Epilogue
For Your Ears Only
- - -
December 18th, 1452 A.S.
Canterlot Royal Theater Dressing Room 1
1054 Hours
“Oh, come on, Mr. Ink; you’ve got to take it off sooner or later.”
The ‘Commander’ of the Honor Guard sighed. “I know, Rarity. It’s just strange. You have no idea how many times I asked him if I could try it on, and he always said no.”
“What, the real thing?” Twilight shook her head. “You know that’s just a costume, right? Commander Lining didn’t make a habit of lending the real set of Hurricane’s Armor out every Hearth’s Warming Eve for the pageant.”
“I am aware,” Ink told her, before putting on the fake black helmet. “It’s still hard to believe he’s gone. Or that I’ve got his job, now.”
“Well, first you’ve got to stop being Commander Hurricane!” Pinkie patted Ink on the back. “Come on, let’s see your racism face one more time.”
“Oh, please, Pinkie. How many times do I have to tell everypony the stories about him aren’t true?” Twilight clutched her brow. “It’s like Rainbow and I went on our big trip to Stol’nograd for nothing.”
“Thanks,” Ink muttered over his shoulder. “Well, I think we should get ready; it’s about time I got back to the Princess; we have dinner with Prince Blueblood this afternoon.” Ink made a ‘gagging’ motion with his hoof, earning a light laugh from some of the mares in his company. “You have my apologies for stealing the show.”
Rarity slapped him across the fake black cuirass teasingly. “Oh, come now, Mr. Ink. And here I thought Rainbow Dash had elected to stay behind this year.”
“Are ya comin’ back to visit some time?” Applejack asked.
Ink shrugged. “Protecting the Princess is a full-time job.”
“I’m sure we’ll see him around,” Twilight noted. “It isn’t as if she has any shortage of reasons to visit Ponyville.”
“Or perhaps we’ll come visit him. But now, we probably ought to be going.”
Ink held up a hoof. “Wait. Fluttershy!”
The mare, who had until that moment been completely silent, made a sort of squeaking noise as she turned. “Yes?”
Ink was grateful for a red coat to hide his nervousness. He’d approached plenty of mares before in his life, but somehow, vulgar Stalliongradi pickup lines didn’t seem like the right approach here.
“Would you... like to get dinner some time?”
Fluttershy’s eyes grew very wide, and she hid behind her mane when she responded. “Well, um, you see... I’d love to... as a friend.”
She darted out of the room before Ink could reply, and it took him a moment of long breaths to restore his resolve. He would probably have wandered off in search of ‘eggnog’ that very moment, were it not for Rarity wandering up to his side.
“I’m not so sure Fluttershy’s ready for that kind of a relationship, Mr. Ink. But your mention of Prince Blueblood does bring something to mind. You’re something like the ‘Prince’ of Stalliongrad yourself, correct?”
Ink shrugged, debating silently to himself whether or not. “My father is Tsar. You could say that. He would be furious.”
Rarity placed a hoof over her mouth as she laughed. “Well, the thing is, I’ve always rather had a fantasy for going to the Gala with a glorious prince. My last try didn’t work out quite so well, but I was rather looking forward to not going to this year’s Gala alone.”
“Gala?”
“The Grand Galloping Gala,” Rarity answered. “It’s quite a big deal here in the Domain of Canterlot; everypony who is anypony attends. This year, Princess Luna is holding a masked ball, and it should be so much fun. Twilight got us all tickets, as always, but I’ve rather been dreading another incident like the last time I attended. So I was wondering if you might consider being my date for the night?”
Silently, Ink wondered why the prissy mare who had been so enamored with his brother’s Prench scarves and droves of money would ask him over the other ‘Prince’ of Stalliongrad. Little did he know that Rarity was well aware of the ‘Lollypop Incident’. Frankly, that’s both a story for another time, and a story that likely isn’t comfortable enough to be told.
Ink cocked his brow. “I’m not much of a dancer. And I’m very busy tonight. I have a meeting with a sculptor about the assassin―”
“You mean you’re going to unpetrify her?”
In an astounding temptation of fate, Ink nodded. “I don’t see how it could possibly do any harm, now that we have her captured. But regardless, she is likely to tie up the rest of my evening.”
“Oh, the Gala isn’t tonight. It won’t be for another few months. Think of it as a night to relax, after some time with a very hard job.”
Ink placed a hoof on his chest. “You and me? What happens at this ‘Gala’?”
“Oh, the usual. Dancing. Socializing. I’m certain after last time we attended, it will prove to be calm and pleasant. I can’t imagine any of your work will show up that night.”
Across the world, philosophers stirred in their beds, shaken by a great disturbance in the concept of ‘truth’, as though a million voices had cried out in deception, and then were suddenly silenced.
Ink, who was about as far from a philosopher as a gigantic boulder is from a diamond, grinned. “I suppose we can make something happen, Rarity.”
“Don’t take it as any sort of romantic proposal, Mr. Ink.” Rarity walked away, though she did flick his nose with her coiled tail as she left. “At least, not so far in advance.”
Ink was left standing alone in a costume of his mentor’s armor backstage, staring blankly at the door. Only one word came to his addled mind.
Кобылицы.
- - -
Sweet Apple Acres
2043 Hours
“Resistant, you comin’ inside tonight?” Granny Smith shouted. “Y’d better not be out there drinkin’ like ya was at Applebuck Season.”
Stoikaja sighed. “I ain’t drinkin, ma’am. An’ I had my part of the orchard done anyhow, so I don’t see why it matters what I do on my time.”
The snappiness of the mare’s response caught Granny Smith’s attention. Pulling her shawl tighter around her withered shoulders, the old mare stepped out of the gentle warmth of the house and into winter’s bitter embrace.
“What’s wrong, dearie? Ya been seemin’ so blue lately.”
“...I don’t take too kindly ta this season, ma’am.”
The old mare rested a gentle hoof on Stoikaja’s shoulder. “Family?”
The younger mare’s silence was all the answer Granny Smith needed.
“Well, yer welcome t’ join us if’n ya want some company for Hearth’s Warmin’; Applejack jus’ got home an’ we got enough supper on th’ table ta feed half the town.”
“No, Ah couldn’t-”
“It wasn’t a suggestion. Asides, I’m sure Big Mac’d love to keep ya company.” The old mare grinned for a moment before seriousness returned to her voice. “Nopony should be alone tonight.”
The Stalliongradi mare stared at the snowing sky before she nodded. “Ah’ll... Ah’ll be in ‘n a bit... Ah promise.”
Satisfied, Granny Smith smiled to Resistant and gave her shoulder a gentle pat. Quickly as her old bones would allow, she made her way back to the warmth of her home. Stoikaja watched her as she went, her ears hearing the faint sounds of laughter from inside.
The foals laughed, chasing one another about the cramped living room. She watched them from the couch, a smile on her lips.
Scowling, Stoikaja cast her gaze to the skies, silently cursing the snow that fell over the fertile earth. Snowflakes fell upon her, cold like death and melting into her coat like tears. She hated snow, she hated the things it carried. The old ache only worsened when she heard the wings approach.
He landed just behind her, snow crunching under his hooves. She didn’t turn to face him, and for a moment, he didn’t move to approach her. Her breath caught in her throat when he took a step, his cold body sitting beside her.
“...Stoikaja?” he spoke.
“You shouldn’t be here...”
The night guard extended his left wing, draping it over her shoulders to shield her from the snow. Though it kept the snowflakes and the calm breeze away, the leathery wing lacked the heat to really compete with a blanket. “It’s Hearth’s Warming Eve. I couldn’t let it pass without seeing you.”
“If she finds out―”
“She trusts me,” he answered quickly, “and even if she knew to ask, I wouldn’t tell her you were here.”
Stoikaja sighed, her head ever so slightly nodding. Then her thoughts turned to grimmer topics. “Is he alive?”
The night guard’s slitted yellow eyes briefly met On’s. “...Yes.”
On lowered her head, her lips pulled into a tight frown. “Why?”
“You know why,” he answered, his voice quiet.
She shook her head, long strands of blonde mane swaying over her face. “What he did to Neustannaja and Upornyj... what he did to you...”
The night guard leaned his head back, gazing into the snowy skies. “He’s still my brother.”
Stoikaja looked him in the eye, the pain of a mother’s loss reflected in her expression. “They were our children!”
The stallion reached into his armor, retrieving a tiny crystal that seemed to be made of the night sky itself. It swirled with colors; blues and purples of every shade and dotted with little pinpricks of light that flickered like stars.
Two little voices sang to her. Their laughter and joy radiating warmth better than any palace hearthfire. They smiled and told her the words...
“W-what is that?” she asked, her vision blurring with unshed tears.
“A message, and a gift,” he answered, holding it out for her. “I brought it along when I got my day in the sun. They said they love you, and they miss you.”
With a trembling hoof, she reached out for the crystal. She hesitated only a hair's breadth from touching it, afraid to lose the warmth. Her heart skipped a beat when she touched it, the warmth filling her like an emptied cup.
“Don’t be sad, mommy!”
“We’re always here for you!”
Stoikaja recoiled, the wall she had built around her heart crumbling as the tears ran down her cheeks. He was there in an instant, his strong hooves catching her and pulling her to him. The mighty soldier... the weary soldier... the broken soldier... she wept into his shoulder, and he held her close for as long as she needed.
“It’ll be alright,” he whispered, a hoof petting her mane.
She wished she could believe him as easily as she used to, before he was turned, before she had desecrated what he was. Where there was once warmth there was now only a deathly chill. It pulled the heat from her body and reminded her of the winters she hated so.
“It’s hard, I know,” he said, his hooves rubbing her back, “but you have to be strong for them, Stoikaja. I need you to be strong for them.”
“They need you, too...” she answered, her voice barely a whisper in the breeze.
He leaned down to kiss her forehead. “I’m doing what I can.”
With a sigh, she reluctantly nodded, and let her hooves slip around his back to hold him close. His cold armor made her shiver, but she didn’t dare let him go. They held each other tightly, enjoying the precious few moments of peace for what they were. Reluctantly, he pulled away, his eyes meeting hers.
“You should go inside. Warm up, have some fun.”
“I don’t―”
He pressed a gentle hoof to her lips, silencing her. With the other he held out the crystal. “Please, Stoikaja. For us...”
With a sigh, she took the crystal in her hooves, losing herself to her thoughts as she stared into its depths. He spread his batlike wings in preparation to fly, she barely managed to snap herself free of the crystal's spell in time to stop his flight with a hoof to his shoulder.
They stared into each other’s eyes, sorrow and resolve mixing with the distant memories of happier times. There were no words as they leaned forward, lips meeting in a soft kiss.
“I love you, Stoikaja, never forget that.”
“I love you too, Polnoch.”
Well.
Um...
Quite a plot twist.
Wow.
...
Wow.
Loved this story. I'm really sad it's over now. Keep up the good work!
Aww.....
Damn son that was good, I was not expecting that.
Oh and one question have we been told how the night gaurd are made or was this just a hint?
3063772
This is a pretty big hint. In fact, at this point, it should be pretty obvious. I've told you all the rules as to how they work (in Act 1), and given a pretty big heads up as to 'Hey, here's an example of them following one of those rules!' (in Act 2).
I'll just go ahead and say that he's one of the three characters that Act 2 (Ghosts of the Past) is named after.
3063835 well I'm unable to remember much but it doesn't really matter because I plan on rereading all of your works in this continuation once you finish them.
Taking into account the length of this story, plus Act 1 and Act 2, I want to make sure that you understand that now, more than ever, I am convinced you are a sentient typewriter. That will only accepts ribbons made with red ink.
That is all.
That twist at the end, damn.
3064211 What about ribbons made of Red Ink? Will be accepted too?
Polnoch Is alive?!
And had kids with Stoikaja?!
Epilogue twist , Level : Metal Gear Solid.
3064462
Sure. Why not?
3064471
Don't tell Loyal I told you, but the real twist is that the whole story takes place in the modern world. Equestria is just modern Bulgaria, but fenced off as the worlds largest nature preserve after a lady in the water told M. Night Shamalan the secret of Rosebud. Shhh!
In all seriousness, Loyal, this is truly one of my favorite stories on the site. Clever, funny, and engaging to the very end. You took a very flat "Rarr I'm angry" character, made him sympathetic, funny, and likable in an antihero kind of way. It was a pleasure to have the opportunity to help out on this in the ways I could.
Your ability to
force me at the threat of violence to sympathize with your characterswrite good characters that I actually care about is outstanding. You were the first person I started following on Fimfic, and if I could only choose one author it would be you. Also, as much as I hate to see this work end, do we get more Act II now?A "Prince" for Rarity, eh? I suppose that you have to work with what's available.
Go Rarity!
Holy shit! Holy shit! So that's the reason for "Third Brother"! I've been wondering what the revelation might be after seeing the blog post yesterday, and wow did it live up to the secrecy request.
Okay, now to think on it a little. I just went back and looked at the family portrait last chapter and he didn't have bat wings, so however that happened, I'm assuming it happened after his "day in the sun". There's also the question of how and when he was brought back, not to mention by who. If I'm not mistaken about the timing, Luna would still have been NMM and in the moon when he originally died, so unless she randomly brought him back after a rather extended stay that leaves us with Tia, one of the other god figures, or possibly some other process that produces the bat ponies.
There's also the question of the relationship and when it started, when it produced the two kids, and when those things happened in relation to the bat pony status.
This also more or less explains why Third Brother is important enough to have been on the assassination list, assuming I'm remembering that correctly.
Hmmnn... Very interesting, and what an astonishing twist.
3063835 What chapter (or chapters) in Act 1 had the bat pony info? I vaguely remember a scene with them, like in their barracks, but it's been a while.
3065250
If I remember right, we met third brother first right after Rainbow's bar fight. Chapter IV.
She then talked about night guard with Luna in Chapter XVI.
Then it was during prophesies, but I don't remember chapter.
P.S. I remember nothing right.
As I told LL, it should've been Foresight. He is First Prince, He is Unicorn. He wear most fashionable Prench scarves. And he is a gentlecolt.
3065242
Actually, I've been very careful about the timing on Polnoch. He died ~3-6 months after Luna's return (or, as I like to think of it, around the same time as Winter Wrap-Up). Some day, I'll put up a timeline, but you're still missing about half the story. On's the one who narrates a lot of this history in GotP, so that should clear up any confusion.
3065191
No, Ink is not dead. Yes, he burned his way out. I mean, come on, I made him fight a monster made of wood. What were you expecting?
3065250
There is some information on the Night Guard in Chapter 4, when Rainbow meets 3rd Brother after the bar fight. But that isn't what I was referring to. In fact, the Night Guard aren't mentioned at all in the context I was talking about.
3065915
I added a bit of text following your comment, Keyesty. The reason Rarity isn't going for Foresight is because Foresight has a reputation for... well, I could say this diplomatically, but instead, I'm going to do it the right way. Everypony thinks that Foresight loves to suck lollypopth, and since Rarity is clearly in it for the romance, and she isn't in possession of a lollypop herself, that significantly narrows her choices.
Also, she does know Ink an awful lot better than Foresight.
3065090
Gah, I missed one. Yes, I'm writing Act II, Chapter 11 actively. It's coming along nicely; I wonder what you'll all think of Luna's scene with the information you now have access to. I'm sure Celestia's commentary about the political implications of the Night Guard make a bit more sense.
3066095 Okay, so I was mistaken on the timing. That does make the most sense, given that it really would be weird to be generating bat ponies sans-Luna. I think that also answers my questions about the timing of the kids, since he apparently visited with them while he was in the afterlife.
Yeah, figures about the Timberwolf. The moment it stepped into the scene I was expecting it to end up on fire.
Wow. Just... Wow. Thanks for this awesome piece of work, and I hope to see more of your masterpieces complete in the (near) future.
Pega-ace
P.S THAT PLOT TWIST AT THE END! You sir, are a GENIUS. One question though: Why doesn't Restraint tell Red Ink that Polnoch is alive? It would stop him from trying to kill her, wouldn't it?
P.P.S I think you italicised "rancorous" wrongly in the previous chapter. Only the first half of it is in italics.
3076827
And who does she blame for killing him, hmm?
Also, 'alive' is a generous term here.
Much like a wizard, I am never too frugal, nor too liberal in my application of italics. I use them exactly as I intend to.
(I couldn't find a video of Luke fighting the thing, but he hits it in the finger with a rock, and sticks an enormous femur in its mouth. In case you're a disgrace to cinema everywhere and haven't seen that movie)
3079801
Wait, so is he dead, or not? I have forgotten where the explaination of Nights Guards is. Also, something tells me there is more to this story... These sort of things keep me hooked for WLL: GOTP.
Oh, and the last time I watched Star Wars episode VI was when I was 8 or 9... Can't remember much of it now. (Btw I'm a teen)
Great stuff. Cannot wait for all the bits and pieces to start lining up.
3082156
The explanation I assume you're looking for has not yet been written. You do have almost all the pieces; certainly enough that simple logic should fill in the missing bits. But I won't spoil your fun, or anyone else's, by handing out the answer in the comments.
3084171
Did I really? In that scene? Great job, Loyal. Pat on the back. Not shooting the emotions in the foot or anything there...
In about twenty seconds, I will have no idea what you are talking about. The author disavows any knowledge of that typo. This comment may or may not self-destruct in an indeterminate amount of time.
3086190
So there hasen't been an explaination on how bat ponies work yet? Huh. Let's get cracking... "goes off to think about it"
3084171 3086190
So much for editing.
In my excuse, I was too much into Rawr!tm for Ink, that some parts could've been overlooked because of red haze. Emotions can do that.
3087579
I have explained many of the necessary mechanics; just not in the context of the Night Guard specifically. Dig or postulate at your discretion.
Also, Eldest Sister would probably commit murder over the term 'batpony'. Just sayin'.
3090444
... "I'm Batpony."
HOLY FUCKING TWIST
3318015 Ah yes, I've heard much about the anomaly of Ruirik.
3336337
No war is a dry-and-cut matter. Some
peopleponies say the dragons started it, with their pillaging, and the accidental death of some ponies. Some say that was always going to happen, and that Frostbite started it by his aggressive, militant reaction. Some say it was Krenn's fault, for the way he tried to resolve the problem (more on that in Ghosts of the Past).Of those targets, can you guess who Roscherk blames?
I'm not sure how I feel about that whole "dead but not really" thing going on with Polnoch, usually I consider such plot twists cheap gimmicks, but in this case it may have some logic behind it.
Still, this may result in one hell of a revelation-filled chapter down the line in WLL Act 2.
3340306
I think Roscherk would have blamed Baron even if he was actively stopping (or at least impeding )the war, because for Red Ink there are only two kinds of opinions: his own and the false ones.
P.S.
Would you kindly consider answering my questions posted on the forum (especially about the well being of Baron Frostbite)? Заранее спасибо.
3355480
I guess I'll start with the first post and work my way up:
That bit of dialogue you wrote is... surprisingly accurate, even if your italics create a not completely true insinuation.
There were three forces behind my portrayal of horse-Dostoyevsky. I'll be brutally honest that the first doesn't have anything to do with MLP, and everything to do with my assigned Freshman-year English reading list.
I don't like Dostoyevsky very much. And his writing always seemed very bitter to me (no surprise, considering what he went through), which is another thing that I don't really like. Maybe I'm being a hypocrite; if I am, I don't care.
It also struck me as a funny idea that you might come across a political dissident who would complain about the political system, even if said system were really good. And, to that end, that his more deep and meaningful works just didn't sell in the Domain of Canterlot because 90% of the time, life is just peachy and everypony is perfectly content to be living under Celestia and Luna.
Ultimately, however, those are consequences of a much more literal need on my end: a Russian author whose name I could use as a pun. I came up with 'Dostudyevsky' fairly quickly, and the similarities in his early life to the political issues of Stalliongrad led me to start tying the character more closely to his real-world counterpart.
In terms of his time on 'The Wall': though he's certainly had a violent life, Ink hasn't really had to endure any hardship or imprisonment on that level. He might know 'academically', but without having experienced it himself, Ink just doesn't care. You know, cause he's Ink.
- - -
3355590
I'm not sure how densely this has been covered, since the iconic use of the ability is in Snow and Shadows, but Fire Empatha can be used to purge toxins from the blood, and cauterize wounds. It hurts like hell (Tartarus?), but it also means you get to walk away. Also, yes, Ink is walking around in Tactical Plot Armor - after all, I'm not going to kill him in a comedy fic.
In regard to Celestia, let me just go ahead and make a little list here:
Twilight, fight my evil sister; I'm not going to warn you ahead of time.
Twilight, take your friends up a mountain and get rid of this dragon.
Twilight, take your friends and go fight the god of chaos. My quasi-deific sister and I are just gonna sit back here in the castle, rather than offering you any sort of support or protection. Oh, except that I guess I'll give you some sagacious advice by returning all your mail.
Twilight, go fight a thousand year old spirit of evil. You can take your friends, so they'll be in danger from him too, but - and let me stress this - they aren't actually allowed to help you fight him.
In all of the above situations, Celestia hasn't had any guarantee of the outcome. She's shown that she's completely willing to gamble with the lives of her 'precious little ponies' - and not just any of them, but the most important six of all. Yes, she has faith in Twilight - but then, reforming Discord was a vastly more dangerous risk than reforming Ink.
Ink isn't really a badass. Badassitude (what a hideous word) doesn't come from being strong or having magic. It comes from enduring hardship, and suffering, and continuing on instead of giving up. It's about drive, and determination, and grit. And Ink might have a bit of those things, but he falls rather short of several other characters in that regard. The important part about Ink is that he thinks he's the biggest badass in Equestria. I can't wait for him to find out that he's wrong.
The subtle (and maybe slightly racist) joke about Ink's bad Equiish is that he deliberately speaks with a ~60's era 'Soviet Accent'. I wrote him such that he would sound like a bad stereotype of a Russian in any American media from the Cold War. Part of that is because I don't know how to phonetically type out real common mistakes of Russians who are only just learning English, and part of it is because the 'fake bad-English' is a lot easier to read and understand than the real mistakes that people make.
It's important to note that, despite his Equiish being awful, the only times anypony ever has to have Ink stop and re-explain what he meant were for comedic effect. It glosses over a lot of the finesse and challenges of real inter-lingual communication, but nobody actually wants to sit and read a bunch of pages of Ink saying "I must find one ballroom." and then have it be picked apart until you realize that he's actually just mispronouncing 'bathroom'. Brevity is the soul of wit, or something.
3355692
Well, I probably don't have to tell you that I don't think it's a cheap gimmick; after all, I wrote it. But that's been in the works for a very long time (in fact, he was introduced before Roscherk and Predvidenie. I didn't just name him randomly, after all).
Yeah, Ink has this very binary 'blame' concept going on:
Was it 5-6 years ago, or earlier?
If so, blame Frostbite.
If not, blame Stoikaja.
I like your comment there at the end about the 2 kinds of opinions Ink recognizes.
I'll get on the forums for you shortly here. Actually, 24 and I just finished a rather involved conversation about how best to answer your question about spirits and what-have-you.
Dear EVERYONE ELSE: You see this guy? You see Fillosof here? Look at his questions. Look at his comments. This is an awesome reader. Props to him. Be more like him. Ask awesome questions.
-Loyal
3357975
Well, thank you for that huge input, though I think all that flattery wasn't really necessary.
There is still one itsy-bitsy little thing that I found somewhat lacking in this fic, in chapter 7 to be precise.
I know that this was something that should have contradicted your previous statement about not-at-all-meta nature of Pinkies Super Powers, and wasn't supposed to be funny, but I was pretty dumbfounded when I saw this for the first time. I also still this moment can't figure out where that came from and why didn't you use something like this instead:
earning a good amount of "oldfag points"
brynjolf.lima-city.de/Internet/120253191433.jpg
I still think that messing up some tenses (how much does one really need?) or forgetting to use a proper article (gets me personally almost all the time) would have seem more natural as far as Russian speaker's derps in English go, but I guess if it works don't fix it, right? Plus you have pointed out at some point that Ink's mistakes were at least partially caused by his disregard towards anything foreign.
Also, if it won't be too much of a problem, I would like you to point out for me some of the most significant books, films and everything else really which contains character's with that "60's Soviet accent". Those of them that aren't in fact parodies of the phenomenon in question but genuine samples.
3360612
In case you missed it, the bit of dialogue about Pinkie not breaking the fourth wall didn't even survive it's own paragraph.
I tried for a while to find you some Youtube clips of gerund-using Russian accents, but it seems my efforts were in vain in that regard. Ivan Drago (?) from Rocky IV is a decent example, though the ones that really come to mind are some of the russians from the early Bond films (the namesake of this fic, for example); I'll come up with a better example some time, but I'm on vacation now and not really thinking of good examples. Maybe the KGB agent from the 4th Indiana Jones movie? I don't remember her, because I have selectively deleted my memories of that 'film'.
The problem is that the 'accent' I'm parodying here is obviously bad, and would represent a low production quality in a non-parody-esque work. You should be looking for 'B-movies', rather than the big name films of the era.
3381020
Ok, good sir, I will dive into a pile of Cold War junk, when I will have enough courage and if I will be able to find titles that aren't super obscure.
I admit, I did miss that first bit, but even though I would like to know why and how exactly did you come up with that joke. Also, it doesn't resemble anything I'm aware of as far as proverbs or even anecdotes go, both Russian and English ones.
Wait, what? I never was a fan of IJ movies, I never even saw one from from beginning to an end, but that still strike me as something odd. Have they ran out of Nazis? And why the heck would agents of the State's Security Committee ( i.e. Intelligence Agency) be involved with something like alien artifacts?
Well, that last section is mainly addressed towards anyone else who will read this, seeing as LL doesn't want to get anywhere near that movie
3382326
I mostly jest. IJ 4 was a bad movie, in my not terribly humble opinion, but I'm not about to lose sleep over it. Because it was made very recently, Harrison Ford is considerably older than he was during the original three films. In order to explain this age-gap away, they moved the timeline forward, so that Indy is also much older, and it is now the Cold War. Nazis are no more, and Soviets are the new 'obvious villains'.
I'm not totally sure I understand what you're asking for clarification on, so I'll do my best to explain the quoted passage. The narrator is going on a long speech about how Pinkie can't break the 4th wall. He concludes by directly addressing Pinkie. She replies to him, in a clear breach of the 4th wall, thus rendering what he just got done saying completely false.
That was the bit that I, till this day, can't understand when it comes to a joke's meaning (besides the 4th wall breaking that was done earlier) or at least it's source.
Speaking of which, how do my version fare in your opinion?
Well, that's true, but they (we) were obvious down to earth villains, and even in old and more over the top Bond movies we (they) had better things to do then chasing acient stories about aliens.
One also shouldn't forget that in the time this movie is set in there were thousands of former Nazi war-criminals around as well as their sympathizers, especially in South America.
TL;DR : Writers did IMHO an awful job with the script.
3385118
OH!
It's a play off of the English words 'rushing' and 'stalling', conjugated forms of 'rush' and 'stall'. In a lot of English dialects around the world, people will drop the 'g' at the end of a gerund or other word ending in '-ing'. Thus,
It's a terrible, terrible joke. If it were actually clever, somepony other than Pinkie Pie would have said it. The entire point there was that she was making a reference that doesn't work in Equestria, because they don't have a 'Russia' or a 'Stalin' to make that joke with.
Your 'Russian Reversal' was absolutely brilliant, though it actually works better in the real world (Stalliongrad does not have "the Party", at least in a political sense). It was a good joke, and it reads very well. Might have to save that for Family Vacation.
You already know my opinion on the script for that film. C'est la vie.
3389174
Wow, that's so obvious...
My only excuse (albeit a flimsy one) is that, being a nonnative English speaker and living in Russia, I don't hear English sayings and proverbs very often.
I'm glad to hear that you have liked 'my' version of that joke, because IMO it's both true to the original (the only funny joke in the Yakov Naumovich's whole repertoire) and appropriate.
Oh, and I think that it works just as good here, because Pinkie undoubtedly is an avatar of the Perpetual Party.
You were kidding, right? You can't possibly really think that, now do you?
I called that dead on. A few chapters ago, I just had the thought, and I looked at Ruirik's art, and then it all clicked. Polnoch lives on, more or less, as Third Brother. The surprise that got me is that he and Stoikaja were together. How... didn't Ink know? If he knew then I don't think he'd have such a bloodlust for On.
My first thought is that they're talking about Ink, but I've got the strangest inkling that they're talking about... the other one, the lollypopth one. One of my favorite parts of this story was just to watch Ink grow. He is an interesting character to read about, and you made him so lovable and easy to hate at the same time. I like how he pines over Fluttershy, since she's like the polar opposite of him in many ways. Maybe Ink will find love one day. I'm tempted, oh so very tempted, to break my rule of not reading a story until it's done so that I can start reading GotP.
I liked this story, but not anywhere near how much I liked Honor Guard and Song of Storms 1-2. This was a comedy, and it was a good one, but comedy will never be something I can sit and read a lot of. What kept me going were the glimpses into the past and the goofy antics... and my general love for your writing. I look forward to reading whatever it is I read next by you, which will most likely be Ghosts of the Past. I've already got some ideas about who gets some screen time in that story, as well as The badass that we all barely know but still love. Until then!
~SolidFire
Oh wow. I DID NOT see that coming. What a twist!
I can see the little hints that were placed know that I know to look for them, but daaaaang that was a good twist.
Wait a sec, though. Midnight should know that Ink's bloodlust for Soldier On was because of him,so why doesn't he just reveal himself to Ink: "Hey, you don't have to hunt down this mare; I'm still alive"?
First The Hobbit, now Star Wars!
Well that depends. What if it's a giant coal boulder?
- Rex Draconum a.k.a ArchangelGabriel
Mother of Luna... right in the frackin feels...