The Timepony's Journal

Chapter 7 - The Glimpse Forward

The castle of friendship always glowed with a particular kind of powerful radiance. It held an enormous source of mana within it, connected to the Tree of Harmony itself. Friendship magic is the most powerful energy known to pony-kind until cold fusion and block matter transfer is discovered. Yet the creature that had writhed its way out of the tardis console room was still denied that power; to yield that gargantuan strength. Only on Equus could Friendship Magic flow naturally and evenly across such a large span of land, linked to the very core of the planet itself. But the source could not be tainted, consumed, or corrupted by any other being.

This is why when the amorphous blob touched the crystal veins underneath the table it was electrocuted and forced back.  Licking its metaphorical wounds, the thing would need an alternative route. It crept around the veins of energy like hands surrounding a campfire to absorb the residual energy. Even though the radiation was a mere afterglow of the once strong and burning light of friendship, it would have to do. The slimy blob of black mass was able to reform and restore parts of its own memory along with its strength. Only mere fragments of true sentience tugged at the old weary mind triggered by the whispers of memory.

"Soon I'll return to you, my old friend." the beast thought as it began to hibernate once more.

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Standing inside the console room with a book in hoof, Twilight slowly moved over the controls. She had to have pure and absolute concentration for the task. Twelve-dimensional flight was certainly no walk in the park or a piece of cake after all. This was only a test run, a literal five-minute jump into the future and into a specific room inside her castle. With a hope and a prayer, she pressed down the ignition lever. The central column began to rise and fall repeatedly with a wheezing groaning noise that often accompanied take off.

The Police Barn exterior flickered in and out of existence before vanishing altogether. The room rocked for a few seconds, which was to be expected since it was meant to be a six pony ship. It looked so much easier when The Doctor did it, even if he hardly knew what he was doing half of the time. The time ship was once again kind enough to put out the readings and statistics into a much more basic form for her to read.

"Perfect timing, same atmosphere, same gravity, and at the very least the same planet. The coordinates don't make perfect sense yet though, they likely refer to the plane of Equus or in some other frame of reference. I'll have to research some maps of Equestria just to be certain I'm correct."

Upon opening the door, Twilight was faced with a whirlwind of snow. It was Equus alright, but at what seemed to be one of it's poles. She would've closed the door immediately and tried again, but something caught her eye. It was old, ancient even, yet somehow completely new at the same time. It was trapped, broken and battered.

The dark and marauding force from the past was threatening to swallow the future. Whatever it was it was evil in it's purest form. The doors slammed shut and the TARDIS ran from the shadow. Coming back to her senses, Twilight got off of the ground not even realizing that she had fallen. She was frazzled to say the least, but not as scared as she should've been.

Although there was no way to truly know what was out there, curiosity still lingered behind. No, there are many things in the universe that are best left alone and this was certainly one of them. Trotting down memory lane once more she questioned if she should really be doing this. Meddling in things that shouldn't be tampered with may have been the Doctor's specialty but even he knew there were lines that were not meant to be crossed.  Did Twilight even have the right to do such a thing?

The TARDIS finally landed in the correct destination. No more testing for awhile. It was starting to get late anyway, and rest was certainly needed at the moment. Looking down the hall one last time, she could see the blue stable stationary as usual. With a sigh of relief, she closed her bedroom door.

"Just what have I gotten myself into?"

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By the next morning, the black mass had become to take on more shape. Still weak, still incomplete, still missing something. The darkness had begun to fade into a series of monochrome tones and shades. The formation was almost beginning to look like television static. She, it was becoming a pony.

She had to blend in and at the very least the same biology as the inhabitants for cover. No more hiding, time to leave the crystal table and enter the light. From the cloud of black mist a grey unicorn emerged. Her whole body flicked in and out between a solid form like changing the channel on an old TV. One step, two steps, three steps, four.

The equine left the castle and went into Ponyville's town square. A mess of a black mane and tail combined with the even worse lack of color made her look weak. Her mind was slipping in and out of consciousness as more emotions rushed into her soul and built upon her inside. Others were staring worried about how she wobbled back and forth, finally collapsing with a thump.

"You alrighty there dear?" asked Nurse Redheart

"W-where am I?"

"Ponyville hospital, you took quite the tumble out there."

Trying to get up was futile, the limbs weren't responding like they should've been. Another doctor and Redheart rushed to her side to make sure she didn't get up and exhaust herself any further.

"You shouldn't be walking around yet, your body is currently very malnourished and needs a day or two of recovery before we can send you back out."

"And who are you? Sorry I haven't introduced myself I'm..." she paused for an odd amount of time.

"Doctor Greymare, I've been assigned to be your practitioner for the duration of your stay. Please tell me, do you remember anything before you collapsed. Anything possibly leading up to it."

"N-no. I really don't. I barely remember anything but snow and metal a-and."

"Now now sweetie, don't stress yourself about it." Redheart cooed.

"O-okay. I'm sure it'll all be okay soon."

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Meanwhile in the TARDIS Twilight was once again struggling to get anywhere she wanted to go. It appeared that yesterday was only a stroke of luck. It was either that or the TARDIS was lending a helping whatever it used help with. The systems might've been growing weaker or what happened yesterday was deliberately doing something. The ship did what could only be defined as a tactical retreat or a safety precaution.

It was all like a dream that never happened. In fact Twilight had a nightmare of a similar fashion the previous night. A black energy enveloping the TARDIS console, sucking the life out of it. The lights dimmed and the cloister bell rang. Danger was imminent. The cloud swirled around her , shrouding her in complete darkness. Suddenly the cry of a young fully called out to her.

"Help me, help me please! It wasn't my fault!"

"Where are you , what wasn't your fault?"

The darkness raced directly towards her and she woke up. Normally dreams didn't stick around long for her, but this one did. It all felt too realistic, too frightening to forget. The time wasn't too far off this time, only by about an hour and a half. The distance was spot on though, and it'd be pretty hard to nail a destination as close to the original like this again. Or at the very least it'd be hard to do it on purpose.

It was better not risk it seeing how unpredictable things could still be. But after opening the doors she discovered that she was about a mile of course in terms of distance.

"Just perfect." Twilight thought you herself.

Well at least it wasn't too far, and it was certainly a nice day out. The Pegasi had done a good job on cloud coverage and Celestia's sun shone brightly down on her through the cracks in the cloudy skyline. It was close to the running of the leaves after all, so the weather was to be expected. A small walk through town was the least she had to pay for her journey.

Locking the door she set out for home. The TARDIS might need to be transported manually back to the castle seeing how unreliable it could be. Just as she turned her head a small crowd had begun to gather in the town square. A malnourished mate laid on the ground was being treated as a medical team was on it's way.