Entry: Monday, June 21st, 2010

Princess Celestia told me to write a journal, so I’m doing it.

I… don’t know how to write a journal, actually. One moment while I look it up.

Entry: Monday, June 28th, 2010

Dear Diar No, this isn’t a diary, it’s a journal. Let me start again.

Dear Journal,

I wasn’t able to find any references that would tell me how to write a journal. It’s like there isn’t a single book on it in the entire library- inconceivable, I tell you! But fortunately, my new friend Pinkie Pie knows how to write a journal.

She… has difficulty explaining it in a way that I could understand. I think I almost caught fire from the effort- and I know there was smoke coming off of my horn, a sure sign that I was overthinking something.

So… I’ve come to the conclusion that Pinkie is just Pinkie. If I don’t understand her, or what she does, or says, or whatever else… that’s fine. Maybe I’ll understand it later, but it’s not worth trying to force myself to understand it now. All that will get me is a headache.

Turns out Applejack also knows how to write a journal. She was able to help me make heads and tails out of what Pinkie said about them, and figure out how to write one myself. She said one of the most important things about a journal is to just be myself, and to write in my own style, without constraining myself to some format or another.

So I asked the rest.

Fluttershy was the hardest to ask about writing a journal. Whenever I spoke with her, her responses were too soft to be understood. It’s making me wonder if her problem isn’t shyness but something else that just happens to look like shyness, but I’m not a psychiatrist so… yeah. But when I put Spike in front of her, and asked him to ask her about writing a journal, she was happy to tell him all about it. Is she, perhaps, afraid of ponies? Despite being one?

When I sent a letter to Celestia… her answer was confusing. She didn’t seem to understand what I was getting at, until I clarified that I was asking how to write a journal- simply referencing her last letter apparently wasn’t enough.

That reminds me. Earlier today, she sent me a letter, with a bunch of attached notes, and asked me to build and set up a worldgate array based on them, and start exploring other universes to see about the viability of moving Equestria to them. When I asked her how big of an array I should make, and for a recommendation for where to put it… she seemed to have forgotten that she’d sent it all in the first place. She’s done that before when I answered days apart, but this was just five minutes!

Entry: Tuesday, June 29th, 2010

Dear Journal,

Everything is weird today. And not in a Pinkie Pie way- even Pinkie thinks it’s weird.

Princess Celestia sent me a letter by dragonfire to tell me she has no idea what a worldgate array is, nor where to look for information on them. I received it while I was pouring over the magic matrices described in the documents she sent- these things are incredibly complex, but I can already see ways to modify the matrices to make stable portals. They’ll need a power source if I want them to be open for more than an hour a month, though- but that’s been solved. There’s lots of different things I could use as the source, so I asked Rarity what she would recommend- and she pointed me to an eccentric stallion named Doctor Hooves. There, I ran into a candymaker named Bonbon, who told me she was working on building a hydroelectric dam. That’s a term I’d never heard before, but it refers to something like a beaver dam that lets water flow through it… while converting the energy of that water into raw power.

The math she showed me said this thing should be able to power a million worldgates no problem, and still blow out the lighting crystals in the homes of everypony in Equestria, all at once. Seriously, what on Equus does she need that much power for!?!?

But I talked to her, and now I’m making enchanted parts for it instead of Doctor Hooves- he apparently takes forever and makes very frequent mistakes, which makes it painfully slow- in exchange for the use of its output. Boom, power supply solved.

Then, while I was enchanting a turbine for that dam… a letter arrived, from Princess Celestia, by post. Derpy Hooves, who turned out to be Doctor Hooves’ wife, is an amazingly kind mare, though a bit clumsy. However, she’s only clumsy because her eyes were damaged by some mistake Doctor Hooves made some time ago- that’s another project, I guess.

In this letter, she introduced the mailpony- why Princess Celestia knows the Ponyville postmare so well, I can’t figure out- and specified how big the worldgate array should be.

In short? As big as possible.

And she included the deed to a plot of land about three times the size of Ponyville, just outside of Ponyville.

We might need to upgrade Bonbon’s beaver dam at some point.

Entry: Wednesday, June 30th, 2010

Dear Journal,

I know, I know, I wrote yesterday and the day before, and only diaries get daily entries. But something important happened today, alright? And it wasn’t a Tuesday!

Not that anything special happens on Tuesdays.

Anyways, the important thing. Pinkie found a new pony in town today, renting a cottage on the outskirts. After trying a couple of times- or, to hear the poor new pony tell the story, a couple hundred times- she fell back and came to me to pout about a new pony that wouldn’t open the door.

So I had gone to try and play mediator. As I walked up to his door, I noticed the… very new, but also incredibly complex enchantments on them. I thought he must be good at enchanting- and he was.

“Y-You’re not that-!” The stallion’s voice cut off suddenly from the other side of the door.

Twilight sighed. “No, I’m not The Pink. Nopony understands her- and I almost caught fire when I tried, so it’s best you don’t try to either.” She paused. “Are you, by any chance, good at enchantment?”

There was a pause from the other side of the door. “Er- Y-Yeah, I am. I… I was going to make an enchantment shop.” Finally, he opened it a little, and peeked out.

And Twilight recognized him. Not by name, no- she didn’t think he’d ever told her his name. But he’d been in her class at Celestia’s School, and always studied with her in the library. His teddy bear had been known to bring both of them the books they needed without prompting- and she had a sneaking suspicion it was he that was behind Spike’s dragonfire mail thing.

“Did you do these enchantments yourself?” she asked curiously, politely, and calmly. If there was one thing she remembered about him, it was that he had always been the quiet kid, probably too shy for his own good. But, if you were calm, polite, and patient enough, as the teachers rarely were, he seemed to respond. Admittedly, she’d never tried actually talking to him before, only silent interactions.

True to form, he nodded in a very Fluttershy-esque manner.

“I happen to be working on a rather large magical project lately,” she informed him. “Starting with a ‘hydroelectric dam’ that needs a lot of enchantments. Do you think you can help?”

There was a pause, and he nodded again.

“Thank you!” She paused. “And, er, if I may ask, what’s your name?”

“Shooting Star.”

Getting her new friend, Shooting Star, acquainted with Bonbon’s beaver project team ended up being Twilight’s next priority. That… ended up being just Bonbon and Twilight so far, but she’d had to introduce Star to Bonbon to find that out. Fortunately, the mare seemed to pick up on his peculiarity even before Twilight could explain it, and approve of his taking over the enchantment work from Twilight.

Then Bonbon… had called for Pinkie.

“Hey, Pinkie?”

The Pink appeared out of nowhere on the path next to them. “Yeeeees, Bonnie?”

“I would like you to meet Shooting Star,” Bonbon informed Pinkie, gesturing towards Star- who had cringed away from Pinkie’s sudden appearance. “He… doesn’t take well to surprises.”

Pinkie blinked owlishly, then tilted her head. “Huh?”

“Kinda like Fluttershy,” Twilight injected, on a sudden inspiration.

Pinkie blinked. “Oh. Oh! OH!” She bowed massively. “I’m so very very sorry, Mr. Star!”

Then she was gone.

“Like Fluttershy,” Bonbon mused. “Huh, I should have thought of that. Her difficulty is very different, but the effect is alarmingly similar, isn’t it?”

Author's Note

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One of my favorite parts about writing Twilight in this story is that while she knows it has nothing to do with beavers, she insists on calling Bonbon's hydroelectric dam a 'beaver dam'.