If asked, Cadance would have said that she didn't get to visit Twilight nearly as often as she'd have liked. Which was true, if misleading; Cadance would have greatly preferred to see her sister-in-law every day. As it was, she had to settle for every other month, when royal business gave her an excuse to visit Canterlot. Which it had done this week.
Despite having spent most of her life in Canterlot at that point, disembarking the train felt like she was setting hoof in a foreign nation. There was a corner of her mind that said the local ponies would turn on her if she made it too obvious she didn't belong.
Maybe I'm just insecure because Shining had to stay behind. I can't remember the last time I was in Canterlot without him... unless I count the wedding, I guess.
Shaking off that line of thought, Cadance checked that her luggage had been unloaded before heading towards the palace, silently accompanied by a few guards and aides. She remembered when Celestia was teaching her royal etiquette, Celestia remarked that Cadance seemed to already know not to directly acknowledge servants or guards in a public setting unless necessary. It had seemed obvious to her; there were so many of them, engaging them socially would take up everypony's time. Nopony would get anything done.
Of course, she knew she was a hypocrite. She married one of those guards.
She stopped reminiscing as she reached the palace, just in time to see a familiar face. "Starlight Glimmer!" Cadance greeted enthusiastically, "It's so good to see you again."
"Likewise, Princess Cadance." the Unicorn mare responded politely, though her words were genuine.
"Oh, you can just call me Cadance. You're a friend of Twilight's, so you're a friend to me."
Starlight smiled brightly, but her smile turned halfway into a grimace before she schooled her expression. "Ah, I should mention that Twilight and I have been working on something we could use your help with. Twilight's excited about it, so..."
"She won't be able to talk about anything else," Cadance finished the sentence. Twilight had come a long way from the socially reclusive filly Cadance used to foalsit, but in some ways she hadn't changed. "I'll just get the details from her later, then?"
"That works. I'll probably be there too, anyway." Starlight thought for a moment before her eyes widened, "Oh, I'm keeping you from resting after your trip, aren't I? I'll get out of your mane for now."
"Oh, it's not a problem," Cadance politely lied, "but thank you. I'll see you... ah, probably at dinner tonight with Twilight, I guess?"
"That's right," Starlight confirmed, "Now go relax already! You're going to need a clear head later!"
Sadly, it wasn't proper for the ruler of Equestria to greet a fellow royal with a juvenile song and dance. But when Cadance and Twilight saw each other in public these days, they would almost imperceptibly sway back and forth to the tune of that silly old rhyme, even as they exchanged a more socially acceptable greeting.
If anypony else noticed the not-dance, they'd have had no idea what it meant.
"Cadance! It's wonderful to see you again," Twilight said as she walked into the dining hall, her body language implying the first part of their old secret hoofshake. Sunshine, sunshine...
"It's wonderful to see you too, Twily. How's the family in Canterlot?" Cadance responded, while mirroring Twilight's small movements. Ladybugs awake...
"Same as usual, though they aren't in Canterlot right now. Mom and Dad are on vacation in Las Pegasus, and Spike is visiting our friends in Ponyville." Clap your hooves...
"And Shiny couldn't come with me today, either. So I guess it's just us girls!" And do a little shake!
Their invisible ritual completed, the two Alicorns leapt at each other for the hug they each knew the other wanted.
"I really missed you," Twilight's voice didn't crack, but it was a near thing. "I don't know how Celestia had as much free time as she did. There aren't enough hours in the day, and I'm the one who decides how long the day is!"
"I have some idea of what that's like," Cadance said as the hug ended, "I'm the Princess of Love, but I can never fully express how much I love my family. Like you."
The brief hitch in Twilight's breathing told Cadance that she had, to borrow a phrase from Shiny, scored a critical hit.
"Th-that's so corny..." Twilight half-heartedly admonished her, even as her eyes misted over.
"Well, it's still true. But I'll stop before you start crying into your..." Cadance glanced at the table, "... hayburgers?"
Twilight smiled sheepishly. "Sometimes I really, really want burgers. I don't think I could accept going without ever eating a burger again."
Cadance blinked, then recognized why this seemed familiar. "Oh, like how Celestia couldn't go without cake."
Twilight raised a hoof and opened her mouth to object, paused, then lowered her hoof and said, "Yes. Exactly."
Cadance made a show of restraining a giggle, even though she really did understand perfectly. She was the same way with chocolate.
"I guess we're still waiting on Starlight?" Cadance asked after a moment, and instantly realized she'd made a mistake.
"Yes," Twilight confirmed, "How did you know?"
"I spoke to her earlier," Cadance didn't bother backpedalling, knowing it was too late. "She mentioned a project you two are working on you thought I could help with?"
Twilight's eyes almost literally lit up, and Cadance prepared for a patented Twilight Sparkle Educational LectureTM.
By the time Twilight had finished, Starlight had joined them and started eating. She did manage to make sure Twilight ate too, by holding one of her burgers just at the edge of her field of vision. Without missing a beat, Twilight grabbed it in her magic, and took an occasional bite without stopping her lecture.
"All of which is to say that we might be able to send a creature's soul backwards in time without any risk to causality. With less need to account for paradoxes," she paused for a bite of her burger, "there's room in the spell matrix to define what would then happen to the soul at its destination, including reincarnation."
She needs to start putting the summary at the beginning instead of the end of her lectures, Cadance thought.
"That sounds... concerning. I can't imagine a reason why you'd even want such a spell. And if you did use it, since the soul couldn't reincarnate with memories without causing a paradox, isn't it just... a convoluted execution?" Cadance asked. She knew Twilight wouldn't intend such a thing, but Twilight sometimes approached a problem from a strange angle and ended up forgetting to account for how it looked out of context.
Starlight, having finished her meal about a minute ago, finally interjected. "I can see why you'd think that," she admits, "and the truth is, part of why I came up with it was as an ethical alternative to... the current way of things."
"You're going to need to explain how forcibly reincarnating a creature, time travel or not, could ever be considered ethical." Cadance deadpanned.
"Alright. For context, I'll tell you right now that this spell is being specifically developed to use on... them."
Cadance only took a moment to realize who Starlight had to be talking about. The three villains who rejected Harmony to the very end, leaving Twilight no other option but to turn them to stone. Chrysalis, Tirek, and Cozy Glow. "That doesn't make it right."
"Let me finish, please. Of course we're not going to just cast the spell on them to get rid of them," Starlight retorted, "we want to use it to reform them. Actually reform them, not just by technicality of them being different creatures with different lives."
Cadance internally admitted that was where she thought this was going. "That's good," she said after a moment, "but how exactly is this spell supposed to accomplish that?"
"I'll start by outlining the issues with dealing with them by existing methods," Starlight began. "The options, in descending order of practicality, are; leaving them where they are, moving them to Tartarus before un-stoning them, executing them, and un-stoning them where they are and hoping to talk it out.
"We can't do the last one because they each proved more than once that their words were worthless. They would agree to anything just to buy time to undermine us. And if they somehow were on the level, most of Equestria wouldn't believe them. They wouldn't be able to live a normal life.
"We can't execute them, because that just proves them right. For Twilight to allow such a final measure would be to admit Harmony has no place for some creatures, which is an oxymoronic statement."
Cadance was surprised to hear a reason against execution that wasn't just "it's wrong." She leaned forward, realizing that Starlight had actually thought this through more than most ponies would.
"Leaving them in Tartarus sounds ideal at first, but we know Tirek has escaped on his own before, without magic. We'd have to keep them under watch for as long as they remain there, which could be forever. And they might still slip the net if they do escape.
"Which leaves the current situation. Leaving them as stone statues until some unknown point in the future, and hoping we can deal with them properly then. Which is far from a perfect solution, as Discord can attest." Starlight concluded.
They all glanced around, in case Discord decided to drop in unannounced, as he sometimes did when he was mentioned in conversation.
"Oh right," Twilight said, "Discord mentioned he had to go 'fix an awful premise.' Something about a queen of fire... anyway, he said he wouldn't be back for a few days."
"That's probably for the best," Cadance remarked, "he might've involved himself in this. Hoping to redeem himself, or something."
"Getting back on topic," Starlight reminded them, "since all of those solutions undermine Twilight's ruling philosophy in varying ways, I decided to look for a way to deal with them which brings them into Harmony, without it being just a form of mind control or something. What I've come up with definitely skirts the line, but Twilight agrees it's better than what we have now."
"I'm still not sure what exactly the plan is," Cadance pointed out, "All I managed to understand from Twilight was reincarnation and time travel." She turned to Twilight, "Please start putting the summary first. It's the only part I understood."
As Twilight pouted, Starlight resumed explaining. "The plan is to send their souls back in time with a 'fated happiness' spell. Since this can't change the past, that'll make sure they find happiness in a way that doesn't involve hurting a lot of creatures, since all other major villains are accounted for. And a 'return to sender' clause, set to trigger the day we cast the spell. Since the only way for them to get back is the long way, that'll work within causality to ensure they reincarnate as individuals respected enough to enter this palace on good terms. And of course, a memory preservation spell combined with a memory suppression spell, the latter of which will be set to wear off the moment after the initial spell will have been cast."
Cadance took a few moments to parse that. "So... we cast the spell, they sort-of-but-not-really die, and then three creatures will show up and suddenly remember being them?"
"Yes," Starlight nodded, "and I know that sounds like an extremely awkward conversation in the making, but since when was that enough to keep us from doing the right thing?"
"I'm still not completely convinced this is the right thing," Cadance said, "Twilight, please tell me you see why I'm concerned."
"I felt similarly at first," Twilight conceded, "but I did actually think it through. As ethically dubious as the spell itself is, this is probably the only situation where the problems with using it don't apply.
"I considered that it would be like an execution, but the problem with execution is the cessation of life, not the fact that they'd be gone. This spell looks like it ends them, but with the memory spells in place, it very much doesn't. It's more of a convoluted banishment, in that way.
"Then I thought of the creatures who would be inheriting the souls and memories of the villains. Presumably, they would otherwise not have to deal with that baggage. But then again, if we do nothing, we're pushing the problem onto yet more creatures in the distant future. That's quantifiably worse. And they, themselves, would still have to deal with being displaced from their old lives regardless.
"Then there's the question of whether I have the right to manipulate their very souls. And I eventually realized that each of them came within a hairs breadth of dooming all of Equestria to a fate worse than what I would inflict on them. So I decided I was willing to accept the consequences if they decided after the fact that I went too far. Which they very well might, even after living their new lives."
"So you admit that you understand what you're planning is immoral?" Cadance accused her.
"Yes, but it's also immoral to turn a creature to stone and knowingly leave them that way," Twilight countered. "I know I'm rolling dice with my karma, but I think I've sufficiently weighted the dice in my favour, and I'm willing to pay out if I still roll badly."
Cadance tried to think of a way to refute Twilight's reasoning, but failed.
"Alright, let's say, for the sake of argument, that I agree with you," Cadance said, "how certain are you that the spell will work as intended? You can't exactly test it."
"I triple-checked all of Starlight's work myself," Twilight insisted. "The only issue is that it takes three powerful mages to cast the spell. I was thinking of sending a letter to Celestia to ask her or Luna for their help, but since you're here, I was hoping you'd be willing to help."
"I'm not really a mage, though. What makes you so sure I can help you?" Cadance knew what the answer would be, but asked anyway just to stall.
"The finicky bits of the spell are best handled by one pony. In this case, Starlight. You and I would mainly be providing the extra power. Just being an Alicorn means you qualify for that." Twilight explained, implicitly teasing Cadance for continuing to procrastinate her magic lessons.
She's come a long way to be comfortable doing that, Cadance thought.
She sighed. She was willing to believe the spell itself was safe, but her intuition was telling her she'd regret it. Still... this was really important to Twilight. The villains in stone cast a shadow over everything she did, because their rampage and subsequent petrification heralded the start of her reign.
Twilight had wanted to promote Friendship and Harmony, but that statue was proof that she'd given up on no less than three creatures. Proof of the hypocrisy of her Harmony. Her entire philosophy would be undermined as long as those three were denied the chance to reform.
If this spell worked, then Twilight's greatest failure would become one of her greatest successes. A success shared by her first student!
And, if Cadance was being honest with herself... she wanted to get closure with Chrysalis. She'd lost sleep thinking about how Chrysalis became who she was. She thought that a creature that depended on love for sustenance wouldn't have been so determined to be an enemy... surely there was more to it?
She realized she was already considering what she'd do when the spell succeeded, which was a sure sign that she actually wanted to do this. She'd already put forth all the responsible arguments against it that she could think of, and accepted their refutation.
"Alright," Cadance grumbled, "I'll help."
The morning after the discussion over dinner, Cadance practically sleepwalked through her morning routine before she made her way to the gardens to meet the others.
One guard tried to stop her. A new recruit who thought he was ordered to keep everypony out, but somehow tuned out the instruction to let Cadance and Starlight through. Based on how his partner was berating him as she walked past, he'd made similar mistakes before.
She'd probably have judged him more harshly if she didn't know that her husband was just as bad when he was a lieutenant. This pony was just a recruit, if anything he was ahead of the curve.
As she turned the last corner to the gardens, she saw that Starlight and Twilight had been busy.
The trio of petrified villains were surrounded by a runic circle. Rather than being drawn in chalk or some other such easily disturbed substance, pieces of silver in various shapes and sizes had been clamped together to form the circle. Cadance mused that Twilight must have finished her concept of a Magic Circle Modular Construction Kit.
Cadance saw that Starlight was busy examining the circle for misalignments, and Twilight was doing calculations on several sheets of paper floating in her magic. Cadance knew for a fact that Twilight could do calculus while reading an unrelated book at the same time, so talking to her now wouldn't be too distracting.
"Good morning, Twilight," Cadance said in greeting, "I take it things are nearly ready?"
"Yeah," Twilight replied without looking away from her work, "Starlight's just double-checking the runes are correct, and I'm working out the parameters for how each soul will find where and when to arrive in order to get the result we want."
Cadance blinked. She hadn't considered that the souls could reincarnate in different places and times. It seemed obvious now that Twilight mentioned it.
"I did have one more question before we do this," Cadance said. "That 'fated happiness' spell Starlight mentioned... I'm surprised I haven't heard of it, if it's powerful enough to guarantee a pleasant life."
Twilight stopped writing for a moment, then resumed. "Ah, I'd forgotten we weren't talking to another mage. We shouldn't have assumed you'd know about it. It's not actually that powerful normally, it has a hard limit in that it only lasts until a week after the spell is cast."
"... Which isn't the same as saying it wears off after a week. So it'll last their whole lives up until a week from now?" Cadance asked.
"Yes," Twilight confirmed, "and while we're talking about it, I should tell you that the spell doesn't just make things go right for them until it wears off. It nudges probabilities so that the subject of the spell will likely be happier than they were when the spell started. Which, over the course of a lifetime..."
"Allows for the possibility of hardships that most creatures go through," Cadance picked up, "letting them become well adjusted individuals who actually learned something over the course of their new lives. And the effect would build up over years until they're genuinely happy, rather than just slightly happier than... statues." Cadance finished.
"Exactly!" Twilight exclaimed, having completed her calculations, "and I'm happy to say that it was all Starlight's idea!"
"It wasn't that big a deal," Starlight interjected, startling Cadance slightly. She'd finished checking the circle, it seemed. "It's a spell I looked into... back then. I'd convinced myself everything would be perfect if the central plan worked, so I didn't bother with it."
"Just take the compliment, Starlight. You did the work, regardless of when and why." Twilight lightly admonished her former student.
"... Everything's ready for us to cast the spell," Starlight forced out despite her sudden bashfulness, "Cadance, please stand on the rune for 'Reservoir'."
"Not a mage," Cadance reminded her.
Starlight's blush deepened as she pointed a hoof. "That one."
Cadance moved into place as Twilight stood on a similar rune several hoofs away. Starlight didn't join them right away, as she was looking over Twilight's calculations. It would probably have taken an hour, but Twilight has long since developed a spell to confirm whether her work is correct. So Starlight only needed to look at the results, rather than check Twilight's work.
Starlight nodded to herself as she memorized the relevant information, then teleported the papers somewhere before taking her place between Cadance and Twilight.
"Just to make sure you're aware," Starlight said to Cadance, "you only need to feed magic into the spell. I'm managing most of the actual spellcasting, and Twilight is doing a chunk of it to lighten my load, but between the two of us that part is easy."
"That was my understanding from what Twilight said yesterday," Cadance replied. "Just let me know when to start."
"Oh, you can start now," Starlight clarified, "the circle will hold your magic ready for me to use, but you'll need to keep it topped off as we go. It won't be all that difficult, just a bit tiring."
Cadance lit her horn, and could sense an invisible space in front of her that seemed to be lightly drawing in her magic. She started pushing her magic into that spot. "Like this?" she asked Starlight.
"Yes, though once I start you'll want to double that flow rate," Starlight answered.
Cadance relaxed slightly, as she was barely pushing at all. Doubling her current effort would be no problem. Yet, her intuition was still insisting that something was going to go wrong.
After several seconds, Starlight lit her own horn and starting muttering an incantation. Cadance increased the flow of her magic as she'd been instructed, and watched as the statue began to glow.
She couldn't help but glance around while the spell continued. Despite everything appearing to go as planned, her intuition was telling her they were about to be caught off guard by something. She didn't see any creatures nearby besides the three of them, though.
A tiny part of her mind realized that this actually shouldn't have been the case, but Cadance decided that she was liable to become the problem if she let herself get too distracted, and focused on her magic instead.
The statue glowed brighter and brighter, until Starlight's incantation completed and it erupted in a blinding flash of light. At the last moment, the thought Cadance had ignored broke through to her conscious mind.
Shouldn't their reincarnations be here already?
In the moments after the spell's completion, the three of them seemed frozen in place. After several seconds, they all shook themselves, as though they'd each been daydreaming at the same time.
They all glanced at each other, as though only just now noticing who else was present. Seeing that their reactions were identical to each other, an unspoken realization passed between them.
"I knew this was going to bite us in the plot," Cadance complained.
"It seems so obvious in hindsight. How did we miss this?" Starlight lamented.
"I've never had a lower opinion of irony as a concept than I do right now." Twilight stated with annoyance.
A few seconds passed.
"Okay, just to be clear," Cadance said, "the three of us are the reincarnated villains we just sent back to be reincarnated. Right?"
"Golly, whatever gave you that impression?" Twilight snarked, using her past self's verbal tic to declare her identity.
"Oh hoofrot, I was trans all along. No wonder I was miserable and angry all the time, I was using masculinity as a coping mechanism for loathing my masculinity." Starlight muttered.
"All right," Cadance, formerly Chrysalis, sighed. "So the pony who tried to take over Equestria by corrupting the magic of friendship, now rules Equestria with the magic of friendship. The centaur who tried to steal the magic from everypony became one of the most magical ponies to ever live. And the, in retrospect, utterly moronic warlord who fed on stolen love is now the Princess of Love. Now, I have to figure out a way to break this to Shiny."
"I'll help. I'll have to tell him about myself too, anyway," Twilight said. "By the way, are you and Starlight going to have any problems?"
Cadance paused, and remembered that her past self hated Starlight Glimmer with a passion.
"No," she said firmly after a second, "there's no problem."
"Really? No lingering resentment at all?"
Cadance saw an opportunity, and smirked. "Yes, it's all in the past."
Opaline Arcana, the Queen of Fire, was livid.
First, centuries of plotting had nearly gone out the window when Celestia and Luna retired for some doubtlessly foolish reason, and gave both of their crowns to the same foal barely out of diapers.
But that would have been fine. With such an inexperienced ruler, her plans were practically guaranteed to work. Especially as Equestria hadn't quite recovered from the slapdash social sabotage the Pegasus filly somehow got away with. In fact, she had just been preparing to tip the first domino which would bring about Sparkle's ruination...
As Discord appeared in the middle of her meticulously hidden home, and turned her to stone with a snap of his freakish claws! Worse yet, unlike most spells which inflict such a condition, she was still conscious!
"You can only repeat the same inner monologue so many times, Opaline," Discord drawled, deliberately mispronouncing her name. "I actually tried to see how many times I could recite the Bee Movie script, myself. After a point, I realized my mind had shut down for a few years without me noticing.
"Anyway, you're probably wondering why I'm just waiting around here instead of, say, exposing all of your plots and sending you to Tartarus."
She wasn't. She was far too busy picturing his severed head being shoved up his-
"Ah-ah! This story isn't rated for that kind of language! For shame, my dear!" The creature prattled on, as if he was making any sense. "Hm... nah, too overdone. But to answer the hypothetical question I'm pretending you want to ask... I'm waiting for the right moment to teleport you directly to Twilight Sparkle!"
He thought that infant was a threat to her, even like this? Ridiculous!
"Of course you don't bat an eye at that. Even on my word, she'd want to interrogate you before making a judgement. And you're not quite insane enough yet that you wouldn't be able to fool her," He conceded, "but that's where the timing comes in. See, she's about to cast a spell tailor-made to... deal with... certain malignant threats to Equestria. Such as the terrible trio you have so much in common with!"
Nonsense. That little fetus would never do what he's implying.
"So I'm going to wait until the moment before the spell goes off to teleport you directly to ground zero, so she never realizes you were there at all. And then at least one timeline will be spared from wrecking our hard-earned happily ever after."
She wouldn't... right? ... Of course not. She's a naive, innocent embryo. There's no way.
The amalgamated abomination's ear perks, and he glances in the direction of Canterlot. "Oh, it's starting! Now, hold still! And be quiet, you don't want me distracted when I do this..."
Moreover, Discord doesn't go for that kind of... solution. Yes, he's definitely just messing with her... right?
"Three... two.... one.... aaaaand..."
*Snap*
A few days later, in Canterlot...
Twilight Sparkle, Princess of Friendship, was livid. And she was neither a villain (in this lifetime, at least), nor physically unable to speak, so she'd forego the inner monologue in favour of a nice, healthy furious rant. Once the target of her ire showed up, of course.
In nearly every way, he was unpredictable. Nearly. But with her recently unlocked memories, she knew that all she had to do was plant a certain idea in the ear of her friend Fluttershy, and like clockwork...
... Discord strolled into the room from behind a light fixture. "Hi, Princess. You wouldn't know if Philomena is still around, would you? Fluttershy wanted to see her again."
Twilight smiled. "Yes, that's probably because I told a delightful anecdote about the time Philomena nested in my mane."
Discord very nearly started laughing at the mental image, before freezing in place in realization with an audible crackle of ice.
Twilight had, of course, already warded the room to prevent his escape.
Discord nervously chuckled. "Uh, how wonderful! Haha, say, have you done something with your mane? You look positively Glowing."
"Can't help yourself, can you?"
"Coping mechanism."
Twilight gave a brief, but sincere giggle. For all that she was angry at him, he was still a friend, and learning about this facet of him was a treat.
"I'm sure you've realized by now why you're in trouble this time," she stated.
"Yyeeeessss," he ventured, "but in the interest of not incriminating myself, I'll wait for you to spell it out."
How... refreshingly direct. For Discord, anyway.
"Well, I do have a good rant prepared," Twilight said, before producing a binder. "I even managed to trim it down to just a two hour lecture!"
Discord flinched. Hm. Maybe Cadance had a point about her lectures...
"But," she continued, "a certain friend of mine wanted you to herself for a while, first."
Discord briefly raised an eyebrow in confusion, before realizing that the room had been rapidly getting warmer since he arrived. He slowly turned to look behind him, and saw a Unicorn with an amber coat, and a two-toned red and gold mane. Her face was the epitome of fury, and she appeared to be passively producing fire from her magic aura.
"I want a few words with you about due process, Discord." said Sunset Shimmer, who in that moment could very easily be described as a Queen of Fire.