MLP Loops 137
137.1
“Nearly Hearts and Hooves,” Spike said, leaning back.
Rarity nodded. “So it is. I assume you have some new and unique plan for me?”
“Nope,” Spike replied, shaking his head.
“Nope?” Rarity repeated. “Nope?”
“We have done everything, dear,” Spike pointed out.
“No, Spike, we've merely done everything you can think of,” Rarity replied tartly.
She stopped, and blinked. “Wait. Idea!”
“Oh?” Spike asked, curious. “What idea?”
“It's a surprise,” his wife told him, rummaging around in her pocket for a lump of metal. She took it out, sliced a perfect cube out of it, and coloured the faces six different colours with a flash of prestidigitation.
“Here,” she said, handing it over. “Roll this.”
“A chance cube?” Spike asked.
“No, a die,” Rarity rejoined. “Chance cubes are silly, they're like coin flips for people who use credit chips.”
Spike shrugged. “Fair point. What are the colours?”
Rarity winked. “If I told you, you'd use the Force to make the one you wanted happen. That's not the point here.”
“Fair enough,” Spike said, deciding not to contest his wife's accusation. He rolled it, and the yellow face was uppermost when it came to a stop.
“Okay, what does that mean?” Spike asked, after a moment.
Rarity shrugged. “You'll find out...”
Spike yawned, and stretched. He crawled out of bed, stretched again, and his wings brushed the wall at their fullest extension.
He scratched one of them with his claws, and then furled them and came back to all fours. Still yawning, he headed downstairs.
Sweetie Belle was already there, pouring out some cereal. It caught fire, and she extinguished it with the milk.
“Morning, Sweets,” Spike said.
Sweetie looked around, and did a double take. “Spike?”
“Well, yeah...” Spike nodded. “What?”
Sweetie rummaged in her pocket, and held up a mirror.
“Huh,” Spike said, blinking. “I'm a griffin. Any idea why?”
The sound of feet on the stairs drew his attention up them, as Rarity came downstairs.
She looked gorgeous. Her beak was just-so, her pinion feathers shading between alabaster and pure, snowy white, and her hindquarters were covered with stippled white-purple fur which took Spike's breath away.
She was, as it happened, also a griffin this morning.
“Well,” she smiled. “That would be the yellow result, dear. I admit this means that it's not hearts and hooves, but it's still romantic, is it not?”
“You have the craziest ideas,” Spike smiled. “How'd you pull this off?”
“Discord,” Rarity replied with a chuckle.
“That would do it,” her husband agreed. “Right – shall I cook?”
“Oh, yes please,” Rarity told him. “There's some non-meat bacon in the freezer, if you wouldn't mind.”
“Pleasure.”
“So, what's the plan?” Spike asked, examining his own colouration as they ate. There were some interesting green accents on his wings, but for the most part a subdued, dusty purple was the order of the day. It looked unusual, but not completely outrageous for a griffin.
“Well...” Rarity shrugged. “I was wondering how long it's been since we took over the Griffin Empire.”
“It has been a while...” Spike agreed. “Would you humbly accept it as a Hearts and Hooves present?”
“Why, sirrah, you must be reading my mind!” Rarity said with a chuckle. “Let's go as soon as we're done with breakfast.”
Gilda sighed. “Seriously?”
“What?” Emperor Spike asked. “We do this regularly, you know that.”
Gilda seethed.
“Dear,” Rarity said, delicately. “I think Gilda is annoyed less by the fact you couped the Griffin Empire and more by how you did it by deposing her, specifically.”
“Oh, right.” Spike looked around at the ruins of the throne room, remembering the battle.
There'd been at least one time he reflected a Power Slash with a lightsaber, he could remember that, and there'd been enough fire attacks going around to power a small steampunk nation.
Over there was where Rarity's customized cape of capturing had shot just over Gilda's head, missed her Thunder Edge by a whisker, and ensnared three important load-bearing pillars in a dense web of steel thistle silk.
And that was where all the water had gone.
“Sorry?” Spike tried.
Gilda hrumphed, and then held up a foreclaw. “One demand. Just one.”
“Let's hear it,” Spike said, lounging back on the throne.
“Can I at least keep my imperial suite? I've only just finished doing it up...”
137.2 (EvilHumour)
Leman sighed to himself, really hating that he had to do this, but as it was for her, he had no problem really doing it.
Knocking on the door with his hoof, he waited for the mares inside to finish to gasping, giggling, and what sounded like Vinyl tripping down the stairs.
With another sigh as it was not even night time, he saw a white head poke out of the doorway. The head look back and forth, scratching her head before Lemon coughed to attract her attention.
"Oh, hiya squirt, what brings you here?" Vinyl smiled, opening the door wider for the pegasus foal to trot inwards.
"I'm here as I can't ask the Little Mother as I don't want her to know, Twilight would tell, and Pinkie Pie would make it into a big show and you're the only one that I can bribe to stay quiet," he blushed, looking at the floor. "I need your help."
"Well, I figured that much kiddo," Vinyl said with an eyeroll, watching the foal walk into the kitchen, not noticing a grey hoof on the staircase. "So what do you need?"
"IneedtolearnhowtomakecelerysoupanddaffodilsandwichesforNyx." The foal folded inwards, with his wings pressed close to himself.
"What was that?" Vinyl lifted her ear to the blushing colt that sat at her table.
"IneedtolearnhowtomakecelerysoupanddaffodilsandwichesforNyx." The anchor for one of the more chaotic realms held his head in his hooves.
"One more time, short stuff."
"I SAID I NEED TO LEARN HOW TO MAKE CELERY SOUP AND DAFFODIL SANDWICHES FOR NYX!" The foal shouted at her, before clamping a hoof across his mouth.
Vinyl grinned to herself, the thoughts of what she could get off the kid from teaching him how to cook were running across her head when a chuckle from behind made her blink.
"Aww, that's so sweet of you," Octavia smiled at the foal, walking past Vinyl to pat him on the back. "Wanting to learn how make special meals for your marefriend. I remember how Vinyl here tried to do the same for me before I had to stop her after burning the tenth pot."
"Octy!" Vinyl whined, blushing at what her friend was saying.
"It's true, which is why I will teach you how to cook," she smiled, flicking her tail across the unicorn's face as she went to the fridge to pull out the ingredients. "Besides, I doubt you can do much worse than Vinyl here."
Octavia turned her head to a grinning Vinyl before sighing.
"Ok, he is worse than you." She shook her head as more pegasi went to put out the blaze that was engulfing nearly all of Canterlot mountain now. "But at least he can make the meals for his marefriend, unlike someponies I can mention." With a huff, Octavia trotted off leaving Vinyl feeling like she was the guilty one this time. But turning her head, she saw the two foals enjoying a candlelit dinner of celery soup and daffodil sandwiches and smiled to herself before walking after Octavia to try and make up for things that were not her fault for once.
137.1 alternate
“Fair enough,” Spike said, deciding not to contest his wife's accusation. He rolled it, and the green face was uppermost when it came to a stop.
“Okay, what does that mean?” Spike asked, after a moment.
Rarity shrugged. “You'll find out...”
“This is, I'll admit, pretty atmospheric,” Spike said.
“Thank you,” Rarity smiled. “I did think it was a... different... choice.”
“Yes,” Spike said critically. “The kind of atmosphere, however...”
“What?” Chrysalis asked, bringing in their starters. “Is there a problem?”
“I'm still getting used to the whole changeling-hive décor,” Spike admitted. As he said so, there was a splat of something landing on the table. “What was that?”
Chrysalis put the plates on the table, and inspected it. “Caramel.”
“Caramel?” Spike repeated. “How-”
“It's just Changeling-themed,” Chrysalis told him. “I took a course from Pinkie once on decorating with confectionery, so the whole hive helped via using my knowledge. Anyway – let me know if you need anything.”
She stepped out of sight behind a curtain.
“So... what are we doing, then?” Spike asked, picking up a fork and taking a bite. His eyes widened. “This is really good!”
“I'm sure Chrysalis has taken a few cooking courses,” Rarity smiled. “And no, the decor's about it.”
She lit the candle in the centre of the table. “Let's just enjoy the meal.”
Behind the curtain, Chrysalis started the timer, and signalled Sub-Hive Two to start keeping track of the amount of ambient love the two other loopers were putting out.
By the taste of it, just the side-bleed would have them fed for the rest of the loop.
137.3 (OathToOblivion)
"Was that Billy thing really that bad?"
"Oh, believe me, it was. You're lucky you've never run into him, Phoenix," Twilight told him.
"Lucky? Twilight, this is me we're talking about," Phoenix Wright said incredulously. It was yet another Fused Loop where Twilight summoned Phoenix to Equestria. The difference here was that instead of Rainbow Dash being arrested for the murder of Ace Swift, it was Shining Armor arrested for the murder of Cadence. Not something that usually happened. Twilight had a hunch that it had something to do with this Loop's iteration of Chrysalis, but couldn't prove it. So the two were off to the Detention Center to question Shining on just what the hell had happened.
"Oh come on, Phoenix. You've had plenty of good luck too," Twilight pointed out.
"Yeah, and then there are those times where everything looks like it's going to, uh, Tartarus," Phoenix sighed, subbing in the local swear word. He was just plain morose.
Twilight was concerned at this. It looked like Phoenix had had a bad Loop. "What's wrong?" she asked.
"Well, Apollo started Looping recently..."
"Phoenix, that's great!" Twilight interrupted.
"I'm not finished. Anyway, he started Looping, and of course he was confused when he Woke up as a teenager again. I mean, we've all felt that when we started Looping ourselves," Phoenix rambled.
"Phoenix, you're rambling."
"Sorry. Anyway, well, there was a lot to tell him, and I told him so. And while doing so, I realized...I never told Trucy that Apollo is her half-brother," Phoenix said sadly.
"...Does Apollo know?" Twilight questioned.
"Yeah, I told him. It wouldn't have been fair not to. He wasn't that mad at me, all things considered. He'd been feeling something familiar from Trucy for a while now, and he did always wonder why they were the only two who could Perceive. He was just slightly irked that it took coming back in time to tell him."
"It's not really like you to keep secrets, Phoenix," Twilight noted. "Why did you keep this one?"
"I don't even know anymore," he admitted. "I guess I assumed that Thalassa was the one with the biggest right to do so, since she is their mother. And you know," he added, "it really hurts. Because I spent almost every single Loop afterwards telling them that they were related from almost the get-go. And then Trucy starts Looping and I immediately forget. Some father I am."
"Phoenix..."
"And now what? What happens when I tell Trucy the next Loop she's Awake? What if she hates me? This isn't even like a normal argument, because as a Looper, it's well within her power to just avoid me for the entire Loop, even if I am the Anchor. What am I supposed to do?!" Phoenix questioned loudly, scaring a few of the ponies who had been observing them walk throughout the streets of Canterlot.
"...Phoenix, I don't even know how to begin to approach this. I've never had this kind of problem with Nyx," Twilight admitted. "But, regardless of anything, Trucy's still your daughter. She'll understand."
"I hope so...but I can't help but feel this is going to go very badly the next time she's Awake."
Twilight didn't know what to say, even for all her experience. When it came to parenting, that was a beast of a whole other kind. In the end, she decided to just try to take Phoenix’s mind off the subject. "Well, we're here," she pointed out, pointing to the Detention Center, "so let's see how Shiny got himself into this."
Phoenix snapped out of it, at least for now. "Right. You're sure he wouldn't have done it? Er, at least this Loop," he hastily added after seeing the glare his equine friend gave him.
"Yes, I'm sure. Shining Armor this Loop is 100% baseline Shiny. No way would he ever do anything to hurt Cadence," Twilight declared.
"Right then. So let's find out what's going on," Phoenix nodded. And so together they walked into the Detention Center.
137.1 alternate
…and the orange face was uppermost when it came to a stop.
“Okay, what does that mean?” Spike asked, after a moment.
Rarity shrugged. “You'll find out...”
“Get up!”
Spike shook his head, grumbling. “What?”
“Get up!” Rarity repeated, shaking his shoulder. “It's nearly dawn!”
“So?” Spike said, pulling the pillow over his head.
Rarity rolled her eyes. “It's Hearts and Hooves day, Spiky-wikey...”
“Yes,” Spike agreed. “Which is why I'm having a lie in.”
“No you're not,” Rarity informed him flatly. “Have you got wings at the moment?”
“Wha?” Spike turned to her, confused.
“Good, you have.” Rarity grabbed his arm in her hoof, Ascended in a flash of light, and then they both vanished.
Spike flailed as he materialized in mid-air. “What the-”
A gentle grip of white magic enveloped him, holding him up. He looked around, then spread his wings and began to beat them. “Okay, I'm flying now, you can let me go.”
Rarity duly did so.
“So... what's all this in aid of?” Spike asked, as the couple floated in the air about a mile above Ponyville.
“Simple,” Rarity said, with a smile. “I've decided to define Hearts and Hooves day as the time between sunrise and sunset.”
“...so?” Spike invited, trimming his wings to exploit a small air pocket.
Rarity nodded towards the east, as the sun emerged from behind a mountain range. “That's dawn.”
She turned in a wide circle, feathers fluttering in the airstream, until she faced west. “Let's see how long until Celestia beats us in a race.”
Spike worked out what she meant, and smiled. “That sounds fun.”
“I try,” Rarity said with a shrug. “I packed several meals, by the way, so we can stop and let the sun catch up if need be.”
Spike indicated his interest in this plan with a flap of his wings, drawing level with her. “Great!”
He paused. “I'm glad you've become so comfortable with flying, by the way.”
Rarity smiled back at him. “Glad you think so.”
137.4 (Evilhumour)
Letting loose a joyful young cry, Record Scratch, Berry Punch and Ivory Scroll pushed off from the top of a hill as they started trying to get their cutie marks from speed racing.
Blinking as they all Woke up, they shouted in terror as their wagon went barreling down the hill and into the forest.
Nyx blinked as the three foals came into her library this loop, all grumbling something about tree sap.
"Hiya Nyx," Record Scratch waved, shaking his white coat in the library almost sending sap everywhere before Nyx caught it in her magic and sent it back to the colt. "GAH!"
With a sigh and a hoof to their faces, the other members of the Cutie Mark Crusaders looked up at Nyx.
"Do you know where Twilight is, dearie?" Ivory Scroll asked, looking at her friend that somehow got stuck in the carpet and was failing badly to escape from it. "This is an odd loop and we're hoping that she might be able to explain things to us."
"Sorry girls," Nyx used several spells that she designed with the original Cutie Mark Crusaders to deal with tree sap to help the two mares, leaving the male Vinyl alone for a bit longer. "Twilight's my filly this time and not Awake; we've got a stealth anchor to deal with."
With a crash, the three mares looked at Record, who had managed get the bust stuck on his head.
Nyx sighed to herself; this was going to be a painfully slow loop.
137.5 (Evilhumour)
Twilight looked at the creature snuggling against Fluttershy and tilted her head.
"Is that Ike?" she asked, pointing to the strange, green creature replacing Angel for this loop. She remembered him from the Quantum Conundrums loops, and he was always nice to have around.
"Yes," Fluttershy muttered happily, rubbing between his ears, which caused the Interdimensional Kinetic Entity to purr happily. "He's been such a gentlebeing to me ever since we both Woke up."
Twilight blinked again at the creature before looking directly at Ike (although not in the eyes as she learned from last time) and asking, "You promise to not misbehave or causes any problems?"
Ike Meeped, popping out of the dimension before popping back with a plate of cake on it, holding it out to her.
Twilight lifted it to her mouth, took a bite and decided that Ike was going to be a very good looper to have around.
137.6 (Pinklestia, edited by warewolves)
Twilight Sparkle Woke up. She groaned as her loop memories hit her.. It was yet another loop where she married Luna. What’s more, she knew Nyx was Awake and had manipulated things so it had happened. Even worse, she suspected Luna was Awake too, and had been willing to go with it.
"Uh... daddy, do you feel a bit Loopy?" The small black alicorn asked the purple unicorn, a hint of fear in her voice.
"Yes."
"Are me and Momma Luna in trouble for this whole marriage deal?" Nyx knew how much Twilight hated loops where she woke up married to somepony else.
"Actually... My loop memories tell me Luna gives very good back-rubs. Plus, she has been a 'perfect gentlemare'. And is true that Luna is your parent too, so I can't fault you for wanting to spend more time with her." Was she really considering playing along, instead of letting Luna and Nyx take care of the loop problems as punishment and going away on a vacation?
"So... we are not in trouble?"
"I do want vacations the next few loops you or Luna are awake. But for now lets try to see if we can make this family you want so much work, shall we?"
Mother (or father in this case) and daughter hugged each other. Twilight Sparkle sometimes forgot how much Nyx wanted a family. Twilight felt incredibly guilty for having ignored the other parent for so long, even when Luna was awake in the same loop with her. And by her loop memories, she knew Luna had enjoyed playing the role of a mother to Nyx. They might not be a family in the baseline, and Luna might not be her true love, but it made Nyx happy, so it was worth to try.
137.1 alternate
...and the blue face was uppermost when it came to a stop.
“Okay, what does that mean?” Spike asked, after a moment.
Rarity shrugged. “You'll find out...”
“Prince Blueblood?”
Blueblood, that most princely fellow, raised an eyebrow. “Yes?”
“Oh – uh, I was wondering,” the young purple dragon said, pressing his fingertips together. “Could you give me any tips, on... uh, on... trying to attract a mare?”
Blueblood's elegant hoof came to his neatly trimmed chin. “Well, it's a good thing you came to me. I am a master of picking up mares, of course, young dragon.”
Spike nodded. “That's why I thought of you.”
“Indeed,” Blueblood nodded back. “Well. First... mares love being flattered, but it's better to give them a backhoofed compliment. Tell them that they're clearly doing well on their diet – not only do they like the compliment, but they also feel grateful to you for noticing them... because it suggests they're still a bit fat.”
Blueblood saw that the drake's eyes had unfocused, so rapt was his attention.
“Secondly, always make sure you remember that any mare secretly wants a bad stallion...”
“Thanks for your help!” Spike said, a few minutes later.
Blueblood blinked at the sight of Spike in a Tuxedo, and Rarity beside him in a veil. “That was... remarkably quick work, young dragon.”
Spike shrugged. “Oh, I got help from you and from Princess Cadence! They helped a lot!”
Blueblood blanched. “You... did you tell her what I suggested?”
There were some loud staccato clop sounds, as a pony stomped up to the three of them.
Princess Cadence, Princess of Love, pointed her forehoof at Blueblood. “You are coming with me, mister. It's time for another lecture on the difference between romance and sleaze.”
“This seems cruel,” Spike observed, as they watched Cadence drag Blueblood away by the ear.
“He's the one who gave the advice, you only reported it,” Rarity pointed out. She kissed his cheek. “Now, since we're dressed for a wedding anyway...”
137.7 (Evilhumour)
Luna sighed to herself and looked at Sunset, eyes darting back and forth.
"You swear not to tell a soul about this?" She pointed a finger at Sunset, glaring at her sister's former-but-now-current student.
"Yes, yes," Sunset said, doing everything that a Pinkie Promise required. "Now can you tell me?"
"Fine," With a huff, Luna placed her right leg onto the desk and pulled up the pants leg. Around her ankle was a thick, metal bracelet. "It seems that a while ago, Celestia and I had a bit too much to drink and that I am a mean drunk. It took about six police officers to pull me off of Celestia and then I had this beauty slapped onto me." Luna pointed at the ankle monitor. "If I get too far from Celestia, I go to prison. If I drink, I go to prison." With a huff, Luna placed her leg back onto the floor. "For TEN months I have to wear this stupid thing, and waste every Sunday evening at a support group or I get sent to prison."
Sunset giggled to herself, finally hearing what happened to human Luna for her version of Nightmare Moon.
Luna slammed her hands onto her desk, causing the girl to jump. "That's it, detention for a month!"
137.8 (Anon e Mouse Jr.)
"Twilight."
"Sweetie Belle."
"Isn't my sister usually the one who has these weird variant loops with you?"
A red-crested penguin waddled past them with a quick "Wark wark" as it went.
Twilight looked down at the smaller penguin standing next to her, then around them at the snow-covered Penguinville, covered her eyes with a flipper, and sighed. "Yes. Yes, she is."
137.9 (Kris Overstreet)
... and the Rest Loop: Winter Wrap-Up
(Reminder: The "and the Rest" Loop was one where the Awake Loopers were Twilight, Ivory Scroll, Cheerilee, Zecora, Gilda and Angel. Twilight wanted to go through the motions in a standard baseline Loop to relax, but the other five have mischief on their minds.)
"What's the problem, Twilight?" Ivory Scroll asked.
Twilight Sparkle paced the floor of town hall, where Zecora, Cheerilee, Ivory and Gilda stood in a row watching her. "Tomorrow's Winter Wrap-Up, right? But the problem is... well, you know how Nightmare Moon was defeated without the Elements of Harmony? Well, I need to train the girls in using the Elements so we'll be ready for Discord in a few months. And training hasn't been going all that well."
"Ah, you realize, Twilight," Ivory said delicately, "that tomorrow we really need all hooves on deck. Even using Looper techniques, getting Ponyville organized for a proper wrap-up is something only you and certain visiting Loopers have been able to manage."
"I'm sorry, but this is really urgent," Twilight said. "I've already spoken with the girls, and they're all going to be with me at the Castle of the Two Sisters all day tomorrow. And I need your help to cover for them." She pointed to Ivory. "I need you to shuffle the paperwork and make the substitutions work." She floated three clipboards out of her saddlebags and over to the other three Loopers. "Cheerilee, you're replacing Fluttershy on the Animal Team. Zecora, you're the new Plant Team leader. And Gilda-"
"Yeah, I know," Gilda snapped, snatching her clipboard out of Twilight's magic, "I'm Weather Team leader, because I'm the only one of us with wings at the moment."
"I'm very sorry to drop this on you," Twilight said, "but if you remember baseline, you'll understand why I'm asking you to do this. Otherwise it'll be almost as much chaos as if Discord awakened early!"
"Don't worry about a thing," Ivory Scroll smiled, "you can count on us!"
A day passed, eventfully.
"So, let me see if I have this straight," Twilight said with the calm, sober demeanor of someone who was being calm and sober only because the moment for going completely postal, though imminent, had not yet arrived.
"Gilda, you began by crafting a whirlwind to blast away the last of the snow clouds."
"Sure," Gilda shrugged. "Gets the job done quick and frees ponies up for other chores."
"The tornado broke free and struck the first flight group of returning migratory songbirds," Twilight continued. "The snow clouds froze the birds solid, dropping them into the snowbanks and turning Big Mac's snowplow efforts into search and rescue. As a result, every single Ponyville songbird now has a nasty head cold and laryngitis."
"I thought songbirds didn't have larynxes."
"Next," Twilight continued, ignoring Ivory Scroll's response, "Zecora decided to use her plant-growing powers to help find the songbirds. Unfortunately the seeds she chose were of the toxic Spiny Seekers vine. To be fair, the vines went straight to the birds and lifted them out of the snow, as intended." Twilight looked into the eyes of a mortified zebra and added, "Unfortunately, in the process of retrieving the frozen birds, over one-third of the snowplow team members had to be sent to the hospital with hoof injuries. Foot-long mildly poisonous vines half-hidden by snowdrifts will do that."
"I confess, my dear Twilight, I have no defense," Zecora said. "At the time my plans seemed to make more sense."
"Despite this, Ponyville soldiered on," Twilight said. "Now we come to the really stupid things. Cheerilee personally led the animal wake-up squad, which resulted in several hours lost when the entire town of Ponyville panicked following the first snake stampede in recorded Equestrian history." Twilight tossed her head and, losing her cool for a moment, shouted, "It's rare even among the Loops, and more than half the instances of that I've heard of involve Arrakis sandworms!!"
"I had it in mind to improve the education of Ponyville's animals," Cheerilee said. "I thought some mathematics problems would be the perfect thing to exercise their minds after a long winter's sleep."
"Mathematics for snakes? How are they supposed to hold the pencils?" Twilight now stared into Cheerilee's eyes. "Besides, any student could tell you- NOPONY likes a pop quiz first thing in the morning at the start of a new term!"
"I thought they'd find it easy," Cheerilee protested. "After all, they were adders."
For a moment Twilight looked ready for a premature explosion, but she managed to get a grip on herself. In a much more brittle version of calm-and-sober, shecontinued, "The snake-frightened ponies, unable to flee town across the fields because nopony had plowed them, tried fleeing across the river and pond. Unfortunately they ran into the single, solitary aspect of Winter Wrap-Up which was completed on time: the cutting and breaking up of the ice." Her attention turned back to Gilda. "The resulting rescue from ice cold water of nearly a hundred ponies and half a dozen snakes put the entire Weather Team out of action for an hour and a half."
"We did our job, yeah," Gilda said, shrugging her talons.
"Unfortunately, the fact that every pegasus in Ponyville was airlifting ponies either to the hospital or to the train station for evacuation to Canterlot," Twilight continued, "meant that nopony was aloft to stop the stray thundersnow storm that rolled over town late in the afternoon. The resulting fresh snow, lightning and winds hit Runaway Hill and triggered an avalanche of unplowed snow."
Twilight’s hoof swept aroundthe interior of the town hall, ending to point at the open window everyone had entered by. "As a result of which Ponyville's streets are now buried under several feet of snow! When the girls and I returned to Ponyville we found almost half the town incapacitated, the animals basically homeless, and everything worse than ever before!" Now Twilight lost her cool, stomping back and forth in front of the other four ponies. "It would have been better if Discord HAD escaped- at least then Fluttershy and Applejack would be SPEAKING to me!!" she shrieked.
In a flash of light Twilight ascended. The lavender alicorn stared in absolute fury at the others. "I'm going to spend all night clearing away the snow and getting the animals settled into new quarters," she said. "Please go home and DO. NOTHING. I'll handle it all from here. Like I should have in the first place!" With a final grunt of outrage Twilight took to her wings and flew out the window, leaving the other four Loopers on the balcony of town hall.
"Well, chicks," Gilda said with a smile, "I call that, operation total success!"
"I didn't even have to arrange for the scheduling conflicts," Ivory said, nodding with satisfaction.
"I feel a little bit bad about this," Cheerilee said. "Though I admit it was definitely an educational experience."
"Do not fret about the townsfolk, teacher dear," Zecora replied. "My cures will make their ailments disappear. When morning comes and spring is brought in, today's travails shall be forgotten."
"I still think it would have been better if we'd just done the job properly," Cheerilee said.
"Hey." Gilda held up one hand in a halting gesture. "Not my wagon train- not my donkeys. Twilight shoulda known better than to muck with baseline and leave us to clean up after her. Now she's learned her lesson, and we won't be bothered about stuff we're not supposed to be-"
"AH-HA! I KNEW IT!"
CRASH! CRASH! CRASH! CRASH!
Four snow shovels stood handles-up, blades embedded in the wood of the balcony floor.
"-bussss-ted," Gilda said, her feather-crest drooping.
"Zecora, Ivory, alicorn up!" Twilight shouted through the new holes in town hall's ceiling. "Gilda, get yourself some fresh ink. And Cheerilee, you better figure something out, because I'm going to work you just as hard as the other three! Sabotage Winter Wrap-Up for a prank? Not on MY watch!"
Zecora began stepping towards the window/door. "I must be off to cook remedies, potions, powders and jams," she said, "for all those ponies in the hospital-"
"ZECORA!"
"-yes, ma'am," Zecora said, lowering her head and accepting the inevitable.
"Told you we should have done it right the first time," Cheerilee moaned.
"But I didn't even get to really DO anything!" Ivory Scroll wailed.
... and the Rest Loop: Sonic Rainboom
The door to Rainbow Dash's cloud home opened, and Rainbow Dash staggered in, exhausted.
"Dude, what's up with you, Dash?" Gilda asked, rising from the couch and rushing over to catch the pegasus before she fell over.
"Oh... hi, Gilda," Rainbow Dash said. "Mind if we order out tonight?"
Gilda guided her best friend and couch-lending host to a chair and flopped her into it. "Girl, talk to me," she said. "You look like something the cat dragged in- and I should know."
"It's the Best Young Fliers Competition," Dash replied. "I've gone through my routine again and again and again. I have to get it absolutely perfect!" She squirmed in her chair. "Everypony who's been accepted to the Wonderbolts for the last fifty years has been a winner of Best Young Fliers! The winner of the Best Young Fliers gets to hang out with them! That's my big dream, Gilda!" She slumped back limply, finishing, "And I still can't get the Sonic Rainboom to work!"
Gilda contemplated her choice of responses. Griffons, alas, were not made for nuance. "Gee, that's tough," she said.
"I know!" Rainbow Dash had known her friend long enough that her bluntness rolled over her. "I've tried narrowing my silhouette, inclining my flight aspect, adjusting my wingtips for minimum resistance... I can touch it, Gilda, I know I'm right on the edge, and then I hit the bow wave and go tumbling flank over teakettle, again and again and again!"
Gilda considered this, and discovered her range of replies hadn't improved. "That's rough, all right."
"And I'm out of time!" Rainbow Dash sighed. "I know I'm going to screw up in front of Princess Celestia and the Wonderbolts and Fluttershy and everypony I grew up with in Cloudsdale! My dream of being a Wonderbolt will be ruined! And all because I can't-"
Gilda reached a single clawed talon up and touched Dash's muzzle, silencing her. "Dash, you know what your problem is?" she asked. "Your head's just not in the right place. You're overthinking everything. You're trying to change your flying style midway through a trick, and at the same time you've got all these worries about stuff you can't control muddying things up."
Music began to play as Gilda sang:
Is your brain a buzzin'?
Is your concentration fuzzin'?
Can't get with the program?
Lucky for you I am
Ready to teach you the trick that you need to win
'Cause you can't cross the line at the finish before you begin
You've got to
Live in the moment! Take it and own it!
Just keep your mind on today
Yesterday's over! Tomorrow is nothing!
Don't let them get in the way
There's a mode to be in if you want to win
Live in the moment
Live in the moment
A winner doesn't worry
Clear your brain out in a hurry
Let what happens happen
When you can do that then
The talent inside you will carry you through to the end
So remember my lesson, forget all your troubles, my friend
You've got to
Live in the moment! Take it and own it!
Just keep your mind on today
Yesterday's over! Tomorrow is nothing!
Don't let them get in the way
There's a mode to be in if you want to win
Live in the moment
Live in the moment
The music slowed, and Gilda stepped away from Dash and closed her eyes to belt out the bridge:
A clear mind and a calm heart will see you through
Don't overthink it!
Don't second-guess it!
Just..... do.....
The beat picked up again for the last chorus, and Gilda, eyes closed, danced to the snappy rhythm as she sang:
You've got to
Live in the moment! Take it and own it!
Just keep your mind on today
Yesterday's over! Tomorrow is nothing!
Don't let them get in the way
There's a mode to be in if you want to win
Live in the moment
Live in the moment
Gilda opened her eyes as the music ceased.
Rainbow Dash had fallen asleep in the easy chair.
"Hmph!" the griffon snorted. "See if I ever do a heartsong for you again! Stupid pony magic heartsong thing..." Shaking her head and grumbling to herself, she went upstairs to fetch a pillow and blanket for her host before calling the pizza delivery pegasus.
137.1 alternate
…and the pink face was uppermost when it came to a stop.
“Okay, what does that mean?” Spike asked, after a moment.
Rarity shrugged. “You'll find out...”
There were a few questions the next morning.
“When?” the dragon asked.
The Jedi was answered by a shrug. “Last night, after we were both asleep.”
“How?”
“Magic, dear.” The tone of the voice was a little condescending, as though the speaker couldn't quite believe that the question had to be asked. “Of course it was.”
“Who?”
“Oh, Twilight did it.” An elegant toss of the mane. “She was quite willing to help.”
“Why?”
'Elusive' shrugged. “Well, you can't deny it's different.”
'Barb' considered that, then nodded. “I can get behind that.”
137.10 (Scorntex)
"The night shall last FORE-"
Someone hissed from behind the stage. Nightmare Moon paused mid-declaration, and turned around. As the increasingly bewildered citizens of Ponyville tried to work out what exactly was happening, they heard hushed conversations.
Eventually Nightmare Moon turned back towards the audience, and scowled. "I do apologise, my little ponies, but I'm afraid there has been something of a scheduling conflict. Ergo, the night shall end..."
She lifted a hoof, one suddenly bearing a watch that hadn't been there seconds ago, and frowned. "... Now!"
The sun rose, and Nightmare Moon stalked away, muttering furiously to herself.
"-an't believe it, spent three Loops working the plan out. WHY COULDN'T SHE HAVE TOLD US THAT SHE WAS TAKING A HOLIDAY BEFORE SHE WENT? THAT'S WHAT I'D LIKE TO KNOW!"
After a few seconds stunned silence, Rainbow Dash sneaked out from backstage, and made her way to where Rarity and Applejack were trying (vaguely) to look as confused as everyone else.
"She's taking it well." Rarity said as dryly as possible, before looking over to Rainbow Dash.
"Not that I can truly blame her. Twilight could have at least left a note."
"Hey" Rainbow Dash shrugged. "Twilight says she needs a holiday, let her. If there's something serious, we can call her."
Several hundred miles away, Twilight Sparkle took another sip from her drink, listening to the crash of waves against the sands of the admittedly lovely, if somewhat astoundingly generic, beach.
A short distance away, Nyx occupied her time trying to make a sand dreadnought, if only because Twilight had asked firmly that Nyx not break out any actual dreadnoughts. Or any other form of heavily armed ship, whether space-going, ocean-going or pudding-going.
After a while, and once she'd found the most boring book in her subspace pocket and utterly failed to read it twice, Twilight decided to help Nyx construct her second sand dreadnought.
137.11 (Gym Quirk)
Spike Awoke kicking at the small egg, ranting about its occupant wanting to be born just as he had. He paused to assimilate his loop memories, absently noting the small form struggling against the unusually thick shell.
Pern again. Benden Weyr hatching grounds, if I'm not mistaken. Pre-adolescent human male this time.
The small creature butted against him through the flexible membrane beneath the outer shell layer.
"Oh, right. Sorry." Spike pulled the knife from his belt and slit the slippery film to let the white form fall into his lap.
"Spike! What are...you...doing??" called Lytol from the stands, the alarm in the Ruathan warder's voice giving way to bewilderment.
A wave of confused hubbub circulated around the crowd as Spike assisted the egg's occupant to its feet.
F'lar exchanged a look with Lessa. "I'd expected those two to show up here as a pair eventually, but this..."
Ramoth, dear? Is there something you'd like to tell us? an amused Mnementh asked his mate.
The great queen dragon could only stare at this most unusual of her offspring.
"Hello, Darling," said the indigo-maned white alicorn filly standing before Spike. She looked around at the gobsmacked crowd. "What? You'd think they've never seen a pony before. I don't suppose you have a large dandelion salad handy? I must admit that I'm absolutely famished..."
Spike masterfully limited his slightly hysterical amusement to a silent chuckle as he gently hugged his very special somepony.
137.12 (fractalman)
Twilight smiled to herself. Her plan to take out Nightmare Moon using CAM (compressed avocado mush, rather than compressed antimatter) was almost ready. She retrieved the last modified dungbomb from her subspace pocket...only for it to explode prematurely, covering her in guacamole.
She sighed...and heard chittering, buzzing, and some flapping. Turning, she saw a large number of birds, squirrels, and bugs (including a couple of parasprites), all staring at her hungrily. Some of the squirrels even held up forks and knives!
Twilight spent the rest of the night, and most of the next day, running from hungry critters.
Her third day in Ponyville, at around noon, Twilight found herself yawning excessively. 'Odd', she thought, 'I could've sworn I got enough sleep.'
Pinkie Pie bounced by in slow motion. "Hi Twilight! Why aren't you in bed for your noon nap?" Her voice sounded strange at normal pony speeds.
"Noon *yawn* nap?" asked Twilight.
Pinkie nodded. "Uh huh! Every pony in Ponyville takes a noon nap, period!"
"Yaaaawn, but....why? How!"
Pinkie giggled, bouncing ever more slowly. "Isn't it obvious? Nothing can stop...the Snooze!"
Twilight's facehoof was the last straw, and she collapsed into a cute, curled up state for her nap, even as Pinkie Pie hung mid-bounce and began to snore.
137.13 (Leviticus Wilkes)
"Do you, Applebloom Apple, take Sweetie Belle and Scootaloo Solaria to be your lawfully wedded wives?"
"I do."
"And do you Scootaloo Solaria take Sweetie Belle and Applebloom Apple to be your lawfully wedded wives?"
"I do."
"And do you Sweetie Belle take Applebloom Apple and Scootaloo Solaria to be your lawfully wedded wives?"
"I do."
The priest shut her book. "Then by the powers vested in me by her majesty Princess Celestia, I now pronounce you wife, wife and wife. You may now kiss the bride."
Up on the lonely hill, crowded with onlooking guests, well wishers, close family, and dear friends, the original Cutie Mark Crusaders Awoke. Applebloom found her voice first. "Wait, did he jus’ say wife?"
The reception, perhaps as a blessing or a curse, consisted entirely of Awake loopers. On the one hand, Sweetie Belle was glad that she could speak immediately and openly about ways to very quickly annul the sudden marriage. On the other hand, she had to endure the pain of being ribbed by people who would remember the abortive marriage. Worse still, it seemed to include almost everyone in the loop, and a few who weren't even from the loop.
The look on Lemon Rush's face was really getting at her.
It was around the time the cake was cut that Scootaloo finally snapped. "Well what is it!?!"
The God Emperor of Mankind (also in attendance) swirled some of his beer in the newly minted wife's direction. "The three of you? I'd never have seen that one coming."
Applebloom rolled her eyes. "Ya, thanks fer Uncle Empy."
The Emperor raised an eyebrow. "Who you calling Uncle?"
"Her brother-in-law," answered Celestia. "But her confusion is understandable. The family tree is a little nutty."
The Emperor was confused. "But I'm not her Uncle or her brother-in-law."
Celestia smiled cheekily. "Actually, you are. Pinkie Pie, if I may?" Celestia reached into Pinkie Pie's mane and pulled out a chalkboard (the question of why Pinkie Pie had a chalkboard in her mane went unanswered), and a piece of chalk.
"Let's start with Scootaloo. Now, since I'm her mother this loop-" Celestia paused to hoof-bump Scootaloo, "-I automatically become Applebloom's and Sweetie Belle's mother-in-law. Now, since Rainbow Dash is almost always Scoot's adoptive sister, we can also list her as my daughter-in-law. Sorry Dash."
Dash, also known as the one mare who hadn't been teasing the newlyweds, shrugged. "Eh. Don't mention it."
Celestia smiled, and drew two more lines. "Through me, Scoot's and her friends are also related to Prince Blueblood and Luna. So she's technically Luna's niece as well, by blood at least." Celestia drew another few lines, this time leading from Applebloom.
"Applebloom's tree is the most consistent. She is, of course, tied to Applejack, Big Mac, and Granny Smith, who effectively has become my mother-in-law. Funny that. She's also tied to Pinkie Pie, as... what was it, fourth cousin thrice removed."
Pinkie Pie cheerfully shrugged.
Celestia cleared her throat. "And that makes three. Now we move on to Sweetie Belle, and this is where you come in Empy. Sweetie Belle is Rarity's sister, who is Spike's wife." A dotted line connected Rarity's name to Spike's. "That make's Rarity Twilight's sister-in-law, since she's Spike's big sister, right?"
Twilight nodded, taking quick notes, before the fact struck her. "Wait, what?"
Celestia then drew a line down from Twilight's name, and wrote Nyx. "Nyx is Twilight's daughter, and since she's dating Leman Russ, which we all know will one day end in them getting married-"
Nyx and Lemon blushed.
"-we can say without a doubt that Leman will become Twilight's son-in-law. Welcome to the club, Twilight." Celestia winked at her stunned student. "Thus, since Leman was raised by Fluttershy, we can say that Fluttershy is Twilight's sister-in-law as well, as is the Emperor, since he's Leman's father. Which, incidentally, makes me the Emperor's mother-in-law." Celestia drew a huge circle, encompassing, from left to right, Rainbow Dash, Scootaloo, Applebloom, Big Mac, Applejack, Sweetie Belle, Rarity, Spike, Twilight, Fluttershy, and the Emperor. "Congratulations everyone within this circle: you're in-laws!"
For a moment, not a single pony dared to speak. And then one did.
"Welp... that's nice and all, but it'll only last till the end of this loop," Big Mac observed.
Rarity nodded numbly in agreement with her brother-in-law. "Quite right... best make the most of it."
"Eyup," the assembled chimed.
137.14 (Kris Overstreet)
The night before the night before the Summer Sun Celebration, that first day of a fresh Loop, the various Awake Loopers trailed into Mac's bar to discover Twilight Sparkle already there. (This was by no means a rare thing; the Anchor, having more Loops than the others, was close to even money to be the first Looper in after a rough Loop.
This time, instead of chugging some excruciatingly potent brew to dull the pain, she spent the early part of the evening toying with the bowl of pretzels and taking the very occasional sip from a tankard of hard cider. (Well, not hard-hard cider. Merely harder-than-soft cider. Semipermeable cider.)
The silent waiting ended when Pinkie Pie entered the bar, bouncing on her hooves without an apparent care in the world. The earth pony made a beeline for Twilight's barstool, taking a perch on the stool next to hers and asking, "Watcha doin', Twilight?"
"Oh, hi, Pinkie," Twilight said. "Just thinking. My last Loop was... kind of strange."
"Really? Strange like all the mountains are made out of S'Mores that melt in the summertime and get rebuilt by chocolate-rain snows in the-"
"It was a Bureau Loop."
Pinkie's babble shut off like a faucet.
Twilight waved a hoof. "Not a bad one," she said. "We opened a portal, humans on the other side, yadda yadda. But there wasn't any magic poisoning or anything like that. That wasn't the problem."
"Really?" Pinkie asked. "No formula? No attack squads? No horrible nasty anti-human bigotry to poison relations with converted ponies?"
"No, none of that at all," Twilight replied. "The problem was, the Earth on the other side was one of those where we're fictional... and have a fan base. A massive fan base."
Pinkie tilted her head to one side. "That's bad?"
"Well, the thing is," Twilight said, "we suddenly had millions of people who wanted to visit Equestria. Almost as many humans wanted to come as there were ponies IN Equestria." Twilight sipped her cider and continued, "So Princess Celestia made a rule that any humans who wanted to visit Equestria had to be transformed into ponies, to reduce disruption of everyday life here."
"That doesn't sound so bad," Pinkie said. "Didn't that cut down on the demand?"
"No!" Twilight said. "If anything it INCREASED it! All sorts of people, even people who never watched the show, wanted to come here just to spend time as a pony! They even organized huge weekend-long parties for it! Celestia eventually had to limit them to two per major Equestrian city and town per year, with three each for Canterlot, Manehattan, Cloudsdale and Los Pegasus." Twilight sighed. "And then she put her most trusted subjects in charge of the committee to run things and keep it fair. By which," Twilight said hurriedly as she saw the question forming in Pinkie's eyes, "I mean us six."
"Sounds like my kind of civil service job!" Pinkie grinned.
"Yes, you took to it fairly well," Twilight agreed. "But I could never get over the fact that I was actually aiding and abetting the Bureau."
"That's okay, Twilight!" Pinkie grinned. "You just said it wasn't an evil Conversion Bureau."
"Not the Conversion Bureau," Twilight corrected, "the Convention Bureau."
137.15 (Kris Overstreet)
"What did you do, Pinkie?"
The Element bearers, all six Awake, watched as two different sets of tanks and other heavy armored vehicles maneuvered and clashed around the outskirts of Appleoosa.
"Well, you know how in baseline there's this fight for the town, right?" Pinkie asked. "And how no matter what I try to do to prevent it-"
"We know," the other five chorused.
"Well, I decided that instead of trying to stop it," Pinkie said, grinning in the confident knowledge that she was a genius, "I decided to speed it up so it'd be over faster!"
Twilight's eyes goggled. "You lost me," she said.
Pinkie pointed at the tanks below, which had begun firing on one another. "I gave both sides tanks, right?" she said. "German Tigers to the buffalo so they could squeeze inside, Russian T-34s to the ponies. But I rigged the guns and ammo so instead of shells, they fire apple-flavored pancakes!"
Sure enough, one such shot spun like a frisbee into the open viewport of a tank. The vehicle ground to a halt.
"It's my idea for swift, victorious war where nobody gets hurt!" Pinkie grinned. "I call it... blintzkrieg!"
137.16 (Kris Overstreet)
"Twilight?"
Prolonged sigh. "Yes, Rarity?"
"Why are we wearing nothing but black and sitting in the back of Sugarcube Corner sharing a bottle of absinthe?"
"Because the world is a dark and depressing place." The purple unicorn, currently resembling a slightly more colorful than usual Maud Pie with black beret and turtleneck, levitated the bottle of absinthe to her lips and took an unhealthy swallow. (Which, when speaking of absinthe, means practically any amount whatsoever.)
"I beg your pardon, darling," Rarity said, wearing a similar outfit. "I know your last Loop was quite the disappointment, but Spike not being Awake aside, this world's not a dark and depressing place at all!" Rarity selected a baked good from the display cabinet and floated it over to where she and Twilight sat. "Case in point- a rainbow-frosted strawberry donut-cupcake-"
"It's a DONAKE!" Pinkie Pie shouted from the kitchen.
"-and those shining green flakes in the frosting? Crystallized love, courtesy of Community Service."
The changeling disguised as an earth pony with a prison-bars cutie mark smiled and waved amiably at the two unicorns.
"We live in a world where this is not only possible, but not all that unusual, Twilight darling!" Rarity said. "And this is only the least of the many joys and wonders that we ponies get to enjoy!" She carefully took the absinthe away from Twilight and capped the bottle- waste not want not, after all- and said, "I admit I was a scoche dramatic when we first met this Loop, but even I think you're carrying this a bit too far!"
She's right, you know, the absinthe in Twilight's system added.
"You know what? You're right!" Twilight Sparkle stood up from the table, hooked one forelimb around Rarity, and dragged the fashionista towards the door. "It's a magical world out there, Rarity! Let's go exploring!"
"Twilight?"
Eager, slightly drunken giggle. "Yes, Rarity?"
"Why are we at the top of Runaway Hill sitting in the Cutie Mark Crusaders' wagon?"
"Because, according to my research," Twilight replied, pulling a certain collection of Hub world comic strips from her subspace pocket, "this is the traditional method to begin exploring a magical world in the proper spirit of innocence and wonder!"
Rarity looked down the very long, very steep road at the cliff where the road made a sharp right-angle turn before descending into Ponyville proper. "We begin with a two-week hospital stay?"
"You worry too much, Rarity," Twilight said, using her magic and a broomhandle to give the wagon the last little shove needed to start it down the hill. "The tiger and his pet boy never got hurt, after all."
"Twilight, darling," Rarity snapped, "when this is over I demand to see the academic credentials of whoever wrote thaaaaaAAAIIIIIIIIEEEE!!"
"Isn't this exciting?" Twilight asked as the wagon picked up an improbable amount of speed. "Doesn't this inspire all sorts of philosophical queries?"
"Only one, dear," Rarity replied. "HOW DO YOU STOP THIS THING??"
"Oh, everything stops eventually," Twilight said. "Isn't the journey we all go on in the meantime much more interesting than its ending?"
"I'M DONE TALKING TO THE ABSINTHE, PLEASE!" Rarity shouted, her mane beginning to match the color of her coat. "I'D LIKE TO SPEAK TO TWILIGHT NOW!"
"Although I suppose," Twilight said, ignoring Rarity's frantic shouting, "there is something to be said for being aware of the consequences of one's actions, instead of ignoring them for the sake of the-"
It was about this point that the wagon became airborne.
"AAAAAAAAAHHH!!!"
"-fleeting rush of pleasure in the experience-"
And it was about this point that wagon, Twilight, and Rarity went from being a single ballistic object to three disparate objects separated by differences in air resistance.
"BY CELESTIA'S SACRED EYELASHES, TWILIGHT, DO SOMETHING!!!"
"-of the untrammeled moment! Oh, is it over already?"
Three flashes of light transferred three objects in motion to three stationary positions on the ground beside the fountain in town square.
"-AAAAAAH oh it's over it's over thank larch it's over oooh, sweet, sweet filthy earth!" Rarity flattened herself on the ground and attempted to hug the dirt. "Solid, loving, friendly earth! Rarity takes back half the mean things she's ever said about you!"
"Wow, you were right, Rarity!" Twilight said, smiling. "I feel so much better already! I think I'll go for a run through White Tail Woods and then sit down to read Rainbow Dash's new book! It's about the Yellow Goddess incognito at a Japanese high school!"
Rarity paused in her adoration of terra firma and gave Twilight her best angry-Fluttershy impression.
A lone white unicorn dressed in black sat at the table in the corner of Sugarcube Corner, drinking absinthe.
"Rarity?"
"Yes, Pinkie Pie?"
"Why are you sitting in the corner by yourself drinking absinthe?"
"Because the world isn't nearly dark and depressing enough, dear."
"Oh." Pinkie Pie spent half a second thinking about this, then decided to ignore it altogether. "Well, just so long as you don't make a mess and don't give any to the kids!"
The family of goats using the rest of the room for Little Billy Gruff's birthday party baa'ed their concurrence.
137.17 (Evilhumour, Ryuus2, wildrook)
Twilight smiled to herself; a normal baseline by herself was nice once in a while to let herself decompress. So far, she had gone through the motions of the loop, rediscovering the same joy and wonder she had found when she first did it eons ago. Dealing with the Changeling invasion was going to be annoying, but fun in working with her friends to stop Chrysalis.
Unusually, Cadence hadn't been in the mines. and Chrysalis had really stepped up her game this time. Everything had been done perfectly to the point. IF Twilight didn't know better, she'd say it really was Cadence next to her brother on the altar.
"-and if anypony should know a reason why these two should not get married, speak now-"
"I OBJECT!" With a slamming of doors stood the changeling queen herself, flanked by furious looking guards, stalking towards the couple with a bundle on her back. "How dare you do this to me Shining!?" The changeling used her magic to push away the Day Guards that were trying to interrupt her. "After everything that has happened, you do this to us?!"
"I don't know who you are, but this is my wedding, and that is my Shiny you are talking about!" Cadence snapped, flying down to meet the changeling queen face to face, returning her venomous look. "And what do you mean, us?"
Chrysalis raised an eyebrow, shooting the panicked Shining Armor a glare before facing the alicorn in front of her with vengeful smirk. Using her green magic, she lifted the bundle off her back, shaking her mane away from her horn to show a horn ring. Chrysalis held the bundle close to her chest, pulling back the layers to reveal a white foal to everypony's surprise.
"May I present your fiancé's and my child, Rippling Shield?" Cadence gasped as the white little pony raised his little hooves, letting out happy chirps as his big blue eyes locked onto the panicking white unicorn. Cadence turned to stand next to Chrysalis.
"Care to explain this, Shining?" Cadence muttered darkly as everypony started to move away.
Twilight could only sigh as it was going to be one of those loops before her mother joined the mares descending onto her brother.
Shining wilted under the glares from all the mares around him. "So...It kinda goes like this. A few months ago I was sent on a deep cover mission to ferret out rumours about a possible invasion of Equestria. In a frontier saloon to the west, I met an unassuming mare named Chrissy who was trying to drink away her issues at home. When a herd of Minotaur bandits came to town, the two of us got caught up in a whirlwind adventure to save the town, and a romance soon started to build. Once the town was safe, Chrissy told me she knew where the rumours had started, and we set off across Equestria, growing ever closer to the source of the rumours and each other. Finally, we reached the changeling hive, where she revealed she was actually Chrysalis, Queen of the Changelings. She told me that she had been planning to invade, but in getting to know me, and through me the temperance of Celestia and Canterlot court, she had decided to abandon the invasion in favour of a more diplomatic approach.
"After a complicated pile of political Jargon, I agreed to become an honorary member of the hive by marrying Chrissy, thus allowing me to be the intermediary and representative between her and Celestia during future negotiations. For the marriage to be binding, Changeling politics demanded-" Here he choked as the glares that had cooled during his tale returned with double the force. There was no right way to say the next part, so he decided to just bite the bullet. "-SoIDidMyDutyAndWasOnMyWayWthAChangelingEscortTheNextDay!"
He closed his eyes and braced for the trampling he was sure he was due. When nothing happened for a full minute, he dared to open his eyes. The first thing he saw was his LSBFF glaring burning pain at him. The second thing he saw was the glow of her magic holding back everypony else from unleashing that pain upon him. "Well," she asked with a calm that bellied her glare, "Then what happened?"
Taking the out for what it was, he composed himself a bit and continued. "After debriefing the Princess, I proposed to Cadence the first chance I got. I thought the marriage to Chrissy was only political and wouldn't prevent me from marrying Cadence. Princess Celestia even assured me that because of how different our species were nothing could come of it."
"Actually, that's a common misconception you ponies always make," Chrysalis interrupted from the back. All eyes turned to her and the slowly rocking bundle cradled in her magic. "Changelings are not insects that happen to look like ponies. We are in fact a subset of ponies -much like Thestrals, Centaurs, and Seaponies- who happen to look like insects and all share the same talent, making us generally weaker than any one pony breed, but much more versatile. Our species are biologically compatible with each other, with it being a toss up as to whether the foal will take after either parent."
Here Chrysalis turned her eyes from the crowd directly on Shining. "I loved you, Shiny; I still love you. But I didn't think we could work past the existing prejudices between our species or our responsibilities, so I decided to live the dream for just one night and then let you go. When Rippling was born and I saw he was a pony...I allowed myself to feel hope that maybe we could be together again. When I learned of the wedding, I rushed to Canterlot to stake my claim..."
"...and in the end, Cadence married Flash Sentry, Shining turned out not to be my brother but was switched at birth with Vinyl, Rarity's family turned out to be super spies of the greatest order, Fleur turned out to be the real Celestia, a whole convoluted mess with Pinkie Pie and Applejack and Rainbow Dash that took us so long to sort out that Tirek used my tree to get our attention to his invasion," Twilight told the mouse, with her head on the counter.
Mickey just pat her on the back. "Soap Opera loops are never pretty," he muttered. "You just hit the tip of the iceberg. Wait until you encounter the Spanish Soap Operas."
137.1 alternate
…and the purple face was uppermost when it came to a stop.
“Okay, what does that mean?” Spike asked, after a moment.
Rarity shrugged. “You'll find out...”
Late in the evening of Hearts and Hooves day – after the day spent walking, the romantic meal, and the inevitable CMC attempt to do something appropriate for the day (fortunately they put out the fires), Spike turned to his wife with a confused frown.
“So...” he asked. “What was the purple result?”
Rarity winked. “Nothing at all.”
“Pardon?” Spike asked.
Giving him a kiss, Rarity smiled. “Purple simply means that I spend the day with the one I wanted to most of all, dear.”
Spike attempted to nod sagely. “Oh, I see.”
“Were you spending the whole day waiting for the other shoe to drop?” Rarity asked, giggling. “No wonder you seemed so tense!”
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Mm, I should get to write a loop were Nyx is the one dealing with the baseline problems for a change, or maybe Luna...
Wooo, go Soap-Opera loops!
>> 137.2
Way to be genre-blind, Octy.
I am not even going to ask.
>> 137.12
>> 137.13
Who'd'a' thunk that the CMC getting hitched would tie everypony together like that?
>> 137.14
>> 137.15
>> 137.17
This one actually gave me a headache.
5625524
.2 You should see what happened he tried to make toast. It wasn't pretty.
.17 sweet!
Ah yes, the dreaded telenovelas will corrupt the good heart of soap operas. Why did I want to see this beautiful chain of events? Is it because I naturally like soap operas or that the chain of events cause a thing in the brain to become addicted to human misery and convoluted plots? Either way that sounds great.
5625524 Re: 137.14 and .15, you are welcome.
Naturally.
That is a terrible pun.
Space between she and continued.
That one was on purpose.
EEyup. One more E.
I'm somehow not surprised in the slightest.
*sigh* Really Pinkie?
Cool.
137.16
Why is she swearing indirectly by Celestia's name? Is this really such an early loop that they hadn't decided on botany?
137.7 You forgot the part where if she wants to drive she needs to use a breathalyzer.
137.9
Twilight is the Kwisatz Haderach.
Author's Note:
137.1: Conquering is always romantic?
137.2: Vinyl fails to realize it's always her fault in Octavia's mind.
137.3: Never been super into PW so yes XD
137.4: especially a genderbent kid.
137.5: And to bribe the anchor.
137.6: oh god those last names >.<
137.7: But still funny.
137.8: Yay for Pen-pen
137.9: Definitely
137.10: Dunno, she had Nyx apparently.
137.11: Especially considering the incest.
137.12: Puns improve everything n_n
137.13: and some fuzzy logic.
137.14: And folks adjusted to the all veggie diet.
137.15: Yeah, but they frisbee so well.
137.16: No more Calvin for Twilight. Also, the Absinthe you get these days is perfectly safe to consume. It's not the same wormwood they used t'use.
137.17: Our soaps got nothing on Spanish Soaps
I liked the romance, very well done. I also liked the snips with Twilight and Luna being Nyx's parents and Twilight deciding Nyx should get some more family time.
Record Scratch?
-edit- R63?
The Calvin and Hobbes homage made me happier than I can verbally express.
Rereading 137.13, it just struck me that the first half of Celestia's explanation, while based on non-standard circumstances ("Since I'm [Scootaloo's] mother this loop..."), would've been enough if she'd gone a little further with it.
To wit: Scootaloo < Celestia -- Luna > Nyx -- Leman < Emperor.
Then again, that would've made the Emperor an uncle after all (brother-in-law of Scoot's mom, I think). Bringing Sweetie's connection into it knocked him down a generation.
Ultimately, I suppose Celestia just wanted to bring as many ponies into the discussion as possible before drawing the In-Law Circle(TM)
Spike and Rarity as Jaxom and Ruth? I would pay to read that!
137.9: What's the tune on Gilda's song there? I kept trying to fit it to Eye of the Tiger, to no great success.
137.1 Pink: Would it be, though? By the time of running out of ideas, I imagine they would've had hundreds of both-awake loops since becoming a couple, and genderswap loops aren't that uncommon.
137.12: When it comes to resting up,
Snooze is what we choose!
We won't swap;
Nothing else can top
Relaxing, unstoppable Snooze!
137.16: I wonder how much of this is Twilight's normal level of mercuriousness and how much is hamming up everything that crosses her mind.
5863341 Gilda's Heartsong is an original. I kinda-sorta have a tune in mind for it, but feel free to roll your own.
And Twilight's Calvin episode was triggered by an alcoholic beverage in which alcohol isn't the most psychoactive ingredient...
Not according to your orgin story in fiendship is magic.
6387022 remember that the specifics vary from loop to loop.
If brewed in the manner that it once was, yes; however, modern absinthe goes through special filtration that removes the impurities that causes some of the worst hallucinations. Then again, I'm sure that this version is the unsafe variety.
that soap-opera loop reminds me of a weird thing-not sure what to call it-by Vavacung called "adventure logs of young queen", which starts off with a young half-changeling setting off on a journey to meet her father...who turns out to be Shining Armor.
... I really, really don't like that Gilda's heartsong in support of her best friend was subverted for a quick gag.
137.11
I'm rather torn about this one. The White Dragon was one of the first of the Dragonriders of Pern books I ever read; as such, it holds a special place in my heart.
At the same time, this particular scene is just satirical enough to be an utter riot.
At some point, I'd like somebody to do either an Acorna-based Loop, or a Mage Wars one.
Props for those who get the references.
Replacing Jaxom and Ruth (Rarth? Rarith?)
I'm sorry? Did you genuinely say that, Cheerilee?
.../Why/?
The one time I will actually enjoy that kind of world.