Through the Mist

Chapters

Prologue
Chapter 1: Curious
Chapter 2: Hello World
Chapter 3: Game Plan
Chapter 4: No Clue

Prologue

Twilight Sparkle adjusted herself to the now-familiar sensation of time travel, as Starlight Glimmer's spell once again sucked Spike and her through. Again, she found herself back in Cloudsdale all those years ago, at the critical moment of Rainbow Dash's first sonic rainboom. It was a scene she saw at least a half a dozen times now, and each time it was tampered with by Starlight Glimmer.

She quickly reoriented herself to land upon a cloud, ready to continue her pleas to Starlight. But it would appear that despite showing Starlight the consequences of her actions and trying to understand her motives, she wouldn't budge on her stance. Before Twilight could try to assess the situation or think of another solution, Starlight began her tirade once again.

"You don't know what it's like to lose a friend because of a cutie mark," she said with more malice and conviction in her voice than ever, "But once I stop the rainboom, you will!"

After that final conviction, Starlight simply plucked the scroll away from Twilight with her magic. By the time Twilight realized what was happening, it was too late to make a move; trying to attack Starlight or take the scroll back with her magic posed too much of a risk of damaging the scroll right then and there. But it would appear that the scroll would be destroyed no matter what Twilight did to prevent it.

"And when I destroy this scroll, there will be no way for you to change it!" Starlight proclaimed.

Starlight used her magic to begin tearing the scroll in half, Twilight and Spike looking upon in horror. Though it would have been easy for her to destroy it in just a moment, Starlight seemed to be savoring every moment of it. Twilight prayed that it was hesitation and not a grim satisfaction that was making Starlight take her time.

Twilight quickly switched tactics, folding her wings in and slowly approaching Starlight in hopes of defusing the situation long enough to dispel the immediate threat, hoping that anything could prevent Starlight from ruining the future forever.

"Starlight, you're right!" Twilight pleaded with her again, "I don't know what you went through! But I do know you can't do this! I've seen where this leads, and so have you!"

Starlight scoffed, tearing the scroll just a bit more as she did.

"I only saw what you showed me, who knows what will really happen?"

Twilight had lived through more than her fair share of world-ending and death-defying catastrophes, but the prospect of what could happen if Starlight destroyed the scroll filled her with a whole new kind of terror. No danger had ever seemed so absolute, yet so uncertain at the same time; if every future she returned to was worse than the next, then would anything exist if Starlight broke the flow of destiny forever? The thought of the possibility of total entropy because of Starlight's actions made Twilight's hooves heavy and body cold.

"I've seen it a dozen times! Things don't turn out well in Equestria without me and my friends!"

Starlight scoffed again and tore the scroll just a little more, now about two-thirds down the middle.

"Ugh! What's so special about your friends? How can a group of ponies that are so different be so important?"

"Because," Twilight cried with even more urgency, "The differences between me and my friends are the very things that make our friendship strong!"

Starlight seemed to hesitate, her face momentarily becoming downcast and contemplative. "I thought Sunburst and I were the same, but we turned out different and it tore out friendship apart!"

In one swift motion, the ripped the scroll almost completely, only a small bit keeping it together. At this point, any common mishandling or accident could easily sever it.

Starlight's anger and conviction came back just as quickly as it had gone, though the gravity of the situation seemed to finally be weighing on her, as if she wasn't sure if she should follow through, but really wanted to look like she had no hesitation.

"And now..." she said, her voice wavering and unsure, "I'm going to tear apart yours!"

Twilight's fight or flight instincts kicked in full gear. The time for pleading and scheming was over the instant Starlight began her final tear, and she shot up and fired a powerful magical blast directly at Starlight.

Starlight wasn't so lucky to side-step this shot, and took the blunt of it, so surprised by the strength and pain associated with the blast that the scroll dropped out of her grasp, dropping lightly onto the cloud. Starlight, meanwhile, was knocked off the small cloud and flew across the sky, having to grab herself in her own magic over open sky.

Before Twilight could procure the scroll, Starlight fired off a blast of her own; not at Twilight, but at the scroll itself. However, the shot went just a little wide and ended up destroying the cloud under the scroll instead of the scroll itself, sending it fluttering.

Twilight flew towards the scroll, Spike clinging onto her back for dear life, but focused her actual efforts back onto Starlight. She fired off another bolt of magic, but not the vague arcane blast that she had in the past. Her wide fuscia beam transformed mid-air into five distinct bolts that looked much more solid and much more painful than the blasts the two had exchanged before.

Starlight teleported out of their path and right next to the scroll, quickly casting a spell to knock Twilight away. Though Twilight recovered quickly, Starlight smirked and looked her in the eyes as she took the scroll in her hooves and prepared to pull. She hesitated, however, at the surprisingly grim and determined look on Twilight's face. The oddest thing about this look was that it wasn't focused on Starlight, but somewhere behind her.

Unknown to Starlight, the missiles were locked onto her and redirected their course after she teleported. Though most of them simply faded before they could curve around to hit her, one slammed into her back. The scroll dropped yet again as the impact caused her magic to fizz out, resulting in her dropping herself into a free-fall. Though the impact didn't knock her out, the pain and intensity stunned her. Though, perhaps more disorienting was the sudden rush of fear, both for her life and of Twilight's sudden grim determination.

Twilight, meanwhile, gingerly caught the scroll in a magic bubble, but encountered an issue of a new kind; as it did last time, the fight resulted in an interruption of the actual race as fillies crowded around to watch this display. But now that it wasn't just a pretty light show, but was resulting in actual violence, children were being quickly ushered away as adult ponies yelled out to her, flying towards her with the intent of restraining the apparently violent and mysterious mare.

The distraction gave Starlight just enough time to gather her thoughts enough to send an arrant magic blast towards Twilight above, striking her and encasing her in a block of crystal once again. Though the various ponies were rushing to resolve the fight before either pony met their end on the ground, what happened next was too fast for any of them to react to.

Twilight, along with Spike on her back and the scroll in the crystal with her, fell quickly, catching up with Starlight's descent in a moment. At just that moment, Twilight summoned the will to blast the crystal open, sending the scroll flying right towards Starlight, still in a free-fall. Starlight grabbed it in her hooves, and without hesitation pulled her hooves apart.

"Starlight, don't-!" Twilight screamed in the split second before the scroll was destroyed.

The instant the scroll was split, white light surrounded it and grew to encompass Twilight, Spike, and Starlight, then shining out across Equestria. Then, everything contracted in on itself, and the world went black.

Twilight reoriented herself, flapping her wings wildly until finding her rhythm. After a moment, Spike finally unburied his face from Twilight's neck, relaxing the death-grip he had around her for the duration of the fight. Both of them looked around, seeing nothing in all directions except for blackness. It wasn't even as if there was a lack of light, but as if there was simply nothing to see. The absolute silence made Twilight suddenly regret never getting treatment for her mild tinnitus, and nothing seemed to happen in this space bar for the flapping of her own wings.

"Twilight," Spike said, his voice echoing strangely across the empty space, "What happened?"

Twilight looked around, hoping to see any clue as to what happened, or anything at all.

"I have no idea, Spike..."

Twilight knew that was a lie. She did have one idea, one that was leaving her well into a state of shock and denial. She had done enough study on both science and arcane interactions to be familiar with the theoretical concept of entropy, the idea that one day, all energy from the universe would be depleted and everything will fall into a state of nothingness. It was mostly a philosophical concept, as what ponies knew about arcana told them that physical energy and arcane energy do not have consistent conversions. Essentially, as long as magic exists and as long as physical energy exists, the two will constantly refresh and grow each other.

But this wasn't exactly a natural progression of things. Starlight had tampered with events that seemed more and more intrinsic to the balance of all of Equestria and beyond, and the reverberations of those shattered bonds may reach further out than any one could possibly know. Her friends were connected to the elements of harmony, which were simply the physical forms of some of the most important forces that held the world together. By ending these friendships and defying destiny, she created chaos in the future, and by destroying the scroll that could reverse the damage, she may well have destroyed the elements themselves.

Though Twilight had no way of knowing, she suspected that this "butterfly effect" that Starlight had created was reaching so far into the past and future that what she was seeing now was a result of magic being taken away from the world. Entropy. Twilight may have felt much more upset about this if it weren't for the feeling that she was very, very far away from herself right now.

That is, until a a pulling sensation brought her back. She thought it might have been a consequence of the shock at first, but the sensation slowly grew, as if gravity just remembered to exist again. She flapped a little harder in order to keep up with the pull, but the force kept growing exponentially, until Twilight wasn't able to keep up.

It wasn't long before Twilight and Spike gripped each other, unable to see anything, but having the sensation that they were falling downwards very quickly. They both began to scream as the sensation became overwhelming, buffeting their bodies and knocking the air out of their lungs. Twilight's last comprehensive thought took the form of a shield, tightly bound around the two like cling-wrap as they fell ever faster into the darkness.

Chapter 1: Curious

Twilight Sparkle sat at her study, as she did every night, contemplating the great mysteries of the universe. Though it happened to be her favorite time of day, the one she was so aptly named after, she found herself unable to focus on her work. Right now she was supposed to be reviewing some equations regarding thermodynamics, ensuring that the results were consistent. Though she trusted her colleagues on this theory, and it wasn't exactly her area of expertise, she would be a hypocrite if she didn't aid in peer review.

But tonight, she just couldn't get into it. In fact, the past few weeks felt a little off. A few weird dreams here and there, dwelling on things that were unrelated to her work, a few strange encounters and events that weren't odd enough to worry about, but odd enough to note. Though she wasn't any stranger to a vague sense of malaise, she could almost always focus on her work to keep her grounded, but lately things seemed to be falling apart somewhat.

Not that anything in her actual life was changing, but she just felt less focused, less motivated. Maybe she was finally getting burned out on work like Shining Armor kept warning her about, and just needed some time off. She stared at the numbers in front of her, trying to get her brain to work, but after 10 minutes of her pencil only being used for doodling in the margins, she finally decided to push herself away and take a break. That was another strange thing; usually, she couldn't step away until she had the satisfaction of a job well done, but right now she would rather just take a coffee break. And she didn't even like coffee.

Instead, she decided to just open up the window and turn on the radio. Maybe later she would go out and get something to eat, or maybe she just wanted to visit her family. For some reason, she couldn't stand the thought of being alone at the moment, something that had never bothered her much before.

She walked over to the radio and flicked it on, it still being tuned to the channel she listened to while she was preparing for her work in the morning. It was mostly a station with discussions about recent events, somewhere between news and entertainment, a good thing to listen to while doing other things.

"-elebration. As ponies begin to prepare for it, we've already been seeing more noise and conduct complaints, so I don't necessarily think this is uncalled for." said a pony from the radio. It was somepony Twilight had never heard before.

"I still have to question if this is all excessive, though." said another voice, "It's supposed to be a celebration, and surrounding it with guards seems to undermine the entire point of the event."

Twilight clambered onto her lounge chair, laying back and listening to the radio. She was fairly certain they were talking about the extra guards that were being posted for the Summer Sun Celebration, due to her brother's concerns that such an important event could cause unfortunate conduct.

"Well, it's not like they're actually going to stop anyone from celebrating, but someone has to make sure ponies don't go overboard with the fireworks. Remember two years ago, on Brook Street? Those mail ponies sure were miffed!"

Twilight pulled a book off of the small shelf next to her chair, one of the few "light reads" she had. Daring Do and the Castle of Coatl, something far below Twilight's reading level but a worthy installment in a beloved series. Though she had read this particular book at least three times already, it was good to read when she didn't want to actually focus on reading.

Her eyes skimmed across the words on the pages as she half-listened to the radio. It would seem that ponies weren't exactly happy with the increase in guard, but Twilight would have to agree with their presence. Equestria was changing in strange ways these days, and what was once a humble observance seemed to be gearing more towards a rambunctious festival this year. Though, Twilight supposed, the fact that it was the one-thousandth Summer Sun Celebration was reason for extra celebration.

She didn't have any plans this year. Her family had invited her to stay over and watch the sunrise, of course, but she didn't even know if she was going to take them up on it. So many of her colleagues were going to parties, mostly with each other, but Twilight was never invited to any of it. She wasn't honestly sure if she should feel upset about it, as she never made the effort to talk to any of them or try to express interest, anyway. She had always used the excuse of her important work for her isolation, but lately that felt weaker and weaker.

She had just reached the part where Daring Do receives a mysterious tip that one of the cities' artifacts, an ancient and mysterious key, will be stolen later that night. Twilight knew what happened next by heart; Daring Do would try to intervene with the theft, but it would turn out that no heist was actually being performed. The guards show up, thinking that Daring was the thief all along, which ended with her narrow escape and wanted status in the town. In Twilight's opinion, it was one of the best openings to a Daring Do book, as it kept the reader guessing just as much as Daring Do herself.

"Of course, there's been no shortage of hokey claims for the one-thousandth Summer Sun Celebration." the radio personnel continued, "Like we talked about last week, lots of ponies have been claiming prophecies of all sorts, so maybe we'll all end up biting our tongues when ragnarok comes around!"

Both radio ponies gave a hearty laugh at the idea. Twilight groaned, got up, and turned the radio off. The last thing she wanted right now was to hear about prophecies and doomsday scenarios. She suddenly didn't feel so interested in reading, either.

Frustrated and bored, she paced around for a few moments before stopping by the window and leaning against the frame. It was a perfectly ideal summer night, the air just cool enough to provide reprieve from the long days. The sky was clear, and Twilight felt lucky enough to have a good view of it. It could be hard to catch for those who lived closer to the center of Canterlot, because of the light pollution, but those who lived further away from the central city had a great view from the mountainside.

The moon was shining as brightly as ever, and would be in its full phase for the night of the Summer Sun Celebration, which only added fuel to the celebratory and speculative fire. Twilight wondered if anypony had any theories about the Mare in the Moon. She had done enough studying around Equestria's greatest rulers, Celestia and Luna, to know of the folklore and stories surrounding it. Though many ponies held their own degrees of worship and reverence of the two historical figures, one of the most consistent beliefs told of the two great princesses who could control the sun and moon and watched over us all, even from the afterlife. It wasn't something that modern science was particularly apt to believe, but many common ponies still hailed it true. Surely there were plenty of wild theories connecting them to the Celebration.

As Twilight rested her head on her hooves, contemplating the state of things, she noticed something odd. As a pony who had spent most of her life studying the stars and cosmos, she had become fairly familiar with star charts and the night sky, which would be the only reason she noticed such a minuscule difference. She wondered if she was seeing things, or if perhaps her memory was simply faltering, when she saw one extra star in the sky. More curious, was the longer she peered at it, it seemed to actually be slowly travelling downwards.

Instantly forgetting her contemplations, Twilight rushed upstairs into her observatory to view this strange light more closely. She set up one of her lighter-duty telescopes as quickly as possible and aimed it at the phenomena, which appeared to have moved further down. As soon as she got a focus on it, she was only more perplexed.

It was a bright magenta light, so bright that it appeared almost white. There was no doubt that it was moving, and it seemed to be gaining momentum by the second. The way it moved ruled out the possibility of any normal shooting star or meteor, and, as she watched it, it seemed to be much closer than any meteor should be. In fact, it appeared to be moving fairly close to the city itself.

Twilight had never worked so quickly. She pulled out every chart and diagram she had in order to try to calculate its size, speed, and trajectory, constantly moving between her notes and the telescope. From what she could gather in a few minutes the object wasn't large enough to cause any damage outside of its crash course and wasn't losing mass, was gaining speed exponentially, and would most likely crash west of Canterlot, into the mountainside. A speed-search through her textbooks didn't give her any more insight into what the objects could actually be.

Twilight felt silly admitting it to herself, but she felt a pull towards this strange star, as if some great knowledge would be revealed to her if she could only see it closer. Watching it fall ever faster towards the ground filled her with conviction, casting her doubts aside and replacing them with a childlike wonder. This is what she needed. Adventure, some daring and intrigue! How long had she sat holed up in her study, thinking of theoreticals and practicalities? When was the last time she had really went out and experienced the world?

She knew it was risky, and she knew it was stupid, but she packed up as quickly as she could and headed out towards where the star should land. She didn't know why, but she couldn't help but feel like there was magic in the air tonight.

During her treck, Twilight kept looking back to the star. It would seem that her assumptions were correct, and it would likely crash before she could get to it. Once the initial exhilaration wore off, she began to feel more self-conscious of running off in the middle of the night in search of a magic star, but by the time she boarded the tram she felt as if she might as well see this through.

By the time she was able to exit the city, she realized that the strange object in the sky had fallen far enough and gained enough momentum to crash into the woods any second. She wondered if anyone else noticed this, or if it was just her. It was possible that someone who wasn't looking could miss it, as by now it was moving so fast that one might assume it was shooting star if they didn't pay attention.

By the time she reached the edge of the western forest on the mountainside, she witnessed the star crash straight down. It thankfully didn't create an explosion or seem to harm the area, but she would be lying if she said the impact didn't nearly cause her to turn tail and run.

However, she was able to steel her nerves long enough to go in. Whatever wildlife was around had surely been repelled by the impact, and the area was suffused with a strange, shimmering mist. Twilight was worried that the mysterious object might be expelling something dangerous to her health, but by the time she was in the thick of the forest, she felt too close to her goal to stop now.

Twilight pushed through the silence and mist, towards the area she thought the crash was at. It was only a few minutes of trekking through the forest with no other interesting events until she neared her goal. The mist grew thicker, moonlight illuminating an area just beyond the trees. Twilight was finding it hard to see past the shining fog, which was growing thicker and unnaturally bright the further in she went.

Her heart leapt and hooves became heavy when she heard a rustling sound somewhere close by. She stopped dead in her tracks, her heart hammering in her chest as she listened harder. Somewhere just in front of her, beyond the mist, something was moving.

Silhouetted by the mist, a figure rose up. Easily pony in shape, though, as its head rose up, Twilight could see a single, long horn protruding from the forehead. The creature didn't seem to notice her, but Twilight remained rooted to the spot, locked there both by curiosity and fear. Slowly standing upright the creature then seemed to raise two grand wings attached to its back, high above its horned head. Then, in a swift motion, the creature swept its wings down, dissipating the mist and becoming visible for Twilight to witness in its full glory.

There, standing tall in front of Twilight, was a horned, winged version of herself.

Chapter 2: Hello World

Twilight Sparkle slowly rose from where she had landed. She was thankfully unharmed, but very sore, and more than a bit shaken. Though she was thankful that she knew her shield had worked, she was now faced with a new problem; as she slowly lifted her neck, she could see that she was surrounded by an arcane mist obscuring her vision. She figured that it must be a residual effect of her powerful shield slamming so hard into the ground, so she lifted her wings and brought them back down again to clear it away.

Now that she could see, Twilight noticed that she was in a forest somewhere, and that it was night time. Thankfully, Spike was right by her hooves, getting his own bearings back and otherwise looking fine. Twilight took a few ginger steps forward, thinking hard about her current predicament. She wasn't nowhere, which was a good first sign. However, the fact that she seemed to arrive in the middle of a forest at night made her think that perhaps she was thrown back into the timeline where Nightmare Moon reigned.

But she noticed that where she was looked nothing like the Everfree forest, and in fact looked much more like the forests near the Canterhorn's mountainside that she had grown up around. Though to be fair, she couldn't be sure anything would be the same as she had seen before. She wasn't able to dwell on this for long, however, before Spike pulled lightly on her tail.

"Uh, Twilight?" he said, staring at something behind her.

Twilight, however was too focused to give him her attention.

"Come on, Spike," she said while looking further into the forest, "We have to try to find the map again, if it's even still there..."

"Twilight..." Spike said while tugging her tail again.

"Hopefully this will still be fixable," she said while continuing to walk forward, "With any luck, the map could tell us where to- Ow!"

Spike had pulled on her tail once again, hard.

"What in the world was that for-" she began, but lost her train of thought once her eyes trailed from Spike to the object of his attention.

Right there, was an earth pony mare with a completely bewildered look upon her face. Lavender coat, midnight blue mane with purple and pink stripes, dark eyes, and a saddlebag filled with books and notes. A mirror image of the very same Twilight Sparkle whose tail was being held by Spike, minus the horn and wings.

The two shared a bewildered silence for a long moment before Twilight attempted to start conversation with the doppelganger.

"Um, hello," she said in a timid tone. "Uh, can I ask you some questions...?"

The other Twilight stared at her for another long moment, until she tried to rub her eyes clear, and then twitch her ears for a moment, and finally, laugh hysterically.

The alicorn Twilight and Spike shared a look, watching as the doppelganger continued to laugh in an unsettling tone. After a moment, her laughter subsided into giggles, until, with a bewildered smile upon her face, she pointed a hoof at the two and said "You're not real."

Twilight shared another look with Spike, then spoke to her unlikely twin again.

"Um, I know this might seem strange to you, but we're kind of in the middle of an emergency and we could probably really use your help."

The other Twilight giggled in an unbelieving way and said "No, no. You're not real, I've just wandered into the crash site of some kind of meteor and inhaled the fumes, and now I'm hallucinating! A-ha haha!"

Spike looked at her skeptically and asked, "Uh, are you okay?"

"Oh, and the talking dragon! How fantastical!" the hysterical Twilight said with a wild look on her face. "Aha ha, you look so real, wow!"

The currently breaking-down Twilight continued to giggle to herself and ogle at the others, while Twilight and Spike looked on with concern.

"Um," said the alicorn Twilight, "Maybe we should get out of the forest and work from there..."

The other Twilight didn't say anything or protest as Twilight gently led her away from the crash site and out of the forest.

Twilight gawked at the sight before her. It was Canterlot, as large and grand as ever, yet so different than the one she knew. Instead of the grand towers interconnected by sky bridges, supported by wide platforms jutting out from the mountainside, the city's buildings were laid out in stout rows along with the land. Though the white stone infrastructure and cascading waterfalls were still in place, Twilight could tell even from a distance that there was a distinct lack of the architectural styles that indicated the city's unicorn-built roots.

They city still retained its main entrance, which presented Twilight with a new problem. She looked over at her doppelganger, who seemed to be slowly coming to grips and worriedly examining the alicorn in front of her. If Twilight's hunch was right, the locals probably wouldn't handle seeing an alicorn very well either.

"So," she said turning to the earth pony, "What's your name?"

The other Twilight slowly looked up and locked eyes with "herself", a worried and skeptical look on her face. "Twilight Sparkle," she said simply.

"Oh, uh, me too, haha!" alicorn Twilight awkwardly laughed.

"You know what," Spike said, "I'm going to go ahead and fix this before it becomes a problem. I'm calling you--" he pointed at the alicorn Twilight, "--Twilight, and you--" he pointed at earth pony Twilight, "--Sparkle!"

"Sparkle" shot him an unbelieving look while "Twilight" just rolled her eyes, but continued to try and explain the situation to her double.

"So, uh, let me try to explain everything," she said, "So, where I come from, there's a pony named Starlight Glimmer. I guess my friends and I made her mad when we stopped her from doing some pretty terrible stuff, and she got back to me by -- and please hear me out here -- by sending us both back in time to a pretty critical moment in our worlds history. Well, she messed with a pretty important event, and I'm not completely sure what's happened, but somehow it's transported me over here. Does that make... any sense?"

"Sparkle" slowly nodded and said "Well, I suppose it makes just as much sense as talking to myself and a small dragon... Though, I'm not sure I actually believe any of it."

The two Twilights shared a long, silent look while Spike tried to get a better look at Canterlot in the distance. After a moment, he looked back to the two and asked "So, what do we do now? If we ended up here, who knows where Starlight could be!"

Twilight looked towards Spike and said "I don't know how to fix this, Spike..."

She looked towards her doppelganger again, and asked "So, uh, I could probably use some help figuring this all out. Maybe... Two Twilights are better than one?"

Sparkle stared at her again with hesitation, "Maybe I should see a doctor about hallucinating that I'm talking to myself first? Or at least call someone about the possibly dangerous gasses in the forest..."

Twilight groaned, "Alright, you don't believe this is real. Fair enough. Either way, with or without you I need to find a way to fix this mess, so can you at least tell me which way to fly from here to a town called 'Ponyville'?"

Sparkle scoffed, "Fly? What, don't tell me those wings are supposed to actually work on a pony's body?"

Twilight lifted an eyebrow, and with a slightly smug look on her face flew up into the air and hovered there while the other Twilight looked on in awe.

"Wait, so if you are real -- and I'm not saying that you are -- but if you are, how can you stay up like that with the weight of a pony? And how can you hover in place so smoothly without more rapid flapping?"

The Twilight in the air suddenly smiled knowingly, quickly forming a plan. She used her magic to lift Spike in the air and right onto her back, which only resulted in the grounded Twilight's eyes widening even more in disbelief and curiosity.

"I'll make you a deal. If you help me find Starlight Glimmer, how about I teach you all about magic?"

The mission back into Canterlot was almost ruined multiple times by Sparkle's incessant questions. As soon as Twilight turned Spike and herself invisible in order to covertly follow Sparkle back into Canterlot, Sparkle began a near constant state of questions that almost gave her away.

Thankfully, they were eventually able to get to her home and study without causing too much of a disturbance. It was a fairly ornate building built close to the cliff face, with a tower jutting out of the side and plenty of wide windows. True to form, most of the building was reserved for being Sparkle's personal study; though there was a distinct lack of the magic-based equipment that Twilight was familiar with, there were also several intricate mechanical devices that Twilight wasn't familiar with.

As soon as they were all inside and the invisibility spell was dropped, Sparkle began barraging Twilight and Spike with questions all over again, all while preparing various devices to study them further, as if it was never strange to be talking to herself in the first place.

"So it's like another type of force? Is it only created from organic beings or are there other sources of 'magic'? And what's the process to allow you to fly and turn invisible? Is it just reactive, or is there some sort of process you have to go through to activate it? And how does--"

Twilight stuck a hoof up to Sparkle's muzzle, "Wait a second now," she said, "I have some questions of my own right now. So this world really just... doesn't have magic?"

Sparkle shook her head.

"Wow," said Twilight, "In my version of Equestria, it's just as natural and immutable as gravity, or wind... What I don't get, though, is why this Equestria doesn't have magic. You see, Starlight was able to use her magic to send me back and forth in time over and over again, and even though each alternate future I landed in was different because of the things she changed in the past, it was never something like this. When she destroyed the scroll that allowed me to try and fix this, I think she might have somehow messed with the timeline even more than she had before..."

Sparkle held a hoof to her face in contemplation, "I won't claim to be an expert in magic or timelines, but couldn't you just make another scroll to send you back again and make things right without her coming with you and messing it up?"

Twilight rubbed her temples with her hooves and said, "Ugh, I wish it was that easy. Not only did she base her own spell off of a time spell that one of the best wizards ever known made, but to even perform a spell that like that she had to use another power source just to make it work. I don't think I'll be able to make, not to mention actually use a spell like that without the..."

Her head suddenly shot up, realization dawning over her face.

"That's it!" she exclaimed, "If the cutie map is still there, we might be able to use it to set things right! We might even be able to get help from our friends from this world!"

"Wait," said Sparkle, "You've lost me again. What exactly is the plan to fix all of this? And... What will this mean for my world? And, wait -- why should I even help you?"

Twilight scowled, "Well first, because it's the right thing to do! And secondly, if Starlight is running about this world with nothing to stop her, she could be really dangerous. When I first met her, she was using her magic to take away ponies cutie marks and indoctrinate them into her cult. And she had enough power to mess up the entirety of time, so I would say that it's probably within your best interest to help me stop this!"

Sparkle groaned and laid her head on her desk, "Ugh, why did it have to be my interdimensional twin..." she raised her head up to look back at Twilight. "Also, what's a 'cutie mark'?"

Twilight stoke a quick look at Sparkle's flank, which she had only just noticed was completely bare.

"Oh, wow. I guess I should have seen this coming... Uh, you see this symbol, on my flank?" she said while pointing to her own flank, "Every pony has a unique symbol of their own, called a 'cutie mark'. It's a representation of our special talents and place in the world; it's basically a magical mark of one's destiny and sense of self. For instance, mine represents both magic and my friends."

"Huh," Spike said, "I guess in the end Starlight got what she wanted, didn't she? A world without cutie marks, right? I wonder if the Starlight Glimmer from this world had any better a life because of it..."

Twilight's face turned serious in contemplation for a moment, "I have no idea, Spike. There's a lot we don't know here; I'm still only really guessing as to how this all happened..."

Her look of contemplation turned into one of determination. She smacked her hooves together in emphasis and said, "But I do know one thing; The best chance we have to figuring all of this out is to find the map, find Starlight, and most importantly, find our friends!"

Twilight shoved a hoof up into the air and took a heroic pose, "Onwards to Ponyville!"

Sparkle groaned, "Can we at least wait until the morning? It's almost midnight right now..."

Twilight put her hoof down as a sheepish look came upon her face, "Oh, uh, right. Onwards to Ponyville in the morning, hehe..."

Chapter 3: Game Plan

Spike was grumpy. Very grumpy. "Twilight" and "Sparkle" had been up for nearly two hours constantly asking each other questions about the other's world. This wouldn't have bothered Spike so much if it weren't for the fact that it was well past midnight, and that most of the conversation was comprised of nerdy, excited squealing. As he tried to get as much sleep as possible considering the stressful situation, he grew increasingly frustrated with the two squeaky mares.

"So," he heard Twilight say from the other room, "without dense thaumatic fields surrounding your atmosphere, wouldn't it be possible to send objects directly into space as long as you could breach the atmosphere?"

"I'm so glad you asked!" Sparkle said excitedly, "We've been developing the capability to send objects into space, and we're very close!" Sparkle giggled in self-assured way, "It's actually kind of my specialty."

From the other room, Spike heard one of them squeal excitedly -- Twilight, he assumed.

"Omigosh, think of all the data that could be collected, or even samples! If you're close, maybe one day soon you could even send a pony up to space! I'm so jealous!" she all but squeaked out.

"Oh, I wish! One of the main issues we're still struggling with is finding an insulator that's both effective and lightweight enough to be used in the delicate machinery -- nonetheless for a spacesuit!"

Twilight loudly gasped, "We recently made a discovery in our own world! If you take a silica gel and transmute the liquid in it into a gas while heating it to a supercritical state, the structure of the gel will be retained without the weight -- it sounds exactly like what you're looking for! We call it aerogel!"

Sparkle could be heard slamming her hooves on a table while she yelled, "Of course! Aerogel!"

Spike glared into the darkness and hopped out of the lounge chair he had been given to sleep in. He marched into the kitchen, where Twilight and Sparkle were talking, and said "Can you two please keep it down? It's like two AM, and we have stuff to do tomorrow!"

Twilight tried to hold back a chuckle while she was being chastised by the very sleepy Spike, knowing how grumpy he got any time his sleep was interrupted but still feeling guilty for keeping him up. Sparkle, however, looked nonplussed.

"It doesn't really matter, though. We're gonna have to stay up tomorrow night, anyway.

Twilight tilted her head and asked, "What do you mean? What's happening tomorrow?"

"Oh, I guess I didn't mention it," Sparkle said, "But tomorrow is the eve of the Summer Sun Celebration. Do you have it in your own timeline?"

Spike yawned, "The Summer Sun Celebration? Yeah, we have it, but last time I checked it was still a few months away. Weird..."

Twilight put her hoof up to her chin and said, "Yeah, it is weird."

She slowly turned to stare hard at Sparkle, as if scrutinizing every tiny detail on her doppelgangers face. After a moment of concentration she asked, "Sparkle, what year is it?"

Sparkle blinked. "Um, the one-thousandth celestial year of peace, starting at the Summer Sun Celebration. Why?"

Twilight turned her scrutinizing gaze away, "From the latest point in my timeline, we're already well into the one-thousand-and-second year. I guess that would technically make me older than you -- but more concerning is why we were sent back to such a strange time..."

She clapped her hooves together with determination. "It might be more important than ever to get to Ponyville tomorrow. In my timelines equivalent of tomorrow is when events happened that changed my life forever, and really set the wheels of fate in motion."

Spike suddenly clapped his hands together in an authoritative way and said, "Well then, let's make sure we're all rested up to see the wheels of fate or whatever tomorrow! Goodnight!" He then promptly walked back into Sparkles study, intent of finally getting his rest.

A long moment of silence passed between the two mares. Finally, Sparkle turned to her counterpart and asked, "Is he always so grumpy?"

Twilight giggled, "Only when he doesn't get enough sleep."

A quite moment passed between the two mares. Twilight looked to her counterpart again with a small smile.

"I have a lot more questions, but I suppose it can wait until morning. He is right, we have a lot to do..."

Sparkle got up out of her seat and hummed, "Hm, I suppose so. Well, goodnight, uh, Twilight... Wow that's weird..."

Twilight stood up and made her way over to the study where Sparkles couch was prepared for her stay. She giggled and said, "Goodnight, Sparkle. And you'll have to tell me all about space-engineering once this is all ironed out."

"So what's the game plan? Are you going to make yourself invisible and sneak onto the train? Because that sounds kind of risky."

Twilight looked over at Sparkle, who was busy tying her saddlebags on. Everyone had already eaten a light breakfast and Twilight was pushing to get them out the door as quickly as possible, much to Sparkle's frazzlement.

"No worries! I can get all of us there in an instant with a teleportation spell!"

Spike, who was sitting patiently on Sparkle's couch, eyed Twilight nervously.

"Uh, are you sure about that? I know you're great at teleportation, but are you sure you can go that far? And while bringing the two of us along with you? I would rather not get tele-singed again!"

Twilight rolled her eyes and said, "Oh please, I won't mess it up if I concentrate! Besides, we don't have a particularly better way of getting there quickly."

Sparkle finished her packing and stepped up to the two.

"Honestly... I'm kind of curious about it, too. How does teleportation feel? Does it hurt?... Will it make me queasy?"

Twilight giggled, "Well, if you want to know what it's like, let's go now!"

"Alright, let's teleport!"

Spike went up to Twilight and said, "Alright, alright, let's get this over with."

Twilight spread her legs and powered up her horn.

"Alright everypony! Keep your hooves on the ground and everything will be fine!"

"Everything was not fine!"

Sparkle, the end of her tail slightly singed, was slung over some bushes trying not to lose her breakfast.

The positive side of things is that Twilight got them all the way over to the edge of Ponyville. The negative would be that Sparkle apparently forgot to keep her hooves below her and suffered a fairly rough ride through the whole ordeal.

Twilight patted her back gently and giggled guiltily.

"Hehe, sorry about that. I guess I should have given you more of a warm-up..."

Sparkle lifted her head up from the bushes and groaned, "Ugh, next time can we please just use the train? What are we even doing here, anyway?"

"Well, near Ponyville is where the tree of harmony resides in my world: basically, it's a mysterious relic with amazing powers to keep things in balance. From the tree of harmony is where the cutie map came from, the thing that Starlight Glimmer used to power her time-travel spell, and the one thing that's stayed the same throughout every alternate future. If it's still here, I'm confident that we can use it to set things right."

Sparkle steadied herself and looked at the town in the distance. She had personally never been, and only heard of it because of its proximity to Canterlot. She could tell from the distance that it was a fairly humble little country town, surrounded by farmland and forests, but it definitely had a certain charm to it.

"So, what do we actually do once we find this thing?"

"Well, ideally it'll just show us where to go, or give us a clue about what to do next. But if not, the next best bet is to find the tree of harmony. If the entire tree is here, then the elements of harmony might be here too. That's where the real power lies, and they've never failed us before."

Sparkle looked down at the ground in contemplation.

"I can't help but wonder what this means for me, though. I understand that when yourself from an alternate dimension crash lands in front of you and asks you to stop a power-crazed sorceress, you're not really in a position to say no, but I can't help but wonder what this will all mean for my own reality. If you go back and set everything back to how it's supposed to be..."

Twilight stared at her for a long moment, blinking.

"I... I guess I did't really think of that. This is an alternate timeline, not an alternate dimension, so I suppose setting things right would sort of... Turn the switch off on this one, and turn it back to mine? But then again..."

Twilight held her hoof up to her mouth, thinking hard.

"The fact that there's no magic in this world, and apparently never was, makes me think that this could all be bigger than just that. Starlight only changed events from when I was a filly, so it doesn't make any sense as to why the history of this world would be so thoroughly changed. It makes me think that maybe, she somehow created an alternate dimension entirely."

Sparkle stared at Twilight, her eyebrows furrowed.

After a moment, Twilight smiled and slung her foreleg around Sparkle's neck.

"Don't worry, I promise that I'll figure this out in a way that's best for everypony. I wouldn't leave myself hanging!"

"Hmm, alright. Let's just see if this map is here and try to work from there, I suppose."

Spike looked over the town from the hill they were all standing on. After a moment of searching, he pointed towards a stream on the outskirts of town and said, "There! It should be over that way. Let's get over there before any of the townsponies notice us."

Twilight smiled and started trotting over the the very spot, keeping close to the treeline to avoid prying eyes.

"Alright, let's go and get this all figured out!"

Chapter 4: No Clue

"Any minute now!"

...

"Any minute now..."

...

"Come on map, do something!"

Twilight stared intently at the map, waiting for something significant to happen. The map was, indeed, where she thought it would be and in working condition. However, it didn't seem that it would give her important information any time soon, and sat there unmoving.

"Are you supposed to do something to it, or does it just work when you're near it?" Sparkle asked.

Twilight grumbled and said, "It seems to more or less work on its own. Whenever a problem comes up somewhere, it will call me and my friends to go and solve it automatically. But in order to go back and forth in time, Starlight and I have both been using it in conjunction with the spell scroll. Now that I don't have the scroll to use with it... Well, I'm not sure what to do."

Twilight slammed her head down on map and said, "I've always been good to you, map!"

Spike, meanwhile, was busy looking at the differences in this Equestria. On the surface level, many things were similar, but there were a few notable differences. For one, the Crystal Empire seemed to not exist at all, instead replaced with a furious snowstorm. Cities like Cloudsdale and Los Pegasus also seemed absent, and the entirety of Equestria was more thoroughly populated with more industrious city areas. There are also seemed to be fewer port cities, as if ponies never ended up bothering to explore the seas.

While Spike picked out the differences in the map, Sparkle eyed it curiously.

"So," she said, "you said that the map is connected to you and your friends, right? And you also said that it's connected to the 'tree of harmony', and the 'elements of harmony'. So, maybe to get it to work, you need one of those three things? After all, the way you describe it makes it sound like it's not really interested in working with just one pony."

Twilight raised her head from the table and stared at Sparkle, forming a plan in her mind.

"Oh my gosh, I think you're right!"

"I am?"

"This timeline, the summer sun celebration, landing right next to you -- it's all connected! I couldn't defeat Starlight on my own, just like every challenge I've faced has been thwarted with the help of my friends. This all can't just be a coincidence, maybe everything is the way it is because the map wants us to find a different way of fixing everything!"

Twilight turned to Sparkle and pointed a hoof at her.

"And maybe you're the one to find it!"

"Woah woah, wait a second," Sparkle said, "what do you mean me? You're the one who's the magic princess here! I'm just a scientist!"

"In my timeline," Twilight said, "this is the very day I met the friends that helped make me into the pony I am today and stood with me at every challenge. And now it's time for you to do the same!"

Sparkle rolled her eyes dramatically and said, "And how am I even supposed to do that? Go up to some random ponies and say 'hey, there's an evil sorceress threatening all of time, come with me to this magic map where we can meet up with myself and save the multiverse!'"

Spike said, "Um, yes?"

Twilight gave Spike a bop over the head and a glare.

"Don't listen to him. How about this; just go into town for a while, mingle with the ponies, maybe help out with the festivities, while I investigate the tree of harmony and come up with a better plan going forward?"

Sparkle groaned.

"Ugh, do I have to? I'm willing to accept a lot of things right now, but this just seems kind of... silly."

Twilight smiled and put a hoof on Sparkle's shoulder.

"I know friendship doesn't seem worth it -- after all, I was once quite literally in your horseshoes -- but I think you'll find that everything will start to come together once you try. Just go and make an effort to be friendly while I figure things out over here. I'll meet back up with you by sunset, and maybe you can find some ponies that can help us, too!"

"Ugh... Alright, I suppose I'll try. But I'm still not exactly clear on how this will help me, it's not like anyone here will be some sort of magical maestro. And besides, who am I even supposed to be looking for?"

Twilight smiled and gently led her away towards the town, and said, "Just go and be friendly, and I'm sure you'll know who you're looking for once you meet them!"

Sparkle glared at Twilight and said, "Wow, you're really leaning into this whole 'cryptic sage' role, aren't you?"

Nevertheless, Sparkle continued on her way towards Ponyville.

As they parted ways, Twilight called out to her and said "I'll catch up with you soon!"

Sparkle was suddenly having second thoughts about this whole affair. Some weird, alternate-reality version of herself comes into her life, takes her name, interrupts her daily life to take her to some podunk country village in order to find a map that doesn't work, and then sends her off to make magic mystery friends. In retrospect, she didn't know why she went along with all of this. She was still having a hard time believing this wasn't some sort of elaborate fever-dream.

She was so busy brooding over her thoughts that she barely noticed that she had entered the town proper. The townsponies were going about their day, occasionally giving the glowering Sparkle a concerned look and giving her a wide berth.

The townsponies were busy preparing for the festival, busying themselves with cleaning up the streets, hanging fliers, and setting up various booths and activities around the towering town center. They seemed overall cheerful and didn't seem to need any particular directions or authority in order to work together to complete the work. At the very least, Sparkle could appreciate how well organized they all were and how much they cared about their community.

She almost wished that she had stayed back in Canterlot to enjoy the celebration with her own family, but even forgetting the... exceptional circumstances, Sparkle knew that she probably wouldn't have anyway. Now that she thought about it, she had only isolated herself more after graduating, and now she was ignoring her family too. Great, now her bad mood had turned from anger into guilt and sadness. Really making progress.

She didn't have time, however, to ruminate on her feelings before somepony else appeared to have noticed them for her. Sparkles hooves practically skid across the ground as she came to a screeching halt, her entire field of vision suddenly assaulted by a sea of pink and frizzy hair.

"Hi there!" Said the atrociously pink pony with a fittingly squeaky voice, "My name is Pinkie Pie, but you can call me Pinkie, or maybe Pinkamena, but the only ponies who really call me that is my doctor and my mom when she gets mad when I put googly eyes on the mattocks. So what's your name?"

Sparkle stared at the approapriately-named pony in front of her, unable to process everything she had said so quickly. "Pinkie Pie" just stared right back at her, never losing her smile or the excitement that practically oozed off of her.

"Um," Sparkle said after a long moment, "my name is Twi- er, Sparkle."

"Nice to meet you, 'Twi-er Sparkle!'" Pinkie said, contorting her face with every syllable of the name.

"Are you here for the Summer Sun Celebration? I've never seen you in town before, and you looked kind of mad, or maybe kind of sad, or maybe you were more like smad, so I decided to come and introduce myself because I thought maybe you were smad because you didn't know any pony, and if I didn't have any friends I would be smad too, or even smonely, but now you can be happy because now you have a friend and it's me!"

Sparkle was starting to get a feeling about how this whole interaction was going to go. Pinkie Pie seemed almost unnervingly energetic, and Sparkle might have suspected that she was playing some sort of prank on her if it weren't for how genuine she seemed.

"Um... Thank you?"

"You're welcome!"

"And yes, I'm here for the celebration. Uh, could you tell me where I could find the town hall?"

Pinkie Pie put her hoof above her eyes and dramatically scanned around the area before pointing towards a large tower further into town and saying, "That big tower right over there! Just follow the road!"

"Oh, thank you." Sparkle said as she began trotting away.

"Bye!" Pinkie Pie called out, "See you at the party tonight!"

Sparkle didn't look back, but silently wondered what Pinkie Pie meant by the "party tonight". The celebration didn't start until early tomorrow morning, was there some kind of eve party happening tonight? She didn't remember it being mentioned.

She figured that she probably shouldn't worry about it too much, as Pinkie Pie seemed to be the kind of pony that operated entirely by her own rules. Sparkle sincerely doubted that she was one of the ponies that Twilight thought could help save the world, so she decided to focus on scoping out the rest of the town. Surely the ponies around here would be more considerate of her personal space than Pinkie Pie.

After several unsuccessful spells and lots of pleading, Twilight came to the conclusion that the map wasn't going to provide her with any useful information yet. So, she decided to look for the tree of harmony out in the everfree forest.

Going through the everfree forest here was strange. It lacked the wild and dangerous magic that had become iconic of it, though it was still distinctly dark and dense. Twilight was mildly surprised to find that the Castle of the Two Sisters actually exited here, worn-out tapestries of earth-pony style Celestia and Luna still hanging morosely from the walls. Though she would have loved to explore it and pick out the differences, she had a job to do today.

It was a quick trip around the side of the castle before Twilight found her prize; a serene silver glow emanating from within a ravine below the castle. And within that cavern was the Tree of Harmony, the elements of harmony attached to the branches.

The area around the tree, however, appeared to be partially dug up, as if someone attempted to uproot the tree but gave up halfway through. Its crystalline roots sprawled out across the cavern, and the entire tree was tilted slightly to the side because of the disturbance. However, it remained just as regal and serene as ever, waiting for worthy wielders of the elements.

"Woah," Spike said as the two approached the tree, "I guess the tree of harmony does exist here. And it looks like someone tried to mess with it a long time ago, too. So wouldn't that mean that there is magic in this world?"

Twilight stared hard at the tree of harmony and said, "Possibly. There's so much we don't know, so I don't want to make any assumptions. Besides, it seems just a little bit too convenient for the entire tree of harmony to just be sitting here and nopony's ever noticed."

Twilight experimentally flew up to the center of the tree, hoping for some sort of response. When it gave her none, she lightly tugged at the elements of harmony with her magic. To her surprise, they came out easily, and the center of the tree opened up to reveal the element of magic. She plucked each element carefully into her grasp, orbiting them around her slowly as she decended back onto the ground.

"So," Spike asked, "What do we actually do with them?"

Twilight touched back onto the ground, pondering the elements that moved around her while feeling their serene power course through the air.

"I have no idea."