I looked at the two blackboards covered in complicated spell calculations and diagrams before I turned to Midnight, raising one eyebrow, "I am better at this stuff than I used to be," I told her, "But I'm still at the two plus two stage. Can you explain this to me in small words?"
Midnight stuck her tongue out at me, "Basically, we almost have it," she said, "I had an idea during the negotiations that seemed to have worked."
"You did math during the negotiations?" I asked and glanced at the blackboard.
She frowned, "What did you think I was doing while nopony was talking?"
"...Okay, dumb question," I admitted. I had spent the time being bored and annoyed.
I mentally ratcheted Midnight and Twilight's estimated intelligence up another couple of notches above myself, "So what do we have?"
"If this pans out," Starlight said from across the table, a pen floating in her magic, "We might have a castable spell ready in a few days to a week."
"That's great news!" I said with a smile, "I thought it would take a lot longer!"
"If this pans out," Midnight cautioned me, "But it's looking good so far, we'll be able to go back soon."
I blinked at that, looking at her, "...You mean I will be able to go back soon."
Midnight shook her head and let out a small sigh, "Page... we're all going home. Me, You, Talon. Because he was right. This was home and it's been amazing seeing everypony again. But this isn't home anymore."
"Starlight, leave the room," I said quietly.
The unicorn almost ran for the door, closing it behind her.
Midnight looked at me as I turned fully to her, "You can't," I told her firmly.
"Can't?" she asked, one eyebrow raising, "I can't?"
"You can't come," I said and sighed, "Ponies here need you."
Midnight stepped forward, her nose almost touching mine, "Ponies? Or Bat Ponies?"
I flinched slightly and took half a step back, "...Both," I said quietly, "What if something happens, they will need the element of magic."
"But that's not what you were thinking of," she said, taking another step forward.
This time I didn't back off, "Don't make it invalid," I told her seriously, "And I might not be able to follow that entire thing," I said and nodded towards the blackboards, "But even I can follow a degrading magical stability ratio. There are only so many times you can do this trip without safely.”
Midnight sighed softly and nodded, taking half a step, moving between me and the blackboard before she sat down, "We might never be able to come back here again safely."
I shook my head, "It's a bad idea," I told her seriously, "Forget the thestrals here, what if they do need your element?"
"Then another will step forward," Midnight said and looked at me, "Page, I'm the element of magic because I was in the right place at the right time with the right ponies. Not because I'm unique."
I sighed, "Fine, what about the bat ponies here, without decursing-"
"A spell any pair of alicorns can do," Midnight told me, "It's not that difficult-"
"Yes it is."
"...Okay, fine. It's relatively not that difficult," she admitted, "It just needs a lot of power behind it to burn through the blood magic. I can teach it to Cadance and Luna. And Celestia."
"Your friends," I said and shook my head, "Your family."
Midnight's ears drooped and nodded, "I will miss them," she said, "I will miss everypony here. But I'd miss everypony at home more."
I shook my head and lowered my voice, "Midnight... Tempest won't last forever," I told her quietly, "And when she's gone..."
"When she's gone," Midnight said firmly, "I will have treasured every second I had with her. And that also applies to everypony here but Cadance, Flurry, Luna and Celestia."
I rubbed my forehead with my hoof. Arguing with any of the Sparkle twins was just an effort in futility. They always had ready answers and often with supporting footnotes. And charts. Not even the lazy ones like pie charts.
But while I found it sexy in Sparks, with Midnight it was just infuriating for some reason.
Shaking my head, I frowned, "What is this coming from, you were... you came down on Talon pretty hard for wanting to go back."
Midnight sighed and then smiled sadly, "I talked to Cadance."
Princess of Love.
I see, yeah that would do it. Fucking damn it, Pink. You just had to, couldn’t help yourself, could you?
"Are you sure?" I asked her quietly, "Because once we go... there might not be a safe way back again."
Midnight nodded, "I know."
"You will have to tell everypony and with me well away from any blast radius. Because I just know I will get blamed for this. Somehow."
"I know," Midnight repeated.
"For the record, I think this is a bad idea," I said before I sighed and looked away, "...But it's not my choice to make. I'll support you whatever choice you do."
Midnight got up and pulled me into a hug.
I hugged back, "...You know, if you two do go back, Talon is likely going to join the guard," I said quietly.
"...Yeah," Midnight admitted and then broke the hug to smile sadly with a small sigh, "Everypony eventually grows up. Even baby dragons."
Relax, the fact that you update regularly is extremely rare in fanfiction but it wouldn't have attracted us if you didn't have a good enough story underneath it.
That mare can be scarry sometimes. Let's hope she thought about more then the consequences for Midnight's love life, when giving her the advice to go back. Somehow, I doubt that.
I really love this series. You made such a wonderful story. I must have re-read the whole thing 10 times so far. Usually refreshing the story when a new part comes out. Keep up the great writing!
So... Once Starswirl the Bearded return they should totally hire him to make more Portal Mirrors.
You move to another country? That is a major game changing event. Best of luck!
Well Hiver, I will say good luck at what country your moving to and be safe while doing that.
And I believe Sgt. Murphy was hiding somewhere nearby giggling when Midnight dropped that Drama Bomb. To willingly leave everyone from her own dimension to pursue love is both a brave & scary thing to to.
Hopefully it won't be too long to see more of this story being updated.
Actually, all friends of Midnight from her home universe have absolute right to feel shitty about this decision, their best friend disappeared for years, basicly was kidnapped. Then this friend finally return to family and friends, who were probably losing minds over this, only to decide, that this other world is much better. I really, really doubt, that Midnight's Mane 5 will be really tolerant to this decision, it can actually feel like backstab, as they are apparently worth less, than some their versions down there, despite being Midnight's first friends.
Moving countries mate? That’s got to be wild!
This story manages to be consistently down to earth with all of its drama and risk situations...why are you so good at this?!
Still, loving this series!
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Magical mishap takes place and Canon!Twilight gets sucked into Pageverse.
Friends and teacher apparently spend years trying to get her back.
Twilight decides to give all her friends, family, and fellow princesses the metaphorical finger and leave them to never return.
I'd say that's a really shitty thing to do.
great chapter
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it is and it isn't as I suspect EU residency. it's only slightly more complicated than moving between states in the US.
Still a major life change though.
Best of luck Hiver!
Great, now everyone will have to update their maps...
That joke out of the way, take all the time you need and best of luck. The story’ll still be here to continue whenever you feel good and ready again.
Thanks for chapter!
You have nothing to apologize for. IRL comes first, always!
Have a good day!
Ooohhh, there is no good answer to the dilemma but... ooohhh.
Good luck in your move, Hiver.
The whole travel being unstable when used multiple times feels like author bs. When making paths usually they become easier to traverse the more they are tread. Although its all theoretical from our perspective so whatever. Maybe portals are drawing the universes together and to many will cause them them to collide. Or maybe they dont want to draw attention from the things in between. Anyway looks like your wrapping this arc up for now.
What about the idea of having Page take a copy of the spell with him to give to his Twilight & Co so that they could send Tempest over into the same world as Midnight's?
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That's all well and good, but Talon wants to go back too.
And Tempest and Midnight would have other connections as well.
They've both become part of that ecosystem now.
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There's a Mirror Comic about Good King Sombra and the Evil Sisters that had world overlap. I can't remember off the top of my head if it was too much travel, or something else, but basically Celestia had to close the portal permanently to save her world, IIRC.
Edit: Just looked it up, it's issue #18-20 of the FiM Comics.
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As opposed to staying because they want her to stay? Tearing herself away from all the friends and family she made in that other world because it would make them happy over Twilight?
There's no right answer in this situation (well, bar that shiny portal on the story's cover) but to say "you're a bad person because you want to be happy in a way we don't like" is a pretty terrible thing to do.
I understand leaving her parents. Everyone has to. But her brother? Never to see his sister again?
If only they could find a way to use the mirror
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The primary difference is that in Midnight's home dimension, that Tempest Shadow is dead and Page never existed in her world.
Most of the friendships Midnight and Talon created in the Pageverse dimension were really just re-connections with people they left behind from their home--only they were copies of the people they knew. The same situation would apply in reverse but at a much smaller scale for Tempest to swap places with Page: the primary love interest that Tempest has is Midnight, where Tempest would be quite happy to be in whichever world has Midnight. The additional friends she has in the Pageverse can be simple re-connections with copies of the people she knows.
There's also the risk to their home dimension's continuity that can be put in jeopardy, as Page pointed out--Midnight assumes that her position as the Element of Friendship can be recreated... What Page forgot to remind her is: perhaps it can--but the last time that happened, it took over 1000 years to do so! When it really needs her to be there, there might not be a replacement found in time to save anything.
So the derailment continues.
...MEANWHILE IN THE PAGEVERSE JUNGLE PYRAMID...
Statue: *sniff* It was beautiful & romantic!
Discord: I KNOW. *blows nose on a tissue* It gonna be worth getting punched in the face when they come back!
Statue: It'll be worth kidnapping her as a bride & make her scary fun like she was in Equestria Girls..
Discord: Hmm...wait what you say?!
Statue: I said I cannot wait to see Midnight beaming with pride!
Discord: ...I hope Hiver is not going to use any ideas like that from you.
Statue:
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It might not be to do with the travel or spell, but them physically. It's been established that there's a trace related to the matter in their bodies, so possibly jostling that matter back and forth between worlds destabilises it... It might be that the spell would become safe to use again in fifteen years or so once almost every atom in the body has been replaced.
All this is entirely possible when you consider that every electron has a unique energy level, and that jumping between universes means not only a break in conservation of energy but also that literally every electron in the universe gets shunted energetically to prevent duplicated energy levels, and likely theirs would be the ones shunted the most. Given that electron energy levels is how chemical reactions happen, the results could get very messy for their DNA and the like.
In layman's terms, they could get cancer jumping between universes.
Grammar jackboots of the day:
Maths, short for mathematics
There are only so many times you can do this trip safely.
Is there a way for them to turn imbue the spell into a magic mirror? That would hopefully allow for continued access to both worlds and help prevent the heartbreak.
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Yes. Because Twilight doesn't lose anything, she gets a copy of her parents, her friends, her teacher, her brother, etc.
All because she went and found some hawt mare while shoved in portal land, which if you assume a realistic take on relationships may or may not last.
Twilight gives up effectively nothing, while making everyone around her give up everything.
Oh, and Twilight could have simply waited a few years to avoid getting attached to avoid all this altogether. Because guess what, if she did get returned to the original universe, there is/was no guarantee she could go back.
It is shitty and Twilight is a shitty person, and if you can't see that I don't know what to say.
Ok, that will so not end badly…
While it would work to bring Tempest over to this world, not sure her sense of honor and responsibility would allow it after what Page did for her, even if he would encourage it.
So looking forward to seeing how this will play out.
Good luck with your move, hope everything goes well.
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It could be a chance, Page seems to have more power over certain spells that could be what we need here, but only time will tell if it's true.
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We could argue about that a lot, but it comes down to one thing: its her choice.
"But it's a shitty choice!"
That's beside the point, its her choice, it could be a bad one, and will backfire in chaotic proportions from this point forward, as Page mentions, but if that's how she wants to go, then she will, final point.
Just as Keroko said, and I will say again, there is no good or bad choice, only her choice.
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The copy logic does not really fly, because if it were that easy, why even bother to send Page back? There's a Luna and a Sunset and even a Twilight now too. He can just marry those and tadaa! No need to wrangle with difficult and dangerous transfer spells.
Except, it doesn't work that way. Because the ponies here aren't the same as the ones Page loves back home. And Twilight knows this, because she already experienced the exact same thing the first time she got hurled across timelines. She knows the Shining, Velvet, Night Light etc. are not the same ponies. She made bonds with them, sure, but those bonds were formed through time and effort, and in no small part done so to prevent Twilight from spiraling into despair to the point where she would start seeing suicide as an option.
Because that was Twilight 's reality: as far as she knew, she was stuck in Page' s timeline with no way back. They tried sending her back once, and that failed rather spectacularly. She had no indication whatsoever that the ponies back home would ever be able to find her. To demand she isn't allowed to make friends with anyone for years on the chance that someone from her original timeline could get her back goes beyond cruel. To demand someone who has lost everything can't find happiness is monstrous, and if Twilight had done so, she likely would have died long before Starlight could get to her, either from grief or suicide.
But even aside from Twilight's low odds of surviving the total isolation your idea demands of her, there's an even more basic reason Twilight is not a shitty person for going back: Twilight is allowed to be happy.
Twilight 's happiness should not be subject to a board of directors who decree that just because they don't want her to go, Twilight isn't allowed happiness. Twilight has, over the span of several years, made a home in Page's timeline. Years. Not just Tempest, but Page, that timeline's Twilight, the family that adopted her, the ponies of Nocturnis, there's an entire line of ponies she has grown to care about. Abandoning them would mean going through the exact pain she went through the first time she got ripped from her home. And all not to be happy, but to make others happy. Because Twilight isn't allowed to be happy. Twilight must always sacrifice her happiness for the happiness of others.
This is why Cadance is best Princess, because Cadance realizes this. She knows Twilight would be happier in Page's timeline, and so pushed Twilight not to make a choice based on what would make others happy, but on what would make Twilight happy.
Because Twilight is allowed to be happy too.
Moving Countries?!
Wow. Well good luck and I hope it’s an auspicious move!
I can’t hardly believe Midnight went from worrying about not being there for her friends to ‘eh, my home is in your universe now.’ That must have been some talk with Cadance.
Take your time, good luck moving
11332512
Preach fellow reviewer preach.
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"Midnight...Why does it say 'Do not mention the tumors' on the board here."
"Nothing to worry about, nothing at all, also you need to get over to rarity's for your fitting."
"Fitting for what?"
"Why your asbestos and lead portal suit! Its gonna be a rough ride"
11332761
Cue Page getting anxious over asbestos poisoning, even if it really is the best material for the job at Equestria's tech level.
11332512
To be honest, the only things holding her back are caution (which can't be proven one way or the other due to the ephemeral nature of the future) and her duties both as an Element and as a Princess. De facto, she is Celestia's somewhat inconveniently-titled heir apparent if the worst happens with no real alternatives other than sticking the whole burden on Luna.
As for if something comes up that needs the Elements... Well, now would be a good time for that world's Equestria to start reforming its military, and/or cultivating some promising adventuring parties. Most of the threats the Elements go up against could have been defeated by force of arms or good old fashioned heroism after all. The only exception that comes to mind would be Discord.
11331747
00But for the first
11332937
But as we all know Asbestos is magic
just don't chew it
Out of the mental hospital and back to reading fanfictions.
Nice
Don't know why she gave up trying to make a permanent portal so fast.
And Twilight wanting to leave everyone forever just feels extremely wrong to me.
"Hey friends you don't need me and I got copies of everyone back there kkthxbye"
Some people drop stories because their readers looked at them funny.
This isn't even on the same relative scale.
11331904
Taking a copy of the spell back COULD allow for both sides to experiment on creating a safer, easier, and more sustainable means of travelling through the dimensions, at least. And with some way of knowing where both dimensions are in relation to each other, possibly with a signal or anchor left behind in both places, to identify them, like say an alicorn, or draconequus, it could be possible for them to figure out a way that Midnight could have her friends and family in both dimensions. It'd be more a "I have properties, assets and familial connections in two countries," rather than "I'm going to make a difficult, practically irreversible choice here, and no matter what happens, someone will get hurt." Like with Worm, and Earth-Aleph and Earth-Beta, only with less pain, tragedy and drama for drama's sake. You know, if I think about it a little, it'd be kinda like comparing RHJunior/RealityCheck's The Warcrafter to the original Worm story, if that makes any sense.
Stable portal. New mirror. Professor. Lava. Hot!
How?