This story is a sequel to Accelerando
The ponies calling themselves the Bearers of the Elements of Harmony (along with the lowly Vinyl Scratch and Spike the Dragon) awaken from their long artificial dream. In truth, they are the most powerful ponies in the world of the far future. In this seemingly perfect world, the only problems plaguing ponykind are in their dreams, and that makes The Mistress of Dreams the de facto ruler of Equestria.
But all is not rosy in Ponyopolis, and the only way out of this growing nightmare is by sacrificing one of their own...
Chapters (11)
It seems the Dragon Emperor has an impressive sense of fashion, since he can change his colour seemingly at will
...I'm wondering if the Elements even ever SAW the Dragon Emperor in person before?? Would they be able to recognize him if their dream didn't tell them that was him?
It's interesting that Twilight only subconsciously remembers Rarity, I wonder if its something she's doing herself in her own dream? Since the spell seem to work under the concept of nesting dolls I'm guessing all the previous ones were inside Rarity's, which is finally inside Fluttershy's?
4220596
No pony has seen the dragon Vasilyevich since the events that made him emperor. What little that the Princesses and the Bearers know about him was conveyed to Vinyl by Waking Terror in Chapter V4 of "[Redacted]".
I will not comment about the rest.
Hoo boy, it looks like it's the 'you've woken up, the dream's over now' dream. That's a nasty one.
How do we know that? She hasn't introduced herself as 'Florlet' yet.
4225407
Yes, well as you might have observed had I been posting these stories on any reasonable kind of schedule, each dream is narrated by the dreamer in the third person. Rarity is narrating this one, and she knows that she's playing Florlet, so she is kindly informing you of that fact. (Also because this story is quickly going to be complicated by everypony getting a second name, and I'm trying to make it as easy on you as possible to learn them all by spreading out the introduction of these names as gradually as possible.)
That's why all the color-coding in the story is important, as it indicates thoughts and actions that the dreamer is somehow unaware of.
4225427
Ah, right. Yeah, I had forgotten about that bit.
Hah! RD president of the airlines? That's funny to me for some reason.
I am so confused.
Which reality is real!?!
Hmm... is Rarity aware that she's dreaming, or s her dream that she is trapped in a dream?! Or is she basically trying to save the world from dragon revolution?
LAYERS! LAYERS!
4236607 The one in your head.
Dream Spike is still there so they're still in the dream, no question there.
4236607
Yes.
This is my least-favorite chapter, by the way. The rule of "Show, Don't Tell" is roughly hurled through a plate glass window. Oh well.
By way of compensation, I'll tell you that the next chapter is the best one in the story, in my opinion.
That certainly explains...thing... though not really?
So typical Pinkie I guess...
4251440 As far as defenestration of rules go, this wasn't a bad effort.
Nooooooo!
Equestrian Airlines, Speed Above Everything.
Huh, well that explained pretty much everything and nothing about Pinkie.
Hmm... Accelerando was better, but this is still pretty cool. This series is quite nice, and I'm still following it after all this time.
4255888
I like to challenge myself with different styles for this series, in a vain attempt to emulate what I actually think each pony's dreams would be like.
And I am gratified and amused that you liked "Accelerando" better, since I consider myself awful at writing Rainbow Dash, and because some of the others commenting on that work complimented me by telling me I must have been deliberately writing bad fanfiction to emulate Rainbow's outlook on life!
Welcome back, AJ.
LIK IF U CRI EVRYTIM!
4256437
Accelerando was absolutely relentless about color. It was never possible to forget that it was Rainbow Dash's dream when Dash herself was narrating. There were reminders even when she wasn't, such as the town still being full of pianos (chances to show off) when Rainbow Dash had her attention elsewhere. After all, Rainbow Dash doesn't have to think about it to know that Ponyville is full of chances to show off. It was cartoonish, and occasionally garish. It didn't read like bad fanfic, but it did read like a good author pretending to suck, and it was full of deliciously displayed emotion. Accelerando is a story written in Equestrian colors.
The Mistress of Dreams is dry. It feels artificial and lifeless. I'd be complaining about it and not enjoying it much, but not only does this fit the sci-fi setting of the dream, Rarity is acting a brittle role. Rainbow Dash was living the story to the hilt with no idea that it was anything but a normal dream. Rarity is distinctly more aware than past dreamers, and for all that she put in little touches favoring the heroes, she is not the only one manipulating this dream. The other participant doesn't understand the color palette with which Equestria is painted.
Saying Accelerando was better is no insult to this. I feel like this story is what it needs to be, or at least that it is something very fitting to the characters and the overarching plot. Whether the final confrontation occurs in this story or in a sequel, it is being set up very well.
4264915
Oooh! That was really incisive commentary. And a good deal better than I was even intending. Hooray for unintended consequences!
Poor Applejack
I guess this makes up for her lack of a dream story of her own.
Dream manipulation in a dream within a dream... is Rarity purposedly manipulating the dream to learn how dream manipulation work to better defend against the Dragon Emperor's mental assaults??
Rarity is playing a dangerous game, me-thinks, but let's see if it leads to victory over the Dragon Emperor.
4264915 The narrated parts do make it feel like the world is a dark and dreary dystopia where the dragons are secretly in charge.
I have to say, I'm not really feeling Rarity's voice in this one. With the others, it would usually be clear pretty quickly that it was being narrated by Rainbow Dash or whoever, but I'm not picking up on that here. Although maybe that's just because this is being consciously controlled by Rarity instead of ripped from her subconscious. And/or it looks like someone else is in control as well?
We have always been at war with Eastasia
Rarity must read some pretty hardcore dystopia stories...
Worst fine print ever.
latter; Pinkamena (in the next sentence as well)
Pixie cut Fluttershy, eh? Hmn.
Dang, Twilight sure doesn't do anything by halves.
Hah! I mean, hah?
4282340
Fixed, and fixed.
I get that nothing happened to Pinkie Pie which would physically harm her, and so she can't be endangered by the Dragon Emperor's spell in that way, but how can they be confident Rarity is unharmed? The effect of Vinyl's spell was pretty vague, and every indication we've had is that the Dragon Emperor's dream trap can't be exited that easily.
DAYMN Twilight... you're as good as the Doctor when it comes to toppling governments
That went rather quick
4293337
You know, that seems to be something I get a lot. Maybe it's because I've read too many stories where the endings went on forever. Or because I'm more a fan of the journey than the destination.
Especially with this series of fanfics. This series is all about short-circuiting the endings to get on to the next dream, and the next one.
Or maybe I just watched too much Monty Python as a kid...
[youtube=FGK8IC-bGnU]
You have all of my respect for mentioning John Cage's masterpiece.
4308121
I'm going to have to correct you there. You can't really say that 4'33" is his piece at all. After all, we the audience are the true composers of that work.
4308918 Well, that's true, but you still get props for mentioning it all the same.
The hell?
Huh, well here's hoping that Rarity didn't just sacrifice her life to let them move on. That's taking generosity a little bit far, darling.
4236705 Thank goodness for
, otherwise, I would explode of confusion.
4292183 Perhaps she's just not in the dreams, but not awake? Sleeping without dreaming, and going to wake up with the rest of them, when everyone finishes leaving, and so it couldn't be performed in a normal Dream Trap because it would just leave them sleeping dreamlessly forever? Maybe it was specifically that dream that it could work in, or something. I dunno. Rarity has to be okay, right? RIGHT?!
Well... that was a trip.
So... was that the real Dragon Emperor who attacked them in the beginning? How did that send them into Rarity's dream? What was the deal with everypony forgetting Rarity for a while, because that went nowhere...
7403038
OK, I had to re-read a bunch of my stuff in order to remember what I was thinking back in 2014, but here goes:
If you remember back in "Accelerando", Chapter 5, the narrator Rainbow Dash wrote Rarity so far out of character that she dropped out of the story. What happened was that she became a lucid dreamer--she had the last book not returned to Twilight's library, and that book was revealed to be The Complete Dream Book, implying that she's got some experience with lucid dreaming.
With the power to affect the dreamscape on the same level as the Dragon Emperor, she removed all traces of herself from Rainbow Dash's dream in the hope that this would leave her undetected by the Dragon Emperor for as long as possible. She was able to look around and learn a good deal of what the Emperor was up to, before she was caught, and her dream powers stripped from her. The Emperor spun the word of "The Mistress of Dreams" largely from Rarity's unconscious, leaving her a limited role in the center of his trap.
The attack at the beginning was the beginning of Rarity's dream, but controlled by the Emperor. He lost on purpose, with the intended result of making the other ponies think they had broken free of his dream traps, and that they actually were the characters he assigned to them. The deception didn't have to be perfect--just good enough to ensnare at least one of them for 24 hours, at which time they would be slaughtered by the dragon rebellion that Rosig the Griffon would have unleashed instead of Twilight, with Vinyl Scratch in particular picked out to kill Rarity. Rarity managed to subvert all of this except for her own death, putting in details like the training room that would better prepare the others for the final confrontation at the end of Fluttershy's dream.
Now since this series is almost certainly never going to be finished, I'll say that by dispatching Rarity with a song, Vinyl was able to save her, so that she woke up back in Canterlot. But that also meant that a pony with a pretty strong ability to manipulate dreams was now out of the battle. And of course Pinkie Pie, their absolute best dream warrior, was also incapacitated. So the Emperor didn't entirely fail this time.
Wait, what? What was Rainbow right about?
8081473
From Chapter 5: Applejack was sucked into the fantasy of being Applesauce because Applesauce still had her parents, plus a loving husband and two children. Rainbow Dash wanted to break her of this fantasy immediately, but Pinkie said that "Applesauce" had the right to live her fantasy, if only for one night.
waver
A waiver is a legal thingy.
Ah, one of those short-sightednesses of SF. Hee.
correction
whose
Mmm. Dark City.
8081473
"AJ would be happier…" or so.
Somewhere, a store clerk hits a homerun with a stick of dynamite.
single quotes might have been better for names (or going to the hilt and using the New Names), but I suppose it's too late.
delete one a
disperse
disburse would involve a payment
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