What do you know about time travel?
Finally, Twilight's preparations were complete. The magic circle was flawless, the time travel spell memorized, and she looked like she remembered herself: exactly her usual self. Well, usual except for the eye patch, she thought as she adjusted the black triangle over her right eye. This time, the spell wouldn't run out of power in the middle of the cross-temporal encounter. That much was certain. To be exact, everything that would soon have happened several days ago was certain. She began to cast.
*zzzap*
"Done! Next up, herbology in preparation for tomorrow's visit to Zecora's." Twilight was alone in the library, arranging all her time-travel related books back on the shelves. They were certainly very interesting, and shed a light on what exactly had happened when she tried time travel the first time. I was lucky I didn't cause a paradox, she mused. Time travel was definitely too dangerous to try without proper preparation.
Just as Twilight was about to float the last book into its space on the "Advanced Magical Theory" shelf, a bright flash erupted in front of her, and she lost her concentration. The book landed on its spine and flopped open, completely disregarded as Twilight blinked not only because of the bright light, but also in disbelief.
There was another Twilight, looking exactly like her, but wearing a stylish eye patch like the one from her earlier misadventure. "Hello, past me!" greeted the intruder. Her apparent enthusiasm struck Twilight as entirely inappropriate. "When are we?"
Twilight put her hoof to her forehead in anticipation of a headache. "Ugh, I can't believe I'll do the same mistake again. I must become out of my mind again. And for your information, it's Thursday."
Future Twilight frowned. "That's not a proper time coordinate, and we both know that. But since I remember saying that, I seem to have landed in the right time. Now, why am I here?" As she was speaking, Future Twilight took a seat on the most comfortable reading cushion in her room.
Twilight stared in indignant disbelief at her visitor. "What do you mean, why? Don't tell me I'll time travel without knowing why. Because I won’t. It's irresponsible. You're irresponsible!" She pointed a hoof at her future self.
Future Twilight rolled her eyes - well, at least the one that was visible. Rolling the one covered by the eye patch was inferred. "Of course you won't. I know perfectly well why I'm here. Now, why am I here?"
"This quiz doesn't make any sense. I can't know that."
Now it was Future Twilight's turn to facehoof. "Past me, this isn't a quiz. Seriously now: what do I always do when I don't know the answer to a question?"
Twilight didn't have to think long at that. "I'll research it. ...But how would I try to research why I'm here from the future? And why do you only speak in questions? And why am I wearing an eye patch again?"
This drew a genuine smile of pride from Future Twilight. "Very good! Those are the right questions... except for the eye patch. Now, what do you already know? What can you deduce from that?" Past Twilight found herself reminded of Celestia. The Princess would often teach her by asking questions, challenging Twilight to come up with answers herself.
"I know you're playing a game with me. I have to come up with answers myself, because you only ask questions. You only speak in questions because... huh. No idea yet." Twilight tried to switch tracks on the railroad of logic. "You're here because you want me to find out those answers. You're here now because... I'm alone?" She paced across the room, while Future Twilight regarded her from her seat on the cushion. "No, Spike was at Rarity's yesterday as well, while I was reading up on time travel. You could have come yesterday, except something important happened."
Future Twilight giggled. "Oh, this is great! I am - I mean, you are. I was, so smart! Go on," she urged, clapping her hooves excitedly.
Twilight raised an eyebrow at her eye patch-wearing double's praise. She thought about scolding herself for excessive pride, but she wasn't sure if that would be hypocritical or not.
The thought was filed away to be examined later, as she returned to her guessing game. "You came here today because it was important that I read about time travel first. That means that some crucial bit of information is in the books." She turned towards the bookshelf, noticing now the book that lay open on her floor. "Well, let's get to reading." As she approached the book, she saw it was opened to the heading "Chapter 5.2: Saddlestrap Paradox". She recalled reading it just last evening. It's about the paradox where knowledge is learned from nothing, when information from the future is necessary for that information to be sent back in time... The name comes from "pulling oneself up by one's saddlestraps".
For a moment Twilight didn't grasp the significance of the chapter, but then she burst into giggles. "Of course! I can't- I mean you can't bring information back from the future, so we decide to only ask questions." She glanced back at Future Twilight, who nodded approvingly, and continued. "I bet you knew that jumping to this point would open the book at the right page, too."
"Would you believe me if I told you it was a coincidence?" Future Twilight asked with a conspiratorial wink.
This didn't amuse Twilight. "Har har. Don't play with causality. So, we're trying to make a stable time loop free of paradoxes, while completing some other goal." Twilight plopped down on another cushion, facing herself. "Knowing me, this could simply be a test of stable time loops. If that's the case, I'm declaring it a success, and you can return now." The Future Twilight stared back. "Ok, now. Now? Nownownow?" Now it was Future Twilight's turn to look unimpressed. "No? Okay, so there's something else."
This gave Twilight pause. She was back to the original problem. How can I find information, that I'm not going to find without the help of Future Me? How can it not cause a paradox? Obviously the information had to be pre-existing. She tapped her hoof on her horn in thought. There are too many places to search. It could be in the head of any pony, at Canterlot Library, hidden undiscovered under a rock somewhere. There has to be a hint somewhere.
Twilight couldn't shake the feeling she was missing something obvious. Like she'd been close to the answer, but dismissed the line of thought with an answer that was too simple. My perspective is limited by the present... Oh, if I could get a hint from tomorrow's me... "Tomorrow's me... That's it!" She slammed her hoof onto her second-best reading cushion. "You didn't visit me tomorrow in the Everfree Forest, on my way to Zecora's hut. In the future, I would be alone in many different places, or you could approach me in disguise." She looked into her own eyes, seeking confirmation of her wild leap of intuition. "That means there is something in the library tree."
Now Twilight could feel a familiar soaring in her heart, the feeling of elation she got when she sensed she had every piece of the puzzle. All that remained was to fit them together. "I was going to have lunch downstairs, and raid the downstairs storage for herbology books, so I think need something in my room. I only keep three kinds of books here: my favorites," which I know inside and out, so that can't be it, "my to-read list," which I already have a reading schedule for, "and the trunk of donated books that I've been meaning to sort, eventually." Bingo.
Future Twilight was smiling widely in a mirror image of herself. Apparently, the final spurt of logic was as exciting to watch as it was to execute.
Twilight bounced up from her seat, almost tripping over her own hooves, and rushed to throw open the lid of the trunk. She plunged her head into the mass of books. "Already have that one... Trash novel... Read that at Canterlot... Coloring book... Trash novel sequel... Huh, so that's where my pink socks were... Aha, what's this? "Mare to Mare: 101 Tips for..." Twilight slowly trailed off and emerged from the trunk, holding a rather large book in her magical grip. With a confused look on her face, she opened the book on a random page. "Eep!" She immediately slammed it shut and blushed beet red.
Twilight turned to look at Future Twilight, whose body was now draped across her cushion in a languid pose. The time traveler’s eyebrow was raised in wordless question, and she slowly licked her lips. "Past Twilight, if there was a first rule of time travel sex, what would it be?"
"Don't become your own parent?"
"Fine, second rule."
Twilight tried to think of something that applied to this situation. It was hard, with a significant percentage of her blood still flowing to her facial capillaries instead of her brain. It's still her game. Her panicked heart was trying to beat its way out of her chest. There must have been hints. ...Saddlestrap Paradox. "You must not arrange for sex to be predestined. Past ponies must be able to give meaningful consent."
Future Twilight nodded. "If you say no, I'll go back to the future and you'll have to take this time trip to get rejected. If you say yes, well..." She winked her non-patched eye and licked her lips again for emphasis. "Of course, I already know what will happen, but it was still my decision when it was now in my past."
~~~
"Ah, ah, oh, past me! I didn't know it felt this good when I was you, sucking on my horn... I think I'm going to... ah! Watch out"
"Huh? Ow, my eye!"
"Phew... Oh, I'm sorry."
"What? Ow-ow! Why'd you do that?"
"Here, take my eye patch. You need it more than I do. It'll be sensitive for a few days. Hahh."
"Thanks. Oh wow, that was good. Except for the magic in my eye part."
"Yeah. Wow. I remember how good it was, and it's just as good for future you, you'll see. Which reminds me, I'll have to go back now. Oh horsefeathers-"
*zzzap*
Future Twilight emerged back into her own time as the time travel spell wore out. "-I gave her the eyepatch that I got from me."
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If I had an OTP, it would be Twolight. Nicely done
Twilight, what have you done?
You've changed the future! You've created a time paradox!
Oh the closed loop paradox... poor Twilight. She just can't win. dl.dropbox.com/u/31471793/FiMFiction/emoticons/shrug_Twilight_future.png
Wait... what?
Brilliant!
Silly Twilight!
Found a typo: book at the right age, too."
What just....... What did I............ HUH?!
................
Twilight recieves another visit from Future Twilight Sparkle, who speaks only in questions. Present Twilight attmpts to deduce the reason for her future counterpart's vagueness - and the reason for her visit.
Receives*, attempts*.
Behold, spelling!
lawls were had.
1292140 you read my ears! Lolwut.avi
Perfect. Exactly what every time travel story needs, a bit of confusion that leaves everyone wondering whether it is one of the best, one of the worst, or just plain is story. I LOVE it.
1293678 Further closed-loop time travel paradox confusion: The eye-patch is a physical object, which we may assume is made of cloth, snake leather, or a similar material which will degrade over time. Seeing as the eye-patch can only move forward within its respective timeline (I.E. age) as it gets passed from Twilight to Twilight, it would be infinitely aging within the same scenario, yet it would have to retain its integrity as it was passed on for the loop to remain closed.
My closing statement.
My god, that ending was so astoundingly perfect. That was one of the best utilized Chekhov's guns I've seen in a good long while. I'm in shock.
Well, it's just a little paradox. Don't worry, we all cause a little paradox once in a while. For example, Elizabeth the First is called the 'virgin queen'. History's biggest exaggeration.
1292967
Thanks... I ran the story through spellcheck, but apparently I should do that for the synopsis as well. I am clinically unable to write two sentences without a typographical "erroor".
1292503
And the spellchecker doesn't even get them all.
1294905
It's like that to show that despite the Twilights' best attempts to avoid paradoxes, she failed.
I know it's not supposed to work
1295406 Are you sure it wasn't... Chekov's gun?
With closed time loops, isn't nearly everything a Chekhov's gun? Everything with any plot significance, anyway. Maybe things just needs a character who's time-travel-savvy enough to make use of them.
1295682 Hm. I actually noticed that I had spelled it wrong, then went back and edited it. It seems it didn't take.
Whether or not everything is a Chekov's gun is irrelevant; it was your utilization that hit me. I had assumed it was a Chekov's gun from the very start, but had also assumed that Twilight knew why it was there and what made it significant, given that she was the one wearing it. That it had a deeper meaning than a simple punchline — a meaning that she herself wasn't aware of — was what made it so impressive.
Edit: Well, it just looks silly, me saying all this to the guy who wrote the story. Suffice it to say that, as I had stated in my original post, the utilization floored me. Commendable work.
Pure YES!
I understood this perfectly, including the lolz-inducing ending. (which, by the way, was pretty creative)
Nicely done.
1295708 No, you had it right?
It's a long-standing tradition of tropers to intentionally confuse Anton Chekhov the author with Pavel Chekov the Starfleet officer.
Tumblr would be proud :P
1295682
EDIT: Wait a moment, eyepatches degrade. It's not a closed time loop - with enough iterations, the eyepatch will get oily and sticky and nasty and will be thrown away.
1295734 This is my cue to go to bed. Goodnight.
Edit: Oh, I remember now; I had originally spelled it "Checkhov".
1295643
Well, in defense of the spellchecker, age is spelled correctly. Just not the write word.
Also, I totally intended to use write instead of right there. These two sentences weren't added after noticing the mistake but deciding to leave it in for humor value.
Selfcest LIves!
That eyepatch is now instantly and irrevocably INFINITY years old!
That's a really badass eye patch, to last so long.
1295965
Perhaps, if it could be examined, the fabric could be analysed to quantify and reproduce an undecaying fabric. Sadly, as it is always worn by Twilight Sparkle, there are no holes in the time loop in which it could be examined.
dl.dropbox.com/u/31471793/FiMFiction/Twilight_Sparkle_lolface.png
1296057
Huh, that's another aspect I hadn't considered. It's not just infinitely old, it's been effectively erased from the universe going forward. Outside of Twilight Sparkles own personal knowledge of the eyepatch, it does not, never has, and never will exist.
It didn't just come from nowhere, it went back to that same place, and got locked into a tiny section of repeating time. Assuming some quirk prevents it from ever timing out, Twilight just figured out how to effectively destroy matter. Sort of...
"Sparkle Brand Nuclear Waste Matter Disposal Units!"
"Caution: Destroyed material may be released at the end of the universe."
Not sure how to actually start the process though, since we don't know how the eyepatch got inserted into the loop in the first place if it has no start point.
Wat? I ... Wat? Waat? Watt? Hwat? I .... Wat is this? ...... dl.dropbox.com/u/31471793/FiMFiction/emoticons/misc_Twilight_crazy.png
1296066>>1292221>>1293678 1295749
I have a different hypothesis on the eye patch.
The eye patch was given to past Twilight by future Twilight who had received it from future Twilight when she was past Twilight. It is locked forever in a stable time loop and only exists within said time loop. It can not exist outside of the loop and therefore it does not exist, but rather is a creation of the time loop itself. It comes into being the moment Twilight arrives in the past and ceases to be the moment she leaves the future.
It is confusing I know, but its the same principle that the Land of the Lost (the show, not the movie) was written around, just on a much smaller scale.
1296258
So you place the "discontinuity" in the eye patch's existence at the moment of the time travel spell?
That's an interesting way to think about it. In a sense, the eyepatch was created as perfect in the past by the energy of the spell. Then it existed, decayed, and was destroyed in the future by the casting of the spell. Instead of being moved backwards in time, its (restored) replica was created in the past from Future Twilight's knowledge of it.
That is, weirdly, a consistent framework in which the stable loop decay paradox is averted, but the bootstrap paradox of it's appearance still sort of remains...
"I know where I got my eyepatch. The question is, where did all you zombies get your eyepatches?"
There's too much eyepatch madness going on here... why did I even read this? I like paradoxes, but that doesn't mean I understand them.
Oh, well, it's faved anyway.
EDIT: Oh my god, before I liked it there were 66 likes and 6 dislikes... I pity the poor soul who got the 66 like...
1298206
I had to reference Wikipedia when I was writing this (I wasn't sure what the Bootstrap Paradox was called). Readers might be at a disadvantage, since not even I am sure what exactly is going on at all times.
1298591 But that's good! Never be sure of what you're writing! That leads to the best results. If, that is, you are a good writer, which I can see you are.
1303520
Thanks for the praise, as undesrved as it is. I know my English is clumsy at best, because it isn't my first language. Whatever illusion of skill I maintain comes from half-remembered fragments of the fantasy books I read in my teens.
As for not knowing what I'm writing - I sort of knew beforehand that I wanted to place some sort of inconsistency in the time loop, but not how I wanted to resolve it. The infinite eyepatch was born to hint that something in the story isn't working as stated. It might be that paradoxes don't have to be avoided, or that the timeloop isn't shown as in its original iteration. It's left for the reader to interpret. I hate reading stories like that, but it wanted to be written here...
This.. I... what?
LMAO and after trying so hard to create a causality loop it still ended up being a paradox! I luv it The Doctor would be proud
This was cool, and also very funny at the end.
2487029 Thanks!
Nicely done. The setup and payoff of that eyepatch was very good.
2532358 Thanks! That means a lot, coming from a writer whom I admire. I don't remember where the eyepatch idea came from, but I think I threw it in at the last moment. I feel it makes the story a bit more of a comedy instead of a preachy thesis about the laws of time-travel.
1297155 Argh, I just got this reference now. I've even read the story long before I wrote this, I can't fathom how I missed it until now.
It's always the little things.