"Ok, when I put it that way, it seems pretty strange," said Clear Sight. "But you seem to be taking it rather well."

Jumping up from the floor, he turned to his three visitors. "Why aren't you, you know, shocked at my appearance as an alternate universe form of your boss?"

Clear Thought shrugged. "Maybe because it's one of the oldest ideas in science fiction? Because we've known about the existence of other universes for years and have been researching how they interact with each other for almost as long? We have the SCM, too."

"Oh yeah," said Clear Sight, raising his arm. "I've got one of those, but us employees only get four coordinates."

Doc nodded in appreciation. "And add that to the fact that this really isn't the strangest thing we've seen so far, I remember the time when Clear Sight fought a duel with a princess of a foreign land, I think it was Prance? Bitaly? Nonetheless, that was the most complicated piece of psychological warfare this world has ever seen." He chuckled. "Did wonders for advertising, too."

Clear Thought spoke up. "Not to mention Res's mastery of loophole magic, what a weird field."

"Well," added Star Swirl, "I have been sending monsters to other worlds for a good portion of my career, the confirmation of established fact has no great effect on me."

Clear Sight looked around and shrugged. "Ehh, good enough for me." After getting up, he extended his hoof to each of them in turn. "Let me properly introduce myself. My name is, funnily enough, Sharp Vision, and I am an employee of the Multiverse Protection Committee. Now," he scratched the back of his head, "you may ask me what exactly I'm doing here. The precise reason is to help this universe through a particularly dubious set of circumstances known by you as the Memory Loop."

Noticing that Clear Thought raised an eyebrow, he explained, "Yeah, the Memory Loop never would have worked everyone would already be dead if I hadn't been resetting things, as it were, every time Clear Sight here used his Fragment. Luckily, that's where my higher-ups come in."

"Higher-ups?" asked Doc.

"The ones with clearance to use the full six coordinates in the SCM. Essentially time travelers as well as multiverse hoppers, cool stuff. But freaking bonkers, if it doesn't make things complicated."

"Wait for a minute. Are you telling us," interjected Star Swirl, "that our personal welfare plays a critical part in the functioning of the multiverse as a whole?"

"Sure seems that way," replied Sharp Vision, "I don't know much about it, sorry. But..."

He looked at his watch. "Yep, just as I thought. Nice chatting with you, but I really gotta be going, or I'm going to miss my bus. Bye guys," he walked away for a and hey, are y'all listening?"

They all nodded.

"Don't speak a word about this to anyone, and actually...now come to think about it..."

He took some small green gemstones from a bag at his side. "Here... let me program these." Concentrating for a second, he then gave each of them one. "Now trust me," he said, "I want to to slam these directly into your forehead. Don't worry about it, just do it for the safety of yourself and your friends, no joke."

There was a moment of incredulous silence.

"I think he might actually be serious," whispered Clear Thought.

"He acts the exact same as Clear Sight," whispered Doc, "I'm pretty sure he's not from an alternate universe, just setting us up for a joke."

"I am quite uncomfortable," whispered Star Swirl. "My brain is only of use to anyone when it is not in several pieces."

"Well," said Sharp Vision, "at least heavily consider it. I've already broken protocol telling you about this, and I'm not about to wipe your memories, that's freaking expensive, I mean whoof, I don't have the budget for that."

"Anyway, see you!" He took a running dash straight at the wall, and just before he arrived, a portal appeared.

As he dived through, the three of them got a good look at what was through the mystical door.

A good enough look.

"Yeah, nope, he's definitely right," said Clear Thought.

Nodding in silent astonished agreement, Star Swirl and Doc both joined her in slamming the gemstones directly into their foreheads.

As soon as the gemstones touched their coats, they flashed brightly and disappeared. No other change took place.

Doc sighed. "Well, count me wrong. It wasn't just Clear Sight pranking us."

--<>-------Speaking of...-------<>--/

Clear Sight settled down from his plate of parozzo and took a sip of his coffee. "Coffee in Italy is a strange drink," he explained, "as the coffee itself is not the main reason for drinking it. Rather, the coffee is merely a warm, caffeine infused receptacle for sugar."

He set his cup back down on the table. "I once saw a man in Romare order a cup of coffee and empty twenty sugar packets into it, every day at the same time for the entire week I was there. Crazy people, those Bitalians."

He shook his hoof. "But, I will say, they make the best candy. There's this, this chocolate, about the size of a bite-sized Whickers bar, made out of dark chocolate and filled with liquid espresso. They call it Pocket Coffees, how amazing is that?"

"That sounds...really impressive," replied Stygian, who hadn't yet touched his parozzo. "I could see that being a useful tool on long office days, too."

"Exactly!" Clear Sight threw his arms around in passion. "But I haven't found a supplier who exports them! I've been trying to work out a series of side companies to do it for the last three years, but it got too expensive, and I had to shut it down. And you can't even make them yourself, they've got this trade secret that really makes it good and for the LIFE of me," he put his head in his hooves, "I haven't been able to find out a way to replicate it. I'll just have to find an excuse to go back to Bitaly for a business trip. Maybe Sand Dune could finagle something out, we're on good terms..."

Stygian patted his shoulder. "Don't worry, I am quite sure you'll figure something out."

He sat back down and finally took a bite of his snack cake. His eyes widened.

Clear Sight continued. "Thanks, Stygian. I guess I'm just getting worked up about the small details... I guess that's why I have Res to help me out. He's a big picture kinda guy, I guess he keeps me on track most of the time."

He looked back to Stygian, whose entire plate was completely clean.

Clear Sight chuckled, but was interrupted by a ringing noise from the wall.

Picking up the phone, he said "Hey, this is ALPHA, what is you---"

"HEY, UH, CLEAR SIGHT?" Res called from the other side of the phone amidst screams and explosions. "DO YOU MIND MEMORY LOOPING A BIT EARLY TODAY?"

Clear Sight raised his eyebrows. "Shiz, man, what's going on?"

"NO TIME," a loud explosion occurred.

From the other end of the phone could be barely heard, "Lost in the mail? LOST IN THE MAIL? THAT IS THE LAST TIME I EVER--" the rest was drowned out by another explosion.

"SH**!" yelled Res. "JUST DO IT! PLEASE!"

"Alright, alright," said Clear Sight, fiddling with his necklace. "Just let me see if I've got the list straight."

He counted in his head for a few seconds and then started the Fragment.

"Geez, I wonder what all that was about," he said. "We'll have to hear about that tomorrow."

"Oh, and Stygian?" he added.

Stygian turned his head.

"How about potato dumplings next time?"

"I...I'd be delighted," smiled Stygian.

And the world turned to light.

Author's Note

hey all, this is the first chance I got to write

holy cow though I have a lot of good ideas for where to go with this.

longer chapters once the Memory Week is finished

Cheers back from the dead,
Betless