Master of the Dark Arts
Sunburst lay his scroll flat across the table. Twilight Sparkle stood at his side, looking over the unfamiliar text and penned images of ponies accomplishing various feats. The one pony who most often appeared was a mare with a green coat and reddish mane, cloaked from head-to-tail in a heavy cape and dark hood. The famed Clover the Clever, perhaps? The second greatest wizard known to Equestrian history—personal student of Starswirl the Bearded. While Starswirl was famed for the invention of countless spells, Clover was respected for completing much of his work.
Or so she’d been told on the car ride to the hospital. It was a crude, quick info-dump to catch her up on the bare minimum history had to offer. Just a little something to let her know where the Memory Stone had come from.
Even that left her a little lost. “Soooo… Clover the Cleaver didn’t—”
“Clever,” Sunburst corrected.
“Misspoke. Clover didn’t make the Memory Stone.”
“That’s right, though she was most certainly familiar with its usage.” Sunburst touched his glasses as his eyes scanned the ancient language dotting the scroll. “It was invented by a master of the Dark Arts, who had gained his knowledge from King Sombra himself. An evil wizard known as Archmage Cithara.”
Twilight tapped her foot. “And in your world, Sombra was an evil dictator.”
“That’s correct.”
“And also a powerful mage of… what the hey are the ‘Dark Arts?’” Twilight Sparkle crossed her arms. “Don’t tell me necromancy exists.”
“Not the kind you’d think…” Princess Twilight sat in a nearby chair, reading from a tome Sunburst had brought over. “The Dark Arts include mind-control magic, including emotional manipulation. The use of magic-formed crystals as a weapon. Genetic splicing experiments. Transferring lifeforce from one person to another.” The princess waved a hand at the table. “Theft of memories…”
Twilight looked further down the scroll to see another pony depicted as a pink-coated, purple-haired, wizard-looking son of a gun. “I see. So basically anything that can cause bodily harm?”
“I wouldn’t go that far.” Princess Twilight closed the book and sat up. “A fireball can kill somebody. I know dozens of spells that can be deadly if misused. These Dark Arts in particular have been singled out as cruel and unusual. Warping both the caster and the victim.”
Twilight looked at the Memory Stone, which sat on the table not two feet away. She figured she’d feel more comfortable with a live bomb in the room. “So Clover went after this… Archmage Cithara. What happened?”
Sunburst pointed further along the scroll to get Twilight’s attention. “It says Clover was always several steps behind Cithara because every time she got close, he would use the Memory Stone to wipe her memory. Once she realized this, she began to leave herself notes in order to keep on his trail. Eventually, she chased him all the way through one of Starswirl’s mirrors into an entirely different world. Cithara got away…” He nodded at the stone. “But Clover the Clever captured the stone. After studying it, she realized that it was too dangerous to keep around. She hid it in this world, because she believed that the ambient magic was too low for the local population to figure out how to use it. She thought it lost forever.”
“But then Wallflower Blush found it, and the rest is history.” Twilight Sparkle idly scratched Little Spike’s head. He muttered a bit, but allowed it to continue. “So did Clover leave notes about how it works? Can we save Moondancer?”
Princess Twilight pressed her lips together.
Twilight raised an eyebrow. “Out with it.”
“We do understand it. On an intellectual level.” Princess Twilight tapped the tips of her fingers together. “Unfortunately, neither I nor Sunburst can activate it in this world.”
Twilight frowned. She could see where things were going, but she didn’t want to admit it. “So, Celestia?”
Sunburst cleared his throat, evidently annoyed at her informality. “Princess Celestia is in the same boat as we are. Our bodies aren’t used to working with the low ambient magic in this world.”
Twilight bared her teeth in a shallow grimace. “You can’t possibly—”
“You know it’s the right choice, Twilight,” Little Spike said. “You’re the only one out of the bunch of us who understands magic on both an intellectual and practical level. And Sunset’s halfway across the world.”
“Don’t remind me.” Twilight threaded her fingers through her hair. She stopped at her loose ponytail. “How am I supposed to figure it out? I can’t read that chicken scratch.”
“No,” Sunburst said, adjusting his robe with a confident tug. “But I can. I’ll explain it to you. I work as a teacher for a living, you know.”
“And we know you’re able to learn.” Little Spike smiled, his tail wagging up a storm. “Or have you not been trying to learn how to teleport the past couple of weeks?”
Princess Twilight’s head popped up, her eyes widening. “How’re you doing with that?”
“Terrible. I can’t get in the right mindset.” Twilight winced, peering at an image of the evil mage Cithara using the Memory Stone on Clover. “Speaking of which… what sorta emotion drives the Stone?”
Sunburst glanced at the princess, who nodded. “We think it’s fear. Abject terror, to be precise.”
“Oh, good.” Twilight sighed, rubbing the corners of her eyes. “I was worried it was going to be a difficult emotion to replicate.”
***
Moondancer lay in bed, surrounded by instruments decoding her body’s maladies. The brain waves were slow, unsteady. She had been completely drained. Near lifeless. Her brilliant mind empty of information.
And still, Twilight Sparkle thought it to be her fault. If only she’d been there for Moondancer. If only she’d told her of magic, just a few years sooner. If only…
She had one chance to make it up to her.
She held the Memory Stone in her hands. A terrifying weapon. A deadly instrument. Everything in her soul told her to drop it and run as fast as her legs could carry her. It was evil, designed to cause nothing but pain. It was useless even for self-defense, only able to completely demolish the unsuspecting.
Princess Twilight and Sunburst stood behind her, while Chief Carrot and Caution waited at the door. Twilight breathed slowly as she sought to control herself. She couldn’t hope to use the stone if she couldn’t keep a hold of her own body.
She felt the magic within the stone. Two distinct sources, one Moondancer’s, the other Wallflower’s. Releasing the stone’s grip would set the both of them free.
Courage is doing the right thing even when you’re scared. Twilight held tight to the platitudes she’d been taught in her younger years. They rang hollow these days. Just jump right in, it’ll be over before you know it. It’s never as bad as you imagine it will be.
“T-Twilight Sparkle, Master of the Dark Arts,” she muttered under her breath. “Has a n-nice ring to it.”
Lies. Lies. Terrible, terrible lies.
Sonata Dusk appeared to the right of the hospital bed, cackling with a wet cough. She pulled her shirt aside to reveal the five bullet-holes Twilight had put in her chest. “I can’t help but admire the marksmanship.”
Twilight shrieked and dropped the stone. Little Spike slid on his back to catch the thing with his belly before it could shatter against the ground. Twilight stumbled back against Sunburst, who caught her before she could fall.
When she next opened her eyes, the apparition of Sonata was nowhere to be seen. Not a trace of it anywhere. The princess swung in front of her, looked in each of her eyes, then swore beneath her breath.
“It’s got some sort of protective spell on it,” the princess growled. “Low-level mind-control magic. Looks like a hallucinogen. Did you see something?”
“Oh God, did I see some sh—” Twilight’s eyes snapped to the princess. “Hallucinogen?”
“That’s what I said.”
“Maybe it’s not a protective spell.” Twilight eased away from an awkwardly-blushing Sunburst. She knelt down to stare at the Memory Stone on Little Spike’s chest. “Maybe it’s there to help the spell along.”
Sunburst twirled his goatee with a finger. “Inducing terror in order to help power the spell. Ingenious. And stupidly dangerous, but mostly ingenious.”
Twilight looked down and noticed that Little Spike had his eyes locked on an empty corner of the room. “Spike?”
She grasped the Memory Stone with a telekinetic spell and lifted it out of his paws. He blinked, shaking his head with a sickly look around his muzzle. He rolled to his feet and leaned heavily against Princess Twilight’s leg.
The princess patted the side of his head. “What did you see, Spike?”
“Z—” He cleared his throat. “Zephyr.”
Sunburst frowned. “Fluttershy’s brother?”
“Not Zephyr Breeze, it’s a different—” He waved a paw. “It’s nothing.”
Twilight called the stone back to her hand. Sonata Dusk leaned against her back, breathing in her ear. “Didn’t think you were gonna get rid of me that easy, didja?”
“Sunburst?’ Twilight said.
“Yeah?”
“Show me the spell components right the hell now.”
Sunburst raised his hands. His fingertips glowed bright, and symbols flashed through the air. They swirled in front of Twilight’s vision, mingling with the rictus-like grin of Sonata’s ghoul. Prickles ran up and down her spine, reaching even to the ends of her limbs.
“Tsk, tsk,” Sonata said. “No open-casket funeral for me. Thanks for that, Twily.”
Twilight forced herself to focus on the first step in the spell. She sent magic pumping from her thundering heart to her hands, where her fingernails glistened a brilliant purple. The subtle glow within the Memory Stone shifted hue to match. She felt Moondancer and Wallflower’s memories even more clearly now, both of them struggling for survival within the evil artifact.
“I’m most impressed with how downright cold you were.” Sonata giggled and traced a fingertip across Twilight’s collar bones. “Gunning me down so emotionlessly and ruthlessly. I never had a chance.”
The next three spell components had to be activated in quick succession. Electricity, motion, and a distinct location. The electricity had the most to do with synapses, the neural chemicals, the very thing thoughts were made of. The motion was leading the memories out of the Memory Stone and into their true owners. The location? That was finding exactly where the gaps lay in Moondancer’s mind… and Wallflower’s. It wasn’t too difficult, as the memories had the same shape as the holes they left behind.
Blood leaked from Sonata’s tear ducts as she reached a gaunt hand towards Twilight’s face. “It’s just too bad that, in the end, I took your rutting dog with me!”
“Shut up!” Twilight’s shout jolted everyone present. A final flash shone from the Memory Stone, and then the artifact was dark and silent. Little Spike once again dove to save it before it could shatter against the floor. This time, he was quick to return it to a nearby backpack before it could work its horrific magic on him.
Sonata wasn’t there. Twilight forced herself to believe it. She had been cremated. Buried in a public cemetery. She couldn’t hurt anybody anymore. She opened her eyes and was rewarded with a much more sane view of reality. No hallucinations. No undead sirens prowling her waking moments.
She caught a weak voice rising up from the bed, mingling weariness and uncertainty. “Twilight?”
She walked to the bedside. Moondancer stirred, lifting a hand a few inches only for it to fall to the sheet an instant later. She blinked upward at Twilight, with a look approaching awe shining in her unfocused eyes. “Twilight. As I suspected. I knew you could do it.”
“Moondancer?” Twilight tried and failed to swallow the lump in her throat. “You remember?”
“Yeah.” Moondancer bobbed her head, her eyes squinting to try and sharpen her focus. “I knew you’d be able to fight whatever magic that woman had. Even if it meant…” She lay her head back and stared at the plain white ceiling. “That doesn’t matter. Of course you’d find a way to save me, too.”
Little Spike polished a claw against his fuzzy chest. “With a little help.”
Moondancer blinked at the other visitors. “Who… else is here?”
Caution poked his head into the room, bluster and bravado obscuring the tremble in his voice. “Chief Carrot an’ oi are glad yah pulled through, Moony. Takes more than some offbeat witch to keep Canterlot City’s Finest down!”
Chief Care Carrot rapped her knuckles on the doorframe. “Luckily, Twilight had some out of town friends who were able to help out. A—um—Professor Sunburst, Mr. Spike, and Princess…” She shrugged and gave Twilight a beseeching grimace.
“Her name’s Princess Twilight…” Twilight Sparkle help up her hands to stall Moondancer’s question. “I know things aren’t going to make sense at first. Believe me, I’m still trying to figure it out. But I want you to know…” She sighed, clasping her hands in front of her waist. She looked away from Moondancer’s searching eyes. “This time, I’m not going to leave you behind. Never again. You deserve so much better.”
Moondancer said nothing for a heavy moment.
Twilight took a step back and rubbed a forearm. “I’m going to show you what I’ve found about out magic. We’ll discover it together. Just like we promised.”
Moondancer nodded slowly. “I’ll hold you to that, Sparkle.”
She glanced across the room to the open door. “On that note, Chief Carrot, I no longer thing we have enough evidence to label Twilight Sparkle as a suspect.”
“I’ll take note of that.” Care jerked her head towards the hall. “On that note, Princess, if what you said is true, then Wallflower Blush just had the same sort of wake-up call that Moondancer did.”
“That is correct.” Princess Twilight strode out of the room with a steely gait to her step. Little Spike and Sunburst hurried to catch up, with Twilight and the police officers bringing up the rear. “We should hurry. I trust Skyhook’s skill, and the others, too, but I doubt they have the strength to stand up to someone with the proportional strength of a trained earth pony miner.”
Twilight spared Moondancer a final glance, waving a goodbye. Moondancer waved in return. A tiny knot in Twilight’s back unwound.
It swiftly tangled itself back up a few minutes later as a room with armed guards loomed into view. Skyhook saluted at Princess Twilight’s approach, though he kept his yellow eyes locked on the bed that held their prisoner. A couple of officers Twilight knew settled for a terse nod, their hands hovering around their weapons.
Wallflower Blush lay locked to the bed. The straps that bound her looked absolutely pathetic after seeing her rend aluminum and steel asunder, to put it lightly. She could have snapped every one without even flexing her arms.
Her expression? Equally intimidating. She glared at Skyhook with the intensity of a dragon guarding its hoard. She ignored the doctor as he bustled around the room, sweat beneath his collar.
“—A fractured collar bone, four broken ribs, a dislocated shoulder, a broken wrist, minor internal bleeding.” Dr Fine presented his findings to Care Carrot with a minimum of noise, as if he was afraid of drawing Wallflower’s attention. “And the aforementioned memory loss. She looks like she was hit by a car.”
“She was.” Care raised an eyebrow. “In a manner of speaking.”
“Yes, yes, very funny, hit with a car.” His eyes flicked to Twilight and the princess, his frown deepening by the moment. “But you were correct. At the time you indicated, her brain patterns returned to normal, and she began to gain a heightened awareness. As you can see—” He gestured to the patient with a jerk of his hand. “—she has regained enough mental capacity to hate.”
He passed the full report to Care and gave her a mock salute as he walked down the hall. “In the meantime, the operations were successful. She should be able to answer questions.” He gave the room a final nervous glance. “Once she gets an attorney.”
“Already on it,” Care muttered. “Haven’t heard back from the agency yet. Gotta ask her if she’s got one of her own or if she needs one assigned.”
Wallflower’s death stare swiveled as Twilight entered the room. Hate melted away as Princess Twilight entered next. Her mouth fell open, but she had nothing to say. The only thought she could possibly relate was complete disbelief.
Care Carrot spoke up, “Have you been read your rights?” but Wallflower ignored her, eyes glued to the princess.
“Hello again,” Twilight said. “We’d like to ask you a few questions.”
Wallflower’s mouth snapped shut. She groaned as pain shot through her bandaged body. “Join the club.”
“Have you been read your rights?” Care repeated. She placed her hands on her hips and heaved a sigh. “You’re under arrest for several accounts of assault and battery.”
“An officer told me a minute ago.” Wallflower only spared Care the briefest of glances before returning to scrutinize the princess. Her eyes shifted, as if she were comparing her to Twilight. “Did you get me an attorney yet?”
“We’re… still working on that.”
The corners of the patient’s mouth turned down. “So I don’t have anything to say to you. Who is that?”
She pointed an accusing finger at Princess Twilight. The princess absently pawed her purple gemstone necklace. “I’m a friend of Twilight’s… and currently the owner of the magic artifact you stole.”
“I didn’t steal it.” Wallflower shook her head twice before realizing that doing so put too much pressure on her shoulders. “I’m not talking to anybody until you tell me who you really are.”
Little Spike pulled a pen from his bag to scribble notes. “Maybe she looks a little familiar to you?”
Wallflower’s eyes trailed down. They widened. “Did that dog just talk?”
Little Spike clicked his tongue twice, winking and pointing his pen. “You catch on quick, kid.”
“That’s enough, Spike.” Princess Twilight crossed her arms over her chest. Her attempt at an imperious stance was lost on Twilight, and Wallflower was still focused on Little Spike. “Very well. I am Princess Twilight Sparkle of Equestria, the land your artifact originates from. I am assisting in the investigation into the murder of Lady Raven Sombra Relámpago, and now your attack on the Party Favor Night Club.” She lowered her eyebrows as the names hit Wallflower. “I suspect these two instances are connected.”
Twilight had watched Wallflower when Raven’s name was brought up. It was that name, not references to Equestria or the artifact, that had brought her attention back to the princess. And the lied answer, “I don’t know what you’re talking about,” was unmistakable in the face of the truth.
“And I’m not saying anything until I get my lawyer.” Wallflower glowered. “Or do you people ignore due process when it suits you?”
“We’re booking you to the tune of seven eyewitnesses,” Care Carrot said, rolling her eyes. “Most of whom you assaulted, one of whom is a frickin’ police officer. Due process is gonna do you the most good if you cooperate.”
Wallflower Blush gave her a tight smirk. “I’ll be willing to cooperate. With a lawyer. I’m… short on funds at the moment, so…”
“Yeah, yeah, pro bono.” Care got the princess’ attention with a tap on the shoulder. “Let’s scoot. We’ll have to wait on getting somebody who’s willing to take on an unwinnable case.”
“Is there any chance I could ask you some questions off the record, Miss Blush?” Princess Twilight opened her bag just enough that Wallflower could see the Memory Stone. “I’m awfully curious where you found this.”
Wallflower lowered her eyebrows. “Are you kidding me?”
“All due respect, um, princess—” Chief Carrot walked around Princess Twilight’s side, putting herself ever-so-slightly between her and Wallflower. “Anything said ‘off the record’ just plain can’t be used in court. We’ll be much better off if we just wait for however long it’s gonna take.”
Princess Twilight zipped the bag up and passed it to Little Spike. “We aren’t exactly flush with time, captain.”
“It’s ‘Chief.’”
“Sorry. Right. Sorry.” The princess turned to Twilight with a tilted head, her expression loudly asking for Twilight to bring up some loophole or other.
Twilight had none. She left the room with the others following close behind. When they were out of Wallflower’s earshot, she muttered with a low voice. “We have other leads we can follow. I’ll get my scanners set up with Princess Celestia’s keepsake.”
Care nodded. “Yeah, and we’ve got a few people we can question from the Party Favor. Caution’s gonna take that little magic detector of yours and scout out a few places around the city.”
“He should take Skyhook with him,” Princess Twilight said. “He should have someone on hand who can handle magic if they encounter it.”
“Fair enough.” Care touched a hand to Twilight’s shoulder, looking her in the eye. “You gonna be okay on your own?”
“The princess and Little Spike—"
“Don’t call me Little Spike.”
“—have equipment similar to mine.” Twilight gave the distorted dragon a wry smile. She was rewarded with a roll of his eyes. “They should be able to help me with the set-up.”
“Okay.” Care Carrot crossed her arms and blew a breath through pressed lips. “I guess we all know what we’ve gotta do, then.” She waved a hand to get Caution’s attention. “I just hope one of these leads actually means something, because I’m liable to blow a fuse out here.”
***
Dr. Twilight Sparkle sat across the table from Dulcimer, a cup of tea held lightly in her hand. She studied the man as he added a drizzle of honey to his own cup, his eyes alight with delight as he used his magic to maneuver the dipper. He turned one hand palm up, angling the dipper towards her. “Care for some?”
“No, thank you.” She blew steam from the cup. “I don’t like my tea to be too sweet.”
“Over-doctoring can indeed ruin a great many things.” He set the dipper down and levitated his spoon to smoothly stir his steaming beverage. “It’s often best to keep things… simple. Uncomplicated.”
She took a tender sip of the tea. Still far too hot. “You don’t seem to be an uncomplicated person to me.”
“It all depends on perspective.” He smiled at her, folding his hands beside the teacup. The cup itself rose in the air and hovered just beside his face. “What I want is uncomplicated. Where I come from, now that’s a story.”
Dr. Sparkle almost smirked. She felt much the same way about herself, if she was being honest. “You’ve already said what you want. Power overwhelming.”
“Which leaves my sordid backstory as the greatest mystery of your life?”
“I recognize that it’s important to learn as much about you as possible.” She gave the room another once-over to make sure they were truly alone. They were in her private laboratory, where very few people were ever invited to enter. The door was locked. Listening devices were absent. She could relax, if only on that front. “And see if it lines up with my plans.”
“I guarantee it.” He rubbed his short, purple goatee ever-so-slightly. “Though it seems unfair for me to bare my soul without knowing how you were able to—is ‘override’ the term?—override my spell.”
“I have a talent for deciphering magic spells and workings.” Dr. Twilight took another sip and found the tea a much friendlier experience this time. “When I saw what you were casting, I was able to devise a counter-spell that allowed me to match your perception of time. I subsequently modified it to be an ambient spell, so I will always be immune to your power.”
His smile faded, replaced with a wide-eyed stare that she couldn’t tell was in awe or frustration. “Well. I knew you were a genius, Twilight, but that is quite another thing entirely.”
“Correct.” Dr. Twilight couldn’t truly explain why, even to herself, but for some reason she took a special joy in bamboozling this man, if only in a small way. “Now, I believe it is your turn.”
Dulcimer recovered quickly on the surface. She still saw fire in his eyes, though what they wanted to burn, she couldn’t say. “Have you ever heard of someone named ‘Clover the Clever’?”
Dr. Sparkle frowned. She thought back through the history pages. There was a pony back in Equestria with the name “Clover the Careless,” but they mostly served as a humorous footnote to King Sombra’s founding of the country. “There’s somebody in Parliament named Clover Field…”
“No, no, not her.” He chuckled, waving a dismissive hand. “Clever she may be, but not that clever.” He took a long sip from his teacup, still laughing faintly. “No. The pony I’m referring to was a master wizard. A champion of magic. A hero.”
Dr. Twilight leaned her arms on the table and narrowed her gaze. “A pony, you say?”
“This coming from a visitor from ‘Equestria?’” He produced a bundle of paper from beneath his jacket and floated them over to Dr. Twilight on a glimmer of sparks. “Many, many years ago, she chased a fugitive from her world to this one. I thought originally that her world was yours, but if you’ve never heard of her…”
The paper was old. Aged and yellowed as though it was a hundred years old. The ink depicted the portrait of a middle-aged mare with twin braids, her head covered with a heavy hood. It almost looked like Clover the Careless. Almost.
“The fugitive was named Archmage Cithara, a disciple of a deposed king. Clover sought to end his line, metaphorically.” He gestured for her to look at the second page and onward. “Clover stole the artifacts he had brought with him, but he was able to give her the slip on a boat sailing from Libertas… to the Highborn Isles.”
“Where he met you and your grandmother?”
Dulcimer smirked, shaking his head. “This was way before our time. He wandered the Highborn Isles for years after that, keeping his interactions with society to a minimum. Hiding on remote islands too small to sustain communities.” He leaned back in his chair, pouring himself another cup of tea. “But word spread of a wizard wandering the wilderness, and so a woman sought him out for the same reason I sought you out.”
Dr. Twilight finished her cup and poured herself a second. The hard cakes they had gathered for their little teatime were tough and crusty, a far cry from the pastries she’d enjoyed back in Equestria. “To learn magic from a master.”
“This is where the twist comes in.” Dulcimer tapped the ends of his fingers together, trying and failing to conceal a smile. “The woman and the archmage eventually married and produced heirs. Over the centuries the family persisted, having knowledge of magic but unable to use it properly.”
The pages in Dr. Twilight’s hands eventually began to make sense. As she moved forward through them, the paper and the writing took on more a modern appearance. Every few pages, a new name was listed as the author, starting with Cithara and ending with a woman named Bow Dulcimer. Her page, in particular, laid out in exact detail the theoretical time-stop spell. “Bow was you grandmother.”
“So the evidence says.” Dulcimer bobbed his head in a shallow nod. “So now you know the origin of my knowledge. And since you come from a different world than the famed Clover the Clever, I also know that there is a third world in our little multiverse.”
“Yes,” Dr. Twilight said, studying the other pages for further theoretical spells. Much of it was plain and unambitious, but the spark of inspiration carried on through the ages. “One flowing with ambient magic and endless knowledge.”
“One that, dare I say, I have genetic roots in.” He leaned his elbows on the table, the fire in his eyes having cooled to embers of mischief. “You might say it’s where I truly belong. Perhaps the same can be said for a masterful mage like yourself?”
Dr. Twilight made a fist with one hand, hiding it beneath the table. She betrayed no emotion as she faced Dulcimer, despite the possibilities dancing in her head. “I have work that I’ve yet to complete here.”
Dulcimer grinned, unrestrained as though he were incapable of controlling his glee. “But you’ve been dreaming of this world, haven’t you? This garbage-fire of a world, with its lack of magic and its pollution and its endless war, can’t possibly have been your intended destination when you left your world behind.”
“You assume quite a bit, viscount.”
“Indeed I do.” He tapped his temple. “But I know much more than I assume. I’m right, aren’t I?”
“Coming here wasn’t my first choice.” She crossed one leg over the other and shook her head slowly. “But I can’t say I regret it.”
“No?” Dulcimer stood from his chair. He cupped his chin as he paced back and forth. “But surely you’ve thought of it. Surely you’ve considered it.” He turned to her, popping his mouth open as if something had just occurred to him. She didn’t buy it; he’d been leading up to this point. “Is Sunset Shimmer from your world or Cithara’s?”
When Dr. Twilight didn’t immediately answer, his smile faded in intensity, while his eyes took up the slack. “Surely she knows how to get back.”
The doctor gently stood from her chair and walked to Dulcimer’s side. Her eyes glimmered in the low light, casting aside the weakness in her eyes and showing her the magic that flowed through his fairy strings unabated. She waited to answer until he had completely calmed down, his face neutral, his eyes attentive.
“I am trying to earn her trust enough that she opens up to me.” Dr. Twilight stood tall and firm, her tone sharing the strength of her stance. “I will brook no aggression from you. I don’t know what you’re used to working with as Fancy Pants’ enforcer, but I prefer to take a softer approach.”
A smile tugged at the edge of his mouth. “I didn’t take you for a soft woman, Twilight.”
“I don’t appreciate dirtying my hands.” She put coldness into her voice, hoping it would seal her words as being final. “If you were to harm Sunset in any way, you would ruin everything Starlight’s been building. Even you have to understand how important this school is. To the students. To the entire world. I do plan on leaving this hellhole behind, yes, but only after I do what I can to make it better.”
He chuffed once in the back of his throat. He turned away from her gaze, and she thought she detected a hint of redness on his pink cheeks. “You know Fancy Pants wants to shut this place down, don’t you? It’s why he sent me here. To give him the slightest reason to bring the Highborn Isles government down on your heads.”
“It’s why you were sent.” Dr. Twilight waved her hand, a spell on her fingertips. The dishes and silverware flew through the room to a waiting sink, where they began to wash themselves. “But it’s not why you’re here.”
“Exactly.” Dulcimer gritted his teeth. He rubbed a temple as he stared at memories just out of sight. “I’ll keep the prime minister at bay for as long as I can, but our time is running out. He’ll catch on to me eventually. We have to make preparations now for when that happens.”
“Perhaps.” Dr. Sparkle returned to her seat and pointed to the chair beside her. “What did you have in mind?”
“If you truly want Starlight’s school to survive, she needs to know.” He took the offered place at the table, leaning on an elbow. “They need to find somewhere to escape from Fancy Pants. I think the best way to go about that would be this legendary third reality. This middle earth between your dismal existence and mine.”
Dr. Twilight considered that. Starlight Glimmer would be difficult to convince. Her goals had always revolved around fixing her old world. She might not agree with the thought of retreating to a new one. She was a fighter, with the intent to stand her ground wherever she found herself.
But she couldn’t fight an entire government, even if she’d been trying for years.
“I recommend that we discuss this with Sunset Shimmer,” Dulcimer said after a moment. “If she knows the situation, she might willingly lead the school to safety.”
“I know you’re right.” Dr. Twilight looked away from him, to the rest of the room.
Three glass tubes, each two meters in diameter, stood sentinel in the rear of the room. One was filled with an organic liquid mixture of her own devising, in which hung a series of thread-like golden lines. These threads formed the vague shape of a human, having two arms, two legs, a head, and a torso. A heart beat at the center, functional but no longer truly alive. Fairy strings, stripped from a poor soul back in Libertas.
What remained of Raven.
“There are… things she wouldn’t understand.” Dr. Twilight swallowed hard. “The longer we keep her in the dark, the better. The less she knows, the less she or Starlight will stumble on this.”
“We still need to find a way to travel to her world.” Dulcimer shrugged, glancing at the devices looming at the rear of the room. “How long until you have what you need for the ascension?”
“It depends.” The news that Wallflower had been captured stung her heart and frustrated her mind in equal measures. “It depends on how fast Neighsay works.”
“Time we might not have.” Dulcimer offered her a smile that didn’t seem genuine. There was too much anxiety hidden behind his expression. “Talk to Shimmer.”
Both of Dr. Twilight’s hands clenched beneath the table, out of sight. She forced them to relax and put them on the surface, though she couldn’t help but drum her fingers. “I don’t want to lose them, Dulcimer. Without Sunset and Starlight, there’s no chance for anything to work. Everything I’ve done will be worthless.”
Dulcimer shook his head. He reached out a hand to lay it atop hers. He gave her a gentle squeeze and spoke in a low voice. “I don’t believe in wasting time.”
Dr. Twilight looked at the hand held by his. Her glowing gaze trailed up his arm until she locked eyes with him. She saw the fire again and this time understood why it burned. Passion and determination. A one-track train of thought that rumbled towards a single destination.
She sighed through her nose and pulled her hand away from his. “Neither do I.”
Silence descended between them.
It was eventually broken by Dulcimer, who spoke calmly and succinctly, much to the doctor’s surprise. “Alright. Do you want me present when you speak with Starlight and Sunset?”
“No, I don’t think so.” She cupped her hands on her lap. “They’ll take the news better if they hear it from me.”
“Smart.” Dulcimer cracked a grin. “Alright. Let me know what comes of it. My limited resources are at your beck and call.”
“Thank you, Dulcimer.” A creeping sensation crawled up her back, as if the fairy strings suspended behind her were staring at her. She steepled her fingers and forced herself to focus on the moment, rather than the horizons already crossed. “If we remain careful, we’ll make it through.”
***
Shining Armor looked up from his toolbox at the sound of his name being shouted from across the shop floor, above the rumbling machinery and car engines being tested. The source of the voice was Scootaloo, his supervisor and sister-in-law. He waved to indicate he’d heard, then shut his box.
It was a short walk across the small car-repair shop to the office. As he was about to learn, it was altogether too short.
“When in the blue heck were you going to tell me about the attack?” Scootaloo jabbed her index finger right into his ribs. “I had to hear about it from Apple Bloom! Apple Bloom!”
Shining felt his face heat up by several orders of magnitude. He raised his hands half in surrender and half to ward off further attacks. “Look, Scootaloo, I didn’t mean—”
“When were you going to tell me? You think I don’t care what happens to our family or what?”
“No, that’s not the case!” He sent his gaze to the ceiling, begging for wisdom and mercy in equal measure. “I’m sorry, Scoots. I don’t even really know what the heck is going on, or who gets to know what, or even what to do half the time.”
Scootaloo shook her head, some of the wind taken out of her sails. She tossed her gloves onto her chair and rubbed her face with an oily hand. “‘Who gets to know’? You think I don’t know Sunset has weird magic pony powers? Kinda hard to grow up around her without noticing.”
“Yeah, and I can’t help but notice that we don’t.” He kneaded the back of his neck as the stress of the last few days tied his muscles in knots. Again. “I’m sorry. When Twilight became a suspect in a magic murder case, I went to help her investigate so we could clear her name. What we found was a crazy lady with memory-erasing powers. Now you know as much as I do.”
Scootaloo sat in an old office chair. Her gaze was smoldering, but the ire was no longer directed at Shining. “So you’re saying there’s nothing I can do to help.”
“We aren’t exactly kitted out to handle this sort of thing.”
“Well, I gotta do something!” Scootaloo’s fist—small compared to Shining’s, but still a mighty tool of justice—slammed on the desk. “Even if it’s just ‘shout, scream, and throw stuff at the freak who attack our family!’”
She sat there for a moment, her hand cradling her head. She jerked upright before Shining could fill the silence. “Can I come over today?” she asked, her forehead furrowing. “So I can at least help keep Sunny safe? Please? I just wanna feel like I’m contributing.”
Shining nodded, glad to have something he could give Scootaloo. If not reassurance, then purpose. “Yeah, that would be fine. We’re staying at the Apples’ until this whole thing’s done with. When we’re done with work, we can both head over. I’ll let them know you’re coming.”
“Alright. Good.” She leaned back, her arms limp at her sides. “I’m sorry for giving you a hard time. Not real respectful of me.”
“Just try not to bite my head off and we’ll call it even.” Shining turned for the door to get back to work. He paused before he could grab the handle. “I’ll keep you in the loop, Scootaloo. I promise.”
“Thanks, Chrome Dome.” Scootaloo sorted a few pages of paperwork on her desk. “I’ll hold you to that.”
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10497929
I suppose that's a way to look at it, but I actually feel the opposite about it. One of the benefits of having multiple writers on one project is you have that many more sets of eyes with which to spot issues, continuity or otherwise. That being said, I'm sure there's at least a couple of continuity problems that slipped past our nets, just as there may be some you've failed to notice in your work. It's a problem that's inevitable in projects of this scope, but as long as the readers don't notice/enjoy the story in spite of it, then it's fine!
Well that was interesting.
Huh. Interesting. So Sombra had an apprentice?
She has a point. I like that phrasing "I know dozens of spells that can be deadly if misused", but we KNOW Twilight wouldn't do that. Also, I think it should be castEr.
Maybe Sci-Twi can?
Ah, brilliant.
The hell?
Of course it does.
Mostly stupidly dangerous.
You, sure about that?
OK, so this hallucination is 'smart'.
Holy shit it worked. Nice work, Twilight!
Indeed.
Yes. So, you may want to keep an eye on her.
More than likely.
She's pissed.
Well, she was.
Ah. Brilliant.
Quite the statement.
She's better at this than you, simply put.
Have you ever heard the Tragedy of Darth Plageuis The Wise?
You, know a lot of things.
Makes sense so far. So where's the twist?
What are you getting to?
There it is.
Equestria. Good fucking luck.
Oh.
Hm...
I can't help but wonder what you're trying to accomplish.
Basically,
Chrome Dome? Is he bald in this?
Oh didn't you hear? the entire town of East Nowheresville mysteriously burned down recently in a bright purple fire.
You must spend a lot of time in the barrel!
Anywho, good chapter to see Moondancer restored, but I love me the villainous plotting between Dulce de Leche and Dr. Twilight (does she actually have a PhD from Sombra's School for Magic?)
I think Clover the Clever was a stallion, but old lore is fairly ambiguous anyway. Love the background on his old nemesis, and tying it into Dulcimer's family history. I like the idea that Dulcimer comes from a long line of people so hungry for power that they have secretly practiced magical spells for centuries, even though it doesn't actually work for them, on the off-chance that someday the family will discover another source of magic.
And that was quite touching how Sci-Twi and Moondancer have reconnected after Twi saved her. The fear aura of the memory stone is really awesome. No wonder the Wallflower Blush of this verse seems way more evil than the Canon one, if she was constantly exposing herself to that aura to power it, she must have accrued some incredibly psychic scars.
Fancy Pants gets shadier and shadier every chapter we hear about him.
And a good reminder that this Scootaloo is part of the family as well.
10498541
"Dude, you've got it so much worse than me."
"No, you have it worse off than ME!"
"No U!"
"U!!!"
But seriously, I think I'm just projecting my previous horrible experience with group projects. Working together with a bunch of people who you get along with and have your back? Now that's priceless.
That said, I don't think I would personally do well letting other writers mess with my babies.
If nothing else, the crew of the Berylverse have my respect.
10499531
Intrigue and plotting with fear on the wings
These are a few of my favorite things...
10500767
At this point, he was less an apprentice and more a not-so-worthy successor, judging by the way he was running for his life.
And yet, she might "misuse" a spell if lives were on the line. She certainly knows how to misuse a spike to the head...
Yes, thank you. I guess I don't even know what a castor is, but it has little to do with magic. I've fixed that right up.
I liken it to a recurring dream. Twilight's mind has more to do with Sonata's consistency than the memory stone.
His hair's actually pretty long at this point (about two inches, he's let it grow out since he left the military). I just thought Chrome Dome was a funny spin Scootaloo could put on Shining Armor. Chrome? Shining? I laugh at myself.
That said, there was a period of time while Sunset and Shining were dating that he was as chrome-plated as the bumper of Big Mac's truck, and there's where Scootaloo's nickname began its life.
10503072
WELL I do believe it to be in my best interest to
keep tabs onkeep in touch with Miss Glimmer in that case, yes. I shall be perfectly willing to communicate with her incredibly sane self from as close as the next planet over! Ayep, just a cool five light years away, easy as pie to visit.HA HA HA HA
And how! You wouldn't believe the bull I gotta deal with.
From two chapters back:
MagD (pronounced "em-ay-gee dee") is roughly equivalent to real-world doctorates, in that she's fully qualified to teach at the highest level. An MagD degree differs from a PhD in magic in that they denote a slightly more notable experience; earned by making some sort of advancement in the science of magic.
For Princess Twilight, it was completing Starswirl's cutie mark switching spell, during which she earned both the PhD and the MagD. For Dr. Twilight it was SPOILER ALERT.
The old lore is not only ambiguous, but inconsistent! Apparently in the Journal of the Two Sisters she's female, but in other equally canonical sources, he's listed as male.
It's like the conversation we had about Hurricane being a dude in the Journal. I'm ultimately just gonna shrug and do what I want.
In my series, I have Private (later Centurion) Pansy and Chancellor Puddinghead as males, while Clover the Clever, Princess (soon to be Queen) Platinum, Smart Cookie, and Commander Hurricane are females. Clover eventually married Platinum's youngest son (Periwinkle), and they had a magically-significant family together.
Raises questions about where Equestrian!Dulcimer came from, don't it?
I'm a sucker for family lines of villainy. Each generation teaches the next how to be better, smarter, eeeeviller, until they create the perfect vessel to unleash their hatred on the hero! So of course I had to play around with that when it came to Pedestrian!Dulcimer. Not quite pure evil, but certainly pure avarice.
Pretty much a required scene for the story, with special attention paid to the warm fuzzies of initial forgiveness. It's very important going forward, too, let us not forget the all-important plot progression.
Dealing with the constant psychological stress alongside knowing that she's essentially erasing portions of people's lives... for over a decade. Wallflower's probably more comfortable performing heinous acts than anything else by this point. In another life, it didn't need to be that way, and therein lies her personal little tragedy.
Politicians, am I right? You either get assasinated a hero, or you serve long enough to become the villain of a cheesy space opera.
She's contractually obligated to appear every twenty-thousand words. I wish she was able to appear more in this story, but there are so many moving parts, and the person she's closest to is overseas, and it's just a huge juggling act, I can't seem to pay her more than occasional lip service.
She was originally going to babysit Sunny while Shining was at work, but those plans were made two years ago. When I finally got back into it, I realized it made more sense to keep everyone centralized at Sweet Apple Acres. So that just means it's time to localize Scootaloo as well!
Telleportation has always been an interesting one. I have always regarded unicorn Telleportation as more akin to a slipspace rupture because it results in an explosion of energy (an EMP) and there is travel time (the caster disappears and then reappears),at no point in time are there two of the caster. When a thestral seems to telleport from one shadow to another what he actually did is latterally shift from the physical world to the dream world, move normally, then shift back. Not telleport. Changelings effectively just become incorporial as them move themselves from one point to another likely via some trick with the hive mind.
I would like to know if Chrysalis (being a changeling queen) can connect to other beings to build a telepathic network or if her magic allows her to interface with the internet at large similar to "my little AI?"
A person is composed of three things. The mind which gathers, processes, and stores information; the body which houses the mind, facilitates movement and anchors the soul; and the soul which drives the body and interprets the information gathered by the mind. If those fairy strings are indeed still holding her soul as has been implied(not just here) it is not impossible for Raven to be saved but the effort would be monumental. The body like a car can be repaired or even possibly replaced, finding a suitable brain would be even more challenging and then re-seating the fairy strings would produce a working person. The problem is that the brain cannot know what the soul knows so only when brain activity is minimal would she be lusid and the soul would likely be perminantly weakened by the forced transplant.
11210804
You would think someone who deals with double personages on a daily basis would have more care toward avoiding identity theft!
In this continuity, Crystal ponies are not limited to any of the three tribes, only receiving the shinier coats due to their time in the Crystal Empire. It's more of a regional variance than a separate tribe. Likewise with the "thestrals," which I've only called "bat ponies" because there's no relation between the mythical creatures in Harry Potter and my critters, who are more likely to just be pegasi with a hint of Dragon somewhere in their ancestry. But I haven't delved too much into that in any part of the series.
Otherwise, each of those species do have their own magic, but they aren't something Starlight's school is focusing on at the moment.
No relation to any recent unfortunate happenings, I'm sure.
In this particular story, I went a little more with the Wrinkle in Time approach, where you are actually just shortening the distance traveled, with no middle ground or other world to traverse. The times where I say "two places at once" it kinda literal in that you are stepping on both sides of the teleport at the moment of teleportation. And naturally, any sort of messing with physics is going to require a ridiculous amount of power with a very visible waste of energy in the form of light and heat.
In this continuity, all changelings have a telepathic ability to hear thoughts, but only if they are projected to them with their signature changeling magic. If you're just thinking your own thoughts, you have no danger of being mind-read, but if you know the spell, you can communicate silently with a great degree of accuracy. It's like an active radar, able to put out and pick up strong enough signals.
They're also able to sense emotions, but unless they have learned what the emotion tastes like, they won't be able to tell what it is at first glance.
I'm not sure if Human!Chrysalis has discovered this ability yet, because I don't think she's met anybody else with a connection to changeling magic.
Unfortunately for Raven, the process that is used to extract the fairy strings leaves the body (including the brain) a completely dehydrated husk. She died the moment the strings were pulled from her. The harvested fairy strings only hold the still-beating heart, which is only beating because of the spells Dr. Twilight manufactured, and the bath of Ambrosia it's been dipped in. It's like how heart cells can still beat in a test tube, even when separated from a body. It's only working mechanically, with the mind destroyed and the soul having fled.
Mercifully, Raven left this world far behind when she was attacked and murdered.
Dr, Twilight's just experiencing the "Tell-tale Heart" effect.
Another story I wrote (Rhythm and Rhyme) dealt with a dagger that could separate a pony's soul from their body and mind, preserving it as a prisoner and a magical power source. Those ponies could be saved, as long as both the body and the crystal the soul was trapped in were unharmed.
The soul is a slippery thing, untouchable by physical devices or workings, inhabiting a world beyond Sunset's. A soul inhabiting another body is an interesting idea, for sure, but the way I've been writing souls, the merging wouldn't take. In these stories, a body, mind, and soul are one being, and none of these things are interchangeable, and all are inexorably linked. To harm one is to harm the others, and to "lose" one is to "lose" the others.
For a soul to be made to forcibly inhabit an unrelated body would require a power far greater, and potentially more unethical, than even Dr. Twilight's. It would require being able to actually touch the soul and wrangle it, or to have it able to move under its own power. It would require overwriting whatever was on the brain beforehand (unless the brain could be grown on its own in a lab somehow). And it would require equipment able to keep a dead body functioning until the brain could relearn enough to perform the unconscious actions itself.
In essence, it would require literal mastery of both the physical and metaphysical, and this is something lightyears ahead of anything Equestria or Libertas and the Isles have even the slightest ability to comprehend.
But not impossible!