“Hey Twi, do we really have to search through the entire castle for your diary?” Spike asked in confusion as he sat on the back of his friend/older sister/boss mare.

“It’s a journal, Spike, and yes, I need your help to find it. There’re just too many rooms here for me to search alone,” Twilight explained while looking into one of said rooms.

“Seriously though, why are there so many of them? It’s like bucking a maze in here,” Rainbow Dash said, hovering above her friends and lazily looking around. “It’s even bigger from the inside than it looks from outside. And it already looks friggin’ huge!”

“But this is just like an adventure! We’re looking for a secret book containing dark and eldritch truths before any meanie-no-pants gets it and uses it to take over the world!” Pinkie cheered while bouncing from one room to the next.

“How would that even work? I doubt anypony could take over Equestria just by knowing Twilight’s secret fetishes,” Applejack deadpanned.

“You never know,” Pinkie sang cheerfully.

“Let’s just check a few more rooms and move on,” Starlight suggested, walking past a blushing and sputtering Twilight.

“Don’t know about you, but I would prefer to take a nap or something. Anything is better than this,” Dash groaned after finding the fifth broom closet.

“Starlight’s right, darling. We should continue before we lose track of time. Celestia only knows how long it’ll take to check all of them,” Rarity suggested while peeking into one of the rooms. “I never thought that you would need so many rooms, Twilight.”

“It still amazes me, and I haven’t mapped them all out yet. What about you, Fluttershy? Did you and Discord find anything?” Twilight asked, looking into yet (you guessed it) another room. Hearing no answer, Twilight looked down the hallway and saw that two of her friends were nowhere to be seen. “Fluttershy? Discord? Where are you?” Twilight yelled, trotting down the hallway as her friends followed.

“Sugarcube, I’m sure they’re fine,” Applejack reassured.

“I just need to be sure. Fluttershy? Discord? Can you hear me?” Twilight called out.

“In here,” a male voice called out from one of the rooms. The group of friends looked around and saw that one of the doors was slightly open. Walking inside, the group saw their two missing friends standing next to a huge box. The room itself was on the big side, the seats and couches giving it the feeling of some kind of theatre.

Discord seemed to be juggling a few smaller boxes, as Fluttershy tried to lift a black, rectangular object out of the larger box. Everypony, minus Twilight, was curious and got closer to see what the two were doing while the purple pony just looked confused.

“Hey, what’s that room for again?” asked Starlight while joining Discord.

"No idea. We never had the time to check every single room in the castle,” Spike answered, jumping on one of the many comfy looking couches in the room. “But this one is awesome! Think of all the sleepovers we could make in here!”

“Yay, sleepover party!” Pinkie shouted, jumping from one couch to another.

"Hey, check out that large screen! Wonder what it is good for?" Rainbow added as Applejack experimentally tapped against said screen.

Twilight finally got out of her stupor and walked up to her friends. This was her castle after all, and she was just as curious as everpony else what this mysterious room was hiding.

As she investigated the contents of the box everypony could almost hear the gears in her head stop grinding.

“Twi? Ya okay sugarcube?” Applejack asked worriedly. “Ya look like BigMac after mah sister asked him where the little ponies came from.”

"These... are devices I saw in the alternative Equestria!" Twilight exclaimed as she pulled them out. "Those boxes contain DVD’s. This is a DVD Player. Fluttershy is holding the remote. And that big screen is most likely a television screen!" She took a deep breath.

"Spike, Starlight, take all of these things out, I need to check on something!"

Without waiting for a response she teleported away with a flash, leaving the rest to wonder what just happened. Spike jumped of the couch and took one of the boxes from Discord’s claws. They all had the same title written on them:

“Equestria vs The Universe,” Spike read aloud.

Noticing a short description on the back, he continued:

“Since the beginning of time, the same questions have been asked from one curious soul to another: Which hero would claim victory over the other? Which villain reigns supreme? Who...is the strongest? Watch as two analysts try to answer the one, ultimate question: Who would win in a fight?”

"That's... a strange synopsis," Starlight muttered.

Discord, on the other hoof, smiled widely. "Oh, this sounds fun!"

“It’s about fighting? Awesome!” Rainbow cheered.

“But what is this all about? Spiky, darling, what are those…things?” asked Rarity as she picked the case with her magic, reading the description.

“Oh, the humans in that other dimension have those boxes they can use to watch plays they have recorded with some kind of super-camera. The pictures those things make can move and make sounds. They are stored on the shiny rings in the cases and then can be watched over and over again. It's pretty neat,” Spike explained.

“Right, I remember seeing them in that mall when I fought Jupiter Montage,” Starlight mused.

“That sounds interesting, but why would they use this for fighting?” Fluttershy asked meekly.

“Because fights are awesome, aren’t you excited?” answered Dash. “Oh right, you would probably prefer some boring animal pictures, do you?”

Fluttershy just hid behind her mane, her checks blushing slightly.

Twilight used that particularly moment to teleport back in, a confused (and wet?) Sunset Shimmer in her telekinetic grab.

"Where'd you go Twilight? And why’s Sunset here?" asked Starlight. "Nice to see you again, by the way."

"The technology and the things in the box reminded me of the other Equestria, so I visited it and took Sunset Shimmer with me, she'll be able to answer any question we might have,” Twilight exclaimed proudly.

"I was just enjoying my bath after a long day of work, when Twilight broke the door in, grabbed and dragged me through the town to the portal… while I was STARK NAKED!!! If this is not important, I swear to Celestia, SOMEPONY is going to die tonight!” Sunset sneered.

- After the others explained everything to her (and prevented her from torching Twilight) -

“So, what do you think?” asked Twilight, rubbing some lotion on her burn marks.

“Yeah, no idea why this stuff appeared in your castle, or Equestria. I never heard of anything like this before, but seriously? 'Equestria vs The Universe'? That sounds like a name only a pony could come up with. You’re sure that is not a prank?”

“No, this kind of advanced technology is unknown in Equestria, so it can’t be from anypony who lives here. Discord?”

“Nope, wasn’t me. Do you really think I would have the patience to wait for you to stumble upon this room? Or not take credit for this chaos?” Discord grinned, while laying on a cotton candy cloud, painting his nails with… mustard?

“Point taken. So, what do we do?” asked Twilight.

“Well, since you dragged me here, I don’t want to leave with empty hands…hooves. I say we should at least check it out,” said Sunset.

“Fine, just let me get some paper and quills first. I need them to make notes.”

“Of course,” sighed Spike. “So, do you know how this thing actually works?”

“Ehh…”

"Oh, don't worry, I got it covered," Sunset assured her.

“Finally!!” Discord shouted, turning his cloud into a flying toast (with extra cheese). "But first-," a snap of his paw and five other figures appeared in the room, all of them falling. Discord caught Celestia before she hit the floor, while a startled Luna somehow managed to land gracefully. Everpony else crashed to the floor.

Yes, Trixie, Shining Armor and Cadence suddenly got very intimate with the floor.

"Ugh, what the hay happened?" Candence asked, rubbing her head.

"Only the best thing ever!" Discord replied, smirking. “Nice view, by the way.”

Cadence blushed and jumped back on her hooves. Shining growled.

“Stop starring on the flank of my wife! What is this about anyway? I swear, if this one of your so-called jokes again…”

"Shining Armor, please calm down. But he has a point Discord, what is the meaning of this?" Celestia asked firmly.

“The Great and Hurt Trixie wants to know as well,” Trixie (duh) exclaimed. “Also, Starlight, please stop staring at MY flank and help Trixie up.”

“Same here.” said Luna.

Discord simply pointed to Twilight. With all heads turned to her she chuckled nervously for a moment before beginning to explain.

“Interesting,” Luna mused. “Artefacts from a different realm, which mysteriously appeared in your castle? This entire room? Could it be yet another present from the Tree of Harmony?”

“Why would the Tree give us something that contains fighting, and possibly violence? That doesn’t seem to be very…well, harmonic,” Cadence argued.

“Maybe, but sometimes you have to fight for peace and harmony," Shining responded. "Maybe it wants us to learn something for future conflicts?”

“Wisely said Shining Armour. But whatever the case, we will never find out by just standing around arguing. There is only one thing we can do to get answers” Celestia summarized.

The rest of the group agreed, except for Discord who was starting to get bored with the sudden lack of havoc. "Are you done playing philosopher yet? Good, now let's get started!"

"What about you, Princesses? Don't you have things to get done?" Rarity asked.

"Nothing pressing, and after dealing with the court all day, I personally could use a break," Celestia replied.

"Agreed," both Luna and Cadence added.

“Trixie was traveling to Manehattan for her next show, but if anypony promise to bring her there in time, Trixie will gladly enlighten everpony with her presence.”

"I'll get the snacks!" Pinkie declared, ignoring Trixie, before zipping away, leaving a slowly disappearing afterimage of herself.

"And I've already set up the rest! You're all very welcome," Sunset said with a smirk, the DVD Player plugged into an outlet on the wall.

"Well, I guess there's just one thing left to do but sit and watch," Spike said.

Pinkie arrived a moment later, balancing a platter with some cupcakes, popcorn and potato chips on her head.

“And I have everything right here,” Pinkie yelled, placing it on the table before taking a seat and grabbing a few cupcakes.

“Good. Now, let's start this thing. I wanna see what this thing is all about,” Rainbow cheered as she got comfortable on her personal cloud couch.

“Might as well,” Twilight sighed as she used the remote to start the first episode.

...
...
...

“Discord, I'm grateful that you catched me. Really, I'am. But you can let me down now.”