The Trinity of Moons: Ancillary Mirrors

They said I have to remember this obvious fact, so I will: even though Metropolis sometimes recognizes Scootaloo’s shard in my soul, I am not Scootaloo.

My talent isn’t like hers. I have a single, deep blue, wilted flower on my cutie mark. I have functioning wings, my colors are nowhere near close to hers — yellow coat, bright green mane, golden eyes.

Scootaloo’s shard only rarely shines bright enough to be seen in me. Cutie Mark Crusaders always were less of their own ponies and more of their trinity. This holds, by the way: as a team in each history we sometimes get and tell insights about true meanings of cutie marks. This happens only when we are together. Not now.

On this journey I am alone for now. A local keeper will meet me soon if all is going to go well.

I am going to reach those other histories — other timelines, Black Moon would say. Not past ones — I feel them more of being sideways. I am going to meet the dragons. With that, as the keepers heavily implied, I am going to help the Trinity. At least I hope so.

Another, the most important difference between me and Scootaloo — she was living about a square nine of histories away... and in a sense, I am getting closer to her right now.

The elevator is going down. I lost count of my heartbeats long ago, but at least I am not stuck in the middle of nowhere, out of the Moon’s sight. I am still going somewhere, deeper down with each beat. My wings twitch — it is too cramped in the elevator cell. Metropolis, knowing that I am in there, keeps Her silence. Small lights flicker with the elevator swaying under my hooves.

The elevator speeds up for a while, then comes to a stop in a really harsh way — I feel a hard unseen load pressing down on me, bending my legs, pressing me into the floor with a weight of a few loaded container crates.

I experienced that — among the many tasks I performed to get here, I had to carry a few crates of soul reimplantation equipment. They are heavier than they appear.

Now at the bottom of the shaft, I stand up. I should hold up, should stay brave. Ponies aren’t supposed to know this place exists, let alone know entrances to it, let alone–.

Yet, I am here now. No turning back.

It takes me a few more beats to step through the open lattice-wired door. Beyond it, no guardrails or corridors, just a narrow platform built from the same wire mesh. It hangs in the wide open air — the open space stretches all around, filled by white artificial lights.

I can fly here. Really fly — the outstanding vastness feels no less than the sky left above. Of course the sky should be wider than that. It has to be wider even if I count the Net stretched all above Metropolis.

I can’t resist the urge. I hover. No thinking, no worries: I flow in the clean air under the white luminosity — not White Moon’s, just pretty sterile white. The ceiling remains well up above. I can climb even higher if I want. I feel the steady artificial winds. After this elevator ride, so long that at least nine times I wished for it to end already, I’m happy to spread my wings and put them to use.

So I adjust the winds with my magic and let them carry me over the enormous facility. It felt almost impossible to ever fit underground — had I been transported to some other dimension, or was the space processed by Black Moon’s art to contain much more inside than it seems to appear outside? The conditioned air fills all the space under the ceiling. That ceiling appears ordinary, except being impossibly high — I would need a slice to reach it, or more. The size of the lamps above doesn’t really change when I climb up or glide down.

Is the facility built to have space for something much bigger than me? That feels strangely exciting.

Down below, computers pepper the floor in black dots, hum contentedly, their polygonal pattern never exactly repeats. I can see no end to them however much I strain my eyes.

The flow carries me deeper still; sometimes other tunnels branch out at sharp angles side by side from the main one. Each is designated for remembrance of one particular timeline, each as near infinite as the current one.

I move to glance into them but come back disappointed — from outside they look exactly the same. Only Metropolis Herself knows the full reach of the temporal change.

Another pegasus climbs up to me from the ground level eventually: adult, pale blue, with the Mark of a sharp black lightning on her flank. “Dartline,” she lets me know curtly.

“Lure,” I tell back in the same tone. Let her make the first step.

“Saucy much, for a filly?” she asks, blushing slightly.

“First, I was aligned to Blue Moon for most of the timelines. Those ones where I was a colt too. Second, I love this name. Third, you reacted just like and why I love it.”

She giggles, covering her mouth with a hoof.

It takes her a moment to proceed for what I suppose is the main thing. “Funny that you remember Blue Moon. Probably the Trinity too.”

I don’t know what to say. I am here because I remember. Because I want to remember more.

Because I want to see the dragons.

“I’m curious. So, how does it feel to remember? How are you not crazy when everything is not like it was? How old are you?” There really is no pause, no breath taken in between of those questions.

I don’t have to query Metropolis to see the azure blue glow of the shard in her soul, bold and unrelenting as Rainbow’s shards always are. I always love Rainbow Dash. I don’t mind admitting it in this history. In earlier ones maybe I would, but the current Rose Moon supports being open and honest with your feelings.

Yet, there are too many questions, none of them simple, each one pretty on point. Just like Rainbow Dash, to think about it. I glide away from my companion. “Please choose one.”

“One what?” she asks, smiling

“One question. Except for that last one,” I glance at her, returning the smile.

“Do I have to choose?” she pouts. “Alright. What does it feel like to remember all those histories?”

“Aren’t you too, from at least one past history?” I stall for time — it is not that easy to tell.

She doesn’t answer right now. First, with her guidance we dive down in a seemingly bottomless vertical shaft, a particular one among others. She falls right next to me. “Others lead not where you want to go,” she comments. “Some for weaponry, others for maintenance corridors. Now we’re going to ancillary mirrors. Keep up, it will be cold there for a while.” The white lights rush from the depth up. Just as she warns me, the wind grows freezing — I recall minor weather protection to counter it somewhat.

We take turns, guided by Dartline, always airborne. Sometimes we wait for an iris diaphragm barrier to open. A couple of times I see a cautioning color code from the Trinity of Moons: orange-yellow-orange arranged in a triangle. The cold remains oppressive, but my protection holds for now.

“Well, I am. I remember the Trinity of Moons. I was born under their light, sure,” at last she finds a beat to reply before I either repeat my question or answer hers. “When they fell, I was right there — two histories back, at the heart of the Revolution. But that’s it. Since that, I am here, protected from timeline changes. I have only one life.”

The protection begins to ablate away, and the cold chews at me. I buck up and keep the descent. I would rather not show my weakness before Rainbow Dash -- even though she is not exactly Rainbow Dash.

“Then it’s the same as to have one life, just many times over.” I smile, letting the joke hang. “In each history, until the unbound age, I am reborn without memories. Then they come back, lay over one another. Scootaloo, Bittercup, Whisper, Poppy, many others. I have parents in this history too. I have friends–”

“Other Crusaders?”

“Yep. It’s the same with them. When the memories come… we remember being there as the world around us melts, rebuilds itself. Our bodies, names, lives change too along with the new world.”

“Wait,” she hovers, and I groan internally. It’s so freaking cold out there. I have to keep cool before her. “Why do you think it is the many lives, not one with weird memories?”

“We remember who we were in past timelines, you see? And it works together between us three. And the transfer event feels distinct when we come through it. We aren’t lost in it — we move, flow across each next change of the timeline. At the farthest end of the myselves chain… I am still the same pony, I guess.”

At least after that answer she finally begins to fly again, and I follow.

“So, why did you come to us?” she asks.

“Applebloom, or Quartz, or Resonance– she’s unbound now. We wait for her to come back. When she returns, she’ll remember, and we’ll move to the next timeline again. I want to learn why we are like that. The keepers said it’s tied to dragons, and I want to meet the dragons too. That’s about it.”

“So you never grow up?” she asks, now with a tint of compassion.

“What do you mean?” Here it comes, I sigh internally. “I awake into adulthood. Always.”

“You don’t look like an adult,” she says bluntly.

“I guess I don’t,” I concede.

At the bottom of the shaft we stand in awkward silence. I look around, not knowing exactly what I’m looking for, just that it is too bucking cold in here.

She picks me up on her back and carries me well away from the shaft to find a heater in a wall recess. No-nonsense, as Rainbow always is. Other ponies would say it’s rude. It helps. I spread and fluff my wings to warm them up in the flow from the giant wall fan. Dartline joins me. She looks at me with some doubt, and just in case I tell her again, just to make sure she understands. She is a keeper after all. Even now she can just — don’t let me in.

“Here’s why I came here. I have questions, and I need answers. I wonder why all the histories need us. This trinity of Cutie Mark Crusaders. I want to know before Resonance returns. I think we never move to the next timeline before all three remember. It couldn’t be that all histories have some mysterious cutie mark issues for us to solve, could it? Or that we never gathered up our quota of tree sap?”

I don’t really believe that last one. Well, maybe a little. I look at her to see if she follows. “We were just ponies. Not Bearers of the Elements, or anypony else worthy of immortality.”

She nods, “As a Herald of Metropolis, I am willing to help you with your inquiry, Lure. Or do you prefer Scootaloo after all?”

“No, not Scootaloo. Bittercup, please, if you really find Lure too saucy. Not only do I remember Bittercup fondly, but I share the entirely same colors with her. Even our cutie marks are pretty similar. That life I first grew a taste for adventures. Scootaloo herself was too bitter her folks left her for adventures.”

I feel grateful, and this feels like a time to say goodbye. I had been warned: probably my memory will not retain the precise means of my journey to visit past histories. The keepers prefer to hold their secrets. It would be a pity to forget Dartline too. I come to her and hug her tight. She doesn’t mind.

“Alright, Bittercup. Let’s see what we have for you in other histories.”

“Will there be dragons?” My wings flutter. I came here for adventures. And dragons.

“Sure.”