Interlude
The Conversion Bureau:
Inversion
Interlude
Throwing down his datapad, Jim Trenton sighed, and gathered up his coat. He needed something to drink and he needed it now, by God.
He found his way to a small tavern in Ponyville after hailing a carriage taxi. Since the arrival of humanity into Equestria and the merging of worlds, life had been somewhat outside the norm for him. But then again he was technically on another world— for however long that was going to remain true— where the dominant species were pastel colored ponies of all things. Outside the norm had practically become the norm for him in the last two years or so. He settled himself into one of the seats. Luckily the tavern had been willing to renovate in order to accommodate their bipedal neighbors long ago thanks to the fact that Minotaurs also existed in this world so it wasn't any real hassle.
"Scotch on the rocks." Jim said to a waitress who came up to him. "Hell, make it a double."
"Bad day, Jim?"
Jim turned to see Mayor Mare approaching, and gave a helpless half shrug.
"Same shit different day, Mayor." he said as he made room for her. He liked the mayor of Ponyville. She had been somewhat unsettled at her first few interactions with humankind, but eventually warmed up to them. "And I'm sorry to say things aren't getting any better."
Mayor Mare nodded as she took a seat next to him just as his order arrived. If he was drinking Scotch, then she felt confident in guessing that there was probably more to his statement he wasn't saying. Not yet at any rate.
"So, I hear Pinkie Pie converted about two weeks ago." Jim said. "Can't imagine that went over as good as she might have wanted."
"Her friends supported her through her orientation and were there for her when she came out as a human. Princess Twilight was...less than enthusiastic about the entire thing, mind you, but she kept a brave face for Pinkie." the mayor replied, ordering herself a small salt lick. "Research into the Field not going well I assume?"
"Understatement of the year, Mayor." Jim replied, taking a long drag off his drink. "I might as well be trying to kill Godzilla with a pea shooter for all the progress I'm having on that damn thing."
She winced. She didn't understand the reference entirely, but she got the basic idea behind it.
"Have you tried coordinating your research with Princess Twilight?" she asked.
"I wish. She still refuses to collaborate with us. She just demands any information we have on the matter and works on her own. I dunno what her problem is, tell you the truth. I want to help you guys. We all do. But she just refuses to get the idea into her head that we're not just dragging our heels here. We want to preserve your race as you are as much as you guys do. Why she can't see it I have no clue."
"I think she's just scared, Jim. Remember, she's used to being able to find answers for things like this after consulting just about any and every book she can get her hooves on, and failure isn't exactly something she's entirely taken well." The mayor said, and shuddered as she recalled the Smarty Pants incident. Sometimes she wondered about the sanity of the fourth Alicorn.
"I can't say I blame her for taking this badly. I mean, Unicorns stand the most to lose. Aside from maybe the Alicorns. The Pegasi might lose their wings, but in the long run that's nowhere near the loss the magic users will face." Jim sighed. "And things might be worse than we first thought."
"How so?" The mayor asked, looking concerned. Jim shook his head. And slammed back a hard gulp of his drink before letting his glass slam to the table with a heavy thunk.
"Wish I could tell you, Mayor. Really, I wish I could. But I can't even be sure of what I've learned yet. We're making sure to double check anything we get when it comes to research on the Field because one screw up could result in God only knows what. All I can say is that if what I've discovered is true, then it needs to be kept quiet for now. Don't need the populace to panic." Jim replied. He looked about ready to try to drown himself in the ice in his glass, all truth be told, and that worried the mayor more than whatever unrevealed discovery he'd made did. She reached out and patted him on the back gently. For all that humans could do, Ponies still had amazing hoof strength and could do damage to humans accidentally if they didn't watch how much force they put into any contact with them.
"I'm sure it will work out, Jim. Or at the very least, I have every confidence that whatever the problem is, you and your people will do your utmost to either minimize it or solve it altogether."
"I hope so, Mayor. I really do. Because if this is accurate, I have no idea how it will affect your society." He sighed and shook his head, a doubting look on his features. "I'm not even sure how we'd attack this problem if it turns out my discovery is a legitimate issue. I'm hoping that I'm wrong. But I'm having the computers run through another set of simulations and all just in case. But the chances of solving this if its real aren't good."
"I wish I could help, but I don't even know what the issue is. Maybe you'd feel comfortable talking to one of the Princesses?"
If anything, Jim actually looked worse at that suggestion, slamming back another large gulp of his scotch.
"I'm going to have to by tomorrow, I think."
The four alicorns arrived at Trenton's lab late in the afternoon the next day, and Trenton looked as bad as he had in the bar. Worse, actually, as he was nursing what felt like the mother of all migraines. But he gave a warm, if pained, smile, and shook hands....or hooves in this case...with the four princesses.
"Dr. Trenton. A pleasure." Cadance said with a smile. Though she then frowned. "You don't look well."
"Blame it on the hangover. I went on a small bender last night."
"Bad news I take it?" Celestia asked even as she stepped forward and applied as much magic as she could to Jim to help him with the effects of his binge drinking. He gave her a grateful smile and then moved to his workstation, picking up a large sheaf of papers and handing them to Celestia, who took them in her magical grip as she and Luna and Cadance looked them over. Twilight stood a bit off to the side.
"Something wrong, Twilight? Usually you're the first person to want to look at my work notes." Jim asked.
"Pony."
"What?"
"Pony, not person." Twilight said flatly. "I'm not a person, and I really wish you wouldn't call me that."
Jim sighed. This was a semi-regular thing with her, and he mentally chided himself for not seeing that coming. "That doesn't answer my question though."
"I want to hear whatever this is from you. Not your notes. I'll see them soon enough." Twilight said, ruffling her wings while shifting her weight from one side to another in agitation.
"This is about Pinkie converting isn't it?" Cadance said, looking over at Twilight, leaving the other two Alicorns to look over Jim's notes. The looks on their faces told him they were taking it as bad as he was. Cadance made her way to Twilight and gave her a comforting nuzzle. or tried to. Her sister-in-law seemed unwilling to be mollified by the affection.
"It's their fault." Twilight said after a few moments. "If they hadn't created that conversion serum, ponies would still be ponies, and Pinkie wouldn't be some caricature of herself instead of the mare everypony loved."
"If we hadn't created the serum, you entire species would be headed for extinction, Twilight."
"At least we'd be dying as ourselves! Bad enough that our worlds are merging, but we're the ones facing extinction, whether by the Field or your serum. How is that fair? You don't have to make the kind of sacrifice we are, and you still haven't found a way to make it so that we don't have to convert to survive the Field. I don't think you're even trying!" Twilight felt bad for the look of hurt on Jim's face, but after keeping this in for so long, she couldn't stop herself, despite the appalled looks on the faces of her fellow Alicorns. "When I was changed into an Alicorn, it took me some getting used to, but at least it wasn't that big a change. I'm still a pony, after all. And I never planned to be anything else. I don't want our species to go extinct, and I want to stay an Alicorn. It means some big changes, particularly in lifespan, but at least it meant I'd still be me!"
Jim sighed and shook his head as he plopped into his chair heavily. "Like the old saying goes Twilight, 'Be careful what you wish for. You might just get it.' "
Twilight was about to retort when his actual statement processed in her head. She lilted her head in confusion.
"I don't understand."
Turning to his computer terminal, he generated a projection on the screen in the wall. "Take a look." He said. The screen showed a blood sample, with a caption stating that it belonged to a pony called Summer Breeze. The image was taken from an actual blood sample on Jim's workspace. He picked up a small liquid dropper. "That image is a normal pony blood sample." He typed in a few commands, and the magnification became such that they could now see the physical structure of the sample, as the blood vessels of an Equestrian pony were very different from that of a human's in look and genetic construction. "Watch what happens when I add the serum to it." Adding in a few small drops of the serum caused an almost immediate reaction. because it wasn't an actual pony, the process took only a few seconds, but the computer was able to record those changes and play them back in super-slow-motion.
"I'm not sure I understand, Doctor." Luna said, cocking her eyebrow. "You've shown us a demonstration of this before. It was how you were able to show us how the process of Conversion would work to begin with. Why is this an issue now? Has some unknown side effect emerged that's caused an issue? Are our subjects safe?"
"The ponies who've taken the serum are fine, Princess Luna." Jim said, holding up a hand to calm the Alicorn. "The problem isn't with them per se. It's with you four. Or rather the problem affects you four. My notes show that the greater the magical power concentrated in a single place, the more rapidly the field seems to devour it. That's bad enough, but I'm afraid there's a bigger issue at stake."
Turning to the computer again, he typed up another few commands. Four sets of blood samples came up, with captions below each sample that indicated them to have come from the Alicorns themselves. Jim picked up another dropper, this one with four different ends, and exposed each blood sample to some of the serum. The effect was immediate and frightening, as each blood sample reacted violently to the exposure, to the point that the petri dishes shattered as their blood samples evaporated. The four Alicorns had stepped back several paces when the reaction to the serum had started.
"What does this mean?" Cadance said, eyes having shrunken to pinpricks in fear. "A-are we somehow incapable of being converted?"
"Sadly, yes. And because the Field reacts more quickly to higher concentrations of magic....."
"We would die more gruesomely and quickly than those of our subjects who had been first caught by the field in the Crystal empire." Celestia finished for Jim, and shuddered. "Is there any means to avoid this?" Jim gave the princess a sad look and a helpless shrug.
"I'm working on it. But as it stands right now, unless we find some way to make the serum work for you....we may have to either send you off planet, or leave Equestria without its rulers."
Also LikedSimilarAuthor
- Khenlos · 18k words · 174 22 · 9.4k views
- CV12Hornet · 5.7k words · 168 13 · 7k views
- OnTheWay · 18k words · 198 7 · 6.1k views
- Ezn · 7.1k words · 248 14 · 12k views
- Warwolf · 25k words · 123 32 · 7.1k views
- Silverdogz117 · 6.8k words · 375 29 · 8.6k views
- Warwolf · 12k words · 34 8 · 2.1k views
- mcb893 · 6.9k words · 99 25 · 4.8k views
Stats
Page generated in 0.043 seconds
Total duration
809 users online
689,874 hits today, 2,724,632 yesterday
FIMFiction
My Little Pony: Friendship is Magic Fanfiction
Designed and coded by knighty & Xaquseg - © 2011-2024
Follow & Support Us
Support us
SubStar
Chat!
Discord
Follow us
Twitter
MLP: Friendship is Magic® - © 2024 Hasbro Inc.®
Fimfiction is in no way affiliated with or endorsed by Hasbro Inc.®
Step 1: fund a lunar colony.
Step 2: find a way to convert CO2 into O2 with magic.
Step 3: ???
Step 4: Survive
2857095
The loss of a world, its species and cultures is always tragic. The problem with CB stories is the blatant misanthropism from the ponies and the emo human protagonists.
And now, my questions:
-Regarding human Pinkie behaviour: has the serum some effect over the psyche of the ponies?
-Could the new magic be adapted by humans to reproduce unicorn´ spells (metamagic)?
3079120
1. No, the serum does not affect the minds of the ponies.
2. Magic stops being magic on the human side as the Field converts it all into a clean, near-perpetual energy form that powers just about every kind of device you can think of.
3079197
I like how your not just doing a switching of species but are trying to create a different type of conversion bureau. And really the only ways we know how to actually reprogram someones mind are long and costly. I'm glad you didn't just say "yes the totally non-magical scientific serum that has already converted a equine into a human also has mind-bending properties".
I do hope you explore the space option. I know a few people have always thought that with ponykind's magic they should have reached the stars at some point.
3079382
You'll just have to wait and see what happens.
For all we know, the Fanatical ponies are trying to make a variant of the potion that can turn a convertee back into A pony
3079769
Oh trust me, the PEF are much crazier than you know.
Sadly, none of my fics have their own TV Tropes page yet. I feel so unloved!
3079769
I imagine that it wouldn't just be the fanatics working on such a thing, if/when a way to deal with the whole "ponies die horribly when exposed to the Field" thing is discovered. The majority of the convertees are converting to save their lives, and if they could survive as a pony they totally would take that option.
Hopefully Twilight will be more willing to work directly with humans on finding a solution in the near future, and together a proper solution can be found (because really, in both this fic and the traditional TCB Apocalypse fics conversion is a pretty shitty solution).
Oh Twilight, you so speicest, and it's turning out for the worst for the Alicorns. It's been shown in the comic that ponies can live on the moon, if you know, you read that sort of thing.
If not though, then that's going to be bad, very, very bad.
3080561
I have heard of that in the comics, and I'm not sure how canonical it is to the actual show as it is right now, so I'm on the fence about using anything from the comics.
Ponies aren't people?
I'm kind of irked that Twilight finds the word 'person' irksome. That's dumb: person/people refers to an intellectual being or a group of them. Person and pony are interchangeable.
3082215
Maybe so, but she's taking the whole conversion thing a lot harder than most, and 'person' just sounds too human for her right now. Remember, Pinkie just converted and while that hasn't been shown to have any negative effects on the EoH yet, her friend just made one hell of a change in her life that Twilight is having a hard time accepting even though it was necessary for her survival at this point. Twilight isn't racist or speciest, at least not in the way some may be thinking. This is simply a stressful time and she's not coping well. We have seen times when Twilight does tend to stress out during certain times of change. Look at the first episode of the Canterlot Wedding. In the first few minutes before encountering Shining Armor again after who knows how long, she is very stressed out and not taking the matter very well, because she was out of the loop and had no idea her brother was even seeing anyone. Granted she was later happy about the marriage when she learned who the bride would be, but prior to that she was none to happy. She even makes a comment to Shining about being upset he was marrying someone she didn't know. Which I found an odd comment to say the least.
This also happens at other times as well. So yeah, Twilight has the occasional problem adapting to certain situations at first. This is one of them.
3081248
Well, they also have a reality warping God known as Discord as well. Couldn't he provide some alternative?
It was shown that he chould change a ponies speices on a whim if he wanted.
3085195
Discord will be addressed eventually.
And now I get the feeling that Twilight wound up avoiding Pinkie to the point where Pinkie really feels bad about everything. Ah well, I suspect that one of their friends will confront Twilight on the issue. I suspect it'll either be Fluttershy or Rainbow Dash.
There's a part of me where it thinks Twilight will take the news about Alicorns not being able to be saved by the serum in a very wrong manner, like she'll start to really hate humans and/or start to have a maniac conspiracy mental episode where she claims that all of Ponykind's ills and disasters were caused by humans. especially the ones where it would be impossible in every way for humans to cause.
But that'd be bordering on a dark tag or something.
3087611
What kind of cameos?
3088501
Whatever ones that don't feel too out of place for the story. I guess use holograms of few public domain characters to argue certain points or have them simply be inspiration for some of the characters to move the plot along if you get stuck or something.
3090826
Hmm. Interesting idea. I might just swipe it.
3090934
If you do use it, then I'm happy I helped a little bit.
3091410
We'll have to see. It may just come up.
Possibly reverse-engineer the false "Magic" into something ponies can use?
3146829
There is no "false" magic here. The magic that permeates Equestria as Thaumic Radiation, which the ponies are dependent upon to exist, becomes an entirely different type of energy source when the Field encounters it.
3087623
In other words, ironically once again, an inversion of the standard Conversion verse where writers turn the collusion into a purposeful happening and evil plan by Celestia. Very ironic indeed. Would be interesting to see ponies have paranoid fantasies that parallel the 'ponies are out to destroy humanity' mentality that appears as empirical fact in standard Conversion stories.
3163467
I suggest you re-read this story, Alex. Because you seem to be missing a number of key bits of info in what's been presented so far. Yes, it is exactly what it says on the tin in that Earth is subsuming Equestria, but unlike standard TCB fics, the serum does not affect one's mind, and there is no one enslaving an entire race for whatever reason, nor is this being done out of any sense of malice or fear. The humans in this story are genuinely hopeful of finding a way for ponykind to safely survive the Field as ponies, but in the meantime, are providing this as a means of survival. (Something the ponies just flat out never do in TCB fics. Hell, they don't even try to make humans immune to the barrier, or in many cases, the barrier is there for the sole purpose of forcing Conversion.)
In other words, this, in my opinion, is what the Conversion Bureau should have been from the start, without the misanthropy that pervaded the original (As Blaze himself admitted to no less, regardless of whether or not it was unintended.) and most others that followed it.
Great story!
3355857
Twilight is claiming the 'normal' TCB concept is a hypothetical. What's happening in this story is real though.
If Earth became a massive superplanet, we would all die via squishing thanks to the sudden, immense increase in gravity. It would be like dropping a human into Jupiter.
Your explanation for why the princesses can't be converted makes no sense. What would the Field have to do with the potion? Nothing. A better excuse would be to say that the Alicorns' genetics are so convoluted (for obvious reasons, just look at them) that the potion would disfigure them instead of truly transforming them.
This is a great fic, though! Keep it coming pleeease!!!
If Ponies become converted into Humans, then there would be a new country!
And also if the princesses die then they could just select a new ruler... possibly as a republic!
3771338
Uh...Thanks. I think? I dunno if that's supposed to be a good thing or not.
3771466
Sooo....that's a good thing, right?
3771497
And I was asking what your preference was.
3773008
*trifles like a trifler! Trifle trifle trifle!*
Yeah, I have no sense of self preservation.
Take that, Chatoyence!
3456681
The Field doesn't have anything to do with the potion. They were discussing the fact that unless a way can be found to either convert the alicorns or get them safely off planet, the Field will kill them in gruesome fashion.
Now this is a bureau story I can get behind, the dilemma is one I can stand on both sides for and the drama from this is something that grips me, but without all the hate and anger I feel when I read a normal conversion story. There is no villains or thing in the serum that make the ponies mindless automatons, like it does for humans in the normal one, and all the character a, in my opinion, done right.
So far this is my favorite Bureau story cause it bashes neither the ponies or humanity and sets them both up against a very serious problem. I look forward to its progression.
4049501
I'll see what I can do to update soon. No promises though. I do have a number of stories after all, including one new one I'm working on.
For some reason, I keep getting the image of Diamond Tiara begging Twilight to find a way to save Ponykind, but for several reasons.
1.) In Diamond Tiara's eyes, as a pony, she is the daughter of someone rich and famous. As a human, she's just another face in the crowd.
2.) It's easy to see that everything is really bothering Twilight, so having Twilight overwork herself and snapping at everyone probably would be great amusement in Diamond Tiara's eyes.
3.) Diamond Tiara might have a really bit problem with the idea of Cutie mark loss. Humans have no cutie marks. They might have Tattoos, but they are not the same thing. No pony can have the same cutie mark as another pony, but any human can have a tattoo that another human has.
4078155
Hmm. I tend to agree on points 1 and 3 as possibilities. But I don't see her being quite so foolish as to try to drive one of the princesses up the wall, since if she ever snapped, Twilight might just turn her frustrations on Diamond.
But altogether, I may have to consider this as a possible plot point. Good eye, dude.
4078233
Thanks.
Another thing that came to mind is that Twilight goes to speak with Filthy Rich, either to help give Diamond Tiara hope or to get his help somehow, but Twilight discovers that he and a few other ponies are in talks with some humans about preserving Pony arts, by scanning books, and taking pictures of statues and some of the more artistic structures and replicating them via 3D printers. Twilight probably would see it as Filthy Rich selling out Ponykind just to make a few dollars, instead of what it really is, trying to preserve the arts and letting the future know that it once existed by any means.
4136420
....
Just so you know...
I am totally swiping this idea and pretending I came up with it.
Seriously though, this is a great idea, one I hadn't even considered. I may use some variation of it.
4409480
I'm always glad to help.
My god this story is amazing. I usually don't care for TBC it makes me hate the ponies usually and I hate hating ponies. On. A side note I imagine a human rainbow dash joining the air force because why not
5108997
Heh. That assumes she converts. But that could be an interesting idea.
Awesome story. Keep up the good work!
Any chance you're still continuing this story? I'd love to see more of it. Especially one that's more positive than the other CB stories I've seen.
5551018
Oh yes. The story is on-going unless you see anything from me saying otherwise. Basically, if it doesn't say on-hiatus or cancelled, assume it's still going.
One thought came to me a few days ago.
What if this version of Twilight read Childhood's End by Arthur C. Clarke?
I'd imagine she would probably get even more paranoid. Maybe even think that the humans are trying to take everything good about the ponies and adding it to themselves, even though there is no proof or that.
5560010
I've never even heard of that book before. I'll look into it. Could be interesting.