• Published 29th Oct 2017
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Songs of the Spheres - GMBlackjack

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152 - Echo of the Earth

I have to get this written down.

I don’t care what I told myself, it has to come out. I…

I am GM. Probably should clarify that before people think I’m Twilence. Specifically, I’m the GM living in church-town in the New World, having lost any semblance of Prophet powers.

And I was done writing. I still think I’m done. But there’s this story… This last story…

It was on the chapter outline document already, so I know Uber-GM already wrote it. I know it already happened. I know there’s no chance my words make it happen. But there’s still a large component of fear.

But it just won’t go away. I have to get it down. I don’t know if it’s my own insecurities or the Tower demanding this be written by me, but here it is.

There’s more than one way to tell a story.

Songs of the Spheres is no different. I chose the most far-reaching and all-encompassing version of the story I could – that of the finite multiverse. I wrote it that way because it gave way to the most things to explore.

And because it was the coolest.

But there were other options. I had tried in the past to write other stories with mega crossovers. All of them failed… a single galaxy populated with many different races, a small section of the multiverse where heroes created other worlds, a single universe with a handful of galaxies…

Each of these had some influence on Songs of the Spheres, in one way or another. The Collector originated from the first, the Evermore like Jane came from the second, and Scarcity’s concept came from the third one.

However there was a fourth – and the first one I ever tried making – that had a different concept. Instead of far reaching galaxies and space empires, it would all take place on a singular planet, seamlessly fused together.

This was a good idea. But I was young and it was the first real fanfic I ever tried writing. I have purged it. It was that bad. The other three attempts weren’t great, but they all had something to offer the success – this story.

The first one sits, forgotten, alone. Neglected.

I’m going to fix that.

Let’s take a look back to a time when the multiverse still existed. Probably around the time of the first Arc. A single planet in a single universe that will never know of the multiverse beyond it. Will never know the strange parallelisms it shares with a story so, so much larger than itself.

It’s one of many Echoes of a much larger story.

~~~

The red woman fled through the corridor, and the Goa’uld followed.

“You can’t run forever,” the Goa’uld said, holding out a zat gun. His eyes flashed and his voice transformed into something deep and reverberating. “You will serve us. If you come back, I can make it a pleasant stay.”

The woman glanced behind her just in time to dodge an incoming attack. She used two of her four arms to perform a jump off a nearby wall, a third arm touching her stomach-positioned gemstone. Her weapon summoned itself into her fourth hand – a large scepter with a mysterious green tint in it.

“…What is tha-” the Goa’uld began, cut off by a red and green beam of energy. The woman had expected the attack to knock the wind out of him, not make him start screaming in agony.

She didn’t feel any pity for him; merely surprise that her attack had been so effective. Perhaps the people of this era were weak. Regardless, it gave her time before the man’s endless stream of copies caught up with her.

Her strength was far beyond that of most mortals, and she was able to punch right through the reinforced door before her, prying it open with all four arms. There was a single guard inside that she dispatched easily, leaving her alone with the gate.

It took the form of an immense metallic spirograph. There was an inscribed glyph in every diamond-shaped section of the gate, not that the woman needed to study them to understand what they meant.

She rummaged through the dispatched guard’s uniform until she found a dialing device – a diamond-shaped object with four buttons on each side. She didn’t have time to type in a complex set of coordinates – she would just have to go with the emergency-dial program. It should arrive somewhere safe…

The footsteps in the corridor encouraged her to hurry along. She pressed the buttons as fast as she could, lighting up seven different glyphs on the gate with an ominous golden glow. The gold gate? How is it here!?

The gold gate activated, creating a shimmering ocean of yell0w ripples. The woman didn’t hesitate – she jumped right through and came out through another gate. The purple one, given the soft glow the gate was producing.

She whirled around, ready to tell the dialing device to close the portal.

But it slipped out of her hand.

That was her final mistake. She turned away from the purple gate to grab the dialing device, meaning she couldn’t see the Goa’uld step through the gate. She had no chance to react when he shot her, forcing immense electricity into her body. The energy quickly found its way into her gemstone and overloaded her body, making her vanish in a poof. The diamond-shaped gemstone fell right into the Goa’uld’s hands.

The Goa’uld smirked. He wordlessly walked back through the portal. It closed, leaving the room dark once more.

A purple alicorn stood in the doorway of the purple gate’s room. “What in Solgaleo’s name was that!?”

~~~

Sunset Shimmer walked up to the gate. How they had managed to keep this thing locked in the school basement without any government agency picking up on it was beyond her, but hey, she wasn’t complaining. It meant she could go back and forth from her life here and in Equestria, no problem.

She checked her watch – school wasn’t over yet, but frankly she already knew all the material and she didn’t need to do any lab work today. She could afford to miss history to have some fun. She pressed her hand to the gate, feeling its cold metal on her hand. It was unlike almost every other material she had encountered in her life. Every time she touched it, she got the chills.

Methodically, she physically pressed the topmost glyph with her hand, prompting it to glow with a brick red color. Numerous other glyphs lit up automatically, prompting a rippling portal to form. She admired the deep glow shimmering across her hands for a moment.

She didn’t dwell on it long – it was a sight she had seen many times. With a deep breath, she stepped right through.

On the other side was Equestria. Specifically, one of the many side rooms in Princess Twilight Sparkle’s crystal castle. Usually it contained nothing but the purple gate, but today it contained all the ponies Sunset knew. Twilight, yes, but also Rarity, Pinkie, Applejack, Fluttershy, Rainbow Dash, and Starlight. They were all looking at her like she was some sort of monster.

“Wha-” it was at this point Sunset realized she was still in human form, rather than a unicorn. “…Ponyfeathers, something went wrong with the race translation spell…”

“Oh.” Twilight laughed. “Everyone calm down, it’s just Sunset. No crazy poofing gem people here.”

Sunset blinked. “…What?”

Rainbow Dash cleared her throat. “Don’t mind Twilight, she’s gone a little nuts. I personally think she’s hallucinating.”

“Then explain the device, Rainbow,” Rarity countered.

“I dunno, it was lost here or something?”

“Before you get off on a huge tangent can someone pleeease explain?” Sunset asked.

Applejack cleared her throat. “There was a red four-armed woman who appeared through the portal. A bearded human appeared behind her and shot her. She apparently exploded in a puff of smoke, and left only a crystal behind. The guy took the crystal and left. The woman dropped this doohicky here.”

“…Applejack, I could have explained,” Twilight said, a little indignant.

“And you would’ve taken about ten times longer.”

“Can confirm, you love to talk,” Starlight said.

Rainbow Dash flapped her wings to get their attention. “You all forgot the part where Twilight has been pressing random buttons on the paperweight!”

“We’re not calling it that,” Twilight muttered.

“Yes we are,” Pinkie said with a giggle.

“No, we’re not!”

Sunset didn’t wait for them to stop arguing nomenclature. She swiped the device out of Twilight’s grip and studied it with her human fingers. “Let’s see here… four buttons on each side…” She started pressing them randomly.

“Um, do you think that’s a good idea?” Fluttershy asked. Pinkie, Rainbow, and Twilight were still in a three-way squabble over the naming of the device.

“Not particularly,” Sunset admitted. “But hey, my race transformation spell has already been disabled, how much worse can it get?”

“…Sugarcube, you’re just askin’ for trouble,” Applejack observed.

Sunset rolled her eye. “That’s just superstitious. There’s no w-” She pressed a button and the gate activated, placing all of them in a purple spotlight.

This stopped the argument instantly. “Sunset! What did y-”

“I got the paperweight to work!” Sunset declared with a cheesy grin.

Twilight blinked. “Sunset… we are n… never mind.” She shook her head. “But I was right! That device can make the gate dial other gates! Look at the pattern of runes – it’s different than when we’re about to go to Cerulean High!” She clapped her hooves together. “It’s probably linking to a whole other gate!”

“Where the scary people came from…” Fluttershy said, shrinking away.

“Why are you scared of them?” Starlight asked. “You didn’t even see them!”

“The map called us here after they came, I’m pretty sure they’re bad people…”

“We can’t make judgments just yet,” Twilight said. “What we can do is go through the portal.”

“Shouldn’t we check to see if it’s safe first, or somethin’?” Applejack asked.

“…Sure,” Twilight said. She sent a little burst of magic through the portal. She blinked. “…It’s a solid wall on the other side.”

“Which means…?”

“We would have been pancakes!” Pinkie announced. “SPLAT!”

Twilight focused her magic. “I think I can still get us through… the barrier is only a few inihooves thick. A simple teleport to the other side…”

“Can we not?” Fluttershy asked.

“I’m pretty sure you all have to,” Starlight said, smirking. “The Tree didn’t call me or Sunset over there.”

“There is no way I’m not going,” Sunset said.

“Same here, I’m just making a point.”

Rarity rolled her eyes. “Always about the points…”

“Teleporting eight ponies… This could be problematic…” Twilight furrowed her brow.

“Seven ponies and a human,” Sunset corrected.

Twilight rolled her eyes. “I can still do it. Just give me a second…”

“One Maplesippi…” Pinkie said. “Two Ma-”

Suddenly they were on the other side, standing in front of the green gate. This gate was housed within a large metallic bunker sealed on virtually all sides. It sat at the top of a long ramp, and there was currently a metallic iris closed between the girls and the gate.

Two-dozen human soldiers were pointing advanced weaponry at them.

“…Fiddlesticks. American military base,” Sunset muttered. “WE SURRENDER!” she shouted in English, putting her hands up into the air.

Fluttershy got on the ground and started crying. All the other ponies backed away, fear on their faces.

…Except Pinkie. She kept smiling. “Boy, looks like I finally get to know what the inside of a holding cell feels like! I always wanted to try that out!”

~~~

General Jack O’Neill’s red phone rang.

He blinked. That was unusual. Since when did the President call him?

He picked up the phone. “Hello there, got some new material?”

President Funny Valentine ignored the usual pleasantries that played out based on his unusual first name. “I’ve gotten a very interesting report, General. You have a set of prisoners?”

“Yes. Seven ponies, one human girl. They came through the gate – apparently they have some way of using point-to-point teleportation abilities.”

O’Neill heard Valentine ruffling through some papers. “I’m here to tell you your little inquiry into this ‘Sunset Shimmer’ has made the entire Canadian A.I.D. go absolutely bananas. They haven’t released an official statement, but there’s something about her that has them up in arms.”

“Really? All we got from our searches was that she was a high school senior. Not much in the way of records.”

“That may have been intentional. We will need to progress slowly.” Valentine paused. “I am sending one of my men over to assist in interrogation.”

“You don’t have to do that…”

“Japan has been breathing down my neck to give them more important SGC roles and I trust him. He’s loyal and may be of… particular use.”

“What’s his name?”

“Jotaro Kujo. As far as the public is concerned, a marine biologist.”

“…Hmm… I get to lead interrogation.”

“As long as you don’t start until he arrives.”

“Deal. By the way, how’s that Steel Ball Run thing shaping up?”

“The pieces are falling together. I may need to call on your assistance before it is over.”

O’Neill smirked. “If you weren’t the President, you would owe me a lot of favors.”

“One day, we will sit down, and then we will figure out what I can give you. Considering your position…”

“For someone with your name you never did have a sense for jokes.” O’Neill cleared his throat, getting back on track. “It will be done, Mister President.”

“Thank you, General.” Valentine hung up.

“Jack…”

O’Neill turned to Daniel. “Sorry Danny boy, you gotta wait a little bit to study horse culture.”

“I’m more concerned about this ‘friend’ we’re getting.”

“A favor to the Japanese, shouldn’t be anything more. By the way, don’t let McKay figure out about this.”

“He’s several miles beneath the surface of the ocean right now. I don’t think he will.”

“Can’t be too careful…” O’Neill said, pulling a lemon out of his desk drawer.

~~~

Jotaro had said absolutely nothing besides his name and a few grunts when he arrived. After an awkward silence, O’Neill decided they had waited long enough to talk to the prisoners so they went to the cell block. Normal procedure was to keep prisoners separate, but since only one of them knew how to speak English and would have to translate for all the others, they had all been crammed into the ‘large’ cell usually reserved for things like dragons and golems and whatnot.

O’Neill opened the door. Six of the ponies were huddled in the back, leaving only the purple one and Sunset Shimmer on one side of a simple interrogation table.

O’Neill and Daniel took their seats. Jotaro stayed in the doorway, examining everything with a silent, careful eye.

“I am General Jack O’Neill,” O’Neill said, folding his hands. “This is Daniel Jackson and Jotaro Kujo.”

Sunset nodded. “I will have to translate, give me a minute.” She turned to the purple alicorn and started speaking in a strange tongue that seemed to have a whinney-like noise and a teeth clack as a phoneme. Daniel was astounded by the way she was able to make her lips move in ways humans’ almost never did.

And when the purple alicorn started speaking the actual language, Daniel was even further astounded that Sunset was able to mimic it at all. Even a language expert like himself would have had difficulty with such a tongue.

“Hello, I am Princess Twilight Sparkle of Equestria, and this is Sunset Shimmer.” Sunset smiled as she spoke her own name. “We take full responsibility for trespassing in your base without authorization and apologize. We just wanted to see what was on the other side.” Sunset smiled. “And, uh, this is me talking now, you found out who I am right?”

O’Neill nodded. “Sunset Shimmer, Canada. Senior at Cerulean High. You’re the most interesting part about this whole thing.”

“Yeeah…” Sunset turned to Twilight and said a few things in Equish. Twilight let out a sigh but seemed to tell her to go ahead.

“So, here’s the deal,” Sunset said. “I wasn’t always a human.”

O’Neill and Daniel stared at her.

“Let me explain,” Sunset said, tapping her fingers together. “I was born in Twilight’s nation – Equestria. No, I’m not sure exactly where it is. My best guess from constellation analysis is somewhere in the Amazon wilds. I was a unicorn – just the horn, like the white one back there – and something of a scientist. We have a… lot better understanding of magic than you do, and that was what I studied. Eventually I helped uncover a gate.”

“What color?” Daniel asked.

“Colo- oh! Purple. That’s right, yours was green…” Sunset pondered this for a moment. “Anyway, I eventually discovered a sequence of buttons that would activate the gate and connect to the ‘deep red’ gate in, you guessed it, a Canadian cave. We’re pretty sure one of our historic wizards, Starswirl, enchanted the purple gate to convert people from ponies to humans and vice versa. There was also the added bonus of a translation spell, though that was temporary.” She folded her hands together. “The actual story is complicated, but I eventually decided to stay there. Since apparently the race-change spell decided I was a teenager, that was the life I took. Had to learn English eventually, which was… difficult. A few years passed, and now it’s today.”

“And today…?” O’Neill asked.

“Today we realized there were more than two gates,” Sunset said. She said something to Twilight, prompting her to enter a huge rant mode. Sunset quickly decided she was going to have to summarize. She described the crimson woman and the bearded man, and the device they had dropped. Then she complained a bit about how the spells weren’t working anymore.

O’Neill reached into his coat pocket and pulled out a photograph. “Is this the man?”

Sunset showed it to Twilight. She nodded vigorously.

“That’s Ba’al. He’s not really a human, he’s a snake-creature that has taken control of a human body. He’s somehow managed to clone himself a million times to make life extremely difficult for us. Not a great guy.”

Sunset translated and Twilight grimaced. “…Twilight wants to know about the woman. Do you know who she is?”

O’Neill looked to Daniel and nodded. Daniel adjusted his glasses. “As far as we can tell from your description, she would be a Gem.”

“A what?”

“There are the creations of the Ancients – the same beings that build the gates. Think of them as… machines so complex they are like people.”

Sunset blinked. She had to think a bit about how to translate that for Twilight. As soon as she was finished, Twilight lit up and started laughing and going off on a rant.

“…She do this often?” O’Neill asked.

“Yeeeah…” Sunset said, rubbing the back of her head. “I’m honestly tempted to join her. We didn’t know who built the gates before today. Didn’t know there were Ancients…”

“If you’d be willing to teach us about magic, I have no doubt we’d be willing to share what we know about the Ancients,” Daniel said.

Sunset translated. Twilight said the word Daniel had deduced meant ‘yes’ over and over and over.

“This went a lot smoother than I was expecting,” O’Neill admitted, sitting back in his chair. “Sorry big guy, looks like we didn’t need you.”

“Yare yare daze…” Jotaro commented.

“…What?”

“It means ‘good grief’ or ‘give me a break’,” Daniel commented. “There isn’t really an exact translation.”

“Ah. …I don’t get it.”

At this point, Twilight’s horn flashed with a high-pitched ding! noise. “OH COME ON!” she said in perfect English, no hint of an accent.

The humans stared at her.

“I thought the translation spell wasn’t going to finish! But no, apparently I can cast it, great Lunala all that back and forth was pointless!

“Translation… spell…” Daniel said. A glazed expression crossed over his face.

“You okay there, Daniel?” O’Neill asked.

“Oh, just wondering if my entire job has been rendered pointless or not. Nothing major.” He put a hand to the bridge of his nose. “I’m sure we can work out a treaty between our people at some point and establish a way to visit each other without getting locked up.”

“YAY!” Pinkie said with a grin. “That’s great!”

“Oh, uh, I have a request. A personal one,” Sunset rubbed the back of her head. “Can you maybe… not tell Canada what I am?”

“Sure,” O’Neill said. I have a feeling they already know.

“Thanks!”

~~~

The trade was simple enough to pull off. Twilight donated half her library of magical textbooks – along with a lot of translation potions. The U.S. Army gave her access to secret files discussing the Ancients, and included a few known gate addresses. A couple of these were the U.S.’s allies – there was a ‘public’ gate in Japan they could dial (the red one), Britain (periwinkle) and even Furshi, one of the free Troll Nations (dark gray). There were a few noninhabited gates as well – the deep green one in the Australian wilds and the yellow gate that went to a nicer area of the Himalayan Dragonlands. There was mention of a white gate in Atlantis, but they clearly weren’t about to give the coordinates of that gate to just anyone.

It did not take long for Twilight to start taking her friends on diplomatic and exploratory missions to these new peoples, introducing themselves, and inviting anyone who wanted back to Equestria to experience some good old-fashioned friendship. It was clear most of the people they met just wanted to learn more about Equestrian Magic, but Twilight saw it as an opportunity to learn more about the world and make some varied friends.

Sunset regularly joined the group, but finals were approaching senior year so she could only do so on weekends. So it was mostly Twilight, Pinkie, Fluttershy, Rarity, and Starlight – Rainbow and Applejack had decided they had other obligations to attend to.

Twilight also got to experience another wave of fame. While the specifics of the gate project were not public knowledge, it wasn’t like the existence of magic had ever been doubted on this Earth. The motions of the sun and moon were enough to prove that to everyone. The sudden existence of a race that had been previously thought to be mostly extinct made worldwide news. Efforts began to be put forward to connect a telegraph cable through the Chaotic Wilds that surrounded Equestria. So far that was looking to be a difficult proposition. Everyone knew the Diamond Authority would be able to do it, but they were not known for cooperating with the other races.

In essence, Equestria became the nation everyone wanted to know. The other princesses ended up with their hooves full, scrambling to manage meetings and political agendas of competing nations. Meanwhile, Twilight explored and made friends. That was her job. She wasn’t quite ready to take a governing role. Like Equestria itself, she was young, a child in many ways. New, important, sparkly, but not really a big player on the world stage.

The average population of Equestria took the news in stride. They had known for a long time that other nations had to exist outside their borders, there were too many legends for that not to be the case.

Historians of the time would have told anyone who asked that Equestria was just another part of the ongoing Age of Connection, where all those peoples hidden behind impassable barriers were contacted by the more civilized races and brought into the fold of globalization. Equestria would just be a name on a list, alongside the Mushroom People, the Cephalopod Embodiment, the Inklings, and the Boreals.

Those historians would eventually be proven very, very wrong. But that’s not for several decades, and this story’s not about that.

This story’s about what happened six months after first contact was made with America.

“Isn’t it nice how we can just do things shorthoof?” Pinkie asked.

“What?” Twilight asked, confused.

“I mean, this!” She pointed at the Australian desert they were standing in, featureless except for occasional pieces of brush and cacti the size of redwood trees. “We didn’t have to take one of Cherry’s haphazard flying machines over the Chaos, didn’t have to make a boat to cross the ocean, and didn’t have to walk for days to get out here! It’s just zoop, zoop, BAM! Everyone should always travel by gate!”

“Only Furshi’s gate and ours are publicly accessible,” Fluttershy pointed out. “Not very good for tourism.”

“This gate’s fine,” Starlight pointed out. “Not like anyone owns these wilds.”

“Yes, but people don’t own things for a reason. Like, um, giant monsters.”

“I can’t believe the idea of ‘giant monster’ doesn’t terrify me anymore,” Rarity said with a chuckle. “I worry more about Sweetie Belle trying to follow us than anything. She’s really curious about our adventures.”

“Aren’t all the crusaders?” Fluttershy asked.

“Well, of course, but there’s something different about Sweetie’s zeal.”

“Maybe she’s gonna grow up to be like us!” Pinkie suggested. “Searching for new gates and exploring the great unknown! Destiny!

“Destiny…” Sunset said, furrowing her brow. She had taken to keeping her human form – it was always handy to have someone with fingers around. She didn’t get as much use as a translator anymore – rarely did they go somewhere people spoke English that wouldn’t just let them use the translation spell. “How far do you think the Tree’s reach extends?”

“I don’t know,” Twilight said with a shrug. “It sent us to America to make allies. That’s the only time it’s sent us out very far. Maybe it can only do so much?”

“Like Arceus?” Sunset asked.

“Sunset!” Rarity chided. “I’m so sorry you had to hear that Starlight, Sunset was being so inconsiderate a-”

“It’s okay,” Starlight said with a sigh. “I wasn’t really that… into the gods, you know? Discovering they were just strong beings wasn’t that… bad.”

Fluttershy looked like she wanted to say something, but shut herself up.

“Nonsense, it was a world-shattering revelation! Why, I myself had a few days of…” Rarity noticed everyone was looking at her. “And I’m rambling. Apologies…”

Sunset stooped down to look at Starlight. “I’m sorry.”

Starlight shook her head. “You were just asking a question. It’s a legitimate one. Is the Tree of Harmony on the level of the gods or not? I don’t know. I know Discord isn’t, but nobody really knows what Discord is.”

Pinkie grinned. “Yeah! And everyone outside Equestria who meets him gets absolutely terrified!”

“I don’t know why,” Twilight admitted. “Every nation has at least one of the gods or two on their side. Even us.”

Sunset raised an eyebrow. “Solgaleo and Lunala haven’t been particularly happy with you revealing Equestria to everyone, I wouldn’t count on them for support.”

Twilight sighed. “Yeah, yeah, I know…” She shook her head. “Look at us, arguing about politics and religion.”

“Same thing, really,” Starlight observed.

“Eh, true.”

“Hey, at least we aren’t America!” Pinkie said. “Have you seen the scream-fests over there?!”

“It’s not that bad,” Fluttershy said.

Pinkie pulled out a calendar that said 1889. “…Yet.”

Flutterfree rolled her eyes. She had no idea what that meant and it was probably best not to ask.

“Anyway, have we actually found anything?” Rarity asked. “We’ve been walking in this desert for a while and I must say nothing of interest has happEEEENED!” The ground gave out beneath her and all her friends, depositing them in a metallic room with many screens lining the walls.

Screens.

Twilight grinned. “Yes! Yes! We found an Ancient structure!” She ran her hoof across one of the semi-holographic screens. “Oh, reveal to me your secrets, digital wonder! How do you bring the floating light to your face?”

Sunset rolled her eyes. “That’s a good question. I can try to answer it if we bring one back to the lab. But I didn’t have any luck reverse engineering the last one, and neither did the American Army, so…”

“Shush. A girl can dream. One day… One day we will understand these marvels.”

“I have my doubts,” Starlight said, poking a screen with her hoof that displayed letters she couldn’t read. “We still have no clue how the gates work, or how the paperweights-”

“Dialing devices,” Twilight corrected out of reflex.

Starlight ignored her. “-communicate with the gates. We don’t even know how many gates there are! Or a reliable way to find more.” She shrugged. “We haven’t even scratched the surface of what the Ancients did. And the gods sure aren’t of any help.”

Sunset clearly wanted to say something, but she bit her lip.

“Hey, this screen is different!” Pinkie said, pointing at one with a pink sugar-skull on it.

“Curious…” Twilight said. “I wonder if this is important in some way.”

“Good guess, Amiga!” the screen said in mostly English, surprising Twilight.

“What…? Are you an Ancient Gem?!”

“Ahahaha! Close, but no cigar. Name’s Sombra and I’ll be taking… this!

The floor opened up beneath Sunset, dropping her down. Twilight activated her magic, but it was already too late – a suspiciously Sunset-sized metallic cylinder shot out of the ground and into the sky.

Where a fully functioning Ancient Airship with sugar-skull markings picked it up.

“Adios!” Sombra said, triggering a sonic boom as she blasted off into the sky.

Twilight stared after Sunset, mouth agape.

~~~

“So, Jack…” Daniel said, folding his hands together. “I was just over in Equestria…”

O’Neill didn’t like where this was going. “Yes…?”

“And I sort of told them about the slave square.”

“...Why?”

“Because Sunset just got kidnapped by Sombra.”

O’Neill put a hand to the bridge of his nose. “Oh boy…”

“And I told them we’d try to get her.”

“Of course we will. We’re nice that way. And we always need another excuse to blow that place up.”

“SG-1?”

“Yep.” O’Neill folded his hands together. “…You didn’t tell them the coordinates did you?”

“Uh, no, of course not.”

“Now I’m pretty sure I know why we detected Discord here a minute before you walked in.”

“…Just ‘detected’?”

“He was being stealthy.”

“…Unusual.”

“Very,” O’Neill said, tapping his fingers together. “How easy would it be for him to find the coordinates?”

“The databases are magically secured, you know that. Not even he could get in there without triggering an alarm.”

“And, say, if he asked a dialer for them?”

“…I mean, he’d have to convince them he had clearance…”

“While looking like me?”

Daniel blinked. “Oh.”

“You should probably get over there before they kill themselves.”

“Riiight away.” He paused as he stood up. “Though I’m not sure they’d be as helpless as you seem to think.”

“They can kick ass but if anyone so much as looks at them nicely they’re instantly trusting. Go keep them from doing something really, really stupid.”

“Yessir.”

~~~

Sombra brought Sunset out of the box with a grin. “Ah, you stayed awake the entire time!”

Sunset leaped out in a combat stance – but a simple shock-dart forced her to collapse to the ground. “…Ow…”

“Yeeeah, I figured you would be one of the fiery ones,” Sombra said, dusting her hands off. “Anyway, I’m Sombra, you’re Sunset Shimmer, and I bet you’ll fetch a good price.”

“…And here I thought all you civilized people had outlawed slavery.”

Sombra shrugged. “Depends on where you are, amiga. Frankly I find it kind of disgusting, but hey, those Juggalo trolls have a looooot of cash.” She slapped a pair of handcuffs on Sunset. “You’re lucky though, you probably won’t be bought as a slave, unless someone takes a shine to your appearance. Your market value is all in here,” she tapped Sunset on the head. “Equestrian scientist secrets, the coordinates of several gates, good stuff.”

“I’m a high-level empath with excessive mental defense, that’s not going to be easy to get.”

“Not my problem,” Sombra said. “I could probably do it with all this tech I have laying around, but eh, not worth it.”

“…You’ve figured out the secrets of the Ancients and you use it for petty gain. Disgusting.”

“Yep!” Sombra shrugged. “But it’s the best way to figure out how the world really works. There’s so much beyond even the gods… My goal in life is to figure out what those things are. And you’re another step on the way to that. You should be honored!”

“Screw you.”

“This sounds like the beginning of a beautiful friendship!” Sombra said with a laugh.

She was joking at the time, just to be clear.

Sombra dragged Sunset away from the Ancient ship and toward a bunch of cages with people inside. “Don’t get too attached to the others, you’re going on first.” She waved cutely at the fiery woman and then went to take care of the ‘showing’.

The first thing Sunset did was try to wriggle her way out of the handcuffs. That didn’t work. “Gah. What I wouldn’t do for some magic right now…”

“You know magic?” an old man asked from the cage he was in.

Sunset looked up at him. “Well, if I’m a unicorn. I’m not a unicorn right now, so I can’t do it.”

“Hmm… all beings have magic within them.”

“Yeah, well, I haven’t really had much luck with human magic aside from…” she decided mentioning the empathy geode was probably a bad idea. “Artifact. Stuff.”

“…Ah. Would you like to hear some advice from an old man anyway?”

“Sure.”

“You’d be surprised how much proper breathing helps.” He rocked back and forth a few times – and then shot fire out of his nose.

Sunset chuckled. “Nice.”

“You try.”

Sunset shrugged. She focused on her breathing, moved back and forth a bit, and then breathed out.

She burned her chin. “OUCH!”

“Oh, I figured…”

She rubbed her chin. “Apparently not as a human! Or if I am I’d need to ace the fire absorbency spell first a…” She paused. “I did it! Yes! I have fire!”

“Sadly, fire is not a magic that will help you here.” The man shook his head. “Metal everywhere.”

“Yeah. …I’m Sunset.”

“Iroh.”

“I’m in for knowing too much. You?”

“My brother wanted to get rid of me.”

“…Geez…”

“It is a long standing feud between us. Nothing you should concern yourself with.” He smiled sadly. “You’re about to have much bigger problems.”

“What d-” Sombra grabbed Sunset by the cuffs. “You’re up!” She dragged Sunset out onto a stage lit by white tube-like lights Sunset had never seen before. The stage looked clean, futuristic, and more than a little gaudy with all the sparkling sugar-skulls everywhere.

The people at the foot of the stage did not look the part. They were a mix of humans and trolls in usually dark, menacing clothes. The stage itself was in a much larger, vaguely square cavernous shape filled with hundreds of other people of the sort. There were laughs, there were screams, and there looked to be blood everywhere that wasn’t the stage.

Fun… Sunset thought to herself, gulping.

“Say hello to Sunset Shimmer of Equestria everyone! Pony-to-human transracial! One of the new magical experts with maaaaaany gate coordinates in her mind. Let’s have an opening bid – remember, you don’t have to pay in U.S. currency, but you better know how much yours converts for! LET THE BIDDING BEGIN!”

“Twenty,” a bearded man said.

Sombra frowned. “Okay, Ba’al, I’ll take the bid. But if you start having a bid war with one of your clones again I will run you out of here.”

“Thirty!” a purple-blooded troll said.

A woman in a white dress snorted. “You all suck. Eighty!”

“A hundred,” Ba’al added.

“A hundred thirty-five!”

“Hundred forty.”

“Hundred forty-five,” Ba’al said, narrowing his eyes.

“Ahem!” a new, dignified voice said. “I must say, you’re all being absolute imbeciles. You don’t understand the true worth of this young lady.” There was a pause. “A thousand dollars.”

Sunset finally saw who was making the bid for her. It was a white unicorn mare in a dirtied leather jacket decorated with real skulls. She had an eyepatch and a hat with a feather sticking out of it that somehow seemed both menacing and fashionable.

It was the best costume Sunset had ever seen on Rarity. Heh. They found me.

Sombra looked from Rarity to Sunset and shrugged. “I’ll take the bid! Anyone want to beat that?”

“Two. Thousand!” Ba’al shouted, grinding his teeth.

“Oho! It appears someone else has understood her value as well!” Rarity said with a menacing laugh. “Trying to play the slow game were you, hoping to get a deal? Well, no dice. Just because a mare jumps once doesn’t mean she can’t do it again.” She turned to Sunset. “Ten thousand.”

It must really help to have access to Twilight’s treasury.

Sunset noticed a few people in the crowd were looking at Rarity with greedy eyes. At first Sunset was concerned, but then she noticed Starlight in a hood moving through the crowd, casting drowsiness spells on anyone who seemed like they might try something. It was a surprisingly good plan.

“Eleven thousand,” Ba’al said, growling.

“Oh you just don’t give up!” Rarity rolled her eyes. “Twenty thousand.”

“Thirty!”

“Fifty!”

“Nobody has that much money!” Ba’al shouted.

“Clearly, you do,” Rarity pointed out. “So why is it so surprising I do?”

“I am Lord Ba’al!”

“And I’m a fancy little unicorn who wants this beautiful young thing very badly.”

“Go against me and you will regret it…”

Rarity laughed. “Ba’al, honey, dear, don’t flatter yourself. Once you find out who I am you’ll find that I’m not exactly easy to touch.”

“I will bring ruin to your entire society.”

“I’m pretty sure you’re the type to do that regardless.” She turned to the stage. “He hasn’t bid in a while, does that mean I win?”

“SIXTY THOUSAND!”

“Seventy~!”

“EIGHTY!”

“Oh, look at that, I’m forced to jump forward with my endless supply of cash. Woe is me…” She smirked. “A hundred and fifty thousand.”

“A-” Ba’al stopped for a moment. He looked around, catching the eye of one of his clones. He let out a grow and clenched his teeth. He opened his mouth.

“Three million, two hundred sixty-six thousand, nine hundred forty-two,” a cobalt-blooded troll said, holding up her hand. “And nineteen cents.”

Rarity, Ba’al, Sombra, Sunset, and the entire crowd turned to stare at her in disbelief.

“I win, right?” she asked.

Neither Rarity nor Ba’al said anything.

“Good.” She flipped them off with a smirk. “Have fun figuring this one out! Woo!” She jumped onto stage. “How about we go back and you give me all the details about this little bacon-headed monkey?”

“Sure,” Sombra said, blinking. “Next auction will be in a few minutes people! Stick around!” She shuffled Sunset and the troll to the back. “You better actually have that money,” Sombra said.

The troll shrugged. “I could have miscounted. But it’s at least three million something.” She pulled out an eight ball, smashed it, and suddenly the room was full of money.

Sombra blinked. “Geez… Where did you get all this?”

“I’ve been stealing money from Ba’al. Every Ba’al. Because he ticked me off last week. And fuck him.” She stooped down and smashed Sunset’s cuffs off. “And you are free to go. You’re welcome.”

Sunset blinked. “You… what?”

The troll grinned. “Vriska Serket, professional spiderbitch, Rebellion Agent, and the best fucking hero around. You’re welcome!”

Sunset blinked – and laughed. “Thanks. Though you probably didn’t have to go through all this trouble. That white unicorn in the audience was one of my friends.”

Vriska smirked. “Ah, the delicious irony. I just messed everything up for everyone. Fuck yeah.”

“Everyone is going to be trying to kill you now,” Sombra told Vriska. “That out there? That was stupid.”

“Definitely,” Vriska said with a laugh. “But I’m getting out of here tonight. Rebellion’s moving out to go give ol’ Condy the one-two an-” She blinked. “And I just got a psychic message saying they had to leave early due to a compromise. Fuuuuck. Just my luck lately…”

“If my friends are here, they have a way out,” Sunset said. “We’ll just have to get to them without gett-”

Ba’al appeared before them in a burst of dark, purple, eldritch magic. “This is my money. The girl is mine.”

Sombra raised an eyebrow. “Yeeeeah, no. I mean, I could be the paragon of fair trade and commerce right now, but I don’t feel like it. These people? Nice. You? Pretty evil. So you can go jump on out of here before I have the Ancient turrets dismantle you.”

Ba’al reached out a hand and tore a panel off a nearby wall. A panel made out of Ancient metal, the sort of material the gates were made out of.

They could withstand high-yield explosives.

Sombra blinked. She activated the turrets, bombarding Ba’al with hundreds of little lasers. Each of these lasers had enough energy to kill an elephant. Ba’als body didn’t survive.

But whatever the purple eldritch mist was did survive. And it moved to a new Ba’al body, teleporting right into the room.

“Ariba…” Sombra muttered.

“Do you surrender them?”

“At this point I’m just curious to see how angry I can make you.” Sombra pressed another button and crushed the new Ba’al with a box hanging from the ceiling. “COME ON GIRLS, IT’S RUNNING TIME!”

“The slave dealer is on my side now,” Sunset mused. “…Sure.”

“Less talking, more running!” Vriska said.

The three of them scrambled through the high-technical backstage, trying their best to simply get away from Ba’al.

“Ship sweet ship!” Sombra said, grinning. “I can get us into orbit with this baby! Nobody will be able to touch us!”

Three Ba’als dropped from the ceiling, the dark purple energy wafting off them.

“…I had to open my mouth.”

Vriska took out the fluorite octet and rolled them, prompting an attack from three-dozen rabid weasels. The Ba’als’ energies burned them up.

“I really gotta stop rolling when the tide has turned bad,” Vriska muttered.

The three Ba’als held out their hands, aiming to disintegrate Sombra and Vriska. Sombra had a shield that protected her, Vriska did not. Instead Vriska had a little help from a pink blur with suction cups on her hooves.

Pinkie bounced back from the hit like a spring, but was otherwise fine. “Aha! You tried to kill suction cup pony! You failed!”

Rarity descended from the ceiling, brandishing a magic-construct rapier. “And you hooligans will continue to fail!” She pointed her sword at the middle Ba’al. “I have no idea if you’re the same one as before, but you really had this coming.”

“You are nothing compared to us.”

“True, true, I’m only decent with this thing and that terrifying purple aura of yours is quite chilling. But I’m not the one you should be worried about.”

Starlight and Twilight fired their lasers from the side at full power, hitting the three Ba’als in sequence and smashing them against a nearby wall. The two mares hoofbumped.

“I say…” Rarity said, walking over to the Ba’als. “Are they going to be okay?”

“Why the fuck do you care!?” Vriska shouted.

“We’re not murderers, unlike the two of you,” Rarity said judgmentally. She examined them. “Hmm… They do seem to be breathing, b-”

A white snake-worm jumped out of one of the Ba’als mouths, lunging for Rarity with a skree. She screamed in panic – but was saved by a bullet shot at just the right time.

Daniel lowered his weapon. “…I was not expecting that to actually work.”

Rarity turned to him, blinking rapidly. “…You… you saved me. Thank you, Daniel, I don’t know what to say…”

“Apologize for stealing our info.”

“…Stealing?” Rarity said, cocking her head. “Starlight found the place through a spell!”

Starlight laughed nervously. “Ahahah, yeah, about that, the spell miiiight have just been Discord and it miiiig-

“Starlight!” Twilight shouted, aghast. “How could you!?”

“Look, there were a lot of factors involved and we r-”

Sunset had been standing still for so long that Ba’al was able to get an eldritch teleport lock on her. She appeared in the middle of a golden room with a Ba’al pointing a zat gun at her. He fired – but she twisted out of the way and launched a stream of fire out of her hands, burning his face significantly. “…Huh. Guess that worked.”

“Your victory is short lived, Sunset Shimmer.”

Sunset whirled around again, unleashing fire – but what met her wasn’t an ordinary Ba’al. He was wearing a mask shaped like a purple heart with spikes coming out of its sides. Sunset knew instantly this wasn’t Ba’al, or anything even close. “Wh…”

“I am MAJORA… And you have something I want…” She reached out a hand toward Sunset. “Your mind… Your destiny… One of the most powerful there is. You cannot see it now, the other gods cannot see it for they do not look, but I can see it… You can be of great use to me…”

A goddess. I’m pretty screwed… unless…

“Hey, you… you haven’t even explained what your plan is yet! Are you really just going to get it done like that? Like…” She looked around awkwardly until she found something interesting. “What’s that red crystal?” She pointed at the crystal laying nearby.

“None of your concern.

Naturally, the moment Sunset had visually registered the red crystal she thought she knew what it was. It was the red woman at the start of this whole adventure. The Gem. Sunset leaped away from Majora and grabbed the Gem in her hands, willing all her empathic power into the little crystal. She didn’t even bother with a direct interface – just power her up and hope something worked.

Nothing happened.

“Serve ME!” Majora demanded, touching an eldritch tentacle to Sunset’s head.

“STAR PLATINUM: THE WORLD!”

One moment, Majora was trying to interface with Sunset. The next, she had been punched several dozen times and Jotaro was standing there.

Sunset got the sneaking suspicion he wouldn’t last long against Majora, so she returned to the Gem. “Come on… Come on…”

“GET YOUR HANDS OFF THE SIRE DIAMOND!” Majora demanded. Sunset felt it hit her mind like an order – but her necklace flashed red, and she resisted the command.

“ORA ORA ORA ORA!” Jotaro shouted as something invisible punched Majora back. She unleashed a tendril of eldritch energy, but he was suddenly behind her and all of her bones were broken.

The body was currently useless. Another Ba’al came in to don the mask instead, but Jotaro kicked him in the crotch. Another Ba’al shot him with a zat gun, but Jotaro just wouldn’t go down.

Not until Majora’s Mask itself floated into the air and hit Jotaro in the back of the head, forcing him to the ground.

It was this moment that Sunset made a successful connection to the Sire Diamond. It lit up and created the four-armed being Twilight had reported.

“Help us,” Sunset pleaded.

The Sire Diamond did. She summoned her staff weapon and pointed it at Majora’s Mask.

Majora shrieked in fear – and teleported away in an instant.

“…She just… Ran?!

The Sire Diamond recalled her weapon. “I was unaware she was one of the gods. I expected to be useless.”

“You are now,” a Ba’al said, leveling a zat gun at the two of them. “There’s dozens of us and only two of you. Surrender n-”

A giant salmon appeared in the hallway, knocking them all down to the ground.

“HAHA! YES!” Vriska shouted, running into the room. “I got my luck back! Sweetness!”

Everyone else ran in. Twilight pulled Sunset into a hug. “We were so worried!”

“Hey, it looks like it’s fine now,” Sunset said. “…Wait, how’d you find me?”

“Followed the Ba’als,” Vriska said, pointing at herself with a sly grin. “You’re welcome again.”

“And I remember you!” Twilight said, addressing Sire Diamond. “You were in my castle for a split second!”

“She has the power to make gods flee,” Sunset said. “…Ba’al was apparently being controlled by an entity known as Majora.”

Vriska blinked. “No idea. Sombra, you got anything?”

Sombra was nowhere to be seen.

“…Figures,” Vriska muttered. “Well, we should probably all get out of here before something goes terribly, terribly wrong again.”

“We can take you all home with us,” Twilight offered. “You can never have too many friends!”

“We still have to deal with Starlight…” Daniel said.

“…Oh. Right. I’ll j-”

There was a loud thump.

“Twilight, can you teleport us back to the gate…?” Rarity asked.

“Yes,” Twilight said. She teleported everyone – except the Ba’als – back to the gate.

The only problem was there was a full grown dragon wearing Majora’s Mask sitting over the gate. She took one look at Sire Diamond and poofed her with a quick eldritch claw. “You will have no quarter here…” In Majora’s free claw, there was an orb with a spinning orange spirograph.

Everyone readied for a fight with an eldritch dragon. They wouldn’t stand a chance – all it would take was a roar. A single roar of madness that would destroy everything.

Except Vriska went and did something stupid.

She tried to steal the orange orb.

This turned out to be exactly what she needed to do. The Ancient device registered that she was the one it was meant to find. That she was the true master… of Light. The orb became like liquid and surrounded her.

“…WHAT!?” Majora said, clearly having no understanding of what was going on.

“I don’t have a fucking clue,” Vriska said, her eightfold eye sparkling with the light of an orange sun. “But it’s gonna be aw-”

Majora slammed her into the ground, flat.

Pinkie facehooved. “Like a pancake…”

Upon removing the claw, Majora was surprised to find that Vriska wasn’t dead - though the troll was incapacitated. “Ouch…”

“Great, the super convenient powerup did nothing,” Rarity said, biting her lip. “What now?”

“Uh… can we talk about this?” Twilight asked sheepishly. “I’m sure we can come to some sort of agreement!”

“No,” Majora said, she opened her dragonic mouth and prepared to scream.

And this is the moment Sombra crash-landed her airship into the dragon, slicing it in half.

“Bullseye!” Sombra announced through her ship’s intercom. “Dra-GONE, am I right?”

“That was bad and you should feel bad!” Vriska shouted.

“Yare yare daze…” Jotaro muttered from his injured position.

Majora’s Mask floated into the air. It looked like it was ready for another round, just her versus them.

Except Sunset had managed to bring Sire Diamond back. The red Gem pointed her staff at Majora. “Die.”

Majora teleported away before the anti-eldritch beam could touch her.

Somehow, Sombra’s Airship was still functional. It lifted itself out of the pile of dragon guts. “Well, thanks for the money, Vriska! Adios!” She blasted through the caverns to one of the exits.

“…I’m not entirely sure what happened today,” Starlight said.

Pinkie shrugged. “Stuff.” She pulled out the dialing device and created a connection to the purple gate. “Let’s go home. We can deal with all the other stuff later.”

Sunset raised a hand to stop her. “Actually th-”

Pinkie rolled her eyes, ducked behind a rock, and pulled Iroh out. “There. Happy?”

“What the…?” Vriska said, staring in disbelief. “How?”

“It’s Pinkie being Pinkie,” Rarity said, rolling her eyes.

Everyone shrugged and walked through the portal.

“Why are you all acting like this is normal!?” Vriska shouted. Nobody paid her any mind.

Fluttershy was waiting on the other side of the portal.

“Oh thank goodness, I was so worried! I-” she paused. “…Are you all covered in dragon blood?”

“Yes,” Twilight said. “…Wait, how do you know what dragon blood looks like?”

“Well… uh… Spike was… it’s not important. What did you do to the poor dragon?”

“We didn’t do anything,” Sunset said.

“Sombra crashed a fucking Ancient Airship into it!” Vriska announced with a grin. “And it was awesome!”

Fluttershy gasped. “That’s horrifying!”

“It was trying to eat us…” Twilight said, clearly trying to rationalize the events in her head and failing. She put a hoof to her face. “How about everyone go wash themselves up, get some sleep, and then we deal with whatever this means in the morning. Fluttershy, you can show our new Gem friend around since you didn’t deal with all the… mess the rest of us did.”

“…Okay,” Fluttershy agreed. “Um, I think we have a spare room this way…”

“Show me,” Sire Diamond said, as if it was an order.

“…Yes ma’am…”

~~~

And so things were resolved, one way or another. Starlight’s charges were dropped because everyone was suddenly freaking out about a god fusing with the Ba’al conglomerate to do something unknown. Virtually everything else was forgotten in the ensuing fallout, so Twilight was going to have to deal with Starlight herself – at a later time.

For a day she just wanted to process everything that had happened.

Two nights after the adventure to the slave square, Twilight couldn’t get to sleep. So she dragged herself out of bed and muttered to herself until she found herself on the balcony of her castle, looking at the stars.

The stars, always the same no matter who saw them. Sure, the northern hemisphere generally got to see different stars, but if they both looked at Sirius, they would see the same arrangement of stars around it.

The night sky was what bound them together, in a sense. Even all the isolated tribes and nations that lived within wilds like Equestria itself…

She could sense the world was changing. Deep inside her, she knew it was changing. At first she thought ‘of course, Equestria is never going to be the same with all this’. But then she realized the feeling was more than that – much, much more. The world was on the cusp of entering a new era.

She wasn’t sure what to feel about that.

Twilight let out an overdramatic sigh and leaned harder on the railing, letting her eyes get lost in the sky. What did it all mean, if anything? What could be said about it, really?

The entire adventure had been a little ridiculous…

What was her life coming to?

“Heya Twi!” Pinkie said, appearing out of seemingly nowhere. “What’s up with you?”

“GAH! PINKIE! Don’t DO that!”

“Sorry, but I couldn’t just walk in through the castle doors! Your guards wouldn’t like it. …I still can’t believe you actually have guards now!”

“Celestia insisted,” Twilight said, smirking.

“Surprise, surprise. You still haven’t answered my question though – what’s up with you?”

“I was just thinking about… About how ridiculous everything was.” Twilight looked into the distance. “By chance, we find the Ancient outpost. Then, by chance, Sombra happens to be there and grab Sunset. And by chance once again, Starlight just happens to be stealing so she can get the coordinates to a place the US won’t give us. The US also sends a team, Vriska shows up and messes with everything because of her grudge, then Majora was there, and Ba’al, and everything seemed to go just wrong and then just right when Sombra decided to smash the ship on the dragon…” She shook her head. “Do you have any idea how unlikely that all is?”

“I dunno. I don’t do math.”

“Astronomical,” Twilight answered for her. “The chances of all that happening was just… ridiculous.”

“And so were the sequence of events that led us to defeat Tirek,” Pinkie said with a shrug. “It’s nothing new, Twilight, our lives have always been like that.”

“I mean… yeah… but it feels different.”

“It isn’t, not really,” Pinkie said with a smirk. “Just more adventure.”

“I just…” She shook her head. “It doesn’t sit well with me.”

“Hey. It’s destiny, or something.” Pinkie smirked. “We’re the Elements of Harmony. Do you expect normal things to happen to us?”

Twilight blinked – then chuckled slightly. “…That’s a good point.”

“You think about things too much, Twi,” Pinkie said with a giggle. “Turn that brain off every now and then, would you? It’s what night time is for.”

“Some of the best work ever done gets accomplished in the dead of night,” Twilight countered.

“Hmm… True, true. But you’re not working right now. So actually go sleep so you can work in the morning.”

Twilight yawned. “Yeah. Pinkie… since when did you get so wise?”

“Coincidence,” Pinkie giggled.

“Heh. Goodnight. See you in the morning.” She stretched her wings and went inside.

The moment Pinkie was sure she was out of earshot, Pinkie’s smile dropped. “We’re not supposed to have that.” She looked up at the stars. “This story’s not about the Narrative. We can tell it without that. I’m the only one who knows here. I don’t need to mirror the story out there that closely.”

I dropped the cloak I had on myself, raising an eyebrow. “I didn’t think you would notice me.”

“I did,” Pinkie said, scrunching her muzzle. “And you’re causing a leak, and you know it. The gods are probably watching, and you just being… you will mess stuff up!”

“You may not understand this, Pinkie, but the things I write in my notebook ensure that will not happen. Your story will go untouched. I was just here to observe. To see the world…”

“Small place, huh?”

“It’s dense. Unimaginably so.”

“You won’t find anything here,” Pinkie said, shaking her head. “Just because we’re less important doesn’t mean you can get closer to us.”

“Do you even know what you’re saying Pinkie?”

“Not really? It’s just… coming to me and it feels right. You should go to your Songs of the Spheres, where you actually matter.”

“They won’t be ready for me for a while.”

“And we’ll never be ready for you. Our story… isn’t a story about stories. It’s just a story.”

“Except right now.”

“Because you’re here,” Pinkie responded. “And because this is the moment you all look back.”

I blinked. Then I shook my head. “You know… For a second there I thought you might have known something I didn’t.”

Pinkie smiled sadly. “Yeah… Almost.”

I closed my notebook and put it away. “This is a very special world you have, Pinkie.”

“There are others like it.”

“Yes, I know. The worlds that mirror… The worlds that are images of the entire story…”

“Twilence, stop,” Pinkie said. “You’re sounding hungry.”

“…I don’t know the ending…”

“And if you look into our ending, it won’t be the ending you’re going to get. You can’t know.” Pinkie blinked. “…Why can’t you know?”

I smiled warmly and shook my head. “Two ponies of vast knowledge shouting at each other from opposite sides of a river bank… We both know exactly what we’re talking about, and we know nothing.” I shook my head. “Enjoy your life, Pinkie Pie. I won’t bother you again.”

And then I was gone.

I kept my promise. I never came back.

~~~

And I don’t know what happened to them. GM here, again, sorry, back to back with Twilence, should probably make that obvious.

On some scale, I know, because I know Songs of the Spheres. All the major villains will show up, though out of order. There’ll be some historic events – the World Wars, the Space Race, and the Steel Ball Run of course for all the Stands.

Then the power to defeat the gods will be unleashed. Will there be a war like the war for existence? I’m thinking not. That aspect of the story would be taken care of in the world wars. The Echo of the Earth would not be about the end of stories… but the culmination of one story. I don’t even know what the ending would be, but I know the heroes wouldn’t have to second-guess their own actions on several different levels just to make sure it was ‘likely’ to succeed. A world without ka awareness is much simpler.

But they existed, that’s for sure. And they lived a deep, complex, and long life.

A planet far, far too full of stuff for its own good.

~~~

Twilence’s Addendum:

The diminutive unicorn with the artificial horn stood on the moon, using her magic to keep the atmosphere. Behind her was the black gate, the only gate that existed off the surface of the Earth, near the very edge of the gates transmission ability.

Her name was Sweetie Belle. And she had colonized this cratered rock.

She looked down at the Earth. Just as beautiful as she remembered – green and blue mostly, but purple in a few places, and the weird messes of color that were the poles were always great to see.

The sun was nowhere to be seen. It had not made the trip with the Earth and its moon. The New World had decided the small ball of fire wasn’t necessary.

She looked up at the dozens of planets swirling across the sky. They attracted her like nothing ever had. Their mystery… Their power… Where had they come from? Why were they here? How were they moving?

…Why did she feel like her presence was so important?

She would later be told that the Earth and its Moon were the only planets in the entire New World not to experience any Dusting at all. Not a single person on either of the bodies had been lost during the collapse. Furthermore, the Earth and Moon hadn’t been separated, which was almost unheard of.

The belief that that was the reason she was special was wrong. She would not discover why for a long, long time, for they were far from Nucleon and the statue of Allure.

For this one moment though, standing on the moon and trying to take in the New World… she somehow felt at peace.

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