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Beforeskin

Little Celestia continued to stare at the purple alicorn, meanwhile future Celestia was growling and Discord was shaking uncontrollably, whether in fear or anger was uncertain.
"Do you understand me?" Little Celestia nodded slowly. "Good that worked. My name is Teron, what's yours?" She slowly looked around the cave, the walls were limestone and perfectly smooth as if they had been pushed out, the floor was dotted by holes filled with more black water and there were four thick pillars of stone connecting the floor to the ceiling.

"So it didn't work." Teron spoke analytically snapping the filly's attention back to him. "Or at least not entirely. Can you speak?" Little Celestia opened her mouth and whinnied quietly. "Well this will complicate things. I guess I'll have to make speech lessons a priority." He smiled bemusedly. "But since you're the only one of this batch I tried the new method with, I guess the rest need to be decommissioned." He motioned to the filly to follow him.

"Brace yourself Dicord." Future Celestia spoke quickly.
"For what?"
"Keep your eyes on me." Teron told little Celestia. As Teron and Celestia left the room the water in the other pits started boiling, prompted by Teron's now glowing horn. A few of the creatures incubating inside ended up being tossed out of their pools as they writhed flesh and bone melting. Little Celestia had her eyes trained on Teron so she hadn't seen the grotesque display. Discord covered his mouth. "So that's what it looks like. I've never melted anypony."

"A curious fact about the birthing water," Teron lectured as they walked past the entryway. "Is that when heated it becomes highly corrosive. But once it cools down it reverts back to the original state, becoming a perfect incubator." There was a callousness to his voice that had not gone unnoticed. A few moments ago they had been surrounded by unseen life but now all that remained were puddles. Younger Celestia was unaware of this but Teron had just demonstrated that he had the power to end her and not enough of a conscience to stop him.
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Little Celestia's first few days were comprised mostly of speech lessons as the incubation chamber required very little maintenance, future Celestia and Discord had very little to do during this period of time except talk with each other.
"What I find hilarious is that you knew how to write but not how to talk." Discord was giggling. "I mean really, what are the odds of that?"
"Ha, ha. You aren't one to talk, just look at all the defects you came out with." Celestia was already sick of him. "Just look at your horns."
"Hey, don't diss the horns. If anything insult my teeth, do you have any idea how hard it is to speak coherently when you have to navigathe arount a sthick in yer' mouth."
"You slurred that on purpose."
"You'd better believe it."

"Father." Little Celestia was always curious about Teron's experiments, what was he working on, what hadn't worked, anything she could ask him. "What happens when things like me don't work out?"
"I'm glad you asked." He walked to the entrance of the cave that served as her classroom, it looked like most of the other area's, the walls and floor were made of smoothed limestone and there was a stalactite here and there, dangling from the ceiling. "Follow me."

Teron lead her through an area that she had yet to explore, the walls started changing colors as they went further down, they flashed any and every color at almost the same time, leading to a tangled disarray of shades that couldn't have been more chaotic if it had started leaking ooze.
"I like this place." Discord quipped. "The color scheme is most enjoyable." As they descended even deeper they started to hear animalistic grunts and roars emanating from the walls, the place almost seemed to breath around them.

Little Celestia stepped closer to Teron, who seemed unbothered by the strangeness of the place.
"Here we are." The world just seemed to cut to black there, as if they were about to step off into a void. Teron did step out seeming to stand in thin air as he walked further. "Come on then." He beckoned little Celestia to follow with a jerk of his head. She stepped out into the blackness, which seemed to only encompass the walls and floor, as she could clearly see Teron. "Be careful not to stray."

"Why is it so dark down here father?" Little Celestia cautiously followed him, mindful of her footing, everything about this room seemed wrong.
"All will become clear, the moment you step through here." Teron gestured to a purple spot on the wall before stepping through himself. Little Celestia ran after him, not wanting to lose track of the only thing that seemed entirely real in this place. The purple spot opened, leading to a pure white room. It was a perfect square if a large one,on the back wall there was a clear case with tubes attaching it to the wall, next to it there was a slab with a single hole in it, seemingly for a Teron's horn. Inside the case was the most interesting, and angry, thing she had ever seen.

"This is Eris. She's what happens when genetic experiments go wrong." The thing in the tank looked like somepony had taken random pieces from several different creatures and slapped them together with no heed for the rules of anatomy or logic. It's head was that of a wolf with purple fur and massive ears, a single horn adorned it, curled like one of the rams Teron had taught her about but it split just before it would make contact with her neck, its neck and body were that of a snake with blue scales, its right arm was that of a pony but the hoof was distended and split to form four claws of bone the base of each dripped blood and pus which blended with the arm's blood red fur, its left arm was impossible to place as it was green, furless and had blades running down the forearm it however had a four fingered hand on this side, its left leg seemed to be that of a giant grey owl while its right seemed to be comprised of three black sticks with a three taloned foot on the end, its tail also seemed to be reptilian but it was less flexible than the rest of its body and was crested by two lines of scales over the top that stuck up at odd angles, it had wings one blue and feathered the other purple and batlike. The strangest thing however was its eyes, they were simply holes in its head yet she got the uncanny feeling that it could see her as its head wobbled around in there.

"Eris, look at your hand, have you been trying to dig your way out again?" It pointed its head at Celestia and cocked it curiously, putting its left hand up to the glass.
"Congratulations Teron, you finally managed to make a creature like yourself." Eris spoke in a decidedly female voice. "I suppose that means you won't have to keep me in here anymore."
"I'm sorry Eris but your energies are still too unstable for me to let you go, the fallout from opening that tube could turn this entire complex into the kind of funhouse this bottom level already is. Poor dear, chaos energy flows from every pore in her body, it's the reason that last room was so strange."

"I know you my dear." Celestia jumped at the sounds in her head. "I've seen you, all that you are, all that you will be, and all that you were.
"Eris, let's see if we can't get those cuts in your palm taken care of."
"Once my brother appears come and get me, I know he won't." Teron placed his horn into hole in the wall and Eris' hand started to glow, mending itself. "Do not trust him."

"I don't know about you, but I don't remember Eris being quite so creepy." Discord whispered, Eris chuckled.
"Yes you do."
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"There was no way that was intended for Teron or little you, she was totally talking to me."
"For the last time, there is no way. This has all already happened, it's just a replay; I repeat there is no way in black water hell she was talking to you." Celestia angrily snapped at Discord for the twelve time in the past hour.
"But didn't she have some sort of future sight that she refused to elaborate on and she was always saying things out of context. It would all make sense, she was talking to future us."
"Discord, Eris was further permeated with chaos magic than you are, it's more likely that she just had some mental disorder that forced her to do that."

"Teron, what happened to Eris' eyes?" It was five days later, Little Celestia had paid further visits to Eris, curious as to the creature's abilities and strange personality.
"Hasn't she told you already?" Teron looked up from the notes he had been studying. Discord was hovering over his shoulder, checking the notes for things concerning Beforeskin. They had found nothing in the week and a half of memories they had sifted through.
"I'm afraid she might get angry with me if I do."

Teron sighed. "Little one, if she's not angry with me, and I'm the one who put her in there, than she's not going to be angry with you for asking about her eyes. Now I need to get back to work, the birthing chamber is almost ready." Little Celestia sighed, with the new creatures in the incubation chambers reaching maturity Teron had very little time for her, it was why she had started personally talking with Eris.

The way down to her chamber was still as creepy as ever, the whitewashed room was a welcome change from the strange area outside it.
"Glad to see you again Celestia."
"Hello Eris, could you remind me why you don't just talk to me again."
"Because when I speak aloud, Teron can hear me and I have the feeling that some of the things have I say he doesn't want you to hear. Now shush child, not so loud." She paused, lifting her head and sniffing. "He's watching, I can smell his magic. Now, you had a question darling."
"Yes," little Celestia brought her volume down considerably, to the point that she was almost whispering. "How did you lose your eyes?"

"I took them out, they were keeping me from seeing."
"Huh?" Little Celestia was understandably confused.
"Let me explain, have you ever tried to cross your eyes." Celestia nodded. "I see not through the light reflecting off of objects, but with the energy things naturally put off, their auras. Crossing that kind of sight with regular sight results in an unintelligible mess, it was like crossing my eyes, I couldn't see anything more than three feet from me. Which unfortunately includes the ground, now I can see everything, from the air as it moves into your lungs, to the flow of time itself. You're going to have to wait a week by the way.
"Until the incubator's done?" Little Celestia pouted.

"No, no; the incubator's going to be done in two days. Teron's going to start the new project in seven days. The last project unfortunately. I wish I could do more to help him." Future Celestia froze as Discord smirked at her.
"Told ya so."

For anyone unable to get the image.