Chapter Fourteen: The Historian Stallion

The museum wasn't busy at this time of day, and few cars populated the parking lot. Our threesome had attracted a lot of attention, but everyone was aware of the ponies by now; it was old news. I hadn't seen any official press coverage of the trio of visitors, but I was sure it was spectacular and ideal-shattering. However, nobody seemed to show it, at least, not around here. The residents of my town were not the vocal type, and these events had not changed that. I had been interested to see how religions might be affected by this, as this was probably something their holy books could not explain. As an agnostic atheist, I believed that religion is a human concept that was born from the need for purpose, and I stayed out of that. I didn't need purpose in my life, though right now, I had one; I had to stop the universes from destroying one another. A bigger purpose than any other, I thought.

We entered the lobby, and the receptionist recognized my equine companions as the trans-universal beings, and offered our group free entry after mentioning that another pony had come that day. This was fortunate, as all I had been correct in my assumption, and had only five dollars on me. The museum wasn't new to me, I had already been here, and though a few exhibits had been changed or moved, there wasn't much new to see. Twilight insisted that we stay and read every plaque, and Derpy was just looking around, fascinated by the visuals of the exhibits. I asked her to refrain from flying in here, though the high ceiling allowed it.

"Wow, this is really neat!" Twilight was having a blast, and had learned quite a bit about the area and its denizens in less than ten minutes.

"I'm sure it's fascinating, but we have to find Time Piece."

"Oh, right." Twilight lost her inflection of wonder, and resumed a more serious posture.

"This stuff is really cool, Zach. I wish we had museums like this in Ponyville." Derpy was enjoying the sights, and I didn't stop her from continuing to do so. We came upon a large exhibit about the Second World War. Twilight gave in to her natural curiosity again and began delving into the wealth of information the exhibit contained.

"Zach, what's a 'Nazi'? I can't find anything about who they really were. Why was your country fighting them?" Twilight was asking me about the Second World War, something, as a teenager that loved military history, had read plenty about. I wondered for a moment on how I could explain Nazism to a pony from a dictatorial monarchy that had known no evil ruler since its conception.

"Well, in the year 1933 of our calendar, in the nation of Germany, a political party, known as the Nationalist Socialist Party,  or the Nazi party, came to power. This government believed that it could conquer the entire world solely because the government believed that the people there were superior in some way. They set this plan in motion in the year 1939, invading nearby nations at a rapid pace, provoking military intervention by nations allied with the afflicted ones- including mine-, causing the Second World War, a conflict driven by defense on one side, and racism on the other." I noticed that Derpy hadn't been listening, and looking blankly at the displays.

"How awful! But... why is it the second one?" She was revolted by the concept of war based on such a thing as racism.

"Because there was another terrible war before it that involved the whole world," I answered.

"What year is it now on your calendar?" Twilight wasn't sure how long ago this had taken place.

"It is now the year 2012, it's been almost seventy years since the war ended." Twilight looked again at the exhibit, at the infantry rifle on display, at an artillery shell, at the casualty figures, and left the exhibit area. We followed her.

"That's the horrible past I told you about," I said.

"It's just so... horrible." She struggled to find another word to describe it, but settled on that one.

"I know, that's what I just said. I also said that this doesn't happen as often anymore, remember?" Twilight looked reassured by this. Our trio continued down the hall, and entered an area that contained the classic dinosaur exhibit of the museum.

"So big!" Derpy exclaimed.

"Wow, those are huge skeletons!" Twilight observed. "How long ago did they die?"

"Millions of years ago. These hollow fossils of bones are all that remain of them," I explained. We'd failed to notice any other people in the room, and heard a voice.

"Hello, Derpy, I didn't expect to see you here! Oh, I didn't know that there were four of us here! What's your name?" We all looked in the direction of the voice, finding Time Piece. The brown stallion with an hourglass cutie mark looked very happy to be here.

"Hello!" Derpy replied, simply.

"I'm Twilight Sparkle, and I assume you're Time Piece?" He looked surprised, but it quickly faded back to his previous friendly expression.

"Yes, that's me. Ponyville's premier historian," he said pridefully. "This world of yours," he gestured at me, "is so fascinating, you know that? What's your name?"

"Hello, Time Piece. I'm Zach. We came here looking for you," I began to explain to him.

"Looking for me? Why is that?"

"As it turns out, the fate of the universe is at stake; you can see for yourself in this book." I produced the ancient text from my backpack, and set it down in front of the stallion. I opened it to the page concerning our problem. He sat and began to read. He began to spill his thoughts as they came.

"I recognize this hoofwriting, It's Starswirl The Bearded's. Oh my... that's not good... Discord? Hmmm..." He trailed off and closed the book again after about a minute of silence and stood. "Do you know of any way we could get back to Equestria?" he asked me, suddenly serious.

"Well, I am one of the individuals that was sent to Equestria, so I was thinking that if we assembled at the place that I entered Equestria at, we could all get back through my hole, or something. There is a problem; Trixie doesn't want to leave, she wants to stay because the humans love her magic. We'll have to convince her to leave, and that won't be easy," I replied.

"Maybe she'll listen to all four of us," Twilight suggested.

"I'm hungry, is there anywhere we can get muffins around here? I want a muffin." Derpy's train of thought was permanently delayed at the station, apparently. I looked at my watch. 4:30 PM. Time went by fast when you're out trying to save the universe, I thought. I was getting hungry too.

"We should go. Yes, Derpy, we can get a muffin, then we should go look for Trixie."

"Yay! Muffin!"

We departed the museum shortly, and found that the traffic had picked up extensively. We began walking back toward where Trixie had been putting on her show. We passed a cafe on the way, and, as promised, bought muffins for the four of us, using up my five dollars. The muffins were of fast-food quality, and were recieved mediocrely by our professional muffin critic, Derpy. Still, she got her muffin. When we arrived at the stage, Trixie was still there performing, this time to a larger croud. When she noticed us, she facehoofed.

"I've told you already that I'm not going with you! Leave at once!" Trixie said as grandly as she could muster. This time the audience did not surge toward us, and I was relieved.

"Trixie, why would we lie to you? This is extremely important!" I reasoned.

"The information that they've told you is all true. I'm a historian, I'd know." Time Piece was a skilled speaker, I could tell. "It was written by Starswirl The Bearded himself, and it is imperative that you come with us." With that, he concluded his speech. I heard the audience talking amongst themselves for a moment, and a few asked us what we're talking about. Twilight told them there was no time to explain, and they respected that. Trixie sauntered over to us.

"Fine," she said in a somewhat hostile tone. "I'll come with you." The croud wasn't being charged for their magic show, and started to dissipate at that time. Surprisingly, none of them followed us. We started towards the path that lead from my high school to my house, where my life was turned upside down two days earlier. None of us said a thing as our motley assortment of ponies and a human proceeded down the path. Now that the four ponies were united, we could return to Equestria, hopefully.