Twilight's Confusion and Another Glimpse at What Should Have Been

It was the following day and the sun had been up for almost three hours. Twilight was watching the sleeping filly in front her, she had made her way to Eclipse's room almost as soon as she was up. Twilight was still mulling over what she had learned about not just Eclipse's ability, but also what she had witnessed because of it. While on the way to Eclipse's room Twilight had pulled all the books on parenting she could from her library, which unfortunately for her was a total of twenty books, she decided to read the books while waiting for the filly to come out of her slumber.

Twilight had literally read them all in the span of twenty minutes and Eclipse Touch was still sleeping. Spike had come in and removed the books from the filly's room quietly not bothering to ask Twilight what she was up to, because in his mind any day Twilight wasn't buried in literature was good. As Eclipse began to stir in the manner that indicated she was waking up Twilight quietly retreated to the door. And when Eclipse opened her eyes Twilight said, “nice to see you're up, since you've been showing such promise with your lessons I figured I'd teach the memory spell.”

“But I've just gotten an intermediate grasp on levitation, a beginners level on light, and just barely started properly practicing the cloud walk spell you showed me in that book,” said Eclipse Touch.

“That is quite true,” said Twilight, “but I think teaching you this spell will take a lot of stress off the ponies using that memory observation spell, and I really want to make up for intruding in your dreams like that.”

“It was your unfamiliar motherly concern for me,” said Eclipse Touch, “I didn't want to tell you about my experiencing that other timeline, but then at the castle my ability made it so that we all experienced it, I wish I had a better control over my natural ability.”

“You don't have to feel bad about that,” Twilight, “maybe when you have better control you can make it occur at will, come on let's get some breakfast.”

“Okay,” said Eclipse following Twilight. In the kitchen Spike had set up a massive stack of pancakes and was waiting for them.

“So, have you seen Spike in the alternate timeline?” inquired Twilight as she floated a stack of four flapjacks to her plate and Eclipse's.

“Once,” said Eclipse, “he had so much mass he could barely fit through the front door and really couldn't move all that much around the castle, the corridors were too confining.”

“That means Unity is supposed to be born later than this,” said Twilight with a piqued interest.

“Um, what are you talking about?” asked Spike.

“Well you see Spike...” Twilight stopped talking as she saw Eclipse's horn glowing at the same time she heard her friends all coming into the castle.

**********************************************

Rainbow Dash had no idea what was going on, when she tried to look around or say anything she couldn't. Then she heard and felt herself say, “Are you sure this is a good idea Soarin? I just had her a few weeks ago, my focus is going to be more on our foal than practice, at least when you were out training you could focus because you knew she was in my care, and let's face it I am an awesome mom.”

“Yes you are,” came Soarin's voice to her right and Rainbow Dash and she turned to see an older version of the Wonderbolt Stallion in his outfit with his hood off holding her's out to her as he ate a slice of apple pie and waited for his coffee to cool down, “now go get our daughter out of bed, you can leave her with Pinkie or Twilight. You know they're both capable, and it will our foal a chance to socialize.”

“Cherri's just as energetic as her mother and Unity is barely a week old,” said Rainbow as she took the uniform and got it on as she walked, leaving the hood off her head for after she and her Daughter were out the door.

“Rainboom Dash, it is time for you to get up because mommy's getting back to work today,” said Rainbow Dash as she walked into what looked like a new room in her cloud house, one which was darker than she wanted to admit. Shaking her head she pulled a few sections of the wall away to let in the morning sun, causing a large bundle of blankets in a cloud crib to stir. “Got ya, ya little sound flight,” said Rainbow while expertly pulling a little filly from under the blankets that with the same coat and mane as her staring back at her an angry amused look with eyes that looked just like Soarin's, which made Rainbow laugh because Soarin was terrible at making an angry eye look. Her laughter in turn elicited giggles of joy from the filly.

“Sounds like she's up,” came Soarin's voice in an amused voice from outside room, probably still at the table, “it's always the same routine with you two, do you think you could try practicing something new for your morning warm-ups.” This was followed by the sound of him drinking his coffee somewhere between a sip and a gulp.

“Mwa Mwa, Oosham,” came the filly's voice.

“Yes, momma is awesome, and so are you for those being your first words,” Rainbow smiled at the filly as she hovered out of the room with the filly in her forelegs. When she came back to the table, she found Soarin had already placed a bottle of warm milk where she could easily get it with the iconic Wonderbolt symbol on it, a baby shower gift from Spitfire. “She said her first words when I got her out of the crib a moment ago,” said the cyan mare as she brought the bottle to her filly who eagerly took the bottle in her forehooves and brought to her mouth and started suckling the bottle with fervor, “not so fast or you'll get a tummy ache, the hiccups or both,” said the rainbow maned mare with a firm tenderness she had discovered since her daughter was born.

The moment the Rainboom stopped and brought her mouth off the bottle she started crying in a manner that told Rainbow and Soarin that the filly had a stomachache, and half way threw started hiccuping, “She told you,” said Soarin trotting over and rubbing the foal's stomach with a practiced gentle hoof for a few seconds before Rainbow turned the foal over her shoulder and and patted her back in the way a parent does when they burp their foal, a few seconds later Rainboom let out a loud burp that gave Rainbow a half smile because of how it reminded her about how competitive she was with Applejack before having Rainboom. “We really should get going,” said Soarin in a more stern voice, “have you decided on where to take her before we head to Cloudsdale for practice.

“I suppose I'll leave her with Twilight,” said Rainbow as they were out the door. They descended towards Twilight's castle and just as they were coming down for a landing the door opened and Twilight greeted them.

“Nice to see you two,” said Twilight who then turned her attention to Rainboom and said, “and how is my little niece, Rainboom?” Fully expecting to hear the burbles of pre-language that a young foal makes, in particular the ones of amusement that Rainboom always seemed to give her.

Twilight was actually surprised when she heard Rainboom say, “Allkee, Allkee,” then giggle as Twilight took the foal in her magic.

“She said her first words when I pulled her out of bed today,” said Rainbow as she and Soarin pulled their hoods on over their heads and began taking off.

******************************************

Rarity watched from the common area with three foals near her. A little sleeping Fuchsia unicorn she had been calling Unity for the past five minutes, a bouncy pink filly with a cherry red mane that answered to the name Cherri, and white foal with a magenta and violet mane she had identified as her own foal by the name of Caring Jewel was curled up next her taking a nap. When Twilight turned around she had what looked like a foal version of Rainbow Dash in her magic.

“Darling, why can't you just have Applejack help us out?”

“Because the Apples want her foal to know what it's like to be a member of the family today. AJ's still not quite up to being able to perform on the farm, mostly because Zap Apple is taking up nearly all her attention.”

“I still can't believe that's the name she decided to go with for her filly,” said Rarity with a sense of amusement.

“I suppose,” said Twilight, “Pinkie pay attention to your daughter for more than five seconds, Cherri's liable to cause trouble.

“Don't worry,” came Pinkie's voice from the kitchen, “my Pinkie Senses will tell me about her if she's in any trouble.”

“Aside from the fact she seems to have inherited your Pinkie senses and uses them to avoid you whenever she can,” chimed Rarity, “at least my little Jewel is well behaved, as is Twilight's Unity.”

“That's just because they're both sleeping,” said Twilight setting Rainboom down next to her daughter before laying down next Unity Sparkle with her legs tucked under her, “Caring Jewel can be a hoofful when she's awake, especially when she's away from her mother.”

“Well, I'll give you that darling,” said Rarity with smile at the sleeping white foal at her side, “but she does seem to take after mommy.”

“All of our foals do,” said Twilight, “Unity just adores when I read new books to her, Cherri's as energetic as Pinkie, Zap's as grounded as her mother, and Rainboom is highly competitive for her age.”

“Yes, well Rainbow had Rainboom practicing flying almost as soon as the poor thing could stand.”

“She was flying almost a full day before she could walk,” Twilight mused

*******************************************

Pinkie Pie was in the kitchen of Twilight's castle making a big carrot cake for Fluttershy, the yellow mare seemed to always truly enjoy Pinkie's carrot cakes. It was while she was pouring each of the layers into a set of round baking tins that there was knock at the door and she hear Twilight's voice telling the messenger that she didn't care if the messenger said the message was from both Princesses Celestia and Luna she and her friends fully intended to be forgoing the Gala again this year. For one they were all caring for foals that weren't even near their second month. The sound of a frazzled messenger pegasus flying off was all Pinkie heard before Twilight said, “I can't believe half of Canterlot's nobility are saying that my participation this year is mandatory, my foal is barely a week old. I'd have to bring her along because most of them would be asking to see her, Unity has a natural sense about other ponies and that many faking ponies could honestly upset her to the point she starts crying the way she does when she wants you to give her space.”

“And none of the ponies at the party will understand and ask you to make her stop while still trying crowd you both when you try to get some space for the both of you,” said Pinkie as she placed the filled tins in the preheated oven.

“Exactly came Twilight's voice as she stepped into the kitchen, “what are you baking in here anyway Pinkie,” said the purple alicorn as she stepped into the kitchen.

“A carrot cake for Fluttershy, she's had nothing but those bland mother meals the hospital serves for the past month.”

“The Gala's tonight,” said Twilight, “last month I sent a letter to the Princesses stating that even if I wanted to I couldn't attend it in good conscience knowing what would happen when I brought my foal with me to the Gala. Unfortunately the nobles are pressuring Celestia to have me at the Gala this year, with Unity.” Twilight let out a deep sigh, “A pegasus carriage is coming to pick us up in an hour for the trip, I told the princess to make sure there's cradle for foals in it. Fortunately I saw something like this coming and had Rarity fit us both for formal attire a few hours before I headed off to Canterlot to meet Cadance, Celestia, Luna and my nieces.”

“Wanna lick the bowl,” said Pinkie offering the mixing bowl to Twilight who just shook her head. Pinkie suddenly felt a filly latch on to her right hind leg, looking down Pinkie noticed Cherri Party latched onto her leg in a joy filled hug.

“Momma, me want lick yum yum bowl,” said the filly. Twilight smiled and floated the bowl down next to the red maned filly who quickly set about cleaning the bowl with her tongue. Both of them smiled at the filly's antics.

They heard the sound of rustling and then, “mwa mwa, veer joo gluu?

“In here baby girl,” said Twilight, a few seconds later a fuchsia unicorn filly with eyes and mane almost identical to Twilight's trotted in sat down and made hugging gesture. Twilight smiled and lifted the filly up with her magic causing the fuchsia filly to giggle with joy.

“She still finds that fun,” said Pinkie with amusement, then she said, “no Pinkie I will not go out into the other room and make a loud celebration,... because there's a foal still sleeping out there, and Unity doesn't care much loud noises... I realized what it means to be a responsible mother, and before you say anything else sometimes that means doing something unfun to do something fun.”

The fuchsia filly then stopped her giggling and started rubbing her stomach and said, “mwa mwa, mee om humgwy.” To which Twilight floated the filly to her nipples and the sound of happy suckling followed.

“Don’t forget to tell us about all the great parts of the Gala,” said Pinkie as she moved to pick up her foal and the mixing bowl.

*************************************************

Applejack stared down at the foal suckling on her with honest joy. Her daughter, Zap Apple, had the same coat color as her, but her mane was colored just like a Zap Apple. Amusingly when the filly was born Applejack had been quite calm, her siblings however were panicking enough for nine mares, Granny Smith fortunately knocked some sense into them after they had been milling about for almost ten minutes. Now her baby was just a few weeks old and was already prancing around when she followed her mother, not telling her mom she needed to be carried around like the adorable sack of apples Applejack always imagined her daughter to be when carrying her.

“Ya'll er nuttier than squirrel stash if yah think fer one minute Ah'd let you interrupt my sister's quality time,” came an older sounding Apple Bloom.”

“I'm sorry ma'am,” came the voice of a delivery pegasus, but my instructions are to bring this package straight to ms Applejack and nopony else.”

“Let 'im in, Bloom,” said Big Macintosh, “Applejack's in tha family room with our niece, but Ah 'ave ta warn you tha' you might walk inta a sight of a mother tha' ya moight naught be ready fer.”

“I appreciate the warning mister Macintosh, by the way the boss says he would like to hire you on for a heavy load, you'll just be hauling it in the cart, but it's going to still be tricky to deal with.”

“Tell him Ah'll see him nex' week then,” said Big Macintosh as a bright red pegsus in a dark brown delivery vest trotted into the room with a considerable package balanced between his wings and clipboard in his mouth.

“Sign on the blank line ms Applejack,” said the pegasus. Applejack looked back at her suckling filly before taking the pen in her mouth and writing out her signature and setting the pen back in its holder which prompted the pegasus to pick up the clipboard in his mouth and gently slide the rounded square package in front of her before giving a respectful nod and leaving.

After he left Apple Bloom came into the room, in her nearly iconic overalls, and said, “whut ya git thi' time sis?”

“Open it up an' fin' ou',” said Applejack gesturing to the package with her head. Apple Bloom quickly tore away the brown delivery paper to reveal a set of four large apple shaped baby pillows that were each a different color (there was a red apple, green apple orange apple and zap apple), “tha' old one we 'ave 'as gotten ta tha poin' it would be a threat to mah little seedling, so Ah special ordered those ones from Rarity's Canterlot shop, tha estimated delivery time was next week, Ah'm glad they rushed the order withou' sacrificing tha quality.”

“Rarity probably tol' 'em just how big ah deal doing something li' this could possibly be,” said Apple Bloom as she removed the orange apple from the box and passed it to Applejack.

As Appljack was reaching for the pillow her filly stopped suckling and made the series of burbles and coos that told Applejack her filly wanted to nuzzle mommy. Applejack brought her face close to her foal and the two nuzzled noses with each other. After the nuzzling the filly curled up and went to sleep, at which point Applejack gently lifted the foal and ever so gently placed her on the pillow. She smiled at seeing her daughter on the pillow, which was a little bigger than the filly and thus gave the impression that she was sleeping atop a giant apple.

***************************************

Fluttershy nuzzled her newborn foal, almost an hour's worth of labor waiting for her foal to come at the hospital. The pain was more than worth it, the moment she was asked her daughter's name she said “Flutterjoy” almost as an instinct. The little foal had her coat and mane, but her eyes were a charming shade of forest green. Fluttershy was gently cradling her newborn, and she practically snapped at anypony that so much as joked about separating mother and child. All the tests had to be done right there with Fluttershy present, which was hardly standard procedure or protocol. However everypony knew how protective of their foals mares could get, and most of ponyville was more than familiar with Fluttershy's more aggressive side by the time the foal was born.

“Alright, ms Shy let's go over the data so you can be brought up to speed on your foal,” said Nurse Redheart, the only one of the medical staff that Fluttershy had not frightened to point of almost collapsing or wetting themselves, “time of birth is eleven-forty-three in the morning, no anomalies were detected in the tests of your foal, she's sleeping comfortably, we all really wish you would let us put her in a bed instead of holding her all day.”

Fluttershy turned to the nurse and in her usual soft voice said, “I would find that acceptable only after you allow the infant bed to be near my hospital bed. We can go home tomorrow, right?”

“Yes of course, we just need to keep you both here overnight to see if we missed any possible complications during our initial observations. Also we'll need to take some small blood samples from both of you to better check for any inherited complications.”

“Did all my friends have to go through this?” inquired Fluttershy.

“Well, yes,” said the nurse, “Twilight and Applejack earned some quick reputations amongst the medical staff that were so intense that we notified the main medical center in Canterlot about their stay here during their pregnancies, your friend Pinkie was uncharacteristically calm about it all up to the point we tried to take her foal for testing, Rarity took it all as well as we expected, and Rainbow Dash had to almost be held down during her stay here. We recommended home birthings to all of them, we extend the same recommendation to you. Maternal mood swings can be frightening, and maternal protective instincts can be far more terrifying. Your protective maternal instincts aren't letting us take your foal more than ten feet away with us before you become far more aggressive than anypony is prepared to witness.”

“Oh my,” said Fluttershy as she continued to cradle her sleeping foal, “I just want to make sure she's safe, I'm so sorry for being so mean to everypony.”

“It's to be expected,” said the nurse, “mare's have a highly aggressive defense reaction for the first couple of days that follow the birthing of their foals, just keep in mind that this is potentially your first of several foals and your maternal instincts well react differently in response to not only the medical staff, but also your friends and children. Most of your reactions will correlate with the kinds of bonds you have with each of your friends and children.”

“You had to go over this speech at considerable length with Twilight,” said Fluttershy with a smile at the sleeping bundle in her forelgs.

“Yes, at great lengths,” said the nurse, “even in full on protective mother mode she wants as many details as possible for everything.”

“I think it's moreso now that she's a mommy,” said Fluttershy, “before it was just curiosity and a desire to learn, but now she needs to know so that she can better protect her foal.

“You're probably right,” said the nurse, “it's good to see you are mostly reasonable, I'll inform the staff to bring an unused foal bed to your room and place near your bed, it should only take an hour to get to your at the most.”

“Thank you very much,” said Fluttershy as her foal yawned and fluttered her eyes open, before the foal could make a sound Fluttershy positioned her foal so she could begin suckling from her mother.

****************************************

Spike was surrounded by golden coins and a massive number of gemstones in the biggest cave he had ever seen. Not that such a thing was surprising seeing as he was almost too big to get through the front door of Twilight's castle. Spike was preparing to go out and hunt in the Everfree Forest, of which his cave was actually in almost the exact middle of, when Princess Luna and a white unicorn with an three toned mane of orange, indigo and yellow trotted in. Spike gave the young unicorn mare a quizzical look.

“Greetings Spike,” said Princess Celestia, who was now around half his size, “it has been far too long since we last spoke.”

“I was just getting ready to go out and make a supply run,” said Spike in his now rumbling deep voice, “but I suppose that can wait for short while, who is this unicorn with you?”

“I completely forgot you never met her after she was born,” said Celestia with a hint of shame in her voice, “this is my daughter Sola.”

Spike raised an eyebrow as Sola said in a warm voice that was similar to her mother, “it is an honor to me you mister Spike, mom has told me much about how things were when you were younger.”

“Did she also tell you that she towered over me in my early days as Twilight's number one assistant, I miss those days at times,” said Spike with a hint of nostalgia in his voice.

“Um, no,” said Sola with genuine surprise.

“Don't be too surprised,” said Spike, “she was always taller than most ponies for as long I've known her,” then turning his attention to Celestia, “Twilight sent me a note saying that Canterlot's nobility practically forced her attendance at the Gala tonight into mandatory, I thought you had final say in Gala matters Princess.”

“Normally I do,” said Celestia, “but half the Canterlot nobility all called for mandatory participation of Twilight, Luna and their foals.”

“But Twilight's Foal is barely more than a week old,” cried Spike with a voice that lightly shook the cave.

“As is aunt Luna's,” said Sola, “Stella is only a few hours older than Unity Sparkle.” Spike smiled at the name of Twilight's foal how and she seemed to always coo and giggle when she saw him, “please tell me I'm not also on the mandatory participation list,” said Spike, “I don't think I'd even properly fit in the dance hall.”

“No, your fine,” said Celestia, “I just came to remind you that matured dragons have a much more pliable physical form than their younger states, and Sola just wanted to meet you.”

“Oh,” said Spike, “I've been practicing little changes, but nothing as drastic as a full body change. One moment,” the purple dragon closed his eyes and focused he began a slow, yet rapid, transition to a wingless dragon that was roughly the size of Celestia he then opened his eyes and asked, “nothing is out of place? I don't look like some freakish monster do I?”

“Nope,” said Sola, “you look like a wingless version of your larger self that happens to be mom's size.” Spike let out a sigh of relief, then his eyes went big.

“My wings removed themselves in the transition,” he gave out a deep heavy sigh, “it took me months to properly figure out how to keep those from getting too big while still looking impressive.” The ivory multicolor maned mares both giggled and bid Spike a fond farewell.

Spike watched the 2 leave scooped up a claw full of gems next him and began to chew on them with a new fervor, exercising his metamorphic properties always gave him a craving for gemstones that was much stronger than usual.

*****************************************************

Twilight, Spike, and Eclipse Touch blinked before they heard Applejack's voice say, “Wha' in tarnation was tha' Twi?” As she finished the question the five mares entered the kitchen to see the sight of Twilight, Eclipse Touch and Spike preparing to eat breakfast.

“Sorry about that,” said Eclipse Touch, “but sometimes my canceling ability flares up and tries to correct the timeline, but keeps running into a paradox so we just experience the other timeline for a bit before snapping back,” The black filly quickly started slowly munching a pancake to avoid further conversation.

“That was soooooooooooooo much more fun than the last time,” said Pinkie with excitement.

“Wait, you mean we're all supposed to be mothers,” exposited Rainbow Dash, “and that I'm...” she started blushing the moment she cut off.

“Really Pinkie,” said Rarity, “Cherri Party Pie, that's what you decided on as a name for your filly.”

“Ah don' see nothin' wrong with the names of any of our foals,” said Applejack.

“Applejack, darling, you named your filly Zap Apple,” interjected Rarity, “that's not exactly the charming name a filly should have, now if she were a colt I'd understand.”

“You're not much better,” said Twilight, “your filly's named Caring Jewel.”

“It's graceful and elegant, the way a proper filly's name should be.”

“And the fact that her name goes well with your Canterlot boutique has nothing to do with it,” said Rainbow Dash with a smirk and an eye roll, “at least my filly's name is awesome.”

“Rainboom Dash,” said Rarity with sense of bemusement, “her name is a trick you can do and sounds so close yours it borders on narcissistic ego stroking.”

“We never really saw Fluttershy though,” said Rainbow, “Flutters, where were you?”

“In the hospital having my foal,” said Fluttershy in her usual gentle voice, “I named her Flutterjoy, she looks almost exactly like me.”

“Almost?” inquired Twilight.

“She has my coat and mane, but her eyes are a different color.”

“Cherri Party has Pinkie's coat and eyes, but her mane is cherry red,” said Rarity, “Caring Jewel has my coat and eyes, but but her mane and tail are two-toned like Sweetie Belle's.”

“Unity Sparkle has my mane and eyes,” said Twilight, “her coat is beautiful shade fuchsia.”

“And mah little Zap Apple has my coat and eyes, but a mane all her own,” said Applejack, “foals will always resemble thair parents no matter wha' happens.”

“Wait a cloud clearing minute,” said Rainbow Dash pointing a hoof towards Eclipse Touch, “she just said this isn't the timeline we've been supposed to be living in, and the one where we all have foals is the one we're meant to be in. I have no problems with being a mom, I'd be an awesome mom, but how do any of us know that was the timeline we needed to be in?”

“Because the princesses and I experienced yesterday, along with Pinkie,” said Twilight and we all came to the consensus that something about our current timeline is off.”

“How is that possible?” inquired Rarity.

“Sola, Heart Guard, Stella and Unity Sparkle were stolen before they had chance to be concieved,” said Twilight, “they were all raised as siblings in nation with different names and appearances in a nation that Equestria has passed in all areas.”

“The displacement of the foals of Equestria's four alicorns caused a temporal ripple effect that prevented the events that would lead to the original foals from ever getting chance to be concieved and born by their mothers,” said Eclipse Touch, “my siblings and I are the foals in question. It also had the side effect of making so that the events that are supposed to lead to you having foals is far less likely to happen.”

“Who were you meant to be?” inquired Rarity.

“Unity Sparkle,” said Eclipse Touch, “Dream Step was meant to be Princess Luna's daughter Stella, Storm Walker was meant to be Princess Cadance's son Heart Guard and Sunshine Bottle was meant be Princess Celestia's daughter Sola.”

Spike dropped his fork and cried out, “WHAT? YOU MEAN I WAS SUPPOSED BE AN UNCLE? That is not cool, somepony is going to have to answer to all of us for that one.”

“The foals that were able to properly speak also referred to Discord as 'uncle' by the way,” said Twilight. All six mares, and spike, started to laugh hard.

“The funny thing is I can totally see Discord playing with the foals,” said Rainbow Dash, “and they'd grow fond of his antics as well.”

Twilight's horn suddenly flared and a scroll with Luna's moon appeared, all of her friends looked at her before Twilight said, “I've been working on a new spell for communicating with the princesses, so far I'm only able to receive the messages half the time, but so far I still need Spike to send the return messages.”

“It's highly unusual for you to receive a letter from Princess Luna,” said Rarity.

“Not as unusual as you might think,” said Twilight, “we've been sharing stories back and forth for the past year now. But it is highly unusual to receive one of her letters while the sun is still up.”

“Well open it,” said Pinkie, “we need to keep the story going somehow.” Every other pony in the room just shook their heads in the 'typical Pinkie' way.

Opening Twilight found Luna's scrolling script with the Cs made in the to resemble a crescent moon reaing aloud what the Lunar princess's letter was saying, “greetings Twilight, I am sending this to you to inform you that my sister is starting to feel preoccupied by the revelation that the young mare Discord decided to drop into our castle was supposed to be her own genuine child. She is currently trying to undo the damage that her lesson's in that other nation seem to have done to her. Just as we were informed she is indeed a very bright young mare, but the cultural mentality that she was trained in seems to have seems to have done far worse to her psyche than originally thought. Also it appears with my sister's overwhelming willingness to acknowledge her efforts she is willing to acknowledge that she has made mistakes and seeks to mend any wounds that she is becoming aware she inflicted. We will both keep you up to date on her progress, as well as notify of any relapses.

~ Best wishes on your end, Princess Luna”

“Well, that was different,” said Rarity, “but isn't she mentoring Dream Step?”

“Yes she is,” said Twilight floating the message over to her writing desk, “but Dream Step is keeping primarily nocturnal hours, it could be months or years before she is able to keep up during both day and night.”

“You've always been keeping odd hours yourself, darling,” Rarity, “why isn't Eclipse Touch having difficulty keeping similar hours to yours?”

“Probably because the vast majority of our hours together have been consistently within the daylight hours, I have yet to learn during night hours, she has plans to give an astronomy lesson tomorrow night,” chimed Eclipse Touch from her seat before taking a another massive bite of her small pile of pancakes and started slowly chewing.

“Care ta explain thi' one Twi,” inquired Applejack.

“Somepony created a spell for locating ponies the future with potential to bring great change, that same somepony created a spell for stealing those ponies from their mothers in the future and turning another pony into their surrogate mother in a period more close to their current present. Eclipse believes it to be the Spirt of Stagnation, Still, and after reading Myrraldin's journals I would be inclined to agree. Still is a spirit that is the complete opposite of Discord. Nopony knows what she really looks like because she always takes a 'host form' and acts in place that pony ensuring that every aspect of a particular nation stagnates, it takes a few decades or centuries, but she never changes her apporoach, even when all the evidence says she should. She also jumps hosts, making sure their appearance is similar to her prior host in build and coloration of both their coat and mane.”

“Why that's just terrible,” said Rarity.

“Yes, well I initially thought style in Bridleton went unchanged for 200 hundred years,” said Eclipse Touch, “but after I realized that Still was prancing around in Grand Charm's body I came to the sudden realization that our fashion scene probably stopped over a thousand years ago,” Eclipse Touch noticed her plate was empty and went to get some more pancakes, but stopped by Rarity litterally picked the black foal up with her magic and told her that it was time for a proper fitting when the discussion was over and the filly needed to be more active in said discussion, Rarity then plopped Eclipse Touch down between Fluttershy and herself.

“Is this really...” a bright flash disrupted her train of thought and everypony noticed her flank now had a purple alicorn with wings spread circled by an orange apple, pink butterfly, blue balloon, red lightning bolt and violet diamond.

Eclipse blinked for a few minutes before saying, “I have no idea what just happened.”

“I do,” said Twilight, “like sharing knowledge as much as you do obtaining it, you've tried very hard to hide this part of yourself, but it turns out that interacting with my friends like this helped your discover what you want to do with your life.”

“But I still don't know what my special talent is, exactly,” cried the black filly.

“It's dispelling, darling,” said Rarity nuzzling the filly, “you have the natural ability to dispel the magic of others and feel a need to dispel the the misunderstanding and lack of knowledge in yourself and others.”

“That's why you suddenly realized Sunshine Bottle was meant to be Sola,” said Twilight, “and why you felt the need to fill her in on the truth.”

“In a way your abilities and special skill are an extention what Twilight's amazing magical talent,” said Pinkie excitedly.

“Twi's talent for magic is partially affected by her understandin' uhf ah spell, and yer talent drives you to understand a spell aus well,” said Applejack.

“You and Unity have just as magical potential as I had at your age, and when you get near the age I was when I first met my friends you'll probably have around the same level of ability I had,” said Twilight, “whether Unity Sparkle or Eclipse Touch by all rights you are the daughter I'm meant to have.”

“Then I guess the real question is how to properly restore the timeline,” said Eclipse Touch, although if we are successful we won't remember of this, I'll be a newborn foal and none of what we've just been discussing would ever reach you. I know it sounds like a really tall order, but we need to find a way to expose Still to the exact same force used to stop her in this timeline. That means we're going to have to find a way to get her to come to Equestria, which I'm sure she's already doing because of Great Spell's urging her to do so because of not only the disappearance of me and my siblings, but also the removal of the spell books I brought and the sudden disappearance of Myrraldin's journals from her private collection.

Has anything like this happened in Still's history before?” inquired Twilight.

You read all of the journals,” said Eclipse Touch, “you are more qualified to answer that than me, Myrraldin claims to have known the history of Still better than anypony in one of journals that I read.”

Twilight closed her eyes and started scanning through her now highly impressive book memory before opening her eyes and saying, “all who chose to defy her never left the boundaries of their home nation, you and your siblings are the first to do so. She has no precedent for something like this, which means she has no procedure to follow in retrieving you.”

“And since Still doesn't like any sort of deviation that means she'll be appalled at the notion of using another policy as a template, and she most assuredly won't play things by ear.”

“Alright everypony time to leave,” said Twilight, “I have a lesson with Eclipse to get too.”

With a nod the other five mares began to leave the castle and Twilight went over to the chalkboard, just before leaving Rainbow Dash said, “Twilight, if it's any consolation I think all our foals would be awesome friends!” with that she was out the door and it closed behind her.

Twilight smiled as continued to write out the formula and draw the diagrams for the memory spell that had helped save her friends after their first encounter with Discord. When that was done she said, “Alright this spell works on the principle of transferring copies of memories you have, so it will require a lot of concentration, which I am more than certain you have considering you were the one with drive come to Equestria more than your siblings...”

Author's Note

And we've reached the point where I try to figure out what comes next. I 'm thinking of making the next chapter a look at Storm Walker's version of the memory that Eclipse and Dream offered up, and as such it would be a chapter with him as the focus (but only for the single chapter).
I'm working on a companion piece for this story, which is written in the styling of journal and Diary entries from Storm Walker and Snow Feather. However since I want to convey part of the story through font style I'll have a Google doc version to accompany the FiM fiction version if they do not a have a choice of different font styles available for use by the time the chapters for the story are ready to be posted. I just would like to reiterate that I would really appreciate comments and all the characters that I have created are free for you to use so long as you give me a notice of intent to use before you post anything with them, and as always if it's a visual art piece please send me a copy.