For Want of a Horseshoe Nail

by Sixes_And_Sevens

Explanation

Pegasus and earth pony walked in stoic silence along the muddy road into town. Only by skirting the boundary between the orchards and the Everfree had they left Sweet Apple Acres undetected. “So,” said Thunderlane, with cheer as bright and synthetic as neon light, “you want to talk about… this?”

Apple Bloom said nothing. She merely stared at her hooves as she trudged along. Thunderlane frowned slightly. “What’s wrong?” he asked, a little more gently.

“Tain’t natural,” Bloom muttered.

Thunderlane frowned. “Um. Gonna need you to be a little more specific.”

“This… broken universe, or whatever ya call it. Tain’t right. Ah mean, on th’ one hoof, Ah know yer th’ Element o’ Honesty.”

Thunderlane puffed up slightly. “Well, y’know, I do my best…”

“But on th’ other hoof, Ah know that mah sister’s meant t’ be doin’ that!” Bloom explained. “An’ ev’rything else is all topsy-turvy too! Th’ Golden Oaks weren’t destroyed! Lyra’s replacin’ Pinkie Pie! Mah parents are—” she faltered.

Thunderlane waited for a moment. “Your parents are…” he prompted. “Different? More reserved? Er… Apple farmers, as opposed to… whatever they were in your world?”

Apple Bloom kicked at the ground. “Ah’d sooner not talk ‘bout that,” she said coldly.

“Right, gotcha,” Thunderlane said with a nod. “Dunno if it helps, but I’d rather not talk about my parents, either.”

Bloom smiled, but there was no humor in it. “They still kicked out yer brother, then?”

Thunderlane stopped. “How did you know about that?”

“Round ‘bout th’ new year, Rumble tol’ us ev’rything. Said he didn’t wanna hide no more. Ah reckon th’ Doctor had a hoof in, there.”

Thunderlane smirked. “Yeah, he usually does. I guess our universes aren’t all that different, then. Celestia raises the Sun, and Luna raises the Moon.”

“Cadence runs th’ Crystal Empire, Twi’s busy bein’ magic in-carnate, an’ Discord’s runnin’ round tryin’a throw a spanner in things, eeyup,” Bloom agreed, a smile beginning to form on her face.

Thunderlane froze. “Wait. You never stopped Discord? But that’s horrible! I remember when they broke out. I… I…” he trailed off. “It was bad,” he said quietly.

“Couldn’t stop lyin’?”

“...Yeah. Something like that,” Thunderlane agreed, staring down at his hooves.

“They ain’t like that no more, though. They've been reformed! Except… I guess they ain’t been, here.”

Thunderlane snorted. “Reform that monster? I’ll believe it when I see it. Actually, no. No, I wouldn’t.”

Bloom cocked her head. “Why not?”

“I don’t want to talk about that, either,” Thunderlane replied stiffly, staring straight ahead. The duo walked in silence for several more minutes. The mud was sticky, but not terribly so. The rainwater dripped off the vibrant green leaves of the trees that lined the path. The faint scent of petrichor filled the air.

At length, Apple Bloom spoke once more. “So. What did th’ Doc think happened?” Her voice was tight and controlled.

Thunderlane merely shrugged as they walked into Ponyville proper. “I dunno. It’s all technobabble to me. He was pretty vague about it, too.”

Bloom frowned. “So he don’t know what’s goin’ on, neither?”

“I didn’t say that,” Thunderlane replied, furrowing his brow at the younger mare.

“He doesn’t, though, does he.”

Thunderlane’s neck slumped forwards. “No, probably not,” he admitted. “You’ve travelled with him before, then?”

“Couple times,” Bloom agreed with a nod. “Went t’ Timbucktoo, once. Nearly got killed by an angry stormcloud.”

Thunderlane stifled a snort. “You ran into a storm? That’s it?”

“A livin’ storm with a mind of it’s own and a plot t’ take over the world,” Bloom corrected.

“Oh. That’s a little more impressive,” the pegasus admitted. “Try being an Element sometime, though. Nightmare Moon, Discord, Chrysalis, Sombra, Tirek… plus whatever time-travelling bug-eyed monsters from outer space come around trying to ruin Gaea’s day.”

“We don’t get many o’ those where Ah’m from.”

Thunderlane shrugged. “Maybe the Doctor just takes care of them all himself or something.”

Bloom shrugged. “Might be,” she agreed. Inside, however, she wasn’t quite convinced. That, however, was a mystery for another day, and another world. Right now, there were more pressing matters to deal with. So, she turned her eyes forward and continued through the streets of Ponyville with Thunderlane.

***

The Doctor peered at Maple carefully. “Alright… I’ll see your three, and raise you… five.”

“Call,” Lyra scoffed, pointing a hoof accusingly at the Time Lord.

The Doctor smirked, flipping over his cards. “Straight Flush,” he said triumphantly. Zecora, Lyra, and Maple all threw down their cards in disgust.

Maud silently turned her cards around. “Royal,” she said. Everypony groaned.

Lyra shunted the pile of chocolate coins over to Maud. The earth pony regarded them stoically. “I’ll trade you all of them for rocks,” she offered.

Before anypony could leap on that offer, the basement door swung open. “Sorry I’m late,” Thunderlane said, trotting down the stairs, Apple Bloom hot on his hooves.

The yellow mare glanced at the assembled. “Huh. Ah’ll be honest, this weren’t what Ah was expectin’.”

Zecora frowned. “We’d not normally have a poker party, but we were bored, and you were tardy.”

“...That ain’t what Ah meant,” Bloom replied absently, staring at the assembled. None of the Elements— none of her Elements— were seated around the table. She felt vaguely disoriented, all of a sudden. “Never mind,” she said, shaking her head.

The Doctor frowned. “Something the matter?”

“Nothin’,” she replied forcefully. Then, she paused. “Wait. How come yer a pegasus?”

“Ah, well, that’d be what Time Lords call regeneration. When we’re about to die, every cell in our body just sort of goes FWOOSH!” He threw out his forehooves in an explosive motion. “And then we… don’t die, exactly. We just come back a bit different than we went in. Luck of the draw, you know, and I’d have to say that I lucked out on this one.” He struck a pose, hamming it up and grinning broadly.

Apple Bloom took a moment to process this. “Wait. Y’all died?” she asked slowly. “That never happened…”

Lyra frowned. “I thought you always looked like that.”

“Right,” the Doctor agreed. “I regenerated before I came here.” He looked at Bloom with interest. “Which me did you see, then?”

Bloom blinked, nonplussed. “Uh, he was tan… earth pony… real spiky mane.”

“Ah. My predecessor, I imagine,” the Doctor nodded. “Well, that’s an interesting piece in the puzzle!”

“What puzzle?” Apple Bloom asked. “What’s goin’ on?”

The Doctor bit his lower lip and furrowed his brow. “Umm. Well, basically, it’s like… It’s a bit like if an author went back to rewrite his book, and changed something, which meant a bunch of other things had to change, too. Except, it wasn’t really the author, it was just a random guy with a red pen. And he didn’t really know how things would change from there. And, um…”

Apple Bloom held up a hoof. “Enough! Ah get it, Ah get it.”

Zecora grinned. “I’ve yet to find a way to prevent the Doctor from going on a tangent. But worry not! I am still looking. And soon, I’ll have a cure a-cooking.”

The Doctor stuck his tongue out at the zebra, but everypony else chuckled. Even Maud smiled faintly.

Then, Lyra cocked her head. “Wait. So how do we find that first event? I mean, if everything’s been changed, how can we find the cause?”

“Ah,” said the Doctor. “Well. Well well well well well! That is where Miss Apple Bloom here comes in. You see, she’s still got her old universe in her mind, all the bits and bobs and memories whizzing about the noggin. And if something can be remembered…” His face went suddenly lax. “If something can be remembered,” he repeated absently, “it can be brought back…”

He fell silent, staring into space. Apple Bloom watched him with concern. “Ignore it,” Zecora advised. “It’s just his strange interlude. Soon he’ll be back with his regular attitude.”

Indeed, no sooner had she said this than the Doctor seemed to blink awake. “Sorry,” he said, grinning broadly. “I was in another world.”

“...Right…” Bloom said slowly. “So, uh, you were sayin’?”

“Ah!” the Time Lord replied, pointing a hoof at her. “Yes, right. Basically, you sort of know how this is meant to be. You can remember how it was all meant to turn out. That means we can get back to the root of the problem, and see if we can’t fix it there.” He smiled happily.

Bloom stared. “What?” she asked, staring around the room. “Y’ain’t serious. That ain’t a plan, that’s half a catastrophe!”

“Yeah, he is,” Maple replied. “That’s pretty much his M.O., really. Find the source of the problem, run headlong into it, screaming loudly, and figure out the rest as you go.”

Spike glanced up idly from his corner. “We’d probably have done something about it by now if it didn’t work so well,” he said, lazily flipping the page of his comic book.

“So,” said the Doctor, grinning. “You in? You can say no.”

Apple Bloom regarded him for a long moment. Then, with a single fluid motion, she pulled on the pink ribbon in her hair, undoing the bow and tossing it aside. “Ah’m in.”