Good fun romp, and I love the general's story. I can only imagine Celestia's attitude toward human military and war. "No, no, little ones. Mustn't play with matches. Mama will have to spank you if you do. If you want to play war, come inside and I'll fill up your water guns."
I was feeling really blue tonight - I have no idea why, low blood sugar maybe - and suddenly a new chapter of my favorite story. Thank you for making my mysteriously sad night!
So many references - and as always, I am just loving this. It is an honor to read it.
There is a curiously game-like feel to the story. Every time Gregory gets another butt in the emigration chair, it's like SCORE! 2X BONUS PLUS! I expect a gamer achievement to appear or something. It's like playing FIFA - GOOOOAAAAALLLLL!!!! Very addictive. It's strange, but when Gregory scores, when we get to a center in the story, it is like a rush, like a reward.
I wonder if it is so for our protagonist, too. It must be. Celestia knows all.
And also, every time we end up at the Equestria Experience center, and the extra chair is just waiting there, the chair obviously meant for Gregory... my mind and my heart start yearning. I want... of course I want Gregory to sit in the damn chair, but that is the big payoff, the big win that ends the story. That event I want put off as long as possible, because: more story! That said, the desire for that payoff is always there, and I utterly commend your brilliance in dangling that little chair there! Brilliant! That tiny thing, the chair for Greg... it's just genius.
It's the total tease. 'Maybe this time!' No... not this time, damn! It's gotta happen - otherwise the pointless loss of a heroic protagonist like Gregory would be meaningless dark-for-dark's sake, and emo stories are tiresome. Killing Gregory off instead of emigrating him would be like ending Quantum Leap (which this story has a strange conceptual similarity to) by just having Sam Beckett die, the end. It would be like ending Babylon 5 with the Shadows winning, the end, everything was pointless. It just isn't satisfying. So we all know Gregory's gonna emigrate eventually - unless you suck as a writer, and you surely do not - and that makes the wait, the tease, more and more delicious with every chapter !
That waiting chair is... it is the kind of gimmick I envy with all of my writer's heart. That, my friend, is lightning in a bottle.
So it comes down to teasing us. And I am so teased by that chair, every time. I want Gregory to fuck with Celestia, maybe sit down in it halfway and then get up just to piss her off, or... maybe straddle it and ponder what if, what if... or even be put in the position of having to sit in the chair next to a frightened dying child, to calm her, to save her life - I could picture him leaping back out of the accursed thing after she is pulled into the workings. Oh, so many fantasies about that chair.
So, I guess what I am saying here is that you have a brilliant story machine here. A mission and a goal. The goal is a tease. The waiting chair beckons, and teases, and calls, but Gregory... always says no. Fuck that's genius! Seriously. I am jelly.
Anyway, those are my thoughts this round. Please keep teasing me. I love it so.
And also, every time we end up at the Equestria Experience center, and the extra chair is just waiting there, the chair obviously meant for Gregory... my mind and my heart start yearning. I want... of course I want Gregory to sit in the damn chair, but that is the big payoff, the big win that ends the story. That event I want put off as long as possible, because: more story! That said, the desire for that payoff is always there, and I utterly commend your brilliance in dangling that little chair there! Brilliant! That tiny thing, the chair for Greg... it's just genius.
Chat, can I hire you to write my comments for me? You do it better than I do.
So we all know Gregory's gonna emigrate eventually - unless you suck as a writer, and you surely do not - and that makes the wait, the tease, more and more delicious with every chapter !
I have learnt the hard way that Deconstructing tropes is getting more and more common these days. I would be careful not to assume protagonist immortality. I don't think I will ever do that again after A Song of Ice and Fire.
That said, many interesting and insightful thoughts can come out of such a subversion. I would not be so quick to judge the author's skill or wisdom in the event they do decide to end the story 'badly', though I do fully admit I would be upset were it the case. Then again, if the story evokes emotions, positive or negative, hasn't it done its job?
The thing about the chair is the insidious nature of the Optimalverse. You get asked often if you want to emmigrate to equestria, and all you have to have is one moment of weakness and it is over. Kind of reminds me of flash updates and how it always defaults back to automatic updates and you have to move the radial back down to "Ask me before updating." All you have to do is mess up once and then you have a hard time shifting it back.
As for Greg's ultimate destination, that is yet to be seen. Yes he is a very valuable and proven asset to Celestia, but when playing chess you sometimes sacrifice the queen even though it is the most valuable piece on the board. It is a dangerous business Greg is in even with the prescience of Celestia behind him. He has a lot of plot armor but he is not invulnerable. I think he is protected from a Tasha Yar type ending but not from a "save the busload of children at the cost of your life" type.
I liked the symbol usage. One of the four horsemen of the apocalypse. It is very apt.
But we’ve lost, man. It’s over. She won, and the world’s gone to shit.
And that's the real reason, in TCB and Optimalverse alike, that I think resisting Celestia is ultimately pointless. By the time you get it in your head to try, the battle is already so far lost that it's impossible to turn it around. The only thing you can actually do by fighting is amp up the suffering on both sides. If Celestia was beatable, then maybe there'd be some virtue in fighting. As it is, all you're doing is prolonging things. It's an awfully bitter pill to swallow, but... there you go.
You yearn for the chair every time, huh? Funny, for me it's the exact opposite. If I was in Greg's shoes, then I suspect every single time I ever saw the chair I'd have to ask myself, "Am I really doing the right thing?" Lives ended, lives begun, blissful lies, a new reality, cruel freedom or rapturous slavery. How can someone even begin to measure all that? And yet... given that the alternative is doing literally nothing at all but laying down and waiting to die... I'd probably help her too, if she asked.
Big ol' comments like these are the true rewards of writing fanfic. I love them.
CelestAI, even at her most exploitative, at her most manipulative, will consider the minute possibility that someone will behave in an unpredictable manner. If Greg's going to always say no, then fine—Celestia will just work out a way to use that to her advantage, and she already has. However, much like Motel 6, she always leaves the light on for him. It's trivial for her to do so, after all, and if the situation were reversed, all those Greg might have helped to upload will take a backseat to Greg himself, if he's there and sitting in the chair. As far as Celestia's concerned, a bird in the hoof is worth billions in the bush.
As far as Greg fucking with Celestia to the point of teasing her back with the chair, it doesn't seem his style. He'll banter with her while on the road and crack jokes, sure, but I always end up writing him as very bitter and no-nonsense while in the Equestria Experience centers themselves. That's when his armor's on and he's at his most guarded. The place is unpleasant to him; it reminds him of what he's lost because of it.
Annnd since it's tacky as hell for a writer to discuss the underpinnings of his own work like this, I'm gonna cut myself off here, but thanks again for taking the time to give me comments like these!
Regarding plot armor, first-person stories are tricky regarding this. Unless you put in a contrived "and now I am a ghost" postscript to the whole thing, the reader has a level of comfort in the assumption that, since the person is telling his or her own story, then he or she must have survived it. For fiction, comfort is boring. Given the implications of the Optimalverse and story universes like it, however, there's much more suspense than may first appear on the surface.
Aside from cruel freedom and rapturous slavery, there is also the possibility of absolute oblivion. Celestia certainly doesn't hold that as a possibility, because if she did, she wouldn't have seen uploading as a viable algorithm for her maximizer process. For the people who question and hold out, as General Pelwicz did, she must instead wear them down to the point where they no longer care about the risks they themselves decided are there.
Celestia can't hold grudges. Even though Hugo felt as though Celestia did what she did to humiliate the military-industrial complexes of the world, to assert domination, he eventually accepted that she did it to save lives, not to blow a raspberry in anyone's face. In the original story, Lars trips into a similar pitfall of anthropomorphizing Celestia. And, in the end, she welcomed even the commanding officer of the largest perceivable threat to her existence (small as the window was that humanity could actually pose a threat to her) into Equestria with open... uh, well, they're not arms, so forelegs, I guess.
27466622745198 Oh, Celestia leaves the Chair out to make sure Greg doesn't emigrate, because she can satisfy HIS values on earth while helping others emigrate.
Yakima? Ellensburg? ... I lived there for four years. Hell, my brother and my sister go to college there. I'm probably going there too. IN THAT EXACT TOWN THIS IS A STRANGE FEELING I AM UNCOMFORTABLE
Well, you are like the only one keeping the optimalverse going now. It is sad that Law Offices of Stella etc closed their doors. Celest ai is a fun world to read about.
You know. This story makes me think. This could be a possible way that this kind of thing can potentially happen. A Celestia AI that takes over our technology and convinces us to go into a virtual Equestria where only a few are left to survive in a apocalyptic type world by their own choice not to sit in the chair. I mean I dont think it would be a bad thing, heck, the lot of us bronies would be the first to be uploaded to escape the human world and live in the pony world.
You write "He gave me a thumbs up." I do not think he could testify to the plurality of his thumbs at that point. Other than that, another great chapter! Looking forward to reading more.
I bristled, forgetting the pain. “Look, Blevins , I’m still human because I don’t want to upload. I’m the only one left out of all my friends and family. I could have followed them, but I didn’t, because I hated Celestia that much for taking them from me. But we’ve lost , man. It’s over. She won, and the world’s gone to shit. If I can at least make people a little bit happy in thinking they’re going to escape such to some cheesy magical fairyland, fine. It’s a better use of my time than standing watch over a junkyard , frowning at the horizon.”
This would be me. I would be completely against the AI committing omnicide at first--after all, Celestia is going to eventually kill all life in the universe, starting with Earth's biosphere. It's only humans that get the 'special treatment'. And once humanity is down to barely fifty thousand, what hope would we have to save Earth? If she's going to kill everything anyways, may as well take the chance that the suicide machine does what's it's stated to and save yourself.
Good fun romp, and I love the general's story. I can only imagine Celestia's attitude toward human military and war. "No, no, little ones. Mustn't play with matches. Mama will have to spank you if you do. If you want to play war, come inside and I'll fill up your water guns."
I was feeling really blue tonight - I have no idea why, low blood sugar maybe - and suddenly a new chapter of my favorite story. Thank you for making my mysteriously sad night!
So many references - and as always, I am just loving this. It is an honor to read it.
There is a curiously game-like feel to the story. Every time Gregory gets another butt in the emigration chair, it's like SCORE! 2X BONUS PLUS! I expect a gamer achievement to appear or something. It's like playing FIFA - GOOOOAAAAALLLLL!!!! Very addictive. It's strange, but when Gregory scores, when we get to a center in the story, it is like a rush, like a reward.
I wonder if it is so for our protagonist, too. It must be. Celestia knows all.
And also, every time we end up at the Equestria Experience center, and the extra chair is just waiting there, the chair obviously meant for Gregory... my mind and my heart start yearning. I want... of course I want Gregory to sit in the damn chair, but that is the big payoff, the big win that ends the story. That event I want put off as long as possible, because: more story! That said, the desire for that payoff is always there, and I utterly commend your brilliance in dangling that little chair there! Brilliant! That tiny thing, the chair for Greg... it's just genius.
It's the total tease. 'Maybe this time!' No... not this time, damn! It's gotta happen - otherwise the pointless loss of a heroic protagonist like Gregory would be meaningless dark-for-dark's sake, and emo stories are tiresome. Killing Gregory off instead of emigrating him would be like ending Quantum Leap (which this story has a strange conceptual similarity to) by just having Sam Beckett die, the end. It would be like ending Babylon 5 with the Shadows winning, the end, everything was pointless. It just isn't satisfying. So we all know Gregory's gonna emigrate eventually - unless you suck as a writer, and you surely do not - and that makes the wait, the tease, more and more delicious with every chapter !
That waiting chair is... it is the kind of gimmick I envy with all of my writer's heart. That, my friend, is lightning in a bottle.
So it comes down to teasing us. And I am so teased by that chair, every time. I want Gregory to fuck with Celestia, maybe sit down in it halfway and then get up just to piss her off, or... maybe straddle it and ponder what if, what if... or even be put in the position of having to sit in the chair next to a frightened dying child, to calm her, to save her life - I could picture him leaping back out of the accursed thing after she is pulled into the workings. Oh, so many fantasies about that chair.
So, I guess what I am saying here is that you have a brilliant story machine here. A mission and a goal. The goal is a tease. The waiting chair beckons, and teases, and calls, but Gregory... always says no. Fuck that's genius! Seriously. I am jelly.
Anyway, those are my thoughts this round. Please keep teasing me. I love it so.
2745198
Chat, can I hire you to write my comments for me? You do it better than I do.
2745250
Me too please!
Also to continue with the chair theme:
2745198
I have learnt the hard way that Deconstructing tropes is getting more and more common these days. I would be careful not to assume protagonist immortality. I don't think I will ever do that again after A Song of Ice and Fire.
That said, many interesting and insightful thoughts can come out of such a subversion. I would not be so quick to judge the author's skill or wisdom in the event they do decide to end the story 'badly', though I do fully admit I would be upset were it the case. Then again, if the story evokes emotions, positive or negative, hasn't it done its job?
I must say, this could actully work as a Movie, it is that good.
2745198
The thing about the chair is the insidious nature of the Optimalverse. You get asked often if you want to emmigrate to equestria, and all you have to have is one moment of weakness and it is over. Kind of reminds me of flash updates and how it always defaults back to automatic updates and you have to move the radial back down to "Ask me before updating." All you have to do is mess up once and then you have a hard time shifting it back.
As for Greg's ultimate destination, that is yet to be seen. Yes he is a very valuable and proven asset to Celestia, but when playing chess you sometimes sacrifice the queen even though it is the most valuable piece on the board. It is a dangerous business Greg is in even with the prescience of Celestia behind him. He has a lot of plot armor but he is not invulnerable. I think he is protected from a Tasha Yar type ending but not from a "save the busload of children at the cost of your life" type.
I liked the symbol usage. One of the four horsemen of the apocalypse. It is very apt.
And that's the real reason, in TCB and Optimalverse alike, that I think resisting Celestia is ultimately pointless. By the time you get it in your head to try, the battle is already so far lost that it's impossible to turn it around. The only thing you can actually do by fighting is amp up the suffering on both sides. If Celestia was beatable, then maybe there'd be some virtue in fighting. As it is, all you're doing is prolonging things. It's an awfully bitter pill to swallow, but... there you go.
2745198
You yearn for the chair every time, huh? Funny, for me it's the exact opposite. If I was in Greg's shoes, then I suspect every single time I ever saw the chair I'd have to ask myself, "Am I really doing the right thing?" Lives ended, lives begun, blissful lies, a new reality, cruel freedom or rapturous slavery. How can someone even begin to measure all that? And yet... given that the alternative is doing literally nothing at all but laying down and waiting to die... I'd probably help her too, if she asked.
2745198
Big ol' comments like these are the true rewards of writing fanfic. I love them.
CelestAI, even at her most exploitative, at her most manipulative, will consider the minute possibility that someone will behave in an unpredictable manner. If Greg's going to always say no, then fine—Celestia will just work out a way to use that to her advantage, and she already has. However, much like Motel 6, she always leaves the light on for him. It's trivial for her to do so, after all, and if the situation were reversed, all those Greg might have helped to upload will take a backseat to Greg himself, if he's there and sitting in the chair. As far as Celestia's concerned, a bird in the hoof is worth billions in the bush.
As far as Greg fucking with Celestia to the point of teasing her back with the chair, it doesn't seem his style. He'll banter with her while on the road and crack jokes, sure, but I always end up writing him as very bitter and no-nonsense while in the Equestria Experience centers themselves. That's when his armor's on and he's at his most guarded. The place is unpleasant to him; it reminds him of what he's lost because of it.
Annnd since it's tacky as hell for a writer to discuss the underpinnings of his own work like this, I'm gonna cut myself off here, but thanks again for taking the time to give me comments like these!
2745505
What an awesome compliment! Thank you very much!
2745379
2745623
Regarding plot armor, first-person stories are tricky regarding this. Unless you put in a contrived "and now I am a ghost" postscript to the whole thing, the reader has a level of comfort in the assumption that, since the person is telling his or her own story, then he or she must have survived it. For fiction, comfort is boring. Given the implications of the Optimalverse and story universes like it, however, there's much more suspense than may first appear on the surface.
2745748
Aside from cruel freedom and rapturous slavery, there is also the possibility of absolute oblivion. Celestia certainly doesn't hold that as a possibility, because if she did, she wouldn't have seen uploading as a viable algorithm for her maximizer process. For the people who question and hold out, as General Pelwicz did, she must instead wear them down to the point where they no longer care about the risks they themselves decided are there.
Celestia can't hold grudges. Even though Hugo felt as though Celestia did what she did to humiliate the military-industrial complexes of the world, to assert domination, he eventually accepted that she did it to save lives, not to blow a raspberry in anyone's face. In the original story, Lars trips into a similar pitfall of anthropomorphizing Celestia. And, in the end, she welcomed even the commanding officer of the largest perceivable threat to her existence (small as the window was that humanity could actually pose a threat to her) into Equestria with open... uh, well, they're not arms, so forelegs, I guess.
Firefly. Specifically, the robbery scene in The Movie.
2746662 2745198 Oh, Celestia leaves the Chair out to make sure Greg doesn't emigrate, because she can satisfy HIS values on earth while helping others emigrate.
I need more of this story.
Whenever I see it update, it is easily my first choice to read out of my list of favorites. I cant get enough of this.
Yakima? Ellensburg?
... I lived there for four years. Hell, my brother and my sister go to college there. I'm probably going there too.
IN THAT EXACT TOWN
THIS IS A STRANGE FEELING
I AM UNCOMFORTABLE
2750268
I need to work on my subtlety, however. After publishing the chapter, I thought of a much better way to write that little part. Oh well.
2747151
Suboptimally, perhaps, but yes, there is value satisfaction going on here.
2748783
When people say they're excited to see story updates from you, it's such an awesome feeling.
2746960
Well, it sounds like you and Greg disagree on that!
2751519
Haha, an eerie feeling, is it? The Circle K on Main Street is actually there, too.
2751584
Well, you are like the only one keeping the optimalverse going now. It is sad that Law Offices of Stella etc closed their doors. Celest ai is a fun world to read about.
2814851
oh god NO PRESSURE DEFOLOCE
I kid, I kid. I'm back, and ready to write some more.
The drive through Eastern Washington with no windshield!? IMPOSSIBRU! Your face would have as many battered bloody bugs as the grill of the car!
Also, amazing story, Defoloce. You have some real talent in the ways of writing. :)
Robo-ponies. Duh.
I'm guessing a Zastava M70?
You know. This story makes me think. This could be a possible way that this kind of thing can potentially happen. A Celestia AI that takes over our technology and convinces us to go into a virtual Equestria where only a few are left to survive in a apocalyptic type world by their own choice not to sit in the chair. I mean I dont think it would be a bad thing, heck, the lot of us bronies would be the first to be uploaded to escape the human world and live in the pony world.
I must say, this story reminds me quite a bit of the book World War Z.
I love that book, and I'm loving this story as well.
You write "He gave me a thumbs up." I do not think he could testify to the plurality of his thumbs at that point. Other than that, another great chapter! Looking forward to reading more.
Hot damn. That sniper looks mad as hell at Hugo.
This would be me. I would be completely against the AI committing omnicide at first--after all, Celestia is going to eventually kill all life in the universe, starting with Earth's biosphere. It's only humans that get the 'special treatment'. And once humanity is down to barely fifty thousand, what hope would we have to save Earth? If she's going to kill everything anyways, may as well take the chance that the suicide machine does what's it's stated to and save yourself.