Chapter Thirteen

"No."

The sound echoed through a bare cave.

"No."

Bare of monsters, bare of ponies, bare of Discord.

Bare of my girls.

I screamed. It was nonsense, but it carried in it exactly what I meant to express. The sound reverberated throughout the cavern, gaining strength and volume until dust was falling from the ceiling. I only became aware of that by feeling it settle across my head- the cave was utterly and completely pitch-black.

I lay there for... well, time didn't seem to mean much at all, in that place. There was no point in hurrying, after all- I was either far too late, or far too early, to do anything.

Because it had happened again.

And because this involved time travel, it was always going to have happened. I'd just never known the specifics, before that very moment.

Discord had toyed with me. Luna and Tia had gotten away, were meant to have gotten away, simply because he hardly took anybody seriously, let alone children. They would be okay. They had to be. Whether or not I was going off of what I knew -or guessed- about the nature of time, or if I was just hoping with all of my heart, they were going to be okay.

I'd drilled the two of them in what to do if I... ever wasn't around. They were smart and resourceful. Even if they just...

...just...

...saw their mother torn out of space-time by a cruel element made flesh.

"Can't wait," I mumbled, pushing myself up. There was still every chance I could get things right- I'd studied Starswirl's spell. Not as extensively as I'd have liked, but I had. Applying unicorn magic to my own system was something I'd done before. It was like trying to translate interpretive dance into ancient Sumerian, but it could be done.

I could even get the positioning right. I felt something that was, while not quite optimism, was at least relief.

First, I figured, I'd need some light. A little pressure put on the atmosphere sent dim static over the front of my wings. It was a neat but otherwise useless trick, good only for generating light. Pegasi used it at night for making more visible semaphore signals with their wings. I usually avoided it for what the static did to my coat, but then I was coated in sweat and dust as it was. Poofy fur was the least of my worries.

My eyes, now used to the dark, led me on a path back up to the crude altar. This was definitely an old diamond dog place- they were the only species that thought it remotely sane to cave in the entrances to a place of worship with no more thought than I'd give to shutting the door behind me.

And... I caught on to the largest change to the cave, and figured, they were the only species likely enough to worship that kind of gem.

At the top of the steps, and on top of the wide, crudely-carved block of basalt, I saw the shiniest damned thing ever. It was a gem of some kind, flat and wide, and larger than my head. It occurred to me that, a given amount of time from now, the cave had been open to the outside. Somebody had probably stolen it in the intervening time, or the diamond dogs had reclaimed it. Either way, the thing wasn't quite in my way, so I hopped up on the altar, stood to the side, and aimed myself at precisely where Discord would one day be standing. I had no compunctions about shooting that fucker in the back.

I spread my wings, took in a deep breath of stale air, and began scripting. I couldn't remain trapped in here forever- either the air would run out or I'd die of thirst. I'd be freecasting, doing it as I went along, and praying I didn't screw up badly enough to kill myself.

Worse, I was distinctly aware that I just might not have enough magic in me. The attempt could kill me, and some ground-dwelling predator could have escaped with my bones before I and my daughters came along in the future.

'Don't think that,' I ordered myself. 'It's not helpful.'

The first strains of vapor came easily. Starting a spell, targeting myself, and defining limits was an easy process, these days.

-Set target(self) not(not-self) exclude elements(extraneous(element(time))) within borders...

Spell-casting, or at least, developing spells, had gotten easier since earning my cutie mark. Sure, it wasn't writing stories. But it was writing, and I certainly had to be creative about it. And here I was writing out my most ambitious project yet, working on a prayer that I could define time in any way similar to how I'd previously defined space.

It was pretty ugly-looking, though, and I had to resist the urge to go back and smooth it out. Refining even a simple spell took just short of forever. I had no idea how Starswirl managed as many as he did.

-...deny extraneous(time-shape) set present define as local curve-versus-(not)local curve where curve equivalent to...-

I had to start a new line, the script gently curving around me and actually curving in over my head as I kept adding to it. This was new- and terrifyingly so, given how the more new elements I introduced, the shakier the process would be.

Sweat broke out over my head and my mouth went dry as the script lines met above my head and then, as I continued, crept down from the hemisphere toward my hooves. I was reaching that portion of spellwork where I had to split off sharply from how Starswirl had done things. Unicorn magic was all about interacting shapes of magic, like increasingly complex polygons hanging from threads.

-...create at(execution-command) conduit set feed(conduit) within parameters(manual(will)) deny case(false)...-

The lines of script were quickly becoming a sphere around my body. It was beautiful, or would have been, had I in a state to admire my own work.

-...preserve predefined-target(self) versus both not(self) and-also outside(defined(curve))...-

And then, for the first time, my script became truly visible. Not just visible to me as shadow-thin vapor, but glowing, iridescent symbols written upon the air.

That... shouldn't have happened. Not daring to stop, not daring to move, my eyes dotted around until they stopped squarely on the gem. The thing was glowing like it was Christmas. In my extensive experience of dealing with and defiling magical artifacts, that was a bad sign.

"Shoo! Move, you stupid ornament!" I growled, trying to nudge it with my hoof and completely forgetting the air of quiet reverence with which I'd treated it before.

And still, I couldn't let myself stop now. The pattern was working -which hadn't been a guarantee- and I had no way of recreating it by memory, because I could already feel the drain burning at my veins.

I was still writing the spell, but it felt like I was pushing against a spell that was writing itself, at the same moment. Just touching, just daring to reach out and interact with time, felt like I was staring into the face of something massive and unfathomable. And just a tad too much inevitable.

The cave disappeared. There was just me, the spell, and the crystal which had begun shining and singing. Beyond all that was just everything else.

Everything.

'I'm not supposed to be here I wasn't supposed to do this these are things that my eyes can't see I just wanted to see my girls and help them save the world...'

-...execute spell-

And then there wasn't light.

And then there was.

It was like having an ocean pushing against me, and then having the sheer audacity to push back. Existence carried a grudge against me for reasons I couldn't fathom. That was so damned unfair that my first reaction was to try to punch it.

Needless to say, things got worse from there.

I must have been dying, and I felt that I had been pretty unfair in dismissing all those who'd claimed to have seen their lives flashing before their eyes.

'I could see myself. I was small, an awkward bundle of shaggy red hair that dad kept trying to cut short, thick glasses, and an aversion to a school that relentlessly ground down on 'that one soft nerd'. My older siblings got into drugs, and alcohol, and there were pregnancies and arrests and it hurt just as much to see it a second time around. My room was plastered with pictures of beautiful, distant places and ancient ruins that looked like the settings to all my fantasy novels.'

'I was graduating. I prayed for the best, but had a travel bag ready when I came out to my parents and told them their little boy wasn't a boy. I left on a bus that very night, my ears ringing with insults and threats. I would live a meager, paycheck-to-paycheck life for four years, scribbling drawings and writing short stories whenever I had a free moment.'

'I had my own apartment. It was small, but the neighborhood came complimentary with three new friends who cared about me and used my correct name and encouraged me to start publishing. The night I earned my first three dollar sale, we partied long into the night and fingerpainted the walls for shits and giggles. The following cleanup was terrible, and we suffered together.'

'A book fell on my head, waking me up for a day where I'd meet new friends that paid proof to everything I'd secretly hoped for. Two of the best months of my life followed, and I secretly worked toward paying every moment of that back to the six new friends I'd made. Jill, Crazy Dan, and Linda all anchored me as I sent myself across an impossible distance.'

'I died, and woke to find myself further away than ever. I lived decades in a fantasy, staving off loneliness by throwing myself into learning all about this strange, strange world. I met lovers, lost them, walked the thin line of life and death and came out shrouded in the knowledge of things yet to come.'

'I set about making those things happen, and making them happen as gently as possible for all of these wonderful new people, ponies, who'd someday rise to be absolutely fantastic.'

'I loved, harder than I'd ever had, the first boy with whom I'd felt safe. We never had the chance to attract any others to our herd, but I was lucky enough to have two wonderful foals. Winter died, senselessly, and I proved myself every bit as capable of being the terrible witch that haunted pony culture as those who'd come before me.'

'The Paradise Estate was gone. There were thestrals, a whole people who needed my help. I carried them with me the entire way. I avoided my parents' mistakes in child-rearing, and managed not to make too many new ones. My girls were lovely and fated to be magnificent. I knew my time would be too, too short with them. I felt a new and fantastic hatred for a half-creature that seemed poised to ruin everything I'd gained and loved.'

'I was lost again, and adrift, watching as I watched myself in a place that wasn't a place, hooves standing on nothing, and then everything was so bright all of a sudden and I thought I was dying for a second time, but maybe it was a third time because I saw a terran moon above me as I lay bleeding a hundred years ago-'

And then there was light.

And then there wasn't.

I woke slowly, still in darkness. My last, panic-filled moments had been layered with the realization that I'd lost control of the spell, as if it had been hijacked by a great tide. Something new, yet at the same time horribly familiar, for some reason, had happened. Obviously, I was still alive, and I hadn't gone too far ahead since, though the crystal was gone, the cave was still closed-in.

I couldn't risk the spell again, since I couldn't be sure that I'd manage to control my timing any better for a second occasion. Running too far over would be worse than not getting there at all. I could be patient, but I certainly couldn't stand to miss my departure point entirely.

Really, I realized, the effort must have knocked me out for longer than I could have foreseen, since my mouth was drier than ever but I still felt well-rested. Better than well-rested, even.

I sighed. This place was completely cut off from the outside world, and had no points of reference for time travel in any case. I needed to re-work the spell, and be able to make discrete jumps. Find some natural cycle to base timing off of, set a certain number of cycles...

'I can do this,' I thought. But only if I got out of this cave, first.

Slowly, almost drunkenly, I made my way back toward where I remembered the exit being, in the future. If I had to make a guess, then I had been the one to make that exit. It was a painful sort of logic, but nonetheless made sense.

I lit static over my wings again. My magic must have been wobbling as badly as my water-deprived body, because it brightened the cavern a lot more than I'd have expected. My eyes turned to slits and I bit back a curse.

Then I realized there weren't any younger ponies I had to watch my mouth around, and felt free to curse like a sailor.

"Blood-fucking feathered fuck! My Buddha Christ forsaken eyes I can't even motherbucker!"

It was quite cathartic, really.

I came to the cave wall a bit sooner than I expected- there was a lot of digging ahead of me.

'Maybe... two Ghostly Hands? I could sort of pry at it... Keep a wind-shield ready in case of a collapse...'

I got to work.

If I were so unlucky as to be in a cartoon -Ha!- or video game cutscene, I imagined that I'd have been startled to get to look at the side of a hill exploding outward and shredding trees, strewing boulders into precisely the rivets that would remain there in years to come, to be discovered by a small herd of strange ponies.

More presently, I stumbled out into the open air with a hacking cough.

"...Because fuck rocks," I muttered, confusion making it sound much more witty than it probably was. Needless to say, I'd intended to very carefully, very safely, excavate myself a little escape route.

"This was not expected," I said, blinking in the morning light that filtered down through the cloud of dust.

A dirt clod was caught by the cruel whims of gravity and, much like a certain book had a long time ago, clocked me in the back of the head. I stumbled at the impact, drunkenly shouting, "Have at thee, fucker!" as I stumbled over clumsy legs into the ground, face-first.

And got stuck there.

And got stuck there.

I whimpered, pulled back with an audible 'pop!', and fell on my rear. I touched my head, through the thick layer of soil caked there, and almost cried. I glanced back at the cave, then back to myself, and then back again. That 'gem' had been a cut piece, I suspected, of cosmic spectrum crystal.

I'd pushed myself to do something new and nearly impossible with my special talent.

I'd nearly died, all to fuel one great work of magic, and done so while stepping on this world's strongest example of natural magic.

Maybe an hour passed as I quietly panicked. I may have cried. I definitely giggled like a madmare, and possible cackled like the witch I was.

'No wonder I was moving like a drunk,' my less useful thoughts went. 'My legs are about half a foot longer!'

I wandered for a long time. I was in no hurry, and despite how much my heart ached for not doing something right that very second, practicality ruled the day. Well, practicality and shock.

I was perhaps as tall as Winter, now. Not quite where the future Luna had been, and definitely not where Celestia had been. Had been... would be...

No language I'd yet learned could accurately handle time travel, sadly.

Equestria, or whatever it was, was in fact less wild than it had been when the ponies had first come over. The other races that I'd expected to see after first walking the land bridge were in full evidence. I watched from a distance as griffons roosted on Canterhorn mountain. Thin strings of zebras, far from their southern home, traded with diamond dogs and what looked like a species of pygmy dragons. And, of course, true dragons roosted high above as they'd always done. Those wyrms had never really given a damn about anything.

Other species, strange and beautiful in their own ways, appeared here and there.

One night, I came across a camping caravan of zebra traders. One of them went into the dark to relieve himself, and I was just the slightest bit too late to catch the dark, chitinous figure that came out of the shadows and snapped his neck.

Seconds later, the changeling, too, died with an expression of surprise on its borrowed, striped face. I left before either body could be discovered.

A massive, sprawling forest greeted me some time later. I thought I'd been hunting some strange trace of Discord.

Instead, I came across Linda.

It was the Everfree. Or maybe what the Everfree had grown from. I'm not quite sure what drew me there. Maybe I'd had lofty ambitions of leaving a message at the future site of the Castle of the Royal Pony Sisters. Or maybe I was just tired at watching from a distance those I couldn't actually communicate with, given the new and depressing languages barrier.

I just knew that I'd followed a rather unerring path toward a quiet place where sunlight filtered down in a cool, green cast. The air was cool and still there, and a stream bubbled just at the edge of my hearing. The place seemed so utterly devoid of movement that the rustling caused me to whip around as if expecting a dragon.

It turned out to be a sapling. Not... quite the threat I'd been expecting. Curiously, I prodded at it, expecting some small bird to explode out of it and give me a minor heart attack. Instead, I heard a giggle.

From behind me.

I whirled round again, only to see nothing at all. Again. The laughter, light and bell-like, echoed from absolutely everywhere, this time.

"Alright, you can come out at any time," I said, letting my voice fill the space.

"Hello, pony..."

"Yes, pretty prancing pony, prestidigitatang precisely, presently," I said, letting some simple script write itself in the air around me.

"Ooh... that was six! That earns you a cookie!"

My spell faded into useless mist. Shocked, I called, "Have you been following me?" The 'alliteration exercise' is one that I came up with a long time ago, subjectively speaking, to combat an old stuttering problem. Chancellor Puddinghead had once overheard me and demanded I teach her.

But that was a long time... from... now, I supposed.

"Don't be ridiculous!" the voice didn't quite snap. "Or do be... just be nicer about it. Being nice is important, I think."

"I'm sure it is," I answered back, and suddenly realized what had been weirding me out about this whole event, besides the obvious- the voice and I had been speaking English the entire time. It had taken me years of vocal practice and a little bit of creative wind manipulation to manage it with my current vocal cords, and now this voice had started out with a language I thought couldn't exist, here.

"How do you know English?" I asked. "Are you reading it out of my brain? I'll warn you- I find mind-reading to be very rude."

"I only have to read my own brain for that," the voice complained, sulkily. Then it brightened up. "Oh my gosh are you a princess? You look like a princess, just like the show!"

My mind stumbled over that unexpected road block, leaving me just enough off-balance that I happened to ask the most pressing question possible, without trying yet another useless topic:

"What's your name?"

"Why, it's Linda! Who are you, pony princess? Are you the sunny one?"

I sat down, hard. I tried to speak, croaked, and had to try again. "Linda Turpin? B... born in Seattle? Two sisters, two dads, afraid of bugs?"

"And dirt!" chirped the voice. "Sort of. Dirt's actually sort of neat! You're a very clever princess."

"I'm not a princess," I said, voice gone slow and dumb. "My hranme..." I had to stop, regaining the right muscle and air control to use my old speech. "My name's Tamara Whittle. I'm your friend, Linda. Do you... do you remember me?"

"Tamara!" The tree in front of me exploded, and something green and smiling stepped out of the bark. "Tammy! Oh my goodness it's been ages, I think!"

"You think?" I asked.

She, humanoid, but with skin glistening like a sapling stripped of bark, nodded. And then I realized that her skin was exactly like that. Plant-like.

"Hi, Linda," I said, feeling faint. "How'd you get in magic pony land?"

She shrugged happily, like herself in many ways, but with a lack of tension that had been eternally set in every line of her body for a long as I'd known her. "Not a clue. I haven't seen many ponies. None of your friends visit me, either. I was a tree a lot, though, so maybe I missed something."

"And... how are you a tree?" I asked. "You weren't a tree before."

The woman... dryad? She looked a bit smaller, and a bit less happy at the question. "Magic. Magic changed me. Or I changed me, and I was magic. Or there was a tree that was magic, and I became the tree..." She trailed off. "I think something bad happened, Tamara. I can't find my apartment. Or my phone. I couldn't call you. Did you go away?"

"By accident. You... remember that book? That magic book I had?" I asked. She nodded. "I did something wrong, and couldn't go back home. Now, where did the magic come from? Did... Twilight, did she come back?"

Linda sighed. "No. No, I saw her in the television, but she never came to say hi. And then there was magic everywhere, and..." she looked up. "I think I fell asleep. For a long, long time. I was in some trees, and then some other trees, then... maybe a mushroom?" She shook her head. "I didn't like the mushroom. The moon is wrong here, but the sun is extra delicious."

"Is it?" I asked.

"Yes. Oh, yes. The sun from home was not this good. Oh, Tamara, I'm so happy to see you!" Then she went and hugged me. That was extremely out of character for Linda, so I mentioned as such, and I felt her nod where her head was stuck in my mane. "People germs can't hurt me anymore. Bugs are still icky, but I don't think you're infested with beetles."

"Thanks," I said, wry grin tugging at my mouth.

"Oh, can I show you my special tree?" she asked, jumping back and bouncing. It did... interesting things to anatomy I hadn't seen in about a hundred years.

"Sure," I choked out.

I followed the dryad, my friend, out of the grove. Occasionally she would simply go through plant matter, and I'd have to circle a tree or thicket only to see her proceeding out the other side.

"Linda? Do you, I mean, have you seen the others? Crazy Dan? Jill?"

"They went away," said Linda. "Or I went away. We never game anymore, Tamara."

"I don't have my rulebooks with me," I replied, staring around at the twisted undergrowth as we went.

"And I don't have any dice," said Linda with a pout. "We should head to the coffee shop. Should, but the shop's gone. Everybody left..."

We reached a cave, and Linda went right on in. I followed a little more reluctantly, but couldn't bring myself to stop and take things in. That would mean leaving behind Linda.

The cave sloped down slowly, curling in on itself or crossing its own path entirely, if seeing my own hoofprints in the dirt was any indication. Eventually, though, we came to a stop before something beautiful.

I knew what it was without being told.

"Do you like it?" asked Linda, gently stroking the crystalline leaves. "Like the show! I used to make those little plastic figures, do you remember?"

"Yes, Linda," I said, swallowing. "I remember. They were very pretty. This is very pretty."

"Oh, good," said the dryad, looking relieved. "I think I was supposed to wait for you, but I got bored. Um... I've been waiting for a long time. Maybe... days?"

"Linda, I don't think you made this in days," I said, approaching just a smidgen closer. The tree felt like... like an endless wellspring of patience and compassion, if that could be a thing.

"Then it must be longer," she said, reclining against the actual Tree of Harmony and sliding down it. "Maybe a long time. Maybe the longest time." I came closer, and saw that she looked a little grayer.

"Linda, I think you need to get back out into the sun, or something," I said. "You don't look too good, for a tree person."

She looked listlessly at the discolored surface of her arm. "No. I'm done waiting, Tamara. It's been long enough, I think. I was supposed to be here for you, and now you're here!"

"And now...?" I asked, dreading just where this was going.

"And now I don't have to, anymore," said the dryad. "I missed you Tamara. Can I pet you?"

"I missed you too, Linda," I said, suddenly aware that her green, glinting eyes weren't focusing on me anymore. I trotted up and settled down next to her, curling up close. She'd never been able to stand this back before... back before this. "Go on ahead," I told her.

Her breathing turned more shallow, and she sighed happily as she slumped further. Her arm around my neck and her back against the softly-glowing tree were probably the only things keeping her upright.

Her fingers twined in my hair and played with my scalp and I was suddenly very aware of how Twilight had been pleased and embarrassed in equal amounts when I did that to her.

"I'm so happy to see you again, Linda," I told the other woman, eyes half-lidded and relaxed.

"Me too, Tamara." Linda's fingers slowed. "Can you say 'hi' to everybody for me, please?"

"Of course, Linda. Anything," I said. "Are you dying?" It seemed a stupid question- the answer seemed obvious.

"I think so," said Linda, not seemingly especially concerned. Just tired. "I'm done, now. And you're here."

"I'm going to miss you," I told her.

"Miss... you, too..."

I buried her at the roots of the strange, lovely tree, scratched out a message in an old earth pony dialect for the girls on a nearby stone, and left.

I was on my way out of the forest when I came across the scene.

Not wanting to backtrack over my own path, I'd turned westward. It was there that I found the witch.

Witch, in these parts, basically meant anybody who used magic that they weren't naturally born with. I could script spells atypical to pegasi, the old dragon of the Arbo Swamp could craft mud golems, the gremlin hag of the southern Paradise Estate was able to steal the youth of pony foals -and hadn't survived our meeting- and this bitch was just doing some frankly unsettling shit.

The massive stone pit, some sort of ill-placed quarry in the heart of the forest that had filled halfway with swampy water, was host to a zebra. She had painted herself with pigments I didn't recognize, had wreathed herself in bones that looked exactly like the kind you might find, for instance, in other zebras, and was waving a blood-drenched staff over the filthy pond.

I was not really feeling a great deal of good vibes coming off of her, is what I was saying.

The final nail in her coffin was the ring of corpses around the quarry pit. They were of various races, and all most definitely, unmistakably dead.

The zebra began cackling madly, swept her staff in an arc, and all of the corpses were drawn down into the water as if on strings. I watched, curiously, for several minutes until the water began to boil.

And out of it climbed timber wolves. Scores of them.

My eyes bugged out, and I couldn't help but mutter, "There's just no way."

Not feeling much like waiting to let her continue whatever kind of necromancy she was into, I wreathed myself in a soft illusion and went all but invisible as I flew up into the treetops, and then further up still.

The clouds here were... uncooperative. I guessed the Everfree had been an anomaly for longer than anybody had ever expected.

Still, if nothing else were true, my natural well of power was substantially larger than it had been. Maybe almost twice what it was. If I had to make a guess, I wasn't quite half the 'princess' that my girls would be, even when they first ascended. I did some rough math in my head as I circled and drew vapor in towards myself.

It took hundreds of unicorn mages to stabilize the path of the two celestial objects. Divide by two, and, even accounting for the power savings that came from having a talent geared specifically toward communing with said objects...

By that vague guesswork and pseudo-science, the girls would be at at least three times my current strength after ascending with the Elements. I chuckled and patted my belly.

"Magic uterus, right here. Two for two successes- suck it, ma!"

That was probably mean of me, but then I had plenty of virtues that I thought I could let forgiveness slide, just the slightest bit.

If, of course, one counted 'enjoys raining down thunder' as a positive virtue.

I stood atop my wide, disc-shaped cloud, aimed, and stomped. The water below went from boiling, which must have been the optimal temperature for arboreal necromancy, to flash-steaming.

The zebra mare's chuckles became a scream of shock and rage.

I dove through the cloud, which had given up the metaphorical ghost and begun shedding rain. The zebra, with the little blood-red flower at her lapel, shrieked up at me.

I knew that flower. A griffon mercenary, or follower, or something, had worn the same thing. I hadn't known why he had ambushed and slain one of the drakelings, but seeing that he'd been procuring the body for somebody else was... unsettling. Worse, that I had missed one of his fellows who must have been in the area, because I saw said drakeling arranged around the pool. It had taken me some time to recognize the coloring when the body had been... less than fresh.

Timber wolves continued to rise out of the quarry. To my satisfaction, though, no new ones were rising out of the roiling water anymore. But on the other hand, there were still dozens of the arboreal monsters in every size from 'intimidating' to 'horrifically large'. I think they might have topped the three I faced with Tia and Luna in tow.

The witch spun her staff, and a spray of crystalline mist hit me. My eyes shut on reflex, before I noticed that it wasn't some sort of exploding acid-breath spell. That was good.

Several dozen timber wolves froze, inhaled deeply, and turned on me as one with glowing eyes. That was bad.

'This really explains why they focused on me to the exclusion of all smaller, tastier ponies back in the future,' I thought, at once worried and satisfied that I'd solved that little mystery. Really, some questions don't actually need an answer.

I would have thought that flight would have made the zebra's efforts pointless. Unfortunately, these tree-formed monsters could, in fact, climb trees. Quite well. Not to mention that the shaman mare below was still a corpse-collecting danger, and apparently the progenitor of one of Equestria's nastiest dangers.

Instead of avoiding the newly-spawned monsters, I tucked in my wings and dove. Fast, but not so much that I couldn't wind back and forth, evading the outstretched limbs of the corpse-born horrors. I'd seen necromancy, faced it, before, but it never failed to creep me the fuck out. The rapidly-approaching zebra shrieked once she realized her fatal error, and once I realized it too.

Her 'children' were not allowed to attack her, but they were fast and not built for stopping quickly on blood-slicked ground. I only -barely- tugged at her with the Ghostly Hand, tipping her into the still-boiling water. A swarm of alicorn-chasing timber wolves poured in after her.

And then, to be certain, I gathered my cloud back up and pounced on the thing until every last ion had been stripped from it.

I reclined, tiredly, on a few fading wisps of vapor as those timber wolves that hadn't been flash-boiled circled warily below. Several had disappeared into the underbrush already- I'd never be able to catch them all. Even should I have tried, I knew through experience that I wouldn't, couldn't, be successful.

Still, I took a few potshots in the form of spells that wouldn't start an out-of-control forest fire before figuring that, either zebras could hold their breaths for more than fifteen minutes, or else the world was down one witch. I flew off to the western horizon.

I put off trying for another jump forward for several more years. In that time, I picked up dialects in zebra, griffon, drakeling and minotaur.

The minotaurs.

I have to mention that the griffons had always been a mighty people, civilized and honorable.

Certain cults, however, had embraced the predator within in ways that were simply horrific.

In a world with more than one sapient species, the concept of cannibalism became more... nuanced. It was, I believe, one of the defining points of griffon civilization that brought them to consider other sapients as not only equal to, but 'equivalent' to themselves, leading to the Thunder and Eyre clans to join the minotaur clans in repelling their own people from the flatlands.

I reached Smethfurt, the easternmost minotaur stronghold, traveling with a band of griffon merchants to supply the defending forces. I had the advantage in dealing with the griffons because of the experience that I'd had with them working with the pony tribe leaders, in the long struggle versus Discord. That meant that their language had stayed relatively stable during that time. I'd not had much to do with minotaurs yet, though, so mostly worked through interpreters.

Once the story was relayed to me, though, I offered my help against the Cult of the Red Beak.

Magic amongst most species tended to be subtle, and specialized. Witches, shamans, alchemists and the like could manage new uses with old abilities, but the tricks I had access to were so far outside the purview of those in the someday-Equestria that... I left an impression.

I shamelessly crafted illusions of Windigos in the clouds above the final battlefield, sending Saint Elmo's fire in a scare tactic which forced the enemy griffons down toward the battlefield. Minotaurs met them from below, while the allied griffon clans, forewarned against the specters, fearlessly dove from above the cover and carved into the cult members' backs.

I used my burning-dust wings to startle them and, low on magic, took them on hooves-first.

I killed five, but scattered the rest so badly that they flew into the waiting claws and blades of the other forces.

Shaken and tired, I followed my guide to the celebrating camps, some hours later. One of the minotaur chieftains bowed and, through the interpreter, asked what had drawn me to the fight.

I answered honestly: "To save my future daughters the trouble."

The chieftain seemed equal parts amused and appreciative. While they were passing around steins of beer that could have rusted iron, they broke into one of the compulsive little war-ditties that had been going on ever since their victory.

Tired, but curious, I asked my guide what they were singing about.

The griffon's beak stretched in a grin. "They're cheering you, their ally. 'The Mother's Fist', they call you."

I listened, trying to pick up on the sound of the words.

'Da Mati Faust'.

Faust.

I buried my head in my hooves. I might have groaned. It wasn't a matter of worrying that this would get out- I knew it was going to get out. Twilight had swore by my name on more than one occasion, presumably because it was less awkward than swearing by her other princess-buddies. Now, I'd sworn by God, Jesus, Buddha, Xenu and Tom Cruise and hadn't ever expected anybody to reciprocate.

"I've got to get out of here," I mumbled.

"Before the party's over?" asked my guide.

"...After the party. Give me another drink."

I could stick around for a bit. Really, how bad could these battles get?

Eventually, maybe years later, I made the long journey east to the Landbridge, then to Amaranth, then back to the Paradise Valley. I went covered in the illusion of a peach and orange pegasus, sans my normal cloak, and with an ugly, frumpy hat on the basis that I hadn't actually transformed, and so didn't want anybody putting their eye out on my forehead, on the horn they couldn't see.

I went back to the Auroch city on the mountain, on the basis that it had been the most stable point of civilization that I knew, before it burned. It also kept the best business and tax records with a kind of single-minded intensity attributable only to bureaucrats.

I was six hundred years before my first arrival in the Paradise Valley. Nearly seven centuries before my bad end at Discord's mismatched hands. Heaven knew how far ahead I'd leaped that first time in the cave, before stupidly casting while atop a cosmic spectrum crystal.

I wanted to go back home. Having not had one that wasn't a cart, not since before when I was still human, and not since leaving with Winter, that meant Luna and Tia.

I returned to Equestria and waited another few years as I planned for possible failure. I couldn't let that failure impact my doing everything I could to give Tia and Luna a leg up.

I visited places that the ponies during Discord's reign never themselves reached. I left messages and wrote stories. I charged a zebra, one responsible for a temple in his homeland, with the delivery of several parcels in the centuries to come, using magically-binding promises utilized off and on by his people.

Finally, I reached the Canterhorn, and landed on the long rock shelf I remembered from before it all went to hell. At the back I messily scratched a large message to myself to turn around and eventually to shoot Discord and, surrounding it, reminders to the girls to brush their teeth and wash their hooves. All in English, but it made me feel better.

I took wing to one of the nearby foothills, on the basis that if I exploded, it wouldn't ruin the scenery for generations to come.

The vapor script spiraled around me until it became a spherical shell of magic. Then a second layer. Then a third. Years of refinement went into it, all aiming to the one purpose of not fucking this up again.

I checked the area around me for suspiciously-shiny rocks, not wanting to find out what a 'double alicorn' might be, and-

-Execute spell-

There was Time.

There was a Barrier.

I struck it, traveling in a direction I could hardly perceive, rolled over it like a puppet with its strings cut, and fell into the darkness.

I woke up nearly twenty-three hundred years later, on the roof of a tavern, and in my exhaustion slept there.