Time and Time Again
From Whence We Fell
By iAmSiNnEr
Time and Time Again
The golem simply tilted its head, before sidestepping the blade.
Midnight’s eyes widened. Impossible! How was it that fast?
Or was she just slow?
“I am the caretaker of the Room of Systems,” the golem whirred. “I control every System. Time. Space. The food chain. The Solar System. The stars. The atmosphere. Everything falls under my purview.”
Gears clanked around them, and Midnight froze.
And then the body of Nightmare Moon disappeared.
“You have failed the Trials, Midnight Sparkle,” the golem intoned. “You failed to face your fears. Instead of accepting, you fought against the truth. You are unworthy of the Engine, and you shall now be erased from existence—”
A rip in the air, and Nightmare Moon sliced down with her blade at the golem’s head as she dropped out from a tear in the very air above the golem.
The golem backhanded Nightmare Moon, sending her flying into a wall of gears. Nightmare Moon’s sword clattered onto the ground, the runes inscribed along the blade dimming.
“Why have you returned?” the golem tilted its head. “You passed the Trials. You were given passage to the Engine. You should have gone on.”
Nightmare Moon grunted with effort as she pushed herself up, looking straight at the frozen body of Midnight Sparkle. “What have you done to her?!” she snarled.
“Time has been frozen for her,” the golem made his way over to Nightmare Moon, the gears inside his chest whirring as he looked at her. “She failed the Trials. She will now be erased.”
“No.”
“What did you say?” the golem asked. “Did you just command me not to erase her?”
Nightmare Moon’s eyes burned. “I did.” She held out her hoof, and her blade returned to her grasp. “What about it?”
“I do not understand.” the golem whirred. “You were given passage to the Engine. You were deemed worthy. You could have had what you wanted. Why did you return?”
“Because the Engine showed me what you were going to do to her, damn it!” Nightmare Moon cried out. “You think I would just let her be erased?”
“Why not?” the golem asked. “You can have what you want.”
“Because I want her to stay,” Nightmare Moon snarled. “Because as much as I hate her, I have grown to love her. And like her for who she is. You will not erase her, because she is mine alone.”
At that, the golem paused. He tilted his head. “System error. This was not documented. This was not in the logs of Time. The logs of Time dictated that you would have left her behind. That you would have let her be erased.”
“Then those logs are wrong,” Nightmare Moon growled. “She’s coming with me.”
“Request denied,” the golem whirred. “She must be erased. She failed the Trials.”
“She must be erased—” the golem suddenly froze. “Error. Logs of Time are being rewritten. Error. Space is being opened from another world. Error. Error. This construct will now shut down. Error. Error. Time is being—"
The golem simply tilted its head, before sidestepping the blade.
Wait, what?
Midnight slashed at the golem once again, but the golem simply held up a hand and she couldn’t move. She couldn't talk. Only think.
“I am the caretaker of the Room of Systems,” the golem whirred. “I control every System. Time. Space. The food chain. The Solar System. The stars. The atmosphere. Everything falls under my purview.”
He stomped a foot on the ground, and even Midnight’s thoughts ceased.
“You have failed the Trials, Midnight Sparkle,” he intoned. “You failed to face your fears. Instead of accepting, you fought against the truth. You are unworthy of the Engine, and you shall now be erased from existence—”
Nightmare Moon blasted the golem in the face with a ray of magic, forcing it backward.
“What have you done?” she snarled. “Why are we back here again?”
“Time will be rewritten until the Logs of Time is fulfilled,” the golem whirred. “Error. The subject has retained memories from the last entry in the Logs of Time. Logs of Time are being rewritten. Error. Space is being opened from another world. Error. Error. This construct will now shut down. Error. Error. Time is being—"
The golem simply tilted its head, before sidestepping the blade.
This time, Midnight stayed her hoof, and waited for the golem to speak.
“I am the caretaker of the Room of Systems,” the golem whirred. “I control every System. Time. Space. The food chain. The Solar System. The stars. The atmosphere. Everything falls under my purview.”
“I know. You’ve said it twice already.” Midnight could barely hold in her anger. How was the golem manipulating time to that degree?
The golem’s gears stopped.
“How?” It asked plaintively. “How do your memories stay after I have rewritten time and forced us back?”
“I don’t know, golem. I don’t know.” Midnight’s horn lit up. “But don’t try again. Time shouldn’t be changed like that.”
“The Logs of Time must be fulfilled,” the golem said. “Until its destiny is completed, I will keep rewriting Time. I will make sure the world is not destroyed. I will keep our Systems intact.”
Nightmare Moon stepped out from the gash, and it closed up again.
“We don’t have much time, golem. What did you mean by Space is being opened from another world?” she demanded.
“Visitors from another world will arrive in a minute and sixteen seconds,” the golem said. “Unless I erase Midnight Sparkle. Then our world will be safe. She is the catalyst. The root to the poisoned tree of Time.”
“We can fix it.”
The words slipped out of Midnight’s mouth before she realized it. She blinked in surprise at her own decision but shook her head. “We can fix it. Let us go to the Engine. And we can find out who these visitors are.”
“I cannot—” the golem’s gears came to a stop. “They have arrived. Error. Error—"
Nightmare Moon blasted it in the face with a ray. “Don’t! You’re just delaying the inevitable.”
“I must stop this. They will destroy our world.” The golem said. “Fine. Go. But I will reverse time just as our world dissolves. This is your chance. Your eternal chance, if you fail. I will keep repeating. And repeating. I cannot leave this plane of existence. But you can. And I will make sure you keep trying until you go insane if you fail.”
Before they could speak, the world dissolved.
And it reformed into a room filled with grand marble pillars.
In the middle of the room, Daybreaker and Heartbreaker stood at a crystalline table that had gears set in it.
“The Engine,” Nightmare Moon announced. “Behold, the system that controls our world.”
“About time, sister,” Daybreaker turned to them. “But I’m afraid we’re too late. The two ponies and their baby dragon have left. And our world is dissolving with them—”
ERROR.
The golem simply tilted its head, before sidestepping the blade.
“Go.”
And the world dissolved again.
Midnight arrived back in the room where the Engine was to a sight that surprised her.
“I have to go back for her!” Nightmare Moon was yelling at her sister. “She’s—”
“She’s right there,” Daybreaker said dryly. “Do you have to say the same thing every time? It’s getting rather exhausting.”
“So what’s going on?” Midnight demanded.
“Here.” Heartbreaker said, her voice devoid of emotion as she tapped on the table that was the Engine.
A scene was created in mid-air, where Midnight saw herself, no, Twilight, gesturing at a wasteland to a lilac unicorn. She seemed to be trying to reason with the unicorn.
“We can’t let them leave,” Daybreaker said. “If they do, our world dies. We’re a split-off timeline from theirs, it seems.”
“What is their fixed point?” Nightmare Moon gazed at the scene. “Where did they change it all?”
“That’s the thing. I can’t find it,” Daybreaker muttered. “It doesn’t make sense. Their fixed point can’t be found in our world. And our world keeps fading once they leave. This doesn’t make sense at all.”
“We have to kill them.” the words came from Heartbreaker. “It is the only way.”
“But if we can’t find the fixed point in our world—” Midnight froze as the two ponies hugged, before sharing a look and disappearing through the portal in the sky.
ERROR.
The golem simply tilted its head, before sidestepping the blade.
No. Not again.
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Ok there shouldn't be any arguments against killing them
Not only they aren't pacifists but they have to save their reality
Again I don't see them having any arguments, dilemmas against doing that
They also can't leave this world with Twilight and Starlight because they will go back to a save point in time
Thought why can't they ask the golem to make them go further back in time to give them more time to deal with them?
11192656
The answer to your question is that the golem is a robotic system that does not have logic, only methods. It only brings them back to two minutes before they arrive, because that's where it assumes is the fixed point to allow them to do as they need.
Who ever made that robot did not give it not many options for dealing with things
Hey this story is alive thank you for the update
great chapter
How do you save your world when it is a split timeline?
It is an interesting problem.
Oh wow. I imagine I know how Midnight will solve this, but it'll still be quite the show.
Okay, now I'm intrigued to see how exactly it will play out. It seems quite a pickle to be in, for sure !
………WELL THEN.
Intriguing that this timeline is the wasteland timeline from The Cutie Re-mark. That is a bit of a pickle. Two different Twilights (one of them being Midnight) want to save their respective timelines. Whether this will solidify an AU is the question.
Very strange. Based on what we've seen, this worldline shouldn't have been able to fork off of the first rainboom. Yet it is, by all appearances and causal behavior, a Glimmer splinter. Most peculiar. Looking forward to seeing how you resolve the contradiction.
11197771
Yeessss someone finally notices what I meant by their fixed point being missing.
I wasn't expecting this world to be the wasteland world Starlight and Twilight visited. Nice one.
I'm really loving this so far! Hope to see an update soon!
-L
Sounds like the fabric of time itself is deteriorating.
Don't worry, those four alicorns did already most of the work.
Just try again.
At one point you must succeed. I mean, you have literally infinite attempts for making it work.
Don't stress yourself.
Quality takes time, and Real Live is always more important.
This store is awesome I cannot wait for the update
and if I'm being completely honest I really hope midnight daybreak nightmare Moon and heartbreaker fail to stop Twilight from fixing the timeline because in all honesty the world is dead anyway and it more interesting if they travel with them
Um, will this story be continued? If you can't/don't want to continue it, it'd be good to know, that's all
11299820
It will. Give me time, I'm right smack in the middle of constant tests as I lead up to finals. Maybe check my blog for news?
that is a fun twist. of course dead Nightmare Moon was just the true trial!
ah, so this world was the complete desolation timeline the entire time! and the golem automatically restarting time so as to prevent the destruction of this timeline is a neat idea
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Wow... I liked this part!