Friendship is Multiversal

by Spark Plug

Episode 4: PARTY WITHOUT LIMITS

There was an art form to parties. Pinkie knew not everypony understood it. It usually started with a question like, "Oh, you're a party pony for a living?" And Pinkie would explain, and they would start the smile-and-nod-while-not-quite-looking-at-her.

Those explanations tended to be about fifty percent truth anyway. Pinkie giggled; if they're not listening, why not be silly?

But back to the party! There was an art form to parties. Drinks had to be monitored. Atmosphere had to be cultivated. Extroverts and introverts had to be kept just the right distance from each other. Snacks had to be rotated for freshness and the proper balance of sweet and savory.

Which is exactly what Pinkie was doing. She popped up in the kitchen of the dining hall. "How're the cookies?"

"Gah!" the chef yelled, dropping the spatula onto the baking sheet. She took a breath, and let it out slowly. "Pink," she said evenly, "what's the first rule of my kitchen?"

"Always stay on the other side of–oopsie!" Pinkie disappeared and reappeared on the other side of the kitchen window. "Sorry, Chef!"

The chef took another deep breath. "What was your question?"

"How're the cookies?"

"Two minutes on the cookies."

"Okie-doki-loki!" She pivoted on her right hind hoof and emerged next to the drink station. Without stopping her momentum, she loaded a tray down with several different drinks, tossed it onto her back, and ducked into the shadow beside the ice machine.

She ducked out from underneath a table full of children and held the tray up, facing away from the table. "Ta-da!"

She heard the giggling behind her. "Wait," she said, "where did everypony go?"

When the children answered with a chaotic yell of their own, she turned around and gave an exaggerated smile. "There you are!" She walked around the table passing out the drinks. "One boysenberry soda, one fruit punch, one grape soda, one Coca-Cola with Cane Sugar, one Coca-Cola with Corn Sugar, and one ginger ale with no ice." She barely stayed still long enough for the kids to say "thank you" before hopping over a nearby table.

She landed in a quiet corner of some out-of-the-way building. She let the serving tray fall to the ground and collapsed down, sucking wind. She leaned on her right forehoof and held up her left. It was trembling.

With an angry snort she shoved both forehooves to the ground. "You can do this, Pinkie," she said to herself. "This is the biggest party you've ever seen, and everycreature here needs you." She sat for a moment longer, doing her best to catch her breath.

Her ear twitched. "Cookies are done," she muttered. With one last determined breath, she stood back up, steadied herself, and fell to the side.

She stood up on the correct side of the kitchen window in time to hear "Cookies up!" from the chef.

"Thanks, Chef!" she yelled before disappearing again.

---

Friendship is Multiversal: Discovery

Episode 4: Party Without Limits

---

"My office is down here," Ronyo said, leading Twilight and Sonic down a stairwell. "Really, it could have been anywhere I wanted, but I've always had a thing for basements." He pushed through a door labeled "Department of Insufficiently Advanced Technology" and showed them to a set of small couches before walking off into the space.

Twilight took a look around the space. It was a pretty open space with a lot of shelving. Boxes and various devices littered the shelves, some of which looked vaguely familiar from her time in Sunset Shimmer's world.

"Tails would love this," Sonic said absently.

"If I knew what half this stuff was, I would too," Twilight answered.

Ronyo returned holding two tablet computers. He pulled a chair closer to the couches and sat down heavily.

"Okay," he said after a moment. "There's a few principles that govern this multiverse. One of them you know: when you enter a world, you take a form from that world. It's not a hard-and-fast rule, but it's a pretty good guideline."

He sighed. "The principle I need to talk to you about is this: history in one world becomes fiction in another."

He looked up at them. "Somehow, real events that happen in one world can make their way though the multiverse. Not though gossip or reporting, though that does happen. I mean though dreams, ideas, inspiration..." He picked up the tablets, but hesitated. "But because it's so far removed," he said, "we've found a lot of the details can get lost or changed. Have y'all heard the phrase, 'based on a true story'?" Sonic and Twilight nodded. "It's the same principle here."

Ronyo took a breath and let it out slowly. He met Twilight and Sonic's gaze. "Where I come from," he said, "Princess Twilight Sparkle and Sonic the Hedgehog are fictional characters." He smiled. "In fact, they're two of my heroes. But they're not you; you're real. And as much as I adore those stories, I'm much more interested in being friends with you."

He held up the tablets. "That being said, these are the stories that are in my world. If you want to, I'd love to compare notes. If you don't want to, that's fine."

Sonic immediately held his hand out. "Hit me, whatcha got?"

Ronyo handed him a tablet. "Sonic the Hedgehog, lead of one of the most well-loved and long-lived video game franchises ever." He motioned over his shoulder. "Think I've got some of the originals in here somewhere."

"Way past cool," Sonic muttered as he dove into the tablet's library.

Ronyo turned to Twilight who was shuffling her hooves nervously.

"Twilight, I'm sorry," Ronyo said after a moment. "I... I have a bad habit of making assumptions about people I meet, especially if I've heard of them."

"It's okay," Twilight said quickly. "That's not..." She looked at the tablet with trepidation. "What am I going to see in there?"

"Stories," Ronyo answered. "Stories that may or may not be true."

"What if they are, though?" She blinked, almost surprised at the words coming out of her own mouth. "What if everything in there is exactly how my life has been?"

"That's fair," Ronyo said. "I can only imagine what that would feel like. But I can promise you this: your life is your own. If what's in there is surprisingly accurate, it just means that your story was stronger somehow." He leaned forward. "Like I said: history becomes fiction. Not the other way around."

Twilight nodded. She held her hoof to her chest, then let out a breath as she pushed it away. Visibly brighter, she said, "So, what do you have for me?"

Ronyo smiled and handed her the tablet along with a stylus. "Princess Twilight Sparkle," he said, "main character of My Little Pony: Friendship is Magic, the fourth iteration of the My Little Pony franchise. Mostly a cartoon, but I've got some of the toys."

---

Drinks distributed. Desserts deployed. Entrées en route. Seating settled. Pinkie placed herself in another nondescript corner to catch her breath. She knew she was running herself ragged, but she couldn't stop. Not yet.

A man stumbled into the room. He loosely managed to string himself up into a standing position and brushed his dreadlocks back behind his head. "Sorry," he slurred, "thought this was the loo."

Pinkie's hind leg twitched. "Hall to your right, second door on the left," she said flatly.

"Cheers," the man said. He turned towards the hall but kept turning until he was facing Pinkie. "Don't think I've seen you here before."

"Haven't been here before," Pinkie said, still emotionless.

"But you know where..." He motioned vaguely towards the bathroom.

"I know the bathroom is down that hall, second door on the left," Pinkie said. "I know that most of the people are taken care of, but there's still plenty for me to do. I know I've got another thirty-three seconds before the next pan of spaghetti comes out of the oven. Once I deliver that, I need to check on TARDIS nine." She finally looked up at the man. "I know what I need to know to throw a good party."

The man crouched down. "How good of a party, love?"

Pinkie smirked. "For you, Captain Jack?" she said, her voice returning. "I'd take you around the world in eighty rums."

Captain Jack blinked. "Well, that's interesting," he said. "When do we start?"

Pinkie's ear twitched. "After TARDIS nine." With a salute, she fell back into the shadow and reappeared at the kitchen window.

"Noodles up!" the chef yelled.

"Thanks, Chef!" Pinkie responded, grabbing the pan of pasta and pronking out the door, magically ending up next to the buffet table that had just run out of spaghetti. With a flourish, she swapped pans out and ducked beneath the table. She made a quick stop at the bussing station to drop off the empty pan then turned the corner to find herself just beside one of the tables for TARDIS nine.

He wasn't hard to spot, with his shaved head, leather jacket, and empty stare. There was an untouched glass of water in front of him.

"Is he what I'm looking for?" Pinkie wondered out loud.

Every part of Pinkie's body, from her nose to her tail, twitched violently.

"Right, a doozy," she said to herself as she walked up to him.

The man shook his head as she trotted up. "Nope," he said. "Nothing for me."

"Nothing at all?" Pinkie said. "A perfectly seared venison steak? Meatloaf with a side of macaroni and cheese?" She shrugged. "Half a gallon of rocky road ice cream?"

The man just glared at her.

Pinkie turned around and flopped her head backwards onto the table.

"What are you doing?" the man ground out.

"Turning your frown upside down!" Pinkie said brightly.

"Oh, I'm sorry," the man said. "Forgive me for not reveling in the destruction of two entire civilizations. Just not in the mood to celebrate an uncountable number of lives lost." He snarled. "Just make sure the one that caused all of this gets his feast afterwards."

Pinkie just stared at him. Then she picked herself up, turned back to face him, and held out a hoof. "I'm Pinkie Pie; what's your name?"

The man kept his arms folded. "I'm the Doctor. The Oncoming Storm. The Destroyer of Gallifrey." He leaned forward. "And I'm the reason all these people are here instead of at home. I'm the one that destroyed everything. And I'd really prefer not to destroy anything else today!"

Pinkie kept standing there.

The Doctor narrowed his eyes. "Run."

Pinkie pulled her hoof back into a salute then disappeared in a comical cloud of dust.

---

Sonic hopped onto the couch next to Twilight. "How's it going, Princess?"

Twilight set down the tablet and notepad. "It's... surreal. You?"

Sonic shrugged. "Eh, no big deal," he said.

Twilight looked at him. "Really."

Sonic smiled weakly. "Well, it helps that there's a mode that lets you play as Tails. So there's a bit of disconnect between those life-and-death fights that I still sometimes have nightmares about and what I'm actually doing in the game." He shuddered. "Means I can't play more of the recent games."

Twilight smiled sympathetically. "They're that accurate?"

"They don't have to be. They get enough of the broad strokes right that I can fill in the other gaps." He shook it off and smiled back at Twilight. "Anyway, how's the cartoon?"

"Not bad," Twilight said. "Fairly accurate overall." She held up the notepad. "I've got a long list of nitpicks, but most of it can be explained by this being a foal's cartoon."

"Like?"

Twilight huffed. "Where do I start? First off, the timeline is all over the place. The cartoon doesn't have me making up with Moondancer until well after I'm a princess, but that happened after I..." She trailed off and mumbled a few things.

Sonic smelled blood in the water. "What was that?" he asked with a broad grin.

Twilight rolled her eyes. "After I freaked out about not sending a friendship report and decided to create a problem by casting a nuromantic spell that—" She shook her head and cut herself off. "I snapped, broke a couple of laws, and had to go through therapy back in Canterlot. That was why I was even in Canterlot to have the chance to make up with Moondancer."

Sonic nodded.

Twilight looked at him. "Too much?"

"Who's Moondancer?"

Twilight smiled slightly. "One of my... well, we were classmates. We worked together pretty often. But I didn't really... have friends until I moved to Ponyville. Turns out, she really wanted to be my friend, and I just kinda... ignored her."

"But you're friends now?"

"We're friends now. She helps me with a lot of research stuff; I've actually got her looking up any other magical items that might have made their way to the other world."

"That's great," Sonic said with an easy smile. "Gotta admit, I'm a little jealous of the cartoon."

"Really?" Twilight looked back over at the TV. "I thought you'd love being a video game."

"I mean, I do," he said. "But the message gets lost. I mean, there's a game back there from where... uh..." He flicked his arms a few times. "The world kinda broke apart? So I had to run around the world and set everything back—Anyway! The game only has a few characters besides me and completely ignores all the help I was getting. I mean, they left out Knuckles!"

He leaned back. "Point being, with your cartoon, it's right there in the title. 'Friendship is magic.' For me, it's like they started cutting out characters right around the time I started making a bunch of friends. Friends that keep me going."

"Friends that make you who you are," Twilight added.

The companionable silence lasted another beat before Sonic leaned forward. "So, timeline issues; anything else?"

Twilight shrunk in on herself. "You mentioned life-and-death situations? That your friends aren't there for?" She shifted her wings self-consciously. "I'm not sure whether to be relieved or offended that they glossed over the story of how I got these."

Sonic shifted slightly. "We don't have to—"

"I died."

Sonic blinked.

Twilight rushed forward. "It was just one episode of the show. Not even a two-parter! Just 'ha-ha look at Twilight she swapped all her friends' cutie marks what's she going to do now?' I sing a couple of songs and..." She sighed deeply. "They made it seem like it was completing the spell that did it, but..."

She looked Sonic in the eye. "I messed up their destinies. That deep magic that gave you a different name? That gives us our cutie marks? That's what I messed with, that's what I screwed up, that's what I had to fix. And it took everything." She looked back at the tablet. "Sure, I finished Star Swirl's last spell. That, combined with the Elements of Harmony, was the only thing that could get back to that deep magic and let me fix things."

She blinked away a couple of tears. "This is a state secret, by the way," she deadpanned. "If it got out what it actually takes to ascend..."

"You died."

Twilight nodded. "Channeling that much magic, correcting destiny like that, it has a cost. But in that moment, all I could think was, 'I have to help my friends. I have to put things back the way they should be so my friends can live their lives.' And I didn't care about the cost.

"When everything stopped, I was alone in... a limbo space? It's like, there's nothing there, but I'm still standing. Princess Celestia met me there and told me..." She blinked more tears away. "Told me that only a special few make it here. And she could take me back, or let me go on."

"Hey," Sonic said, placing his hand on her shoulder. "You're here."

"Should I be?"

"Hell, yeah!" Sonic said. "I don't know much about what happened, but it certainly sounds like if you weren't supposed to come back, you wouldn't have." He chuckled slightly. "Granted, I don't think I've actually hit the afterlife, but I've gotten close. Really close. Like..."

He got up. "Want to see me try to beat the game? They did a pretty good job with the Death Egg."

---

Pinkie looked down from the balcony of the lighthouse. She was collapsed in a heap, and she honestly wasn't sure if her rear calf muscle twitching was Pinkie Sense or just an old-fashioned muscle twitch. Upon further contemplation, she was too tired to care.

But the Doctor. That was a doozy if she'd ever seen one. She hadn't had someone that opposed to being happy since... ever. Cranky Doodle was just a grump; the Doctor was mad. Mad at the world, mad at everyone, mad at himself.

And the worst part was... he was right. She'd gathered bits and pieces of what had happened and pieced together a pretty nasty story: there was a war, both sides were being horrible, and the Doctor ended it by destroying both armies. Problem was, those armies were both on his home planet. So the planet had to go too.

Pinkie looked down at the party, at the hastily set up tables and seemingly random buffet lines. It was like those harvest festivals in Ponyville where everypony brought a dish and just spent the afternoon sharing recipes and swapping outlandish stories.

Pinkie blinked and focused on the people here. They were sharing plates of food, swapping stories, and she saw several groups of children starting to converge into a massive game of freeze tag (or whatever they called it on Gallifrey). She reached out with her party sense to see if there were any trouble spots brewing...

Nothing.

"They're not mad at him," she said to herself.

"They're really not," a voice said next to her.

She turned to see another man, this one with a long coat and slightly messy hair.

"Doctor?" Pinkie said.

"Hello," the Doctor said.

Pinkie's eyes widened. "Oh, because you're all the Doctor but at different times and the one down there is from TARDIS Nine because he is number nine and you're number..."

"Ten," the Doctor said simply.

Pinkie brightened up. "So you know that things are okay now—"

The Doctor shook his head. "No, Pinkie," he said. "Things are not okay. I just lost my home. But..." He sighed. "I've made peace with that. Not as much as he has, though." He pointed over Pinkie's shoulder.

Pinkie turned around to see another man, this one in a tweed jacket and a stylish pompadour. "Hello," he said. "Number eleven."

Pinkie narrowed her eyes. She looked back at Ten, felt the ear twitch, then turned back to Eleven. "It's been over a hundred years, mister," she said. "You're getting a party."

Eleven rolled his eyes. "Can't we just—"

"I don't make the rules!"

"Yes you do!"

Pinkie giggled. "Yeah, I do." She looked back down at the party.

"I think I get it now," she said. "It's like when I first get into my party cave after being outside in the bright sunlight and I can't see anything except dark and it only looks like dark and I don't know if I've gone blind or if this is normal but then my eyes adjust and I can see the string lights I left on and the glow crystals and the in-floor-LED-lights that I can't do anything with because I've never met Alexa—" She inhaled. "And then it all makes sense. And right now Doctor number nine just went into the cave and he can't see anything and he thinks he's gone blind, right?"

"That sounds right," Ten said.

Eleven just gaped. "Bloody hell, I forgot how insightful she is," he muttered.

Pinkie grinned. "Okay, I think I know what to do. Can you—"

"We'll meet you there," Eleven said.

Ten furrowed his brow. "Meet her where?"

"Oi!" Eleven snapped back. "I'm about to show you, Sandshoes."

"But—" Ten looked around the balcony. "And she's gone."

---

"So these games take place in your home world," Twilight said, motioning to the stack of cartridges. "But these other games are in that other world you mentioned?"

"Yeah," Sonic said, "pretty much. The first time we went to that other world was a complete accident, though. Took Angel Island with us." He shuddered. "Knuckles was not happy about that."

Twilight smiled. "But you were able to move it back before this game?"

Sonic nodded as his on-screen version sat on the end of a pier with a red flying dog. "This was actually my last adventure in the human world," he said. "They, uh..." He winced. "They didn't like me very much after this."

Twilight raised an eyebrow. "For something Robotnik did?"

"Oh, they hate him," he said with a laugh. "Like, 'show your face here and we will not hesitate to shoot you on sight.' Amazingly enough, they don't take kindly to their planet being broken apart." He chuckled. "No, it's more of a 'you're nothing but trouble' kind of attitude. So I've kinda laid low when we go back."

On the screen, the sun went down and Sonic turned into a larger, furrier version of himself.

Twilight motioned at the screen with a wing. "Did that hurt?"

Sonic shrugged. "A little," he said quietly. He suddenly put the controller down and got up. "Actually, you should watch the last cutscenes in here."

Twilight got up to follow him. "Are you okay?"

Sonic blinked and fidgeted with his bracelet. "Yeah," he whispered.

Twilight looked at the bracelet, then back to the flying dog on the screen with an identical item around its neck. "That's Chip's?"

Sonic nodded. "He was a good friend," he said. "I mean, one of the two spirits responsible for the cycle of life in that world, but..." He smiled. "He just loved living. Ice cream, chocolate, hanging on for dear life while I was speeding along. And even when he got his memory back, he still had that joy."

Twilight held a hoof out to touch him. "Did he...?"

Sonic shook his head. "He didn't die. Neither of us did, though it was touch-and-go there. He had to magic me out of the middle of the earth after the battle, though. And he stayed behind... to sleep for a thousand years."

Sonic took a deep breath and shook himself off. "And then Baldy McNosehair did that thing with the Wisps and I was off on another adventure!"

Twilight gave him a mild glare.

Sonic smiled sheepishly. "Seriously, I'm okay," he said. "It was... just a lot of memories to bring back up."

Twilight smiled back. "Memories of a good friend, though."

---

Pinkie was pushing herself harder than she ever had. She didn't have her usual supply of cameras hidden around for camera-related emergencies, so first she had to find some. Thankfully she found a room with a box of disposable cameras just waiting for her.

She almost stopped by to say hi to Sonic and Twilight, but Pinkie Sense said not to interfere. She grabbed several dozen cameras and stuffed them into her mane then dove into the box—

—to reappear next to the table for TARDIS one. "Hey, everycreature!" she yelled, holding up a couple of the cameras. "Who wants to take some pictures?"

Immediately several children and at least two teenagers rushed forward. Pinkie handed out a few cameras, admonished them to take turns, then pronked off towards TARDIS two.

And so on.

When she gave out the last camera at TARDIS twelve, she collapsed. Not in a dead faint, but awfully close.

"Getting on all right, then?" an older gentleman said, leaning over her.

Pinkie lazily looked up at him. "Doctor number twelve?"

"Aye," he said with a smile. He reached down and helped her to her hooves. "What you're doing..." he began.

"It's gonna work, right?" Pinkie said.

Twelve shook his head. "I'm here, aren't I?"

Pinkie smiled. "So... does that mean I can borrow your TARDIS to develop the film?"

Twelve sighed. "Leave it in Eleven's," he said. "I'll make sure it's ready by the time I'm here."

Pinkie's right hind leg twitched. "TARDIS one is done!" Without waiting for a response, she pronked over a nearby wall—

—and landed sideways in the middle of the crowd at TARDIS one. A few kids laughed, and a few more laughed when she sprung up. With a smile and a thanks, she collected the cameras and disappeared.

Collecting the remainder of the cameras didn't go quite as quickly. One Doctor, with an impressively long scarf, insisted on taking a picture with her. Another group of middle-aged Gallifreyans were still debating what kind of pictures to take—Pinkie took the camera herself and ran them though some rapid-fire poses. But eventually the cameras from all twelve groups were collected.

Pinkie parked herself outside of TARDIS eleven. Gingerly, she knocked on the door. "Excuse me, Miss TARDIS?" she said. "I know it might be impolite, but I have a lot of pictures to develop and I need a time machine for that."

The door swung open.

"Thanks!" Pinkie said as she pronked inside. Five seconds later she pronked out and into TARDIS twelve. Five seconds later she pronked out of that, her mane filled to bursting with photographs. "Thanks again!" She pronked into the shadow behind the TARDIS and came out into the out-of-the-way corner she'd been frequenting earlier.

She took three whole seconds to survey the area. Plan made, she pulled a piece of her mane out, stuck it in her mouth, chewed it for a bit, then pulled out the sticky bubble gum and used it to attach the photos to the wall.

There were a lot of photos. Enough to cover both walls of the corner, from the ground to twelve feet up.

Pinkie took a moment to survey her handiwork, and, with a nod of satisfaction, fell backwards to get the guest of honor—

—and fell on her back.

“Ow,” Pinkie muttered, her voice cracking. “That hurt.” Slowly, painfully, she pulled herself back to her hooves. She’d been able to ignore the fatigue while she had the project to focus on, but it all caught up with her suddenly.

“Why couldn’t I go?” she mused out loud. With a deep breath, she closed her eyes again and focused on her Pinkie Sense: her unique brand of magic that let her be where she needed to be, know what she needed to know, and do what she needed to do. She focused inward, trying to find what she needed.

The results were… confusing. Which, to her, was a new experience. The ninth Doctor was somewhere impossible, which she guessed meant he was in his time machine. Even with her magic, she wasn’t sure she could get there.

She looked up at the collage of photos. All the people that the Doctor had saved today. All the stories she had heard during the party.

“No,” she said, steeling herself for one last jump with her magic, “you’re going to laugh today.”

She took one last breath, and pounced.

She emerged in a circular room that had seen better days. There were several support beams exposed (not on purpose), exposed wiring everywhere, and piles of junk and broken armor everywhere. The focal point was the center console, itself charred and broken, the center column wheezing as it pumped up and down.

“How the hell did you get in here?” the Doctor yelled, frantically getting between Pinkie and the console.

“Woooooooah," she said, wide-eyed and looking around. "Is this your time machine?"

"It's my TARDIS," the Doctor huffed. "And you can't be here."

"But I am here," Pinkie said with a grin.

"Yes, you are!" the Doctor yelled. "Inside a TARDIS that is inside the time vortex! So how—"

"Wait, we're traveling through time right now?" Pinkie interrupted, still grinning. "That's so cool."

"Yes, it is, and it's also—"

"Are you running away?"

"What?"

Pinkie lost her grin. "Are. You. Running. Away."

The Doctor matched her stare. "Yes."

"Why?"

"Why shouldn't I?" the Doctor yelled. "Why should I stay there? Among all those people who lost their homes because of me? All those children without parents?" He pointed at Pinkie. "And don't tell me everything's going to be all right. I'm the Doctor. I'm a time traveller. You think I don't know what my future selves being there means? Of course this isn't the end. I did everything I did so it wouldn't be the end! But that doesn't change what I did. That doesn't change everything that happened in this war. And I don't need anyone, especially stupid horses, telling me to be happy!"

Pinkie blinked. "Okay!"

That brought the Doctor up short. "Okay?"

Pinkie looked up at the center column. "Can you get back on your own?"

A pleasant chime sounded from the console. The Doctor turned to look at that, then glared back at Pinkie. "Don't talk to my TARDIS."

Pinkie smiled back at the Doctor. "I'm nopony's messenger pony," she said with a malevolent grin.

The Doctor tensed up.

"I'm a delivery pony."

Pinkie pounced forward, grasping the Doctor in a perfect hoofball tackle, and the two of them fell backwards—

—onto the floor of the photo room. The Doctor immediately sprang up and looked around, ready to defend himself against Pinkie, but he was alone in the room.

Not seeing anything else of interest, he walked up to the walls of photos.

"It's not everyone," the tenth Doctor said, walking into the room with Eleven and Twelve close behind. "But it's a lot."

"But..." Nine stuttered. "They lost their homes."

"They'd already lost their homes," Eleven answered. "Whether by weapons or by policy, the Gallifrey they knew was already gone."

"But I pulled the trigger!" Nine yelled.

"Yes," Twelve said, smiling sadly. "You did that. And because you did that..." He walked past and pulled a photo off the wall. "This child will grow up. They'll go on to study science and advance the understanding of the multiverse." He motioned to another. "These teenagers are going to end a refugee crisis in another world by sheer force of will."

"Stop," Nine said, defeated. "I don't... I don't care what everyone's going to do. What phoenix will rise from these ashes. Not when there should never have been a fire."

"No, Doctor," Twelve said. "There should never have been a fire. But there was one, and you put it out."

"The war is over," Eleven continued. "They have a chance to rest, now."

"And everything that happens," Ten concluded, "can only happen because you ended the war."

Nine let out something between a cough, a laugh, and a sob. And then another one. Twelve stepped forward and pulled him into a hug. Nine grasped onto Twelve's coat like a life preserver, laughing and crying all at once.

Off to the side, where Nine had originally fell into the room, a pattern of three balloons was scorched into the floor.

---

Twilight dropped the controller.

Sonic jumped, startled. "Everything okay?"

"No..." Twilight said, distracted. "Something..."

She shot to her hooves. "Pinkie!" she yelled. She turned to Sonic. "I need to find someone that can planeshift!"

Sonic nodded and started to move, then stopped. "What am I looking for?"

"Something's happening on another plane of existence," she said frantically. "I think Pinkie..."

Sonic nodded. "Same thing that happened to you?"

"Right," Twilight said, "but I don't know if she can get back on her own. And Princess Celestia never taught me how to planeshift, so I don't think I can get her—"

"And you need someone that can," Sonic finished. "On it." He sped out of the room in a flash.

He darted up the stairs until he got to the map room. "Caretaker, you in?" he shouted.

"Sonic!" the Caretaker said jovially, Ronyo looking up from his terminal off to the side. "What—"

"We need someone that can planeshift," Sonic said. "Twilight got a sense that Pinkie Pie might be on another plane of existence."

Ronyo brightened. "She ascended?"

Sonic glared at him. "She's dead until someone brings her back."

Ronyo clammed up.

The Caretaker nodded. "We can scan the surrounding multiverse, see if that shows anything." He pressed a few buttons on his terminal—

—and every screen in the room changed to a red background with white text reading "BAD WOLF."

"Uhhhh," Ronyo said. "Is this a good 'bad wolf' or a bad 'bad wolf'?"

"Well," the Caretaker said, leaning back. "Given that she's blocking us out, I'm inclined to say 'good'."

"So is Pinkie okay?" Sonic said, tapping his foot. "And what's 'bad wolf' got to do with this?"

---

Pinkie was alone. There was a vast expanse above her and below her, yet she was standing on something resembling firm ground.

"Hello?" she called. Her voice didn't echo.

"¿Hola?" she tried. "¿Dónde está la biblioteca?"

"Now, that's an interesting question," a woman's voice said behind her.

Pinkie turned around to see a woman with dirty blonde hair in a ragged white dress.

"The answer, unfortunately, is 'which one'? I know a lot of libraries." She smiled. "But that's not what you were really asking, is it."

Pinkie shook her head.

The woman knelt down to look Pinkie in the eye. "What is your question, Little Pony?"

Pinkie gulped. "Am I dead?" she whispered.

The woman cocked her head. "You could be, if you wanted to be," she said. "But if you were to go back, things would be different."

Pinkie nodded slowly. "What happened?"

The woman laughed. "Pinkie Pie, you impossible thing!" She sat down cross-legged, and Pinkie sat with her. "You were tired, and you pressed on. You were using every last scrap of magic you had and kept going. And then..." She held out a hand and gently held Pinkie's cheek. "You used your magic to jump into the TARDIS. A time machine in flight. And then back out again."

"He was sad," Pinkie said without thinking.

The woman nodded. "This is the Doctor at his lowest. All through this war, he's had to make decisions that went against everything he stood for, this last decision most of all."

A portal opened, showing the older twelfth Doctor comforting the ninth.

"And you brought him exactly where he needed to be: with the ones that understood him to remind him who he is."

Other portals opened, showing not only the party happening around the Lighthouse but moments and parties from Pinkie's past.

"You've done so much for other ponies, Pinkie Pie," the woman said. "Do you understand?"

Pinkie nodded slowly as she looked around.

"Are you ready?"

Pinkie turned back to the woman. "I'm scared," she whispered. "Everything's going to be different."

The woman nodded. "Yes, all but one thing: your friends will still be your friends."

Pinkie smiled, and that smile slowly grew brighter. "Okie-dokie-lokie!" she chirped. "Let's go!"

---

LAUGHTER has joined the party.