Author's Note
Jeez, it took longer than I expected. Anyway, this is Episode 7.
ALERT! This is a regression story, but NOT THAT KIND OF REGRESSION! It won’t focus on babyish things like cute faces, changing diapers or… breastfeeding. It will focus on things that most of these stories don’t do at all: growing up. And not just physical, even mental, psychological and emotional. You’ll understand later.
With nothing else to say, enjoy it!
1. Jellybabies
Chapter 1: Jellybabies
Equestria, 1036
Outside Ponyville, in a cave far away from the ponies, a strange creature was snoring, until he smelled something weird.
“What’s that smell?” The creature woke up, smelling the air. He began to inquire himself about the smell. “It’s not Rainbow Crash attempt of cooking, that’s for sure. This smells better. Way better!” The creature took another smell. “It’s not Fluttershy cooking neither. It’s something different… but familiar.” He scratched his head trying to remember the smell from his memories. “Aha! I remember that smell! Of course! It’s fading away, I must hurry before it disappears!” The creature said. Taking a bag from nowhere, he shouted “HE’S BACK!”
And with a snap from his fingers, he faded away.
TARDIS, inside the Time Vortex
“Wait, girls, it’s me!” The brown pony said, chasing the fillies at the interior of the TARDIS. “It’s me! The Doctor! Don’t run away from me! DON’T RUN TO ME, NEITHER!” But all the fillies were over him, stepping him and attacking him.
“Tell us! Where’s the Doctor? NOW!” Twilight said.
“I. Am. The. Doctor!”
“You are lying. Check around if the Doctor is in another room!”
“No, no no. Don’t go away, you might get lost down there!”
“That’s what you want us to do, right?”
“What? If you- OUCH! Who bite me?”
“Sorry.” Fluttershy answered.
“That hurts. Come on, if you are over me I won’t be able to explain to you what is happening!”
“That’s true.” Twilight said. “Everyone, leave him!” All the other ponies left the older pony. “Now, we must confirm if you are the Doctor. Tell us something the Doctor only would tell.”
“How will you know it’s true what I’m going to say?”
“I’ tell ya when you’re a liar” Applejack said.
“Ok, something only me would say.” The older pony said. “I’m an alien from outer space. I have lived over 9000 years. I got a time machine that looks like a police box-”
“Not working”
“Ok, I like jelly babies, yo-yos, ginger beer. I have a lot of doctorates, not medical.” Seeing the faces of the other ponies, the older one changed his tone. “I have defeated creatures like the daleks, the cybermen, the changelings, the weeping angels, and even more.”
“Red alarm! Bad Trigger! Bad Trigger!” Derpy shouted, covering her ears in fear. The older pony walked close to her.
“Don’t touch her!” Rainbow ordered, but the older pony still walked towards Derpy.
“Derpy, it’s me. You know it’s me. I may have a different face, and a different voice, but I’m still me. I’m still the Doctor.”
“Blueberry?”
“You told me what happened when you were eight. You didn’t tell anyone else what happened there. Only me. And it will stay that way if you wish. But I’m telling you this, right here, right now: I won’t let you alone.”
Derpy had tears rolling down, then she raised her head and looked the older pony. She cleaned her tears and ran to hug the older pony. “Doctor!”
“Derpy! I knew you'd remember me.”
“Muffin!”
“Yes! Muffin! Whatever that means.”
“He’s saying the truth” Applejack said.
“So, are you the Doctor?” Twilight asked.
“The Doctor, indeed. Nice to meet you again.”
“But, why do you look like… this?”
“Are you telling me that I look ugly?”
“No!”
“Well, excuse me for this face. Not all of them are nice ones. I’m telling you, there were others worse.”
“No, I wasn’t saying that. I was asking why?”
“I know, I just wanted to see the look on your face. Priceless.” The Doctor giggled.
“Doctor!”
“Fine! You know how some bugs, like butterflies, are in their lives? One moment they are a worm, another a cocoon and later they have wings?”
“Yes. Sure, I am an expert on bio-”
“Time lords are nothing like that. Every time we are about to die, our body changes all of our cells so we can survive. This is my fourth body. I’m the Fourth Doctor.”
“Fourth?”
“Yep. I can change twelve times. I was the Tenth Doctor when you met me.”
“Tenth?”
“Or maybe eleventh, twelfth. I forgot, I think.”
“You forgot? How can you forgot something like that?”
“I’m so smart I can’t remember some things. Like my age.”
“You forgot your age?” Pinkie screamed. “So you don’t know when it’s your birthday! We’ve got a situation here!”
“We’ve got a worse situation than my birthday date, Pinkie.” The Doctor said, opening one of the panels of the TARDIS. “And it’s November 23th.”
He began to take wires off the console, mumbling words to himself.
“How do you know when it’s November 23 if you travel in time?”
“All the questions in the world, and you asked the more stupid ones? That’s not the question you must ask.”
“Ok, why are we young again?” Twilight asked.
“Something corrupted the TARDIS, but that’s not the right question?”
“How will it be fixed? I think-”
“NO! That’s not the question!”
“David Tennant?” Derpy asked.
“Yes! Yes!” The Doctor shouted. “That’s the right question, Derpy.”
“What? Who?” Twilight asked.
“Precisely. Who? That’s the question. Who could corrupt the TARDIS? I’m the only one who can use the TARDIS, and to be fair I learn new things from her everyday.”
“Her?”
“Oh, yeah, she’s lovely. But that’s not the point. Something or someone found the TARDIS and broke some of the circuits, making all of its occupants to go backwards. In your case, you are getting younger every minute, and in my case, I’m going to, well, ‘degenerate’ until I start to get younger.” The Doctor explained while he was taking some chords and wires.
“What would happened if we don’t fix that?”
“Mmm, probably all of us would disappear. Starting with the dragon, he’s the youngest. Next it will be you the elements and Derpy, and then, me, but I’ll took longer.”
“What can we do? Open the door?”
“No! Don’t do it. If we open the door the time flux we are going will be affected and every city, every planet, every solar system and everything in this universe will get younger just like us. Hah!” He took a box from the inside of the consoles.
“What are you gonna do?”
“It’s simple, this thing is affecting our age. If I stabilized it, well, in the best case, we’ll grow up again to our ages.”
“In the best case? What if is not the best case?”
“Well, it will be stopped and we will be stuck in this age. Or we will get killed.”
“What??”
“We will stuck in our current age. Now let me work on this, this is not an easy task.”
“What we do, then?”
“I don’t know, play with a yo-yo, eat something. In some of those round things you’ll find anything.”
As Twilight left the Doctor working on the box, she said to the others. “Well. I think we’ll stay in this way for a while.”
