One chance to set it right
Bon Bon locked the door to her sweets shop bringing her hard work day to an end. Winter would be ending in a week. Unfortunately, this marked the close of her busy season. Bon Bon tightened the scarf around her neck and trotted down the street, happy to finally be able to spend some time with her marefriend Lyra. The one thing she didn’t like about the busy season was how little she got to see Lyra. Being in constant competition with Sugarcube Corner meant she had to work late hours often only see Lyra for breakfast.
Lyra had volunteered to help out in her shop one year. Unfortunately, due to Lyra’s sweet tooth Bon Bon had ended up just sending her home. Despite their time apart it never seemed to bother Lyra. While she didn’t have much work this time of the year Lyra did have her hobby to keep her occupied, or more accurate her obsession. Bon Bon had long suspected that the reason Lyra never seemed bothered with their time apart was that it gave her a chance to go overboard about her so called ‘Humans’, without Bon Bon there to reel her back in.
Bon Bon opened the door to her apartment, the warm air already melting away the tension in her muscle. She took off her scarf before wrapping it on the coat rack near the door before proceeding to the living room, and immediately stopped at the threshold of the room. On the coffee table, on the couch, surrounding the coffee table, and covering the walls were maps, lot and lot of maps. Bon Bon gazed out over the tapestry of Equus. Some of the maps looked crisp and fresh while others looked wrinkled and torn, held together by a few bits of tape.
Many of the maps seemed to be of different regents of equestria but there were a few other areas she recognised; The Griffon Kingdom, The Minotaur Republic, and even one poorly drawn map with the words ‘Badlands’ written on it. In the center of them all was Lyra.
“Bons! You’re home early,” Lyra said sitting on the only uncovered portion of the coffee table.
“No Lyra I’m not.” Bon Bon stepped into the room ignoring the crinkling of the maps as she moved.
Lyra glanced to the wall in search of the clock only to see that it too was covered by maps “I guess I lost track of time.”
Bon Bon took in a deep breath before slowly letting it out. “I’m going to give you five minute to explain.”
Not daring to waste a second of her allotted time Lyra quickly began. “I think it may be possible to find humans.” Lyra waited, expecting to hear some kind of outburst, but Bon Bon remain emotionless. The only sense of her listening was the occasional blink or ear twitch. Lyra realized that Bon Bon was going to wait the full five minute before her outburst and continued. “So, as you know, Humans only seem to appear in the oldest of mythology books, but at a certain point in time human just disappear both from Equus and any mythology book from a later date. But I was reading a book about dragon hibernation and how they can sleep for hundreds of years, and that got me thinking what if Humans never disappear but instead just went to sleep. I gathered maps of everywhere I could think that where secluded enough for nopony to ever go there but large enough to hide an entire civilization.”
Once again Bon Bon took in a deep breath before letting it out “And I’m guessing you want to go look for them.” Lyra simply nodded “And I’m just supposed to sit here while you go gallivanting all over looking for these darn Humans!”
“I-I was hoping we could go together.”
Bon Bon stepped over to the coach knocking the maps to the floor then climbing on; when she had finally situated herself she looked to Lyra her eyes filled with sympathy. “Lyra, sweetie I’m not a musician like you. I can’t just up and leave when I feel like it. If I take a week off from my shop I may as well close the doors for good. I know this human stuff means a lot to you but we can’t put our lives on hold just to chase myths.”
“Y-Yeah your right.” Lyra said, her horn glowing a soft green as she gathered the surrounding maps stacking them neatly on the table. “This was stupid.”
There were few things that Bon Bon hated more than anything, that look in Lyra’s sweet watery eyes was one of them. That hopeless broken look; worse was knowing that her words had cause it, regardless of how right she was.
“I’ve been thinking of hiring some help at the shop.” Lyra's head snapped up at this but said nothing as Bon Bon continued “once I get someone trained I wouldn’t be against taking a week off every few months to look at one of your human hiding spots.”
The smile that spread on Lyra’s face was enough to make the amount of headaches she was likely to get over this in the coming months all worth it. Lyra shot from her spot on the table with a tackling hug squeezing Bon Bon tightly.
“You are the best marefirend ever!” Lyra cried out.
“I have a condition,” Bon Bon said getting a curious look from Lyra. “You have to cut back on your human stuff.”
“DEAL!” Lyra said; a bit too quickly for Bon Bon’s taste.
“I’m serious Lyra. If I come home to find the house filled with rocks you claimed were touched by humans the deal is off.”
“And I said it was a deal,” Lyra said placing a gentle kiss on the cream mare’s lips.
Their moment was short lived as a sphere of light emerge in the air sending out torrents of wind ripping the maps form the walls. “Lyra what is that?” Bon Bon asked holding on to Lyra.
“I don’t know!”
The light expanded filling the room and blinding the two mares and then, just like that, it was gone. Bon Bon opened her eyes as she surveyed the masses of her living room and gasp as what she saw. Now standing there was a familiar lime green unicorn, It was another Lyra.
Bon Bon looked at the Lyra in her hooves who now seemed even more shocked then her. The second Lyra had her back to them looking around the room
“This is it; this is where it all started.” The second Lyra said
The second Lyra’s horn glowed a bright green grabbing the maps in mass then shredding them to fine pieces. The sight of more than two weeks of map collecting turned into glorified confetti raining down on the room, snap Lyra out of her shock.
“Hey what do you think you’re doing!?” Lyra yelled as the second Lyra turn to face her.
“And just who are you!”
“I’m you from the future and I don’t have a lot of time so shut up and listen!”
“What do you want?”
The future Lyra held up a map with her magic before ripping it in two “Listen very carefully. Humans. Are. Not. Real!”
Lyra was speechless for a moment, that her future self would say something so against one of her core belief was just unthinkable. Lyra knew that every morning the sun rose, every night the moon came out, and that humans existed. “What I-I don’t understand how can they not be real?”
The future Lyra grind her teeth together, she didn’t have time for this the spell only lasted a few minutes. “They’re just stories, just made up foals tales, that’s all! And if you don’t stop now you’re going to waste your all life and lose everyone close to you!”
“Who are you! You can’t be me I would never say something like that!”
The future Lyra used her magic and flung the table cross the room, Bon Bon jumped with a yelp “Why can’t you understand they were never real to begin with!”
Future Lyre stopped when she felt the pull of the spell, her time was up. White light slowly enveloped her body, for the first time since she arrived future Lyra looked at Bon Bon. Bon Bon looked back and could see the same eyes she saw just minutes ago, the eyes she hated so very much before the light enveloped her completely and she was gone.
They sat there in the complete silence only the confetti as a distraction before Lyra finally spoke up “Bons, what just happened?”
Bon Bon stroked Lyra’s mane as she spoke “I don’t know.”
***
Lyra emerge from the time portal in the same damp cave she had left, she felt the presence of somepony stepping out from the shadows of the cave. She didn’t bother looking as she spoke to the purple alicorn “Has anything changed?”
“I wouldn’t know I’m part of this timeline, you would be the only one that would know.”
Lyra nodded. She supposed that made sense, as much sense as she could make out of time travel at least. “I guess I’ll check the entrance then.”
Twilight led the way out of their tucked away corner of the cave system down a narrow path way. Neither had much to say as they made their way. They came into the brightly lit main cavern. Torches were hung along the walls casting a slimy shine on the walls. It was the largest of the caverns they had found so far, now home to several hundred refugees.
Talk from the refugees all but stopped as they made their way through the cave. Lyra kept her eyes on the ground; she could feel their eyes on her they were like sack of weights bearing down on her, their hate filled eyes blaming her, the same eyes Bon Bon had before they… No Lyra shook her head. Now was not the time to think of that. She had cried enough, anymore would just be a waste of water.
Twilight stop at the entrance to the cave high in the mountains overlooking Ponyville. “So what’s changed?”
Lyra looked out the sky was still overcast in a sea clouds tinted by the forever red sky, Twilight’s castle lay in ruins surrounded by the long burnt out remains of Ponyville.
“It’s all the same.” Lyra said more to herself then Twilight.
“Not long after you left,” Twilight began, “I got a letter via Spike; it was from Cadence the Crystal Empire has fallen, Shiny…” Twilight had to stop unable to use his nickname, as warm liquid flowed down her fur hitting the cave floor. “Shining Armor led the defense buying Cadence enough time to evacuate the civilians.”
Lyra placed a hoof over her mouth chocking back a sob. “I’m so sorry Twilight.”
Twilight simply stared out into distance “You spent all your time trying to find humans, but you never stopped to think if you should.”
Moments passed as the two just set there. “What do we do now Twilight?”
“We hide and we pray they never find us.”
