look red in the face.

“The… the Crystal Heart is clouding your mind! You have to snap out of it and realize that this is putting everypony in grave danger!”

“Crystal…”

“Please… please…” Crystal cupped both of her forehooves together and said, “I am begging you to not fire off the Heart. There has to be another way.”

“Enough!” Cadance exclaimed as she threw a foreleg into the air. “Crystal Faire, you will return to the castle at once!”

Crystal’s jaw dropped and she shot back to her hooves. “Mother!”

“That is an order!”

The other ponies in the vicinity of the Heart glowered in Crystal’s direction with the intensity of a thousand sets of eyes.

Crystal opened her mouth to speak but bent under their stares. She took a step backward and then two. The color drained from her face and she still looked like she wanted to say something.

Twilight wanted her to say something.

Crystal, with tears in her eyes, took flight. She arced upward and flew onto a balcony further up the crystal spire where she disappeared inside.

“Goodness…” Twilight whispered. “That’s… that’s wrong. That’s so wrong.” She turned her attention back toward the group of ponies gathered around the Heart who were now returning to their earlier conversations. She turned her attention back to the Crystal Heart which still contained the evil energies.

“I was powerless to convince them otherwise. I didn’t know how to extract the energy myself at the time,” Crystal’s voice said. “I’ve since learned.”

Twilight’s lip quivered, and she turned her eyes back in the direction that Crystal had flown off to. “I… do see some part of Cadance’s logic, Crystal. I would think that you would have prevented the magic from getting inside it in the first place, right?”

“Well…”

Twilight raised an eyebrow. “Crystal?”

There was no response for a few moments. And then, “It’s like I’ve said before, Twilight: I’m not a perfect pony. I make mistakes from time to time. The bottom line is that it did happen. What you just saw was what happened.”

Twilight frowned and turned her attention back to the Heart. She stared at it even as her world turned white again and she became a consciousness once more.

Her senses came rushing back, and Twilight found herself standing within the interior of the Crystal Empire again. It seemed like she had been standing in it just a few minutes ago, but Twilight guessed that a significant amount of time had passed since the last she saw it; the shelf of cloud-filled bottles now sat empty.

Twilight spotted Crystal frantically pacing in front of the windows. She trotted over in her direction.

“What do I do?” Crystal sputtered. “What do I do? What do I do? Ohhhhhh!”

“I knew I had to stop it,” Crystal’s voice said. “I knew that I had to think of something and fast.”

“What do I do? What do I do?”

Twilight watched as Crystal paced and then she trotted toward the window, passing right through Crystal in the process.

“This is all my fault,” Crystal muttered. “This is all my fault. This should not have happened…”

Twilight glanced out the window. The streets looked normal with crystal ponies trotted about and talking with each other. She couldn’t see any smiles, though. She imagined that, somewhere underneath her, the Crystal Heart was floating in its place.

She then heard some voice from outside. With the way it echoed across the city, Twilight guessed that there was some loudspeaker somewhere, likely on the castle itself. The windows muffled the sound, but Twilight could tell just from the flowing, adenoidal tones that it was Cadance speaking.

Crystal shot over to the window. Her eyes darted over every corner of the city outside.

Twilight spotted all the crystal ponies below turning and facing the castle. She frowned. “They’re all turning this way,” she said.

“Yes,” Crystal’s voice said. “Time was running out.”

“No… no no no!” Crystal exclaimed as she banged a hoof against the glass.

Twilight furrowed her brow as she watched the scene but she said nothing.

Crystal stood watching the crowds below for several long moments. Her ears flicked with every inflection of Cadance’s muffled speech. With each passing second, her dismayed frown disappeared until she finally nodded to herself and whirled away from the window. She bolted for the door, all but threw it off its hinges, and then dashed into the hall.

Twilight flapped her wings and took off behind her. “I still don’t understand, Crystal, how does this lead to your reality collapsing?”

The halls in front of her wound left and right and in several directions. Crystal was a little bit faster than Twilight was, but Twilight knew her way around just enough to predict what path Crystal would take.

“Truth be told, in all of these years… I’ve never had a concrete answer,” Crystal’s voice replied.

Twilight cut a corner closer than Crystal did which helped to close the distance.

“I’ve always known that I was special. I’ve always known that I was an anomaly. I’ve had the ability to see the realities since birth. And as far as I know, I’m the only one who has ever been able to do that.”

Crystal bolted up a set of stairs on the right. Twilight, still flying behind her, followed suit.

“And lo, the multiverse changes and reacts to my presence. That is how I can change timelines for the better. But perhaps existence is shaped like it is because I exist… Maybe the multiverse is discontinuous because I exist.”

Twilight frowned. “That has serious implications if it’s true, Crystal.”

“I know.”

“But I still don’t see it,” Twilight continued. “How…?”

The two arrived in a short hall full of doors. At one end of the hall was a pair of double doors at least twice the height and width of those doors on either side of the hall; a pair of guards stood in front of them. Crystal instead turned in the other direction which immediately opened onto an open-air balcony that looked over the city. Crystal rushed over, steadied herself against the banister, and looked up at the tip of the castle.

Twilight flew past Crystal so she could examine the city below. More and more ponies were gathering in the streets. Cadance’s voice was much clearer now, but Twilight paid the speech no mind. She examined the surrounding lands which, while slightly grayed, looked just like she remembered.

Crystal shot straight into the air. Twilight watched and then took off behind her. Crystal outpaced Twilight by a good amount but never left her sight. That was enough.

How long was it before the citizens of the Crystal Empire powered up the Heart? How long was it until, supposedly, Equestria was ruined?

Even Twilight felt her heart quicken despite knowing that what she was experiencing wasn’t real. At least, it hadn’t been real to her.

Twilight saw Crystal pick a spot just above the top-most spire. Crystal whirled around and stared down at the castle. As Twilight herself closed in, she started to study the terrified expression on Crystal’s face.

Twilight came up right beside Crystal and looked down herself. She drew a path with her eyes between the spire and the pony above it, and then she gasped. “Oh my gosh… You’re floating right where the beam will be.”

“At the time,” Crystal’s voice said, “I figured that, between me and my alicorn magic, I could absorb what came out. I thought it would be the last thing I ever did… I foresaw it.”

Twilight whirled around as the streets below began to glow. She could see crystal ponies everywhere bowing as energy circulated about. The glow spread across the city, accenting its snowflake-like layout. And then the glow retreated.

And Twilight could hear a crackling down below. She could see a greenish glow in the space below the castle where the Heart rested. Her heart sank.

Crystal sniffled and wiped some tears off her face and then straightened up. Her expression firmed up and she, despite the redness in her face, looked like a regal princess.

“But what if I was wrong? What if there was more to me than I could have ever conceived?”

Twilight sucked in a breath but continued watching nonetheless.

“What if I really am an anomaly? What if I am an error in the multiverse?”

The next moment, the entire castle glowed white as energy swam up its body. There was a brief flash of light at the tip of the castle, and then a multicolored beam shot straight out of it.

“How does that one imperfection… that one point of weakness… change everything?”

The beam shot straight into Crystal’s chest. Crystal buckled and writhed in the split second that the beam made contact. She convulsed for longer than Twilight expected or could bear to watch. But Twilight had barely looked away when an agonized scream escaped from Crystal’s mouth.

And then Twilight heard a loud boom and whirled around. The Crystal Empire itself remained as it had before, but it seemed that, at that moment, everything beyond a few kilometers out suddenly shattered into a million pieces. Black overtook the sky in the places where stuff had once been. Even the very air itself seemed to disappear in the blink of an eye.

Alien sensations bombarded every inch of Twilight’s skin, and she shriveled up in response. She felt unwhole, even more so than she had previously. There had been a sense of weight to her body; that didn’t exist anymore. Everything started going numb, and Twilight realized that there was a ringing in her ears. Her insides churned and she felt the need to hurl.

“Oh my goodness,” Twilight wheezed.

Twilight wanted to flip over and look around but found herself unable to do so. There was no air to flap her wings against. She cocked her head instead so that she could see everything else. Her eyes followed along toward the point where the still-intact Crystal Empire and its surrounding lands abruptly ended. An endless expanse lay just outside its borders.

She was at a loss for words. She was at a loss for breath. She spotted towers within the endless expanse, each stretching to infinity in both directions.

She could feel the cold sweat drops forming on her brow, and she looked back at Crystal who now hung limply within the expanse. Her body glided away from the Crystal Empire in a direction, Twilight was sure, would eventually meet with one of those infinitely tall towers.

And slowly but surely, Crystal opened her eyes. Her dazed expression stifled any reaction that she might have had. Crystal blinked and briefly glanced around. Her eyes passed over the castle, the grounds, the surrounding countryside, and then into the expanse.

Crystal grunted and fell unconscious again.

Twilight’s world turned white again and then she found herself sitting back on the bench. Twilight felt herself to make sure that she was whole, ran her eyes over Canterlot to make sure that it existed, and then she turned her attention to the Crystal that she was familiar with.

Crystal still sat next to her, but at the moment, she stared into space. “The next time I regained consciousness, I was already in another timeline who knows where. I may have drifted for a while and fallen into some timeline like Celestia did. But I can’t say for sure.”

Twilight shivered and nodded solemnly.

“All I can say now is that, after that, I was able to use the travel power.” Crystal shook her head. “But my timeline was gone.”

Twilight sighed and folded her hooves together. “I-I… I just don’t know what to say.”

Crystal sucked in a breath and shook her head. “I never expected that I’d ever have to face my past again. And certainly not like this. I don’t know what I’m going to do. I know that I’ll have to figure out something.”

Twilight tried to crack a smile. “Well, at least you might get to see them again, Cadance especially. You told me that you’ve been wanting to do that.”

Crystal chuckled. “That is true. It’s… an interesting possibility… But I still need to process everything first.”

“Absolutely.”

Crystal went quiet for a few moments. It was just long enough for Twilight’s smile to fade into a more neutral expression.

I’ll have to ask Princess Celestia more questions when we get back, she thought. There’s a lot about all of this that I’d like to make sense of too.

“But Twilight…” Crystal began, “I do think…”

“Hmmm?”

“It’s as I’ve said… collapsed timelines beget more collapsing timelines. It’s a chain reaction. And in the past… I’ve convinced myself that what you just saw was just a coincidence.”

Twilight frowned and waited for Crystal to continue.

Crystal swallowed and said, “But now I have to wonder… if it wasn’t.”

Twilight’s frown deepened.

Crystal turned her head and met Twilight in the eyes. “My presence shapes the multiverse around me. It is the way it is right now because of me. So what if everything else is too? What if my timeline collapsing… what if this business with the multiverse dying… started with me?”

Comments

[Titan Commander Sebaste]

Holy throne....

[EchoWing]

The idea that this collapse is Crystal Faire's fault is interesting, but down right terrifying. And I'm scared to find out how the Crystal Heart ended up becoming corrupted.

[EverfreeSparkle]

Hmm, it seems Cadence is still under the infulence of the corrupted Crystal Heart. Calling herself 'Queen of the Multiverse' is pretty OOC and thus she must be evil.

[terrycloth]

8511081
Everyone knows queens are evil.

[Razzy]

Hah, knew it, that much power in anyone's grasp is bad news.

8513540 More like Queens are awesome. Well, at least one glorious chitinous queen.

[Csquared08]

Oh my.