Alternate timelines persist.
They sorta have to, in order for time travel to work at all: Let's say you go into the past, and then change history. Alright, so assuming you can't paradox yourself out of existence, that has to mean that your original timeline still exists in some form or other. Now, however, let's say you go back again, and prevent that change from occurring, resulting in events going back to the way they went the first time around (or maybe just creating a new timeline nearly identical to the one you started with, always a strong possibility). If non-paradoxing out of existence means that your original timeline never ceased to exist, wouldn't that mean that the alternate timeline you created must still exist as well?
Questions like this are pretty much THE reason why time travel makes your head hurt. Time is not a single straight line that goes from point A to point B: It is more like the ultimate tangle of Xmas tree lights, a trillion different lines of lights tossed together without rhyme or reason. Or perhaps, a better comparison would be to a vast ocean, filled with currents going in every possible direction, and nearly impossible to keep track of. Thankfully, this is not, strictly speaking, a story about time travel, or you'd be reaching for your your Asprin right now. Instead, this is a story of an alternate timeline, where a guy named King Sombra, Equestria's perfect asshat, was not stopped right after he escaped from his imprisonment, but instead was able to retake the Crystal Empire, and from there, started metaphorically kicking Equestria in the dick over and over again.
Now, those of you familiar with the Primary Timeline (Or PrimeTime for short), are probably wondering how a single wizard with an army of maybe a thousand ponies, tops, could be such a massive threat. To understand that, I'll need to give you some info on Equestria in general. In PrimeTime, Twilight Sparkle and her friends handled a sizable number of Equestria's problems. Problems, I might add, that would be Celestia's to deal with, if Twilight Sparkle and her friends had not gotten together. See where this is going? Starlight Glimmer monkeyed with the timeline, and suddenly, Celestia's go-to group for solving problems was gone. And things started to snowball from there.
Lacking any other alternative methods due to an absence of Twilight and Friends in this timeline, Celestia had to deal with everything that went wrong in Equestria, and a lot of shit goes wrong in Equestria, every single day. To make things worse, for one thousand years Equestria's entire military strategy during a crisis boiled down to 'keep whatever it is busy until Celestia can come and deal with it'. Up until this point, it worked, because Sombra-level problems were rare. However, let us take a quick look at the highlight reel of all that had happened in Equestria, leading up to Sombrero's escape and invasion.
First off, Celestia's sister, Luna, escaped from the moon. Yes, she was still hopped up on dark magic, and as Nightmare Moon, she tried to overthrow Celestia and steal all her cakes. Celestia took offense to that, as no one messes with her cakes, as the sun princess' massive booty can testify. Two alicorns, equal in power, did battle, and Celestia just barely managed to overcome her sister, and basically sent Luna back to her room to think about what she did for another thousand years.
Second, Discord. Motherfucking Discord. Not that I have anything against the guy personally, but this is someone who can change reality with a literal snap of his fingers. He's the ultimate godmode cheat made flesh. He's in a weight class all his own, and Celestia having to fight this guy in the best of times would be dicey. Worse, this guy showed up not long after Nightmare Moon, so Celestia had barely recovered any of her strength. She had to cheat, and pulled a Discord herself: She tore reality a new space hole and shoved Discord right up into it, just as far as she could. She shoved him so far up her space hole that it would take centuries for him to find his way out, and even then, she made sure to clench it shut, nice and tight, so he'd have a hard time forcing his way out.
Third, a bigass dragon took up residence on the mountain by Ponyville, and began releasing a metric fuckton of smoke into the atmosphere. This blocked out the sun, and made the air difficult to breathe, and would cause a lot of problems in the long run. Celestia tried being nice, but the dragon was kind of a dick, and made disparaging remarks about the size of Celestia's flanks. As anyone who knows anything about females of any species can tell you, this was a spectacularly bad idea. Thus, the dragon had to go. Not having anyone else available who could defeat the creature or convince it to go elsewhere in her stead, she had to go and defeat it herself. She fought the dragon for six days straight before finally suplexing it into a volcano. Seriously, she did that. They even had a stained glass window made to commemorate that event. It looks exactly as insanely awesome as it sounds.
Then, there was the changeling invasion. That was a complete clusterfuck: Security for an important royal wedding was sorely lacking, and Equestria paid the price for it. The bride-to-be, and only other alicorn around, was abducted, and by the time she was found, she'd starved to death in a cave somewhere. The husband-to-be, and leader of the royal guard, was brainwashed, and ultimately his mind was completely destroyed by changeling mind magic: While his body was saved, the cheese had slid completely off his cracker. The queen of the changelings and Celestia did battle as the changeling army invaded the city en-masse. Canterlot was more than half destroyed in the resulting chaos, and while Celestia was able to secure victory through dogged determination, it was a very near thing. The changelings fled the city, carrying their wounded queen with them. Celestia was too exhausted to pursue and try to finish things.
And then Sombra came along, less than a day later. Celestia was exhausted at this point, still recovering from the battles she'd barely won, and was unable to nip that particular evil in the bud. And by the time she was well enough to fly of to the Crystal Empire, Lord Tirek busted out of Tartaraus, and she had to deal with that first, as he was a more immediate threat. Thus, Sombra had plenty of time to retake the Crystal Empire, consolidate his forces, and ready his slave army for war. By the time Celestia defeated Tirek and choke-slammed him back into Tartaraus (Not hyperbole, but sadly, there wasn't time to make a window of this particularly awesome scene), King Sombra and his army of battle slaves were marching into Equestria.
Now, as mentioned, the Equestrian army's battle doctrine consisted of holding actions. This meant that they were great at slowing the enemy's advance, but when it came to actually winning battles, they sucked asses on fire. Had Celestia ingrained into them the idea that they could actually win battles on their own, hell, even just given them the idea that a bit of initiative when the princess wasn't giving them direct orders was a good thing, they might have beaten Sombra's army on the first day. After all, they had a distinct numerical advantage, and while Sombra was a brilliant individual in a lot of ways, he was no expert military strategist. Sadly, Equestria's army leadership was staffed by ponies who were staunch traditionalists, and weren't going to change things just because it was clear standard procedure was failing. Tradition was infallible: Generations of dead ponies can't be wrong, can they?
Sure they can. They had to die somehow, right? Bad traditions do a fantastic job of getting people killed. Sadly, traditionalists make a tradition out of ignoring that fact. 'We've done things the wrong way for generations! You'd insult your ancestors by doing it the right way now!'
Regardless, due to Celestia being extremely exhausted, she could not bring her full might to bear against Sombra when she took the field, even had she been willing to kill a thousand mind controlled civilians to get to him. Instead, it turned into a battle of attrition... and that was exactly what Sombra wanted. Sombra had intentionally timed his escape at a point when he suspected Celestia would be worn out by several rough battles, as various evils were unsealed and ran amok. A full-on, head-to-head battle with Celestia at her full strength would spell instant defeat for Sombra. However, an exhausted Celestia and a war-weary Equestria would be ripe for the taking.
Just like the Equestrians, Sombra's forces didn't fight to kill, but to capture: Every captured pony was outfitted with a brand new brain bucket, and turned against their former allies. Meanwhile, since Sombra's forces consisted mainly of civilians, capturing one of Sombra's soldiers and de-bucketing them did not automatically mean a new soldier for Equestria: Instead, it meant a civilian, often horribly traumatized by what the helmet had forced them to do, and one who needed food, rest, medical attention, and counseling. It meant a new mouth to feed for a country barely getting by during a harsh war that had no end in sight. Equestria got weaker with every defeat AND every victory, while Sombra's forces tended to just keep getting more and more numerous...
Yard by yard, Sombrero The Asshat And The Bucket-Headed Army Of Doom advanced. It took several moons, but finally, the dreaded king marched to the gates of Canterlot itself, an army numbering in the tens of thousands at his back, and confronted Celestia head to head, confident he would be victorious. A mighty battle was fought, and...
...And this is where I happen to come in.
-----------------------------
I awoke with a splitting headache, unable to recall what I'd been doing the night before. Thus, I reasoned that it must be either Saturday or Sunday morning, and Jack Daniels and his buddy Jimmy Bean were holding a no-holds-barred tag-team death match in my skull against Bud Wiser and Johnny Walker. The fact that so many people were inside my head probably explained why it felt like it was going to explode.
Since the searing pain of my hangover would ensure that sleep would be impossible, I decided that the best thing to do right now would be to get the fuck up. The sooner I did that, the sooner I could start searching for something to cure my hangover with... like a Tylenol... or a loaded shotgun.
I rolled off of my back, and got my hands under me... and immediately realized that they felt odd. I couldn't feel my fingers. My eyes snapped open, and I looked down... to see hooves where my hands should be. It took me a few brief seconds to realize that I was no longer a human: I was some kind of horse creature.
What. The. Fuck. What in a million, billion, trillion fucks?
This is utterly hilarious bud. Keep up the good work.
......
*slow claps*
I just... I don't... *sigh*
I just kinda want to read this story, but I also can't take it as seriously as I want to. I'll come back another day to see what happens to this story.
8183519
If you're taking this story seriously, you're doing it wrong.
8183523
I take stories seriously when I want a good read, I don't when I just want to be entertained.
...
Take that as you will...
8183461
Thanks much. Feel free to spread the love: I can use all the readers I can get.
Is the title a play on "unfortunately I am the high king of Skyrim"?
"They saved his body, but the cheese had completely slid of his cracker" I lost it after reading that sentence. I really enjoy how well you described things here. Also you don't happen to watch tfs do you."? The mention of time travel and being kicked in the dick brought about flashbacks. Cant wait to see how this plays out.
And that's using the long scale.
Celly just keep on dealing with threat after threat and it eventually wore her down enough for sombra to lunge on the weakened equestria causing it to fall and then some random guy shows up in the aftermath as their conqueror. This is most definitely going to be a good fic.
That was the greatest telling of Equestrian history I have ever read. EVER. It was so good, I read it in VaatiVidya's voice. This deserves a like!
8192492
And now I have to go back and do the same thing xD
This shouldn't bother me but it does.
Jim Beam
and
Budweiser.
That this telling of Equestrian history was mostly a lighthearted alternate encapsulation of events made Cadance's death and Shining's insanity a surprise slap to the face in stark contrast to the chapter's tone. I was kinda hoping to see them alive and well. Regardless, this premise is intriguing, much like a certain other (in)famous human-turned-Sombra fic. Visions of agonizingly long hiatuses... Ah, it gives me conniptions. At any rate, this looks promising. Have a like!
8193964 Save and/or destroy?
"Bad traditions do a fantastic job of getting people killed. Sadly, traditionalists make a tradition out of ignoring that fact. 'We've done things the wrong way for generations! You'd insult your ancestors by doing it the right way now!'"
Greates line EVER!! Thank you for writing it!!
If only people in power could have read it, and dare i say, even learn from it, the world would be a much better place.
You have a great talent for writing, keep it up.
Makes you wonder how celestia of all ponies was able to defeat everyone before sombre. Lol
But it makes perfect sense how this storyline came to be. Xd
Yet he uses Sun Tzu-esque tactics and wins.
Informed Flaw 101.
Ooooohhhhhhh that's a wall of text. That's a negative right off the bat. Mind you, it's still split with indents so it's all good.
Strong start. Always good to start with some philosophy. I feel like that can't go wrong so long as you don't ramble too much or go on a tangent.
Comedy that doesn't break the story. Sexcellent.
A good lead up. Backstory, reasoning behind other villain defeats, believable weakening of Celestia. Brilliant!
Awesome first chapter with lots of laughs, but, paragraphs man, paragraphs. That wall of text right there needs a few breaks.
cache.lovethispic.com/uploaded_images/213361-Oh-My-God-I-m-In-Love.jpg
I lost it here
Logically, if time is in a line then if you go back in time and change something and return to the future, you can go back in time to a point before you left to make the change and so you would then be in a time without the change. If you wait there you will then enter a time with the change. Because time always moves forward. It logically does not create alternate timelines, merely adds to the current timeline.
For example:
Dinosaurs alive -> meteor hits -> dinosaurs die -> cities rise -> you go back in time -> you stop the meteor -> dinosaurs alive
In the above timeline you cannot go forward in time because it does not yet exist. In the last period of time, dinosaurs are alive. If you go back in time, you will be able to see cities or see the dinosaurs die. Because it already happened. By changing time you did not actually save the dinosaurs. You just made the fact they died no longer matter. You could go back in time and see the meteor hit and then go forward in time to see yourself stop the meteor.
This also means you can only move forward in time until you arrive at the latest point in time. The "present". Which means if you ever achieve time travel and manage togo forward in time, you probably weren't the first time traveler. If time travel ever becomes possible in the future, this means we probably aren't currently living in the present.
Eh, no. This was the timeline the alt-universe thing with Starlight should have ended on. This should have been the timeline the story in the show threw Starlight into along with Twily to demonstrate just how clearly F'd they all would be without Twi & Co. Celestia is ABSOLUTELY HELPLESS AGAINST DISCORD without the Elements. He friggin' toyed with her and Luna as if they were babies. Discord himself can rip doorways through reality. We've seen it. We've seen no evidence Celestia can on her own. Discord is essentially a GOD. Even the EoH cannot destroy him, only contain him. He's slightly below Q in raw power, probably akin to Mr. Myxlplyx... only tricking Discord into saying his name backwards does nothing but lead him to ask you, "Did you REALLY think this was the DC universe?"
In any case one can put together, Discord should be the ONLY future. He's simply too powerful for any other villain to approach. Even if we assume Tirek could still have escaped, THIS Discord would have absolutely no reason to bother teaming up with him or letting him run free. As with the other antagonists, it'd be over before it began.
Celestia alone would be defeated instantly, without even a struggle. Discord would snap his fingers and her wings and horn would vanish. he can do that, remember? Heck, she'd probably be well aware of her helplessness and beg him to torment her in exchange for her little ponies... which he'd then refuse to do and torment them more than ever because at that time he was a complete A-hole.
I hate trying to make sense of the season 5 finale, because there is no way to make sense of it. It was a lazy time-travel trope plot which fell into every continuity plot hole trap possible.
Eh... sorry, just NO. Sombra had no idea what was going on in his imprisoned state. He sealed himself and the Empire outside of their reality. That's hard canon. His return was pre-set and from all we can see from both the show AND the comics, he had no further control over the timing of the return after he'd cast the spell nor any means to determine what would be going on in the time he returned. I have to be a stickler on that point because it's very clear from every source.
There are things that can be ignored from the comics if you just want to stick with the show, things to ignore from EqG, even things to ignore from further along in the show if you start from an earlier season and branch off from that point. But this story is taking far too many liberties and adding abilities to an already poorly-crafted character. Sombra is a Villain Stu now, only stopped because the HiE character is an all-powerful Self-Insert who just trumps EVERYTHING by his very presence.
It's not a premise I can take seriously in the least, but the 'comedy' aspects aren't amusing enough to laugh at.. not even as dark comedy because there is a complete lack of subtlety.
Yard by yard, Sombrero The Asshat And The Bucket-Headed Army Of Doom advanced.
I believe I have found my favorite sentence in all of literary history.
If anyone gets this game grumps joke
"Well this is a fine pickle!"
8194174 Possibly, but my mind jumped straight to Hail to the King, which is insanely excellent, but might as well be on indefinite hiatus at present. Still 110% worth reading, though.
ill never understand how anyone in their sane mind can drink the piss called american alcohol and dont start me on their terrible beer
8203378 I'm American and I can confirm that it is indeed piss. Piss from the great bald eagle full of patriotism and marketability.
This s coming from a guy who doesn't drink at all.
I could entirely see this happening exactly as you've written it.
8199236 Man, relax, it's just a story. It's not suppose to be faithful to the cannon from the show. Actually, no fanfic is suppose to be faithful to the show. It's just a story, bro.
8193964
That's a bit too below the belt...
That mention of our favorite drinks got this stuck in my head now.
*Slowly puts the asprin down*
*Reaching for the asprin again*
8203722
While I'm not a fan of most 'Murican alcohol, Bud is above average, if you consider supermarket trash like Heineken.
8198702
This chapter could have been just these few words.
8203378
Thats why we drink wine, Canadian whiskey, and Russian vodka. No beer.
8326151
yea but beers a lot cheaper and wont waste you under 5 minutes by "abusing" it.
Nice recap.
I DON'T KNOW WHY BUT I LOVE IT.
When no one was looking, Nightmare Moon stole forty cakes! She stole 40 cakes! That's as many as four tens!
And that's terrible.
Nooooo I can suffer a lot....but you killed cadence.....noooo.
love it
This author predicted Engames convoluted time travel mechanics.
9817899
The Trouser (that's literally how Terry Pratchet described it - the Time Travel Trouser) isn't convoluted. It's the most basic way to avoid the Grandfather Paradox.
No, it actually doesn't. Your own "timeline" exists in your personal past, which is your subjective timeline. No objective timeline required - they can all retroactively cease to exist, for all I could care. As long as you separate your personal time from any particular "shared" (i.e. objective) stream, that's it - once a time-traveller, always a time-traveller. ;-)
Want some aspirin? ;D
I'm loving this shit. I re-read the whole "highlights reel" twice, it was that good.
So: for want of a filly, the kingdom was lost - the movie.
This prologue makes Celestia sound badass, I can just imagine a glass panel in the style of doom guys poster with her just completely surrounded by bruised and knocked out villains.