Condemnation

by Peekaboo

A Celebration. But Is It?

Today was a special day. Celestia had been abuzz about it for weeks, and was clearly very proud of her former student. Such was why she first had the idea to commission such a grande statuary in her honor. Luna guessed that Celestia had finally grown tired of her fixation on stained glass for a while.

At Celestia's insistence, Luna had agreed to help her sister in interviewing ponies who were the best of the best in their craft. And once they were selected, those ponies spent many months toiling under Celestia's instructions, so that it may be perfect. Luna herself also came to check in on the projects grandeur once in a while. But she had not been by in quite some time, so had not yet the pleasure to see it in it's completion.

Now, many months after the project had been started, it was finally the evening that Twilight and her friends had been gathered with many of the 'upper crust' ponies of Canterlot for the unveiling. Luna did her best to put on a sociable face and to appear as overjoyed as her elder sister. Even Cadance and Shining Armor had made the trip down from The Crystal Empire for the event, so it was important to her that the make a good impression on her new family.

The princesses stood side by side as the crowds gathered around them in the courtyard, and Luna couldn't help but notice their buzz of excitement. Celestia had been sure to play up the unveiling to the public, and had seen to it that not only would there be the unveiling of the statue, but an entire after-party in the Canterlot gardens to celebrate it's completion as well as the ponies it had been dedicated to.

"My dear citizens of Canterlot! I thank you all so much for joining us on this special day to celebrate the marking of our first year with Equestria's newest Princess, Twilight Sparkle!" Celestia beamed out over the cheering crowd of ponies before her. Luna snapped back to attention as Celestia spoke. She wanted to remember well this day, knowing that despite the fact that there would be many more like it to come, this was the day that truly marked the rest of Twilight Sparkle's life.

There was a spread out ring of guards that kept the crowd at a reasonable distance from the princesses and the so that they had plenty of room to stand, but not so far that the townsponies wouldn't be able to see the unveiling of the gift to Twilight and the other bearers of the Elements of Harmony.

"Without any further ado, I would like to present Princess Twilight Sparkle as well as her dearest friends: Fluttershy, Rainbow Dash, Applejack, Rarity, Pinkie Pie, and of course, her ever-faithful assistant, Spike the dragon." Celestia smiled, welcoming Twilight to come forward and say a few words. With an extra nod and smile of assurance from Princess Luna and Princess Cadence, Twilight bashfully stepped forward.

"Thank you all so much for this generous gift. I am truly touched at your kindness, and am very excited to see the finished product after the craftsponies of the kingdom worked so hard!" Twilight projected out over the crowd. A roar of cheers and applause rose out from the crowd, causing the fairly introverted Twilight to blush a little.

"Without further delay then, I would like to ask the guards placed beside the statue to now pull the cover aside please, and reveal this wonderful gift beneath!" As she spoke, two pegasus guards flew to each side of the canvas tarp which concealed the statue underneath and pulled.

The crowd oohed and awwed as the tarp slipped from the beautiful statue. It was carved from the highest quality white granite, and was inlaid with gems in their eyes, as well as into the gold plated poitrels that adorned each of their necks, each one signifying their elements. Millions of tiny chiselled decorative scrolling lines embroidered every gold piece and every every hair seemed individually carved. Celestia beamed with pride at the fine craftsmanship of the creation, knowing she had hired the very best she could find in all of western Equestria.

The rest of the ceremony flew by in a blur, despite Luna's best efforts to remain at attention. She knew that the ponies cheered, Celestia and Twilight both spoke again, but Luna wasn't really listening at this point. She was more concerned with the statue below, fixating on each of the finely sculpted faces. Despite every attempt otherwise, she could not shake a sense of sorrow as she gazed upon it. If only they knew...

---

Celestia had planned the luncheon after the ceremony to perfection, it took place nearby, in the royal gardens as to accommodate all the guests. Luna joined them and even enjoyed herself for a while, but as the afternoon wore on, more and more ponies took their leave. When most of the guests had gone, Twilight, Cadance and the others remained in the gardens to visit with one another.

They all told stories and laughed. Celestia even joined in telling jokes, and was overall jovial. How Luna envied it, but her hearts desire to join and laugh and play were set aside as a deep sadness lingered within it. The image of the statue was etched into her mind, and it deeply unsettled her.

"I'm glad you came tonight, Luna." Celestia smiled, stepping away from the circle of others. "It's been a while."

"Indeed it has. I was honored to receive an invitation. It was a lovely ceremony." Luna smiled in return, but it hurt. Most of her smiles these days were false.

"You know you're always welcome here, Luna." Celestia gently bumped her sister playfully. "You don't have to linger elsewhere if you'd rather be here."

"I am aware, and it is certainly tempting, but I am doing research elsewhere at the moment on night-blooming flora that is rather pressing. It is truly fascinating, and I'd hate to leave it just yet." Luna dodged.

"I see..." Celestia's smile faded. "Well the offer stands. Always. And perhaps the writings of your research could go into the new wing of the library. It's construction was just recently completed." the elder Princess tempted, almost desperately trying to connect with her younger sister.

"WOAH! Wait a second!" Princess Twilight chimed in. "Did I just hear you say that you built a new wing to the library?!" Celestia rolled her eyes, but chuckled.

"You've heard correctly, Twilight." Celestia beamed. Luna was grateful for the new distraction. Conversations with her sister had become... sparse in the last year. It had become a struggle of sorts to keep a connection alive between them.

"And you didn't tell me?!" Twilight's jaw dropped. "Oh, you need to show it to me! Is it big? How many new sections have been added? Or how many have been expanded?" Twilight's eyes glittered with excitement. "Can we go see it now? Can we go? Oh please, please, please, please!" she practically danced, much to the amusement of her friends.

"Well..." Celestia considered, shooting a glance to her sister. Luna rolled her eyes and nudged her elder to go. "Alright then, we'll go. But Luna, it'd be nice if you'd stay. I'd love to talk with you more later." Celestia smiled, pleading with her eyes.

"Ah... Well... As you wish, sister. I will stay." Luna agreed, albeit unwillingly.

"Wonderful! I will see you later tonight then." Celestia grinned, and waved slightly before leading on to the library with Twilight, Cadence and her friends in tow. Luna watched, waving until they had left sight. At last, she was alone. When she could no longer hear them laughing down the corridor, Luna spread her wings and silently took flight.

She enjoyed the cool evening breeze in her face for a while, and circled the more beautiful courtyards before landing gently in front of the precious statue. It was not yet lit up for the night, but it's white stone shined like a beacon against the approaching darkness. With a sigh, she gently approached the statue and sat at the foot of it. The detail was indeed impeccable.

"My dear sister, I hope you know what you're doing." she said as a few tears welled up.

Author's Note:

I had originally intended for this to be another single chapter thing, but there was just too much ground to cover in it. So expect a few more chapters from here.

Comments

[PrincessLaLa]

wow u did a great job hope to see more

[randome284]

Poor Luna, she's clearly upset about the thing from the prequel... Who wouldn't be though? This was awesome so far, I like how well it portrays emotions. I'm going to go read the next chapter now

[DivinePanzer]

with gems in their eyes,

Their eyes? What? What is this statue depicting? You have a paragraph of scenery chewing about bits of it, but not what it actually was or was depicting.

Reread it a few times, and i guess it's of the Element Bearers, but that makes little sense. It's a commemoration of the 1st anniversary of Twilight's Ascension. It should be a statue of Twilight itself. I mean, I GUESS you could argue that the other element bearers had a big part in her ascension, and that this is meant to highlight that fact, but there is zero indication of that in story.

At least for me, I expected a statue of Princess Twilight Sparkle, and the description of it confused and distracted me I was drawn out of the story.

[Peekaboo]

8741513
Well, it was meant to be a gift to Twilight, not a public ego booster.
Besides, she's the Princess of Friendship, in my mind why wouldn't Celestia want her gift to Twilight to contain the elements that shaped her into the pony she has become? I mean, if you don't care for the fact that it included the others, then whatever, I just wanted to portray the image in my head, which just so happened to commemorate all of them seeing as they're pretty much the most important things in her life.

The way I see it, there wasn't actually much time even spent on the statue description part, which may explain why it seems to not contain that little detail of it containing all 6 of them (I should probably fix that). I'm sorry if I seem frustrated, but I guess I'm just finding it hard to believe that of all the flaws in this story -and with no editors or proofreaders, there are MANY- that that's the one you picked out.

Thinking back, I guess I didn't want to spend too much time on the statue because the statue itself isn't the real focus of the story. Either way, it's whatever, I pumped most of these stories out in an evening just to write something, so I can guarantee that there are plenty of details and thoughts that didn't make it to the pages correctly. I'm sorry if the errors threw you off.