“Wait a second, that’s it!” Twilight pushed away from her friends, as the revelation dawned in her mind. “I understand now. I know how to fix the spell!” Marching into the library triumphantly, she levitated the unfinished spellbook before her and began to write.

“From all of us together,
together we are friends.
With the marks of our destinies made one,
there is magic without end.”

In a surge of power, the five elements of harmony flashed, shooting a beam of colored energy at the focus, the sixth element, and it’s bearer. A mighty flash of light flooded the library, and caused all present to look away for a moment. As quickly as it began the moment was over, and the remaining ponies gasped as the center of the room was now empty, save for a large star-shaped scorch mark on the ground. No sign of the pony who had once occupied that space remained, save that the scorch resemble her cutie mark. Twilight Sparkle was no more.

“TWILIGHT!”

Wha?

“TWILIGHT!”

Where am I? Who is that?

“TWILIGHT SPARKLE!”

Me?

“YES YOU!”

Oh no.

“YOU’RE DEAD!”

No.

“YOU ARE DEAD!”

No no no...

“DEAD AS A DODO!”

“DEADER THAN A*^r5---!!”

Wat?

“Bloddy arsed, this bloddy contraption... Who’s idea was this anyway?”

Um...

“Right. Hello. My name’s Al. Glad to meet you.”

Looking up at the creepy stallion before me, I just blinked in confusion. “What?”

“Don’t laugh. I’m all powerful and stuff.” The funny looking pony glared at me, his grey coat and white mane offset by an rediculous flower print shirt that covered his barrel.

“Arn’t you a bit under dressed for a grim reaper?” I quipped.

“Well how many grim reapers have you met before, mate?” he responded. “What am I supposed to look like?”

“Yea, that's a good point.” Well it was a good point, after all.

“Now, let’s see...” A device like a bunch of crystals appeared before him, and I noticed he was a unicorn. The object was square, with clear blocks like a foals building block set. His horn flashed and I could see him manipulating buttons on the thing. “Twilight. Surname?”

“Umm, Sparkle? Daughter of Twilight Velvet? Personal Student of Princess Celestia.” I replied, feeling a bit miffed at the impersonal treatment.

“Oh, bloddy hell. It would have to be you wouldn’t it?” he grimaced. “Element of magic eh?”

“Is there a problem?” I snarked in reply.

“Yes there is actually. It’s like those bloddy cats. Such a pain in the arse. You’re one of these ‘Special Cases’.” Rolling his eyes, he fixed me with a baleful gaze.

“Oh, really?” I returned his look with a raised eyebrow.

“Yes apparently, according to the powers that be. I’m just doing my job. Not even getting paid. You are too important to just be killed off as a convenient plot device.” A sour look crossed his face at the idea.

“Oh, I see. So I’m not dead?” I smiled at the prospect of my continued existence.

“Oh, you’re dead. Just, not quite.” A sly grin crept back onto his muzzle.

“What?” Again I was confused.

“Awww... dammit, I just can’t follow that stupid script. It’s just too corny and badly written!” A genuine smile spread across the stallion’s face.

“So wait, this is all a joke?” I started to look around for Rainbow Dash and Pinkie Pie.

“Oh, it’s a joke alright. The biggest to end all pranks. Fate has pranked you good this time!” the grey pony began to laugh in earnest.

“I don't get it. If this is all a joke, why am I still here?” Looking around, I saw nothing but vague colors and endless space. “Who are you anyway, and what’s going on?”

The colt stopped laughing and wiped a tear from his eye theatrically. “I’m sorry, but I have just been waiting so long for this, that the chance to have so fun was too much to pass up.”

I just glared at him and started to tap my hoof impatiently.

Sighing, the unicorn took on a more serious demeanor. “Ok, right. The fact is, you are dead. Your body has been vaporized by the Elements of Harmony, and your life as you know it has come to an end.” He paused to raise a hoof, forestalling any response I was about to make. “However, that is not the end for you. The nature of your death, and indeed your life beforehoof brings with it certain, complications.”

Rolling his eyes, he pressed some buttons on the crystal device floating before him. A series of beeps and squeals issued forth, and a screen of colors appeared behind him. “First of all is the fact that you are the Element of Magic. This alone brings with it a certain burden, as well as some perks. The dumb fabric of fate has become warped around you, and your life is altered forever.” The screen shows my cutie mark, bending and warping, becoming a stylized version of itself. He presses more buttons, creating more noises. “The spell you cast did several things. First, it altered the fates of your friends, and then when you cast it again it altered your own fate. Sadly, that had the result of deleting you from the living realm. In short, you nuked yourself out of existence.”

“Wait, I thought you said I wasn't dead? What is this place? And who are you?” Pleading, I stomped my hoof for and answer.

“Oh, I’m sorry. I did forget to introduce myself properly, didn’t I?” Sketching a bow, he then stood straight and squared his shoulders. “I am Albus Carolinus Starswirl the Third; Grand Magus of Unicornia, Headmaster of the School for Gifted Unicorns, Master of Secrets for the Court of the Divine Sisters, and Consort to Princess Luna. And a damn fine poker player, I might add.”

I admit, I just stared dumbly at the list of titles. My mouth was most likely hanging open, until part of it sank in, and my brain re-engaged. “Wait! Albus Starswirl? As in Starswirl the Bearded? The greatest mage in all Equestrian History? You’re THAT Starswirl?”

With a weary sigh, the stallion before me seemed to deflate a bit. “Starswirl the Bearded was my great aunt. She was a circus performer, and a damn fine juggler. I’m Albus Starswirl, although my friends call me Al.”

“But that makes no sense? All the history books refer to you as Starswirl the Bearded! There has only been one recorded Starswirl to be declared Grand Magus, so that has to be you!” I started to pace back and forth, trying to make sense of things, before stopping to point a hoof at him. “You’re messing with me again, aren’t you?”

Finally he rolled his eyes and stomped a hoof. “Bah! This is so not fair. I should have been known as Starswirl the Great! Starswirl the Wise! Starswirl the Incredibly Handsome! But NO! You pass out drunk at ONE costume party, and you bear the shame for the rest of eternity!” Plopping to the ground, the grey unicorn covered his head with his hooves.

“I don’t get it? What’s wrong with being called Starswirl the Bearded? I’ve seen all the pictures, and you always have the great white beard, and your pointed hat, with the bells and... wait. Where is your beard? How can you be Starswirl the Bearded without your beard?” I waved at him in bafflement.

“Oh, thank you Celly, now she gets it!” He rolled his eyes to the sky, and shook his head. “That silly outfit was a bloddy costume! I had a little too much to drink, and some freshmare earned her fraternity pledge by magically gluing the damn beard and hat on me. Wouldn't you know, two days later was my appointment to have my portrait made for the school hall. It took a damn month for the glue spell to wear off, and by that time everyone was laughing and calling me Starswirl the Bearded!” Stomping his hooves, he snorted and glared at me. “It’s not bloddy fair!”

As he stared at me, I tried my best to keep a straight face. Really I did. But the image of somepony like Rainbow Dash or Pinkie Pie pranking a sleeping headmaster was too much. As it dawned on me how ridiculous the outfit must have been if he was wearing it as a costume, I broke. In fits and gasps, I started to snicker and then laugh, until my vision blurred, and I had trouble breathing. It was so utterly absurd.

“Oh hah, hah. Live it up, but remember you dressed up as me last Nightmare Night! And I happen to know all your friends laughed at you for it!” Looking grumpy, he just continued to glare at me as I caught my breath.

Then it dawned on me. “Wait, how do you know that?”

Finally a smug grin spread across his face. “Wouldn't you like to know?”

“You’re darned right I want to know! And even better, how did you get here? And where IS here anyway?” It was my turn to get angry. If I had died, then why hadn't I passed on? Was this the afterlife?

“Well first things first. I got here the same way as you. I tried to cast the spell of fate, and was blasted into the afterlife for my troubles. But unlike you, I didn't have any friends anchoring me to the living realm, and so I have been stuck here for over a thousand years.” The stallion sighed, and turned away, sadness written in his every movement. “I was like you, spending my every moment studying. Even when I took on the duties as Magus, and Headmaster, I had no time for friends. Magic and study was my life, and my only free time was when I was with my dear Luna.”

Grunting, he stomped a hoof on the ground. “Even that was tainted. She had her duties as Princess, and we barely saw each other, outside of my dreams, when she would visit me.” Turning to me with a smirk, I could see he understood the shock on my face. “Yes, I wasn’t lying. Even her sister didn't know about us. We kept our love secret, in our dreams, where nopony could know. I would tell her about my latest research, and she would tell me her sorrows of how the ponies feared her, and her sister never respected her.” Bowing his head, he looked down at his hooves at the memories. “I am fairly certain that it was my disappearance that triggered her downward spiral into madness, and her transformation into Nightmare Moon. Without my shoulder to cry on, she quickly fell apart.”

Stepping forward, I put a hoof on his shoulder. “I’m so sorry, Albus. You must have lost so much. If it’s any consolation, she was eventually freed, and has returned to herself as Luna. She now rules with her sister, and is much loved by ponies everywhere. She’s happy again.”

Suddenly I was being hugged, and after the shock passed, I returned the hug. “Thank you, Twilight. Thank you for setting my Luna free. I owe you so much for doing what I wasn't able to do.” Pulling back, I could once again see the cocky grin was back. “And please, call me Al.”

“Sure thing, Al. So about my other questions?” I cocked a curious eyebrow at him.

“Oh! Yes, right.” Stepping back, he pulled out the crystal device again, and waved it around. “You see, we are not really in the afterlife. This place is a kind of limbo that exists between the real world and the afterlife, a sort of parking area for ponies with unfinished business. And the best part is, the real world bleeds through, so we get all the really good channels!” Pressing a button on the device, it emitted a squeak, and then suddenly a patch of air shimmered, forming into a window. Suddenly I was watching my friends as they panicked and ran around, looking for me. There was no sound, but the distress was plain as most of them searched for me, while a straight haired Pinkie cried over a star shaped scorch on the floor.

“Wait! Girls! I’m here, I’m okay! Pinkie, don't cry, I’m fine!” I tried to reach through the window, but I passed right through it like it was smoke. “Al! You have to do something! I have to tell them what happened.”

“I’m sorry Twi, but they can’t hear you. It’s a one way image, although you can listen in if you want.” With a poke of his hoof, the gadget squealed again, and suddenly sound came from the window as if I were standing right there in the room.

“Ah’m tellin ya, Rarity, we gotta tell the princess! Somethin bad happened an nopony else can understand that stuff but Twilight herself, and mebbe the Princesses.” Applejack was trying to argue with a panicking Rarity.

“Do you want to be the one to tell Spike that we all killed Twilight with some untested spell? Do you want to tell the PRINCESS?” Rarity was practically screaming.

This prompted more crying from Pinkie, as she rubbed her hooves across the scarred floor. I’m sorry, I’m sorry, I’m so sorry Twilight! Please come back! I promise I will throw you the bestest party every if you just come back!”

Meanwhile, Rainbow Dash could be seen comforting a catatonic Fluttershy, who seemed to be frozen in the place she stood as the spell went off. Only her rapid breathing gave away that she hadn't been turned into a statue, as her body was completely rigid despite Dash trying to hug her.

Suddenly, the window closed, and the sound stopped, leaving an eerie silence, and the sound of my own panicked breathing.

“I’m sorry Twilight. Nopony should have to see the results of their own death. But hey, at least you won’t have to watch your own funeral! Boy, that was a mindbbuck. “ Sighing, Al stepped up to where I was still staring into the void where my friends had just been. I felt a wing fold over me, and I was pulled close into a hug.

I froze. I was being held close by a grey wing. A wing belonging to a unicorn.

“What the hay!” I stumbled out of the embrace, spinning around to face him. “Wings! You have wings! Why do you have wings? You’re a unicorn!”

With a bitter smile, he extended the wings that had been hidden by the shirt, and I saw one of the rarest sights in all Equestria; a winged unicorn. Starswirl the Bearded was an Alicorn. And not one time in any of the books, scrolls, and manuscripts had it ever been mentioned that he was anything more than a unicorn.

“Yes, well. Did you ever stop to wonder just what that spell you cast was supposed to do?” With a snap, he closed the offending appendages, and turned away from me. “It was supposed to be my finest achievement, my magnum opus. It was a way to change my fate, make me a prince, and enable me to finally admit my love for Luna so that we could publicly be wed. It was my gift to her, so that we would never be apart, and she would always have somepony to love her.”

With a sigh, his wings sagged to his hooves, and he seemed to shrink in on himself. “Instead it became my curse, and in my hubris I doomed myself to an eternity alone, and my love to a slow descent into madness.” Suddenly, he turned back again, pointing a hoof at me. “But you, Twilight, you are different! You shall succeed where I failed! You completed the spell, you brought together your friends, and through them anchored yourself to the living world in a way that I never did. Even my love for Luna was not enough to bind me the way your friends have bound you through friendship and the Elements.”

Grinning again, he stepped up to me, and with a press of a button, the device he wielded opened five portals between us. In each of these I saw one of my friends, not as I had seen them moments ago, but as I had seen them that very morning. Each of them wore the wrong cutie mark, and each could be seen bemoaning their twisted fate. No sound came from the portals, but I knew well the song they sang, of cutie marks and destiny. It was a fate that I had caused, with my botched casting of the spell, and a fate that I had fixed by helping them remember who they really were.

“I don’t understand, I fixed all this. I helped them remember their true cutie marks and set it all straight. They were all back to normal.” Looking back at the alicorn, I shook my head.

“No, Twilight, you didn’t. At least, not yet.” Waving the crystal device around, the portals all closed, replaced by a multitude of others, each showing a different scene, and each of them showing a different time in my life. “You see, time does not truly exist here, not the way you know it. From here, all points in time intersect, and you can view any moment of your life, or anypony else’s life, so long as it is in the same time that you lived. For me, that is a very long time. I can see any moment from the moment I was born, until now. But you can do more. You can actually visit any time during your life.”

“What about the future?” I asked what I felt was an obvious question.

“No, the future is still in flux, and too volatile. You can only go back, not forward. And in that way, you will be able to go back to the lives of your friends and fix what once went wrong.” Smiling gently, he waved to the floating portals. “And once you have fixed what has been broken, you will have earned your own wings, and can return to your new life as a Princess of Equestria.”

As he beamed at me, I felt the optimism infect me, and I started to feel hope again. Hope that I would see my friend again, hope that I would be able to set things right. Hope that...

“Wait a moment. Is that me, in the shower?” I gawked in dawning horror. There was me in the shower, me sleeping, me with my first date (when I lost my virginity), me and my first Playmare magazine... “Oh. My. Celestia!”

“Oh, uh, sorry!” Quickly he tried to press a series of buttons on his controller, which caused it to squeal in protest, and more portals to appear, each featuring a different mare in a compromising position. “Sorry! Sorry, sorry, damn this thing!” He pounded on the little gizmo, getting more angry bleep and squeals, until finally all the windows disappeared with an audible pop.

“WHAT THE BUCK AL? What the actual buck?” I grew livid, as he managed to blush furiously, and back away. “What kind of sick perverted weirdo are you? Great and mighty mage my hoof! You are nothing but a twisted old bastard!”

“I can explain!” Pleading, he kept backing up as I advanced on him. “Seriously, think about it. I have been alone for over a thousand years! Now you tell me, how long would you last without the touch of another pony? It’s flippin lonely here, Twilight!” He cleared his throat, and muttered, “And, you are kinda hot...”

I stopped, and felt my entire body blush. Nopony had ever told me I was hot. Well, sure that one bastard in college, but he never called after that night. “I.. I. Um. Thanks?” I renewed my glare at him. “But that does not excuse you from peeking at me. It’s just plain twisted, and really creepy.”

“I’m sorry, I won’t do it again. I promise.” He managed to make the motions for the traditional Pinkie Promise, which brought a smile to my face. I am pretty sure that even here in limbo, he would have no chance to avoid Pinkie’s wrath if he broke that promise.

“Okay, then, so long as you promise. I guess I can forgive you, in light of the circumstances.” I sighed and walked over, giving him a thump on the arm. “But I’ll be watching you, Mister!”

“Fair enough.” He grinned, and held out his hoof for a bump, which I gladly returned. “So then, do you want to see what Celestia does in the shower?”

I felt my heart skip a beat, and then my face began to burn. I slowly turned to see his cheeky grin smiling at me.

“Buck yea, I do! Can we get some popcorn while we watch?” I grinned back at him.

In response, he hit a button on the remote, causing a comfy looking couch to appear, with a large bucket of popcorn and a six-pack of cider next to it. “I thought you’d never ask.”

I have to admit, being dead isn't as bad as I thought it would be.

Author's Notes:

https://docs.google.com/document/d/1Xz4G-2kPAjPagQGACVUJlxpcfenBedVEnjAY0qDya8c/edit

This was an idea I had as soon as I saw Twilight get vaporized at the end of season 3. It's my headcanon that she actually died and was reborn a Princess. A bit of Christ allegory for the pony masses. Over time the idea twisted into a story where, like Sam Beckett, Twilight was forced to go back in time to fix the lives of each of her friends and restore their future destinies. So Twilight becomes Sam, and Starswirl becomes Al, who only Twilight can see as he helps her try to fix what once went wrong. I'm gonna write him similar to Al, as a sarcastic womanizer, making lewd comments, and hitting on anything female, although only Twi can hear him.

Sadly, I still have no timeline on when I will be writing these, although I would be open to collaboration if anyone wanted to pitch in and help me write some of the chapters. Until then, enjoy this chapter, errors and all. Meh, I still need a reliable editor, preferably one that understands American pop culture, and specifically the show, Quantum Leap. Until then, consider it on permanent hiatus.

And kudos to anyone that knows what script Al was trying to read...