“Where is the dematcircuit?” I asked the head of the room, Viola. “The dematcircuit is the device required for keeping the time machine from running into anything on its way through time by sending it through a time vortex!”

Viola backed up, surprised at my sudden snap. “I-I gave it to Doctor Hoof. Ask him.”

I felt guilty about snapping at her. The building of the time machine started about a week ago. The flux capacitor and the plutonium reactor have been installed in an empty box that was being worked on by another room. Whatever they did made the box bigger on the inside than on the out. Doctor Hoof didn’t feel so lightly about it, though. Which is odd. That kind of technology is awesome!

“Doctor Hoof!” I called out for him. “Doctor Hoof!”

“Right here, old chap.” Said Doctor Hoof. Doctor Hoof is a lot like a fictional character from a TV show that was aired centuries ago. “What do you need?”

“Viola said she gave the dematcircuit to you.” I told him. “Its ready to be installed in the TAS.” The TAS is the name the room came up with for the time machine. It stands for ‘Time And Space’. “To surpass time, we have to surpass space too. And thats what the dema-”

“I know what the dematcircuit does.” Doctor Hoof scoffed, suddenly angry. “I was the one who invented it.”

I always knew Doctor Hoof was the one who made the dematcircuit I need. But the way he said it made me rethink how he meant it. “What do you mean?”

Doctor Hoof sighed. “I am not actually who I say I am.” He said, turning away. “You ever heard of Doctor Whooves?” Doctor Hoof asked me.

I thought back to my childhood when Forest Feather had told me about how possible time travel is. He told me about how a fictional character named Doctor Whooves. Doctor Whooves is a time traveler that goes throughout time, saving it. “Yeah. What about him.”

“You’re looking at him.” Doctor Hoof said to me. “I am Doctor Whooves.”

My mind went blank. I mean it literally went blank. “Y-You’re Doctor Whooves?”

The Doctor nodded. “Do you know the hardship of time traveling?” He asked me. “I mean do you really know it?”

I thought about it long and hard. Hardship is the quality of being hard to endure, uninviting or formidable. “Yes. I’m not going to be a time traveler. I’m going to be a time saver, per say. I’m going to right the wrongs that other time travelers have made, without disrupting time itself. I’m going to be the bite in her royal highnesses flank. I’m going to end the thirty-two hundred year long war.”

The doctor nodded and gave me a small odd looking device. “That there is the dematcircuit. Plug a control lever in and poof, you’re thrown into the time vortex, rampaging down time.”

“Thanks, Doctor.” I said, using my wings to hold the dematcircuit on my back. I walked over to Forest Feather and passed the device along to him. “Hey, you remember the Doctor? You told me about him a long time ago.”

“Doctor Whooves?” He asked. “Yeah. Why?”

One of my ears flicked towards Doctor Whooves, who was sitting on the floor, overlooking the manufacturing of the Chameleon. The Chameleon is a device thats going to be built right into the TAS. Its supposed to change the outside appearance of the TAS to blend in with anything that would match the actions of somepony doing something. “Doctor Hoof is Doctor Whooves.”

Forest Feather stiffened, his wings going rigid, locking the dematcircuit on his back. “There’s a time traveler with us?” He asked, whispering.

I nodded subtly. “You want to impress him?” I asked, forming a plan. “I need you to make sure he’s one of the twenty thats going on the time mission. Can you do that?”

“Of course I can do that.” He answered. “But my opinion on who goes or not is inferior to yours.”

I thought for a second. “Tell Viola I made you head of who goes on the time mission.”

Forest Feather beamed. “Thats what friends are for.” He said.

Suddenly everypony looked at him in awestruck surprise. Forest Feather was glowing. And I don’t mean he was beyond happy. I mean he was actually glowing. The casted glow was a bright green, same as his coat. He looked down at his front hooves, and gasped in surprise.

Viola bounced over to us. “Whats going on?” She looked at Forest Feather. “No way…”

Doctor Whooves came over to us. “Viola, you don’t think…”

The glowing faded away. Forest Feather was breathing hard. “What happened?”

Viola and Doctor Whooves looked at each other, and nodded. “Everypony, back to work! Her royal highness is preparing to launch an attack in a week’s time.” She and Doctor Whooves began walking towards a big door that only both of them have been in. Viola stopped and looked back. She flicked her tail at us, gesturing for us to come.

When the door shut, we were standing in a medium sized room, filled with artifacts of all kinds. “Sit down.” Viola said calmly. “We have a lot to talk about.”

“Like what?” I asked, ignoring her command and looking at the artifacts. “What was that glowing aura surrounding Forest Feather?”

“That, my chap, was the aura of friendship.” Doctor Whooves stood beside Viola in her chair. “The last time the aura of friendship was recorded was a thousand years ago, a day before Princess Twilight Heather died.” He sighed. “I was there when it happened. Her royal highness was about to brutally murder Princess Twilight Heather. But Rainbow Stripe took the blow. I saw her dying body encased in a powerful, eye-searing light blue light. That was probably the bravest thing I’ve ever seen.” Doctor Whooves sniffed, and his eyes grew watery. “The blast sent her royal highness one hundred miles away. The next day…”

Viola patted him on the back. “Our history goes back a long ways. I’m a descendant of the most famous violin player in all of Equestria. Sweet Drop is the descendant of special agent Sweety Drops. Aloe Sun, she’s from a long line of masseuses-turned-mercenaries.” She sighed. “We have to go back in time to rescue the five ponies taken by the screeching Banshee. And then to when Princess Twilight Heather’s brother went missing.”

Something came across my mind. “Could the screeching Banshee be the royal highness up in Canterlotia?”

All three ponies glanced at me wearily. “Could my royal pain-in-my-flank be a time traveler?”

Doctor Whooves nodded. “Do you know of the Chrysalis Syndrome?” He asked Forest Feather and I. Both of us shook our heads. “The Chrysalis Syndrome is a condition in which a Looper awakens for the first time in a variant of their home loop. These Loopers treat this initial variant loop as normal until it ends. Once they awaken in a baseline loop, they experience difficulty accepting which reality is their baseline and which the variant.”

I must say my mind is extremely quick at learning and adapting. “So if the royal highness is affected by the Chrysalis Syndrome, then that means she’s having a hard time adapting to this loop, if it is one. First off, how do we know we’re in a loop? Second, when does the loop restart? And third, how can we tell when it started so we can avoid it as much as possible?”

“I can answer all three of those.” Doctor Whooves said. “If I had my time machine, I could tell you without looking thirty hundred years ago that we are in a time loop. Second, according to my memory, the loop is due to restart when the world is consumed in total light, which initiates the combustion of the planet. Its not due anytime soon. Third, we can tell when it starts when we go back in time. Actually, I could’ve answered all three questions with ‘we can tell when it starts when we go back in time’.”

I nodded. “Makes sense.”

“Tell us about the aura of friendship?” Forest Feather asked. “I mean I was just shrouded with it.”

Viola’s horn glowed a light brown. “The aura of friendship was first recorded when Princess Twilight Sparkle, the Princess of Friendship, cast a very powerful spell.” A piece of paper appeared in front of the both of us. There was writing on it dating back to the 21st century. “The spell was cast on everypony in Equestria. When a strong act branching off of the six Elements of Harmony is performed, the magic the act produces is consumed and placed in a well deep below the earth, above the ruins of the castle of friendship.”

“Princess Twilight Sparkle sacrificed herself for her friends when they needed it the most by performing an extraordinary act of magic. Tirek had returned and was after Twilight alone. When they met in battle, he had her friends trapped, and the only thing that could save them was her giving her magic to Tirek.” Said Doctor Whooves. “But she gave it all to him. From the very beginning of time when the first Alicorn, other than the two sisters, gave up said Alicorn’s magic, the Alicorn turned to ash.”

“An Alicorn needs magic to live. When Tirek took the magic away from all the Alicorns the first time, he didn’t take the source of the magic.” Viola explained. “Anyway, Princess Twilight Sparkle had an Alicorn daughter Tirek didn’t know about. So before she gave her magic to him, she entrusted the rest of the mane six with Princess Twilight Dawn. Some stuff happened in between that we don’t know about. And then there’s now. Multiple sightings of the aura of friendship have occurred. But the royal highness took everypony who had it and threw them in a dungeon.”

Something flashed at the back of my mind. “Quibble. I completely forgot about him. Did he get to go investigate the surge of the Alicorn magic?”

Viola stared thoughtlessly at me for a second. “He and his squad was captured just before he reached the destination. Nopony knows what captured them, but Sweet Drop had to shut the Alicorn magic detector because it wouldn’t stop blaring.”

I tilted my head. “We should probably go see what happened.” I told her. “Once the TAS is done, how about we go check what happened? And see if Alicorn magic is back or not.”

Doctor Whooves shook his head. “Once you back in time, you alter the future. Even the slightest of changes could even keep Sweet Drop from being born.”

“If we change the past, the royal highness might not be here, which would mean the rebels wont be here either. Which means we wont be here. And if we’re not here, we don’t go back in time. If we don’t go back in time, then the royal highness would still be here.” Said Forest Feather. “We’d just be making a paradox. But if we have magic on our side, we might actually survive the change of time.”

Both Viola and Doctor Whooves were quiet for a minute, deep in thought. I shifted my hooves impatiently. Finally Doctor Whooves sighed. “Fine.” He said. “You two may go see whats up. But return with at least one piece of evidence, or nothing at all.”

Forest Feather and I beamed. “What do we take to get there? Who do we take with us? How would we get back if we do find them?”

Doctor Whooves grimaced. “That’s up to you. I’m putting both of you in charge of forming a group thats willing to go.”

Um, that doesn’t make sense. “How are you putting us in charge? You’re just a retired time traveler.” Forest Feather said.

“Do you know what the rebels fight for?” He asked us.

“They fight for freedom and liberty.” I answered. “Why?”

“I’m the pony who brought rebel groups together to form the Rebel Alliance against the royal highness.” He said, grinning in his old age. “I lead the rebels.”(�l�

Author's Note

I hope this story starts to be appealing to some. This is my first book on this site and also my first book in the mlp Fandom.....that I decided to publish. Please leave any helpful criticism in the comments below. Thanks!