Lyra through the Worlds

Lyra couldn't believe what was happening at the moment. She was furious. Bon Bon finally said that she might know somepony, who could help searching for her father. One that might actually know where he was. And now both were standing in front of a blue phone box.

    “Is this some kind of jo-?” Lyra was cut short by a little explosion inside of the box. Almost instantly afterwards, the door opened and smoke spread around the area. Caught in a black cloud, they didn't even notice the gray mare coughing with them. After, what felt like a minute, the smoke cleared.

    “Derpy? What were you doing in there?”, Lyra and Bon Bon cried out in unison. The cross-eyed pegasus coughed a little longer, due to a longer exposure to the result of the explosion.

    “Sowwy, girls. Let's just say my expewiment didn't work out as I expected.” She stood up and cleared the ashes out of her blond mane.

    “Oh, I didn't know you were his new companion.“ Bon Bon stated.

     “Technically, I'm his old companion. What are you two doing here, anyway?”

Before any of them could say another word, a British voice came from far inside the telephone booth. “Derpy, how many times did I tell you not to make the experiments BEFORE I check on the theory. This is exactly what I'm trying to avoooooiiiid.”

He was noticeable surprised by his unforeseen guests. He was quite a sight. Gelled up brown mane, matched with light brown coat, striped brown suit, combined with white shirt and crimson tie.

    “Hello there, ladies. Care for a cup of tea?”

As the smoke was finally gone for good, they entered the booth and Lyra couldn't scramble words inside her head. This room was the most bizarre thing she has ever seen in her life (but not the most bizarre thing she will ever see in her life).

It had to be at least 10 times the size of the box from outside. The room consisted of a strange column in the middle and some gold-ish, bronze-ish formations reaching up to the ceiling.  She finally managed to say something. “This place is bigger on the …” - “Yes, on the inside. It's dimensionally transcendental. Don't ask. I think it would be too much to explain.”

After a few minutes of habituating to her new surroundings, Lyra finally had the confidence to ask a legitimate question. “What the buck is going on here?”

    “What exactly do you mean?”

    “Well, where do I begin? Who are you? What is this place here? How do you know my girlfriend? How can you help us? And, yes, I'm going to ask, HOW IS THIS PLACE BIGGER ON THE INSIDE?”

    “Well, first of all, I am the Doctor and … “

    “Doctor who?” (yes, I know that was forced)

    “Just the Doctor and this place here is called a TARDIS. It means  'Time and Relative Dimension in Space.'”

    “Kind of a long name for a telephone booth.”, she said in an overly sarcastic tone.

    “Actually, it's a spaceship.”

    “A spaceship?”

    “A spaceship in disguise.” He made gestures with his hooves in order to try to support his statement.

Lyra could not believe she was having this conversation. She was waiting for the ponies from that TV show, “Hidden Camera”, or Princess Luna showing up, telling her it was all just a bad dream. But, Bon Bon wouldn't lure her here, because of such a thing. Plus the slap she gave herself proofed, that it was not a dream. And since this place REALLY IS bigger on the inside, she decided to play along.

    “Your question about the size of the inside and outside of the TARDIS, is quite difficult to explain. Uhm … oh, got it.“ He cleared his throat before he began to declare the, not so secret, secret of the box. “Imagine a cube. And now imagine a bigger cube. The larger one could be able to fit inside the smaller one, if the bigger one is further away, and yet, immediately accessible at the same time.”

Lyra still looked a bit puzzled, but she got the idea. Though it still seemed strange, she was familiar with the concept of teleportation, so what he said was not totally unfounded. “You mean like, this place is in another dimension.”

The Doctor was now the one to be confused and, more importantly impressed. “Actually it's more of a pocket dimension, but I have to say I'm impressed. So, about your friend here. She joined me on a couple of expeditions, for a while. For about, … I don't remember. Uhm, Sweetie Drops?"

    “Six Months.”

    “Thank you, Sweetie Drops."

    “Okay, we hang out together nearly every day. I think I would have noticed you disappearing for six months.”

    “Yes, you would have. It's just … in your time it was only about 3 hours.” Bon Bon knew how silly that sounded and Lyra could hear that.

    “Wait wait wait wait. Hold on a second. In MY time?” She really started to get furious.

    “Yes. You see. This is also a time machine.”

That was it. Lyra had enough. She shook her head, let out a loud grunt and headed straight to the door. Spaceship? Sure. But an actual time machine? No way.

    “What? You don't believe us? Here, let me prove it to you.” The Doctor jumped up from his seat and pulled a strange stick out of his jacket. He pressed a button, which was followed by a green light and a buzzing, and the door was locked.

    “Hey, let me out.”

    “I'm gonna let you out. Just wait a bit.” He bounced onto the giant machine in the middle of the room. It was a confusing looking thing with a lot of buttons and keyboards on it, emitting a turquoise light. It was pretty clear that one had to study this machinery for decades to figure out how it worked. As he pushed the said buttons and hammered on the keyboards, the TARDIS made strange sounds. The lights faded and lit up for a few moments.

    “Now, take a look outside.”

Lyra hesitated but then opened the door anyway. Before her eyes she saw a blooming town. It was still very small, but additional buildings were already being constructed. She looked over to what seemed to be Sweet Apple Acres, before the trees were planted and saw a little filly and a stallion planting seeds and with multiple bright flashes the trees shot out of the ground.

This alone would have been strange enough, if she hadn't heard this story before. It was the story of how Ponyville was founded.

Lyra's eyes flung open and her jaw dropped as she finally came to the realization. “Oh my bucking, sun-butt and moon-cheeks gods. I'm in a time traveling spaceship.”

The Doctor suddenly appeared next to her, slowly closing the door. “And for your last question, I don't know, whether I can help you or not, if I don't know what your problem is.”

So Lyra explained the story of her father, her mother and the strange world he talked about in his stories, while the Doctor was playing with his instruments to get them back to their time.

    “Well, this certainly sounds ... interesting.”

    “I knew it. Sorry we bothered you. Come on, Bon Bon. We go.”

    “Oh no no no no. I have never said I wouldn't believe you. I just said interesting, and it is interesting, indeed. I am very glad you came here today. For I am also looking for this world.” Everypony was stunned by that statement.

    “Yes. Every 30 moons, for 3 days, I pick up a signal. From another TARDIS. But, like, from MY TARDIS. I believe it could be the version of me from another universe or parallel dimension. Maybe even from an entirely different reality. So, yes. I am going to help you."

Lyra could not describe the unbearable amount of joy her body was overflowing with. But Derpy had to ask the question, that was eventually going to be asked anyway.

    “Where do we go?”