The Cutie Map sets Twilight a most unusual task, one that will take her to worlds both familiar and new.
There's always some air of mystery and uncertainty when the magical map in Twilight's castle activates, but after a long period of dormancy it summons Twilight with a most perplexing image: two cutie marks as usual, but both are hers, and they alternately orbit over Ponyville and float over the edge of the map entirely. To find the answer to what the Map is asking of her, Twilight turns not just to her student, Starlight Glimmer but must also travel to the parallel dimension of Canterlot High to consult with her alternate self and Sunset Shimmer. The combined brainpower of three magic savants and one scientist should be enough to puzzle out the Map's intentions, but none of them can guess where the path will lead them.
The little purple dragon cracked open the door to his bedroom and peered out into the hall. “What’s up, Twilight?” he asked, one hand reaching back to scratch at the irritating nubs developing on his shoulders.
“Cut that out, Spike,” Twilight scolded gently. “We still don’t know if scratching will stunt your wing growth.”
“Did you just come here to nag me?” Spike grumped.
“Ah,” Twilight stammered. “No, sorry. Have you seen my notes on inter-world portals anywhere? I thought I’d left them on top of the books last night, but they’re not there anymore.”
Spike shook his head. “You were up later than usual working on them,” he said, “maybe you just misplaced them because you were too tired.”
“Maybe,” Twilight said, looking away, “but I’ve searched every inch of-” She stopped with a sudden gasp and looked down at her flank. Spike leaned out of his door enough to see that Twilight’s Cutie Mark was pulsating with light. “The Map!” Twilight exclaimed happily. “It’s been ages since I got a mission for it. This is going to be…” Her ears fell and she frowned slightly. “But I have to find those notes.”
“No worries, Twi,” Spike said, emerging fully from his room, “I’ll find ‘em while you’re out doing your duty to Equestria.”
Twilight gave the little dragon a quick hug. “I can always count on you,” she said. “Now, let’s find out where I’m headed to!” She took off down the hall at a full gallop, leaving Spike to sprint after her.
Further down the hall, Starlight Glimmer emerged from a side passage just in time to narrowly avoid being run over by the galloping Princess of Friendship. Starlight threw herself up against the wall with a cry and watched Twilight gallop on until Spike came by. “Where’s the fire?” Starlight asked.
“It’s the Map,” Spike panted.
“Oh,” Starlight said. “It’s been a while, hasn’t it? Wonder what’s up this time.” She levitated a grateful Spike onto her back and took off in pursuit.
One of the doors to the Map Room was still slightly open when Starlight and Spike reached it. They slipped inside and then Spike hopped off Starlight’s back as they both looked around. Besides them, Twilight was the only one in the room, and she was completely fixated on the Map, which had already assumed its active form displaying Equestria and the neighboring lands. “So,” Starlight said, sidling up to Twilight, “who’s your partner going to be? Rainbow Dash? Rarity?”
Twilight’s head made a startled little jerk. “Um,” she said, simply raising a hoof to point. Starlight looked, and her eyes squinted in confusion.
Spike climbed up onto one of the thrones to get a better look. “Huh?” he exclaimed, rubbing his eyes. “Am I the only one seeing two of Twilight’s cutie mark floating there?” he asked.
“Nope,” Starlight said, “I see it too.”
“…and they’re floating over Ponyville?” Spike asked.
“Yeah,” Twilight said slowly. As soon as the word escaped her mouth, however, the paired pink starburst symbols flickered and jumped to orbit a point a good foot beyond the edge of the Map. After a moment, they flickered again and returned to hovering over the model of Ponyville.
“You think it’s broken again?” Spike asked, “Like after Starlight used it in her time-travel spell?”
“Well, I haven’t been messing with it!” Starlight said defensively.
Twilight cast a general detection spell over the Map, and then shook her head. “There’s no sign of any kind of tampering,” she said, “and outside our little circle, I think only Discord could hijack or alter the Map’s magic, but he hasn’t been in here alone since… ever.” She watched the paired images of her cutie mark flicker between Ponyville and off the edge of the Map a couple more times, and then sighed. “Well, it wants something from me, so let’s figure out what.” She looked at Spike and Starlight. “Any ideas?”
Starlight raised an eyebrow. “Unless there are two of you in Ponyville all of a sudden-”
“Hold up!” Spike said suddenly. “The mirror!” Twilight and Starlight both looked at him in confusion. “Th- Canterlot High,” Spike said, gesturing widely. “There’s a Twilight Sparkle in that world, right?”
Twilight’s confused expression changed to thoughtfulness as she looked at the Map again. “That doesn’t make much sense,” she said, “but on the other hoof, it does in a strange sort of way. It’s worth a shot at least. Good thinking, Spike.”
Starlight glanced from Twilight, to Spike, and back again. “What are you two talking about?”
Twilight blinked. “We haven’t told you about the magic mirror yet?” she asked.
“No.”
“…So, let me get this straight,” Starlight said as she followed Twilight and Spike down a hallway, “You own a magic mirror that lets you travel to an… alternate version of Equestria full of ‘humans’ instead of ponies, the portal spell turns you into a human when you go through it, and-”
“I become a dog,” Spike cut in.
“Right,” Starlight said. “And, this world’s population is mostly human versions of ponies from Ponyville and nearby, including all our friends.”
“That’s about it, yes,” Twilight said, coming to a stop by a door and conjuring a key out of the air, which she then inserted into the door’s lock.
“How did I not know about this before?” Starlight asked. Spike and Twilight both looked at her, but before they could respond, she continued, “When I was plotting my revenge, I studied everything about you, Twilight. In exhaustive detail. I researched your abilities, your friends, this castle, the Map, every bit of recent history even remotely related to you, and I never found so much as a hint you had access to a portal to another dimension!”
“What, really?” Spike asked, incredulous.
Twilight gave Spike a sideways look. “I’m not surprised, “she said, “since we’ve made a point of not publicizing the Mirror’s existence, Spike.”
“I know,” the dragon said, “but I don’t recall the Order-naries portals being a big secret.”
“Order what?” Starlight asked.
Spike threw up his hands. “Seriously?!” he exclaimed. “How ‘exhaustive’ was your research again, Starlight?”
“All right, that’s enough chatting,” Twilight said, turning the key and opening the door. “We can test the limits of Starlight’s history knowledge later. We have more important things to think about. Like how I’m going to track down the other Twilight Sparkle; it’s been so long since I’ve been to CHS, the girls probably graduated from there by now.” She stepped into the room, which contained only the tall freestanding mirror-portal with the augmenter frame Twilight had built to bypass the portal spell’s time-lock and a bookstand holding a brown book emblazoned with Princess Celestia’s sun cutie mark. The book was glowing and vibrating gently.
“Looks like Sunset Shimmer’s got something she needs to talk about,” Spike said. He gave Twilight a cheeky look. “Gee, what a perfect coincidence.”
Twilight just rolled her eyes with a good-natured smirk and summoned the book over to her, opening it to the last place she recalled seeing a blank page.
Sunset Shimmer frowned in concentration as she scrolled through a list of dates on her computer, pausing occasionally to jot one down on a sheet of note paper and do some quick arithmetic. The gentle, persistent sound water flowing swiftly through the dorm’s plumbing indicated that Sunset’s roommate, Twilight Sparkle, had just started her morning shower, and the white noise lent a little more focus to Sunset’s thoughts. She moved the list to one side of the screen and opened her word processor program. After a second of thought, she typed Magic in History paper. brainstorming.
Granting that aside from my own experiences since I tried stealing the Element of Magic, it is almost impossible to confirm the validity and timing of events where Equestrian magic leaked into this world, nevertheless there’s an inexplicable lack of continuity between events here and the likely causes in Equestria’s history. Particularly, the problems in Equestria (at least that I’m aware of) most likely to have been solved using the portal mirror occurred within the last thousand years, yet several of the correlated events in this world seem to either date back several thousand years or happened far closer to the present day than they did in Equestria. (See: unusually short time span of Siren activity compared to when Princess Celestia banished them.)
Consider asking Prof. Gretchen if Equestria history books are reputable sources?
Sunset paused, considered the last sentence she’d typed for a long moment, and then deleted it. “Right,” she drawled, “just give her more reasons to think you’re crazy.”
“Who thinks you’re crazy?” asked Spike.
Sunset looked at the purple dog – no longer a puppy but still technically lap-dog sized – who was sitting on Twilight’s bed and giving Sunset a curious look.
“Professor Gretchen,” Sunset said. “This paper would be a lot easier to write if I could reference Equestria’s side of the stories, but there’s no way the Professor would take me seriously.”
“Hmph,” Spike said. “Sounds like she’s the crazy one. Two of the seven most magical girls in the world taking her class on myths and legends, and she doesn’t believe that you know the magic comes from a world full of magical ponies and stuff?”
Sunset looked askance at Spike for a moment, but shook it off quickly. Spike was very intelligent for a dog, but at the end of the day he was still just a dog – loyal, friendly, and straightforward. Sarcasm was still a bit beyond him, so he meant every word he said.
Spike suddenly sat up and started biting at his shoulder. “Fleas again?” Sunset asked, a little worried.
“Nah,” Spike mumbled between bites, “this spot’s just bugging me all of a sudden.”
Sunset got up from her desk and went to sit down next to Spike. “Here,” she said, starting to scratch the dog’s shoulder, “let me lend you a hand.” Spike sighed and closed his eyes in contentment.
They stayed like that for a while, Spike simply enjoying the attention while Sunset’s thoughts returned to her research paper, until the quiet roar of the running shower cut off. A couple of seconds later, a sharp cry of fright came from the bathroom, bringing Sunset and Spike to their feet. “Twilight?” Spike shouted, hopping off the bed. He ran toward the bathroom, reaching the door just as it opened and Twilight staggered out, staring at the back of one hand while holding her bath towel around herself with the other. Spike narrowly dodged out of the girl’s way and watched her pass by with clear concern on his face.
“What’s wrong Twilight?” Sunset asked, running over to her friend.
“I… I’m not sure,” Twilight said, struggling to calm herself. “I mean, it might be nothing but… look.” She turned her outstretched hand so Sunset could see. A pink, six-pointed starburst image marked the back of Twilight’s hand, and it was glowing with a faint, pulsating light. “It appeared when I was stepping out of the shower,” Twilight explained.
“Strange,” Sunset said. “Uh, why don’t you get dressed? Then we can try and figure out what’s going on.”
“Yeah,” Twilight said, blushing slightly, and went into the bedroom. Sunset went to the front room and sat down on a couch to think. A few minutes later, Twilight joined her, wearing one of her more science-y outfits as well as her glasses and her purple Harmony geode necklace. “Ok,” Twilight said, sitting down next to Sunset, “this weird mark is the same shape as the symbol on my necklace, so it probably has something to do with my magic.”
“I agree,” Sunset said. “Maybe it just means our magic is evolving again, like at Camp Everfree? You were the first one of us to start displaying your powers there.”
Twilight frowned and fingered her necklace. “That only happened to us because we were close to the magic shards,” she said, “so unless someone’s suddenly brought more bits of Equestrian magic here to Griffstone…”
Sunset stood up, striking a determined pose. “If that’s the case,” she said, “then we should start investigating!”
“I really don’t think that’s it though,” Twilight said.
“Huh? Why?” Sunset asked. In answer, Twilight reached into her pocket and pulled out a purple pendant about the size of a small makeup compact with a segmented ring-shaped screen on its front. Sunset’s eyes widened. “Hold on,” she said. “Is that the device you used during the Friendship Games where we first met?”
“Ee-yes,” Twilight said, simply.
“I’m pretty sure I broke it though,” Sunset said.
“Well, I… Kinda made a new one,” Twilight said. “Just recently.” Sunset raised an eyebrow, and Twilight hastened to explain, “I figured out why it sucks Equestrian magic out of things and how to control that, so it will only detect magic unless I decide otherwise. I thought it might be a good idea to have something that could help us track down stray magic, and possibly neutralize it if it’s something that’s causing problems that aren’t big enough to require the, uh, big guns.” She fingered her necklace again.
Sunset regarded Twilight in stony silence for a moment, and then sighed and sat down. “Ok, if you say you can control it, I’ll believe you,” she said. “And that’s why you’re so certain your… hand mark isn’t from something external?”
“I’m fairly certain, yes,” Twilight said, holding out her marked hand and pointing the device at it. “I had to tweak it to filter out the magic you, me, and the other girls have. Otherwise, it would be going off all the time. Right now, it’s not reading anything, so whatever caused this mark to appear, it’s all me.”
Sunset sighed and leaned back in her seat, arms folded. “I don’t like this,” she said at length. “If there’s one thing I’ve learned in life, it’s that when magic starts doing weird things, then trouble can’t be far behind. That’s true even in Equestria, with all its abundance of weird magic, but it goes double for this world.” She up straight again. “In fact,” she said, “this is a long shot, but maybe Princess Twilight can help us. She’s the expert in Friendship magic, after all, and that’s exactly what we’re dealing with. Excuse me.” She got up and ran to the bedroom, leaping over Spike on the way.
“Geez,” the little dog groused, “we oughta post a speed limit sign in here or something.”
Twilight went over and picked Spike up in her arms, and then went into the bedroom to see Sunset digging furiously through her closet. “What are you looking for?” Twilight asked.
“This!” Sunset proclaimed, emerging from the depths of a box that had been tucked into a corner of the closet, holding out a brown book emblazoned with a red-and-yellow sun emblem. “This journal’s linked to another one like it in Equestria,” Sunset explained. “Whatever I write in this one will appear in the other, which is in Princess Twilight’s possession.” She procured a pen and opened the book to the first blank page. “I just hope it doesn’t take her a week to get back to us this time,” she mumbled before starting to write.
“‘Dear Princess Twilight,’” Twilight Sparkle read, “‘Wow, it’s been a while, huh? I hope you’re not too busy, because I need some advice on magic. This morning, my friend Twilight – the Twilight Sparkle of this world, that is – suddenly had what would be her cutie mark appear on the back of her hand, and it’s glowing.’”
Spike pumped a fist in the air and whispered to Starlight, “I love it when my ideas are right.”
“‘It looks like a small thing now,’” Twilight continued to read, “‘but I’m worried it might be the start of something bigger. I’d appreciate any advice you can give me. I’ll add updates if anything changes or if we manage to solve the mystery on our own. Your friend, Sunset Shimmer.’” Part of Twilight wanted to break out in a huge grin at the fact she was on the right track, but another part was feeling slightly tangled in new questions. She settled for a confident-looking smile and cast about for a quill pen. She found one, and an ink well, tucked away behind the Mirror – likely stashed by Pinkie Pie in case of writing emergencies – and went back to the journal. “How should I phrase this?” she wondered aloud.
“Just be straightforward,” Spike suggested.
“Right,” Twilight said, and dipped the quill ink the ink. “Sunset,” she dictated as she wrote, “it just so happens that I think I know precisely what’s happening to your Twilight. Meet me by the statue so I can confirm my guess, and I’ll explain everything there. Your friend, Princess Twilight.” She set the quill down, shut the book, and turned away. “There,” she said, “now we just wait.”
Starlight blinked and glanced past Twilight. “Or not,” she said, pointing. Twilight turned around to see that the journal was glowing and vibrating again.
“That was quick,” Twilight said, opening the journal. The beginnings of a reply were already below Twilight’s entry, and more words appeared as she read. “‘Thank you for replying so quickly, Twilight. We’ll meet you in front of Canterlot High, but it’s going to be a couple of hours; Twi and I are in college now and we’re on the other side of the city from old CHS. I’m going to see if one of the girls can come keep you company while you wait. See you soon. Sunset.’” Twilight closed the book and contemplated it and the Mirror for a moment. “Well then,” she said, “I think I’ll just go on through now. Whoever Sunset sends can catch me up on recent events. Starlight, Spike, do you want to come with me?”
“Hm,” Spike said, “Nah, I think I’ll pass this time. That world’s safe enough, you don’t need me to watch over you.” He smirked as Twilight rolled her eyes at him. “Besides,” he continued, “I promised to look for those missing notes, remember?”
Twilight nodded. “And you, Starlight?” she asked.
Starlight shuffled nervously and looked away. “If it’s all the same, “she said, “I’d rather stay here. I’m not exactly eager to be transformed into something without a horn.”
“Oh, ok,” Twilight said, a little disappointed. She levitated the journal from its stand and up to receptacle made for it in the Mirror’s augmenter. Twilight gave the device a little spark of magic to start it up, and soon the room was full of humming and whirring as the journal’s cross-dimensional link was layered atop the mirror’s own spell and the portal activated. “I’ll be back soon,” Twilight said, and then stepped through as Starlight and Spike waved goodbye.
As soon as the mirror ceased rippling, Starlight put her hoof down and asked, “So, what do you really want to do while she’s gone?”
“I’m going to try and find those notes,” Spike replied, folding his arms.
“Ugh, fine,” Starlight sighed, ears lying flat.
Spike gave her a sideways look. “How about, if you lend me a hoof, I’ll tell you what I know about that other portal to other worlds we’ve got around here.”
Starlight perked up a little. “The order-thingies you mentioned earlier?”
“Yep,” Spike said, giving her a thumbs-up as he led the way out of the room.
It had been quite some time since Twilight had stepped out on just two legs, but she managed to land the exit from the portal onto the sidewalk in front of Canterlot High with only two gyrations of her arms to regain her balance. A quick check confirmed she wearing the usual blue blouse, purple skirt with her cutie mark, and knee-high boots that the portal’s magic always gave her. Looking around, she saw that the sidewalk between the statue she’d just emerged from and the entrance to the school was deserted. “Good,” she said, “I wouldn’t want to give anyone a fright by popping out of solid rock. Although,” she added, looking at the position of the sun, “I could have sworn it’s about the time for the students to be arriving.”
“Really?” a familiar but unexpected voice said from behind Twilight, “because I could have sworn today’s Saturday.”
“Yah!” Twilight yelped, whirling around to see a pink-skinned girl with insanely curly dark pink hair standing behind her. “Pinkie Pie,” Twilight gasped, fright quickly giving way to happiness, “of course.”
“Heya Twilight,” Pinkie said, beaming. “Long time no… wait.” She narrowed her eyes and leaned in close to Twilight’s face. “Which one are you?”
“Uh… the-” Pinkie stopped Twilight’s answer by putting a finger on Twilight’s mouth.
“No, no,” Pinkie said, “let me guess. Hm…” she walked slowly around Twilight, pausing occasionally to poke her shoulder or lift a lock of her hair. When she came back around to the front, she nodded and declared, “You are Princess Twilight of Equestria. I can tell because you’re not wearing glasses. And I saw you come out of the portal just now.”
“Then why…” Twilight stopped herself with a shake of her head. It’s pointless to question the workings of the Pinkie Pie mind, she thought, no matter which world you’re in. Instead, she asked, “So, you’re the one Sunset Shimmer asked to keep me company?”
“Huh?’ Pinkie responded, head tilting quizzically. “No, I haven’t seen her since…” she trailed off as something in her pocket vibrated and giggled. She reached into the pocket and brought out a cell phone, which she checked. “Oh wow,” she said, “Sunset just texted me to ask if I could meet you by the statue Canterlot High.” She typed a quick reply, put the phone away and gave Twilight a searching look. “Have you learned how to see the future, Twilight?” she asked.
“To be honest,” Twilight said, “sometimes I wish I had. No, Sunset and I just arranged to meet here. Well, I’m actually waiting for… the local Twilight, but since Sunset’s the one with the magic journal...”
Pinkie’s eyes went wide and started to sparkle. “Ooooo. Both Twilights in the same place? That hasn’t happened since… after the Friendship Games where she kinda-accidentally stole all our magic. That means we have to break out the nicknames again to keep you two straight.”
“Oh,” Twilight said, “that hadn’t crossed my mind, but you’re right, Pinkie.” She rubbed her chin in deep thought. “I can’t recall what we-”
“You’re ‘Princess Twilight,’ obviously” Pinkie cut in, “and she’s ‘Sci-Twi,’ cuz she’s all science-y while you’re magic-y.”
“Right, ok,” Twilight said. “So then,” she continued after a moment, “it’s going to be a couple hours, apparently. Catch me up, Pinkie, what’s been happening since the last time I visited?”
“Oh, soooooo much!” Pinkie exclaimed. “Where do I start? I know! We had a really cool summer camp…”
“… and so I got banned from touching the sprinkles shaker again! Can you believe it?”
“Wha?” Twilight said, snapping out of a daze. “Oh, sorry Pinkie. I must have spaced out at some point.”
“No problem, Twilight,” Pinkie said with nonchalant wave of her hand. “What’s the last bit you recall? I can start over from there.”
“Uh…” Twilight’s eyes darted around in search of something to change the subject with. While she didn’t see anything, her ears picked up a perfect excuse: the sound of a bus pulling up to the curb on the other side of the statue, and then a persistent beeping noise accompanying the bus driving away. “What is that?” Twilight asked. She and Pinkie peeked around the statue’s base to see Sunset Shimmer and the bespectacled Twilight Sparkle standing at the curbside. Sci-Twi was fiddling furiously with a device in her gloved hands, which was the source of the beeping.
“I thought you had that calibrated not to go off at known magic,” Sunset yelled over the beeping. “Did you forget the portal?”
“It’s not reacting to the portal,” Sci-Twi responded. “The reading’s too strong. I’d bet it’s-”
“Hey Sunset!” Pinkie shouted, waving, “Sci-Twi! Look who’s here!” She grabbed Princess Twilight by the shoulder and pushed her out into full view of the others.
“Sci-Twi?” the thusly-nicknamed girl said, looking up. When she saw Princess Twilight, comprehension dawned on her face. “Ah. That’s it then.” She focused back on her magic detector as she and Sunset approached Pinkie and Princess Twilight, and by the time the two pairs met up, Sci-Twi had managed to shut off the incessant beeps. “Sorry about that,” she said, adjusting her glasses nervously. “I guess the Princess’s magic and mine are different enough that the detector didn’t recognize hers. Hi.” She held out a hand to Princess Twilight with an awkward smile.
“Uh, hi,” the Princess echoed, shaking the offered hand in an awkward, loose grip. “What’s with the gloves?” she asked.
“Oh,” Sci-Twi held up one hand, “I didn’t want to have anyone on the bus staring at this.” She pulled the glove off in a single motion, revealing the pulsating starburst symbol on the back of her hand.
Princess Twilight’s eyes went wide and she grasped Sci-Twi’s wrist in both hands. “This is seriously happening!” she said, caught between excitement and confusion.
“What?” Sunset asked, “what’s happening?”
“I…” Princess Twilight began. “You know what?” She grabbed Sunset’s wrist and pulled both her and Sci-Twi around to the portal side of the statue, saying, “It’ll be easier to just show you.” Before anyone could protest, she jumped into the portal, pulling both of the girls in behind her.
Pinkie Pie, left alone in front of the school, tapped her chin with a finger as she contemplated the scene. “I wonder if I should join them,” she said. “I mean, on the one hand, it’d be really cool to see what Equestria’s really like. On the other hand, Equestria already has one of me and it is possible to have too much of a good thing.” Her phone went off, and she kept her thinking face on as she answered it.
“Hello? … A block party?! On my block, and I’m only hearing about it now?! Who’s responsible for this? … I should have known. … Yes, I’ll be right there.” She hung up and gave the statue an apologetic look. “Sorry, Equestria,” she said, “maybe next time.” She put her phone in her pocket, checked the fit of her boots, and then took off running down the street screaming, “Cheese Sandwiiiiich!”
Starlight huffed as she straightened up from crawling around under the Map. “Still nothing,” she said. “Spike, we’ve been searching this room for the past fifteen minutes. There aren’t that many places a stack of papers could be hiding. Are you sure Twilight’s notes can’t be anywhere else?”
On the far side of the room, Spike shrugged. “Twilight was in here working on them when I went to bed last night,” he said. “It’s the most likely place for the notes to be other than the library and Twi’s study, and we’ve already turned both of them upside down – almost literally.”
“I’d say we’ve accomplished that here too,” Starlight said. She sighed and sat down, resting her chin on the table near the models of Appleoosa and Dodge Junction. “What is this Map’s deal anyway?” she grumbled after a minute. “Since its creation, there’s been one certain fact: it only ever calls on the Elements of Harmony to go fix big friendship problems across Equestria. Other ponies inevitably get involved in fixing the problems, but only Twilight, Applejack, Rainbow, Fluttershy, Pinkie, and Rarity get summoned. Suddenly, that rule’s out the window and so far over the horizon that the Map can call on ponies from other realities.”
“Well,” Spike said, coming over and hopping up on a chair, “technically it’s calling for Twilight twice.”
Starlight glowered. “That’s not the point,” she said. “Who is this other Twilight, to the Map? What has she ever done to be connected to it like this? You and I are more qualified to be called on, Spike. I’ve interacted with the Map directly in two different ways, and the magic that built this whole castle gave you a chair right next to Twilight’s, there. Where’s your call to go solve friendship problems?”
“Uh, Starlight,” Spike said, raising an eye-ridge, “you’re starting to get a… nasty gleam in your eye there.”
Starlight straightened up. “What, I’m not allowed to get worked up about stuff anymore?” she snapped. She turned and marched away toward the door. “I’m just going to go wait for Twilight to come back,” she announced.
“Hey, hold on!” Spike exclaimed, jogging after her, afraid to leave her unsupervised in her present mood.
Starlight ignored Spike’s efforts to get her attention as they moved down the hall. As they neared the Mirror Room, however, the dragon’s persistence started to grate, and she whirled to give him a piece of her mind. Before she got the words out, however, the sounds of multiple bodies screaming while falling to the floor and onto each other came from the Mirror Room, and after a second a persistent beeping joined the cacophony. As Starlight and Spike nudged the door open, the babble of voices gained coherency.
“Again, Twi?”
“It’s not my fault; it reacts to Equestrian magic, and, well…”
“Can you turn it off, please?”
“I’ll try, but I don’t have hands any- whoops!”
Starlight stepped into the room just as a round purple, beeping device on a string necklace slid across the floor to come to rest at her hooves. She and Spike looked up from the device to see two instances of Twilight Sparkle and one yellow unicorn with a bright red and yellow mane in front of the Mirror. One of the Twilights was the alicorn Spike and Starlight were familiar with, while the other was a unicorn wearing black glasses, a small purple charm on a necklace, and her mane tied back in a ponytail.
Spike bent down and picked up the magic detector. “So, how do you make this stop?” he asked.
“Uh, just switch it off,” Sci-Twi answered. “On the back.” Spike found the little switch and clicked it, silencing the detector, and then walked over and handed it to Sci-Twi, who clumsily managed to get it hanging around her neck. “Thanks, uh… Spike?” Sci-Twi said.
“That’s me,” Spike said, giving her a thumbs-up.
“You’re a… dragon?”
“All my life,” Spike said proudly. “Eeexcept for a couple weeks here and there, traveling to your world. Oh,” he turned to Princess Twilight, “how are we going to keep names straight?”
As Princess Twilight answered the question, Sunset slipped away from the group and approached Starlight. “Hey there, I’m Sunset Shimmer,” she said, offering a hoof.
“Starlight Glimmer,” Starlight answered, accepting the hoof-shake. “I’m the Princess’s student in Friendship.”
Sunset’s eyebrows went up. “How’d you get that position?” she asked.
Starlight averted her gaze and kicked at the floor in embarrassment. “Well, it started with her and her friends stopping me from holding a town’s worth of cutie marks hostage, and then I tried to get revenge but she managed to talk me down… eventually.”
“So,” Sunset said, “you used to be evil and she turned you into a friend.” Starlight nodded, and Sunset smirked. “Welcome to the club,” she said.
“Eh?” Starlight said.
“My story’s a lot like yours,” Sunset said. “Sci-Twi’s too, except I was the one doing the friendshipping in her case.” She put a hoof on Starlight’s shoulder. “Good to see the Princess of Friendship is still collecting folks like us, eh?”
“It’s also nice to see that two of those ‘folks’ are already bonding,” Princess Twilight said at Sunset’s shoulder, startling both her and Starlight. “You two go right on ahead,” the Princess continued, “Sci-Twi and I are heading to the Map and see if we can figure out what it wants.” She left the room with Sci-Twi following close behind, the bespectacled unicorn looking to be somewhere between amazed and overwhelmed by her surroundings.
Sunset and Starlight exchanged a look. “Map?” Sunset asked.
“No, I think I understand the basic idea now, Princess,” Sci-Twi said as the group entered the Map Room. “But I don’t see why you’re so certain I’m tied up in all this. The Map is linked to you and your five friends and, until now, hasn’t ever summoned anyone besides the six of you. I’ve never even been to Equestria before now, so how would the Map even know me, let alone summon me?”
“Funny, “Starlight Glimmer said, “I was just wondering the same thing.”
Princess Twilight stopped halfway to the Map and glanced back at the others with an uncertain frown. “I don’t understand the ‘how’ or ‘why’ any better than you girls,” she said, “and I’m not 100% sure this is even right, but consider the evidence.” She pointed to the Map, where the paired set of Twilight’s cutie mark was still flickering between Ponyville and beyond the edge of the table. “I’ve only seen the Map pair a cutie mark with itself once, very briefly, when it was reactivating after Starlight and I undid the damage she’d caused. Now it’s happening again, and persisting. Second, Sci-Twi, your cutie mark appeared on your hand about the same time the Map activated here, and the ones on your flanks now are still flashing the way mine and my friends’ do when we’re being called.” She held out a hoof to Sci-Twi. “And it’s a quick and easy hypothesis to check. Just approach the Map with me.”
Sci-Twi nodded, smiling at the appeal to scientific method, and joined the Princess. Sunset Shimmer, Starlight, and Spike gathered nearby as the two lavender ponies approached the Map. A few seconds went by, and then the Map changed. The images of Twilight’s cutie mark stopped flickering around and hovered over the center of the table as the model of Equestria rapidly shrank down toward the center and turned into a round, featureless lump. A thread of crystal stretched out from the lump for a short distance, and another lump rose up to meet the thread. Another thread emerged from the second lump to connect to a third lump, and so it continued for over a dozen iterations that described a gradual curving path from the center of the table to very edge, with one last thread of crystal reaching into the void.
“Well, that was informative,” Spike snarked.
“At least we know the theory was right,” Sunset said. “Still: What in the world?”
Princess Twilight ignored the commentary as she counted the lumps. “…Twelve, thirteen… fourteen.” She frowned. “Fourteen steps in all, but it extends beyond that. Why is that famil- oh!” Her eyes flew open wide, and then quickly narrowed. “Surely not,” she said, “but… This could be the Tau’rin Chain, from the end-point here in Equestria back to the home universe of the Order-naries, Taryn.”
“What are the Order-naries?” Sunset asked.
Princess Twilight started to answer, but Starlight spoke up first. “They’re a small group of mercenary heroes from a distant universe of humans. They came to Equestria pursuing a universe-hopping demon called Tau’rin and managed to stop it here with the help of the Elements of Harmony. The Order-naries stayed in Equestria for about a year, having a few adventures, until someone from their home found a way to get them back home. And it seems our Princess here has made it a hobby to find a faster way to travel between Equestria and Taryn.” Princess Twilight gave Starlight a startled look, and Starlight said, “What? You were away for several hours, and Spike gave me the crash course.”
“Ah,” Twilight said. “Anyway, that’s your answer, Sunset. There’s always been this little itch in my mind that I have friends I can’t easily visit or even write to. Everypony I know in Equestria is just a train ride or a couple days of flying away, at most, and I’ve got the Mirror and the linked journals right here for you, Sci-Twi, and the rest. The Order-naries, though, are out of reach. That does raise a question, though.” She turned to give the Map a suspicious look. “The Order-naries haven’t been in Equestria once since the Tirek incident and the Map’s creation. How does it know about them, and my efforts to reach them?”
As if it had been waiting for that question – and in retrospect, Twilight thought it may very well have been – the Map shifted again. The chain of lumps and crystal thread sank into the flat surface of the table, the cutie mark images vanished, and a stack of loose papers and folders emerged from the table in front of the Twilights. Princess Twilight snagged the top couple of sheets in her magic and scanned them quickly. “Celestia’s Sun,” she said breathlessly, “these are my notes on inter-dimensional magic!”
“That’s where they went?” Spike exclaimed, “The Map… ate them?”
“Not just that,” Sci-Twi said, “I’d wager it somehow was able to read and comprehend what was written on them, and then decided we need to work on them. Or… something like that.”
“Well, one thing’s for certain,” Princess Twilight said, “the power behind this Map is much stronger and more mysterious than we’ve been giving it credit for.”
Spike walked into the workroom attached to the area of the castle designated as the Ponyville Public Library, his steps perfectly confident despite his carrying a stack of books as tall as he was. He set the books down by three similarly-sized stacks and brushed his hands off with an air of finality. “There we go,” he said, “that’s every book you’ve ever referenced for this project, Princess Twi.”
“Thank you, Spike,” Princess Twilight said. She looked around the room with a smile, taking in the sight of her notes carefully separated and organized into piles on desks around the room, the large rollaway chalkboard standing in a place of prominence and well-stocked with chalk sticks of various thicknesses and colors in its tray, and the invisible but tangible energy of scholastic acumen about to be applied to a big problem. Sci-Twi was standing by one of the desks, fiddling with her pendant and the magic detector as she gave the books Spike had just brought in a nervous frown. “All right,” Princess Twilight said, “any questions before we start?”
“I have one,” Sunset Shimmer said from the other side of the room from Sci-Twi. “Why are Starlight and I here? The Map didn’t ask for us.”
“True,” Twilight said, “but you’re both available and experts in the theory and application of new magic. It would be criminal not to have your minds working on this as well.” Starlight, standing next to Sunset, blushed with pride.
“So,” Sci-Twi said, “where do we start?” She levitated the top sheet of notes from the desk by her and perused it. “Looks like you’ve already hit the esoterically technical level of information,” she proclaimed. “I can’t make sense of a word of this.”
“Yes, I suppose a brief overview of what I’ve gleaned so far is in order,” Princess Twilight said, walking over to the chalkboard. She levitated a piece of standard-width, white chalk from the tray. “Let’s see,” she said, grabbing the nearest stack of notes in her magic to consult. “Where to begin… Ah.” She drew a small circle on the board, and then launched into lecture mode. “Obviously, it’s a given that are multiple, distinct universes, each governed by unique laws that govern everything from the nature and operation of magic to the forms that sentient beings can and cannot take. Here in Equestria, there are a wide variety of sentient beings, and magic seems to take almost as many forms, most of them tied to a particular race, but the bipedal and mostly hairless ‘human’ form is forbidden. In the world of Canterlot High, however,” she said as she drew a second circle next to the first, “the humanoid form is the general rule for sentients – dragons apparently being the exception.”
“We know all this already, Princess,” Sunset said.
Princess Twilight glowered at Sunset. “As I was saying,” she said, turning back to the chalkboard and drawing several more circles around the first, “because these laws of magic and morphology are so drastically different from one universe to the next, I’ve concluded that the boundaries the define each universe are impermeable by ordinary means.” She drew a thick line and then a sequence of stick-ponies running into the line and bouncing off it.
“Now, when I say ‘boundaries,’ you’re probably imaging something like the universe being contained in a bubble or balloon, but that’s not quite accurate.” She turned and pointed in the general direction of the Portal Mirror. “After all,” she said, “the Mirror isn’t sitting at the farthest corner of our universe, up against some impassable barrier. And the two portals that the Order-naries and Tau’rin first arrived through are both fairly close by – above Fluttershy’s front yard and out in a clearing in the Everfree Forest. So, the ‘boundary’ of the universe, for lack of a better term, seems to exist in every place at once, in a spatial dimension we can’t normally perceive or interact with. Unless, perhaps, that dimension is the same one a unicorn’s teleportation and summoning spells utilize…” Her lips pursed as her mind wandered on that tangent for a bit, and then she shook her head and asked her audience, “With me so far?”
“Clear as mud,” Spike said, giving Princess Twilight a thumbs-up and a cheeky grin. She gave him an unamused look.
“I’m following so far,” Sci-Twi said. “Now, when you said the boundaries are normally impermeable… Well, that’s clearly not the case, since you have two examples of universes being linked.”
“Right,” Princess Twilight said, returning to the chalkboard. “The Mirror and what I call the Tau’rin Chain.” She sketched the Mirror on the right end of the board, and then drew a jagged shape in blue chalk a little to the left. “They’re fascinating in that they’re so different while doing essentially the same thing” she said, “The Mirror is a deliberate construction of what can only be highly advanced ancient magic, ordinarily tied to the cycles of time for security, and passing through it is a painless experience, putting aside the brief loss of balance that comes from switching from pony to human and vice versa. The other portals…” She shivered as she called up a memory she’d rather forget. “They’re everything the Mirror isn’t,” she said at last. “They’re more like wounds in the fabric of space, mostly closed now but never healed. They can be torn back open with the right kind of spell, and to travel through them is to enter a… place of nonexistence between the universes. A place the Mirror manages to either bypass or move you through so quickly you never notice. It’s maddening.”
“You, uh, have personal experience with that?” Starlight asked, sharing a disturbed looked with Sunset.
“I do,” Princess Twilight said simply. “It’s partly why I know making a direct portal to Taryn is even possible.”
Sci-Twi approached the chalkboard and picked up a piece of chalk. “So,” she said, “I take it the ultimate goal is to take this,” she pointed to the jagged portal sketch, “and make it more like this,” she tapped the picture of the Mirror.
“Almost,” the Princess said. “The portals at Fluttershy’s and the Everfree lead to a world called Valden. Counting it, there are twelve universes between Equestria and Taryn. A stable portal one could travel through without going unconscious would be ideal, but the most important thing is to cut out the need to trek through dozens of other, strange worlds just to visit some friends.”
“Right, right,” Sci-Twi said, “it just seems reasonable to work toward making the portal safe and sane at the same time we tackle the biggest issues. Namely: how do we… punch through the boundaries of the universe, and into Taryn in the first place?”
Princess Twilight sighed. “That is the biggest problem,” she said. “I’ve worked the theory down to the point I could teach classes on it from memory. I can open and close the pre-existing portals – Mirror and otherwise – without breaking a sweat. What I can’t do, despite all my knowledge and alicorn-level magic, is make a new portal.” She looked at Sci-Twi with a big, hopeful, and somewhat creepy smile. “But then the Map told me to get your help, Sci-Twi,” she said. “So, any genius ideas yet?”
Sci-Twi met the Princess’s smile with a flat look. “I still haven’t seen all the data yet,” she said.
“Right, right,” Princess Twilight said, “I’ll let you study. Here,” she levitated one of the stacks of notes over to Sci-Twi, “these are my theories on how to make contact with other universes. Look those over first, and tell me if any of them are close.”
“Princess, I’m hardly an expert on portal magic,” Sci-Twi protested gently as she took the stack in her own magic.
Sunset Shimmer suddenly got a thoughtful look on her face. “I almost don’t want to mention this,” she said, instantly catching everypony’s attention, “but, out of everypony here, you kinda are the most experienced with portal magic, Sci-Twi.”
“What do you mean?” the two Twilights asked in unison.
“Two words,” Sunset said, walking over to Sci-Twi and pointing at the magic detector she was wearing, “Midnight. Sparkle.” Sci-Twi gasped and backed away, holding one front leg up defensively.
“What are you talking about?” Starlight asked.
Sunset addressed Sci-Twi by way of answer, “When you turned into Midnight, you had the magic of the Portal as well as that of my friends. Our fight culminated in what I assume was the gap between our world and this one. Maybe, if we can replicate that in a more… sane manner…”
“No,” Sci-Twi said. “I see where you’re going, Sunset, but I don’t want to relive that. Ever.”
“But…” Sunset started to say.
“No,” Sci-Twi said firmly, turning away and burying her attention in the notes she held.
“Twilight, just listen,” Sunset said, trying to approach her friend, only to be stopped by Princess Twilight.
“Let her be,” the alicorn said, a deeply thoughtful and knowing look on her face. “At least for now.”
“Attention, everypony,” Princess Twilight announced, breaking the silence that had been settling heavier and heavier in the workroom over the last hour, “since it seems nopony has had a breakthrough on the problem of poking a new hole in the universe, I say we take a break and switch our focus to a different angle.” She levitated a sheet of paper off the stack of notes she’d been working on and walked over to stand in front of the chalkboard. “As Sci-Twi said earlier, it would be best to have a solid anchor for our portal to Taryn, similar to the Canterlot High Mirror,” the Princess said. “To that end, I’ve taken what I learned about the Mirror’s construction when I made the machine that bypasses the portal’s time-lock and compiled a list of materials for building a magic mirror capable of anchoring a portal to another world. Theoretically at least.” She channeled her magic and cast a spell that turned the paper she was levitating into four near-identical copies, and then passed one each to Spike, Sunset Shimmer, and Starlight Glimmer, and kept the last for herself. “Spike, Starlight, Sunset, I’m tasking each of you with collecting one of the key items, and I’ll go get one myself.”
“What about me?” Sci-Twi asked.
Princess Twilight gave her an apologetic look. “Sorry,” she said, “but I think it’s best that you just stay here. The ponies in this town can be… excitable, and you look so much like me…”
“No, no, it’s fine,” Sci-Twi said. “I’d rather stay here and keep studying anyway. I think I might be onto something.”
“Great!” Princess Twilight said. She turned back to the rest and said, “Alright everypony, let’s go!”
Sweet Apple Acres
“I’m sorry, Ah don’t think I heard that right. You want to do what to mah Zap Apple trees?”
Starlight meekly floated her paper over to Applejack. “I’d take any naturally fallen branches if I could, AJ,” Starlight said, “but Twilight’s instructions are for living Zap Applewood.”
“Well, there wouldn’t be any windfall wood in the first place,” Applejack said with a grumble in her voice. “Zap Apple trees never shed their branches. No tellin’ what cuttin’ one off would do to the tree.”
“Can’t you just plant a new tree if one dies?”
AJ shook her head. “Granny tried that a couple times, early on,” she said. “Seems only wild Zap Apples have good seeds in ‘em. The ones ya see are all we’re ever gonna have, but at least their magic keeps ‘em free of disease and whatnot.”
Starlight frowned and consulted her paper. “Tell you what, Applejack,” she said. “I really need the wood, so if the tree dies after I harvest the branch – and it’s just one branch – I will personally search the length and breadth of Equestria for a wild Zap Apple tree and get you the seeds for a replacement.”
Applejack sighed and pulled her hat down over her face. “Granny’s gonna give me an earful for this,” she said, “but fine, if you’re that determined, I’ll allow it. For Twilight.”
Carousel Boutique
“Rarity?” Spike called, opening the back door to the Boutique’s kitchen even as he knocked on it. He spotted the white unicorn in question brooding over a tub of ice cream with a spoon held in her magic, her eyes slowly moving to look at him as he slipped inside and closed the door. “Hey, what’s wrong?” Spike asked. “I knew something was up when I found the front door was locked with no notice put up.” He climbed onto the chair across from Rarity and waited a polite few seconds for a response that didn’t come. “Come on, Rarity,” he said, “it’s not like you to hold your problems in. Did you get a bad review? Stupid frustrating client?”
Rarity sighed. “No, Spike,” she said, “I just can’t seem to find my inspiration today, or the motivation for much of anything, to be honest.” She set the spoon down and shoved the ice cream slightly to the side, giving Spike a hopeful look. “Please tell me you have something to ask of me,” she said, “or that Twilight sent you on some urgent errand. I could use an adventure to distract myself from this melancholy.”
Spike fidgeted in his chair. “Well, I don’t know about adventure per se,” he said, “but Twilight did send me to ask you for a few things.” He produced the paper he’d been given and Rarity’s ears rose in interest as he slid it over to her.
Rarity picked up the paper and read it, her eyebrows rising in stages, and then one eyebrow dropped into a confused position as she reached the end. “Gold and copper filigree wire and spell-quality gemstones, fair enough,” she said, “but why in Equestria does Twilight want my designs for Ashen Blaze’s ‘Artificial Element of Magic’?”
Spike shrugged. “It’s a little over my head,” he said, “but it’s part of her plans for making a direct portal to the Order-naries’ world.” Rarity gave him a dubious look, so he planted his hands on the table and leaned closer to her. “It’s not just a flight of fancy this time, Rares,” Spike said, “the Map told her to do it.”
Rarity stared at Spike for a long moment, and then got down from her seat and struck a noble pose. “I see,” she said. “If it’s that serious, far be it for me to begrudge whatever assistance I can provide. Stay here, Spike; I shall return momentarily with the items you need.”
Barnyard Bargains
“Thank you for your business,” said the earth pony cashier.
“Thank you,” Sunset replied. She hefted the large box containing one free-standing mirror up in her magic, and walked out of the store. “And here I was thinking I’d have to hunt all over town for a proper-sized mirror,” she mused as she walked down the street.
Fluttershy’s Cottage
As Twilight trotted up the path to Fluttershy’s front door, she cast about for signs of active Chaos magic in the area. Finding none by the time she reached the porch, Twilight paused to consider her approach. If Discord wasn’t visiting Fluttershy, he would be as hard to track down as he was difficult to get rid of when you didn’t want him around. Even Fluttershy didn’t know a reliable method of finding and accessing the draconequus’s chaotic home. Which, Twilight thought, is not unsurprising, given the nature of the place. She considered simply casting a spell to summon Discord, but didn’t want to risk putting him in a bad mood by interrupting something. Or how about, she suddenly thought, not a direct summon, but a spell to get his attention. A kind of doorbell spell. Feeling satisfied with her plan, Twilight turned away from the door and promptly bumped into a fuzzy brown tummy.
Twilight looked up to see Discord leering over her, arms folded to match the grumpy look on his face. “Oh, I was just looking for you, Discord,” Twilight said with a smile.
“I… you were?” Discord said, surprise replacing his grumpy face. “Well, that’s fine, but you just took the wind out of my sails there, Twi. I had this whole ‘heard it through the grapevine’ gag prepared,” he reached behind his back and produced a vine from which hung a couple bunches of grapes, each grape sporting a mouth jabbering away with inane rumors, “and you just had to go and nip my complaints about not being included in your world-hopping project right in the bud.”
“How do you know about that?” Twilight asked, suspicious. Discord held his talking grapes out with a raised eyebrow, and Twilight rolled her eyes. “I’m serious, Discord,” she said, “this is the first time I, or anypony else in on the project, has left the castle today.”
Discord tossed the grapes away with a careless shrug. “There’s no fun in revealing my sources just yet, Princess,” he said. He bent his head down to Twilight’s level with a conspiratorial grin. “So, what can I do to help?”
“You’ve claimed to be older than Equestria itself,” Twilight said. “If that’s true, that means you’re originally from ‘outside’ this universe.”
Discord held up a forestalling hand. “Technically true,” he said, “but before you ask, no, it’s actually not in my considerable range of powers to create portals that actually lead ‘outside,’ as you put it. Pocket dimensions are the best I can do.”
“I figured,” Twilight said, “but I don’t need you to do anything; I’m just looking for something that didn’t originate in Equestria to act as a catalyst. If that something happened to be from a spirit of Chaos, it might be even better.”
Discord folded his arms and huffed. “I should have guessed you only wanted me for my body” he said.
Twilight’s eye twitched, and she took a focusing breath to resist rising to the bait. “A clump of hair or a bit of antler should suffice, Discord,” she said smoothly. “Nothing you can’t grow back.”
“You’re really no fun today,” Discord said, rolling his eyes in a normal manner. He held his lion paw out in front of him, flexed a finger to extend the claw, and then deftly plucked it out with his other hand. “You’re lucky I’m in a slightly charitable mood today, Princess,” he said, dropping the claw on her muzzle, “but expect an impromptu ‘playdate’ when you least expect it. Now, if you’ll excuse me,” he hopped over Twilight and approached Fluttershy’s door, “I’m going to spend time with the pony who really appreciates me!” He marched through the door without bothering to open it, leaving the wood rippled in a vaguely Discord-shaped pattern behind him.
Twilight plucked the claw off her nose with her magic, scrutinized it, and then started flying back to her castle with a smile on her face. “That was easier than I thought it would be,” she said to herself.
Sci-Twi stared at her reflection in the Portal Mirror. “This is all your fault, you know,” she said. “Your magic is ancient – older than anypony that has ever used you, and so strong. By all rights, it should have been impossible to contain all that magic in this,” she held out and looked down at her magic detector, “let alone add another five samples of magic on top of it all. But, it happened, and I almost went mad trying to channel it all. Almost shattered the barrier between home and Equestria, or worse!” She let the detector drop from her hoof, letting it swing gently from its necklace, and looked back up at the mirror with a sigh. “And now I have to help Princess Twilight harness that very kind of magic?” she said, her voice starting to strain. “Is it possible? Can we find the magic to cross into a new universe? Will we even be able to handle that kind of power?”
Sci-Twi’s reflection did something very odd then: it moved on its own, smiling in a reassuring way and winking at her. “Uh…” Sci-Twi said, stepping back involuntarily – an action that her mirror image didn’t take. Sci-Twi cautiously approached the mirror and lifted a hoof toward the glass. Just before she touched it, though, the mirror rippled and the image of a lavender unicorn in black-rimmed glasses was replaced by a glimpse of Sci-Twi as a human. The image shifted again, becoming a dark silhouette with widespread wings and a long horn of glowing light, and just as Sci-Twi recognized the features of Midnight Sparkle the reflection changed again, taking on the appearance of Sci-Twi in her full ponied-up, Harmony Guardian outfit with the addition of a horn of light, shorter than Midnight Sparkle’s and not jagged. Finally, with one last ripple, the Mirror returned to normal and Sci-Twi’s reflection was her own again.
“What in the world?” Sci-Twi whispered to herself. She looked the Mirror up and down with deep confusion. “Were you trying to-” she started to ask
“Twilight!” Sunset Shimmer called from the door, startling Sci-Twi into a two-foot-high jump. “Sorry,” Sunset said, “I didn’t mean to sneak up on you. I just came to tell you that everyone’s finally back, so we’re ready to go.” She started to walk toward Sci-Twi, but the lavender unicorn turned away from the Mirror and came over to Sunset first. “What had you so focused?” Sunset asked.
“I have no idea,” Sci-Twi said, casting a wary glance at the Portal Mirror as she left the room. “Just another bunch of questions to add to the pile, really.”
Sci-Twi and Sunset walked into the workroom and froze at the sight that greeted them. Starlight Glimmer, her mane disheveled and sporting a few singed locks of hair, was maintaining a large turquoise bubble of magic full of lighting. Near the center of the bubble, Princess Twilight hovered inside a smaller shield bubble of her own as she poured magic into twisting a huge piece of wood that was shedding the lightning every time it changed shape. Sunset and Sci-Twi stared blankly at the spectacle until Starlight noticed them out of the corner of her eye and snapped, “Shut the door!”
Sunset did as she was instructed, and then she and Sci-Twi sidled carefully around the edge of the room until they found Spike. “What’s going on?” Sci-Twi asked the dragon over the loud crackling of electricity.
“They’re making the frame for the new mirror,” Spike answered.
Sunset watched Princess Twilight coax the wood into a mostly straight beam shape, and then asked, “Why the lightshow then?”
“It’s Zap Apple wood,” Spike replied, simply. When Sci-Twi and Sunset both gave him curious looks, he sighed and elaborated, “Really, really magical – and temperamental – trees that on grow on Sweet Apple Acres and somewhere in the Everfree Forest. Princess Twi figures a frame made of living Zap Apple wood will give the new Mirror enough magic power to sustain a portal.”
“Ah, I see,” Sci-Twi said. She flinched as the wood let out a particularly large lightning bolt in her general direction, but Starlight’s magic just absorbed it like all the rest. “Uh, anything we can do to help?” Sci-Twi asked.
Princess Twilight grunted and bent the wood slightly in the middle. When the electric reaction died down, she glanced down at the group and said, “The mirror, please.” Sunset turned her head to where she’d placed the mirror she’d bought and lifted it in her telekinesis, and then floated it through a hole Starlight made in her shield until Princess Twilight took control of the mirror. The Princess carefully separated the mirror from the frame it had come with, casting the frame aside, and then with even greater care she folded the Zap Apple wood around all four edges of the mirror and shaped the bottom segment into a set of legs so the mirror could stand upright.
Once the lightning storm from this last molding of the wood died down, Princess Twilight lowered the mirror and herself to the floor, Starlight dispelled her shield, and the two ponies sat down hard, fanning their horns and panting. “That was intense,” Starlight said. “I haven’t pushed my magic that hard for so long since… crafting my time-travel spell.”
“We’re not done yet,” Princess Twilight said, “but… the rest shouldn’t be as exhausting. Spike, the gems?”
“Right here,” Spike said, going to a nearby desk and pulling a large, heavy-looking bag off of it. He carried the bag over to the new mirror and then started unloading its content onto the floor: big spools of copper and gold wire, gems in a rainbow of colors and ranging in size from as large as a hoof to twice the size of Spike’s thumb, and finally a couple sheets of paper rolled into scrolls. Princess Twilight set to organizing the gems while Spike unrolled the scrolls and laid them out in order on a desk.
Sci-Twi went over to the desk, scanned the papers quickly, and then turned to the others with a frown. “These are designs for a necklace,” she said.
“Not just any necklace,” Princess Twilight said, finishing her organizing and joining Sci-Twi at the desk. “Ashen Blaze’s Artifical Element of Magic.” She walked over to the blackboard, erased some of the diagrams from before, and sketched a stick-unicorn. “Ash was one of the Order-naries,” Princess Twilight explained, “and he was a prime example of the differences between how magic works in various universes. In Equestria, unicorns and alicorns power their magic from internal reserves built in part by the energy of living, but mostly by just passively absorbing some of the magical energy from the world around us.” She drew several arrows pointing into the stick unicorn’s head. “Earth pony and pegasus abilities work in similar ways, but unicorns tend to have larger ‘reserves’ than the other tribes, and some unicorns have an even bigger capacity for magic than that.” She gave Starlight Glimmer a meaningful look. She then turned back to the chalkboard and drew another stick-pony with one hoof outstretched. “In the universes like the Order-naries’ home, however,” she said, drawing arrows that gathered around the pony’s hoof, “magic is cast by actively drawing in the ambient energy and shaping it into spells. That style of magic can technically work in Equestria, but because ponies are always drawing magic into themselves, there’s not much left ‘free’ for mages like Ashen Blaze to use.”
“But, Ashen Blaze was a unicorn when he was in Equestria, wasn’t he?” Starlight asked with a confused look.
“He was,” Princess Twilight said, “but his natural capacity for magical energy was actually on the smaller side of average for a unicorn, so he couldn’t supply the power he was used to using on his own. That’s where the necklace comes in. Ash and I designed it, with some help from Rarity, to essentially… disrupt the natural magic around it just enough so it wouldn’t be drawn into anypony and thus be available for Ash to weave in his style.”
“All right,” Sci-Twi said, “but what does that have to do with the mirror?”
Princess Twilight scuffed her hoof on the floor a bit. “We’re going to need a gem array to shape the raw magic in the frame into the actual portal spell,” she said at last, “and I figured if we based the array on the design for the AEoM, it’ll give the portal a resonance similar to magic in Taryn and… have an easier time finding and linking up to Taryn?” She smiled weakly, her eyes betraying her uncertainty.
“No offense,” Sunset said, “but that sounds… a bit farfetched.”
“This entire project’s farfetched, Sunset,” Sci-Twi said. “We’re creating a whole new branch of science… er, magic. Magic science.” She walked over to Princess Twilight and put a hoof on her shoulder. “Point is, the only way to know if your hypothesis is right is to try it.”
Princess Twilight gave Sci-Twi a grateful smile for the support and nodded. “Ok everypony,” she said, “let’s build this thing.” She picked up the design documents while Spike, Sunset, and Starlight gathered around the mirror to await instructions.
Sunset placed simple spells into each gem to double-check their durability before setting them on specific spots on the mirror’s frame. Spike braided wires together and wove them around each gem as he came to them, linking them gems together into a looping array that went all around the mirror. Starlight moved behind Spike, using her magic to fuse the wire into the wood.
Sci-Twi stayed back and just watched as she felt a new little doubt start to form in her mind. I was specifically asked to be here. What can I contribute to this that the others can’t? Her hoof strayed to her magic detector device, and her thoughts to her experience with holding the original mirror’s magic. She tried to banish the memory, but as the new mirror’s construction continued, the memory kept returning. No! she thought, screwing her eyes shut, I can’t do that again. I couldn’t handle the power then. Why think that I could now?
At length, the gem array was finished and the mirror set upright. As everypony looked it over, Sci-Twi noticed an odd space in the wiring at the very top. Before Sci-Twi could point it out and ask, however, Princess Twilight brought out a black claw and floated it up to the space. “With this piece of a living, solid, Chaos spirit,” the alicorn said, “we should give this mirror’s magic the ability to reach outside our universe, where the spell can hopefully locate and connect with the universe of Taryn.” She fit the claw into the array and tightened the wires around it a bit.
“Is it supposed to be… doing something?” Spike asked after a moment.
Princess Twilight frowned. “I was hoping for a reaction of some kind,” she admitted, “but maybe we need to give it an actual portal spell first.”
“And that puts us back on our original problem,” Sci-Twi said, desperate to contribute. “We don’t have a portal spell to use yet. Although…” She scratched her head thoughtfully. “Princess,” she asked, “if we put a spell into this mirror now, could we… remove it later and set the portal spell in it instead? Just to test the array.”
Princess Twilight frowned in thought. “That should be possible,” she said. “After all, Ash’s necklace was designed to enable spells in general, not hold and maintain a particular one. Spike, take a memo please: devise a way to lock the portal spell into the mirror.”
“On it,” Spike said, going over to the stack of notes.
“As for now,” Princess Twilight said, turning her attention back to the mirror, “let’s try putting a normal teleport spell on this to… the Castle of the Two Sisters.” Her horn lit up as she narrowed her eyes in concentration, and after a moment a matching magenta glow surrounded the mirror. The light swirled for a moment and then disappeared into the gems. Princess Twilight released her magic and took a couple steps back as the gems started glowing in their respective colors and the glass of the mirror clouded slightly. Discord’s claw trembled against the wires holding it in place, and the glass cleared and showed an image of the library in the Castle of the Two Sisters. Princess Twilight grinned triumphantly, but just as she started to take her first step toward the mirror, the image suddenly vanished, the gems started flashing erratically with near-blinding light, and the whole mirror began to shake.
“What’s happening?” Sunset exclaimed.
“It’s overloading!” Starlight yelled, diving for cover under a table. “Twilight! Shut it down!”
Princess Twilight reached out to the mirror with her magic, only to be thrown back by a lightning-laced pulse. “Oof!” she grunted as she hit the wall. “The Zap Apple wood!” she exclaimed, “Its magic has overwhelmed the gem array!” She tried to wrangle the shuddering mirror again, only to thrown back again. “Ugh… I can’t control it. Everypony, get out of here!”
Reacting faster than conscious thought, Sci-Twi removed her magic detector from around her neck, switched it on, held it out toward the mirror, and opened it up. The detector beeped twice, and the magic flowed out of the mirror in the form of a white light into the open device. The mirror ceased shaking as the last of the magic was pulled out, and Sci-Twi quickly snapped the detector closed and checked the dial on the front. “Less than an eighth full,” she said in mild surprise.
Sunset came over and bumped shoulders with Sci-Twi. “Nice save, Sci-Twi,” she said.
Starlight crawled out from under the table and gave Sci-Twi a wary look. “What did you do?” she asked.
Sci-Twi showed Starlight the detector and explained, “I pulled all the magic out of the mirror and into this. I can hold it for a while, but if I don’t put it back soon, things might… get weird.”
“Twi,” Sunset said flatly, “you’re just holding a teleportation spell and some raw magic, not a dimension-spanning portal. I think the fabric of reality’ll stay stable. Not sure I can say the same about that,” she pointed at the mirror.
“I don’t know what could have gone wrong,” Princess Twilight said.
“Mixing Discord’s magic with Zap Apple wood would be my guess,” Starlight said.
“I accounted for that,” Princess Twilight said, going over to the notes and riffling through them. “Let me show you the calculations I’ve made on the interaction of Chaos magic with natural Equestrian magic. There shouldn’t have been any conflicting energy-”
While Starlight and the Princess launched into a discussion of how magic from different sources interacted, Spike nodded at the magic detector still floating in Sci-Twi’s magic and asked, “Can you do anything else with that magic, or just hold it and put it back where it came from?”
“Well,” Sci-Twi said, “I could tap into it myself, like a secondary reserve of magic like the Princess was talking about. Last time I did that, though I kinda went… crazy.”
Sunset sighed. “The situation was more complicated than that, Twi, and you know it” she said. “You’d never actually used magic before then, it was an awful lot of power to get all at once, and – most importantly – you were under a lot of emotional stress from… many sides." A look of guilt crossed her features for a second. “Look,” she said, “I don’t want to pressure you, but I think you should consider how much stronger you’ve grown as a person and at using magic, and consider the unique perspective that this,” she tapped the magic detector with a hoof, “might be able to bring to this mystery. You overcame your fear of becoming Midnight Sparkle once already. I know you can do it again if you want to.”
Sci-Twi looked into Sunset’s eyes and saw the confidence and trust her friend felt toward her. She then looked at the magic detector and nodded. “You’re right, Sunset,” she said, slipping the device back around her neck, “I shouldn’t be afraid.” She held the device up with one hoof, took a deep breath, and slowly opened it up again.
The magic flowed out of the magic detector as two streams of light that dropped to Sci-Twi’s feet and then began coiling up around her in parallel. The light caught the attention of Princess Twilight and Starlight Glimmer, and their discussion came to an abrupt halt as they turned to watch. “What’s happening?” Starlight asked as the coiling lights surrounded Sci-Twi completely and converged at the tip of her horn. Sci-Twi winced as the magic flowed into her through her horn, and then gasped and fell to her knees.
Princess Twilight moved to try and help, but Sunset held her back. “We have to let it play out,” Sunset said, trying to sound confident despite the clear worry in her eyes.
The magic finished flowing into Sci-Twi and she began levitating slightly off the ground, eyes screwed shut and back arched in apparent pain. For a moment, a sickly light appeared around her eyes and nebulous blobs of light appeared on her sides. “No,” she muttered, “no… I… I’m the one in control!” Her purple geode pendant began to glow and the light around her eyes and on her sides vanished. She settled to the floor and opened her eyes, which appeared normal aside from a faint lavender tint to the whites. “I did it,” she said, amazed. “I’m full of magic, and I’m not crazy.”
Sunset heaved a big, relieved sigh and went over to give Sci-Twi and shoulder bump. “I knew you could handle it,” she said.
“Did you just take all the magic you pulled out of the mirror into yourself?” Princess Twilight asked. Sci-Twi just nodded, and the princess’s eyebrows rose. “I never imagined anypony other than an alicorn could handle absorbing so much foreign magic.”
“I don’t think there was quite as much there as you’re thinking, Princess,” Sci-Twi said with a sardonic look. “Now, let me see…” She walked up to the mirror, scrutinized it from several angles, and then sat down and closed her eyes. “Yes, I can tell the different magics in me apart and how they want to interact,” she said after a moment. “I think I know where we went wrong, Princess Twilight. The gem array. It has far too few gems in it to control the magic coming from the wood. I think we’ll have to double up the array pattern, no, triple it just to be safe.”
“Are you sure?” Princess Twilight asked. “I’ve seen Ash channel an incredible amount of magic through this array as a necklace.”
Sci-Twi gave her counterpart a sideways look. “He used it as a conduit, right?” she asked. “It would have been Ash himself shaping and directing the magic.”
“Right,” Princess Twilight said.
“Well,” Sci-Twi said, “you just stretched out that conduit and expected to act as both a conduit and processor. It’s like expecting a computer’s power supply to do the CPU’s job as well.”
“Say what,” Spike and Starlight said in unison.
Princess Twilight blinked slowly. “I… think I see what you’re saying,” she said, “and you’re right. Anything else you can tell me? An idea for a spell that’ll get us outside the universe, perhaps?”
Sci-Twi thought for a minute, and then shook her head. “I don’t even feel like any random portals are threatening to open up around me,” she said.
“Maybe you need the original mirror’s magic,” Spike suggested.
Sci-Twi’s mouth twisted into a complex sort of half-frown as her eyes drifted toward the general direction of the Canterlot High mirror’s room. “Yeah, you’re probably right, Spike,” she said apprehensively. “I’m putting this magic back first, though, so I don’t risk an… overload.” She lifted her magic detector up to eye level, made an adjustment to the dial, and then started gathering magic into her horn. The detector popped open and light flowed out of Sci-Twi’s horn, bounced off the device, and flowed into the mirror, except for one mote that flew toward Princess Twilight instead and vanished into her horn. Princess Twilight reflexively lifted a hoof to her horn, but felt nothing amiss, so she just looked at Sci-Twi with an unspoken question in her eyes until the unicorn stopped shedding magic closed the magic detector. “Oh,” Sci-Twi said, seeing the princess’s look, “I gave the magic from your teleport spell back to you, so the mirror doesn’t destabilize again.”
“Ah, good idea,” Princess Twilight said, smiling. “Now, should we fix the array first, or have you… check the CHS mirror?”
“We’re going to need a lot more gems if we’re expanding the array,” Spike pointed out. “I’ll go get some more while you girls do the other thing.”
“I’ll lend you a hoof, Spike,” Starlight said. “And I’ll take care of building the new array, so you Twilights can take your time with experimenting.”
Princess Twilight and Sunset Shimmer stood near the door while Sci-Twi approached the Portal Mirror, her down-turned ears betraying her nervousness. Sci-Twi studied her reflection in the mirror for a bit, wondering if it would start changing again. She shook her head, realizing she was just putting off doing what she needed to do, and held the magic detector out to the mirror. “Here goes,” she said, leaning away apprehensively as she opened the device up.
Nothing happened.
“I don’t understand,” Sci-Twi exclaimed, looking between the Mirror and the detector. “We just proved my detector can absorb magic, and I’ve taken the portal spell before. Why isn’t it working this time?”
Princess Twilight walked over and looked at the detector as well. “What’s different between now and when you took the portal’s magic the first time?” she asked.
“I’m not sure,” Sci-Twi said. “It all happened rather accidentally last time. I mean, whenever one of the girls ponied-up when I was nearby, the detector pulled in their magic on its own, but the only other time it did that was to the portal, and it never went after Sunset’s magic.”
“Well, “Sunset said, “I never actively used my magic during the Friendship Games until you went Midnight on us. Maybe that’s the difference.” She pondered for a second as the Twilights looked on expectantly. “Yeah,” Sunset said at last, “that makes sense. I was about to use the Portal to come to Equestria and ask Princess Twilight for help when your old detector sucked up the spell. And our new mirror was definitely active when you used the detector on it. Try making as if you’re going to step through while you have the detector open.”
Sci-Twi nodded. “It’s worth a shot, at least,” she said. Princess Twilight backed off, and Sci-Twi steeled herself again. Holding the magic detector aloft in her magic, she took a step closer to the mirror and reached a hoof toward the glass. The glass rippled for a second as her hoof neared it, and then the magic detector beeped twice and the mirror went still as the magic flowed out of it and into the open detector. Sci-Twi snapped the device closed, checked the dial, and then turned the device toward herself and opened it once more.
Sci-Twi’s pendant glowed as the mirror’s magic flowed into her body, and the unicorn underwent a small transformation, growing an inch or so taller and gaining a sparkling blue dress with a purple skirt and small crystal wings while her glasses changed into a purple visor. She blinked several times when the change was complete and looked herself over in surprise. “My Harmony Guardian outfit?” she said, confused, “why on earth…?”
“Better that than Midnight Sparkle,” Sunset pointed out. “How’s the magic feel? Under control?”
“Oh, yes,” Sci-Twi said, sounding surprised at her own statement. “Whether it’s because I’m in the right frame of mind, or because it’s not mixed up with lots of other magic, the Portal magic isn’t overwhelming at all. I think I can parse out the portal spell, but I’ll need a few minutes.”
“I’ll go fetch some paper so you can write down what you discover,” Princess Twilight offered, excited.
“Bring me the calculations for your own portal as well, Princess,” Sci-Twi said. “We’ll see how close you managed to get on your own.”
“Right,” Princess Twilight said, trotting out of the room with a gleeful look on her face.
Sunset waited a few seconds after the Princess left, and then asked Sci-Twi, “Are you sure everything’s under control?”
“Yes, yes,” Sci-Twi said with a slight scowl. “You were right with what you said earlier, Sunset: since I’m more accustomed to magic now and I’m using this power with a clear mind and intent, it’s much easier to handle it all. Besides, you’re looking out for me,” she added, “and that makes a lot of difference.”
When Princess Twilight returned, she saw Sci-Twi lying on the floor, eyes closed in a contemplative expression. “Hey, I, uh, have the notes,” Princess Twilight said, floating the papers and a pencil forward. Sci-Twi barely cracked open her eyes as she took the materials and spread them before her in the air. Her eyes scanned over the princess’s notes once, and then she closed her eyes as the pencil began to scribble furiously on the blank papers. “Um,” Princess Twilight said, unsure how to begin her questions.
“I see it all, clear as day,” Sci-Twi said as she continued to write. “The power, patterns, and methods we’ll need lay before me in plain formulas. You were close to the mark, Princess, tantalizingly close, yet there are a few constants you haven’t discovered yet, and one you miscalculated. Everything needs to be rebalanced, but that’s child’s play, and our new mirror should be suitable once the array’s fixed. There is one big problem, though.” She finished her writing, stood up, and opened her eyes.
“What?” Sunset and Princess Twilight asked.
“For the spell to succeed and create a link between two universes,” Sci-Twi said, “it needs to be cast in two stages. First, the spell needs to break down the boundary of our universe so the caster can sense the magic of other realities. Second, the caster needs to find a known… something in the destination universe that can serve as the anchor for the portal on that side. Princess Twilight, have you ever been to Taryn, personally?”
“Never,” the Princess said, shaking her head. “I’ve always suspected I’d need to find a familiar object to connect to over there, though. I figured I could use the aura of one of the Order-naries as at least a guide or something.”
Sci-Twi shook her head slowly. “What the Canterlot High portal is telling me,” she said, “is the anchor has to be a fixed object, like the mirrors or CHS’s statue.”
“But,” Princess Twilight started to protest, but then paused and thought. “Never mind,” she said at length. “I was going to argue that the Tau’rin portals aren’t in fixed objects, but they’re also more like leftover holes in spacetime rather than actual portals.” She frowned. “So, are you saying we’ve hit a dead end after all?”
“Not necessarily, Princess,” Sunset said.
“No, that’s exactly it, Sunset,” Princess Twilight said with an emphatic stomp. “If we don’t have an anchor point in Taryn, we can’t make a portal there. But we can’t set up an anchor point without going to Taryn. It’s a catch-22!” Her wings flared open as she screamed her frustrations to the ceiling. “This can’t be right!” she ranted. “The Map gave us this mission, and it doesn’t ask the impossible!”
“Now hold on,” Sci-Twi said calmly, “I don’t think we’re stuck quite yet. Let me try something.” Her horn lit up with magenta magic as she narrowed her eyes in concentration, and then a thin bolt leapt from the tip of her horn and burst into a round hole in the air a couple feet in front of her showing the front of Canterlot High School. Sci-Twi nodded slightly in satisfaction, and then with a small twist of her head and another bolt of magic she closed the portal. “Good,” she said, “I can manifest the link to CHS at will. Now, if can interrupt the spell after the first stage…” She cast her magic out again, and this time the air in front of her cracked apart into a jagged shape that wavered for a second before stabilizing and bathing Sci-Twi’s face with a white glow.
“What in the world?” Sunset Shimmer exclaimed as she and Princess Twilight cautiously approached for a better look.
“The space between Equestria and my world,” Sci-Twi explained. “The same place you and I ended up in during my Midnight Sparkle episode, Sunset. With the magic of the portal mirror in me and under control, it might be possible to traverse the interdimensional void and get to Taryn, and from there we can cast the new portal spell toward Equestria’s familiar magic.” She held out a hoof toward Princess Twilight. “Care to give it a try, Princess?” she asked.
Princess Twilight’s ears lay back as she looked between the offered hoof and the jagged, glowing hole in reality with trepidation. “I’ve had a bad experience with a portal that looked like this before,” she said. “Living beings aren’t meant to… well, exist outside of established reality.”
“This time will be different,” Sci-Twi said, “trust me.”
“You should trust her, Princess,” Sunset said. “I’ve been in that space, and even though the portal magic was driving Sci-Twi nuts and out of control, the two of us were able to hold a whole conversation.”
Princess Twilight glanced at Sunset, and then gulped down her trepidation and took Sci-Twi’s hoof. “Ok,” she said, “before I lose my nerve, then.”
Gentle white light surrounded Princess Twilight on all sides, which the logical part of her mind noted was a vast improvement over the all-consuming darkness she remembered from the void between Equestria and Valden. The lack of a horizon in the light and the absence of gravity, however, left her extremely disoriented, and she felt panic and nausea beginning to fight for dominance inside of her. Then, she felt a light touch on her back and turned to see Sci-Twi floating beside her. Sci-Twi was still in her fancy dress with the crystal wings and purple visor, but she was no longer a pony. Princess Twilight looked at herself and found that was still an alicorn.
“Why are you human all of sudden?” Princess Twilight asked.
Sci-Twi looked at her hands. “I guess that out here, our bodies just follow the morphological rules of our home,” she said. “This will make things a little easier, though.”
“Easier how?” Princess Twilight asked. In answer, Sci-Twi just wrapped her arms around the pony’s midsection, holding her close. Then, there was a sensation of movement and the light pulled away from the pair and split into two distinct yet shapeless spheres far beneath Sci-Twi’s feet. Princess Twilight instantly designated that direction “down” in her mind.
All around the Twilights, the black void seemed to be filled with stars arranged in far too regular a pattern to be stars as the pair knew them. “Those must be other universes,” Princess Twilight said, amazed.
“Most likely,” Sci-Twi agreed. “How do we tell which way to go now, though? They all look the same.”
Princess Twilight looked “down” at the lights representing Equestria and Sci-Twi’s world. “Look,” she said, pointing a hoof at something she noticed. Sci-Twi looked and saw a thin stream of light twisting off beyond the vague edge of Equestria. She moved to get a better angle and saw that the light dissipated fairly quickly after leaving the greater mass, but it still managed to point in a clear direction. “That may be from the Tau’rin portals,” Princess Twilight said. “Little… bits of reality leaking out of the universe and pointing back along the trajectory Tau’rin and the Order-naries took.” She followed the direction the light was pointing with her eyes, and it seemed to point at one of the distant stars. “Go that way,” she said, pointing. “Let’s see where it leads us.”
“Ok,” Sci-Twi said, willing herself into motion. She glanced back as she flew, wondering how the two of them might their way back if they took a wrong turn, and saw a line of magenta sparkles trailing out behind her, linking her back to Equestria. Feeling relieved, Sci-Twi returned her focus to the universe the princess was still pointing toward and redoubled her efforts to move toward it.
As the Twilights neared the next glowing sphere of a universe, they saw it had a little thread of light poking out of it as well, aimed directly toward Equestria. By mutual agreement, they approached the thread and Sci-Twi carefully took one hand off of Princess Twilight to cast the portal magic at the thread. In the blink of an eye, the girl and the alicorn were floating, surrounded by a bubble of magic, in a sky that was both comfortingly blue and strange. Below, a town-sized cluster of buildings sat at the edge of a vast, black, perfectly circular crater. Princess Twilight looked at her hooves and wings, then at her companion, and noted, “I guess your magic isolates us from the laws of this universe. Otherwise, I’d be human and neither of us would be lavender-colored.”
“Fascinating, “Sci-Twi said. “But, are we in the right place?”
Princess Twilight looked down at the town, lips pursed in thought. “It’s been a long time,” she said, “but I’m certain we’re above Overlook, the Valden town located next to the spot where the Order-naries and Tau’rin left this world. That crater’s unmistakable. We’re on the right track.”
“Awesome,” Sci-Twi said, grinning. “Now that I know what to look for, we should make it to Taryn in no time. Ready to go?”
Princess Twilight considered for a second before nodding. “There are a couple people here I wouldn’t mind saying hello to,” she said, “but we’re just passing through, and I can have a proper visit later, once I’m certain on how to make portals.”
“All right,” Sci-Twi said, and with a wave of her hand she took the two of them back out into the void.
As the Twilights flew through the void between universes, they caught momentary glimpses of each reality in the Tau’rin chain as they paused to get the bearing on the next leg of the journey. Counting Valden, twelve universes stood between Equestria and Taryn, yet only a few provided the pair with memorable sights during the glimpses.
There was a universe also inhabited by intelligent equines in a variety of colors, but with longer faces in general and a strange fixation on pastel blues and pinks, if the buildings in the village Princess Twilight and Sci-Twi saw were any indication.
There was a world full of humans and other nearly-but-not-quite-human races which sailed the oceans on ships built onto the backs of giant sea dragons.
A world that appeared to be split between humans and large insectoid beings that dwelt in sprawling cities under domes of magic. A massive battle between the two groups was occurring near the massive crater that marked the “exit” portal of the Tau’rin chain; the humans were evidently trying to defend the crater from an attack by the insects.
Another world at war, except that humanity’s foe here seemed to be animated chalk scribbles, which the humans fought with linked magic circles and chalk drawings of their own.
As they left the twelfth intervening universe, Princess Twilight clapped her hooves in glee. “That’s it,” she said, looking ahead to the next glowing spot in the void, “our next stop has to be Taryn. We’re almost there.”
“Oh, good,” Sci-Twi said, with a little strain in her voice, “because I don’t think we can go any farther than that.”
“What do you mean?” Princess Twilight asked.
“Look back the way we’ve come, “Sci-Twi answered. The princess did so and could see a sparse scattering of magenta lights in their wake. “The portal spell is keeping us tethered to Equestria,” Sci-Twi said, “and it’s been stretching a bit tight since the last couple universes. The magic’s running low, too.”
“Wha- why didn’t you say something sooner?!” Princess Twilight exclaimed. “I can lend you some of my magic if you need it.” She lit up her horn, but when she tried to touch her magic to Sci-Twi’s, she felt a sudden pull on the magic from all sides. She dimmed her horn quickly and shuddered. “N-never mind,” she said, “this non-space is too… weird for me to cast in.”
“We can make it,” Sci-Twi grunted, pushing a little harder to reach the glow of Taryn.
After an agonizing period of immeasurable time, the Twilights started to draw noticeably near their goal. The two thread-like streams of light leaking from the Tau’rin portals became discernable, and Sci-Twi aimed toward the nearest one. However, before either Twilight could reach out and grab the thread, their progress came to sudden, jerking halt. The princess gasped as Sci-Twi’s grip grew unsteady, but the girl wrapped both arms tighter around the alicorn.
“What happened?” Princess Twilight asked.
“The tether,” Sci-Twi groaned, looking back, “it’s reached its limit. We can’t go any farther.”
“No!” Princess Twilight yelled. “We’re so close! We can get there!”
“I’m sorry, Princess,” Sci-Twi said. “I’m trying, but I can’t move us any closer.”
“Try harder!” Princess Twilight shouted. She wriggled until she managed to free her wings from Sci-Twi’s enveloping arms, and started flapping hard, desperately trying to move herself and Sci-Twi the last few, tantalizing feet.
“Hey!” Sci-Twi exclaimed as the alicorn’s wings jostled her. “Cut that out, Twi. I’m losing my gri-” A wing flap cuffed her on the cheek and her arms instinctively shot up to guard her face. Princess Twilight yelped at the sudden loss of pressure around her middle and she started tumbling away. “Twilight!” Sci-Twi yelled, reaching for her companion, only to be jerked away in the opposite direction. Before she could react, the tether of magic had begun retracting hauling her back to Equestria at blinding speeds.
Sci-Twi quickly lost sight of Princess Twilight against the glow of the universe the alicorn was tumbling toward, and in a blink even the universe itself became impossible to pick out among the innumerable star-like lights around it. Sci-Twi knew, whether because of the magic in her or her own knowledge of basic physics, that she had no chance of reversing course again, so just went limp and let the magic carry her back to Princess Twilight’s castle. Alone.
“Gybbi xyd, Cscdob. S’fo mkeqrd rob, kxn coxd rob grobo cro xoonc dy lo.”
“Sd gkc k xokb drsxq, Lbydrob. S kw cdkbdsxq dy poov… myxmobxon klyed drsc.”
“S’vv gkdmr rob kc sp cro gobo yxo yp wsxo, kc iye rkfo nyxo pyb wo. Rob gsvv sc swzboccsfo.”
“Hey.”
Ah, so hearing came back first this time, Twilight thought sardonically. And coherent thought is a close second.
“Hey, Miss?”
Male voice, Twilight noted as she slowly became aware of her body again, and the feeling of grass under her. He sounds a bit annoyed, or maybe angry. Great. She tried to move, but voluntary motion still escaped her. Well, she thought, I’m sensing fingers and toes instead of hooves, so I’ve gone human again. Feels like I’m wearing clothing too. That’s good.
“Hey, Miss,” the voice said, shifting to a concerned tone, “are you ok?”
Twilight’s sight returned then, and she managed to prop herself up on her elbows as she blinked her eyes into focus. A man in a blue uniform with a matching cap and a shiny shield-shaped badge on the chest was kneeling over her, his tense, blue-eyed face relaxing slightly as he saw her eyes open. “Are you ok, Miss?” he asked again.
“Mostly,” Twilight answered, sitting up properly and getting a good look around. She seemed to be in a small park in the midst of a town or city, and the wall of a large building was directly behind her. Aside from the man – who Twilight realized was probably part of the local police – there was a small crowd of people a short distance away, watching her.
“Good to hear,” the policeman said. “Now, mind telling me what you were doing?”
“Um,” Twilight said. She wasn’t sure how much she should reveal about herself. While the Order-naries were fairly well-known in Equestria, Twilight didn’t know how what information, if any, about Equestria was common knowledge in Taryn. In any case, the police man was a stranger and wouldn’t know Princess Twilight Sparkle from a diamond dog.
Magic, though, Twilight knew from conversations with the Order-naries, was not an uncommon sight in this world. So, the answer she finally gave was, “I was trying a spell, and it didn’t quite work as expected.”
“Oh?” the cop asked. “Can’t say I’m an expert in magic, but popping out of a solid wall seems like something hard to do by accident.”
Twilight stood up and turned around to look at the wall. She reached out to touch it, and found it was as solid and rough as it appeared. “Well,” she said, “I assure you I did not intend to emerge from a wall, of all things. Or end up here, necessarily. I’m not in trouble, am I?” she asked, giving the policeman a worried look.
“No,” the policeman said, “but you did appear unexpectedly, and one of the Avalon Vaults is right below us, so I have to be sure of your motives. You understand, right?”
“Uh, sure,” Twilight said. Although I don’t know what an Avalon Vault is, she added to herself. “I’m trying to track down some friends,” she told the policeman. “They’re a mercenary team called the Order-naries. Have you heard of them by chance?”
The cop blinked, and then started to laugh. “Heard of them?” he exclaimed. “Ma’am, you’re standing in the heart of their hometown, Contentle!” He sobered a little and regarded Twilight with an askance glance. “There are better ways to get in contact with folks like them, you know.”
“Maybe,” Twilight said, casting her gaze down, “but I don’t exactly have the means… Could you help me get in contact with them, officer?”
The cop rubbed the back of his head. “Well,” he said “I’d have to call in to headquarters to get their contact information but-”
“Oh, you don’t need to worry, about that, Officer Graven,” called out a woman who had separated from the onlookers and was typing quickly on a cell phone as she approached. “I’m having a chat with Ash right now.”
“Ms. Smith,” the policeman said, giving the woman a hard look, “you’ve snuck back into town, I see.”
The woman lowered her phone for a moment and returned the cop’s glare. “I’ve been in town for the last two months, sir,” she said, “and a respected member of the press like myself does not ‘sneak’ anywhere. Especially not into this town.” Her phone chimed, she checked it, and then turned to Twilight and asked, “So, wall-girl, what’s your name anyway?”
“I’m Twilight Sparkle,” Twilight answered.
Ms. Smith blinked, then typed away on her phone. After a moment, the phone chimed and, after looking at it, the woman stepped closer and held the phone out to the policeman. “Look at that officer,” she said smugly, “Dear old Ash wants me to look after her until he gets here.”
The cop glowered, but threw up his hands and walked off. “Fine,” he said, “just don’t cause any trouble, understand?”
“Morag,” Ms. Smith muttered, rolling her eyes. She turned back to Twilight and gave her a bare-toothed smile, revealing unusually large canine teeth which, combined with her golden-brown eyes, gave the woman a predatory air. Twilight took a step back, and her fingers tensed as she tried to recall the lessons Ash had given her on Taryn’s weave-style magic. “Don’t worry,” the woman said with a trace of humor, “I don’t bite. Not the good guys at least.” She held out a hand and softened her smile a little. “My name’s Samantha Smith,” she said, “ace reporter for the Unseen Happenings paper, longtime friend of the Order-naries, and proud wifwulf. You can call me Sam.”
Twilight shook the proffered hand and gave the woman a closer look. She was tall, with a more muscular build than Twilight’s concept of the average female human. Her hair was very dark brown, shoulder-length and tied into a ponytail. She was wearing a white button-up blouse under a dressy blue vest and matching slacks. It was a professional-sounding ensemble, but the effect was spoiled by how loosely it all fit on her and that she was wearing scuffed green sneakers with it. Studying her face, Twilight sensed determination and – more importantly – friendliness behind Sam’s wolfish features. Twilight decided that Sam fit in the same category as griffons and Changelings: a little frightening on the outside, but not inherently bad.
“I’m pleased to make your acquaintance, Sam,” Twilight said. “Any friend of the Order-naries is a friend of mine.”
“You took the words out of my mouth,” Sam replied with a laugh. She released the girl’s hand and put her arm around Twilight’s shoulder instead. “Now come with me; Ash’ll be a while, so we have plenty of time to chat and I know the perfect place to do so.”
“Here we go,” Samantha announced as she set a basket-plate full of french fries on the table in front of Twilight, “the famous Pragmagic Fries.”
“Pragmagic?” Twilight asked as she took and examined a fry. She popped it in her mouth, chewed, and declared, “Not bad.”
Sam sat down across from Twilight and put her chin in one hand. “They’re a bit more flavorful than most restaurant fries,” she said, “but, really, the only reason they’re famous is because Ash considers them the best thing ever. He talks up these fries every time someone offers him fries from another place, and Gomer’s decided to run with the free publicity. It’s kind of cute.”
Twilight arched an eyebrow. “I think that’s the first time I’ve ever heard the word ‘cute’ applied to Ash,” she said. “How long have you known the Order-naries, exactly?” she asked.
Sam leaned forward and smiled. “Why,” she said, “I was practically the catalyst for them becoming an official team.”
“Really?” Twilight asked.
“It’s true,” Sam insisted. “I originally came here to Contentle to follow up on the story of how Ash and three local kids – that’d be Ray, Rachelle, and Carmilla of course – saved the library from a deranged anarchist mage. I had the bad luck to discover that that mage was just a pawn in a larger conspiracy, and I got kidnapped and impersonated to lure the M’Dales into a trap. The twins managed to not only get themselves free, but rescued me and fought off one of my kidnappers. That convinced Ash that the M’Dales had potential, so he agreed to mentor them, and then Carmilla decided to tag along, and the Order-naries were born. I’ve been the lead reporter on Order-naries news ever since.” She reached for a fry, but paused when she saw Twilight’s eyes had gone a bit unfocused. “What’s with the look?” Sam asked.
“Huh?’ Twilight said, startled. “Oh, sorry. I’m just straightening names out in my mind. Except for Ash, the Order-naries adopted very different names while they were living in Equestria. If I recall… the twins go by Gold Heart and Soul Mage, so that’s Rachelle and Ray, respectively. Carmilla goes by Gale. Ash extended his name out to Ashen Blaze. I think it’s an extension, anyway.”
Samantha blinked a few times, and then produced a small notebook and pencil from inside her vest and started writing. “Interesting,” she said. “Yeah, here, Ash is just Ash, or ‘Ash the Pragmagic’ when on the job. ‘Ashen Blaze’ does fit with his flair for dramatic names though.”
Twilight chuckled. “I guess it does,” she said.
“So,” Sam said when she finished her notes, “what brings you to Taryn, Twilight?”
“I’m trying to create a direct portal between here and Equestria,” Twilight answered. Sam nodded, started writing again, and was about to ask another question, only for Twilight to beat her to the punch with, “So, you introduced yourself as a reporter, a friend of the Order-naries, and a… wifwulf? What’s a wifwulf?”
“It’s a word Ray M’Dale came up with, which I rather like,” Sam answered, smiling. “It’s from Old Anglish roots: wif meaning woman and wulf being, well, wolf. The common terms are werwulf and lycanthrope, both meaning ‘man-wolf,’ which is more than bit gender-biased. Whatever you call it though, it means I turn into a wolf sometimes.”
“Ah,” Twilight said. “That… explains a lot about the… feeling I’ve been getting from you.”
Sam looked intrigued. “You can… sense my lycanthropy?” she asked. “You must be something special; most people can’t tell a wifwulf from an unturned human unless one’s transforming before their eyes. Speaking of which,” her expression turned sour, “if you want a demonstration, think again. Lycans have a garbage reputation in this country, and the only reason this town tolerates me is because of my connections.”
“I think you’re being a bit unfair, Sam,” said a male voice from the end of the table, startling both Sam and Twilight into tiny squeaks of fright. “Seems to me,” the speaker continued as he snagged several fries from the basket, “every time I step away from Contentle for more than a week or so, I come back to find you’ve charmed another sector of this fair town.” This newcomer was Ash the Pragmagic, a tall man with short-cropped black hair, an outfit consisting of black combat boots, dark pants, and a robe that was cut much shorter in the front than the back, and vivid, piercing green eyes said to strike absolute fear into the soul of any who gazed directly into them. Twilight had never experienced that herself, but the Order-naries and Rarity could all swear to the truth of it. Those eyes swept over Sam and Twilight without quite meeting either of theirs, and then focused on the fries in his hand as he said, chidingly, “Now, Ms. Smith, I believe I asked you to look after Twilight Sparkle, not interview her.”
“I’m not interviewing,” Sam protested, spreading her hands and trying to look innocent. “We were just getting to know one another.”
Ash raised an eyebrow. “You have your little notebook out, Sam,” he said.
Sam folded her arms and pouted. “Fine, you caught me,” she said. “But did you honestly expect me to pass up a chance to dig into one of your untold stories, Ashy?”
Ash chuckled and popped a fry into his mouth. “Point, newshound,” he said.
“How’d you get here so fast, anyway?” Sam asked. “I thought you were in Clara Gaton today, with the county reps.”
“I was,” Ash said lightly, “but when I heard that one of Equestria’s Princesses - and living focus of one of the most powerful forms of magic in the multiverse - had just appeared in center of Contentle, it wasn’t hard to get them to let me excuse myself.” He finished off his fries and folded his arms behind his back. “I still don’t know why they insist on getting my input; I have no interest in the politics of this New Avalon thing.” He turned slightly toward Twilight and smiled. “Give me a good mystery or disaster any day,” he said. “Is that what brought you here, Twilight?” he asked, “Or is this just… oh! You’ve finally made the direct portal between Equestria and Taryn, haven’t you?”
Twilight glanced to the side and gave an embarrassed smile. “Uh, yes and no,” she said. “We’ve managed to figure out how to do it, but the spell has to be cast from here to Equestria.”
Ash blinked. “Then… how?’ he asked, gesturing at Twilight and then the space around the group.
“Blind luck, mostly,” Twilight admitted. “I should probably hurry up, find a good spot for the portal on this end, and cast the… spell…” Her hands moved quickly over her skirt and blouse, searching for something and coming up empty. “Oh no,” she groaned, putting her head in her hands, “I was so excited about finding a way to get here that I forgot to grab the spell formula! Ugh!” She dropped her head from her hands and onto the table.
“Hm,” Ash said, not quite managing to hide an amused smirk. “That would be a problem. Good thing I happen to have a spaceship that can travel between universes.” Twilight raised her head, eyes shining with gratitude. “It’ll take a while, of course,” Ash said, “but-”
“Better than nothing,” Twilight said, surging to her feet.
Ash led Twilight out of Gomer’s and headed to the left. He was balancing an open paper bag containing the remaining fries on one hand while he swept the other around to take in the surroundings. “So, what do you think of Contentle so far, Twilight?” Ash asked.
Twilight looked around, observing the buildings on either side of the wide, paved street. “It’s nice,” she said. “The buildings seem to be trying to strike a balance between urban uniformity like Manehatten and the personalized character you see in Ponyville buildings. The layout of the streets seems a little… unusual. The roads are all straight, clearly a planned layout, but they don’t form a grid.”
“You noticed, “Ash said. “There is a pattern alright, but it’s based on concentric hexagons instead of the standard square grid. Well, it starts shifting toward a grid after the sixth ring out, but the town’s heart maintains the ancient pattern that designates this place as the location of one of the Avalon Vaults.”
“I keep hearing that term,” Twilight said, “Avalon. What is it?”
“The Lost Land,” declared Samantha from behind Twilight. “The mythical birthplace of many schools of magic, and unassailable bastion of Order which vanished mysteriously in ancient times, never to be seen again! At least, until the Order-naries found the six Vaults that held clues to Avalon’s location and put it back on the map.”
Ash slowed down slightly and looked back, raising an eyebrow at Sam. “You’re still here,” he stated flatly.
“Of course,” Samantha said haughtily. “Mysterious visitor from another dimension lands in the center of Contentle. Local legendary merc Ash the Pragmagic steps up to aid her in returning home. Esteemed wifwulf journalist smells a chance to go where no wifwulf has gone before!” She held her pencil aloft dramatically as she finished.
Ash opened his mouth, a rebuke clear in his eyes, but then just faced forward again and picked his pace back up. “If I tell you to go away, you’ll just hound me all the way to the Lirin and force me to block you from getting on board,” he said. “Fine then. You can come, on condition that you don’t publish anything about this without mine and Twilight’s approval. Compreende?”
“Not even a word of it to my editors,” Sam said. “On a separate note,” she said after a second, “why are we walking? Can’t you just teleport us to your ship, Ash?”
“The Lirin is still en route from Clara Gaton,” Ash said. “And attempting to teleport into a moving target without precise knowledge of the vector and speed differentials is not advisable. Besides, it’s a nice day, and Twilight ought to get a feel for the town’s layout.”
“Where are we walking to, then?” Twilight asked.
Ash pointed ahead and to the right. “Five blocks around and one ring out,” he answered, “to the Lirin’s usual parking spot at the deGrange Fabrication Garage, which was Maesi General Mechanics before the old man retired last year and passed the place on to Carmilla. That’s Gale, if you forgot,” he added, glancing back at Twilight.
“I still remember your actual names,” Twilight assured him. “How are Ray and Rachelle doing, by the way?”
“Eh,” Ash said with a shrug. “There were doing fine, last I heard from them. They’re off chasing rumors of a new set of Spiriter twins down in South Amerigo. They’re determined the next generation should have actual guidance in developing their powers.”
“Ah,” Twilight said. “Well, tell them I wish them luck next time you talk to them.”
“Will do,” Ash replied, and then stiffened as a ringtone went off from inside his robe. “Oh, what the skeb now?” he grumbled, gesturing impatiently with one hand to summon the ringing cellphone into it. He stopped walking as he checked the screen, his frown deepened, and after a second of thought he answered the phone with a curt, “Pragmagic speaking.” His eyes slowly rolled from side to side as he listened to the response, then stopped suddenly on the third cycle. “Purple, you say?” he asked. “…Yes, I’m pretty sure I know it too. Just keep him there; I’ll be right over, and you can tell him that if he gets antsy.” He hung up and slipped the phone into his robe with a sigh. “Welp,” he said, turning on his heel and walking away toward the center of town, “change of plans. Back to the library, ladies.”
“Why?” Sam asked.
“Because something just popped out of the same wall Twilight apparently did,” Ash answered. “One small, purple, wingless dragon wearing a messenger bag.”
“Spike?!” Twilight exclaimed. She took off at a run, leaving Ash and Samantha to follow in her wake.
As she approached the library, Twilight saw Spike standing between two police officers near the wall she’d emerged from. The little dragon was gripping the strap of the messenger bag he was wearing tightly with both claws as he looked around anxiously at the people who were gradually emerging from the library and the two other buildings on the block to gawk at him. Twilight pushed through the crowd and called out, “Spike!” as she approached him. The cops tensed and shot suspicious looks at her, but before either of them could speak, Ash appeared next to Twilight and put a hand lightly on her shoulder. The cops relaxed, apparently taking Ash’s action as a signal, and withdrew a couple steps.
“Twilight?” Spike asked, hesitantly, looking the girl over. After a second, his eyes brightened with recognition and his tension vanished as he ran over and hugged her around the waist. “Oh man,” he said, “I almost didn’t recognize you. Wait,” he looked up at her, “if you’re human in this world, why am I still a dragon?”
“We have dragons in this universe,” Ash replied. “They don’t come in purple, or anything close to your size, but we have ‘em. Where in the multiverse have you gone that turns you into something else?”
“Who are you?” Spike asked, stepping away from Twilight and glaring at Ash.
“This is Ashen Blaze,” Twilight explained.
“Oh,” Spike said, looking the man over. “Yeah, I kinda see the resemblance, I guess.”
Twilight knelt down and looked Spike in the eye. “What are you doing here, Spike?” she asked. “No, how did you get here?”
Spike took a deep breath, preparing to relate a story.
“We’re back!” Spike announced as he entered the room. “Starlight’s already started setting the new gems onto the mirror and…” He trailed off as he looked around the room and saw only Sunset Shimmer. “Uh, where’d the Twilights go?” he asked.
Sunset, who’d been gazing intently at the Canterlot High Mirror, turned her head toward the little dragon and tried, with little success, to mask the worry in her eyes. “Oh,” she said, “They’re, uh, out… Between universes, trying to find Taryn.”
Spike had to take a moment to process the statement. “How?” he finally asked.
Sunset tapped her hoof on the Mirror which, having been drained of magic, remained solid. “Sci-Twi worked up the courage to absorb the Mirror’s magic so she could check it against Princess Twilight’s dimension spell,” Sunset answered. “Turns out, the spell needs to be cast from Taryn because there’s nothing to anchor the spell to there yet, so Sci-Twi figured out to how get herself and the Princess into the, uh, between space and… yeah.”
“Oh,” Spike said, reaching a claw around to scratch one of the wing-nubs on his shoulders as he walked farther into the room. “How long have they been gone?” he asked.
Sunset thought. “They set out… just a little bit after you and Starlight left to get the extra gems. A couple hours, then?”
“Really?” Spike said, switching to scratching his other shoulder. “Well, Taryn’s like fifteen whole universes away from here, so I guess it’d take a while.” His foot brushed against some paper, and he looked down to see what it was. “Uh, Sunset,” he said, bending over to pick up several pages of notes from the floor, “did either of them happen to mention that they’d memorized the dimension spell?”
“No,” Sunset said, confused. She saw the papers Spike was holding and glanced down to see the rest of the spell notes still scattered on the floor. “Oh no,” she said, panicked, “they left the spell behind! How are they going to get back if they can’t cast the portal spell?”
Spike looked at the notes in his hands, momentarily worried as well, until he recalled a few things and relaxed. “I wouldn’t worry about that, Sunset,” he said. “Even if Sci-Twi can’t just bring Princess Twi back the way they went, the Order-naries have this flying machine that can move between universes. That’s how they’ve been able to come back for visits before.”
Sunset exhaled slowly, calming down. “Right, right,” she said, “they’re not going someplace completely unknown. Everything’s going to be just fine.”
At that exact moment, a glowing white hole in reality ripped open between Sunset and Spike, and Sci-Twi came tumbling out onto the floor, shedding magic energy and her Harmony Guardian dress as she rolled to a stop. The magic gathered back into the Mirror as it flowed out of Sci-Twi, and tear snapped shut as quickly as it had appeared. Sci-Twi groaned as she stood up, once again just an ordinary lavender unicorn with glasses. Sunset and Spike hurried over to try and help, but they both froze as Sci-Twi exclaimed, “I lost her!”
“So, let me get this straight,” Starlight Glimmer said, pacing in front of Sci-Twi, “the two of you were flying from universe to universe with no problem, but as soon as you get within touching distance of the one universe you were looking for, the magic suddenly runs out and you lose your grip on Twilight?”
Sci-Twi sniffled, tears pouring freely from her distraught eyes. “I… I tried to hold on to her,” she said, “but she was so intent on making it that last little bit and… I saw her falling toward the Taryn universe but… I don’t know if she… where she might’ve…”
“You were supposed to help Twilight!” Starlight snapped, “Not let her fall to Celestia-knows-where in an unknown dimension!”
Sunset stepped between Starlight and Sci-Twi and gave Starlight a hard push backwards. “That’s enough,” Sunset snarled. “We’re all upset that Princess Twilight’s lost, but yelling at each other isn’t going to fix the problem.”
“What is, then?” Starlight retorted. “Do you know how we’re supposed to search an entireuniverse for Twilight when we can’t even reach that universe? We don’t even know for sure if she actually made it into the Taryn universe.”
The machinery surrounding the Canterlot High Mirror suddenly started running, drawing everypony’s attention. As the three mares and Spike gathered in front of the Mirror, their reflections faded away to be replaced by an image of Princess Twilight tumbling through a dark void. After a moment, a pale gold light enveloped the alicorn, cradling her gently, and carried her down to a planet that rose from below. The image faded away, the Mirror began reflecting the room normally again, and the machinery slowed to a stop.
“What the hay?” Spike asked in a flat, confused tone.
“It’s saying Princess Twilight is ok,” Sci-Twi said. Her ears perked up and she set her face in an expression of fierce determination.
“How are you so sure?” Starlight asked.
“That’s the second time today the Mirror’s shown me a vision,” Sci-Twi said, turning around and taking a few steps away from the Mirror. “The first time, it was trying to encourage me to try borrowing its magic again.” She took her magic detector and absorber in her hoof and turned back toward the Mirror. “The Princess is fine, and I’d be willing to bet there’s something out there – the Map’s driving force or something else – that wants to ensure we succeed. It may actually be possible to reach Taryn before running out of magic.”
“How so?” Sunset asked.
Sci-Twi’s bravado diminished somewhat. “If I’d had, say, one more unicorn’s worth of magic…” she said slowly, lowering her head and looking at Starlight and Sunset through her bangs.
Sunset nodded grimly. “Say no more,” she said. “You can have mine.”
“Mine too,” Starlight said quickly. “It wouldn’t hurt to have more just in case, would it?”
Sci-Twi shook her head. “Thank you, Starlight,” she said, “but the new Mirror still isn’t ready to accept the portal spell, and you won’t be able to get the array finished in time without magic. Sunset’s will have to be enough.”
Starlight shot Sunset a glowering sideways look and stalked away. “Guess I’d better get back to work then,” she grumbled as she left the room.
“What’s with her all of sudden?” Sci-Twi asked.
“My guess?” Spike said as he started gathering up the spell notes that still lay on the floor, “She’s just feeling jealous that Sunset’s going to have a more direct hoof in ‘rescuing’ Princess Twilight.” He picked up the last paper, then jogged out of the room as he shouted, “Don’t go anywhere until I get back, Sci-Twi.”
“Huh?” Sci-Twi and Sunset exchanged a confused look. Spike returned less than minute later, stuffing the notes into a messenger bag he had slung around his shoulders, and then stood expectantly near the Mirror. “What are you doing, Spike?” Sci-Twi asked.
“I’m not letting you forget the spell notes this time,” Spike said, patting the bag, “and I’m going with you. If Sunset’s magic isn’t enough to get the rest of the way to Taryn, then I’ll gladly risk my life following my Twilight in a leap of faith to get these to her.”
“Spike,” Sci-Twi started to protest, but upon looking into the dragon’s determined eyes, she relented. “Ok then,” she said as she pointed the magic detector at the Mirror. As the magic flowed out of the Mirror and into her body once again, she said, “The Princess is lucky to have a dragon like you, Spike.”
“Judging by the fact that you arrived alone, Spike,” Ash the Pragmagic said, “I’m guessing the extra magic from this Sunset Shimmer still wasn’t quite enough?”
Spike rubbed the back of his head. “Actually, I think it was,” he said, “but when we touched the edge of this universe, something took me out of Sci-Twi’s arms and sent her back. Next thing I knew, I was here.”
Ash tilted his head up slightly with a disgruntled look. “Bah re,” he muttered. “Pertel vet’cu rugalif…”
“What was that?” Twilight asked.
“Nothing, really,” Ash said with a dismissive wave.
“And since when do you go ‘bah re’ over nothing, Ash?” Sam asked, giving him a knowing look.
Ash flashed a glare at her, then rolled his eyes skyward before his fear gaze could take effect. “The notion that we may just be dancing on some puppeteer’s strings bothers me, is all” he said. “As Meis Thamule, that’s all I really was: a puppet.”
“That’s certainly not the case with the Map,” Twilight said. “All it does is alert the other Bearers and I to friendship problems we wouldn’t be aware of otherwise.”
Ash quirked an eyebrow. “And what ‘friendship problem’ does building a direct portal between Taryn and Equestria solve?” he asked.
“I… don’t know,” Twilight admitted with a blush. “Yet.”
“No need to be huffy, Twi,” Ash said, smiling. “I was teasing. I’m all for making Ponyville a more convenient place to visit. So, let’s get to it then, shall we?” He folded his arms behind his back, turned on his heel, and started walking off.
“Where are we going now?” Twilight asked as she, Sam, and Spike hurried to catch up with Ash.
“Carmilla’s workshop,” Ash answered. “There should be a spot somewhere on the property we can use as the anchor for this end of the portal. That library wall would actually be ideal, but it’s too… exposed to be able to control access to it, and we don’t want just anyone wandering into Equestria willy-nilly, right?”
“Oh, yes,” Twilight said emphatically. “Especially since Equestria’s end is going to be inside my castle. I don’t want strangers popping into my home.”
“Castle?!” Ash exclaimed. “You have a…” He shook his head. “Never mind; I can wait to catch up on current events until after we’ve got the portal ready.”
The deGrange Fabrication Garage was an unassuming-looking grey brick of a building that sat alone on a city block in the north-eastern sextant of Contentle. The remainder of the block was surrounded by a high chain-link fence with view-obscuring slats inserted into it, and since the fence went right up to the side of the Fabrication Garage, Twilight figured the space within was part of the same property. “What does Carmilla work on here?” Twilight asked.
Ash shrugged. “Whatever suits her fancy,” he said. “When old Yu-san owned it, this was a mechanic’s shop where you could get just about anything repaired, from cars to home appliances and even personal, one-of-a-kind gadgets for mercenary work. It was, and still is, the only place on the whole planet I trust to properly handle the Lirin’s maintenance.” A shadow passed over the group, and they all looked up to see an airship shaped like a wedge with wings descend from the sky and land inside the fenced area. “Speaking of which…” Ash said.
From inside the fence, a woman’s voice suddenly shouted over the sounds of the Lirin settling onto its landing struts. “Back already, Ash?”
“I’m out here, Milla!” Ash called out.
There were sounds of bustling, then a grunt, and a grease-streaked face under a mop of brown hair barely held back with an upraised welding mask popped into view over the fence. “What are you doing out there?” Carmilla asked. “Hold on,” she said in the next breath as she caught sight of Twilight, “I know that hairstyle.” Her gaze then swept over to Spike. “I know that dragon.” She looked back at Ash, eyes narrowing suspiciously. “Ash, don’t tell me you decided to ditch the county meeting and visit Equestria.”
Ash held up a hand, fingers together and palm outward. “As much as I was tempted,” he said, “I did go to Clara Gaton and attended that dry, pointless meeting. Twilight and Spike got here under their own power… More or less.”
Carmilla didn’t look completely convinced, but she didn’t say anything else before dropping out of sight. A couple seconds later, she pushed open a gate a little way down the fence and waved the group over. “Come on, then,” she said. “I want to hear this story.” Ash nodded and headed through the gate, Twilight and Spike were right behind him, and Sam brought up the rear. “Hey Sam,” Carmilla said as she closed the gate behind the reporter, “getting a first-hand exclusive to this, I see. How’d you talk Ash into that?”
“Ash would probably still be Clara Gaton right now if I hadn’t seen Twilight pop out of one of the library’s walls,” Sam said with pride.
“Oh. Nice,” Carmilla said, grinning. She then turned to Ash and Twilight and asked, “So, what’s the story, then?”
While Twilight started recounting the story in brief, Ash went over to Spike. “Let me see those spell notes,” Ash said, holding out a hand expectantly.
“Why?” Spike asked, suspicious.
“Unless I guess wrong,” Ash said, “the spell was designed for unicorn magic. It’s going to need to be modified to fit Weave style if we intend to cast it in this world.”
Spike tried to lock eyes with Ash, but the mage kept his gaze fixed on the bag while looking utterly sincere. Spike sighed, opened the bag, and pulled the notes out. “I think Rarity’s been pining over you today,” he said as he held the papers out to Ash.
Ash blinked. “Why mention that?” he asked.
“Just thought you ought to know,” Spike said. “When this portal’s finished, there’s not going to be much standing between you two anymore.”
Ash took the notes, but didn’t look at them. “Does that include you, Spike?” he asked solemnly.
Spike sighed and shrugged. “I think I’ve outgrown that,” he said. “I care about Rarity, but it’s not as… overwhelming anymore.”
Ash chuckled and patted the dragon’s head. “Well,” he said, “I guess I should wish you luck on quickly finding the right person… mare… dragoness?” He coughed awkwardly and started reading through the notes.
Twilight finished her summary of events about then, and Carmilla said, “So, you need someplace to put this shortcut portal. Sorry, but it’s not going to be here.”
“Why not?” Twilight and Ash both exclaimed.
Carmilla held up a finger. “First,” she said, “I have two young apprentices that I have a hard enough time keeping out of trouble as it is; the last thing they need is an easy escape route to another reality. Second,” she raised another finger and looked at Ash in particular, “you know very well this place is where I make all my Magebane gels. The dust from all the rocks I’ve ground up over the years has to mean magic doesn’t work so well here.”
“Bah,” Ash said, generating a ball of magic light in his hand with a complex dance of his fingers, “I’ve never had a problem Weaving here. Magebane just grounds out any streams that are part of an active spell, and not even notably fast if it’s not concentrated into a gel.”
“But this portal will be an active spell, won’t it?” Carmilla countered. “Raw Magebane dust in the air would wear the portal down over time, like your teleport waypoints always did in Equestria.”
Ash’s magelight faded to a tiny glimmer as he frowned. “That’s comparing two different principles,” he said, “but… yes, the effect would be the same.” He extinguished the light completely and folded his arms. “Can you suggest someplace else, then?” he asked. “Your space is apparently unsuitable, the M’Dales aren’t around to offer up their home, my house has its own… problems, and we can’t exactly use the Avalon Vault without upsetting the ‘cultural heritage’ faction. We’re out of reasonably secure and local locations.”
“Hey,” Carmilla said, “I only said you can’t have the portal here. This isn’t the only place in town that’s ‘my space,’ Ash.”
“Where-” Ash started to ask, and then his eyebrows shot up. “Oh. Are you sure?”
“Perfectly,” Carmilla said, walking into the building and waving for the group to follow her. “Come on; I’m sure we can all fit in my car.”
Carmilla parked her car in front of a house on the outside of the outermost hexagonal ring, on an oddly shaped block as the town’s streets transitioned suddenly from the concentric hexagons of its heart to a more conventional grid. The house was a spacious two-story structure with a gabled roof and was, in Twilight’s opinion, excessively green. The walls, the front door, the corner trim, the fake shutters framing the second-floor windows, and even the roof were all different shades of green. The color certainly made the house stand out from its similarly shaped but more humbly colored neighbors, but it also somehow reminded Twilight of the Smooze, and she had to fight down a shudder as she followed Carmilla’s lead in exiting the car.
“What’s this place?” Spike asked as he hopped out of the back seat.
“Home,” Carmilla said with pride.
“Ok,” Spike said. “Why’s it so green?”
Carmilla spread her hands in a hopeless gesture. “My dad has this… thing with repainting the house a new color every couple of months,” she said. “Typically, that means whenever he and Mom get back from their latest culture tour or cruise.”
“So that’s why you’re so confident in offering to put the portal here,” Ash said. “No awkward questions from the parental units until long after the deed’s done. Assuming they’re ever around to catch on.”
Carmilla shot Ash a withering glance over her shoulder as she opened the front door. “Unlike you, Ash,” she said, “I’m not in the habit of keeping big secrets from my loved ones. My parents won’t mind, especially since I didn’t have any part of the house itself in mind. Still,” she added after a second, looking around warily as she and the group stepped into the foyer, “we should probably try to avoid attracting-”
“Hey, you’re home early, Milla,” came a voice from down the hall. The speaker was a young woman dressed in shorts and a t-shirt. She had the same brown eyes and hair as Carmilla, but where Carmilla’s hair was barely tamed, the newcomer’s was worn in a neat braid. She stepped into the foyer with an intrigued look in her eyes. “And what’s this?” she asked, looking at Ash, “Captain Creep-eye, in my house?”
“What’s this? You’ve emerged from your cyber cave of your own will, mini-Milla?” Ash retorted with a playful smirk.
“A girl’s gotta eat,” the young woman said with a dismissive wave at Ash. “Seriously, though, what’s going down? Ms. Smith’s here, I don’t know the girl with the dyed hair, and… is that a midget dragon of some sort?”
“I’m not a midget!” Spike protested. “I’m a b- a kid, is all.”
Carmilla sighed and rubbed her forehead with a finger. “So much for that,” she muttered. “Twilight, Spike, this is my kid sister, Sharon deGrange. Shara, meet Twilight Sparkle and Spike the Dragon, from Equestria. Ash is trying to help them create a direct link between our two universes, and I figured they could use the garden shed to hold the portal.”
Shara nodded. “I see,” she said. “So… That means I get to use the portal when it’s ready then, right?” Carmilla sighed again, but eventually nodded. Shara’s eyes lit up, and she grinned in a disturbingly gleeful manner.
“Why do I feel worried all of sudden?” Twilight whispered to Ash.
“I wouldn’t be,” Ash whispered back. “Shara’s too devoted to her computer science to find much appeal in Equestria. Not at the current tech level at least. Now,” he raised his volume and addressed Carmilla, “you were saying we could set the portal on the side of your shed?” Carmilla nodded, and Ash held up the spell notes he’d been studying. “Well, I still need to finish going over the spell, so you can go make sure the space is clear of debris while I work on that.”
“All right,” Carmilla said. “Are you going to need any material components?”
Ash looked at the notes and frowned. “Well,” he said, “there’s a full page here dedicated to building a framing array out of gems and gold wire…”
“Don’t worry about that part,” Twilight said quickly. “That’s on Equestria’s end; the portal doesn’t even need to have any identifying marks on this side, so long as it’s anchored in something solid.”
Ash continued to frown in thought. “No,” he said, “if we’re casting the spell from this end, we’ll need something to make Weave symbols with so the magic doesn’t unravel once we take our focus off it. Some kind of paint would do the trick.”
“Oh, we’ve got paint to spare,” Shara said.
“Good,” Ash said distractedly, focusing his attention squarely on the spell notes as he wandered off down the hall. “Whatever you have that’ll stand out against the shed’s color. Twilight, if you’d come with me please; I’d like to be sure we both know what we’re going to be doing.”
“Right,” Twilight said confidently.
As Twilight and Ash walked out into the back yard several minutes later, she was feeling much less sure of herself. “Maybe I should spend more time learning Weave Magic before we do this,” she said. “This is an extremely complex and risky spell, after all, and I still can’t sense the magic around me like you can, Ash.”
Ash put a gentle hand on her shoulder and guided her over to the wooden garden shed in the corner of the yard, where everyone was waiting for them. “Don’t worry, Twi,” Ash said, “I designed the patterns we’re each going to make according to our abilities. I’ll mostly be doing the ‘heavy lifting,’ gathering the magic threads together and cracking the dimensional boundaries. Your part will be to guide the spell toward Equestria and tie it to the anchor point. I can’t do that because I don’t know what to aim for, but you do.” He produced a fresh set of papers with intricate diagrams and put them in Twilight’s hands. “Just follow the pattern and focus your will on your goal, and everything will fall into place.”
Twilight did her breathing exercise a couple of times, expelling her nervousness and letting Ash’s confidence bolster her own. The pair reached wall of the shed, where a can of black paint and two paintbrushes waited for them, and Twilight knelt down, spread the diagrams out on the ground, and took the smaller of the two brushes. “Ok,” she said, “let’s do this.”
Ash nodded and took the other, broader brush. “Keep clear, everyone,” he said, looking at Spike in particular. “This probably won’t be flashy until the last moment, but you never know with new magic.” He dipped the brush in the paint, closed his eyes in a moment of focus, and then started painting.
Per the plans, Twilight waited until Ash had finished a few glyphs before starting to paint her own set next to his. The glyphs would ultimately form a two-layered arch, with Twilight’s finer glyphs as the inner layer. As Twilight painted the fourth symbol, she started to worry again, as she couldn’t feel anything she recognized as magic occurring. After she dipped the brush and started on the fifth symbol, however, she felt it: a gentle pressure swirling about on all sides and growing stronger as it moved down her arm and around the fingers that gripped the brush. Twilight began painting faster, her strokes becoming more confident as she moved up the wall. Her vision began to narrow, and as her line of glyphs started curving to the right to follow Ash’s line, the wall of the shed seemed to start bending inward. She became aware of the dark nothingness of the void between universes, and Twilight hesitated.
“Steady,” Ash said gently, moving to the other side of Twilight so he could keep working without reaching around her. “You feel the void now, don’t you?” Twilight nodded, pausing again as her hand started to shake. Ash took her free hand in his and said, “You’re still here, you’re just sensing how the spell is starting to reach out. Stay focused on where it needs to go, not where it is now.”
Right, Twilight thought, raising her paintbrush again. Equestria. The new mirror. I hope it’s ready to go. She double-checked the diagrams, and resumed painting.
As Twilight and Ash finished the top of the arch and began working their way down the other side, Twilight’s sense of the void faded into a sensation of light, and then a mental image of Equestria seen from high above. With each new glyph she painted, Twilight’s view zoomed rapidly closer to the ground, and soon she could see her castle, then the work room where the mirror stood. She saw Starlight Glimmer affixing a gem into the array on the mirror’s frame, and the glass flickered and Twilight saw herself, her normal alicorn self, reflected in the mirror.
With a final twist of her wrist, Twilight painted the last line of the final glyph, and the mental images vanished. She stepped back from the shed, looking over the arch she and Ash had painted. “Did it work?” she asked.
Ash looked over the arch with a critical eye. “The Weaves are holding,” he said, “and every line is clear and proper. All that remains is to activate it.”
“Activate it?” Samantha asked.
Ash nodded. “I built an activation phrase into the spell, so nothing will pass through the portal accidentally. Should help with regulating who has access, too.” He glanced at Twilight. “Well, shall we test it?”
“Yes,” Twilight said emphatically. She stepped up to the wall again and placed her hand on it inside the arch. Ash did likewise, and at his nod the pair both spoke the key phrase: “Destulf Equestria, Transport!”
“All right, that should do it,” Starlight Glimmer said as she set the final gem in place in the mirror. She looked over to where Sci-Twi was standing and asked, “Does it look ok to you?”
Sci-Twi tapped her magic detector lightly as she looked the mirror over critically. “I think that should be enough gems to hold the magic,” she said, “but without testing it I can’t be- look out!”
Starlight looked back at the mirror and jumped back when she saw the gems array was glowing and the glass was rippling. “What in Equestria?” she exclaimed.
A second later, she got her answer as Princess Twilight and an ash-grey unicorn stallion with a red and orange mane stepped through the mirror on their hind legs and promptly lost their balance. Princess Twilight picked herself up with a chuckle and then helped her companion to his hooves. “You ok, Ash?” she asked.
“Nothing broken,” Ashen Blaze replied. He looked around the room, taking note of Starlight and Sunset Shimmer, who was also in the room, and did a double-take when he saw Sci-Twi. “Um, Twi,” he said to Princess Twilight, pointing at the lavender unicorn, “Maybe we miscalculated a bit, because I’m seeing double yous.”
“Hm?” Twilight said, looking where Ash was pointing. “Oh, no, that’s Sci-Twi. She’s my double from another dimension. She helped craft the portal spell.”
Ash lowered his hoof slowly and gave the Princess a bemused look. “Doppelgangers again,” he said. “Bah re.”
“So, this is the infamous Ashen Blaze, I assume?” Sunset asked.
“Yep,” Princess Twilight said, brightly. “Ash, I’d like you to meet Sunset Shimmer. She’s a former student of Celestia who lives in Sci-Twi’s world now. And this,” she indicated the last pony in the room, “Is Starlight Glimmer, my friendship pupil.”
Ash glanced briefly at both the mares, nodded curtly, and said, “Hello,” before turning back to the mirror and putting his hoof on it.
“Wait, wait,” Starlight said, “you’re not leaving already?”
“I’ll be back,” Ash said. “I just need to verify this thing works both ways. Plus, there’s a certain dragon and small host of hangers-on that need assurance Twi and I made it safely. Destulf Taryn, Transport.” The mirror wavered and Ash stepped through.
“Well, he’s a real ray of sunshine,” Sunset said, deadpan.
“You get used to it,” Princess Twilight said with a shrug.
“So,” Sci-Twi said, walking over to the mirror, “we’ve successfully built a portal to another universe in, what, an afternoon? Amazing. Now what? Are we done?”
Princess Twilight checked her flank. “If we’ve accomplished what the Map wanted us to do,” she said, “our cuties marks should-” Her cutie mark and Sci-Twi’s flashed with light a few times. “There we go!” Princess Twilight said, grinning. “Mission accomplished.”
The mirror flickered and started rippling, and the Twilights both stepped back as Spike walked through, with Ash shortly behind him. “And there we go,” Ash said, brushing his hooves together, “back where you belong, Spike. Now, did anypony have something planned to celebrate a job well done, or do we just wing it-agh!” Two brown earth pony mares, one with a messy brown mane and a wrench cutie mark and other with a piebald snout and a film projector cutie mark, and a turquoise pegasus with a quill pen cutie mark and a wolfish tail came tumbling through the mirror in rapid succession, burying Ash under their bodies.
“Oops, sorry,” the mares all said at once.
Ash just muttered darkly under his breath as Sunset and Sci-Twi hurried over to help untangle the pony pile.
Princess Twilight started to help as well, but a sudden knock on the workroom door distracted her. She went to the door and opened it a crack, enough for her to see who outside without letting anypony see in. “Oh,” she said when she saw who it was, “Rarity! What are you doing here?”
“Pardon the intrusion, Twilight,” Rarity said, “but after helping Spike get all those gems today, I’m afraid my curiosity has gotten the better of me. Might I ask how your efforts to reach Ash’s world are coming along?”
“Uh,” Princess Twilight said, looking over her shoulder at the state of the room. Ash and the three Taryn girls had all managed to get to their hooves, so the Princess grabbed Ash in her magic, brought him over to the door, and set him down next to her before opening the door wide and saying, “See for yourself!”
Rarity squeed in delight and hugged Ash tightly, momentarily blind to the other ponies crowding the room. Ash shot Twilight a hard look over Rarity’s head, but it only lasted a second before his expression softened and he returned Rarity’s embrace with one leg. “Good to see you too, Rarity,” he said.