The Doctor saves the timelines

by Snakes0

Chapter 2: When Day Breaks

This time the TARDIS does not crash land into a tree like the first time it entered into Equestria after the flux capacitor destabilized. They appear on the outskirts of Ponyville during the night.

"Doctor, do you think we'll see another version of you?" Derpy asks curiously.

"No. We shouldn't. As I am not originally from the Equestrian reality, I have no counterpart. It would concern me if there were. I had enough headaches facing other timelords traveling and altering timelines." Doctor Whooves answers right away.

Derpy nods and looks around. She sees from a distance there are many ponies still up "Hm... There are a lot of ponies up right now. Shouldn't they be sleeping?"

"Good eye! There could be many reasons for this. Perhaps it is a night celebration or perhaps a cultural difference that tends to stay up late. Oh! It could be that they evolved to wake up during the night and sleep during the day!" Doctor Whooves rattles on with possible explanations as to why the ponies of Ponyville are all up at night.

"Can't we just ask?" Derpy says while yawning.

"While we could, it is best that we interfere as little as possible other than solving the crisis. Besides, we can just go around acting naturally and listening. We are bound to overhear somepony talking- DERPY!" The Doctor shouts as Derpy has flown off without him. "I swear... That mare... Derpy! I didn't confirm that this world was safe yet!"

Flying headfirst into a signpost and falling Derpy shakes her head to orientate herself. This startled Bon Bon and Lyra, dressed head to hind hoof in clothes.

"Oh hi, Bon Bon!" Derpy says with a smile. "Why is everypony up? And why all those clothes?"

Bon Bon looks confused seeing Derpy without the same full-body clothing as everypony else, "Um...How do you not know this by now? It's been 5 years since Celestia went mad."

"Hurry home! Don't forget to close all the curtains and don't let any sunlight inside! Sunrise is coming!" Lyra says seeing the sky starting to brighten. "I pray that Luna keeps you safe. Celestia won't..."

Lyra and Bon Bon start to hurry off. Doctor Whooves comes galloping toward Derpy.

"Derpy! You can't just do that! What did I say about leaving the TARDIS? What if this was a reality where Changeling had taken over? You could have been in danger! There is no telling what is or isn't the same!" Doctor Whooves exclaims flailing his hooves in the air like a human would. "Derpy! Do you understand?"

"Doctor? I'm sorry... I forgot. But I think they are scared of the day. Something about not letting sunlight inside? And Celestia is mad I think." Derpy says as her ears droop a little.

"That's some information I can work with. But Derpy. PLEASE stay by my side. Now let us return to the TARDIS so that we can see if the sunlight is harmful. Perhaps the ozone layer is depleted and the UV radiation is more intense than usual. Though that wouldn't explain why the grass and plants seem fine." Doctor Whooves goes on.

"I am sorry. I will stay by your side Doctor." Derpy says wanting to make sure he understands that she is sorry.

The two return to the TARDIS just as the first rays of the sun reach Ponyville. They can see through cameras that there is not a single pony outside. The Doctor starts fiddling around and pressing buttons to scan the sun.

"Strange... The sun appears to be normal. Perhaps I should-" Doctor Whooves says as he opens the door and is about to walk out into the sunlight.

"Doctor! What if it's not sciency bad but magically bad? You told me a few weeks ago that your TARDIS and your funny stick and techy stuff can't detect magic." Derpy says warning him.

"That's... Right. I had forgotten that magic was a thing. There is no telling if I can regenerate if magic is at play. I wonder what is going on with Princess Luna and Celestia." Doctor Whooves ponders.

"Luna can visit our dreams. We can try talking to her there!" Derpy suggests cheerfully.

"Does she? I always block my mind off from other entities so that I can't be influenced so I never knew. Perhaps you should try it," the doctor suggests "Now, you see before you tell me that she only does this at night you have to remember that everypony was up during the night which means they SHOULD be sleeping around now. If Luna does her dream thing when ponies are asleep then now would be the time."

Derpy yawns as she stayed up anyway so she is feeling tired. She goes up to Doctor Whooves and lays right there curled up and sleeps. He resists the urge to reach over and pat her head or ruffle her mane. He wants to try and stay professional. He places a couple of probes on her head to measure her brainwaves and then use that data to try and see her dreams. He realizes this is a breach of her privacy so he creates a filter so it only picks up to anything related to Luna.

"I am sorry. I'm just curious. I won't ever snoop around in somepony's memories. I'm just setting this up so that I can see your dream too. I'll be sure to fully explain it all to you when you wake up." Doctor Whooves says to the sleeping Derpy.

The dream starts and Derpy starts having her dream as she waits for Luna. Derpy knows that Luna's job isn't to check on ponies during their dreams but to vanquish nightmares. And so even though the dream was good and happy Derpy alters her own dream to make it into a nightmare.

To Doctor Whooves he sees Derpy dreaming of happily delivering mail while eating muffins. Suddenly a rock was thrown and she falls to the ground hurt. Derpy is surrounded by ponies of her past that bullied her and they laugh at her while throwing junk at her. Doctor Whooves felt bad. He heard Derpy one time talk about being bullied, but seeing it happen makes his blood boil. Eventually after five minutes he could take it no longer and whispers in Derpy's ears leaving suggestions in her ear to change the dream.

"You are not alone. You are a kind, strong, and cute mare who is better than those ponies! Dream of me. I won't let you get hurt." Doctor Whooves whispers into her ear.

Derpy's dream changes as she dreams of Doctor Whooves standing up for her. He is pleased that it made her dream into a more pleasant one. However Derpy speaks to him within the dream. "Doctor? How are you here? This was supposed to be a memory... This isn't how it ever played out before... I'm... Happy."

Doctor Whooves is happy to see her smile and wipe away her tears within the dream while he continues to watch her dream play out through the monitor. Derpy pauses as she remembers that she was supposed to have a nightmare on purpose and that lead her to fear what she might see now. That in turn made her dream reflect that and she sees a tombstone of everypony she knows. Luna appears at that moment and the scene changes.

"Thou art being observed by an outside force. If thine observer could be so kind as to stop that would be nice." Luna says tiredly as she notices that something or somepony is watching this dream.

"That's probably the Doctor! It's ok! But what happened to the day?" asks Derpy.

"... How? There art, not a pony or creature in Equestria that does not know about the event. Thou dreamth of the death of those closest to thee because of the event?" Luna says hoping to remind her.

"I'm not from this Equestria! Me and the doctor come from another one! One where ponies sleep during the night!" Derpy states as Doctor Whooves plants a hoof on his face.

"Not from this Equestria?" Luna asks confused.

Doctor Whooves, seeing that he needs to get involved, places probes on his temple and closes his eyes as he lets his brain waves sync to Derpy's to access her dream. Though it involved him lowering his mental defenses. He appears right beside Derpy in her dream.

"Hello Princess Luna! I am the Doctor. What my companion was trying to say is that we aren't from here. We are trying to solve this crisis of yours. So could you explain from the start? What happened?" The Doctor says to Luna who jumps back startled.

"H-how art thee here?! ... This is... New. Fine... It all started with us returning as Nightmare Moon. Twilight Sparkle and her friends rushed to use the elements of harmony on us however it was not enough to finish us. Celestia came and took the remaining darkness out of us... Me... Out of me... And she took it into herself. I was redeemed and Celestia was burdened by my darkness.... We lived happily for a while. We were able to Co-rule together. But she was always so tense. The darkness drove her crazy and she lashed out at everypony. She felt so alone... Except for when I was there...I had to leave for a political meeting and that was the final straw.... She became Daybreaker and the sun turned as hostile as she did. She was mad that Nopony tried to help her through her suffering and she thinks I left her... She doesn't even let me see her..." Luna says pouring out her heart.

"When you say that the sun turned as hostile as she did what does that mean?" The Doctor asks curious.

"... Thou art not being respectful. Ponies don't die if they touch sunlight. They turn into clouds that are still living. Celestia... No... Daybreaker wants to remake Ponykind... Reshape them... We have all called this event... 'When Day Breaks'. The time our sun and our sun princess turned hostile..." Luna says hiding her face so that they don't see her cry.

"Well? There surely must be something that can be done." The Doctor says.

"We are sorry to hear that this all happened...." Derpy says as she hugs Luna.

Doctor Whooves thinks before asking, "She must be stopped. Can't the Mane 6 use the elements of harmony to-"

"They art all gone... They were one of many who were outside when it happened... There was no chance to try... And I am not worthy of the Elements. We tried... The Elements don't work anymore... They are faded and gray... I can't even seal her away..." Luna says grimly. Derpy doesn't know what to say.

"Hm... Perhaps if we built a reality anchor and somehow permanently attached it to her we can disable her alterations to reality." The doctor states.

"Reality... Anchor? We're... Not following." says Luna more confused than ever.

"You are all reality warpers. If your claim of moving celestial bodies like the sun and moon are true then that's because you are altering reality. Very inefficient by the way. The point is that I think that magic might actually be reality warping. I can't believe I haven't thought about this sooner! So if we put a Reality Anchor on Celestia she won't be able to alter the sun anymore!" Doctor Whooves explains as he gestures with his hooves. "And can you speak normally? It's a little hard to understand."

"Um... So... A magic nullification device? But... Doesn't she have to turn the sun back to normal first?" asks Luna as she tries to mentally adjust fully to speaking as they do.

"Oh... I didn't think of that. I know! She trusted you in the past! Go up to her and try to reconnect. Perhaps sisterly bonds can break through. Power of friendship and love and all that. It works for our Equestria." the Doctor suggests.

"She DOESN'T want to see me! I told you! I wish it was not so! I DO want to see her! You know NOTHING about the pain I feel! We lived together for over a thousand years! Making this separation even harder for me!" Luna shouts.

"Princess Luna... He does know. He isn't a pony. He is a Timelord. He lived a very very long time." Derpy says trying to de-escalate the situation.

"I watched entire civilizations collapse... I watched loved ones die. I have seen timelines erased. I have lived more than a few thousand years. So YES. I do indeed know what it is like. I believe you can make things right. Human drama shows are just like this. Celestia might be pushing you away, but you are the one who let yourself give up. She needs somepony there to show her that she is not alone. The power of friendship comes in many forms. I saw that in Equestria that is the strongest force. We came here to stabilize our Equestria by altering the course of history in struggling worlds like this one." The Doctor says with a hint of sadness creeping into his voice.

Luna pauses. She lets his words sink in. "You really think that I can... Just go to her and return her to normal if I see her and stand my ground if she tries to push me away? I... You are right... Doctor, you are wiser than I thought. Tonight I will see her. Even if it takes all night. Even if I have to risk the sun's hostile light."

Luna leaves the dream. She sets out to prepare. She is tracking Daybreaker Down. The Doctor has his own plans and as soon as he and Derpy wake up he designs a full-body suit that reflects all sunlight for himself and Derpy. He holds out his sonic screwdriver.

"We just have to follow Luna to her sister. After that we set up the reality anchor and let Luna do the talking and this Equestria will be saved. What do you think?" He asks Derpy.

"Sounds like fun! It sounds like Celestia needs a hug! Maybe I could hug her!" Derpy responds.

"Err... Let's do that after I disable her reality alteration. But now I'm hungry so let's make breakfast." he says smiling.

The day passes and with the technology available within the TARDIS finding Luna and Daybreaker wasn't difficult. They waited until night when it was safe. Daybreaker was up in the clouds and Derpy had to leave the Doctor who was upset that he wasn't a unicorn or a pegasus. Daybreaker is glowing and she hisses.

"LUNA! LEAVE!" Daybreaker hisses.

"No sister. We made two mistakes. The first was going on that meeting without bringing thee with us. The second one was us leaving after thou became Daybreaker instead of taking a stand and embracing thee. Celestia! Return with us!" Luna says this time with confidence. Either she comes out of this with Celestia or she doesn't come back down at all.

"CELESTIA IS GONE! IT'S DAYBREAKER! YOU ARE NO SISTER TO ME!" Daybreaker growls a large ball of flame appears in the air and it was like a miniature sun.

"Uh oh!" Derpy says as she holds the Doctor's Sonic Screwdriver in her mouth. She remembers Doctor Whooves explaining it to her. She presses a button and a red field surrounds the area and the fireball fizzles out. Daybreaker takes a step back.

"WHAT?! What did you do?! IMPOSSIBLE! I am Daybreaker... The most respected and loved!" Daybreaker says with confusion.

"NO! Thou art my sister!" Luna says as she goes and hugs Daybreaker.

A single tear rolls down Daybreaker's face. "N-no! I'm not! I'm... I'm...Daybreaker! You all broke my heart before! GHA!!! I STILL CAN'T USE MAGIC?! N-no! The darkness! I can't return! Not to that weak Celestia!"

Daybreaker starts to flicker out as the darkness in itself is magic and it can't alter Celestia anymore in the Reality Anchor. The darkness disappears and Celestia is left. She cries into Luna's mane. Half an hour later Celestia and Luna descend from the sky holding up thousands of non-flying ponies and creatures with their magic after turning them all back to normal.

"Doctor! I did it! I pressed the button and it did a thing! Celestia isn't being creepy!" Derpy exclaims happily.

Doctor Whooves hugs her before realizing what he was doing and lets her go before turning and blushing a little, "I... Was worried... You TOOK my Sonic Screwdriver. It has a biometrics scanner so how in Celestia's name did you use it?"

Derpy seems really happy to be hugged and doesn't answer.

"Oh well. The important thing is that we made this Equestria have a happy ending which means we won't have a 'When Day Breaks' event in our Equestria." He says continuing.

"So where to next? Another Equestria but what crisis is next?" asked Derpy.

The Doctor sighs before answering, "I swear I told you this before... But I don't know. We'll just have to see!"

They both enter the TARDIS and it shakes before disappearing in a flash of light.

Author's Note:

What possible SCP encounters or events would you all like to see? Feedback will influence the story. If nothing I will continue on anyway.

Also I am aware that "When Day Breaks" those who touch sunlight turn into fleshy goo, but I thought to make it more MLP themed and more reversible. It won't always be like that.