My Little Contingency: Friendship is an Institution

by Wiggidy

Rating: teen
Tags: My Little Pony: Friendship is Magic, Alternate Universe, Other, Comedy, Adventure, Twilight Sparkle
Length: 1582

Twilight Sparkle's having a bad day. She's hungover and out of booze, and she's just found out everything is about to collapse on itself. Now she needs to jump through universes and fix every pony else's mistakes.

Being the personal protege of the princess of your country (who is also a living god which controls the source of life that you rely on) has quite a few sets of perks. For example, you get to apply for an unlimited number of scientific grants from the royal treasury. You also get a personal stipend to spend however you want. Hell, you even get to attend all major events held at the palace or on the palace grounds for free! There are, however, some pretty big drawbacks to having such a big position. Saving the entire world from demons, fire-breathing dragons, ancient archaic beings of evil, and forcibly attending social events are just a few of your duties. None know this better than Twilight Sparkle.

Now this is all part of Twilight's average life, of course. But seeing as she's the bearer of a magical element, sometimes she's called on to do a little bit more than that. Today she's discovered that she'll need to travel into parallel dimensions (or alternate universes, if you're so inclined) to put a stop to a number of events where someone vital dies or fails at their job. As if this weren't enough, she's forgotten to bring any whiskey along for the trip, and most of these variations of her world don't produce consumable alcohol in any capacity. She's also got a hangover, and she's not in the mood for any crap.

Published 2016-10-30 22:10:01 UTC
Last updated 2016-10-30 22:10:01 UTC

The Remedy for Event Horizons.

It was an acceptable day in Ponyville. The sun was out in full force, shining with all its strength on the planet below it. But it was fine, because the weather team had moved in some cloud coverage over town in preparation for rain later that week, so it wasn't really too bright anywhere and you could just walk to another spot relatively close to where you were if you did think it was too bright. And as the clouds drifted over the thatched roofs a lone unicorn lay in bed, sleeping away through the effects of yet another hangover from being out a tad too late at her friend's house. In the peaceful silence of her library home, the purple pony slept.

"Oh, Twilight~!" Another unicorn approached her house, calling out her name in a jovial trill. The librarian grunted and turned over in her sleep.

"Twiliiiight~!" The newcomer sang out, this time a bit louder than before. She took a moment to fluff up her agonizingly styled mane as Twilight got up with an unenthusiastic grumble and shuffled to the window. She threw the window open with a stern frown, glaring down at the white mare with the hatred of a thousand suns,

"What in the hell do you want, Rarity?!" Twilight shouted. "You know that Saturday morning is my Hangover Morning! I had at least half a barrel of AJ's hard cider last night, and we both know how hard she brews that crap!" Rarity giggled and gestured to the stallion standing beside her.

"I'm well aware of Applejack's brewing tendencies and your borderline alcoholism, Twilight. But all of that pales in comparison to this gem of a colt I've taken a fancy to!" The stallion in question didn't seem too extravagant. He was a fairly attractive unicorn in Twilight's eyes, but she failed to see anything out of the ordinary. Twilight stood an stared, momentarily dumbfounded at the fact that Rarity would violate the sanctions placed on this particular say of the week.

"You mean to tell me that you marched all the way out here, knowing full well that I'd be sleeping off my hangover, to then scream my name until I woke up and present me with your latest rebound colt?! Whatever you're gonna show me had better be damn important! If this is another one of your stupid schemes to get Hoity Toity jealous, then so help me Celestia, I will shave Opal clean and stuff every bagful of hair I get from her so far up your ass that you'll be crapping cat fur for a month!" Twilight shouted. Rarity let out an uneasy chuckle as her company glanced up at the purple mess.

"You know, Rarity, maybe it's best that I be introduced another time. Your friend seems to be a bit preoccupied with more urgent matters and- Hold on, did she say 'Hoity Toity'?" Rarity let out a confident grin, nodding her head enthusiastically.

"She most certainly did!" The fashionista began. "Toity and I have always had an on/off relationship of sorts! Why, just last month he had come into town on business, and-"

"No!" Twilight interrupted. "I don't care when you saw him, or what you did with him! It's a completely pointless story that none of us need to know, and it's just as pointless as the poor sap you've dragged all the way to my house!"

"Oh, I think you'll change your mind about that! He's quite the magical savant, actually! The whole reason I brought him here was to introduce you so that you might work together on magic studies!" Twilight sighed, resting a hoof on the bridge of her nose.

"Fine. I'll give him one chance to impress me. But if I think he's inept -which he probably is- You'll both go away and leave me be!" Rarity nodded in agreement, and Twilight promptly shut the window to make her way downstairs.

"Um, I thought you said we were trying to talk her into meeting up for a threesome." The stallion said. "My grasp of any magic other than cheese transmutation is novel, at best, and the longer I stand here the more I think that maybe I shouldn't have signed up for this in the first place."

"Shutup, shutup, shutup!" Rarity growled. "I had to say something to get her to hear us out, and you weren't doing me any favors! Just put your best hoof forward, and I'll cover the fallout from your inevitable failure!"

Twilight grumbled as she left the warm embrace of her bed. She moved toward the staircase with all the grace of Granny Smith with a broken glass hip and a slipped spinal disk, taking a moment to stop by the liquor cabinet for a quick pick-me-up. Much to her dismay, the cabinet was completely barren. Twilight cursed under her breath, greatly irked by Spike's inability to acquire alcohol for her.

"When Spike gets back from Canterlot, I'll have him scrub this whole Celestia-forsaken dump from top to bottom! With his toothbrush!" She said to herself. She descended the stairs and started for the door.

Without warning a bright flash of light appeared before her, followed by a sharp popping noise and an outward burst of air. Twilight, after jumping away from the disturbance, glared daggers at the source of the interruption. Almost immediately her expression changed to one of confusion, as standing before her was herself, just as bedraggled and tired as she was now.

"Me?" She asked. "Why am I here?" The other version of her looked her straight in the eyes, a serious look plastered on the doppelganger's face.

"I'm you from the future... I think. So, it turns out that all of existence as we know it hangs in the balance in a much more delicate manner than we thought." It started. "For whatever stupid reason, everything hinges on the Elements of Harmony. Something to do with "the balance of powers that be" or some garbage. But, in about five minutes, every plane of existence is gonna collapse in on itself. What we need to do is go into parallel universes and intervene with a major event that changes something about the bearers to the Elements of Harmony." Without much pause, she summoned a scroll and thrust it against Twilight's chest. "Take this. It has all the basics you'll need on how to figure out which universe you'll be in and what the event is for that particular universe. Cast the spell written at the very top when you're done to move on to the next one. Oh, and after you've cast it, I suggest keeping your eyes and mouth closed." With that, the intruding Twilight was consumed in another flash of blinding light. The Twilight from this universe looked down at the scroll, unfurling it without question.

Sure enough, all the information that had been promised seemed to be there. The unicorn sighed and sat down to prepare casting the spell. After Twilight followed the instructions on the scroll, the world around her momentarily popped out of existence and was instantly replaced with an itchy feeling on her body, a painful jabbing sensation in her eyes, and a musty atmosphere. She covered her eyes and closed her mouth, brushing some unpleasant substance from her mouth with a sputter. Instinctively, she began to shift around blindly, moving to where she felt was the path of least resistance. The world seemed to get brighter and brighter through her eyelids, and after a few minutes she broke through to fresh air. Twilight let out a gasp as she felt herself breach whatever substance she'd found her way into. With a final grunt of effort, she ejected herself entirely and felt her body return to the earth. She cracked open her eyes, seeing a very pink earth pony standing over her in shock.

"Wowie Zowie! I really need to brush out my mane!" Pinkie exclaimed.

Author's Note

I've always suspected that a secret to the universe lie somewhere in Pinkie's mane or tail.

Aside from that, this story is gonna be one of my next projects. The concept is actually not all that original, but surprisingly no one has written it yet, and that's disappointing because I have nothing to reference in terms of execution. Basically, Twilight needs to go through and put a stop to the events that serve as major plot points in fanmade stories. Such stories include but aren't limited to Cupcakes, Haunting Nightmare, My Little Dashie, and The Star in Yellow. This version of Twilight is gonna be very similar to the Twilight from Rainbow Dash Presents, but with a few changes to her personality to make her easier to work with. Mainly, she won't be completely ignorant to the wants and needs of other ponies, and will actually acknowledge Fluttershy's existence. She also won't be entirely racist, though I think I might keep some prejudices in place for her. You know what they say; everyone's a little bit racist.

Onto the specifics of this story, this first chapter is just to get a foot in the door. I'm thinking of having Twilight deal with either the Haunting Nightmare or MLD story line. They'll be pretty short, to be sure, but I'm hoping the interactions will make up for the lack of length with a better overall story quality.

Wish me luck. I'm gonna fukkin' need it.