Chapter Nineteen

An epilogue...

"We are walking piles of plutonium, is why," said Jillian. "You tried to contain it, Tamara, and it didn't work."

"Point." The redhead frowned, then glanced out of the window. One of the nigh-eternal storm systems over the planet -Earth, but not Earth- was raging. "I still wish I could have found somewhere less terrible for us to go. I'm not sure why this world was so easy to get to..."

"Of course you don't," said Jill, scowling. "Your brain is swiss-cheese."

"Your face is swiss-cheese," grumbled Tamara, almost sounding like her old self for a moment, to Jillian's ears.

"Almost like one of us has..." Jill cut herself off before she could say 'been here before'. Instead, she changed the subject. "Linda got some of the astronomy geeks together. This planet is on its way out."

"Out of its solar system, and possibly out of its mind, yes," said Tamara, still eyeing the storm. "It was almost perfectly like Earth, environment-wise, a few millenia ago, according to our scrying efforts."

"A terrible place to build our version of Hogwarts," Jill acknowledged. "It's going to turn into what Crazy Dan calls a 'rogue planet', chucked out into the space between solar systems. And then it's going to freeze like a chicken wing that fell into the back of your freezer."

Tamara shrugged.

Jill grit her teeth. "So yeah, our choice is between going back and irradiating everybody back on our Earth, or freezing to death. Why aren't you worried?!"

The woman opposite her, still not looking away, shrugged again. "There's a lot of background magic here. It holds patterns pretty well. All we have to do is ignite the second moon."

Jill nodded. "Of course. We'll just ignite a moon." She kept nodding, as if she weren't about to lose her mind. "What moon? How? Make some goddess-damned sense."

"There's..." Tamara waved a hand. "There's another moon. A small one. If we hook it up to a ley line, it can sustain a spell putting out the same light and heat the planet would have got from a real star. Not a full star, but the millionth of a percent that normally reaches it. Set the 'normal' moon as a counter-point, and there we've got a day and night cycle."

"The sun and moon going around the planet," mumbled Jillian. She could still hardly believe just what they could do these days. "How very 'Ptolemy' of you."

A small grin tugged at Tamara's mouth. "You paid attention back in school, huh?" The grin disappeared. Odd, fun Tamara hadn't seen much of the light of day for a few years now. "It will work. We can make it adjustable- give it different paths it can 'hop rails' on, come a little closer for every year the planet orbits further away from the true sun." The woman sighed. "Can we... take a walk? Somewhere? I haven't seen the newest part of the shelter yet. They say the natives -some sort of cow, person thing- keep coming by and offering to trade."

"I can't."

It was as simple as that.

"Jill?"

"I'm holding the door," said Jill. "I can't move half a mile from this..." she gestured around at the little amphitheater they'd built, "...spot."

Tamara glared. "So we'll walk half a mile."

Jill snickered. "Fine. Might as well stretch my legs..."

They walked, through the hallways under the land slowly undergoing 'desertification', as Linda called it. Linda was the builder. She studied and saw to the domestic needs of thousands. Dan and his little following of odd-balls were exploring, disappearing for days at a time and coming back with careful notes on just how odd-ball the rest of this Earth was.

And Tamara...

"How's your think-tank doing?" asked Jill, looking up at all the cliff-dwelling style apartments. There were no windows down here, in this section. Not near the 'temple' where Tamara's group played with the threads of magic that crisscrossed the world.

"Fine." Tamara shook her head. "I'm more worried about Linda. This place has at least five speaking, thinking species and she wants to uplift more of them." She paused, then brought up a hand. Light exploded forth, resolving into an image of a rainy plain. Over it, dozens of ponies were living. "Look- she says Dan found them. 'Natural terraformers', she says. See the normal ones in the middle? They're keeping back the 'super-weeds' that have been taking advantage of the decay of the natural orbit."

Jill blinked, and leaned in. "Let me guess. The flying ones are making a pocket of stable weather, and the ones with horns are zapping at any wild magic that gets into the pocket."

Tamara grinned. "Exactly!" Then her face flattened out. "You're still going on about that cartoon?"

"Of course not. That would be crazy," said Jill, rolling her eyes.

She, Dan and Linda were the only ones to have caught the implications. Humans wouldn't last, here. Linda had put her full support towards making the world as stable as possible before moving on. Dan wanted to catalog everything. And Jill was keeping the door open -had been for six years, now- for when they wanted, needed, to try the next world over. Really, she was just waiting for Tamara to unknowingly come up with whatever bit of magic they needed to find a world that wasn't so close to their home Earth.

'Imagine why this place was so easy to get to,' mused Jill.

Their walk, conversation, and general states of mind completely broke as light burst out of the step-constructed 'temple'. It washed over them. It might very well have washed over everything, everywhere.

Tamara screamed.

I woke up. As expected, it was in my quarters in the palace. I spent all of half the days of the year, here, when I wasn't out playing 'ambassador'.

Quietly, I rolled out of bed and wandered out past the guards that were far too overprotective of their charges. If anything ever managed to take me by surprise and kill me, then kudos to them, right?

The Palace of Canterlot wasn't entirely dead at night, but the inhabitants kept a respectable hush near the midnight hour out of tradition. Luna was probably taking her 'dinner' about now, so I set off in the direction of the dining room.

My 'memoirs' bobbed alongside of me, an ongoing effort of years reconciling what I knew with what I'd learned in the Badlands. Likely, the public would only ever read the highly edited version, but just writing it made me feel better.

"Good evening, mother!"

I grinned up at the night-blue mare sitting with a couple of her closer court staff. "Daughter. Having fun tonight?"

The mare shrugged, feeding another tidbit to her possum. "Well enough. We're wrapping up for the evening. There will be some more tariff proposals to take with, when next you visit the sea ponies."

"I'll bring my nicest hat," I assured her, giving a sigh. Brushing back my mane, I saw the first few streaks of gray. Not bad, for a mare entering her third century. Not quite a sign of old age so much as advanced age, the way I'd understood it.

My youngest glanced away innocently. "Twilight mentioned that she would like to accompany you..."

I made to berate her, before noticing the selective silencing field between us and the other hungry inhabitants of the table.

"Really? It's been eighty years," I grumbled.

"And ten since Miss Lulamoon has passed," Luna continued primly. "Twilight isn't getting any younger-"

"Or any older, yes. I get the joke," I finished for her.

"So I suggest, as a daughter who wants nothing but the best for you," said Luna, as if she'd never been interrupted, "that wanting to rub elbows with a good friend might be in your best interests."

I was tempted, then and there, to find the world's fastest geriatric pegasus and kick her ass for never letting that joke die.

"Whatever you say, daughter."

Dinner, or maybe just a midnight snack on my part, went along quietly. Pleasantly, though. For as much time as I spent out of the city keeping busy, home was still... home.

Linda worried. It was what she did, really, and she was good at it. Right now she was exercising her talents to the fullest.

Dan and his group had come in at all speed, flying or teleporting or using whatever method they had cooked up as individuals. The organization of any given 'witch or wizard', as they'd taken to calling themselves, was tenuous at best. You either figured out a way to make magic work for you, or traded spells with somebody who already did.

"It was Terry," said John, one of Linda's own group. The normally withdrawn man was bobbing back and forth with nervous energy. "He... you know he got a bit 'off' after his brother died in the storms?"

"Yes, I know," said Linda.

"We just... we need more accountability," said John, mostly to himself. He was staring down at his shoes. "There was nobody else watching out for the guy. There are no rules other than 'don't mess with the projects of others', and... Just, damn."

Linda nodded. That was all there was to it.

Dan, at the other end of the amphitheater, waved her over. "Linda, did you pick up on it? Lucy wrote up some documentation but-"

"I don't need it," Linda said, walking over and bringing a hand up to the center of her chest. "I felt it. I could measure the effects on myself. You know diagnostics have become a specialty of mine..."

"Right, right," said Crazy Dan, tightening up his calf-length coat. "Some sort of restoration spell, right? Or regeneration. The guy got paranoid about our safety and-"

"No, Dan." Linda shook her head, then glanced around at the growing crowd. She led him on with a gesture to a more quiet corner. "It's a persistent spell. One I don't know we can break... it's as woven into the nearby lines as Tamara's 'clockwork solar system'. It's bad, Dan."

John gave a tight nod, summoning a simple scroll covered with chicken scratch and penned diagrams. "The magic... it forces a 'genetic normal'. As in, you're stuck with whatever your genetics say. Reconstructive surgery got undone. Norman Trent, over in topside group, had a spontaneous resurgence in that muscular disorder. Healers can't do anything since his body considers it the 'healthy norm'. We..." He winced. "We've had three spontaneous abortions. Nobody's sure if it's the mother or the fetus, or if it was just 'in progress' pregnancies or... or if the same can be expected of future ones."

Dan let his forehead drop to the table in a heavy thud. "Find a way to test that which won't give me nightmares, then come back to us."

Acknowledging him, John made a note and ran off.

Jill stumbled into the room after him, moving very much like she was drunk.

"Persistent threads," she gasped.

"Huh?" asked Dan.

"I'm shutting the door," said Jill through gritted teeth. "Otherwise this fucking piece of magic is going to attach itself to the ley lines back home. I'll be ready in two days."

"We... thought it would be unlikely, ever going back," said Linda in a faint voice. "And I'll make a wild guess and say this problem would follow us going forward to any place else?"

Jill nodded.

"What's Tamara got to say about it?" asked Crazy Dan.

"Tamara says we're in a pile so deep we're all choking on it," came the voice of said 'founder'. She walked into the room, hands jerking around a tangled weave of magic.

Linda hissed. "You're wearing an illusion?"

The redhead gave a shudder. "Of course I am."

"What's... oh. 'Genetic normal'," said Dan, eyes widening.

Grinning harshly through the false image that mimicked how she'd looked just days before, Tamara said, "Of course. I'm physically perfect right now. Just like everybody else."

"Oh, Tamara," said Linda, reaching out with a hand, only for Tamara to jerk back.

"No touching. Nobody touches me right now," hissed the other woman, just a touch frantically.

"Right. Okay."

"We've got worse news," said Jill.

"What could be worse?" asked Tamara.

Reading through a report, Jill first mentioned the issue about the gate back 'home'. Then, "The spell shook people up. One of Dan's people tripped off of one of the balconies and got an... extensive head injury. It healed up almost immediately, of course, but..." She glanced up, unhappily meeting eyes. "She thinks she's fifteen and back on her old horse farm. Doesn't remember magic, doesn't know how she got here... Miss Williams might be the start of a pattern."

"Oh. That's worse, then," said Tamara quietly.

"Aw, what's a few accidental lobotomies between friends?" asked Dan, sketching out details for a 'safety helmet' to be worn at all times.

"We'll figure it out," said Linda, determinedly. "We'll fix it, or... or else we'll find a way around it. We'll be... we'll be fine..."

Quiet reigned.

"Discord."

"Tamara."

We ignored the horrified and, or, awestruck looks from the beings around us as we sat down in a cafe in Manehattan. A passing cab puller saw us through the window, went off course, and ran into a light pole.

"Happy birthday," I said, shoving a box across the table. "You have no idea how much math it took to figure out Earth-standard dates."

"Hmm." Discord stroked his beard. "Mostly I just assign random days for birthdays -they're all equally as likely to be right, right?- but thanks!" He passed over his own box. "Happy birthday!"

I rolled my eyes, but took the box. He opened his first, revealing the ugliest possible suit in existence. Making it glow-in-the-dark plaid would have been an improvement.

Opening my own box, I found... an identical suit.

"Well..." Discord hummed. "We certainly can't wear them at the same time- that would be tasteless!"

Chuckling, I put the box by my hung cloak.

The chaos spirit lifted a claw. "Oh, waiter? We'll take the menu. And everything on it."

Watching the slightly terrified barista try to lever the blackboard full of drink choices off of the brick wall, I sighed. "That's going to go straight to your hips, you know."

"It's my birthday, apparently. I'm allowed," said Discord, crossing his mismatched arms.

"Fine. How's the cottage doing?" I asked.

"The animals have formed a republic," said Discord, grinning. "Angel the Twenty-First is in the running for mayor." He gave a bit of an awkward cough. "Also, the grandkids come around and help sometimes..."

I frowned. "Question. Did you ever actually wind up with offspring before? During those twelve millenia, I mean."

"Er..." Discord frowned. "You know I still don't remember a lot... and there were those four centuries I spent blind drunk..." He waggled a claw. "Call it fifty-fifty. Pretty sure griffons didn't exist before that last bender in Norngarten Square..."

"Did not want to hear that much detail," I murmured.

"Ha, yeah, probably not!" Discord grinned. "I'm taking a vacation, Tamara. Call it a century or two. I wanna see what new and interesting monstrosities exist in the local Australia equivalent. Maybe topple a few annoying governments. Whatever comes up."

It was a testament to our regrown friendship that the thought bothered me. "Well... take care of yourself, then. And visit."

"Of course." Discord threw a lazy salute, and began spreading mustard over his menu as a stream of waiters and baristas began delivering mug after mug and plate after plate.

"I don't remember how we met," said Linda, arms crossed over herself.

Tamara stared down at the grave marker. "Pike Place. You were trying to buy exactly two hundred jelly beans and insisted on counting them all, one by one."

The other woman giggled. "Yeah, that sounds like me." She bit her lip. "Seen Dan?"

"He's been locked up with those high-energy experiments," Tamara said. "Last I heard, a swarm of ferrets blinked into existence on the north atrium... which I assume he had something to do with." She lit another stick of incense, and patted the soil over where Jill had been lain to rest, after violently snapping apart the door between worlds. "I've got the solar pathways worked out. They just need some maintenance... a little nudge, to correct planetary albedo, now and then." Looking over, she said, "You've been spending more time in the greenhouses."

Linda self-consciously touched the sprig of ivy growing around the curl of one ear. "I've been... looking into options. I'm scared of forgetting more, Tamara. And there are fewer of us every year to remind me about how things used to be."

"True, true..." Tamara lifted a hand, which for a moment flickered transparently. "A lot of us are taking third options, so to speak, these days. Or just going out to wander."

Linda hissed an inward breath. "Something like that, yes." After a long moment, she asked, "Wasn't magic supposed to fix things?"

"Things, not people," said Tamara. "It all went too fast, I think."

A longer silence passed.

"I miss her."

"Me too."

I kept my eyes on the tea set.

Twilight stared at the wall with a grin tugging at her lips.

"Knitting not going so well?" she asked.

I looked over, faking a casual glance at the needles embedded in the stone wall with bits of yarn trailing from them. "It's a work in progress. Trying to get into old people habits."

"I heard you got into a bar fight during the last diplomatic mission with the griffons."

"Left a few scars," I said, glancing around innocently. "And hoping I didn't make any accidental marriage proposals. Griffons, am I right?"

I grumbled as the alicorn laughed hard enough to draw tears.

"Here," I said, shoving over a scroll. "I did some more quartz-vein transmission tests. I figured you'd like to see the results."

Twilight brightened up and pounced on the roll of paper. "Yay!"

I set another pot to steeping as she got straight to reading. An unreasonably short amount of time later, she finished.

"Very interesting!" she declared. "Have you tried other relative purity levels in the mineral?"

"Step two," I admitted.

The other mare nodded happily. "Great! So, I've been invited to the new Crystal Orchestra hall. Want to be my plus one?"

"I'll pencil it in," I said, just before a message appeared in front of the princess in a flash of flame.

Snatching it and, with visible annoyance, reading the missive, Twilight huffed. "Got to go. I'll pick you up at eight."

She bounded around the table, kissed me on the cheek before I could protest, then disappeared in a flare of teleportation.

"About time," said Spike, ducking to fit through the doorway. "She asked Luna and Celestia for permission months ago."

"What?" I asked, blinking stupidly.

"I mean, you two have been unofficially dating for about twelve years..." the drake said, picking up several recent arrivals for the library downstairs.

"No we're, wait, what? Have not!" I snapped. "I'm elderly! Too old to date- see this mane?!"

Spike gave a slow, reptilian blink. "You charm it that way. I swear you're the worst immortal ever."

Gaping in horror, I asked, "Who told you that?"

"Pinkie." The dragon snickered. "That's what you get for letting her get her hooves on a time machine. She said she's due to arrange you girls' tenth anniversary."

I felt a vein twitch on my forehead. "Damned, damned time travel! Who attends their own fucking funeral?! She catered!" Letting my head impact the tabletop, I moaned. "Not dating. Put that idea out of my head years ago."

"Predetermination," Spike sang.

Sighing, I stumbled out of the room in search of something to set on fire.

She slept. Sometimes she woke. Mostly, even that had more resembling sleep than anything else.

An unlikely number of years later, she opened her eyes and saw a familiar sight. It was a bubbling, dancing, light-filtering scene like had once been visible to her below the deep, cold waters of a long-ago forest.

She observed it, tracing a unique path along indescribable directions. She saw an empty bed, surrounded by a... vaguely familiar pile of clutter. Almost as if she could reach over and touch...

"Huh." The first word spoken in that space in thousands of years of sleep was... less than profound.

Unseeing, but for the window into the past that hung at the outside of her senses, she took a step.

Paper crinkled.

Tamara Whittle found a card on the ground. It was cheerful, and written out in bright, eye-searing crayon colors.

'Your horoscope for today: Congratulations, signs are positive for a new direction in life! A sort of sideways-backwards-spinwise direction, through a corridor of unintended consequences! Your lucky number is number negative twelve thousand, one hundred and fifty-three! Your lucky color is mauve!'

"What fresh hell?" the woman -these days more magic than flesh- muttered.

She took a look back at the pool in which she'd submerged herself for her long, long slumber, then back at the vision pinging her magical senses.

"That... is a fine-looking mattress," she thought out loud.

The corridor was already pulling at her senses, and at the threads of magic which bound her to existence. Perhaps she could just... sort of shrug them off, step forwards, and lay her head down. Just for a bit.

Several minutes later, a very relieved amnesiac woke up after being struck in the back of a head with a book.

She screeched, rolled over, and tried to stave off her imaginary attackers with an alarm clock.

A little over thirteen thousand years post-arrival of a slightly too-eager band of humans, Pinkie Pie stuck out a hoof.

Grumbling, Discord handed over a bag full of bits.

"A pleasure doing business with you!" said the mare, still spry at the age of sixty-two.

"Yeah, well... I sort of owed her," mumbled Discord. "Keep this quiet, would you? I have a reputation."

"Pshaw." Pinkie shook her head. "Now, if you'll excuse me, I have to go trade places with Chancellor Puddinghead for a week and see if anybody notices."

"So long, Pinkie Pie," said Discord, before blinking. "Bring me back a souvenir."

"Okie dokie, lokie!"

And they all lived happily ever after, except when they didn't. Because time travel is messy, as is, coincidentally, living.

Author's Notes:

To one and all...

Dear, sweet, festering Shatner I finished a story. I experimented with writing a bit of erotica -two whole scenes!- and don't think I'll be doing it again. I managed a semi-coherent time loop... swirl... double reacharound? Whatever.

And all you wonderful people liked, read, and reviewed!

I'll be throwing up another project soon, something I did in my spare time and not one of the ones I've hinted at, which I mostly wrote as stress-relief.

Then... further projects, I suppose.