This story is a sequel to Sanctuary: An Interview of a Changeling
Following the events of Sanctuary, the stallion, Dr. Lovejoy, is looking for a place to hide. He runs into a place of Starlight's village, a seemingly happy utopia where everypony is equal.
But for the retired stallion, he considers this place as the perfect playground to spend his last days.
A special thank you to AlaskanBabe for proofreading this.
Music for this fic used in chronological order:
-Moonlight Sonata by Beethoven
-Air on the G String by Bach
-Symphonie Concertante, K 364; 1st Movement by Mozart
-1st Symphony, 3rd Movement by Mahler
-Rêverie by Debussy
-Gelido in ogni vena by Vivaldi
-Goldberg Variations, Aria by Bach
-Piano Concerto No 2, 2nd Movement by Rachmaninov
-Swan Like (arrange for solo piano) by Tchaikovsky
-String Quartet in B-flat major, Cavatina by Beethoven
-Amato ben, tu sei la mia speranza by Vivaldi
-Concerto for two cellos & strings in G minor, 2nd Movement by Vivaldi
-Träumerei, Op. 15 No. 7 by Schumann
-Sonata for Violin and Piano in B Flat Major by Mozart
-Sheep May Safely Graze by Bach
-Nocturne 21 in C Minor by Chopin
When does the gore come into play?
7034103 Well, Lilly was invited over for tea...
It's been a long time that I have been hopping to see a multi chapter story of a pony wandering to Our Town long before the M6 arrival. I'm looking forward to see more of this story. The main problem that I fore see for Starlight is seeing how frail the Doctor is I don't think that he could survive the equalization house, or be able to practice his trade correctly after such an ordeal. I also wander what will be the effect of the equal mark on him, in the show it seemed to me that it has a subtle influence over the subject by subjecting them rewarded or punished system to on their mind gradually influencing there thoughts over time.
7034110 Considering what he did in Fillidelphia, I think you might underestimated this frail Doctor.
"You can't have a nightmare, if you never dream."
They never said anything about living nightmares...
This guy's a psychopath...
I'm just saying...
This has me on edge I can't wait to see what he concocts next.
Everyone is equal in death...
7038217
7038670 Of course this old, frail stallion is a
psychopath. But it's his reason as to why that makes it all the more interesting.Correction: Sociopath.
this is great, a cult town harboring a serial murderer, two antagonists fighting over dominance of town the I can't wait to see how is going to come out on top of all this. So Party Favor is going to joint the doctor for diner, that certainly doesn't for-boat anything bad...
Seeing that Party Favor is my favored pony of the show
, it would be shame to have him mummified so early in the story
. But on the other hand, I am expecting gratuitous violences in this story
, so I expect this one to be the most entertaining of them all and that you wont be skipping on any of the gory details of the possess of mummification, which if you actually several days to do event if he doesn't respect all the rituals, which I HOPE you will do the whole possess even if you take several chapters to do it. 
7040081 Who said I was going to Mummify him?
Oh good lord Party Favor is a goner. T-T
Ohoho, I sense this is going to be interesting.
7034110 I'm pretty sure Dr. Lovejoy is not as frail as he appears.
Oh god.
Poor innocent mare.
7042791 I think I got the message on chapter 2
Yep, I see the AU now...
RIP Party Favor.
Phew, Party Favor's not dead!
And I hope his secret admirer is Sugar Belle. I ship it like FedEx.
Why did you spare Party Favor for? With all the anticipation you did with him in the last chapter about what horror he was going to befall on my favored pony of all, sort of disappoints me... just a little. Anyway, I wander what the good doctor is going to do if Starlight Glimmers lit' social experiment got his attention now.
7043071
7043173 Why did he get spared? Simply because he didn't answer correctly to the wrong question.
P.S. Trust me, within the next chapter or two, there will be blood.
derpicdn.net/img/view/2014/2/22/559454__safe_solo_animated_scootaloo_screencap_smile_spoiler-colon-s04e15_twilight+time_cutealoo_eye+shimmer.gif
I wanna see some horn action. Maybe saw it off and stab em' with it. That sounds fun.
7045606 If I can figure out how to do it artistically... we'll see.
7045606
Why would you wish that?!
Basically, he's saying he's killing them bc they were lying about how they were actually miserable in the town. How does killing them help?! All he's doing is leaving their souls to remain forever bound to the living as they would not want to leave their loved ones.
7045657 Note to self...
7045657 P.S. No, it's because they said they were happy. Then again, I think I can use what you've just said in a future chapter.
7045674 Wait...oh, I think I get it.
...But it's still very wrong.
And glad to be of service...I think?
7045657 sites.google.com/site/n8thegr83008/_/rsrc/1458435948624/home/Screenshot%202016-03-19%20at%208.47.29%20PM.png
7045959
I'm not dignifying that...
This stallion, I have to say is the most messed up pony OC i've ever read, and that's saying something. Poor little colt, I have to admit I did not see that coming. His reasoning is soooooo strange to me.
7045989 You just now realized that?
And don't worry, you're not only one in the sentiment that his reasoning is weird.
This was a good chapter after all, after the last chapter I was starting to think that you where going to be squeamish of what the doc was going to do the the citizen or Our Town, and seeing that he brook a foals leg, framed an other and bled one to death I think it was, I think things are getting interesting. But, their is a big problem that I see in Our Town, if they can get food by bringing it by train and that the town doesn't have any form of agriculture to make it at least to a minimum be self- sufficient when it comes to food, then what does the Town does to bring in the bits to pay for the foot they need if they don't even have the mean feed themselves. Do they operate a mine of some sort to extract ore, they can't have the means to manufacture anything, or is the Town just there so that the Equestrian can clam the aria to be their territory from other country, and that Starlight just made a deal with the Government keep town artificially alive with basic necessities and keep a blind eye to the going-ons in the town? I am look forward to see what is going to happen next.
7046189 And thank you for giving me a topic for the next upcoming chapters.
Oh god...
I'm probably gonna be sayin' that a lot in this story.
Glad Night Glider didn't end up dead in this chapter. Hope she'll last the entire story though...
so Our Town economy is based on lazy the exploitation opal rocks? I would have imagined that they would do much better at having farm rocks to produce it rather then just dig for it one a week. Still I wander what do the rest of the town do during the rest of the time; idle hooves gives time for ponies to think for themselves as well as making Sedition thoughts and that is something that I would expect Starlight loaves to let them do, what other things do they do to keep the town running?
7048642 Do you want me to rewrite it?
7048737 not necessarily , I just though that the poking the subject might give an interesting respond and I think of finding a very creative answer to your own glaring contradictions is a lot of fun to see. My best suggestion would be that that Nightgliver or what ever her name said that it was a quarry because she doesn't know the deference between that and a rock farm and that she isn't really the most curious pony around. opal is has its value, but grows very slowly and ones they start to grow in a certain aria it will constantly back and doesn't need so much tending to like other rocks. That and the town doesn't have a farm land but have underground green houses instated because of the low population is small enough for it to support it and it wouldn't fall pray to the harsh climate especially sens climate control can be done by all ponies instead of just the pegassy, and that they could get fresh food all year round except for some things lit sugar an flower that they would need to import at the moment and would necessitate preparing lot of land that they don't have the ponypower to do it at the moment.
Still I would wander why an entire pony family would want to move to such a remote place, what made the parents move away from their previous house to think that Our Town would be better for them? I supposed that they had accumulated heavy deth that they couldn't pay anymore so they when into hiding to Our Town to escape the dept collectors.
7048813 I'll tell you what, since I had a bit of a long day, before I could begin with the next chapter, I'll go back on this one to add in your suggestion. Along with the idea of having underground greenhouses (Maybe built in the side of a mountain or in one of the caves there. Probably say that they're only grow certain vegetables like carrots and potatoes (or something the lines of that)). To be honest, I'm fascinated that you're more interested in how the village itself works then the character development, their pasts, or the fact that practically anyone in Our Town is in danger of being turned into an art piece if they said yes to the happy question. Then again, I'll take what I can get. So, for future reference, if you see a plot hole in the story, suggestions like this are very useful for me to think about.
7048813 Okay, I've just expanded the conversation a bit between Lovejoy and Night Glider about the quarry and the underground greenhouses. Is there anything else, I would like to get to work on the next chapter about those greenhouses?
7051081 sorry i didn't thought that you would go as far as to rewrite the chapter because of by comment, I just thought that you would fix the confusion in the next chapter. As far as I can tel it is pretty much all there, and I think you mange to make the conversation more natural with the doctor correcting Night Glider for the confusion with the distinction between a rock farm and a quarry, and make the joke about not understanding how can rocks grow. Maybe you add later that opal need a certain type of magical soil of sort to grow that Our Town just so happen to be near it and that the ore yield was too small for a full mining operation and that Our Town has the deed to dig their. The The underground green houses seem to be good but for some reason it make it sound like each group ponies have to take care a different green house and that their a severals of them under the town or near by. I think having multiplies green houses might be a good idea, as in if on in infected with a disease or a bacteria the other croups might be spared that faith in case of a food crises and can rotate crop cycles. Hope this gives you a few ideas for the good doctor to do.
7049097 Well, sense you have shown that this is going to be Saw like story where the protagonist is a remorseless psychopath serial killer that has put the arbitrary rule of killing his victims only if he is content in the moment they are living their living in, just so that it makes it more complicate his selection of his victims to complicated for the fun of it, under the pretext of a foalhood dissatisfaction, I can’t really help but to take a clinical detachment to the situation of the tragedy that is unfolding and examine it in the same manner as the doc would, and see what cruel means to kill his victims. But in actuality I am very worry about what will happen to the townsfolk of Our Town, but I know that they are just the tools for the story which you will torture them, so to worry for them is a forgone conclusion in my mind, you would need to present much interesting backstory to the characters you’re going to kill for me to sympathies with their like, their past, their hopes, their dreams, their fears, their strengths their weaknesses. The point of the syncopate is to clinically examine/study every aspect of their victims’ live. They want to understand them, think like them, to be them, to know how to manipulate them however they want them to react, to put them in a desired state of mind before moving in for the kill to finally reach their paroxysm that they crave. What they want in the end is absolute control of their victims’ lives in their hands. Your story is trying to put the reader in the mindset of the psychopath and the thrill of killing incense is part of of the fun of reading it.
What has fascinated me ever sense I discovered FLP and by extension Fimfiction is how people go about speculating how Equestrian pony biology works their society work along with their technology. What you have to understand about the ponies of MLP Fim is that they are not human, their psychology would be very different form our own, they are another culture entirely despite the similarities and that you can’t just put the same rules to them as we have for ourselves; you have to adapt the rules to suite our understanding of how things work for them. There is also the other aspect that the show focuses a lot on the world building, with constantly showing so many new characters, of who the pony world work despite always staying ambiguous about the details of the facts to leave it to viewers interpret what things in a lot of different ways. there is enough material to work with to adapt peoples stories into anything they want without having to be constrained of always having to refer to our own history to make the reference or don’t need to create all of it from scratch.
In this case, what I like about Starlight Glimmer’s Our Town, is that she is trying to create an almost completely self-sufficient community that can stay isolated from the rest of the world and as much as most people think it is a really hard thing to do especially when you have to rely on the community to solve its own problems. As much as I like fantasy stories, they tend to gloss over the fundamentals on how small communities work and don’t go really into detail about their lifestyle or customs, the different trades that communities needed to survive together. Early settlers has fascinated me for many reason most of all, because of their isolation of where they are, that they can’t really count on any outside help, recourses are shares and didn’t had the money to order replacement marital that breakdown, so they have to improvise some solutions and became jack of all trade build their own tools and furniture to cut down on cost in order for their family to survive. We also then to forget that agriculture is the cornerstone of civilizations and it is what allows them to grow the population expand trade, have other more specialized rades to support them, have elite class to develop new technologies and better administrate them and afford to raze an army to invade others nation, that fact is still very much true even to this day and without it society would crumble because our society is so focuses on speciation skills.
In Starlight’s Our Town, I wander how she tries to apply her philosophy of everypony is equal to another to her community, for whatever sense she means it especially how it apply to . For what I understand or how I like to think of what Startlight want to create a cult commune that revolves around the idea that everypony roles are interchangeable in their tasks and anyone showed know how to do the job of all the others in at least the most basic ways. I would imagine that everypony have been thought taught the rudiments of how to tend to fields, to do masonry, to do carpentry, blacksmithing, basket weaving and other necessary skills to keep the town running.
In the end result, like all cults leaders, Starlight wants to control the lives of the inhabitants under her interpretation of how the world should function, not that it is necessarily bad if the community but in this case she is ruling by using fanatics, like Double Diamond how strongly believes in her cause; coercion, she has forced ponies to accept her rules and belief with the equalization house, fear, guilt, denunciation and weariness of what comes from the outside. “Animal Farm” would be a great example of the group dynamics she is creating.
I hope my creasy ramblings are of interest to you.
7051523 Okay, I do agree that these potential victims should be given more time to be sorry for. I think at this point the doctor understands that he has to slow his killing rate down a little so that the village doesn't become too suspicious of him.
At the same time, please keep in mind that this isn't my first time writing a story. After all, I've got about thirty under my belt (at least on this site) so I think by now I have a pretty good idea what I'm doing here.
And yes, I understand that fleshing out the how and why this society is standing is important too. I also understand the countless ways that this subject of Starlight's town could be approached. But lets be honest here, which kind of story would you rather read: A detailed history, cultural and workings of every little thing in this or that world that goes as far as to describe how nails and cloth are made; or about a character trying to explain that world from their point of view? For that is what I'm trying to do, try to explain from my (and not the creator's) imagination in how this place works from a unique point of view.
To quote a line from a famous theme song: "You may wonder how he eats and breathes, and other science facts. (La-la-la!) Repeat to yourself, 'It's just a show, I should really just relax.'"
Please, don't think that I don't appreciate the feedback. Because I do. Whenever someone comments about a way this story can improve that I can do, I do it. If they have a point about a character, I listen. But I beg of you, please remember who's story this is.
7051657 Sorry, I apologize for being overbearing to you in my comments, I never wanted to give you the impression that I am trying to tel you what to do to your story. when I get exited about a story I tend to get very enthusiastic about the story that I like and I will say every little things that comes to mind about the story and i like to see things in as many different angles as I can and I like to pay attention to details. So for the sake of keeping a cordial dialogue between use I will try to contain my comments to the main subject.
again sorry
7051709 You're forgiven. After all, I've learned to take constructive criticism and figure out a way to work my stories with it. Like your question about the family that moved there with the two brothers, of course, I'm planing on addressing it. And the fact that I should really slow down with the killings for a bit is verified. And the whole mummification thing... Don't worry, it's coming up soon.
While I'm gland you're enjoying this, also please do try to relax a bit and enjoy the ride.
this is interesting to see, Lovejoy has the chance to see firsthoof the whole equalization process of Starlight Glimmer and he get to see all the psychological effects that the equal mark has on on the pony sense the stallion will be staying with him for the foreseeable future, so that he can casually probe him for information when he is with them. I suppose this would also be a chance for Lovejoy to prove his loyalty to Starlight, or at the very least show that he is not antagonistic toward her methods, by easy the new pony into accepting the mind conditioning and even give helpful suggestions into making her method more effective, like showing subtle her mind games to confuse the pore stallion to break his will sooner to make his mind more pliable. In turn, I would imagine that the doctor would be fascinated to see how the Stallions world-view would change over time, along with helping him in the proses and take pleasure in tormenting him into discussions hypothetical situations where their is no easy answer form him say and reduce him to a quivering mess that can't make a decision on his own and be reliant on others to make choices for him. The doctor could even turn him to become a zealot and use him as an unwitting accomplices that he can use to distract other from his other activates.
I suspect that the equal mark is an arbiter of sort that induces minor pains to the bearer brain of the mark if they are not in the right mind set and reward them with dopamine they are complaint to Starlight's will and her ethoses. I suspect that she will make him recite all the mindless propaganda over and over again and that the mark will make reward each time he says the right thing without any reluctance making starting to believe the mindless dribble. I also wander if the mark also make them bearers want to stay in Our Town or at least make it feel like a bad choice in their minds. All doe the mark could have a completely different effect then what i have just said
I have also wander what Starlight was before she fonded Our Town?
7051949 Y'know, the dear Dr. Lovejoy might not even witness the equalization process, since Trek is staying at his house. We don't exactly understand him and how his mind functions.
7051980 probably not at first, but i tough that he wont notice the new mark on his rump or the fact that he had be it the equalization house for several days, and he has shown to the townsfolk that he is of a passive curious nature. At the very lest he wont see him until he accept the mental conditioning is done.
This is interesting, Trek seem to also be a of a curious nature, so the Doc doesn't need to act the part as much on his and can let Trek ask the basic question and stay more on the side lines to examine everyponies behavior without being in the line of fire in conversations so that he has more time to muse on planing in his "future art projects". Trek seem to the sort of pony that is hooves on pony and very open mind and is not really judged mental about other ways of viewing the world so he might be initially interested in living in Our Town for a time at least until he tries at least all the basic daily activities that the townsfolk do every day and start to get board. Seeing this could be an interesting opportunity for Starlight seeing that Trek work for a travail guide magazine it would mean that he know ponies in the media industry and have at least a band of loyal readers that are receptive to his comment and she could show all the good stuff of Our Town tel him of all its lifestyle philosophy and could make an article about it so that ponies from the out side might actually willingly seek out to go this place in the middle of nowhere so she might . The problem with it is that it might attract unwanted attention from the Equestrian government about the happenings there, but the biggest problem that I would see if their is an increase in tourism, with would be a chance to give away books that talks about the "evils of cutie mark" is that Our Town the place might become just an other tourist attraction for outsides and might actually undermined Starlight's cause and authority. For the doctor having tourism there might be a great for him, strangers no pony knows anything about them coming and leaving with no pony really conserving them about them specifically and he wouldn't have to pray on the Townsfolk anymore giving him more chances to do his art in an isolated aria. I wander how things will be going on. Personalty I would prefer that Trek just stay in Our Town and be subjected to the treatment, but Starlight and the Doc might at least consider the option.
You monster! Not even trying to help him! Hmmp!
7058286 He's a Sociopathic killer, what were you expecting?
7058293
Ahh...true.