Frozen in Time
Apr. 2nd, 2015 11:39 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
twilightponyI've been trying to puzzle out the nature of the Canterlot High world where Sunset Shimmer is staying. With the emergence of the Sirens there, I'm thinking that this Canterlot High universe was created by Starswirl the Bearded.
Instead of building a bridge to an existing Alt-universe, I think he accidentally created a new, flawed Alt-Equestria. It is populated by beings that mirror the hearts and minds of existing Equestria residents, but they manifest as totally alien, flat-faced, bi-pedal and multiple-fingered furless beings.
Since there is no magic there, he used it to gently dispose of problem creatures, namely, a trio of Sirens bent on enslaving all of Equestria. Thing is, this Alt-Equestria is sustained by the Equestria it mirrors. At a certain age, the hearts and minds of new residents of Equestria in close proximity of Starswirl's mirror is detected by Starswirl's spell, which then causes a Canterlot High version of them to pop into existence.
They spend their lives as teenagers enrolled in endless classes from which they never graduate. Really old ponies switch to a profession. As their Equestria counterparts die, they vanish.
The three Sirens are probably the only three that got dumped into Starswirl's oubliette. Since they had no magical bridge of their own back to Equestria, they were caught in the static time loop of Starswirl's closed universe.
In a closed universe, time does not just move forward, it moves in reverse as well. The context and ponies reflected from Equestria would change but no one notices, not even the three sirens. In this world all is illusion and memory is a flash in the pan that keeps getting rewritten. It is so like the passage in Alice in Wanderland, where she meets the Red Queen, variable time running but remaining in a static frame.
The Sirens were imported by Starswirl the Bearded and their magic was imported along with them via the gemstone each wears as a choker. This is quite similar to Sunset Shimmer importing magic via the Element of Magic crown. It still looks like magic is alien to the Canterlot High world but that magical artifacts remain magical when imported and that they leave a magical impression on Canterlot High beings they have affected. The Sirens may still be dangerous.
So, how does this mirrorverse work? Why haven't the Sirens experienced over a thousand years of exile there? Since this universe was created by Starswirl, it isn't expanding and driving time forward via increasing entropy. Time there usually swings back and forth. But then came Sunset Shimmer and her book. By keeping an open link to Equestria, it is causing the passage of time in the mirrorverse to match that of Equestria and thereby driving it out of its static frame. The question is, did Starswirl set a time limit, say six years to match the high school model? Will this Alt-Equestria and all the entities living there implode into nothing? I think it may be time to try and convince Sunset Shimmer to come home.
It's the ultimate oubliette. It may well be a nearly inescapable oubliette. Without a tether like Sunset Shimmer's book-link to Princess Celestia, not much time passes before time reverses. The gateway opens every thirty moons in Equestria. At the Canterlot High end, prior to Sunset Shimmer, time may well have been restricted to less than 30 moons. The gate would open, but the pattern would depend on how time passes in Canterlot High.
If time lasted only a day, then it would seem that the gateway was open everyday... or never. A pony trapped at Canterlot High wouldn't remember the days the gateway was closed. A short passage of time also reduces the amount of time a trapped pony can search for the gateway, assuming they didn't note where they came in. Or that the gateway at the Canterlot High end doesn't move!
Worse yet, if a pony came through the gateway with the plan to stay longer than the time span of the Canterlot High Universe, they might never leave because they'd never reach that goal! But now, thanks to Sunset Shimmer's tether to Equestria, time is moving as it would in an open universe (or a very big closed one).
I wonder, are there now trapped ponies rapping on the gateway back every once in a while? I half expect Starswirl the Bearded to walk out of that mirror one of these days.
Instead of building a bridge to an existing Alt-universe, I think he accidentally created a new, flawed Alt-Equestria. It is populated by beings that mirror the hearts and minds of existing Equestria residents, but they manifest as totally alien, flat-faced, bi-pedal and multiple-fingered furless beings.
Since there is no magic there, he used it to gently dispose of problem creatures, namely, a trio of Sirens bent on enslaving all of Equestria. Thing is, this Alt-Equestria is sustained by the Equestria it mirrors. At a certain age, the hearts and minds of new residents of Equestria in close proximity of Starswirl's mirror is detected by Starswirl's spell, which then causes a Canterlot High version of them to pop into existence.
They spend their lives as teenagers enrolled in endless classes from which they never graduate. Really old ponies switch to a profession. As their Equestria counterparts die, they vanish.
The three Sirens are probably the only three that got dumped into Starswirl's oubliette. Since they had no magical bridge of their own back to Equestria, they were caught in the static time loop of Starswirl's closed universe.
In a closed universe, time does not just move forward, it moves in reverse as well. The context and ponies reflected from Equestria would change but no one notices, not even the three sirens. In this world all is illusion and memory is a flash in the pan that keeps getting rewritten. It is so like the passage in Alice in Wanderland, where she meets the Red Queen, variable time running but remaining in a static frame.
The Sirens were imported by Starswirl the Bearded and their magic was imported along with them via the gemstone each wears as a choker. This is quite similar to Sunset Shimmer importing magic via the Element of Magic crown. It still looks like magic is alien to the Canterlot High world but that magical artifacts remain magical when imported and that they leave a magical impression on Canterlot High beings they have affected. The Sirens may still be dangerous.
So, how does this mirrorverse work? Why haven't the Sirens experienced over a thousand years of exile there? Since this universe was created by Starswirl, it isn't expanding and driving time forward via increasing entropy. Time there usually swings back and forth. But then came Sunset Shimmer and her book. By keeping an open link to Equestria, it is causing the passage of time in the mirrorverse to match that of Equestria and thereby driving it out of its static frame. The question is, did Starswirl set a time limit, say six years to match the high school model? Will this Alt-Equestria and all the entities living there implode into nothing? I think it may be time to try and convince Sunset Shimmer to come home.
It's the ultimate oubliette. It may well be a nearly inescapable oubliette. Without a tether like Sunset Shimmer's book-link to Princess Celestia, not much time passes before time reverses. The gateway opens every thirty moons in Equestria. At the Canterlot High end, prior to Sunset Shimmer, time may well have been restricted to less than 30 moons. The gate would open, but the pattern would depend on how time passes in Canterlot High.
If time lasted only a day, then it would seem that the gateway was open everyday... or never. A pony trapped at Canterlot High wouldn't remember the days the gateway was closed. A short passage of time also reduces the amount of time a trapped pony can search for the gateway, assuming they didn't note where they came in. Or that the gateway at the Canterlot High end doesn't move!
Worse yet, if a pony came through the gateway with the plan to stay longer than the time span of the Canterlot High Universe, they might never leave because they'd never reach that goal! But now, thanks to Sunset Shimmer's tether to Equestria, time is moving as it would in an open universe (or a very big closed one).
I wonder, are there now trapped ponies rapping on the gateway back every once in a while? I half expect Starswirl the Bearded to walk out of that mirror one of these days.
no subject
Date: 2015-04-03 12:45 am (UTC)It makes sense! If it is connected to Starswirl than I wonder if he may have done that again, and is wondering around another universe he accidentally created!
no subject
Date: 2015-04-03 12:56 am (UTC)Yet another universe! It could... be.
no subject
Date: 2015-04-03 01:02 am (UTC)With Starswirl being as great as he was, it's it a pretty good possibility.
no subject
Date: 2015-04-03 01:49 am (UTC)The big twist was that he was the captain of that submarine, and he's being forced to relive the whole night over and over again as some sort of divine punishment, with his memory resetting each and every time the night restarts.
This might seem irrelevant, but something you said made me think of it:
" A pony trapped at Canterlot High wouldn't remember the days the gateway was closed. A short passage of time also reduces the amount of time a trapped pony can search for the gateway, assuming they didn't note where they came in...
...Worse yet, if a pony came through the gateway with the plan to stay longer than the time span of the Canterlot High Universe, they might never leave because they'd never reach that goal!"
Does this mean that, if a pony were to go to the Canterlot High world without some sot of tether, they'd be in a situation similar to the submarine captain? Being forced to relive the same thirty moons over and over until the end of that world?
...I feel like I'm overthinking this...
no subject
Date: 2015-04-03 03:25 pm (UTC)There are those who would argue that the reset is harmless in and of itself, and beneficial in a larger context as it prevents the psychological ill effects of long-term confinement by preventing those confined from knowing they've been confined for more than the reset period. There are also those who would argue that every reset is a death, as who the resetee has become vanishes and is replaced by a new past self who will follow a different path.
no subject
Date: 2015-04-03 07:17 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2015-04-03 07:22 pm (UTC)Yes, a pony without a tether would be in a situation similar to your ship's captain. To an outside observer they would be reliving a short time period over and over again, with slight variables. But the untethered pony would only experience the present time period. Every single one of the previous time periods experienced since arriving in the Canterlot High world would have been indelibly erased.
no subject
Date: 2015-04-03 07:31 pm (UTC)If I were to contrast this to the other prisons we ponies have employed, namely, trapped in stone, in the moon, chained in Tartarus... to be trapped in the Canterlot High world but never experiencing it long enough to lose hope of escape may well be the least harsh of Equestria punishments on this order. Naturally, magically shedding a pony of their desire to harm or enslave Equestria is a harmonious solution. But that too is weighing ethics against the greater good; it is also a reset, a death of the past. It is also a rebirth.
no subject
Date: 2015-04-05 10:24 am (UTC)