The tiny cup-shaped sapphire sparkled as the bronze gear, smaller than the smallest coin, hovered in the air above it, supported on a blue cushion of magic force. Gently the force field dimmed and the gear with its tiny glinting teeth descended, axle in precise alignment, until it nested perfectly into place, the point of the axle directly in the center of the sapphire.

Rarity leaned back, released her breath, and ran a damp cloth over her brow. She took a quick sip from a jar of water to refresh her, then leaned over her workbench again. The next piece was the escapement gear, its long spiked teeth making it resemble a crown, or perhaps a row of unicorn horns. She assembled the pieces of the oscillating crystal that would drive it, and lowered the segments one by one into their proper places.

A soft chime, the tone of which she had chosen as least likely to startle her, went off, and Rarity had just time to settle the more delicate elements and be ready to raise her head when her visitor arrived. A gentle deep blue light, the color of the sky, filled the stone hallway and Rarity’s heart nearly paused, but she calmed herself and looked up as the Queen entered the room.

“How is the new design, my loyal watchmaker?” she said. The stars were roiling in her mane.

“It proceeds well, your majesty,” said Rarity, setting down her monocle. “I am approaching the decisive point and should have this device ready within the hour.”

The Queen nodded. “It will be none too soon; we shall have to discuss other strategies for the emplacement. I am sure that you will find a way; you have a most decided knack for the work. I recall that you told me how you loved to make dresses for your toys as a youth; how amusing to conceive of you as the royal clothier.”

“I have always felt the call for elegance and precision, your majesty,” said Rarity with deference. “My gems are not large nor ostentatious, but they smooth and constrain the motions of the clockworks with unmatched accuracy.”

“I have the utmost confidence in you,” said the Queen. “You have never once failed my trust. Please send word when the new piece is in operation, and we shall test whether further devices will be needed this week.”

Rarity nodded and bowed her head as the Queen took her leave. Taking up her monocle once more, she finally placed the escapement and screwed down the bronze framework that would fix it and the other gears into place. She powered up the device, tested it and calibrated it, making adjustments with tiny screwdrivers and more complex tools until the clockwork box ran to her satisfaction. 

She stood, stretched her back and neck, and placed the box within a protective case. She took it up and walked down the long hallway, illuminated by moonlit windows. Passing down deep spiral stairs, she made her way between multiple mage guards and thicker and thicker doors until she reached the lowest chamber.

The hexagonal room with granite block walls was a seeming chaos of clockwork mechanisms suspended from ceiling supports, mounted to walls, and standing on pedestals. Bright magelights were mounted on each wall, but they were all insufficient to drive the darkness out of a spherical patch at the center of the room. 

Rarity inspected the gear chains, unmounted one assembly and replaced it as swiftly as possible with the one she’d just completed. She watched as pendulums swung, escapements ticked, gears whirred, and the darkness remained stable. She let out a breath she’d forgotten she was holding, then began to inspect the multitude of gear chains. They were maintained regularly, but she did it again, adjusting and lubricating each box which had been enchanted to not merely record but [i]enforce[/i] the passage of time.

Rarity’s heart was beating in synchrony with the ticks of the mechanisms nearby her, but their tiny gears drove larger gears towards the center. Reduction gear boxes fed into reduction gear boxes, each box forcing the surrounding magical fields into slower and slower states, forcing time itself to beat slower and slower and enforce the maximum possible restriction on the center of the room, so slow that light itself could not readily escape from it.

What was in the dark patch in the center was too dim to be seen by any but the most sensitive cameras, left to make exposures in the darkness for days, but Rarity had done these experiments. At the center was the unicorn with the seven pointed star for a mark, that Canterlot outsider who’d shown up in Ponyville for the Summer Sun event, now also known as the Sunset Celebration. No one had gotten to know her very well before she challenged the Queen, and lost. She’d been a star pupil once, and was likely an agent of the deposed regime.

It was the bewildered look frozen upon her face that stuck in Rarity’s mind the most.

Rarity took her time and made sure of each link. Something was wearing on the gears, more than would be explained by the stress placed upon them. Time was greatly slowed here, but it was not [i]stopped,[/i] and that was likely to be the next project to which the Queen would set her. The reduction gearing had likely been taken as far as it could; a new approach would be needed.

Perhaps some inspiration would come tonight as she tried to sleep. Rarity completed her rounds, dimmed the magelights, and left the room as the gears whirred quietly at their appointed rounds, much as the stars were turning in their courses overhead in the dark blue sky.