Magical Theory

Twilight and Spike sat next to the open fire, reading in the warm glow cast by the flame. "It's probably not a good idea to have an open fire in a library - " Spike remarked as an ember spat from the fire and landed near his foot "- that is also a tree." Spike leaned to the side of his book as he stamped out the ember, his flame retardant scales making short work of the ember without hesitation or pain. "Literally everything in here is flammable but me,"

Twilight looked up from her book to turn to Spike. "It's perfectly safe. If everything here caught on fire, the entire place would have burned down whenever you have a sneezing fit," Twilight explained, a hint of humor in her voice.

Spike took this as a sufficient explanation, but wasn't satisfied as to it's effectiveness. "It's still not safe," he commented before returning to the world of Daring Do's exploits in the Kingdom of Chupacabras.

Twilight rolled her eyes and laid down her copy of Niccolo Maneievelli's "The Princess" and "blinked" up to her room.

Spike heard a slight popping sound and a flash of pink-purple light illuminate his pages for a brief moment. Seconds later, the situation repeated itself and a book entitled "Tree Home Care for the Average Unicorn" dropped into his lap.

"If you really want to find out how we make things flame-resistant, look it up," Twilight told Spike, a slight tinge of annoyance at what she perceived as being told she was wrong. "But Winter Wrap Up is still over a month away, and I'm a little chilly" Twilight announced, sitting back in her place. "So, I'll keep the fire going to avoid catching the sniffles" she explained, summoning a log in the fire to emphasize her point.

"All right, I get it" Spike mumbled, his patience a little thin due to having caught the very cold Twilight was now trying to ward off. "Horn head..." Spike added under his breath, using a term he'd picked up from Applejack after a Unicorn in Canterlot had referred to her as a 'Mud Pony'. "But I bet the magic doesn't help" Spike grumbled, recalling that Twilight had mentioned use of magic often added or created migraines.

"Perhaps it doesn't," Twilight conceded, "but it does save time,"

"I know - Celestia forbid you have to walk up the stairs," Spike jabbed.

"It's not just the travel time," Twilight began, letting Spike's comment slide in favor of being able to talk science. "I'm actually a few nano-seconds in the past or future whenever a warp," Twilight stated, putting down her book to give her full attention to Spike.

Spike too put down his book at the mention of time travel. He was fond of the concept of time travel, and was intrigued by Twilight's mention of it.

Twilight took Spike's silence as a sign for her to continue.

"Well, whenever I, or any Unicorn warps, we create a small wormhole in time-space which - "

"Whoa whoa whoa" Spike stammered, holding up his hand. "Wormhole? Space and Time?" he asked, looking for clarification.

Twilight was going to sigh at Spike's lack of knowledge, but held back - he wasn't alone in his lack of understanding. Twilight took a piece of paper from a nearby desk and whisked it over to her with levitation magic. "Say this paper represents the universe" Twilight began, holding the paper flat in front of her. "Normally, you'd have to go from point A" Twilight magically added a drop of ink on the far left of the paper. "To point B". A second drop of ink appeared on the far right, at the same vertical height. "Through normal means." A line appeared on the paper, connecting the two dots. "But this takes time. A lot of it at this scale," Twilight explained. "But, a wormhole," Twilight said, striking a hole where dot A had been. "Is a gap in Space-Time - the paper - that connects two points" Twilight folded the paper. The hole had aligned with the dot, so that one could look through the hole at the dot. "So, by using a wormhole, you don't have to go all the way across the paper - you can just bend it to get you there more or less instantly,"

Twilight threw the paper in the fire. Spike looked like he understood a little better, but was still confused. "So... what's space-time? Space and time are two different things, right?" Spike asked, seeking further clarification. Twilight let out a small half-sigh, trying to find a way to put her thoughts into words. Her eyes looked up left as she attempted to recall her lessons on the subject. "Space and time are two different things, yes. But, for the sake of what we're talking about, they occupy the same..." Twilight was hesitant to use the word 'space'. "Area," Twilight concluded. "Though time is progressing, increasing, the space we're in isn't; but they both..." Twilight trailed off. It had been a long time since her last lesson on relativity. She rested her right fore hoof against her temple. "It's difficult to explain... and kind of not important." Twilight said hurriedly, wanting to get back to the subject at hoof.

"My point is that my 'warping' or 'blinking' or whatever else it's called these days is, for all intents and purposes, a miniature wormhole," Twilight explained, taking her hoof off her temple and allowing it to rest in a more natural position. "So that means that, whenever I warp, I'm bending space around me to get where I need to go," Twilight paused, allowing Spike to give a small nod. "I think I follow..." he said slowly, genuinely intrigued now but struggling to wrap his head around the whole thing properly. "But, if I'm warping space, it also means I'm warping time - as I said, they're basically interconnected for the time being" Twilight continued "but that's a way over simplified version of things" she added, not wanting Spike to get the impression that's all there was to it. "Which means that, though the amount of space I'm bending is measurable - hence the apparent teleportation - the amount of time I'm bending isn't. But, I am bending it, even if ever so slightly. Because using a wormhole makes one move faster than light - as such, so does my warping - I travel a very miniscule amount into the future; a few nanoseconds at most."

Spike felt truly underwhelmed by this.  "So... how many times would you have to warp around to actually time travel?" he asked.

Twilight thought for a moment. "For it to be noticeable... too long" she concluded. "If I was warping constantly from the day I was born to the day I died, it still wouldn't be noticeable" Twilight told Spike.

"So, if you're technically in the future..." Spike began, "Do you have a delayed reaction to everything?" he asked. Twilight had to think for a little longer about this one. "In theory... I'm perceiving a separate timeline. And so are you, so is everypony else." Twilight remembered something a friend in theoretical physics concerning time travel had said. "Time isn't a line, it's not a set progression of events. It's more like a big ball of timey... stuff." Twilight recited. "Think of it like a balloon. If you dot a balloon, and take a picture of it. Then, blow up that balloon, and overlay the dots onto that. If you align one dot, everything else is out of line. Think of each dot as a person - they're all fine, but everything else is just off. So, you see and react to me as if I'm in your time-line, and I react as if everyone is in mine." Twilight attempted to explain. She was confusing even herself a little now. "Well, that's one theory. There is another..." Twilight mused.

Spike remained silent. Twilight decided that he either didn't care or was still interested. "I... could exist in a parallel universe,"

At this, Spike's eyes widened a little. He was listening somewhat intently now. "If every time I warp I'm bending space-time, I could be going to a completely identical parallel universe in which I'm closer to where I want to be," Twilight said. Spike looked a little puzzled. "If it's a parallel universe... then why is everything the same?" he inquired.

Twilight knew the answer to this one. "Because there are infinite universes. There are approximately 36 trillion particles in the universe - when the universe began, each atom could have chosen to pair with a different one, but still have the same result. So, if every atom could have chosen any other atom to get the same particles, there are 36 trillion, to the power of 36 trillion universes where everything is exactly the same. That's not to mention the other universes where there is only 1 more water particle, or something like that," Twilight explained. But she had saved the most interesting bit for last. "So, the chances of me coming back with anything different about me are infinitesimally small... but then again, the chances of intelligent life are insanely small... so one day a Twilight from an epic pony war in the future could come through," a grin spread across Twilight's face. "just food for thought!" and with that, Twilight went back to her book.

Spike, on the other hoof, would be thinking about how to get to that universe for the rest of his life.