It had taken four days to organize, but Limestone sat across a table from a pony. Like Rainbow Dash, she had wings, and like Twilight Sparkle (the college student), she had a horn. There was no tape recorder because Raven had told Limestone she wanted no record of any royal alien to exist. That meant all Limestone had was her pen and paper. "Princess Twilight Sparkle."

"Please just call me Twilight. You wouldn't believe how much that grates on you when you hear it day-in and day-out. You're a police officer named Limestone Pie, correct?" Twilight couldn't hold back the little smile she felt bubbling up inside when she found out the police officer was one of Pinkie's sisters. "I know your sisters in my world."

"I've been briefed that there are pony versions of most of us, yes. And yeah, I'm Sergeant Limestone Pie." She noticed Twilight's eyebrows raised at mention of her rank. "I was under the impression you would become human when you came here?"

"It's complicated now. There's so much magic in your world that it's leaking out all over. The portal should have made me into a human, but I think it's so magic-logged that even it can't tell the difference anymore. Sorry about that, by the way, I think it might have been at least a little tiny bit my fault." When Twilight saw curiosity explode onto up-until-now-stoic Limestone's face, she knew she'd need to continue. "It was about a year ago now. Sunset Shimmer came through the portal to Equestria and stole my crown. It's magic—the crown that is. She was fighting for all the wrong reasons, and I consider her debt repaid now, but that resulted in a lot of magic releasing into Sunset and her friends.

"Then, when the sirens first came to Canterlot, I came through and helped everyone defeat them." Twilight paused, a new smile wiping away her serious expression. "It's exciting to see that Sonata has learned how to be friends."

Limestone nodded, her hand moving a million-miles-an-hour as she scribbled notes. "I'd heard most of this from my sister, though she kept quiet about you. Well, she didn't, but I figured you were the Twilight that's here now. So you helped defeat one of the greatest scourges to mankind, and then what happened?"

It was a startling way to put it, in Twilight's estimation, but it fit. "Then my country was invaded, uh, a few times. I had my hooves full for a while. Did I mention time moves different between our worlds? It does. For me it's been about seven years. Anyway, I visited one more time to meet your world's Twilight Sparkle. She's pretty amazing, and we started sharing notes.

"I recently dropped by to help when Sunset said all this weird magic was going on, and the best I've been able to work out is that your world is basically a mirror of our world without magic. Now that magic is promulgating here, you're becoming a true mirror."

"You know, Twilight, I was worried you were going to tell me something worse was coming, not explain why all this craziness was going on. And that"—Limestone gestured to the stack of books at the end of the table—"will hopefully be of use."

Hearing someone happy they got books made Twilight feel bubbly inside. Sharing information was literally part of her life's work—an essential part of being a good librarian. "Please, if you have trouble translating them, let myself, Sunset, or this world's Twilight know. And, if you need more, let Sunset know and we can arrange more."

It was a gold mine for Limestone. She felt months and years of her life fading under the assault of so many books. "I might have to get a few researchers to take care of this for me."

"I can assure you that Equestria will not hesitate to lend support in this—" Twilight stopped when she realized what had been bugging her about Limestone Pie. "You have pony ears."

"Yeah, turns out they're pretty helpful in my line of work." Reaching up to the top of her head, Limestone rubbed at one of her ears. "My unofficial report on meeting you will be that you were not just helpful, but might be instrumental in assisting our understanding of all this. Given what you said, there's no way of stopping it, and in my estimation your—crown—was just a match. This world was a powder keg waiting to go off."

Twilight's mouth slowly dropped open as Limestone detailed her thoughts. It wasn't just correct, it was technically correct to the letter. "That's—that's a very good way to put it. A very good way. Then again, understanding this is your job, right?"

"Lately it has been. Putting facts in order and understanding how they mesh isn't all that different from putting people in order and understanding how they mesh. Facts are less complicated, at least." Limestone shrugged her shoulders. "What did you expect, my boss to send someone who wasn't good at this?" Not sure if it was a bluff or the biggest joke even, Limestone managed to keep a straight face—and that was all that mattered.

Relief flooded Twilight more and more. She would have preferred it if information was more public, but there was nothing in how Limestone had spoken to hint toward any mishandling of the situation. "I'm glad the matter is being managed seriously and cautiously, but I'd like to take some measurements."

Limestone nodded while writing down her thoughts on the pad. She underlined the word measure. "That would tell you how widespread this is and how fast it's spreading, right?"

"Remind me before I go home to contact your pony double and offer her a job." Twilight climbed down from her chair.

With a laugh, Limestone stood up. "Yeah, I can drive you around. Hope you don't mind the rain, we've been getting a fair bit lately." She walked to the door and held it open. "What's my pony-self do, anyway?"

"She grows rocks." Twilight knew the world she was in had been almost entirely based on science, so she knew how silly that might sound. "It has to do with how rocks are formed."

Limestone only recovered from her confusion after Twilight had left. "What do you mean? What good are rocks?"

"Minerals, mostly. Growing a field of iron-bearing rocks is always a good investment, but there're crystals as well. Your pony family have a tradition of some of the finest mineral-bearing rocks in Equestria." Following Limestone out of the building, Twilight glared up at the sky and used her magic to create an umbrella above the two of them. "We can safely assume that Canterlot High School will be the epicenter, so we just need four good readings around it."

Looking up at the magic, Limestone shrugged her shoulders. "Sounds about right. Are you sure you don't want a reading at CHS?"

This made Twilight blush a little as she climbed into the car. "I—um—already took a reading there. It doesn't take long and I thought I might as well get it done in case it gave me any answers."

"Did it?" Limestone started her car.

"Yes. At that epicenter, magic is approximately twenty-five percent of Equestrian norm. This will affect creatures that pass too close, but I don't think any changes would be permanent yet. Your ears—"

"My ears are the result of helping my little sister and her friends deal with two very nasty sirens. There was a lot of magic that day, and several departments are still trying to get all the answers about what happened. We know, but we want to see if we missed anything." Limestone lay down a bunch of cards she'd been holding in her hand, metaphorically speaking.

"That makes far more sense than I thought it would." Twilight, used to dealing with cars, opted to sit down and lean back against the seat while fastening the belt across her belly. "Your, uh, boss. Would you be able to tell me who it is?"

A moment before pulling out into traffic, Limestone pulled the handbrake back on and pulled out her phone.

Ma'am, permission to give our guest your name?

Sergeant, we're law enforcement, not men in black. Just leave off my rank.

"Raven Inkwell." Limestone wasn't sure what she expected from Twilight, but her jaw dropping open in shock wasn't quite it. "I take it she's a"—Limestone gestured to the air—"a cloud farmer?"

The gag was just what Twilight needed to break from her surprise. "What? No. That would be silly."

"At least that's still norm—"

"We use factories to make clouds. No, Raven Inkwell is—" It was Twilight's turn to muse on her answer. "She's a problem-solver for Princess Celestia."

Raising an eyebrow, Limestone pulled out her notepad. "Princess Celestia? As in the Canterlot High School principal?" When Twilight nodded, Limestone started writing that down. "Who's queen?"

"We, uh, don't really have one. It's just we like to have a team govern—and, uh, Princess Celestia doesn't want to be seen as a tyrant. So we call ourselves princesses." It was the best Twilight could manage to explain the situation. "I know it doesn't make much sense, but—"

"Princess Twilight Sparkle?" When she said it, Limestone watched Twilight's head jerk toward her. "I am exceptionally glad this is being kept under wraps. Could you imagine how it would be if it got out a foreign ruler was involved in this?"

"Not actually a ruler."

A lessening of the political mess Limestone was worried about came as a relief. "So why princess?" Pulling into the road, Limestone figured she could handle any other odd things that might come up without needing to take notes.

"Well, because they want me to be a co-ruler. Also, the wings had something to do with it. That's kinda a big deal in Equestria."

Driving to Canterlot High School, Limestone turned east. "Okay, measuring a mile from here. I assume you need it exact?"

"As close to it as you can. I can measure the distances with magic after I've taken the reading—so I don't corrupt the measurement—then add some error bars later."

Limestone managed to hide that she knew what Twilight was talking about. It was egg-head stuff, but she'd found herself having to understand statistics a lot of late. When she pulled up, it wasn't too far from her parents home. "According to my car, this is the spot."

Getting out, Twilight resisted the urge to put up an umbrella spell and instead cast her magic measuring spell, then quickly followed up with another to detect the distance to the portal. "Okay, got that."

The drive to the second location was done in silence. Limestone passed the school again and reset the mile-counter on her dash. She was a little surprised to find that the location was within a block of her own home.

Twilight climbed out of the car into the pouring rain and huffed a little before shaking herself to clear most of the wetness from her coat. She was about to cast her magic-measuring spell when she froze.

"Just get back in your car and leave me alone."

The voice was prominent to Limestone because it stood out even against the rain. Climbing out of the car, she twitched her ears and looked at the only other person in the street. Limestone's first instinct was to rush over and knock the person out, drag them into custody, and go home to relax in a warm room—but she was escorting literal royalty.

When the car didn't drive off immediately Wallflower Blush's mouth formed into a line. She hated it when the rain messed with her stone. As the woman climbed out of the car and looked right at her, Wallflower started to panic. "No. Just leave! I don't want you here." As she said the words, she held the stone up and used it to reach out toward the two people and remove their memories to allow her words to sink in.

Wallflower loved the rain—normally. It had been raining so much lately that she'd almost started to feel happy—until it started messing with her stone. When the woman climbed back in the car and drove off, she let out a happy sigh and pulled the hood off her head. Cold, wet water quickly soaked her hair and started rolling down her body. "Now, to get Mom to book them for my party."

"I—I need to go back to Equestria," Twilight said. "I need to go back now."

Author's Note

General Inkwell: Doesn't FBI know about your MG? Because this magical incident seemed to fit under your organization's supervision, but they dispatched their agents all over Canterlot instead of leaving it to yours.

"We are kinda short on personnell, in case you hadn't noticed. I'd love it if I could have Limestone out there with a good partner at her side, and a bunch of analysts keeping track of all the paperwork and vetting all our work—but I don't. I allowed the FBI to cover the case precisely because I wanted someone providing solid feedback on our methods." General Inkwell reached out to her familiar and started to rub the cat's offered belly. "Given how a member of the Bureau acted, however, I'm now pushing to get some analysts on board."

So I do this "Ask X" thing. X can be any pony within the story. You can ask them anything and they will definitely, hopefully reply. Keep the questions appropriate to the age-rating of the stories, and they will answer the best question in the author notes of the next chapter. The more votes a comment has the more likely I will get it to the right pony to answer. Try to keep it to one question per post! They will pick one question per chapter.

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