Hey, folks. Today's story was a requested review. (Even though it took me forever to finish it). Let's take a look at Editor Required by stupidhand14.

With a title like that, what would you expect? A story about the travesties and utter futility of attempting to wrestle the English language like some kind of feral, bucking beast that just refuses to cooperate and will trample anyone to death multiple times if they even so much as think of trying to tame it? Maybe? Perhaps?

What about an adventure/mystery story about using magic to rewrite history? Er, close enough, right?

I guess I can't complain too much because the description does a good job of explaining things, but a story will have a hard time attracting its target audience if it looks like something else entirely at first glance.

Not long after testing new magic in Equestira, Sunset Shimmer notices that one of her friends are gone, and no one seems to remember them. Now, armed with enough knowledge of magic, Sunset must set the world's past right.

Here's the short description, and, lo and behold—an obvious typo! The word "them" is incorrect. Either it's being used as a plural pronoun for a singular person, or Sunset doesn't know what gender her friend is. I know that mysteries need to contain secrets and all, but why even bother hiding the identity of the target when it's part of the story's premise? Last time I checked, the game of Clue doesn't force people to guess who the victim is. That would be incredibly silly.

Starswirl was the last unicorn to have studied the magic of other worlds. That was over a millenia ago, and still no one had even thought of using magic in another world. At least, no one until Sunset crossed the portal. Disobeying her teacher, she had taken magic to the new world, and found it altered. After being reformed, she tried to understand the world's native magic, but failed. She found it was different. Perhaps she just needed a focal point, and what better focal point than Equestrian magic?

However, not long after the primary test, Sunset discovers that one of her friend’s pasts has been altered, and all memory of them erased. Only she notices anything is wrong and has enough knowledge of both worlds to save her friends.

Now history requires an Editor, and Sunset will have to step up if she is to save her friends.

I don't want to focus too much on typos, but I spotted two more. Here, "millennia" is misspelled and "Editor" appears to be erroneously capitalized. The latter may not be an error if it's a title, though it would help to establish that first. It's also worth noting that in the short description, the victim disappeared, and here, the victim was altered. The entire story in general is rife with minor inconsistencies and contradictions like this, and they're about as exciting and appetizing as finding a wriggling maggot in every spoonful of cereal! Joy!

The main point of a description is to introduce the conflict and set the tone for the story itself. While this accomplishes the former, the latter could use some polish. It would work better if it focused entirely on the conflict and left out that random block of exposition. The historical nuances between native magic and Equestrian magic might be important within the story, but at this point, I have no reason to care. When a person doesn't care, they look elsewhere. See where I'm going with this?

The choice of cover art, while nice, doesn't appear to be related to the story other than its being a generic Equestria Girls image. It's also way too cheerful for a story about vanishment.

PS: This story takes places between Equestria Games and Legends of Everfree. That's also important to know, but not mentioned.

Onto chapter one: History

        “Remember to study for Monday’s test,” the history teacher told his seventh period class as they rushed towards freedom. “It’ll cover the Gilded Age, so be sure to study Rockefeller.”

        Only after he had finished speaking did Twilight Sparkle begin to pack her notebook into her backpack. Sunset Shimmer, who had fallen asleep halfway through the lecture, was groggily stuffing her notes away. They were disappointingly short, with no real information behind them. Shaking off her sleep, she walked outside with Twilight.

Formatting is important, and the first thing that jumps out is a wall of text. Paragraphs are indented here, not spaced, when it really should be the opposite. In print, paper costs money, but on electronic media, space is free, so use it. Add that extra newline character after each paragraph and don't look back. Join us on the white-space side; we have cookies. Also, the indentions are uneven, which is what happens when you import from GDocs. That's another reason to switch.

White space is also a great place to hide secret messages.

The story itself opens with Sunset slacking off in class, for no apparent reason. I wouldn't expect Sunset to be the type to slack off as she was Celestia's prized student at one point, after all. A bad teacher can make any subject boring, but none of the other students are having trouble here, just Sunset.

Not that anyone does that.

Yeah, it's way too early to start judging characterization, but I did want to record my initial impression. Simply giving Sunset a decent reason for her delinquency is all it would really take to fix this. Maybe she was up late studying magic or something. I dunno, because the story doesn't bother to tell us.

But you could if you wanted to.

        “Oh, there you are, darlings.” Rarity came rushing over to the group, Pinkie Pie in tow. “You would not believe what they’re forcing us to do in computers!”

        No one in the group asked the obvious question as each of them mentally rolled their eyes at their friend’s melodramatics.

        “Alright, I’ll ask. What’re ya’ doin’ in computers?”

        “We have to design a web site for another person. An entire website!” Rarity continued her complaints for several seconds, her friends quietly allowing her to vent. As soon as she was calmed, the topic quickly changed to the dreaded History test.

        “He always give me a bad score, no matter how much I study.” Rainbow Dash threw her hands into the air. “No matter how much info I put in my essay, he always gives it a D!”

        “Yeah, he’s a real hard teacher ta’ please.” Applejack turned to Sunset, a small smile on her lips. “By the way, Sunset, mind if I borrow your notes for today’s video? I ran out of paper.”

        Sunset couldn’t help but feel guilty, and her poker face was not what it used to be. Instantly, her friends saw through her.

        “Sunset, did you fall asleep during History again?” Twilight finally asked after Rarity had been pacified. “I can let you borrow my notes again if you’d like.”

I mentioned minor contradictions and inconsistencies, and this is a good example of that. The colors I added to the quote above highlight two such instances. Well, three if you count Applejack asking about notes for a video. I'm pretty sure she meant to say 'lecture.' Individually, none of these things are a big deal. It's the sheer quantity of them that leaves me scratching my head. I think that if more care was taken to describe what was going on rather than just blandly telling us everything, that a lot of these things could be worked out.

This scene also sets up the initial conflict of the story. Because Sunset was slacking, she doesn't have the notes she needs to study for Monday's test, and she's too embarrassed to take up Twilight's offer. Applejack apparently doesn't have any notes either, but fuck Applejack; nobody cares about her.

So, of course, the answer to Sunset's problem is magic. Um, sure, why not? A better grade on a history test is obviously worth the risk of fundamentally tearing apart the fabric of reality and rewriting very nature of the universe itself. /Sarcasm. And who better to ask than her best friend in pony land?

        I would be more than happy to help you test the magic in that world. When do you need me over there?

        Sunset couldn’t help but smile at the inefficient use of a quill. It left the words bigger and much more smudged. She pulled out her pen again and wrote her reply.

On the one side, this passage does offer a neat and tidy explanation for why Princess Twilight's writing in bold text, but on the other side, it leaves a bad taste in my mouth. Please note how the pony is instantly labeled as inferior because she's using antiquated technology. I really hope that this doesn't become a 'thing.'

        I need a book that’s been enchanted with the Continuous History charm.

This is Susnset's request, and, quite frankly, I have a lot to say about it, but I'll wait until it's been properly introduced.

        Do you mind if I try something new I’ve been making to get it to you?

        What do you want to do?

        I have been designing a spell based on one of Starswirl’s theories of Portal Dynamics. It should allow for me to send you an object, which I will try with a book after I give you the regular copy through the portal.

Princess Twilight has some magic of her own that she wants to try, just in case you were wondering how all of this could go horribly, horribly, wrong. So yeah, the setup is pretty much that Sunset will get one copy of the book herself, while the second copy vanishes, winding up in exactly the wrong hands. I don't even need to read ahead to find out because this setup is just so obvious.

So after this conversation, our bacon-haired heroine stops to watch soccer practice for a bit, making note of a rivalry between Rainbow Dash and Lightning Dust. After that, she goes home and starts studying for her history test from her regular, dog-eared, chewed-on, scribbled-in, five years out-of-date, school-issued history book. You know, like a normal person. This is the first real problem that I have with the story's premise, because if she has her regular book, then what in the world does she need a magical one for? That seems like an awful lot of extra work for no real value.

        Saturday morning, Sunset found herself walking to school once more. When she was ten minutes away, she felt her backpack shake slightly. Pausing, she opened it and withdrew the Instantaneous Message Journal™.

Yep, the book that communicates between worlds has been trademarked, meaning that it's legally registered to corporate entity.

Twilight: Sunset! Do you happen to know anything about this invoice I just got from ''Hasbro"?

Sunset: Uh, well, I was a bit short on cash when I arrived, so I thought a few corporate tie-ins would tie me over.

Twilight: This is insane! It's full of hidden fees, roaming charges, and what the hay! They somehow even tripled the rates that I didn't even know about before I got the bill!

Sunset: I'm sure it's not that ba—

Twilight: It's payable in wedding-castle playsets, talking dolls, weird pony games, solid gold bars, and firstborn children!

Sunset: Whoops. Gotta go.

Twilight: GET BACK HERE!

Cadance: That last part's not so bad.

Shining Armor: So what if we sold Flurry Heart into slavery?

Twilight: You two aren't helping.

So anyway, Sunset gets a transdimensional text message, and fumbles for a bit because she's lost her favorite pen. Because this is a mystery story, I'm going to label that as a Clue™. It wasn't explained how Twilight's spell to send over the first, doomed, copy of the history book works, but having it arrive at the location of the pen that Sunset had been using to write in the journal seems plausible.

Alright, go ahead and send it. I’m a few minutes away from the school. By the way, where will it end up at?

It should show up right in front of the portal.

Sunset picked up her pace, practically jogging towards the school. It shaved a minute off her arrival, though she was slightly out of breath when she arrived. Smiling, she looked in front of the statue, only to find it vacant of any and all books.

Then again, the spell could be no different from just opening the portal and tossing it through, and Sunset misses it because she's running late. This begs the question of why Princess Twilight would even bother with an experimental spell when she's already capable of doing the exact same thing. Speaking of which, when Sunset doesn't get the first copy (no surprise there), Twilight brings the second copy over personally and it's even gift-wrapped, because that's exactly what Twilight likes to do in her spare time: gift-wrap backup books.

Sunset wasted no seconds in tearing open the gift, showing what should have been a Book of Continuous History. It was supposed to be a sleek looking book, with a modern binder and roughly the size of a compendium.

Instead, the book looked rather large, with a leather binding, as well as being the size of a compendium, it was as thick as two, though surprisingly light. It was entitled Book of History: Editor’s Edition.

“Well,” Sunset said while still slightly stunned. “The words changed.”

“It would appear so, but what else changed?”

The two girls sat down as Sunset opened the seemingly aged book and flipped to the glossary. Just as she had hoped, the glossary contained chapters about Earth’s history. Everything from the Ancient Greeks, and older, up to the Modern Era.

Flipping to the furthest page in the glossary, the two girls found words still being written as the events came to pass. Even the minutest of details were in the book, including what the diplomats were drinking.

And here it is, folks: one massively overpowered macguffin. Not only does this book contain the entirety of Earth's history, but it's self-writing too. Everything that ever happened could plausibly be found within these pages, such as: what happened to the missing copy. Oh wow! The mystery's over. We can all go home.

On top of that, we're led to believe that a similar version exists in Equestria and it isn't hard to produce. To show why such a thing is absurdly overpowered, I've listed a few examples:

• Can't find the Elements of Harmony? The Continuous Book of History will know where to look!

• Why is that mysterious, rhyming-prone cloaked stranger digging up holes in town? The Continuous Book of History will know everything about her!

• Have all your friends started acting all funny-like by avoiding Gummy's after-birthday party? The Continuous Book of History will know what they're up to.

• Wondering what this 'Crystal Heart' is and what happened to it? Look no further than the Continuous Book of History!

• LOL, what mystery on the Friendship Express? The Continuous Book of History already knows who ate the Marzipan Mascarpone Meringue Madness. You can't keep any secrets from this bad book!

And that folks, is my biggest gripe with this story's premise. Either some contrivance will need to be set up to prevent Sunset from using the book for its primary purpose, or she'll look like a massive, grade-A idiot for failing to turn to it to solve all of her problems. Basically, giving the main character an object that effectively grants omniscience probably isn't the best idea in a mystery story.

My will to continue is diminishing rapidly, but I must admit that I am curious as to how awful things can get. It's kinda hard to top that level of stupid, though. Perhaps the story will come up with a contrivance that I can accept, or perhaps it will dumbfound me with even more stupid. Guess which one is more likely.

So the princess and Sunset get into a discussion about how dangerous this book and magic in general is in this world, and that somehow doesn't segue into looking for the missing copy. Instead, Twilight uses her limited time to, well...

“How about you show me some of the technology from this world. I’ve yet to use a cellphone, and I can’t help but wonder if it can be replicated in Equestria.”

“Sure,” Sunset said as her smile grew.

For the next hour, Sunset allowed Twilight to use some of the technology that was in the world while showing her others. Laptops, phones, digital cameras, among other things. Before long, the hour was up.

...fawn over superior human technology. Excuse me while go I check to see if I still have a gag reflex. It's been wearing thin because of passages like this.

Yep. It's working perfectly. What a mess. Just like this.

This is horrible characterization for our favorite pony princess overlord. Even if one ignores the rather glaring obvious problem with the missing magical book thing, she'd obviously spend any limited time in Canterlot High catching up with her friends. Even ignoring that, why would she even think of trying to replicate a cellphone before she'd even used one? That seems a bit premature, but hey, if the story is going to force her into a forgone conclusion without any sort of investment whatsoever then why not? The whole scene takes place in the entirety of like two sentences, one of which isn't even complete.

On a more positive note, I'm actually kinda glad this scene was glossed over, because it's not at all relevant to the story's plot. Sometimes, you can get away with rushing things. Try not to make a habit of it, though.

After Twilight leaves, Flash Sentry shows up and somewhat creepily returns Sunset's missing pen. It's a bit creepy, because how in the world did he know that pen was hers? Either he had to be stalking her to watch her drop it or he recognized her bite marks or something. So yeah, somewhat creepy.

Anyway, it's noted that he has something large and heavy in his book bag, and um, that's great? I guess. The implication is that he picked up the missing copy of the magic history book but he doesn't say anything about that and Sunset doesn't ask about that so I guess we'll never know.

So with the awkward teen romance out of the way, she can finally get down to business: studying. She has a magical history book. What could possibly go wrong?

        “What do you mean I get a C?” Sunset all but shouted to the teacher. She could still hear some of the other students most of them complaining about their grade. “I answered every question completely, thoroughly, and provided evidence. Why did I get a C?”

        “Sunset, your evidence was exactly the problem.” The teacher lifted up her paper and read through the first paragraph until finding what he was looking for. “Right here, you speak about JP Morgan buying Carnegie Steel, but you have all the facts wrong. It was quick, with JP Morgan buying it immediately after Carnegie named his price. You put that it was a long, drawn out process, full of backdoor dealings. And don’t even get me started on what you fabricated about Rockefeller.”

        “It wasn’t fabricated,” Sunset insisted. “I found evidence that that’s how it really happened!”

        “Oh?” He sat back in his chair. “Where did you find this evidence?”

        “Uh…” Sunset’s mind racked to find some form of excuse, some way to make it not sound like she was an idiot. “Internet?”

...the obvious, of course. It's far too late for her not to look like a complete idiot, I'm afraid. Let's make a list:

• It was already established that her book contains history exactly as it occurred, not as it was recorded. The history test was obviously going to be on recorded history, and she'd have to not realize that.

• Given that she'd been attending class and studying from her regular book first, she'd have to either not notice all of these major discrepancies or not think they'd be problem.

• This book is significantly more detailed than what she'd been studying from before, causing her massive amounts of extra work to even use the thing in the first place. If all she needed was more info, there are these places called 'libraries' where one can find stuff like that, and hey! We know that Canterlot High has one of those because they let students sleep there overnight! Plus, there's the internet!

• You know, there are right ways and a wrong ways to use a book like this, and we've seen the idiot way. The smart way would be to look up the history lecture she missed, which is what I thought the whole point of this was. Why else would she need a magical book?

• As long as we're discussion bad ways to use this book, I might as well bring up the less ethical way, where she could just look up the test itself and copy all the answers. Should the teacher give her any grief about that, she'd have this handy-dandy reference guide containing all of his dark, hidden secrets such as affairs or any other blackmail-worthy material. Don't like someone? Just look up all of their passwords and send the FBI the nuclear codes from their email account. Problem solved. Because, y'know, having a magical book that contains all possible information, recorded or not, is not in the least bit overpowered in any way, shape or form. /sarcasm

So after getting a 'bad' grade on her history test, Idiot turns to her friends for solace, and we finally discover who it was that got herself erased from history.

        Sunset stopped, stunned. None of it made any sense, Rainbow usually responded to an elbow with an equally rough one, and she would never miss a single practice. Something was wrong, definitely wrong. Rushing over to the soccer team’s condition, she found Lightning Dust there, leading the team through exercises. After a few sets, she called for a break and moved to get a water, where Sunset intercepted her.

        “Hey, do you know what’s wrong with Rainbow?” Sunset asked her.

        “What do you mean? And who’s Rainbow?” Lightning replied before drinking down some of her water.

        “You know, Rainbow Dash, the team captain?” Sunset gave Lightning a hard stare, though her only response was laughing.

        “I don’t know who you’re talking about, but I’m the captain of this soccer team.”

It was Rainbow Dash, of course! Well, she hasn't technically been erased, but she's no longer the soccer captain, and she's no longer part of the magical clique. I'd like to point out that in order to commit a crime, people need both a means and a motive. It's unclear who has the means, but the only one mentioned in this story thus far who'd have a motive to harm Rainbow Dash is Lightning Dust. Thus, Idiot may have inadvertently revealed that she wasn't effected to this story's only reasonable suspect.

Of course, this could be an accident too, as messing with forces of nature beyond mortal understanding tends to have a steep learning curve. So I guess Flash Sentry could be a suspect too, along with someone like Twilight Sparkle (the human one), because she's done something like that before. Then again, if it really was one of those two, then they'd be panicking and asking Idiot for help, and there'd be no mystery, so yeah, Lightining Dust is really the only reasonable suspect thus far. But hey, it's not like the story's progressed much, so there's plenty of time to introduce more.

So Idiot runs home and vegetates on her couch for hours before finally deciding to see if that magical book she got has anything to do with this.

Slowly, her mind drifted to the book that Twilight had given her. Getting up, she walked to her bedroom and, on her desk, was the book already open. There seemed to be a red glow coming from one of the pages. It also appeared to have a bookmark set to the page, and it wasn’t the one she had left the book open on. She walked over and read the red text.

        Mistake found in this section of History. Evidence of tampering found. Editor required to fix mistakes.

        Sunset could practically feel the magical energies emanating from the book. Already she knew the book had been changed by the world, but how and in what ways she didn’t know. Sitting down next to the book, she examined it fully. There was an entire section highlighted in red.

After a brief scan, she deduced it was about a soccer game, one Rainbow Dash had been in. There was, however, something odd. It looked as if someone had used white out and wrote their own story in place of the book. The font was different, as was the size of the letters.

Oh, wow, look. The problem section is conveniently highlighted, bookmarked, and everything. And it's all shoved right in her face with quite literally zero possible ways to plausibly avoid absorbing any of the information contained therein. And you know what? That's a major problem for this story, as the entirety of chapter three is dedicated to interviewing people and tracking down everything written here that she should already know and has a handy reference guide for!

I mean, I might be riffing Sunset for being this slavering brainless thing that oozes across the bozosphere on its dumb-o-pods to suckle the moron juice from mother idiot ball, but this goes well beyond the pale. Sure, people do stupid stuff all the time, and when said stupid stuff inevitably blows up in their face, suffering the consequences and trying to deal with the fallout can make for interesting conflicts. But to give this a pass, I'd have to either assume that she didn't actually read it, or that she forgot everything and forgot that it even existed. I can't do that. When all hope of plausible deniability has vanished into the wind, the only thing left is a plot hole.

A huge plot hole. A gaping one even.

I get the impression that the way this time loop stuff is supposed to work is that someone tweaks the past to erase Rainbow Dash, and Idiot then has to go searching for clues to discover what happened so she can go back in time to fix it. But it's all fucking pointless because she has this magical, infallible reference guide that already tells her everything that she needs to know and it practically jumps in her face every five minutes shouting, "HEY! LISTEN!"

You cannot build the entire foundation of a story on a plot hole! Not only does the whole thing cave under any sort of scrutiny, but what you wind up with is a leaning story of dumb.

I...

Sorry, I got carried away there.

Well, Idiot tries editing the book the normal way, but with it being magic and all it doesn't take. And now that I think about it, what in the world was she even planning on writing in there? "And then Rainbow Dash sprouted majestic thespian wings and flew off into the sunset. 'My people need me,' she cryptically uttered before vanishing into the crimson orb." Yeah... no.

Sunset looked at the words in red again. An editor was needed, but what did that mean? How did someone manage to alter the book? How could anyone else in this world know how to control an Equestrian construct?

Setting aside those thoughts for later, she turned back to the problem at hand. She knew the book was most likely the problem and solution to Rainbow Dash’s problem, but she didn’t know how to fix it. Twilight wouldn’t know, nor would anypony in Equestria. Only she knew enough about both worlds to fix it.

The logic here is astounding. Idiot makes a sensible admission in that she doesn't know how to fix things, and then not two seconds later that somehow qualifies her to be the only person who actually can fix things. What the actual fuck is going on in that head of hers? I think, therefore I can fuck up? But let's skip that whole 'thinking' part, because that's too hard for her.

Look, I'm going to give a spoiler here by pointing out that contact with Equestria has been cut off at this point in the story due to time loop shenanigans. I mean, I appreciate the noble gesture where the person who caused the problem feels an obligation to fix it herself, but the least she could do is try to contact Twilight before running off on her own... Or put some more thought into it. I mean, come on!

So after drawing a blank because she doesn't actually know what to do, Idiot pull out a photo of her friends, and I can finally see where the cover art ties in, except it's wrong. Rainbow Dash is missing. And that makes the cover art wrong too. So I went ahead and defiled 'fixed' it.

[Original]

See? It matches the story a whole lot better now.

So anyway, Idiot gets the bright idea that she should use magic on the book, and that turns it into a magic sucky book that tries to steal her soul or something. However, she manages to resist it, thus giving her the rather sensible option of not allowing herself to get sucked into a weird, magical book. There are plenty of other things she could try first, like searching for the perpetrator, looking up the point in time when Twilight sent the books over and trying to track down the missing copy, attempting to contact Twilight, learning more about what happened to Rainbow Dash, and probably a few magical tricks of her own.

Taking a deep breathe, Sunset got up and closed the book. She couldn’t be dragged in without a backup plan. Walking to bed, a plan began to form in Sunset’s head. It was stupid, dangerous, and probably hazardous to her health, but it would probably work. Hopefully.

On for fuck's sake! She's just going to jump straight into the soul-stealing book, isn't she? Why even bother giving her any other options if she isn't going to pursue them? The book could have just gobbled her up in right then and there and be done with it! Now the whole thing is going to be dragged out unnecessarily in a way that makes Idiot look even stupider than she was before! Sigh.

Well, that concludes chapter one, and I'm getting rather sick of how poorly thought out this whole thing is. We have inconsistent details, a nonsensical premise, and our hero's been rolling around in idiocy like it's a patch of Sunset-scented catnip. Sunset seems wholly unaware of the true nature of the book and just how ridiculously easy it'd be to abuse the damn thing. In fact, she is! Not once does she ever turn to it to look something up after the history test and it's incredibly frustrating because the story also seems intent on finding ways to remind us that it has all the answers and thus how easy everything would be if she actually bothered to read any of it.

Am I really asking too much when I expect people to use the tools they've been given to solve the problems they have? I mean, sure, characters often do have to screw up to advance the plot, especially at the start of a story, but there's a limit to what people can swallow. I can't buy the fact that when a copy of this book goes missing, they sit and talk about how dangerous it is but don't go looking for it. I can't buy the fact that Sunset looks at the altered passage and even tries to edit it without actually reading it. These aren't character mistakes; they're narrative mistakes. That's what a plot hole really is. Should the story ever need something so godawful stupid to happen that not even the entire Bermuda Triangle is big enough to swallow it, then it needs to be changed.

I don't really want to keep going on and on about how dumb everything is (okay, I do), but I will desist, for now. After all, there is plenty more material to dissect. Onto chapter two: Akashic Records.

        The next morning, Sunset found herself waiting at the front of school far ahead of her usual schedule. Most of her friends didn’t even show up until five minutes before the first bell rang, but she had arrived thirty minutes early.

        Yawning loudly, Sunset stretched in her spot on the front steps of the school. Although autumn was already in full swing, it wasn’t a cold morning. Sunset checked her phone for the fourth time that minute. Twilight should have been at school already, but she hadn’t shown up with the last bus.

This story does have it moments, and this is a pretty good one. I can see without needing to be told that Sunset's so nervous and worried that she lost sleep and she's determined to do everything she can to fix it. Mid autumn in front of the school isn't a great description, but I already know what the school looks like so that is enough to set the scene. Ah, bask in the advantages of working with fanfiction.

So Twilight shows up, and after a bit of small talk, Sunset's left with the awkward task of explaining what's going on.

        “It’s… it’s complicated.” Sunset let out a loud sigh. “Long story short, something happened to the past, and now you don’t even remember one of our friends because they’ve changed. I have an idea on how to fix it, but I need you to watch over me while I do it.”

        Twilight leaned back against the step, her head nodding slowly as her mind worked its way around all the new information. After several seconds, she turned to Sunset.

        “Alright,” she said simply, pulling out her phone again to send off a quick text.

        “Wait, that’s it? You’re not gonna ask a bunch of questions concerning what I need you to do or what I just said?”

        “Nope.” Twilight looked around for her backpack and, noticing its absence, looked a touch glummer. “If what you’re saying is right, and I have no reason not to believe it’s true, then asking questions would prove itself moot as, if you do succeed in restoring our memories, then I’d understand what you meant.”

And whatever feeling of goodwill I had with this story is already gone. This logic is flawed. I happen to know for a fact that fixing the timeline will cause Twilight's memories of this encounter to be erased as the original timeline supplants itself. Thus, while asking questions might technically be moot, she most certainly will not understand what was meant. Seriously, she should be asking questions like that, and a lot of other questions too.

While I can understand why the story might not be too keen on a philosophical discussion about the effects and ethics of temporal altercation, outright avoiding it in this manner is bad characterization.

But yeah, whatever. This story obviously wants to get back to the magic sucky book, and everything else will suffer until that happens. In fact, it doesn't even bother. It just gets right back to the magic sucky book, nevermind the fact that we're kinda interested in life without Rainbow Dash is like. Given the whole 'butterfly effect' thing, it'd be hard to make one specific drastic change without affecting a whole bunch of other stuff too, plus we're still looking for the perpetrator so stuff like that might serve as clues too.

So what exactly does Sunset need Twilight for?

        “So, what do I need to do?” Twilight sat on the couch as Sunset began to put some water in the bucket.

        “It’s very simple, really.” Sunset continued to put water in the bucket as she spoke. “I’m going to try to connect with the magical energies, but I don’t know what’s gonna happen when I do.”

        “Isn’t that really dangerous?” Twilight asked in a worried tone.

        “No, as long as you’re here I should be fine.” Sunset gave Twilight an assuring smile. “I’m only to be connected with the energies for two hours. Once those two hours are up, shake me to bring me back.”

        “What if that doesn’t work?”

        “That’s where this comes in.” Sunset motioned to the bucket, now full of ice and water. “If you can’t wake me up by shaking me, do not hesitate to dunk my head in the bucket to shock me out. That’s the best way to wake someone up when they’re exploring unknown magical energies of this type.”

To be an alarm clock, of course! What? You thought she wanted a research buddy to talk to and bounce ideas off of while they worked out a plan? Why bother with that when Sunset already knows exactly how the magic she doesn't understand works—flawless logic, that.

Idiot1: Something I want fell into that big, noisy machine whose purpose I don't understand. Can you watch me while I climb in and get it?

Idiot2: It says 'wood chipper.'

Idiot1: Yeah, I and don't know what that is. Can you watch me?

Idiot2: Huh. Neither do I. Uh, sure, I guess. Is it safe?

Idiot1: Well, if I don't come out after two hours, then you should climb in after me. That's the best way to deal with unknown machines of this type.

Idiot2: Sounds like a plan!

So after letting herself get sucked into the book, Sunset finds herself in a library, and she's a pony again, for whatever reason. She picks up a book that catches her eye, and goes exploring until she finds an off-color fountain and a desk. Something strange is there to greet her.

Sunset turned to face the creature that spoke. Sitting at the desk, which was now a chaotic mess, was some form of creature. It’s body was very unique, with a nearly flat angular face. Its skin was a pale brown. It was missing its nose and ears, but its mouth was made in a wide smile.

This description is... what? Honestly, I don't even know. There's some effort to fill in the details, but it 100% misses the big picture. I don't know what species this guy is. Is he a human, a sphinx, a naga, an oddly-shaped gelatinous cube? Given that this guy is basically Discord, I'm going to assume that he's some kind of draconequus.

See? Just like that.

Anyway, his name is Hast Soporific, and it's apparently his job to explain stuff to the three point five visitors that wind up there every couple of centuries or so.

“Where is here?” Sunset pulled her hoof away from Hast. He simply moved back to sit behind the desk again.

“You don’t even know where you are? What are they teaching you?” Hast swirled his finger in the air, creating a floating sign saying, “Welcome to the Akashic Records”. “Does this answer you question?” His smile transformed itself into an annoying smirk, making his face all the more punchable.

“That doesn’t tell me anything!” Sunset jumped up onto her hind legs, placing her forelegs on the desk. “What. Is. This. Place?”

        “It’s the center of all knowledge. Any and all ideas, thoughts, events, and general history are stored here, for the select few that manage to make it here… which hasn’t happened in a long time, though some manage to tap into part of it.”

        “So this is where all that comes from…” Sunset trailed off, realizing where all the information from the Continuous History enchanted books came from.

        “Now, Ms. Shimmer…” Hast outfit had changed to that of a secretary, complete with tiny glasses and a clipboard in front of him. “You seem to fit most of the requirements, so I will offer you it now. Do you wish to be an Editor?”

See what I mean? He's basically Discord. He even does all that omnipotent magic stuff too. He explains that an Editor is someone who fixes mistakes found in the records, which, conveniently, is exactly what Sunset needs to do. But first, she'll need to sign the contract:

1) I may not look at my own future or change my past.

2) Any consequences that come, I must accept. If that means what I fixed leads to an undesired outcome, I don't have the right to complain to any entity of the Records.

3) A fee will be paid to the Editor based on the problems they fix, and in what way.

4) I may not ever tell anyone else of the way to get into the Records.

This less of a contract and more of a set of rules, but whatever. Given how Hast is, something like this is par for the course. There are only four rules, so I'll give a brief comment on each one.

Rule one is presumably to prevent paradoxes, as the easiest way for Sunset to fix everything would be to go back to her History class and wake herself up.

Rule two seems to imply that she'll only get one chance to fix each mistake. Should she do something wrong and stuff winds up worse than before, well, tough luck.

Rule three is something that I frown upon, as it's too open-ended. Given Hast, this 'payment' could be anything from a rubber ducky to a hand-cranked active volcano launcher.

Sunset's pretty much already broken rule four, as she entered the Akashic Records in the presence of Twilight. Do you really expect that inquisitive book worm to patiently stare at a lovely, bacon-haired corpse comatose body for two hours straight without even once peeking in the massive, magical tome?

As for the contract, Sunset has about as much choice in the matter as the average skydiver does in deciding whether or not to deploy their parachute. So of course, she signs it. Hast then gives a guided tour, showing her the conveniently located equipment that she'll need to go back in time and make changes.

        “By the way, did anyone else come through here recently?” Sunset interrupted just before he could start talking about the glories of mystery meat.

        “Yes, I told you that earlier. Weren’t you listening?” Hast reached over and pulled a cotton ball out of her ear. “Ah, I see the problem. Cotton in your little pony ears. I didn’t know it was a problem for equines as well as humans.”

        “Who were they?” Sunset leaned towards him, trying to draw the answer out of him.

        “I have no idea who they were, I just gave them the tour like I did you. And they were much nicer about it!” Hast hmpfed and teleported a small distance away. “Now, if you don’t need me, I must be going.”

        “Wait!” Sunset called out to him, which he surprisingly obeyed. “Can you at least tell me what they looked like?”

        “Ah, alas, I’m not good with faces. I might remember something later, though.” With a smirk he tried to hid behind his hands, Hast teleported away, leaving Sunset alone, the chairs and projector disappearing with him.

I think I can forgive her for not asking about the other visitor when Hast brought it up, because she seems to be in a clouded state of mind. It took her a long time to notice that she'd been turned back into a pony too, when that should have been immediately obvious. In any case, Hast is clearly lying. He knew Sunset's name without even bothering to ask. Given how omnipotent he appears to be, he could easily fix everything himself, but he'd much rather play games. This is much like how Discord acted in that "Princess Twilight" season four opener. I'll never be able to think of Hast as his own character as long as I'm constantly reminded of Discord.

Well, with Hast gone, Sunset goes to play with the toys she's been given. She suits up and primes this thing called a 'time displacer' with the book that she needs to fix. It wasn't mentioned, but that book is presumably the one that she picked up and it's presumably about Rainbow Dash.

        The machine sprang to life. A swirling vortex with multiple time symbols covered the gateway. Already a picture could be made out, but it wasn’t focused. Returning to the book, Sunset flipped through a few of the pages and found the picture changing, getting more focused. When she flipped to the page with the error, the vortex showed Rainbow sliding into another player’s ankle.

Oh. So this 'error' presumably involves Rainbow crashing into somebody's ankle, and that probably wasn't supposed to happen. This matches what we already know, given that the altercation takes place in a soccer game. It's nice to have everything just handed to her so that she doesn't have to go looking for anything herself. (Yes I'm being sarcastic, because I know that's what she does anyway.)

However, her time limit is up, and she partakes upon the ice bucket challenge, courtesy of Twilight. As it turns out, spending time in the akashic records is very taxing in the real world. Sunset's not-quite-occupied body was sweating and muttering while she was absent, and I can see how that would subdue any inquisitiveness on Twilight's part, though she never mentioned actually being tempted so we'll never know.

Instead, she has her hands full trying to keep Sunset from immediately going back, as her friend's far too worn out to handle another trip.

        “Sunset, if you change the past, will it change the present?”

        “Yeah, I think so,” Sunset answered after a moment of thought. “That’s how it was changed in the first place and why you can’t remember Rainbow.”

        “That means you can fix it any time and it won’t have any negative effects on Rainbow or anyone’s past. You don’t have to rush through it, harming yourself in the process.”

This is pretty sound logic that I don't have a problem with. Time travel, by definition, does not have a time limit... unless it does, of course, but since it's pure fantasy anyway, it can work however it needs to to fit the story. Presumably, we'll discover any limitations on that ability when she gets to that part.

Sunset also doesn't know what, exactly, she's supposed to be doing in the past. Hast didn't really explain much, and she's never done it before so it's understandable that she's nervous.

        “Do you even know what you have to do in order to fix it?”

        “No.” Sunset sighed, laying down on the floor. “I don’t even know what I’m supposed to be doing when I go to fix it. I have no idea what the ‘right’ choice is or how to bring it about.”

        The two sat in silence for a few more moments, thinking. Twilight moved off the couch and lay next to her friend.

        “Why not just ask Rainbow Dash what happened that day?” Twilight proposed.

        Sunset looked at her, thinking it through. “That would be helpful, and give me more information…”

You know what would also be helpful? Reading the book that's conveniently bookmarked and highlighted on the exact moment in Rainbow Dash's life where the problem began. In theory, Sunset already read that part plus she got to watch it happen right in front of  her when she used the time displacer to open the portal! But no... for reasons too stupid to fathom, she's going to go badger someone who is effectively a complete stranger for deeply personal information. She's going to feel like an exceptional idiot when she finally realizes that the shenanigans that she's about to undertake were a complete waste of time because she already had the answers sitting in front of her the whole time.

Since there's presumably no time limit, I could understand searching for more clues as to who would do this in the first place. I could understand her wanting to learn more about the records themselves and what it means to be an Editor. Heck, I could even understand her stopping to talk with Rainbow Dash to see if this is an alternate future that even needs to be changed. After all, there are no evil monsters taking over the world and for all we know, Rainbow Dash could be perfectly happy. What I can't forgive is for Sunset to waste time running off to discover something that SHE SHOULD ALREADY KNOW!

So with that in mind, she discovers that her book now has her name on it. Great, all she has to do is find the missing copy and the person who stole it should have their own name written on their version too. That's probably easier said than done but it could be used as proof once the perp has been caught.

So, just to make things needlessly complicated and/or difficult, we have Chapter Three: False Paths and Urgent Moves.

This whole chapter might exist because of questionable logic and a faulty premise, but it's not like it's actually bad. Here, we finally get to explore what this new world is like, and discover just how much Rainbow Dash has really changed. That also puts into perspective just how powerful this history altering magic is, and by extension, just how high the stakes are if Sunset fails her task.

So she trails Rainbow Dash at school, following her into an anime club. Um, okay. Dash is now a nerd. This is totally not world-shattering, but whatever. They're all watching a cartoon and Dash gets in an argument over whether Naruto is better than One Piece—excuse me—whether Ninja Y is better than Single Segment. This breaks an unexplained rule, and the punishment is, well, this:

That video was linked directly from the story text, so I can only assume Dash dressed up as Derpy to seduce the Doctor. In general it's not a good idea to link stuff in the middle of the story as that forcefully expels the reader and breaks the flow, but this video was a lot better than the story I was reading, so I'm not even mad.

Anyway, this 'Nyan dance' is incredibly humiliating and degrading, so naturally, everyone records it on their cellphones (including Sunset). I don't know why Rainbow Dash goes through with it, but she rapidly exits stage left when finished, thus preventing Sunset from learning what happened in the past.

With the day a bust, Sunset invites her friends and they retreat to Sugarcube Corner. Not much happens except for an embarrassing moment when Pinkie steals the phone and plays the Nyan dance full-volume. Sunset also gets a note from Hast (via Pinkie) to talk with him. That's also awkward, because she can't tell her prying friends about him presumably because of her contract thing.

After the group breaks up, Fluttershy returns to speak to Sunset privately. She'd been close to Rainbow Dash in the past before something happened that changed her, but she doesn't know how or why that happened. She suggests talking to Spitfire, Dash's old coach, and then we get this gem:

        “Alright, thanks.” Sunset internally cursed at still having no answers. But… if Fluttershy remembered a little bit, she might remember more. “Are you sure you don’t know anything else about Rainbow Dash, don’t have any other feelings or memories about her?”

        “Um…  well…” Fluttershy looked around, trying to see if anyone was close enough to hear her. In a hushed tone, she continued. “I’ve never told anyone else this, but she was my first kiss.” Sunset sat in stunned silence, not knowing where this conversation was heading. Fluttershy noticed this and started waving her hands in front of her. “It wasn’t like that! She was dared to kiss me and I knew how much she wanted to be a part of the sportsy group, so I let her.”

Yes, it's pretty cheesy, but I'll take it. Little secrets like this might not contribute much to the plot, but they make for great character moments. They help remind us that these are supposed to be real people with lives, histories, and motives of their own. With a general dearth of character-defining moments, this little detail stood out like a shining gem.

        After getting home, Sunset went through her usual Friday ritual of eat, clean, TV, computer, sleep. She went to bed thinking over all the facts she learned over the day. What she didn’t realize was, in her skirt’s pocket, a small card was slowly crumbling into itself, burning away as she drifted off into sleep.

...and par for the course, Sunset immediately forgets Hast's note. It's good to know that TV and computer are part of the cycle of life these days. Ya can't break up that daily routine for anything, not if means missing out on cartoons and funny cat videos! That would just be so awful.

Because this is much more important than helping Rainbow Dash recover her lost identity.

Well, Hast's note wasn't just a suggestion, as Sunset gets sucked into the Akashic Records in her sleep. We learn that there is a time limit after all, as uncorrected errors become permanent after a week. This is all part of the fine print of the contract, viewable only via microscope. Yes, Hast is a jerk. He still insists that he doesn't know who's messing with time, and points Sunset in Spitfire's direction before sending her off.

The inclusion of a time limit does add a certain amount of urgency to this endeavor, but she still has half a week left and has already done most of the leg work on this research project, even discounting the fact that everything she needs is already written down in that book. Thus, her sudden urgency feels like an over-reaction, as it nowhere near 'crunch' time yet.

        Sunset woke up with an abnormal lethargy. Forcing her eyes, she forced herself to get up. She felt drained; her arms were slow to move and her leg was asleep. Forcing herself up, she found a card by her bedside.

12:30, park. Time’s ticking.

-Hast

        Reading the card jogged Sunset’s memory and she lunged for her phone that was on the charger. Dialing a number, she sent up a silent prayer that the person would pick it up.

        “Hello?” Twilight asked, sounding like she was wide awake.

        “Twilight, it’s Sunset. I need you over here tonight so I can go to the past and fix it.” Sunset looked at the clock. It was only 10:24, so she had plenty of time.

See? even the story itself is telling us that she has plenty of time.

So with Twilight roped in, they go to the park to find Spitfire and, um...

        “Look, you’re kind of a local legend, kid.” Spitfire’s smile turned into a smirk. “Besides, how could I forget the person that saved my mind from some brainwashing? Thanks for that, by the way.”

        “N-no problem.” Sunset hadn’t expected to be thanked for her efforts. In Equestria, heroes were rarely mentioned, much less appreciated after the fact.

Hey look: random praise that somehow makes humans look better than ponies. While we're at it, let's suck Sunset's e-peen too. Because, why not? I bet it tastes like the sound of crushing duck skulls in a waffle iron, because that's just about as random and deserved and easy to swallow as this is.

        Spitfire’s eyes gave Sunset a full examination before they finally softened. “It was a couple of years ago. It was the semi-final against the Everfree’s Wolves. During the second half, right after the break, Rainbow did a slide tackle… right into a teammate’s knee, fracturing it.” Spitfire closed her eyes, as if reliving that day. “Rainbow… she couldn’t forgive herself for what she had done. I saw her confidence completely drain away in one instant. I tried helping her, we all did… but it didn’t help. She stopped coming to practice, and hasn’t touched a soccer ball since.”

So anyway, Spitfire just goes ahead and spills the beans. I could complain about that, but instead, I'd like to discuss the scenario that's laid out here. It's fairly obvious that Hast's playing both sides for fun (because he can), so this other person likely has to abide by a similar set of rules. Rule number two implied that they only get one chance to change things and have to live with unintended consequences if they screw up. Thus, it makes sense that any action taken would be guaranteed to knock out the target without leaving any room for error. And what better way is there to take someone out of a game than a crippling sports injury? Rainbow Dash may not have even been the intended target here. However, we, as readers, are never allowed to entertain that notion because:

A: This second person is never named.

B: The injury itself is one of those inconsistent details. In the time displacer, Rainbow Dash was aiming for the ankle. Here, it's a fractured knee. Later, it's a broken shin.

C: The story flat-out tells us that Rainbow Dash was the intended target, and that this was the perfect way to take her out.

In order to accept that as truth, we have to assume:

1: The other person would have to know ahead of time that Rainbow Dash would throw in the towel if she hurt somebody.

2: That they knew this specific action taken in the past would lead to an injury caused by Rainbow Dash: (Tying her teammate's shoes together.)

3: That they flawlessly accomplished all of this on the first try.

4: That Rainbow Dash's sports record was important enough that changing it would lead to a better future for themself. After all, Dash herself was completely unhurt.

That last item is more of a clue than a complaint but this whole setup still looks horribly contrived. Speaking of that clue, it still points to Lightning Dust who is still the only reasonable suspect. The only other option would be Hast himself, which, while possible, would be rather lame, honestly.

        “So, same plan as last time?” Twilight asked as she filled up the bucket with ice.

        “Close to the same.” Sunset opened the book to the appropriate pages and pulled out a timer. “I’m probably going to need a few more hours to fix this, so give me… 5 hours before you begin to try and pull me back.”

        Twilight gave her a thumbs up before writing down all the notes she could into her notebook. Sunset couldn’t help a small smile from showing on her face at seeing Twilight trying to learn magic when her other-self was the princess of it.

Okay, So Twilight is on alarm clock duty, but here she's shown to be studying the magic that Sunset's using when she enters the akashic records. This is a blatant violation of rule four, but nothing comes of it, because Twilight's only role in this story is to be an alarm clock.

        Sunset opened her eyes to find herself in front of a fountain with dark purple water. Sunset saw that she was once again in her equine form. Sunset looked around in a faint hope of having the book she needed to fix still with her, to no avail. Sunset was about to go off in search of it when she heard a voice coming from the front desk

This story has a rather unfortunate systemic problem on the technical level. I've held off mentioning it until now, because this is the perfect example. Every single sentence starts with SUNSET! Her name outnumbers the pronoun 'she' in this chapter by a ratio of 162 to 116! Given that she's the only character for much of the story, this is a horrible ratio. Constantly seeing her name over and over and over again makes it stick out like the only green M&M in a batch full of butt plugs. It's like her name is some sort of cancer that's metastasized and is slowly choking the life out of the story.

Honestly, you only have to mention a person's name once and can continuously use pronouns after that. The only time a name is actually needed is when there's ambiguity as to who a pronoun could be referring to. It's better to use pronouns whenever possible as they tend to be invisible are aren't as likely to detract from the story when repeated ad nauseam. But that repetition thing? Yeah, that's a problem too. Would it kill to have some variety in that sentence structure? Yeesh. To help illustrate these points, I'm going to revise that paragraph:

After diving back into the Akashic Records, Sunset found herself staring at that begrudgingly familiar, gurgling purple fountain which smelt faintly like watermelon. She was wholly equine, again. Mounds and mounds and stacks and rows upon rows of books in all directions loomed around her. A sharp pang overtook her when the book she needed failed to jump out at her. She'd never find it in this mess!

Wait—it was probably back where she'd left it with the time displacer, wasn't it? That made her feel better, but the knot in her gut wouldn't let go until she saw it safe and sound with her own pony eyes. She was about to rush down the isle in search of it when a voice boomed behind her.

I went ahead took the liberty of embellishing things as well. I guess what I was going for was to have more variety in the sentences with the name Sunset only appearing once, but I got carried away. I couldn't resist adding a bit more attention to detail too. Please note how a mixture of four senses (sight, sound, smell, and touch) blends together to create a more immersive environment. By 'touch', I'm referring to feelings, as that's how the body physically responds to emotional states.

Hast shows up to badger her and give her the book she left behind. He gives her an opportunity to ask more questions about the Editing thing, but she (incorrectly) feels as if she has enough information to do her job. After going through the time portal, she becomes human again, and starts watching the soccer game.

        Without warning, a familiar voice entered Sunset’s skull.

        “I forgot to ask, did you read the handbook on how to control the Time Displacer?” Hast asked.

        “What handbook?” Sunset thought back to him. There was a pause, though she heard pages being flipped through.

        “Now I know that I gave you the handbook for controlling the Time Displacer. I put it in your locker at school.”

        “I don’t use my locker!” Sunset tried to yell think back at him.

Erm, what? I'm pretty sure that we've seen Sunset use a locker at some point in one of the movies. At any rate, she isn't carrying a book bag around with her all the time so she must use a locker at some point. But okay, even if she doesn't use a locker, Hast is still a jerk.

He tells her how to start and stop time along with rewinding and stepping forward. There's some sort of limit to how much she can change, and once she does alter something and resume time she'll sucked back. So basically, she can only make one small change and she'll have to make it count.

Using these tools, she discovers that Rainbow's unnamed teammate's shoes suddenly get tied together, forcing her to trip. So naturally, Sunset tweaks the flow of time to discover exactly when this happened and undoes it. I... guess I can give props to the story for making it seem like tying shoes properly can be suspenseful?

Problem solved, she goes back to the records. The book has been altered again, and this time the altered section appears in her own handwriting. That sounds like a clue to me. All we have to do is flip back to the first chapter, and the nature of the handwriting in the book will tell us something about the nature of the perpetrator.

After a brief scan, she deduced it was about a soccer game, one Rainbow Dash had been in. There was, however, something odd. It looked as if someone had used white out and wrote their own story in place of the book. The font was different, as was the size of the letters.

Eeyep. It looks exactly like this. Exactly. Bask in its perfection.

Oh wait. It's just the font that changed. So either this person has the handwriting of a computer, or this is yet another example of the story being unable to keep its details straight. God forbid that any sort of consistency happen in a mystery. I mean, it isn't like the little things are supposed to fit together to form a bigger picture or anything. What's even the point of laying out a trail of breadcrumbs anyway when we only have one suspect?

Hast shows her how to return to the real world without needing to partake upon an ice bucket challenge. She asks Alarm Clock if anything's changed, but there's been no obvious effect on the timeline. Too worn out to go back, she'll have to sleep on it before complaining to the management. That wraps up chapter three.

At this point, I've said most of what I want to say about this story, so I'll just skim the last three chapters, highlighting the parts that stood out.

In Chapter 4: Aftermath, we learn that Sunset's change went through after all. It simply just took effect overnight, rather than immediately. We also learn what that means, as everyone except Sunset had their memories overwritten again. And, uh, that's basically it. There is some talk about making a plan to hunt down the villain, but Sunset's extracurricular activities have been effecting her grades and she gets called to the principal's office because she's in danger of losing her scholarship. The chapter ends with her being sent to the nurse's office, presumably because she's been falling asleep in class too much.

        Hast let go of the book, allowing it to move next to Sunset before responding. “I’d suggest you read it before you go about ‘fixing’ it again. Oh, and before I forget...” Hast, with a wave of his hand, pulled an envelope out of thin air, and made it disappear with one fluid motion. “There we go, done.”

        Sunset’s immediate response was just to glare at him. “Obviously it’s not fine. Twilight didn’t remember Rainbow Dash, meaning I didn’t do it right.”

        “Have you asked her that today?” Hast held out his hand and a book soared straight to it. Opening it, he scanned through one of the pages before looking back at her. “Nope, you didn’t ask her after the update.”

In this part, Hast not only flat-out tells Sunset to read the book, but he also reads the book himself, looking up Sunset's actions right before she came storming back into the records. Guess what Sunset doesn't actually do. At this point, I think I'd stand up and cheer if he crammed the damn thing directly into her brain.

        Sunset’s mind thought for a prime example, before turning to her pink haired philanthropist. “Fluttershy, do you remember telling me anything important on Friday?”

        “Um…” Fluttershy stared off into the distance, combing through her own memories. “Not that I know of.”

        Leaning towards her, Sunset cupped her mouth to Fluttershy’s ear and whispered so no one could hear her say, “Your first kiss was with Rainbow Dash.”

        Immediately the light yellow girl’s face turned a shade of orange as red embarrassment flooded her face. Quietly, she told the group, “She’s right.”

        The entire group was quiet at this, each one in the recesses of their minds having had a seed of curiosity planted. What could embarrass Fluttershy?

Okay, so that bit I praised earlier was actually included for a plot point. That's fine. It's healthy for a story to draw upon past events like this. This is one of the few moments where Sunset does something that could be considered clever, in contrast to her usual fare of looking like a total idiot.

I should also say a few things about the chronology, as Sunset's time spent in the alternate timeline also passed when she returned to the main one. Given that her friends didn't notice her missing for a week, that must mean that they remembered her being present, even though she technically wasn't. What she was supposedly doing in that time shall forever remain a mystery, as she does not read the book, and the story goes into no further detail on this.

        Sunset got up and left the room, leaving Celestia to contemplate. Several minutes after she was gone, Celestia opened a drawer in her desk. Inside were two files. Taking the top one out, she pulled out her phone and sent a text to Vice Principal Luna.

Schedule Rainbow Dash a medical exam and get me the files on Fluttershy.

The chapter ends on this note. Principal Celestia is now also investigating the magical stuff, by, uh, reviewing Fluttershy's student records? Well, it's not like she has some magical book that just gives her all the answers, so I guess that's as good of a place to start as any. The medical exam does kinda make more sense, though if she just wants to talk it'd be more sensible to call Dash into her office instead.

In Chapter 5: Medical Test, Sunset goes to the nurse's office for a full physical including blood work. She hasn't had any vaccines, apparently, though I don't think you can vaccinate against idiocy. At any rate, they're interrupted when Lightning Dust is rushed in because she'd fainted during soccer practice. No surprise, she gets sent home early, and Sunset has to escort her.

After that's all sorted out, she discovers that Princess Twilight's been trying to get in touch with her from the pony world, but that's been impossible due to timey-wimey stuff. It even blocked the gateway between worlds despite her best efforts. They set up a time to meet later, but let's be frank. That's obviously not going to happen because whoever messed up time in the first place is just going to do it again.

Sunset finally remembers that she's supposed to read a book, but it's not the big book with all the answers that she goes for. Nope, can't have that! She runs back to school to retrieve the user manual Hast put in her locker. It turns out that it's also a magic sucky book, and she curses Hast before preparing to use it. And that's chapter five.

        “I wasn’t dehydrated.” Lightning shot a glare outside the window. “I wasn’t thirsty. I just fainted after looked at Rainbow.” Lightning finally allowed for a shiver to come over her. “It was weird.”

        “How was that weird?” Twilight looked back, cocking her head. “It sounds like a normal coincidence to me.”

        “When I saw Rainbow it was like…” Lightning tried moving her hands, as if trying to grasp the proper words. “It’s like my mind broke, I guess? It was like there were two ideas at the same time in my head, and it just beat me over the head with pain.”

        The car was silent for a few seconds. This silence was broken with an excited screech from Twilight, who all but turned around in her seat to look at Sunset.

        “Do you think it has anything to do with the magic?” she asked, an enthusiastic smile on her face. “Do you think it may have affected her?”

While escorting Lightning Dust home, Sunset meets up with Flash and Twilight. This conversation takes place while they're all together. Here, we learn that Lightning Dust suffered an adverse reaction to the timeline's being corrected, and she's quite literally the only person aside from Sunset who even noticed that anything was different. This should throw up giant red flags that she could, perhaps, be involved in this directly. But no, they don't even ask her about it. They'd rather just spell out all of their plans for dealing with this magic nonsense while she's right there, sitting in the car, listening to them. Dumb. Dumb. Dumb...

Chapter 6: Missing (unedited)

It's never a good sign when the author releases a chapter labelled as unedited.

Author's Note:

Warning, this is an unedited version uploaded only for the NaPoWriMo challenge.

This is not a final product. It is a rough draft that I needed to post in order to get over the 10k mark.

I would suggest not reading until the (unedited) addendum is removed.

Remember, Criticism is always welcome.

Right... so we're not supposed to read it, but it's fine to leave criticism. How is that supposed to work? Are we supposed to just criticize this author's note, then?

FYI: NaPoWriMo stands for National Pony Writing Month, an event held by Equestria Daily. You can check out how well everyone did here.

By the way, you don't actually have to publish all of your content for them to verify your word count. A simple link to each unpublished chapter (along with the password if you've set one) will do.

This final chapter in its unedited glory has a lot happening in many small scenes. In fact, I counted seven, which averages out to about five hundred words per scene. That's a bit misleading, though, as some of these line breaks are extraneous. For example, there's no perspective shift, no time shift, and little spacial shift between the first two scenes. In fact, they're separated only by Sunset walking through a door. What's the point of adding a divider there?

        Hast snapped and disappeared, reappearing behind the desk. He was now dressed in his normal outfit. “This isn’t the Akashic records. You are, actually, in the tutorial book.” Hast swiveled in his chair, doing a full rotation. When he came back around, he had a little laptop on his lap. On it was a map of the records.

        “See, this doesn’t actually have the full wings of books, only a much smaller selection of practice books. It also has the editor’s area, as well as all the tools you’ve unlocked.”

        “Tools I’ve unlocked?” Sunset got a little closer. “What do you mean?”

        “Naturally we can’t trust a new editor with tools that could rip the space-time continuum in two, so that’s restricted until you’ve fixed a few mistakes.” Hast gave her a grin. “Though, since you’ve successfully fixed an issue, you probably have a new tool. You can see what you’ve unlocked in this room right here.” Hast pointed to a room marked Armory.

Hmm. I'm detecting a vile whiff, an abhorrent scent, a nasty funk. An egg, hardly fresh and recently broken gives off wondrous yellowish fumes that titillate the senses in comparison to this. Month-old dead fish lying in rows upon rows atop oily, half-composted fruity garbage and raw sewage freshens the air in comparison to this. The musk of the polecat could be applied as perfume in its company. What I'm talking about, of course, is the unmistakable stench of video game mechanics.

See, video games are vastly different mediums from fanfiction. They share the same glowing screen, sometimes, and that's about it. Games are interactive and put heavy emphasis on visuals, sounds, and feedback. By contrast, writing is passive, consisting only of pure text, and it's up to the reader's imagination to fill in the visuals and other details. There are many limitations on both genres, so it's important to know how to cover for them.

Video games are logical constructs. They operate on a set of rules as determined by machine code. There's a limit to the complexity of these faux universes as determined by the ambitions and resources of the programmers. As such, they tend to highly unrealistic, featuring massive amounts of contrivances—and that's fine. Game play is often the main driving factor of whether a person likes a video game or not.

Stories are basically social constructs. They're limited only by language and live or die based on effective communication. Without any sort of direct control or sensory stimulation, immersion can be fragile. Thus, care must be taken to ensure that the story remains thematically coherent and that the events contained within remain plausible within the story's own terms. Randomly tossing in a massive amount of contrivances simply to make an otherwise serious story more like a video game tends to shatter this effect.

In the above quote, there's a tutorial without a tutor, and new tools automatically become available. Discord Hast clearly isn't taking responsibility for Sunset's training, so he doesn't count. That leaves... nothing. Typically speaking, when people are left on their own, they should have to learn by themselves, rather than enjoying the luxury of being spoon fed by some non-existent entity that somehow knows how much Editing they've done.

        Sunset heard a ringtone. Hast reached into his pocket, pulling out a comically large cellphone. Clicking a button, he put it up to his ear. “Hello?” Hast was silent for a time, only nodding. “Be there soon.” Clicking another button, Hast put the phone away, making a face. “Well, I have to go and explain something now. Toodles!” WIth another snap, Hast was gone.

        Sunset stood still for a moment, before asking to no one. “Explain to who?”

And besides, he's clearly playing both sides.

I'm not going to bother going over the stuff in the armory, except to state that it's yet more overpowered garbage. Sunset also drools over this 'Editor' tech like Princess Twilight drooled over the human tech, so there is that too.

While poking stuff and reading the pop-up windows, Sunset gets awakened by her alarm clock, thus proving that human Twilight's entire role in this story was superfluous. On her way out, she forgets to lock the door. In a story, mentioning that someone forgot to lock the door basically says that not only are they about to be robbed, but they deserve it because they were too stupid to lock the door.

Next comes a scene where Sunset argues with her friends about whether Rainbow goes to family dinners or not. Honestly, that part doesn't make a whole lot of sense unless we haven't been introduced to all the suspects yet. Better late than never, I guess. Also, if Sunset really wants to know she can just look it up in that magical book of hers. Yeah, I'm never going to stop mentioning that, because it's never going to stop being a 'thing', and it's never going to cease sucking the life out of everything.

After school ends for the day, Sunset and Twilight bum a ride from Flash over to Crystal Prep to pick up Twilight's lab equipment. This scene somehow makes even less sense. What kind of school allows people who aren't even students there to store a bunch of stuff in private labs? Am I really supposed to be shocked when they discover that everything is missing? Forget being stolen—the janitor probably threw it all in the dumpster where was eaten by raccoons.

Upon returning home, Sunset discovers that's she's an idiot she's been robbed too. But seriously, though, forgetting to lock the door was completely unnecessary, as I sincerely doubt that any person after her magical junk would be stopped by a locked door.

        Both the Book of History and the Instantaneous Message Journal were gone.

Now this is a development that I wholeheartedly agree with. For once, Sunset has a valid excuse for not turning to the book to instantly solve all of her problems. However, it comes too late in the story to deny her omniscience, as the thief didn't take her tutorial book. Using that, or just entering the records by going to sleep, it's been revealed that she can set the Time Displacer to 'view only' mode and watch her house and/or Twilight's lab get robbed and use its magical powers to track down the thief. See? No need to draw this all out in some sort mystery story—oh wait.

And that's all that's been published so far.

You might spend your whole life helping students bloom, and then you get something like that. And you die a little inside, as you realize exactly what they're blooming into. Life is certainly full of, erm, 'challenges.' Let's leave it at that.

Editor Required has no shortage of 'challenges' too, starting with that misleading title. In summary, these are the things that stood out to me:

On a technical level, grammar and such was not flawless, but good enough. Please separate paragraphs with spaces, rather than indentions, especially when importing from GDocs. Do not be afraid to use pronouns, try to vary sentence structure more, and pay more attention to detail. Do you really want to see that picture of Hastlluminati again? Also, be consistent.

        Twenty minutes later, Sunset was walking down the hallways accompanied by Lightning Dust. The latter wasn’t even trying to stifle her laughter.

        “That didn’t happen,” Sunset said, her voice sounding dead even to her ears. “Nothing that occurred in the nurse’s office happened.”

        “Don’t worry,” Lightning Dust assured, stifling another round of laughter. “Though I don’t know if I can keep quiet about the nurse chasing you down the hallway.” This time she didn’t hold back, letting out all her stifled giggles.

Can anyone parse this and tell me exactly what Lightning Dust's state of mirth is? No? I didn't think so, either.

The characterization is somewhat shallow, though recognizable. Left to themselves, the kids tend to act appropriately, but when it comes time to advance the plot they either pick up the idiot ball or break character entirely. The Twilights really got the raw end of that deal. Possibly best princess ignored everything that was important to her and drooled over shiny human toys while the other one logiced herself into a medieval torture device because that's how cruel it was to her character. The only one who remained consistent the whole time was Discord, except that he's called 'Hast' for some reason. As for Sunset, well...

I'm going to reiterate just how dumb it is to make the main character omniscient in a mystery. Had she actually taken advantage of that, the story would have been over halfway through chapter two and it would have been awful—not that it isn't cringeworthy enough watching her bumble around trying to solve things the hard way when the answers were literally shoved right in front of her face.

In my opinion, there really should have been only one book, and stuff should have gone downhill when it was stolen. Facing off against an opponent who can read your every move and alter history itself would be a daunting task for anyone, and a good story premise too, except when the protagonist can do it too but decides not to because plot. Without Sunset's unused copy of the magic book looming over everything, her decision to interview people about Rainbow's past would have made sense, for example. The only other tweak I'd recommend would be ensuring that the stuff in the Akashic Records is all printed in a language that she can't understand, including all that 'tutorial' nonsense too. Forcing her to go through Hast for everything is far more amusing than letting her level up and unlock stuff because no good reason.

Speaking of which, it might seem clever to make the story more like something else that people enjoy, but it isn't. Just say 'NO' to video game mechanics. Just don't. Don't go there. You will regret it. Even video game crossovers tend to shun them.

Honest Attempt Medal ~ Granted to fics that might be failures in writing and/or execution, but still have good ideas that could have been made to work with more effort and polish.

Conspicuous Contrivances Award ~ Given to stories that are reliant on an absurdly-unlikely set of convenient circumstances and a questionably "perfect" series of events.

The entire sequence of events that set up the story's premise was just one continuous contrivance after another.

Shoddy Script Award ~ Granted to stories with inconsistent and otherwise lackluster characterization, often a result of poor, rushed writing. Also applies for when any character, canon or otherwise, is behaving out of character.

I've giving this award simply for the story's mistreatment of the two Twilights.