Sunset Shimmer. Celestia's student, element of magic, princess of friendship. From the outside, it was all perfect. From her point of view, it was quickly turning into hell.
Sunset Shimmer had everything one could ask for. Celestia's best student, wielder of the element of magic, recently crowned alicorn princess of friendship. Everything was perfect. Then why did it feel wrong? This was her calling, her destiny. This was the life she was meant to live. Was it not? Why did the world around look so alien to her? Why did it feel like somewhere, somewhen, something had happened the wrong way?
Princess Sunset Shimmer sat on a wooden bench atop a small hilltop looking over a park in Canterlot. The mid-afternoon sun's light streamed over the nearby tree, throwing its shadow over her and the rest of the summit. This had always been her favorite place in the park, the elevated, somewhat isolated position giving a perfect view of both the ponies spending time in the garden below and the sky above the city, usually hidden by the buildings, while also allowing one to rest undisturbed. It wasn't rest that the alicorn was looking for today though, as she was enjoying watching the younger colts and fillies playing in the fields.
Not many dared to challenge the heat of the late spring, most preferring to spend their time inside their homes, but those still in their youth were not so easily deterred, having no intention of wasting a perfectly good chance to forget school and homework and just enjoy time with one another. She somewhat wished she could've joined them, but she knew it would've been a rather awkward experience for all of them. Her relations with others had been like that ever since she had become Celestia's student, and she was sure her recent ascension would have only made things worse.
Still, on a better day she might have tried regardless. She could always get others to go past the barrier of her supposed importance, and the younger age would have certainly helped, given they weren't as used to the standards of social interaction as older ponies were. But Sunset was not in the mood to try today. Besides, she wasn't the only pony spending time on her own in the park.
Twilight Sparkle, another one of Celestia's students and probably the best one beside Sunset herself, was reading a book under the shadow of a small tree in a corner of the park, completely oblivious to the commotion not so far from her. Sunset had always wondered about her. She was an extraordinarily talented learner, being able to master about any spell she studied in mere days, sometime hours, all the more impressive considering she was younger than Sunset.
Despite this, there always seemed to be something off about her. She spent most if not all of her time with herself and her books, and the few times Sunset had tried to approach her had been unsuccessful at best. She always tried to avoid talking to her, their interactions felt unnatural, and Sunset once feared she would've dropped asleep in front of her, the look on her face suggesting she hadn't closed eyes for more than one night. They hadn't met directly after Sunset's coronation, but the indecipherable mixture of admiration, jealousy and what looked like hate she had seen in the unicorn's eyes at the event deterred the princess from trying to approach her again.
Sunset sometimes wondered if she would have ended up like Twilight had Celestia not taken care of her as closely as she had. She genuinely wanted to help her see what friendship was like, but never found the right chance to do so, the wall put up by the younger student always proving too much for her. It pained her to see such a talented and promising pony denying herself the possibility to become so much more than what she was already, and all because she wouldn't understand that others were there to help her, not to stop her.
It felt wrong. And unfortunately for the alicorn, it was not the only thing that felt wrong. There was something, she could feel it, something that didn't belong. She had realized she had always felt like this, but that only recently it had gotten strong enough for her to notice. It was like the music of the world was playing the wrong notes, like reality was dancing to the wrong beat. Everything felt forced, unnatural. The ponies she met sounded like actors playing their role with the wrong script. The city around her felt misshapen, like a painting seen through a distorting lens. The rays of the sun felt alien, their heat leaving her cold inside, the light falling at what felt like an angle that should not exist.
It was driving her crazy the more she thought about it, and she knew it would only grow stronger if she tried to ignore it. Reality all around her looked like a mockery of what it should have been, and the more she felt it the more she knew why. It was like looking from a place she wasn't supposed to look from, like witnessing a play from the side scene instead. And she knew why. She felt like she was wrong, like she wasn't supposed to be where she was. There was something, just out the corner of her eye. A shadow moving behind the courtain of existence, something beside her out there on the edge. The more she stared at the stage of the life she was put in, the faker it all looked to her, the more Sunset knew that she was not alone.
"What is the matter, Sunset?" Celestia asked before taking a sip of tea from the small cup she was holding with her magic.
She was a beautiful sight, the way her mane drifted on a wind that wasn't there, her white body resting over the bright crimson colored cushions at the center of her room. To Sunset's tired mind, she almost looked real. Almost, but the younger alicorn couldn't ignore the strings pulling and moving her teacher, nor the unending void looming beyond the confines of the room. It was a surreal experience, almost like her eyes were able to see in a dimension above the common ones. Celestia saw nothing of all those things, just like she couldn't see the figure of a pony sitting to the side near the fireplace of her room, most of their body hidden beneath a dull yellow hood and cape.
"It's... complicated," Sunset answered in a quiet tone, her weary eyes betraying her inner discomfort as she sat down in front of her teacher.
"You are the most talented student I ever had, I'm sure you'll find the right words."
The right words. Sunset wasn't sure she understood what was going on herself, let alone trying to explain it to somepony else. But that was why she was there, so might as well try.
"Have you ever felt like you were noticing something wasn't the way it was supposed to be? Like there was something wrong? Ponies acting weird, looking like they don't belong where they are, doing what they're doing?"
"You think there might be another changeling intrusion?"
"No, it's not that. It's not just ponies, either. It's like everything feels wrong."
"Maybe Discord escaped again," Celestia replied, taking another sip of her tea.
"No, no, its different,"-Sunset shifted awkwardly in her position,-"and what do you mean escaped? He's been reformed! He would never-"
A fit of pain shot through her head, cutting her short.
"Wonderful weather, wouldn't you say?" asked the white alicorn while staring out of the window.
"What does that have to do with anything?" asked Sunset, a hoof pressed to her temple.
"Whatever is happening, I'm sure you'll find a solution. You are my greatest student, after all."
"What if I'm the problem?" Sunset said, standing back up. "What if I'm the cause of all this?"
"Of course, my dear, I'll gladly join you for a tea at your place."
Sunset moved closer to the other alicorn. "What? Are you even listening to me?"
The headache made it painful to walk, a costant thumping from the inside of her skull trying to hammer its way out of her head. Her gaze unfocused and she stumbled slightly to the side before steadying herself.
Celestia's voice came distant and muffled to her ears. "I'm quite impressed by the progress you've made with those high precision teleportation spells, I'm sure they will be extremely useful in the future."
"What are you talking about?" the orange mare shouted in the direction of her mentor.
The sound of another sip of tea leaving the cup. "Don't overwork yourself. As for the party, I think a raspberry cake would be the best choice."
"Celestia?" Sunset slumped forward until her body collided with that of the princess. "CELESTIA!" she screamed, her hooves grabbing the other pony as the world came back into focus around her, the older alicorn's body unmoving despite her efforts. Celestia wasn't looking at her. It was like she wasn't even there.
"Goodbye Sunset," she said, her eyes tracing from where Sunset had been sitting before to the exit door. Her body then moved with a series of mechanical looking jerks, her eyes now staring at the slowly withdrawing figure of her student, her still full cup of tea repositioning itself as her features returned to a more natural look.
"What is the matter, Sunset?" Celestia asked before taking a sip of tea from the small cup she was holding with her magic.
"It's... nothing," Sunset answered in a quiet tone, an expression of terror painted over her face. "I just wanted to say hi."
Running.
Not to any place, not towards anything, just away. Away from all the madness that had become her life, away from the living nightmare that she was trapped in, away from the deafening silence of the void beyond the crumbling walls of her reality.
Running.
The mad pounding of her heart as she sprinted over the marble floors of the castle's corridors, the clacking of her hooves as she made her way through the halls, the short spasming sound of her erratic breath.
Running.
The rhythmical black and white of the checkered tiles, the rainbow hues cast by the light passing the stained glass, the gold and silver, red and blue of the banners lining the walls.
Running.
The pain in her legs as she pushed forward, the burning in her lungs as the cold air filled them, cutting like a knife on its way to them, the aching in her chest, her body screaming at her to stop.
She couldn't. She wouldn't.
She had to get out.
Out of that game, out of that play, off of the stage, out of wathever it was, out of wathever was happening to her and to the world around her, she had to run away.
And she couldn't.
No matter how hard she tried, no matter how long and hard she ran. The halls and corridors looped themselves, each and everyone like the last and the next. It was a twisted mockery of reality, a little space for her to have her little crysis before she went back to her place, time standing still as it waited for her to go back to her role.
And around every corner, beyond every turn, in every room, she saw it. That same figure, the same hooded pony she had first noticed in Celestia's room. It was following her, watching her, like it was a part of her, a part of her body that she'd forgotten about and was only now aware of, always with her wherever she went.
A missplaced hoof, a slip on the floor. Sunset's body fell forward, coming to a stop with a crash against the wall. The alicorn got up, tears in her eyes because of her situation more than because of the pain. The other pony was there, looking, mocking her with presence alone. The princess slowly made her way to the nearest door.
She entered the library. A few ponies were in the large room, some sitting at a table, others looking for a book on the shelves. Some were surprised by her presence, some greeted her in a stiff, formal way, others more used to her presence in the place gave her a welcoming smile, a few were too focused on reading to notice her. She paid no mind to their reaction, ignoring them and instead walking on between the bookcases, pain accompanying her every movement. She absentmindedly wandered the labyrinthine structure of literature-filled forniture, not caring for where she would end up. She was trapped either way, any place would be the same.
The sudden metallical clicking of a chain hitting her low held horn awakened her from her thoughts. She had inadvertently reached the entrance to the forbidden section of the archives. She had never been to that particular wing of the library, Celestia herself having told her she wasn't ready to go there yet.
She watched the sealed wooden and iron door for a few moments, pondering what to do.
"Screw it."
A blast of magic sent splinters flying off of the remains of the door, ripping it from the joints and turning the bulk of it into dust. Sunset strode forward through the ashes and the white-hot shards of metal, staring at the unlit corridor stretching in front of her. She had to admit, it was a rather unsettling darkness. But she had seen worse, everyday for the last few days. She helped her legs with a small flap of her wings and jumped into the shadows, her hooves landing on the smooth ice cold floor.
It broke.
Like a sheet of glass being hit with a rock the world around Sunset shattered, leaving a hole for her to fall into as all around her came crashing down, down, down into the void.
Sunset was falling, a maelstrom of nothingness swirling around her as she plummeted away from reality, glimpses of worlds beyond the world flashing through her eyes before she lost them in her descent.
She didn't land. There never came a moment in which she felt herself stop, an impact from her body hitting something. Simply, one moment she was falling, the next she wasn't, and she became aware that she was standing in the middle of a dimly lit hallway lined with bookshelves. The light had a strange green and blue tint to it, the air was cold, and the floor seemed to be covered in a layer of sparkling dust. She tried to move and found it unnaturally difficult, like being immersed in cream rather than air. She took a few steps forward and noticed that the small clouds of dust she lifted with her hooves seemed to hover in place, reflecting the light in a shimmering pattern.
She had just grabbed a book from a shelf with her magic when a sound startled her and caused her to drop it, the half opened tome remaining suspended in midair. She turned towards the source and saw a pony walking towards her. She was the same one that had been following her, she realized, only now she had lowered her hood to reveal her amber colored fur and her red and yellow striped mane from under which a horn was jutting out.
Sunset stared at her reflection in the cyan eyes of her slightly taller, winged, but otherwise identical double.
"You always have to go and ruin everything, don't you?"
Sunset stared at her reflection in the cyan eyes of her slightly smaller, wingless, but otherwise identical double.
"Who are you?"
"I'm pretty sure you know that one. Ever looked in a mirror before?" the other her replied, a snarky tone to her voice. "But I'm willing to let it slide. Why don't you ask me something else?"
The alicorn gave a grunt. "Where are we?"
"Oh, that's an interesting one," Sunset replied. She lifted her hoof and gestured dramatically. "Welcome to where time stands still."
"What's that supposed to mean?" the princess barked back.
"Exactly what it says, silly. I thought Celestia's star pupil would be smart enough to get it," the unicorn said while moving closer to her other self, "guess the standard for being a princess isn't that high after all."
The sound of gritting teeth could be faintly heard coming from Sunset's mouth.
"Or maybe it's just high compared to the rest of pony society."
A slight twitch could be noticed on the alicorn's left eyelid.
"But I guess it should be expected, given the quality of those who sit on the throne."
A flash of light, the unicorn's body was sent smashing on a bookcase before being pinned there by a pair of hooves, books falling off the shelves and stopping midway through their fall.
"Another word and your fur joins the dust on the floor."
The two glared at each other, the taller one's angry stare being met by an interested gaze from her unascended counterpart. It was the latter who broke the silence first.
"Irascible as always I see. That attitude of yours never got you anywhere good I recall. Not before I came to fix things, that is."
"Quit the nonsense and tell me what's happening."
"I'd love to, but it seems I'm not quite in a comfortable enough position to. And like it or not, Sunset, I'm your only way out of here, so you better make me want to help you."
The princess pondered what she'd been told, then begrudgingly let go of the other mare.
"Great. Now if you'll follow me, I'll be glad to tell about how you managed to screw up everything again, and about how I am going to fix this." The unicorn didn't wait for an answer, and instead started to walk in a seemingly arbitrary direction down the corridor, the other having to put in quite the effort as she struggled to follow her through the unnaturally dense air, already regretting her decision.
She finally managed to catch up to her, the two of them having arrived inside what looked like a large round library with other corridors departing from it, a staircase circling the room likely leading to another floor above them, the illumination too scarce to determine how tall the room actually was.
"So, about this place," she asked as they took a right turn down another bookcase lined hallway.
"As I was saying, time seems to be frozen in this place. Nothing moves if you don't touch it, nothing changes on its own. It's also the reason why the air acts so weird. It makes for some rather impressive scenery when you look at the hourglasses, especially the broken ones. There's even a number of perfectly working clocks that just refuse to tick. Funny thing, they're all stuck on eleven fiftyeight."
"What's funny about that?"
"Right, you wouldn't know that. I made sure you couldn't."
The pair took another right turn.
"But I should probably tell you more about me. Where to start? You can't imagine even half the stories I could tell you of gates and halls and silver keys. It would probably be faster to just make you read them. I wrote them all down, you know? Turns out, living here means I don't have to sleep, unlike you, so that leaves quite a lot of free time." The mare stopped and turned to her winged companion, her eyes opened unnaturally wide. "You'd be surprised to find out how much time you spend doing nothing but sleeping. Leaves quite a void to fill, when the only thing you want to do is keep watching and the show stops for eight hours." She turned her face away and resumed her walk, the suddenness of her action forcing the other to once again struggle to cath up to her.
She finally managed to reach her side, panting slightly as she watched the inside of the room at the entrance of which the unicorn had stopped. It was a circular room with a series of mirrors placed along the walls, a particularly large one with a winged sun chiseled at the top of its frame standing on the side of the room opposite to them, a green cushion sitting in front of it. Two tables lined the pathway between the door and the mirror, the left one occupied by a series of neatly positioned books standing side by side, each volume sporting the letters 'OGAHASK' written in bright gold, and under that a different sign on every book that Sunset deduced was part of a numbering system, although she didn't recognize it. The right table only had a single open book on it, an inkwell and a quill resting by its side.
"See that big mirror over there? That's where I'd be watching right now," the smaller of the two said as she started to walk towards said mirror. "Unfortunately," she continued, reaching the other side and touching the mirror's surface with her horn, which caused it to turn black, "it's broken right now, as you can see. Your fault. And all because you just had to decide there was something wrong when everything was going perfectly fine."
"I've said it before, but maybe I wasn't clear enough. Tell me what is going on, and be very clear about it, because I'm getting rather tired of your blabbering, so I might just decide to take the truth out of you," the alicorn spoke as she neared the other mare.
"You agreed not to use that forced secret reveal spell just a couple months ago, do you really value your promises to Celestia so little?" the unicorn said, watching as the other stopped and gave her a puzzled look. "Surprised? I know a lot of things about you, Sunset. More than you do, probably. But I do want to help you. So, where do you want me to start?"
"The beginning," spat out the princess, shooting an angry glare at the now smirking mare.
"Well, if you want me to do this properly I guess I'll have to start all over, so excuse me." The wingless one turned around, then turned again, an unconvincing expression of surprise crossing her face as she pretended to notice the alicorn for the first time. "Hello me-" she gave a slight bow "-meet the rea-"
She never finished the sentence, the wind getting knocked out of her lungs as the other Sunset's magic grabbed her and pulled her face up to the alicorn's, her eyes practically shooting fire at her.
"I said enough with your games," she growled at her.
The unicorn said nothing, and instead simply pointed at a mirror in a corner of the room, the top of its frame decorated by a stylized depiction of the sun. Sunset let go of her and walked towards the mirror, then lowered her horn and touched its surface. As soon as she did, images started to appear in place of her reflection.
Immediatly, the princess recognized her younger self as the one moving in the mirror. She saw herself studying, discussing with Celestia, reading books on her own. But there was something weird about the vision, things playing out differently than how she remembered them, that version of her seeming to have a completely different attitude. Yet for some odd reason nothing of what she saw felt wrong to her.
"What is this?" she asked.
The other walked up to her. "It's how things went once. How they went for me."
The images kept moving on the mirror, straying further and further from the reality the princess knew. Arguing with her teacher. Refusing to go out and play with others, choosing to stay inside and study. Celestia bringing her in front of a mirror. Another discussion. Breaking into the forbidden section of the library. Getting caught. Celestia having her brought away by a pair of guards. Knocking them out and running back to the mirror. Walking up to and then going straight through the mirror.
The unicorn to her side touched the mirror, turning it back to its normal reflecting state.
The princess turned towards her. "What did you do?" she asked in a whisper.
"I fixed our life." She returned her that same wide-eyed stare from before.
The alicorn pushed her aside and walked to the next mirror, this one decorated with a six pointed star.
"It wasn't an easy thing to do, trust me. Had to start all the way back from the beginning."
The mirror's surface came alive at the touch of Sunset's horn.
"From the day you were born, I made sure everything went they way it should've gone in the first place."
Sunset recognized the purple filly in the mirror as Twilight Sparkle.
"I gave you everything one could ever want."
The young student being sent to Ponyville by Celestia.
"I made you the perfect student."
Nightmare Moon's return, Twilight and her new friends finding and using the elements.
"I made you an alicorn, a princess, the most powerful pony in all of Equestria."
Discord's return, the changeling invasion, the Crystal Empire.
"I gave you the life that should have been ours from the start."
Twilight becoming an alicorn, her battle with Tirek.
"For every single day and night of your life I watched over you, making sure it all happened the way it was supposed to, making sure you reached the glorious future you were destined to."
As she watched the history of a world not her own unfold before her, Sunset finally understood. The horrible feeling of unbelongingness gnawing at her for as long as she could remember found the reason of its existance, and in that moment she knew that what she was seeing was the way things should have gone.
"But you just had to ruin it all again. It would have been so easy, Sunset. All you had to do was live your life. Everything was going to be perfect. Everything was going to be right. The brightest of futures, for the rest of all eternity, and you only needed to play along. But no, let's go around messing with the script. Why, why did you? Couldn't you see it? Could you really not see how it was the best possible life you could have? Did you really think you could find something better, that there was something wrong with what you had?" Sunset was practically screaming at this point. "I have worked so damn hard for this, Sunset. I've done things you couldn't even begin to imagine. And I won't let you take it away from me. I won't allow you to destroy the life I deserved!"
"This has to stop. We're going to change things back to how they were, now."
"I don't think you understand, Sunset." The unicorn's horn started to glow a bright amaranth, the glow around it rapidly expanding as she charged her magic.
The alicorn turned towards her a moment too late.
"I Won't let you take this away from me."
The blast hit the princess in full, knocking her half unconscious. She was dimly aware of the world bending around her, and soon she was falling again. Racing across the void, universes passing by her as she fell towards the sky, lights flashing in her eyes from alien stars in times impossibly distant, until finally she found herself anchored to reality once more, her vision blurry as she tried to determine where exactly she was. The world slowly came back into focus around her, and she became aware of a white silhouette sitting in front of her. She closed her eyes and shook her head, the low buzz in her ears finally coming to an end, and she focused back on her surroundings.
She recognized the place, she recognized the situation, and with horror she realized she had already lived through this same events.
"What is the matter, Sunset?" Celestia asked before taking a sip of tea from the small cup she was holding with her magic.
Sunset slowed down, trying to calm herself. She had found an exit before, she could find it again. All she had to do was get back to the library. Easier said than done, as the castle's shifting halls seemed to be leading her anywhere but there. She knew there was no point in running anymore, not now at least, but she couldn't stop her instincts from screaming at her that she should. She took a turn to the left and reached a dead end, her other self waiting for her at the end of the hallway.
"You should just give up. It'll make this much easier for the both of us."
"Why are you doing this? Can't you see that this is wrong?"
The unicorn approached the princess. "Because, as I've told you already, this is the way things should go. The way they should've gone since the beginning, and I'll make sure that neither you nor anyone else can try to change it. Even if it means having to send you back over and over and over again. This is the realization of my destiny, and I will not rest till it's done." Her horn gave a flash of light.
Princess Sunset Shimmer sat on a wooden bench atop a small hilltop looking over a park in Canterlot. She got up and stared cunfusedly at the scenery around her. It took her a moment to recognize where and more importantly when she was, but she soon identified it as the previous afternoon. The sun was still only halfway down, the young ponies playing in the park, and Twilight was still there, alone with her book. Twilight. She should have been the one with a pair of wings on her back. Sunset started to walk down the hill and towards the mare.
It was a risky move, she knew she was being watched and if she failed she would probably never get another chance. Slowly, carefully, Sunset made her way to the purple unicorn, trying to look as natural as she could. Only a few meters away from her now. She could see her other self watching, just a barely visible shape at the corner of her eye. She had to be as fast as she possibly could. Her horn was set ablaze with magic, that of the other Sunset following mere fractions of a second later. Two bolts of magic sailed through the air, one towards the alicorn, the other towards Twilight.
A flash of light later, Sunset was back in the hallway. She hoped it had worked, but to know for sure she would have to get back there. She started running again, in no particular direction. She knew her counterpart could maybe keep her trapped in the same place forever, but was certain she wouldn't, so all she needed was time. The caste's interior started to once again change to prevent her escape, becoming an endless series of identical repeating patterns, and Sunset kept running. She came to realize though, simply waiting would probably hurt her more than it helped her. The other seemed to be far more experienced at that game, and she didn't need to stop. She could probably let this play out for as long as she wanted, and only come in to send her back once Sunset became physically unable to carry on. It was a frightening thought, being stuck there running until her legs gave out, only for a chance to get sent to the right time. Sunset wondered if her mind would've given out first under those circumstances.
Or maybe it already had, and this was all just her imagination. It would have been an easier answer, really. No timeless chambers floating in the void, no mirrors showing other versions of reality, no insane evil unicorn Sunset from another dimension. She had just gone mad. Understandable, really, all of that stress from her position, all the fears of not being good enough, nopony would have been surprised if her head had just snapped at one point. It would have certainly been a funny story, Sunset had never fancied herself to be that creative, to come up with such a complicated, absurd story without even realizing it.
The unending sea of black and white tiles flew by under her as she kept running, the monotonous sound of her hooves on the floor filling her ears a perfect background for her thoughts to run free, the unchanging scenery presenting her with no distractions. Her reflections were interrupted eventually, when the growing ache in her legs became too hard to ignore. She didn't want to stop, but it was getting harder and harder to keep going. After some indecision, she finally slowed down until she was completely still.
As she had expected, she was greeted by the unicorn walking towards her, the shadow of a smile on her face. "I see you've finally given up on this little escape attempt of yours. Well then, Sunset, ready to move on with our life?"
It wasn't an easy decision to take, even after all she'd been through, but she had realized there wasn't really a choice. She wouldn't be sent back unless she strayed far enough from what the other wanted her to do, and trapped inside that hallway there wasn't much she could do beside what she was about to. Hoping that she hadn't really gone insane, that it was all real, she charged her horn and fired a blast of energy, then steered it towards herself.
Another flash of light, for one moment she feared she'd just made the last mistake of her life. The light cleared, and Sunset looked at the library around her. It worked. She thought about going back to the forbidden archives, maybe make it back to the room with the mirrors, but decided against it. She would only get trapped in the library like in the hallway. What she needed to do was force the other to send her back again. She didn't like the idea, but everything she did would be undone once she was sent back, which made it easier to bring herself to do it. She set her horn ablaze once again, and this time fired at the nearest pony.
Another flash of light.
In the middle of the library, surrounded by bookcases. She set them on fire.
Celestia's room again. She jumped out of the window.
The hallway, again. She didn't even lose time running, she simply blasted down the walls.
Again and again, she was sent back to different moments of her more recent life, and again and again she let loose of her magic to crash, break, destroy any nearby structure, to force the other Sunset to rewrite history once more, to send her somewhen else. Finally, after many attempts, she was returned to that afternoon in the park. She wasn't on the hill anymore, she was under the shadow of a small tree in a corner of the park, in front of Twilight Sparkle. And the look on her face told her that her plan had worked.
Twilight Sparkle was attentively reading from her book, resting under the shadow that a small tree offered. That had always been her favorite reading place, isolated enough from the center of the park, so that ponies wouldn't disturb her, but still allowing to see the entirety of the garden. There was another reason she liked that place, it had to do with the tree she was under. She always liked that particular tree. Small, isolated, one day it would grow to be the biggest tree in the whole garden. Almost the biggest, Twilight had to remind herself, the one on the hill would probably always be bigger just because it was older, not to mention how much work had been put into making sure that it grew to be the best one in the park, maybe even the city. Her tree hadn't received any of those attentions, but that was part of why she liked it. It proved that one could get far even on their own, even if it meant only being the second best.
The tome she was reading was an interesting one, an antique volume she'd found in the library, clearly misplaced there when it had been brought to Canterlot from the old castle and then forgotten behind an old and almost crumbled green book about focusing charms or something. She was currently concentrated on a passage describing the process by which matter was transported during teleportation, wondering if she could use it to come up with some higher precision variants of the currently used teleportation spells.
Despite what one would have thought by looking at her, she was perfectly aware of what was happening around her, she simply chose to ignore it. She was extremely good at concentrating, even with the sounds of the young colts and fillies playing nearby. So when the princess started to walk towards her from her bench up on the hill, she simply chose to not look at her. She wondered what she would mock her with this time. Boasting about how apparently everypony in Equestria had worked to get her where she was? Telling her to give up on her studies, because she would never make it on her own? Maybe she would just point out how everypony loved her and not Twilight, and how clearly that was simultaneously the alicorn's merit and the unicorn's fault.
There was something weird about how she walked, almost as if she was afraid. Probably afraid of ponies seeing her hanging around with Celestia's other student now that she was a princess. It wasn't right. She had everything Twilight could have wanted, and all because she had gotten there first. And because she'd been better, Twilight had to remind herself. As hard as she worked, she had never been able to match Sunset's results. It was frustrating, her whole life a struggle only to get second place. These were the thoughts swirling around in Twilight's mind as Sunset approached her, and distracted as she was she only noticed the spell from the alicorn's horn after it'd been cast.
It was by far the weirdest thing the young unicorn had ever experienced, so unlike any other thing that she didn't know how to describe it. After some time, and with inspiration taken from how she had learned the other had processed it, she would have explained it as what a figurine in a particularly complicated miniature with a series of moving parts would have felt if she had been removed from her place and shown the way the gears turned to make the simulated world seem alive. But when she was first hit with it, all she could do was stare blankly ahead as pure confusion washed over her.
A nauseating rush of information, memories, thoughts and sensations flooded her mind, messages flashing in her brain, chunks of data slotting themselves inside of her knowledge, her perceptions of the world around her being rewired as strands of concepts alien to her rewrote her convinctions and beliefs to become part of them. Suddenly she saw the world through a different light, suddenly she was aware of something deeply wrong going on around her. She took in all of Sunset's thoughts and memories, and from that moment she knew what was happening.
She saw Sunset's body in front of her disappear for a moment before returning. She made her way towards her as quickly as she could. It was all so confusing, that other version of herself Sunset had seen in the mirror, the way the world looked like to her now, Sunset's feeling blending in with her own. It was too much too fast, but that didn't matter to Twilight. She had seen what Sunset had been through, she'd almost lived it herself, and she was going to help her.
The alicorn moved towards her. "I don't know how much time I have before she sends me back again. I'll try to get back here after that, but I don't know how long it will take on my side. Twil-"
Sunset blinked in and out of existance one more time.
Twilight looked at her preoccupied. "How long did it take?"
"A couple of hours. But that's not important. Twilight, I need you to help me. I don't know how long I can take this. Please, h-"
Another brief disappearance.
Twilight noticed the look on Sunset's face. She was about to ask the same thing again, but the princess anticipated her question.
"Three months." Tears started to form at the corners of her eyes. "Help me."
She flashed in and out of reality again, but when she returned Twilight wasn't there, the residual light of a teleportation spell left in her place, her book abandoned near the tree.
Sunset was extremely annoyed by the situation. Everything had been perfect up until then, everything had been going smoothly, then out of the blue the princess had decided to start messing with the plan. Maybe some things never truly changed, maybe she would always end up doing what she was told not to. But it didn't matter, she could fix it. She could fix every mistake, every inconvenience, until her life was exactly how she wanted it. Until it was exactly the way it should have been. She just wished her other self would be a little more willing to cooperate.
She thought a couple of days of reliving the same events would have been enough, but it seemed the alicorn was far more resilient. She should have expected it, really. After all, she was perfect, the greatest creature to ever walk the land of Equestria. The strongest, most intelligent, most powerful, most beautiful mare in all of history, documented and not. And she could still become so much more, if only she stopped trying to fight her destiny.
Sunset sent her other self back to the hallway once more, a sigh escaping her lips. They had been going at this for months now. She wasn't really tired, but neither did the alicorn give any signs of fatigue. She was honestly starting to fear it might just go on forever. She turned to see the princess blowing up holes in the floor. With a flash of her horn and another low sigh she took both of them back to her time deprived home in the void.
The alicorn looked around confusedly, but before she could ask anything her mouth was shut by the unicorn's magical aura, four similar blocks of magic locking her hooves to the ground, one around her horn blocking her magic.
"I'm sorry that it had to come to this, Sunset, I really am. I've tried again and again to make you see what the right choice was, and all you did was ignore me and stubbornly go your way. I'm sorry, really. But I'm afraid you leave me no choice."
Twilight walked around in the castle's library, slowly making her way towards the sealed door that led to the forbidden section. She had to be careful. Even if being Celestia's student allowed her some more liberties when it came to taking stuff from the library she still wasn't allowed to go there. Finally she took a turn and found herself face to face with the door. She attentively scanned it with her magic. It had a spell to detect any damage done to it, one to prevent teletrasporting behind it, and a number of other fail-safes and protective measures.
She sat down in front of it and started to slowly untangle the complicated net of enchantments placed on the door. She meticulously probed at the spells one by one, carefully deactivating them in an order that wouldn't cause the others to trigger. One by one she removed every magical barrier, every protection spell, every built-in alarm system, until finally the door slid open with a loud metallical click.
Behind it was the same dimly lit corridor Sunset had seen. She walked towards it slowly, hesitating for a moment, then she finally stepped into the shadows.
As she'd expected, the world below her opened up and she fell beyond the borders of reality. Visions of alien landscapes briefly danced before her eyes as she felt herself moving further and further from her world of origin. She finally stopped, and looked around to see the same bookshelves-lined hallway she'd already seen in Sunset's memories. Now she had to... do something. Maybe go to the mirrors in the room and try to change things from there. Maybe look for what the other Sunset had written down and try to figure out how to fix things. Maybe find something else that could aid them in there. All she knew was that she had to help Sunset.
She was about to start walking when a sound from behind her made her turn around. Sunset Shimmer, the unicorn, was looking at her, a smile on her face. Twilight tried to run but found her body blocked by magical chains.
"You know, I never liked you, Twilight. Stealing away what should've been mine, and now you try to do it again. Luckily for us, there's no need for you in my new life. Which means I get to do this." She charged up her horn. "I've never actually tried this spell before, I wonder what it'll feel like to you. Well, guess you're about to find out. Goodbye my friend."
The spell hit Twilight in full, and then she was floating in the void, no direction to her wandering, no control over her movement. She saw her homeworld far in the distance, moving away from her. Somewhere deep inside herself she felt like something had been cut, like someone had severed her connection to her past life. She slowly drifted away in the endless nothingness between dimensions, tears running down her face.
"What is the matter, Sunset?" Celestia asked before taking a sip of tea from the small cup she was holding with her magic.
"Nothing important, Celestia. I simply wanted to say hi."
Sunset's voice came to her distant and fake, but she could do nothing about it. She watched her life play out from her own perspective, but she no longer had any control over it. Her voice spoke by itself, her body moved on its own. Now she was just another puppet on the strings, forced to play her role the way the other her wished. But she couldn't give up. She still had a chance, there was still Tw... Who... Who was there? She could have sworn there had been someone else. No, that couldn't be. She was alone, she was trapped. She would be forced to stay there and watch, see her own life happen before her for the rest of eternity, and there was nothing she could do.
It was a strange thing to see. A perfectly functional mechanism, gears turning in calibrated synchronism, each part harmoniously moving in perpetual synergy with the others, the endless prosecution of the world's underlying structure's carefully designed evolution. And yet, one thing seemed amiss. It was not interfering with the way creation unfolded around it, and a close examination showed it couldn't. It looked much like a misplaced label or a note left by someone else, or like a spare part unintentionally abandoned there, disconnected from the machine, a piece discarded or forgotten that served no purpose.
If one had observed the scene earlier, things would have looked much different. Broken joints, pieces falling off of the others and aimlessly bouncing around. There had been gears turning against each other, cogs splitting under the pressure of contrasting forces. There had been a large tear in the wall of reality, where one piece had been forcefully removed and thrown into the void. There had been numerous signs of damage left over from various attempts at rebooting the structure, and the marks left by one uncontrolled piece that had been purposefully trying to break the cycle.
But existence, even in the face of events as alien and unnatural as those which had transpired, found a way to restore itself. Tears healed, connections realigned, each part shifted and slotted itself in its new position. And in the end, despite the fact that the interference had come from outside, a way was still found to fix the damage and adapt to the changes brought.
What came next was the result of a pondered choice. Pondered upon incomplete and misleading information, and dictated by a whim much more akin to a purely esthetical taste than to an actual yearning for practicality, but pondered nonetheless. And in truth none could have found valid objections had they been in that situation. As meek as the desire for the spectacle to be more eye-pleasing was, nothing against it was laid on the opposing plate. Thus was the decision made, merely by the merit of there being no reason not to.
The piece was taken, reshaped, modified to fit the current paradigm, and then inserted back in the machine, where in had been found, its inner workings changed to match and allow for connections to the structure around it. Princess Sunset Shimmer forgot, though it would be more appropriate to say she simply remembered the way things had gone to reach that point, even if such events never truly happened. And she became what the world around her had always wanted her to be, she became another piece of the puzzle, playing her part without even knowing it. Not so terrible a fate, given how that world's script had been designed with her as the centre and goal.
The alicorn walked through the streets of Canterlot, content with a life that had given her everything one could have dreamed of and beyond, and was destined to give her even more and more. The sun shone bright in the sky, his warm rays streaming over the city, ponies merrily chatted along the road, and nothing was wrong with the world, and everything was right.
And in a lone chamber amidst the currents of the void a unicorn watched and smiled, damned for all time to watch the life she never had and never would have, joyful at the disappearance of her one and only hope to ever be freed from the prison she'd created for herself.
