"Anyway, Steadfast quickly became my friend and introduced me to his brother Res," continued Clear Sight, "both of whom were about to set up a huge folk artist culture festival. Music, dance, traditional sweets, you name it: the two brothers were at the head of it all."

Res chuckled and shook his head nostalgically. "Ah, those were the days, when the two of us would create these festivals for the appreciation of the most honest parts of the fine arts. Folk and tradition are the purest and most heartwarming kind of art imaginable."

"Absolutely," added Clear Sight, "the two brothers asked me to help out, clearly seeing my skill with my hooves as something worth enhancing the festival with. With my help, they rounded up all the artists and set up all the decorations well before the deadline."

Clear Sight leaned back in his chair, lost in the nearly real lie he was spinning, almost even oblivious to the fact that it was a lie at all.

"Never before or since have I seen anything so beautiful in my life. The streets of Vanhoover were lined with banners, ribbons, stalls, stages, booths, anything and everything Quebecrop you could imagine. Sounds of Prench singers and fiddles mixed with the haunting tones of shaped note choirs. Stalls sold poutine, ham, maple pastries, meat pies, molasses taffy, dumplings, and some other things that were absolutely incredible but I can't remember the name. Folktales and plays (both starring cheery working class colts with a propensity for local slang) went on in all corners of the city. In short," Clear Sight said, "it was paradise."

He placed his hoof on the table with an air of momentous decision. "As I took this all in, I made a clear choice. These innocent, joyful ponies celebrated the history that made them special. Since I, a guilt-ridden, depressed pony, didn't have any history," he said, taking his hoof slowly off the table and placing it on his chest, "I would make my own to celebrate about."

Illesio felt a surge of compassion for this wonderful decision--and then remembered that none of that had actually happened, and it fled away, leaving her feeling hollow inside.

"So I started by doing what I was best at: making stuff. I had already shown a talent for it during the festival preparations, but this time I intended to help people out my own way. I soon found a job making commissioned decorations for events, and eked out a respectable living."

Clear Sight frowned. "Still, something was missing. I loved to help people out, but I wanted to add something more...substantial, if you know what I mean. So in between orders, I would go to the library and begin to read, thankfully something I picked up as a foal. I read every single book in that library and only one thing truly stood out to me. Magic. It seemed to me, still with my pickpocket mentality, that there were some, some logical conclusions and unexplored regions to magic that no pony had thought of.

Of course," he chuckled, "some of them were really forbidden arts long outlawed, but more importantly, some were entirely new."

He scratched his chin thoughtfully. "It seemed that the only thing stopping magic from proceeding forward at a rapid pace was the blunt fact that the minds of all its scholars were, let's face it, narrow. Thought patterns simply trudged on through the ages, tradition ruled, and to be honest, that caused nine hundred years of stagnant magical research. Thankfully, once this barrier was overcome, interest in magic resurged and development sped along faster than anyone ever thought possible. The everyday unicorn now saw new ways to use magic, and through the clever exploitation of a glitch in enchantments, pegasi and earth ponies could now reap the benefits of their hard work as well." He smiled.

"Of course, I would never have gotten anywhere without the help of Res here. Steadfast had long since left town to start a new festival elsewhere, but Res stayed, having fallen in love with the culture. Together we worked on small projects and magic work until we made a breakthrough."

Res chimed in: "Our new method of transmuting any spell into an enchantment would eventually lead to the creation of previously impossible objects and technologies, and who else knew it but Princess Celestia herself. As the only princess of Equestria at the time, it was a tremendous honor for her to travel all the way to Vanhoover to see two amateur scientists. She even went so far as to give us a royal commission to continue our work and to instruct others in new methodologies that Clear Sight unearthed."

"And that's our past, well, as much as was unknown before," Clear Sight concluded. "Any questions?"

Illesio thought for a moment. "What happened to Steadfast?"

"Good question," said Res, looking a little concerned, "He eventually made it all the way to the Crystal Empire, where he worked for a while, but I haven't heard from him recently...what's he up to now, I wonder? Hmm," he scratched his chin.

Good, that detail will probably sort itself out.

She couldn't think of anything else to ask, every other detail seemed pretty believable.

But then a voice came from behind her.

"Uh, actually, Mr. Clear Sight, I have a question."

One of the radio ponies had spoken up, and Illesio realized where this was going a moment too late.

Oh he's going to reveal the lie, isn't he?

Clear Sight seemed to have seen this too, but he also seemed to be accurately imitating limestone: pale, rigid, and flaky.

"Up until last year I had been living in Vanhoover my entire life," the radio pony said, puzzled, "and I never once heard about the two of you. How did I manage to miss both you and the best folk festival ever?"

Clear Sight stared at him in a state of panic.

Res stared at Clear Sight, who was in a state of panic, in a state of panic.

Illesio stared at Res and Clear Sight who were both coming out of their states of panic and entering states of grim determination.

The radio pony stared into midair, still in a state of confusion.

And the reason why Res and Clear Sight had foregone states of panic for states of grim determination was this:

Everypony Equestria Round entered a state of confusion.

A fraction of Everypony Equestria Round entered a state of realization, and then anger.

The rest of Everypony Equestria Round joined them after having the ones in the states of anger explain the situation.

And then Clear Sight pulled his artificial unicorn horn out of nowhere and entered the radio ponies into different states of unconsciousness, and took the broadcast off the air.

The three of them sat in silence for a few minutes.

Finally, Res spoke up.

"I really absolutely despise you right now, Clear Sight."

Clear Sight stared at him with the air of an utterly mortified and defeated pony.

"...You're not the only one."

Illesio said, "To be honest, that was some pretty good improv. Too bad this was a radio interview instead of an Ogres and Oubliettes session."

Clear Sight looked surprised. "You play that? I wouldn't have guessed, your type usually doesn't, no offense. What class?"

"Oh, um, usually I play a paladin, but I don't really play often, what with work and all."

"No way! Paladins are my favorite class too, I love how you can just whale on someone with Divine Smite while healing with Lay On Hooves, it's so conveni--"

Res said, "Hey, we got something else to be thinking about. So shut the hell up."

There was silence for a few seconds again before Res spoke a second time.

"This attempt was an utter and complete absolutely fully incomprehensible vastly massive faliure," he said. "How does this even happen? Doesn't matter. What do we do to fix it?"

Clear Sight said, "There's no other way. Regardless of the consequences, I've got to use the Memory Fragment on them again."

Illesio said, "Why do you need to? If they get in here and tear the place apart, so what? You can always skip town."

Clear Sight merely looked at her and asked, "Do the words 'Everypony Equestria Round' mean anything to you? Every single pony in Equestria now hates me and Res."

Res nodded. "Not only that, but if they got in here and tore the place apart, they'd tear apart some things that'd tear them apart back, and quite possibly tear apart the thing that could tear apart the fabric of space and time."

"The worst type of fabric to work with," muttered Clear Sight.

Res thought for a minute, then seemed to start, and glared at Clear Sight.

He pointed at Illesio. "Okay, wait, why did we even have to bring her into this? That makes absolutely no hecking sense."

Clear Sight glared back, saying, "Sassafras, man, you know that the two of us together would get about as far as my ego on a Saturday morning, which is to say, stay on the floor in pain and go nowhere. We needed a third party who's got a clear head and a reasonable temperament."

Res looked completely stunned. "You're calling a journalist reasonable?? She's the least likely in the entire world to be reasonable, its her job to not be reasonable, you idiot!"

Clear Sight breathed calmly for a few seconds and wiped the sweat from his sunglasses before answering. "Pot calling the kettle. In real life, not papers, this mare right here is a remarkably reasonable pony. Trust me, I've seen inside her head."

He grinned, and Res muttered, "Haven't we all, Mr. MRI?"

Clear Sight moved on to the next subject. "Alright, if we're really going to do this again, we've got to stabilize reality somehow so our move doesn't warp and weft it. You thinking what I'm thinking? Of course you are. The R.I.T."

Illesio, having felt distant from the conversation for a while, thought now would be a good time to enter again. "What's the RIT?"

Clear Sight leaned back in his chair. "The Reality Instance Tripod."

--<>-------S********s is a pony swear, you know s**t's going down-------<>--/

Author's Note

i said heyyyyyyayyyyyyayyyyyyayyay, heyyyyyyayyyyyyay, I said hey
what the hell is going on here

Wow, I can't tell whether this is a really good chapter or a really bad one.
Also I love Quebecois stuff
Took 3 hrs

Cheers from a fatally tired man,
Betless