The Dark Place

It was a typical day in the Canterlot Royal Observatory, scientists running tests and making observations, or writing out equations, and interns fetching coffee and doing other menial and unimportant tasks. There were a few ponies in the break room, chatting about new discoveries, solutions to problems, or what they could do to the interns as a little practical joke. One of the mathematicians was marking up parts of an equation, only to erase it when he saw the initial flaws in its construction. It was a pretty normal day, unless you were a pony named Vanilla Swirl. Vanilla Swirl was the Observatory's foremost expert on theoretical physics, and was recognized for his work in cosmology. Only a few select individuals knew of his lesser known work on worm holes and alternate dimensions. Vanilla did not need an intern but he received many applications, he didn't know why however. The real reason, the interns said, was who wouldn't want to work for somepony that was looked upon as crazy by most people not in his field of study? The interns talked about how lately he was very reclusive and almost never left his work. One had even mentioned him spending days working on his secret project in his lab. No one, not even the other scientists knew what Dr. Vanilla did in his office, nor did they desire to know, they were content with the mundane tasks they repeated everyday.

Vanilla was hard at work on his top secret project. It only seemed like yesterday that he had sent the letter to Princess Celestia about the potential his new discovery. He had finally found a way to tear space-time and create a wormhole! The Princess had seemed interested and had given Vanilla whatever he needed to work on his new project. In reality it had been two years ago, but that all seemed irrelevant now. He had a prototype of his machine, after years of exhausting work. The only problem was that he had never tested it. "I have finally done it.", thought Vanilla too himself,"I hope that this thing will work this time, I have invested so much in it". He walked around the machine until he found the switch that would power the machine up and paused for a second. He wanted too savor the moment and pray that his machine would function. When he flipped the switch it kicked to life. Vanilla screamed, due to the sudden onset of excitement, at the top of lungs, so much so that the other scientists thought that something had gone wrong, but where relieved when they heard the laughter. Vanilla went to the control panel, desperate to try out his machine. He slowly typed out the sequence, and fed it into the machine. The machine began the process. Everything went dark in the Observatory. The machine has absorbed the excess energy from the surrounding area to assist in the process. The machine reached the second stage, where, theoretically an extremely dense amount of matter would be utilized to tear space-time, but something went wrong. The matter was beginning to collapse on itself. Knowing that this would spell catastrophe, Vanilla killed the machine. When Vanilla left his lab, there were a few members of the Royal Guard ready to escort him to the castle. Sighing, Vanilla went off with the Guards, while his colleagues looked on.

"Princess I can explain!" begged Vanilla Swirl. He had been summoned by Celestia after she heard about the incident and apparent dangers of what could have happened at the observatory from a report filled out by the guards when they took Vanilla Swirl. "Please do Dr. Vanilla", replied Celestia in a rather unpleasant mood. "Well you see Princess," began Vanilla, "I have finally created a semi-working prototype of the machine I have been working on. When I finished, I was so curious to see how it would work, I just couldn't help myself." Vanilla tried to appeal to Celestia's sense of compassion and mercy. "Your "semi-working prototype" could have killed everyone," she said back in a more refined but still visibly agitated tone. "Princess I am so close to finishing what will be one of my greatest accomplishments! There has to be some sort of agreement we can reach!" spat out Vanilla. Vanilla knew that he could not lose what he considered would be one of the greatest achievements of ponykind. "Do you have any suggestions Doctor? " replied Celestia. Vanilla walked over too a nearby window, and looked around. He noticed the mountain by that small town known as Ponyville.

He assumed that he could use the town to get supplies and use the mountain as a safe house for his experiments. "Princess, how about that mountain over there? No one would be around except myself, so I could work without fear of injuring others." Celestia pondered the idea for a moment, she was still unsure about the consequences of the experiment should Vanilla Swirl be unable to stop his own creation. Remembering that this was Doctor Vanilla Swirl of all people, she trusted him. In a slightly more positive tone she said to Vanilla, "Doctor I will allow you to work on the mountain, under the condition that you will keep your work a secret and you send me reports every week so I may keep up with the status of your work." "Thank you my dear Princess, thank you," shouted Vanilla excitedly. Vanilla apologized for his outburst and thanked Celestia once more for her kindness. "You are welcome, doctor. I will arrange for your machine and what you may need from your laboratory to be moved to the mountain, you ought to gather your things and head out on the train to Ponyville tomorrow." "Yes Princess," said Vanilla. The guards escorted him to the outside of the castle. There he headed to his small house near the observatory to gather some of his things. It was midnight when he was finished gathering the last of his things, and he was exhausted. Vanilla climbed into bed, ready for whatever the next day would bring.