One particular day, I felt I needed to go visit a few ponies in… other timelines. I’ll be frank, I have no clue how to use portal magic. I don’t know how, I don’t know why, but I just wanted to visit Prime Equestria, and maybe Composite Equestria to check on Celestia and Luna. First, however, I had one small problem. While I was getting ready to eat breakfast with Celly and the Family, I tried to cast a Levitate, the version I had made in Python so I could levitate things. I know it’s a small thing but… Honestly, I’m a little concerned, even if it’s not that big of a deal, since regular Levitation works just fine, even if I instinctively go for Python’s equivalent of most spells.

“Feck,” I said, as my Levitation gave out. “What the fuck?” I asked, staring at my fork as my magic tried to grab it, and failed. “Why the hell can’t I levitate things? DragonFire still works!”

I used Levitate and blinked a few times. “What the hell, dude?” I asked, looking up at the rest of my family. Mostly at Celly. “What’s wrong with me?”

“...Source, I am not entirely sure what is wrong with your magic currently. Perhaps it’s because of how specifically tailored Python Plus is to your needs? I know that you’ve fine tuned everything to require a certain level of magic, and if you exceed that point, you just do not cast the spell,” Celestia hummed. “Regular Levitation seems to work just fine.” She’d hum again. “But the question then remains, how are you using more magic than necessary?”

“I don’t know!”

“Dad, I think your magic is growing in raw power,” Button piped up. “I mean, you said it yourself, if a unicorn uses their magic for a little more than just Levitate, their magic begins to grow. You’ve done more than just use your magic for that.”

…

“So I’m going to have to push through muscle memory for a while, while I begin to fine tune Python Plus to my needs again?” I asked. “Because… How often or how long does it take for these magical growths to happen? Because depending on how long it takes, I could be out of half my spell catalog, save for DragonFire, Light Shield, and Phoenix Fire, which are spells I made specifically to operate in their own little ball park.”

“I suppose you will have to,” I sighed. “Mother fucker.”

“Hey, it’s not all bad,” Celly nuzzled me. “I can coddle you while you beat your head into the pillow because you have to convert an entire spell system… in about a month. Usually that’s when unicorns’ magic, when it has a growth spurt, stops until the next year. Meaning you’ll have plenty of time to fine tune Python again before you have to fine tune it again next year… by the way, these growth spurts only happen once a year, but there’s no predictability to it!”

“Celly,” I sighed. “Fuck you.”

“It’s not my fault you decided to fine tune a spell system specifically for you, young man.”

“Horse.”

“Retard.”

“That’s rude, and accurate.”

Celly giggled before nuzzling me again. “Don’t worry, you can still technically cast spells in the other spell systems, even if you’re out of practice…”

“And I need to adjust my muscle memory, Celly. I’m going to be first responding to anything with Python… I suppose I can use regular Python as it’s not as restrictive as Python Plus, but the problem with my Muscle Memory remains.”

“It’s good that you have your Light Shield available, then,” Celly nodded. “Because if you came home one day, in pieces, I might break into dark magic just to kill you for dying.”

“...I hate that you’ve started indulging in my sense of humor, Celly. God dammit,” I said while chuckling behind a hoof. “But yeah, I guess I can have fun for a while, just dissecting my entire spell system and retooling it for my magical needs by the end of the month.”

“Well, maybe you should stop whining,” my wife leaned in with a mischievous glint in her eyes. “Besides, I’m certain that you can easily figure out how to retool your spell system; you’re good enough at developing spell systems that I wouldn’t be shocked if you ended up making a new spell system and naming it after one of those other… operating systems? Coding languages?”

“You know what?” I grinned. “Fuck it, I’m going to take Python Plus, combine it with WME and call it W seven. Or Windows Seven, the best computer operating system known to mankind.”

“You nerd,” Katie rolled her eyes. “Of course you would,” she giggled and threw a pancake at me. It hit me square in the face and got impaled on my horn. I stared at it for a moment and sighed. “Awe, is my big, strong brother going to be defeated by a pancake?”

“Katie,” I said, adopting a mock, stern tone. “I love you, I do nothing but love you, and call you bald, and you… hit me with a pancake?” I lifted a hoof to my chest. “How could you?! I thought you loved me!” I said theatrically. “And now… my power… it’s draining-”

I face planted into my now empty plate and pretended to be dead for a while. Button got a stick from somewhere and started poking me with it.

“Auntie Katie, why did you kill my Dad?” Button asked.

“Because, your father is very stinky,” Katie answered resolutely. "After all, he decided to pay for a bunch of crystals for Twilight to use to inscribe the special Magic Movies, the idea me and Dan had together, onto. Why else?”

“Oh.” He poked the stick and jammed it into the pancake, getting stuck in its fluffy goodness.

“Why Button, why!?” I whined. “I’m already dead, why must you defile my corpse so?” I started crying.

“Dear,” Celly patted me on the back. “Dead bodies don’t sob.”

“Celly, shut up, I’m having an emotional, spiritual moment here.” I chuckled, before teleporting the stick outside and throwing the pancake on Katie’s face, and it got stuck on her horn. “Take that, you foul beast!” Katie groaned but didn’t move to remove the pancake from her face. “So, what do y’all plan on doing? Because logically, when your magic is starting to short circuit, you’d want to go to another Equestria, so that’s what I plan on doing today.”

“Source, you are not going unless Sunset Shimmer goes with you,” Celly said. The mare in question blinked and looked up from her food. “She’s a little out of practice, but she’s a capable mage, and doesn’t rely on a spell system that stops working when your body decides to, in your words, ‘be more magical.’”

“Fair enough,” I nodded. “Sunset, you want to come to a version of Equestria where I don’t exist? Does that sound fun?”

“Oh yeah, can I leave you there and make this Equestria be the one that doesn’t exist?” Sunset asked, her tone told me she probably wouldn’t leave me behind.

“Mmm, nah. I’ve still got to give Celly a foal.” I said with a smirk.

“Okay, that’s it. I’m making you stay with the other Celestia.” Sunset rolled her eyes and nodded to Celestia. “I’ll go, Mom, and I’ll keep your dumb husband-”

“Treat my husband with respect, young lady.”

“Fine, I’ll keep your husband safe, Mom.”

“That’s better,” Celestia clapped her hooves. “If anything I want this to be used as a bonding moment for you!”

Sunset and I looked at each other and nodded. We don’t want to make Celestia sad and that was something we could mutually agree on.

When we got to the mage tower, we were immediately greeted by the Nine… and Bolt was at the forefront. He grumbled as the nine masters of the tower approached, I happily waved at Exo. “Yo, Exo! My favorite mare in this place. How’re you doing, buddy!” I walked right past Bolt, who started fuming.

“Source! It’s good to see you! You want to visit specific timelines, assuming that I didn’t misconstrued?”

“Oh yeah. Fruit’s here, right?” I asked.

“He is… he’s been helping our portal scientists a lot, but is making us do a lot of the leg work instead of outright telling us how to do everything on the spot. It’s kind of fun, but so frustrating because I can tell when he’s letting us make a mistake, knowingly and letting us find out the hard way!”

“Sounds like Fruit. Dude’s kinda… nuts.” I nodded.

“Hey!” Bolt growled.

“If you touch Source I will gut you,” Sunset said, glaring at the old dude. “Celestia made it very, very clear that you shouldn’t attack him.”

“And just who the buck are you?” Bolt snarled.

“That’s Celestia’s daughter, dude. Maybe don’t pick a fight with her, because she’ll kick your ass, and if Celly finds out you hurt her daughter, she will kick your ass,” I explained. “Seriously, don’t fucking do it, my man, Sunset’s scary, and her mother’s scarier.” I explained before giving Bolt the stink eye. “And I may not be able to perform at my peak right now, but I will make a fool out of you if you hit Sunset, or try to; show her some bucking respect. Because, technically, I am Sunset’s dad now. You touch her, and I’ll beat send you to Jesus with a fucking shoe.”

Sunset… rolled her eyes, but gave me a genuine smile. “Good to know that you’ll get yourself killed by trying to fight a unicorn when your natural talents are messing with your magic system,” Sunset chuckled. “But… Bolt, was it? You hurt Source and I’ll turn you into a cactus and water you once a year, and nopony will know where you went, and I won’t be tried for murder because you won’t be dead.”

“...Sunset, what the fuck?” I asked. “No, seriously, how do you think of shit like that?”

“I lived as a highschool student, in America, for at least two years worth of time in that place. Human teenagers are morbid creatures.”

“Fair enough,” I nodded. “So, Bolt, want to test Sunset’s capabilities? Because I don’t.”

Bolt looked… disturbed. “You won’t turn me into a cactus if I attack Source, would you?”

“Oh, I would,” Sunset nodded to herself. “Don’t let anyone hear about this, but I actually like Source, and Celestia, who’s my mom, loves him with all her heart. If Source gets hurt, my mom gets upset, and then I will be upset.”

“Okay!” Exo breached our conversation. “Enough with talking to my ex husband, he’s a dickhead, as Source says. I’ll be taking the lead of you two, and we’ll see if Fruit’s willing to let you go to other timelines under his supervision.”

When we got to the portal room, I saw Fruit running around, smacking a fancy portal machine-thingy and explaining what it was and what it did. Upon seeing me, he waved and said. “So, you wanted to visit the universe where you don’t exist and its reflection, ay?” Fruit chuckled and tapped the portal machine, at least what I think it’s a portal machine. “Which is why I busted this puppy out- Discord get the fuck out before I teleport you to the end of the universe with this thing, or tell this timeline’s Celestia.”

“Uh… okay,” Discord, I don’t know where the fuck he was. “W-we don’t n-need to-to do that! Surely you wouldn’t tell Celly that I was here! She’ll shove the Element up my rear end if she realizes that I’m here!”

“Then piss off,” Fruit snarled. Discord saluted and teleported away. “Okay, so, which do you want to experience first, Sunset? I don’t trust your old man’s judgment on where to go first. Do you want to experience Equestria where Source doesn’t exist, its mirror, or a version of Equestria that’s ruled by Daybreaker and NIghtmare Moon?” Fruit asked.

“Wait, what?” Sunset Shimmer asked before looking at me. “Uh… how about that third one. Who the heck are Daybreaker and Nightmare Moon?”

I snickered and said. “Oh you poor-wait, how the hell do you not know who Nightmare Moon is?” I asked as Fruit started kicking the machine.

“Uh… I thought that was a foal’s tale.”

“That’s real; Luna’s fucking proof, Sunset.”

“Oh.” Sunset giggled. “Well, I suppose I should go hug Auntie Luna; I can’t imagine that being stuck on the Moon’s any fun.”

“She’s moved on, but she will take that hug.”

“Okay!” Fruit said, kicking the machine hard enough that it actually turned on. “It’s configured. I’ll stay here to make sure none of these morons breaks the machine,” he stepped back and said. “Source, you’re going first; it’s rude to make a lady walk into a dangerous portal first, don’tcha think?”

“Oi,” I said. “No need for you to say that shit, mate!” I chuckled before nodding. “I do want to see those two lassies again, they were rather pleasant. Where will we be spat out?”

“Canterlot Castle’s throne room.” Fruit said confidently. “What? Are you afraid of my masterful engineering and good ol’ ‘beat it until it works’ method?”

I shook my head while snickering before saying. “If I die, I’m suing you, Fruit.” I stepped into the portal as everything around me began to warp. The last thing I heard was Sunset Shimmer running in after me.

The first thing I saw when my eyes opened was the red carpet. The thing I noticed, aside from the soft carpet, Sunset screaming, followed by an ‘ooph’. The next thing I noticed is she landed on my back. Lastly, she landed on my back and I am in pain now. I hissed and quickly pulled out from under her and started rubbing my back. Sunset ‘oophed’ again after she hit the ground. I stretched and let my spine slowly and wagged my tail a little before saying to Sunset.

“You’re feckin’ heavy, Sunset.” I groaned before straightening up. “Get up, Sunshine,” I said before bowing.

“What do you… mean?” Sunset asked as her eyes landed on what my eyes were looking at.

Daybreaker and Nightmare Moon sat, side by side, staring down at us. Nightmare Moon stared down at us with a confident smirk and Daybreaker was giving us both a toothy smile.

“Ah, Source Code!” Nightmare Moon jumped, spread her wings, and glided down towards us, before strutting like she was trying to make me watch her hips. “What a surprise! Come, come, I’m sure you and this… friend of yours will make for a very interesting chat after dealing with prissy nobles for hours.” She nuzzled up next to me and wrapped me in a wing hug.

“What the buck?” Sunset asked. “Why are you so friendly with… Nightmare Moon of all ponies?”

“Because, young lady,” Nightmare Moon wrapped a foreleg around my neck. “This little morsel is delightfully cunning, powerful… and provides… quite the sight. If my sister wasn’t so adamant about leaving him untouched, I would drag him to my personal chambers right now.” She purred.

“Moonie, I’m glad to see you, but I’m a married man, and you’re literally an alternate reality version of my sister in law. Please stop being weird,” I rolled my eyes. “How’s life going after you Tom Sawyered the shit out of those griffins for twenty bits?” I asked.

“Oh, it’s been wonderful!” Nightmare Moon picked me up by the scruff and trotted back up to her throne and set me in between her and Daybreaker. “We’ve been trying to expand into all that territory we proclaimed from the griffins as well; more farms dedicated to feeding the families of Equestria that aren’t exactly thriving, as you would say. My sister and I may be dictators, but we do care for our subjects’ well being and try to be friendly with them when given the opportunity.”

“Damn,” I chuckled. “This is nice,” I said while leaning on Daybreaker. “So Daybreaker, lookin’ lovely as usual. You enjoy not having to deal with those birdcats?” I asked.

Daybreaker looked taken aback by that. “Source Code, that is a racial slur and you know it.”

“Hey now, I know it’s a little wrong, but I don’t exactly have great experiences with those assholes. I only spent the last year having those assholes sent my way, the king of the griffins tried convincing my wife to let him fuck her… not exactly a lot of good experiences I’ve had, and me helping you negotiate with the griffins in this timeline certainly doesn’t help,” I shrugged. “I still keep an open mind, but you can guess why I don’t exactly keep a good view on those guys.”

“I suppose you have a point,” Daybreaker nodded. “And who is this that you’ve brought? A marefriend, perhaps? Inviting her to your herd-”

“Ew, what the fuck?” Sunset asked.

“I suppose not,” Daybreaker snickered. “I assume you two are not dating then. Why is she here?”

“That’s Sunset Shimmer, my… I guess for a lack of a better term, adopted daughter? She got adopted by Celly at some point, long, long before I met her, and recently she came out of a portal and figured that holding a grudge against her adoptive mother’s a bad idea. Celly figured this would be a good bonding experience for us,” I said with a shrug.

“Oh?” Daybreaker chuckled. “I assume there’s more to it than that-”

“It’s because my lovely father is a bitch boy and sucks at casting magic,” Sunset said with a smirk.

“Woah, what the fuck!?” I said breathlessly before laughing. “What the fuck!?” I started pounding the foreleg-rest on Daybreaker’s throne while trying to calm down.

Daybreaker and Nightmare Moon lost composure so quickly that they dropped back into Celestia and Luna, both of them were bent over, laughing and barely able to even begin to compose themselves. Sunset just sat there, smirking; she knew just exactly what she had done and I fucking hate her, but god damn, I was not expecting that. Celestia regained composure first, whipping a tear out of her eyes, while ignoring the ruined makeup and saying:

“Oh, I love you already! What a fiery little personality you have, young lady!” She snickered and snorted before fully calming down. “Thank you for that; my sister and I needed that.”

Luna nudged me and said. “So, what’s this about you being a little… female dog boy?” She asked with a smirk.

“Okay so, I’m growing in magical strength… and long story short, I have a very personalized, custom spell system that’s starting to fucking not work very well when I use it. Core spells like my personal diagnostic spell still works, which is all I need to maintain Light Shield, and I designed DragonFire to be versatile and accessible regardless of magical prowess… and Phoenix Fire, a new spell of mine that keeps me from dying, is something that still works because it only works through inscriptions I have hidden on all four of my hooves. Other than that? It’s a bit of a toss up if anything will work right now… Sunset’s here because I can be a sitting duck at best, or a pro magician at best. By the end of the month I’ll be able to start adjusting my personalized magical system to my needs.”

“Ah, so you’re becoming less of a bitch boy and became a bigger one in the process?” Sunset smirked.

“C’mon, Sunset! I groomed you this morning and this is how you repay me?!” I asked. “Be nice!”

Sunset’s expression softened and she chuckled. “Sorry, I was riding the high of the moment. I don’t mean to actually hurt your feelings,” Sunset assured me. She teleported me to her and she wrapped me in a hug. “I promise you that I mean well and that I’m just joking around.”

“Jesus christ, Sunshine, I just don’t want to die from laughter; I love the jokes, but I need air!” I chuckled and nuzzled her cheek, which made her blush. “That’s what you get for calling me a bitch boy!”

“Dammit Source! I was winning in our one sided banter!”

A few hours later, the four of us were walking through Canterlot during the day time. As we walked, I noticed a lot of propaganda, and Sunset did too. It was mostly about ‘obey the Sun’ or ‘all hail the Moon’. Ponies all around were bowing to Daybreaker and Nightmare Moon as they walked down the streets… only for Nightmare Moon to approach a stallion running a haydog stand and start talking to them, and had a nice, friendly conversation that slowly became… interesting. I walked up next to the two of them.

“You’re quite the specimen, don’t you know?” Nightmare Moon’s voice was husky and sounds…

“Uh, thank you, your highness,” the stallion said calmly. “Is there anything I can do for you? You want a haydog? It’s on the h-house,” the poor guy’s barely keeping composure.

“Oh, I would enjoy a haydog… it would be a nice snack. Just like yourself-”

“Nightmare Moon, with all due respect, you’re making the poor bastard nervous,” I interrupted.

“But he’s a hunk!” Nightmare Moon sighed.

“Did you ask if he was married before you started flirting with him?” I asked.

“...No…” Nightmare Moon’s ears drooped and looked at the stallion. Like a little filly she asked. “Are you taken, young stallion?”

“No, your highness. I’m flattered that you find me… handsome, but it’s not exactly everyday you’re told that by a mare of your stature,” the Haydog guy said before handing her a haydog. “Really, it’s… something else.”

“She sucks at flirting, doesn’t she?” I asked. “C’mon, just say it!”

“No, she’s great; I’m just surprised.”

“Well,” Nightmare Moon said, now exuding confidence. “If you ever desire to chat some more, or become a friend, or consort, stop by my night court. I would love to indulge in you, young stallion.”

“Yes, your highness,” the Haydog Guy bowed his head slightly. “And uh, thank you for your time.”

As we walked back over to Daybreaker and Sunset. Daybreaker doesn’t even look surprised, she’s probably seen her sister do this hundreds of times, while Sunset just looks visibly concerned. As we kept walking, Daybreaker looked at her sister and asked. “So did you finally manage to woo another stallion?”

“Shut up, sister. So I want to spend the next century curled up with a stallion holding me, can you blame me?”

“Well, I don’t believe I can,” Daybreaker nods. “I’m just making sure that stallion, or Source, didn’t break your heart. I saw your ears droop. Because if they break your heart, I will rearrange Source’s insides.”

“No, sister. Source was just making sure that I wasn’t flirting with a married stallion-”

“So basically what I do, okay… Source, you live another day!” Daybreaker cheered.

“You wouldn’t break my insides; you like me.” I said with a smirk.

“And if you did, I’ll break your spine,” Sunset interjected. “Because Mom will spank me if she finds out that Source had to resort to his Phoenix Fire to get out of a situation when I was nearby.”

As we walked along, we came across a stallion, a unicorn, being a problem. He slung a spell my way which Light Shield stopped, before he threw a log at me. I lit my horn to stop it-why the fuck ain’t my horn working-”

I caught a log in the face. My head was pounding. Jesus christ, ow. Ow. FUCKING HELL! Logs hurt, Jesus Christ, I think I would rather be dead. That shit fucking hurts. “What the hell?!” I yelled before Sunset stepped in and started beating the shit out of the stallion that threw the log at me. Daybreaker stood protectively over me… when did I end up on the ground? I clutched my head and groaned as I tried to heal my head, only for my magic to try and at least numb the pain… It didn’t work until I used a Hybrid spell to numb it… now my horn hurts.

“Go get him Sunny!” I said as Sunset threw the stallion into a building and pinned him down long enough for Nightmare Moon to backhoof the fucker across the face and knock him out. I grumbled while sitting up and rubbing my head. “Feck.”

“Are you alright, Source?” Sunset asked, her voice was soft. She nuzzled my cheek and started hitting me with spells to make my growing headache less painful. “Sweet Celestia, what was with that pony?” She asked.

“I’unno. My head feckin’ hurts even after all those numbing spells.”

“You really really should focus on using Rune Based spells for now.” Sunset pointed out.

“Yeah, yeah. Tell that to the habit I’ve built up to rely on Python.” I grumbled.

“Fair enough. I suppose I’ll have to do a better job at keeping you safe,” Sunset hugged my neck.

“Where’s the real Sunset? I thought she hated me.” I grumbled.

“No, I give you a hard time because you’re married to my Mom. I don’t hate you, and personally, I hate seeing ponies, even you, get hurt… your head’s bucking bleeding, Source!” Oh. Before either of us could do anything, Daybreaker struck me with a healing spell and my head was feeling less like shit. “Thanks, Sun Butt; you’re not too shabby,” Sunset grinned.

“Oh please, do you believe I would leave my friend in pain?” Daybreaker asked. “But if you call me Sun Butt, I will follow you to your timeline and tell your mother to discipline you for that disrespect, young lady.” Daybreaker teased. “But… I believe you two should go home for the time being. Nightmare Moon and I will be quite busy questioning that vermin for deciding to throw a log at me, and then charge him with assault for missing so much that he hit Source instead.”

“Yeah, good thinking,” I grumbled. “C’mon, Sunny. Let’s get Fruit to send us to Prime Equestria.”

“Are you bucking serious, Source?” Sunset asked. “You just took a log to the head-”

“And Prime Equestria’s relatively peaceful. I’m not going to get hurt unless I decide to fight Princess Luna for her throne.” We waved our friendly, dictator friends goodbye as we walked to the alleyway where the portal should be. “Yo, if either of you wanna join us, you can… I’m sure Celly would love to have a chat with Daybreaker.”

“For now, we will have to decline the offer, my little morsel,” Nightmare Moon nuzzled me. “Again, we have a criminal to… uh, ‘prosecute’.”

“You’re gonna execute him, basically.”

“Well, yes, but actually, no… yes, he will be executed. If he had not hit an alicorn or possibly an earth pony, that stallion could’ve killed somepony with his antics.” Daybreaker answered.

“Well,” I bowed. “Always a pleasure, see you around!” Sunset and I walked into the portal and told Fruit that we were ready to check in on Prime Equestria again.

Author's Note

So, story arc time! source is gonna be a lot more vulnerable for the time being... but we get to have fun with bacon horse daughter because of that.