83: Where time stands still or moves at your will.
Where time stands still or moves at your will.
Chapter published 4th Sept 2015
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left, right, left, right, left, right, step after step she walks, head bowed, eyes down, hands held out before her, crossed at the wrist. in front and behind her, others walk as she does. feet, hooves, claws, whatever the hell those things over there are, they all shuffle forward, lead down the same dingy stone passageway. the creature two ahead of her, some kind of large headed parody of a equine that she hadn’t seen before, stumbles, falling flat on its face. the satyr-esque being directly between it and her doesn’t notice until it’s too late, the two ending up in a messy pile of hooves and hands. she stops, doesn’t want to end up joining them down on the rocky floor, the being directly behind her almost pushing her over anyway, bumping into her back like that. as her two fallen, would companions be the right word, struggled to get themselves back on their, whatever they had, she could hear those behind moaning, the urge to get moving again getting stronger by the second. she could feel it herself, the growing feeling of dread, the rising desire to hop over the fallen, abandon them, scurry away after the those that had already left them behind. she did not like to be kept waiting, tardiness being one of the most common causes for punishment around these parts. one of the many, many causes anyway. the two are up again, hurrying forward, moving swiftly to catch up with the rest. she can feel claws against her back, urging her forwards, to make up for lost time. she hurries, breaking into a short painful jog, just to catch up. within minutes they are all back together, leaving the cloying gloom of the dimly lit passageway behind for the brightly lit opulence of the great hall. no, no no no, it’s true, she is here. she feels the pain, the dread, the nausea. she has to look down, scrunch up her eyes, cracking them only so she can see her own feet so she doesn't trip. they take their places, all of them, in a semicircle around the throne. she takes to one knee, just as she knows the other bipeds in the little party are doing. some of the quadrupeds do something similar but with twice as many knees, others go even further, pressing their bodies to the floor like a fearful hound at its master’s feet. ha, how apt. that thing over there, it doesn’t even have legs, it just kind of squashes itself, the ooze that makes up its body spreading wider across the glossy stone floor. the feeling of dread grows, stronger than before. she almost vomits, the fear is so strong. bowing her head further, she puts both hands on her knee to steady herself. just in time too, a wave of dizziness washes over her as she starts to speak.
she can move... she can move her head, she can open her eyes. the dread is still there, but it has lessened. the pain in her skull has not gone away but it’s not as overwhelming as before. she looks around, at the grand hall with its stark white polished floors, up along its towering pillars of polished dark green granite, across its high arched roof far above. she can hear words being spoken, but they are not as compelling as they were seconds before. she turns to face the speaker, but the pain is back, lancing through her brain. she instinctively jerks her head away. she had only caught a glimpse... before she had needed to look away, but it had been enough. it was her. a blinding light encasing a bipedal form, obviously female, wrapped in ever rippling ribbons of cerulean and turquoise, cobalt blue and pale heliotrope - no wonder he had been so afraid of her. he? who’s he? she’s having a hard time remembering this he was. but why was she here? she had been... She had been in her castle, it had been late, she had been called, beyond the void. She had left her body, stepped across the border and... now she was here... but where was she? ...and when? ...and who?
She lifted a hand from her knee, stared at it, took in its details. Human, most likely male, hairy, dirty. Yes, a human male, one that she knew. She knew this hand, even under the dirt, she could recognise the colour of her skin... no, his skin, his skin. This was not her hand, it was his... it was Lero’s.
"and when the time comes you will remember me, since it is to me before all others that you owe your lives."
As the words float to her ears, the fleeting moment of freedom of movement she had enjoyed is gone as she feels her lips move, words falling from her mouth that she has no control over, a chorus of voices all around echoing the same statement. methodically. robotically. emotionlessly.
"we will never fail to worship you all the rest of our days. for it was you, our lady, who gave us back our lives."
she tries... tried to move, willing her head to respond, her face to lift. she manages a small movement, just enough to bring that horrible, horrible form back into view. the glow is so strong, the ribbons of colour so vivid, the pain in her brain stabbing and slicing at her thoughts as they tried to sort themselves into some small semblance of order. She can hear a chuckle, an evil sound, not one of beauty but of spite.
“well, well, well. it would appear that we have a visitor. a lilliputian hitcher in our midst.”
she steps closer, the pain in her head increasing with the proximity, already burning away at the edges of her mind, threatening to take the rest with it soon enough.
“perhap this would make it easier for you, gentle visitor.”
the glow decreases, the pain subsides, but not entirely. she looks up, finds a woman, human in shape, standing before her. she is clad from neck to toe in a flowing silk, of what colour she can’t tell, her mind is still too confuddled for that right now. not an inch of skin below the chin on display, the face though, the only skin on show, glows too brightly to make out. while definitely human, she could be of any race, any colour. her features too indistinct, too overwhelmed by the cursed glow to make out. she may not even have had facial features at all. What she did have, however, was a cloud of hair that floated around her head, flowing behind her like a cloud of spun gold caught in a summer breeze. from between the strands, a million eyes watched the visitor, boring into her soul, judging her, controlling her, owning her. the urge to vomit returned.
“still too much? perhaps this will help?”
The non-existent breeze ceased non-existing, instead becoming non-non-existent. Billowing hair fell, losing its golden glow and turning a deep red as it settled around her shoulders, the front shortening and falling into a straight fringe just above eye level. The face below the bangs lost its own glow, pale pink skin with eyes of blue forming in a face that she knew all too well.
Fear gave way to both anger and indignation in equal amounts as she willed her host body to stand, to move forwards. After a moment of resistance, she felt herself move, un-sticking from her host, her alicorn form unfolding, expanding, de-compressing as it emerged from the human’s smaller form. Her four long legs carried her just a few steps, the sounds of her hoof-falls echoing around the chamber.
“How dare you think even for a second that you can defile her appearance like this,” the alicorn fairly spat, a rarely seen righteous fury overpowering her usually pleasant tones.
The target of her ire, however, merely clapped her silk-clad hands together, an expression of girlish glee swimming across her features.
“my, my, my. princess celestia. how delightful to see you.”
The woman pinched at the edges of her full-length blood-red silk gown, pulling it away from her hips as she executed a playful curtsy.
“you know, at first i had expected it to be your sister that was dipping her toes into my personal pool, but you... you're just as much a sight for sore eyes. you know how much I love a good...” her eyes moved from her visitor to the supplicant figures still crouched all around her throne, “...guest. so, to what what do i owe the pleasure?”
“I’m warning you,” Celestia hissed, wings spread, ethereal mane lashing all around her head.
“Oh, tia,” she pouted, “still so hung up on appearances.”
If anypony back in Canterlot had ever been on the receiving end of a scowl, the like of which the alicorn of the day was currently throwing out, they probably would have spontaneously self-combusted in either crippling embarrassment or unbridled fear - or maybe both. The current target of her scorn, however, just couldn't give a shit.
“ohh, look at miss grumpy face,” gloved hands reached out, fingers pushing against Celestia’s cheeks, manually manipulating the princess's mouth into a smile. “that’s better. why. so. serious?”
With a girlish giggle, she span away, lifting her hands above her head, sparkles floating from her fingertips as she danced around the hall, spinning and twirling in ways that would put a prima ballerina to shame.
“you’re in my world now, princess prissy plot,” she laughed, and it was not a nice sound, “and you're such a very small fish in a very, veerrry big pond.”
With nary another word nor sound she vanished... just vanished, no flash, no pop, no crack, just gone... only to reappear again, using the still crouched form of Bellerophon Michaelides as a handy leaning-stool. Battered and bruised as the human may be, her lovely little subject made such a handy little seat.
“and piggybacking on the mind of my little wandering ulysses here...” silk covered fingers patted her chair’s head, ruffling his hair life a small child, before grabbing a handful and yanking his head back, eliciting a small grunt of pain from her otherwise unresponsive ‘guest’. “so beneath you, i feel...”
Celestia continued to glare daggers at her ‘hostess’, fully aware that there she wielded little in the way of power in this realm but still unwilling to back down.
“oh, tia, still so sensitive. oh well, as you wish.”
Raising her hands above her head, she began to spin a little rhyme - one familiar to almost every human within her realm.
“mirror, mirror, on the wall, who’s the fairest of them all?”
Ribbons of light formed around her body, blues and greens and purple, covering her form, obscuring her from view before vanishing just as swiftly as they had arrived. After they had disappeared, she still remained, though the transformation was startling. The dark red hair and pale pink skin had been replaced by flowing ethereal locks striped in pink and green, purple and blue. and skin so pale as to be almost white. The gown of blood-red silk had also been ousted, replaced instead with a long, full skirted ball gown of shimmering gold; slit high to expose a long, well toned toned leg shod with a golden three inch stiletto heel; the neck cut well off the shoulder and low in the front to expose a cleavage that one could drown in, should one be lucky enough.
The most striking element of her new appearance though, was the face... or rather, whose it was. Beneath strong yet gently arched eyebrows, amidst the darkest of lashes, sat a pair of eyes in the most striking of light magenta. These eyes spoke of depths of knowledge, wisdom, grace, and kindness, eyes so caring and reassuring that they left anyone on which they gazed filled with a sense of calm, wrapped up tightly in a blanket of peace.
Unfortunately, whatever spell these most graceful of features had cast was lost almost instantly as lips of the darkest of pinks twisted into a cruel smirk, any kindness these windows to the soul may have possessed lost as a wave of cruel humour washed over them.
“happy now?”
While Celestia was not at all happy about seeing what was undoubtedly her own features in human form on her face, it was at least better than the mockery she had made of mother’s appearance.
“so, never mind all that; how have you been? i so did enjoy our last meeting. how are things with you? i hear you have your sister back. how lovely that two such desperate souls should have found each other again. ahhh, it almost brings a tear to one’s eye.”
With an over emphasised pout, she pushed herself off of her perch, her fleeting expression of sadness instantly replaced with one of barely contained glee.
“ahh, little lulu. she was so much fun to corrupt. it’s always the proud ones, those who think themselves so strong, that are the most satisfying to bend to my will. your little sisterly tiff was just so. much. fun. But, you know how it is when siblings fight - it all gets so... personal.”
Skipping over to her alicorn guest, a now bare hand trailed along the underside of the princess’s chin.
“poor lulu, so easy to twist, so much pride, and so much bottled up resentment for always being kept in her sister’s shadow... quite literally, too. we really must do all that again some day. I’ll bring the wine.”
A gentle finger worked its way along Celestia’s jawline, working its way up towards an ear. The contact made her skin crawl, the desire to jerk her head away fair near unbearable, but she held firm, would never give her the satisfaction.
“but, you? you were almost a worthy adversary, so much harder to influence, such a strong will and steady heart. what a tasty little challenge you were, and so much more satisfying when you finally fell.”
“You never had me.” Celestia growled in response.
“oh, if it helps you sleep any better then you just keep telling yourself that.” fingers moved back to her own chin, a deep look of consideration across what could be otherwise be a beautiful face, if not for who was currently behind it. “and how is your delightfully hunky little somby-womby, by the way? still hates your guts with all the passion of a burning sun i take it? oooh, that must really choke you up inside. especially with what you two had goi-”
“Enough!” Celestia shouted, stomped a forehoof into the ground with enough strength to leave a small crater in the otherwise flawless granite surface.
“I know of your probings, your excursions upon our borders. do not think to dare cross me, queen,” the alicorn almost spat the title. “We will defeat you, just as we did before. So many times you have tried your luck and so many times you have failed.”
Waving Celestia’s words away with a disinterested hand, she smiled, the edges of her lips leaving dimples in her cheeks. “minor inconveniences, nothing more. unlike you, and your so called ‘immortality’, we truly are forever. long after your piddling little reality has faded away, after all the toys have been packed away and forgotten, we will still be here, doing what we do. while there are minds to twist, while there are souls to corrupt, we will be there to do the corrupting. you cannot stop us, like entropy itself we are a force of nature. as long as there is existence, we will continue to exist.”
With an air of encroaching boredom, she made a show of checking the state of her nails, conjuring up a small emery board to work on a troublesome cuticle.
“ah, but you were so fun to play with, and you will be again. but, for now, it seems you have taken yet more of my playthings from me.” happy with her work, she flicked the the emery board over her shoulder, “those foolish bughorses were so much to push and pull, to convince and coerce. a cruel whisper here, a doubting word there. oh i will miss them,” a small sigh escaped her lips, “actually, no, i won’t. never mind, there’ll always be more bughorses, or the squawky ones, or the big, ugly lizard-things. there’s always more.”
She pouted and, by now, Celestia was getting really rather tired of seeing what should be her own face, even a human version of it, being abused in such a why.
“but, there is a hole in my collection. do you know why, my dear celestia?” she span her way across the room with gay abandon until she came once more to the still crouched Lero “a little birdy tells me that you’re the one selfishly holding onto one of my possessions, my little wandering star, and now my poor bereft toybox weeps for its return.” again she ran her fingers through the static human’s hair, “and i do not share.” she grabbed a handful of his hair, dragging him across the chamber behind her as she stomped her way over to the princess before throwing his unprotesting form down at the alicorn’s hooves. “return it to me, or we shall have to... balance the books, shall we not?”
Princess Celestia arched a single eyebrow, standing defiantly firm in the face of the petulant form before her.
“Never. He, and any others that might come before me, are under under my protection. I would no more let him suffer under your... care than I would any of my own subjects”
“your protection? why? why defend it?” she grabbed the human again, lifting him from the ground with a single hand, hefting his form as effortlessly as if he was made of nothing but papier mâché, “it is not one of yours,” she shook him in Celestia’s face, her grip on his neck making her toy’s eyes bulge out, “it is not a child of your world. it is a target, a vulnerability, a weakness that begets nothing but more weaknesses.” wrapping her other hand around his skull, she ripped his head from his neck, blood spraying all around as she tossed the limp body off to one side, “this... human is nothing more than a man of constant sorrow, and he will bring you nothing but the same.”
With the disembodied head thrust in her face, great gouts of blood running down her arm as she pushed the gruesome remains upwards into the alicorn’s face, Celestia stepped back, sickened by the wanton display of violence. It wasn't just the callous and uncalled for cruelty of it that made her want to vomit, but the carefree manner of it all. She’d ripped poor this Lero’s head off as easily as if she had done no more than open an envelope, or blow out a candle, or close a door - spending no more care or consideration on his murder than she would have done on any of those other tasks.
“tia, tia, tia,” the corpse’s head was tossed to the side, rolling across the chamber floor before coming to rest against its body. As she advanced, Celestia had to force herself not to back away as the crimson-splattered figure came so close that she could smell the iron in her victim’s blood.
“eventually the circle will be unbroken once more. you may think you can fight it, fight us, but by and by it will reform with time, every time.” Holding out her bloody hands, she used her pointer fingers to sketch out a circle in the air, finishing with her fingertips pushed together, signifying the closing of the circle. “and then, you will not keep from me what is mine, silly rabbit. i will have my tithe.” a shimmering circle formed in the air exactly where her fingertips had passed, solidifying into a large golden ring. It hung in the air for a second before she pushed a bloody hand through its core, the ring contracting in size until it fit around her wrist like a bangle. With a hiss, the impromptu piece of jewellery’s outer edge began to smoke for just a second as letters etched themselves into its surface. Celestia had seen these letters before; Lero’s full name, written in the language of his father’s people.
“You will not get away with this, La--”
Before she could say any more, Celestia was silenced by a bloody finger held against her lips.
“shush, shush, my dear tiny tia. even here, here in the intangible, words and names still hold great power, you know that.” She smiled smugly, in that way that Celestia was now well beyond just hating and now truly detested. “even now, there are thousands of eyes watching us, beyond their black mirrors, behind walls of fire, taking in our every move, reading into our every word. you do not want to introduce my true name to their minds, do you? lest it give me even more power, power i could quite easily use against you.”
Removing her hand, she gave the alicorn a wink. “you can have that one for free, though i will not be helping you out again.”
Turning, she stalked away, hips swaying as she made her way back to her throne. Absently brushing at her clothing as she eased into her most regal of seats, the shimmering golden ball-gown peeled away, the fabric burning, vaporising into nothing, revealing another full-body covering ensemble of blood-red silk beneath. The pink and purple stripes faded from her hair, leaving just the blue and green to mix and merge, a thousand eyes staring out from within the roiling cloud of hair billowing about her head.
“you have built your walls well, and you guard them diligently. but all walls fall with time, my dear tia. in the end, they all come tumbling down. and we will wait, and watch, and when they fall... oh yes, when they fall. even if you were to plug the hole with your equestrian dead we will still surge through the breach like a swarm.”
Crossing her legs, the deep red silk flowed around her thighs and calfs just as the blood had from her hands just minutes before.
“so scurry on home, my darling tia, and guard your borders from betwixt fearful brows, for someday we will come a-knock-knock-knocking at your door, and by the time you hear us we will already be within. farewell for now, princess of the ponies, we will see each other again soon enough.”
From her position of power, she raised a hand, wiggling her fingers in farewell. Caught on the cusp of a biting retort, Celestia’s consciousness was gripped, twisted, thrown back out from beyond the void. Reality reasserted itself in her mind, pushing its way back into each of her senses, easing her return from the places beyond the here and now and back into her physical form.
Even as the familiar sights and smells of her private chambers were still solidifying themselves around her, Celestia was already summoning her guards. Giving each of them a list of several ponies, and non-ponies, that they should gather together post-haste she sent them on their way, their ears still ringing with the urgency of her instructions. As her most steadfast of servants sped away to perform their royal duties, she set out herself for her sister’s bed chambers. There was much to discuss, and much to prepare, and Luna would undoubtedly want to be at the forefront of whatever was to come.
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Holy cow that was intense!
cdn-img.fimfiction.net/user/9j09-1431818825-4216-256
Clingy, ain't she?
And it almost seems like Her Ladyship's real name begins with the letters 'L' and 'A'.
Nothing as boring as a villain Sue.
As much as I like the quality of the writing and the conversation, I feel the whole concept is a bit ... overdone ... cliche...
Super powerful enemies are lurking in the shadows, just waiting for the right moment to strike. Taunting, playing with a character that is considered the most powerful being in their world. You'd best be careful...
This has been done way too many times and it has kind of lost it's impact.
Has it ever occurred to the bad guys that maybe, just maybe there is someone out there more dangerous than them? Maybe they are the ones, living in their sheltered bubble, thinking themselves so superior and powerful while the real monster is looking at them and it's not wise to taunt them. Maybe they should be the ones hiding under the covers this time. Sure, they might think of themselves as the biggest fish in a big pond, but it's still not wise to taunt the guy with the car battery.
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Fae lesson 101, kiddos:
They lie.
I can pretty much guarantee that everything that The Lady said here was a lie, half-truth, exaggeration or misleading in some way, all carefully calculated to cause Celestia make the wrong decisions.
Every time we've seen her, she's presented herself as a queen, a ruler, not a warrior- she does not conquer with force of arms on the battlefield. That is not her narrative. She conquers with honeyed words on the negotiating table.
Not to mention, while unto a god in her own world, in ours or Equestria, she is bound to the rules of that place: like everything else, she can die. Not easily, mind, she is a being of unfathomable power, yes, but still vulnerable in a world that is not her slave.
So coming there when your opponent controls the sun is not wise.
If she's one to take aggressive action, it would not be by invasion, but by nibbling on all of Celestia's defenses, forcing her to spread her resources on shoring them all up...
...and when she's spread too thin, snatch up something precious.
And look, what happened a few chapters down the line, hmmm?
It's really hard to become invested in a plot so ephemeral.
I have nothing to grasp. I'm in a stream without a paddle. I'm blind in a snowstorm.
You're setting up the woeful powers of antagonism as so vaguely defined, but certainly dire, that only an equally-vaguely defined dues ex machina can save us. Because of that, the reader is aimless. There's no clear goal; no path to victory, however dubious; there's nothing for the reader to track. They just sit there, like in a roller coast, being jerked left, right, up, down, and all around. They wait for the author to write 'and then the villain was foiled', with fuck all to know how it's supposed to happen.
In that circumstance, the eventual resolution just doesn't have impact, because it's arbitrary. Part of the narrative has to be producing the antagonist's foil so that the reader is invested in that foil.
Lord of the Rings had a clear goal: destroy the ring in the fires of Mount Doom. A whole lotta shit happened on the way, but it was all tied together by the clear goal of destroying the ring.
The MLP:FiM series opener had a clear goal: defeat Nightmare Moon via the Elements of Harmony. Sure, the rainbow friendship cannon was a bit dues ex machina, but it didn't feel so bad because it came out of the goal we were already tracking.
If I wanted to just sit in that roller coaster and enjoy the ride as things happened to me, then I would probably get the same ride out of abusing drugs.
So what I'm trying to get at is: are we going to learn wtf is going or not?
I should add that I still wholly enjoy this story and I'm looking forward to your presumed upcoming lighter chapters. I'm always up for a story about Lero and his happy band of merry mares. It's just that the dark chapters are getting pretty dry.
Ah, it all becomes clear now. Lassie grew irritated with the habits of those foolish humans she lived with. She not only had to save Timmy from the well countless times, she likely had to run the tractor and file the federal crop surplus rebate forms as well. So she started investigating dark magics and transformed herself into the Queen of the Fae.
Would this be beyond the fourth wall? Wouldn't this be the fifth wall?