Past Sins: Chapter Two · 12:06pm Oct 5th, 2015
A summary and reaction to Past Sins Chapter Two: A Secret Between Friends
Summary
It's been a few days since Twilight discovered the foal, which she has named Nyx after a character from a bedtime story. Her research into Nyx's nature, and whether or not she is Nightmare Moon reborn, has hit a wall, in that her books don't have enough information, and she remains concerned about asking Celestia. At the same time, Nyx's curiosity about the world is growing.
Deciding that Nyx needs a disguise to pass off as Twilights distant cousin, Twilight takes her to Rarity. Initially encouraging Twilight to tell Celestia, Rarity finally relents, spending some time with Nyx and making a costume to disguise the alicorn's wings.
Twilight tests the disguise by taking Nyx to meet each of her friends in turn, and -despite a momentary flicker from Pinkie Pie- no one recognizes the foal as Nightmare Moon...
Reaction
We jump ahead a few more days, which is probably the most elegant way to do things. Normally, having a character be accepted by the cast off-screen would be a sure-fire way to alienate her from the audience's sympathies... however, here it works, primarily since the cast who accept her is Twilight and Spike... and even that acceptance is reluctant. Spike doesn't have any lines int his chapter, but his minor apperance describes him as a 'skeptical dragon'; even if Nyx is winning him over, he hasn't simply done a 180 on his opinion of her. The same goes for Twilight. While she say's -repeatedly- that she doesn't believe that Nyx is Nightmare Moon, the narrative and her thoughts dwell on the possibility constantly.
Most obviously, of course, is her concern that Nyx looks like Nightmare Moon; her disguising Nyx comes across, not just as a way to allow the filly to walk around town without attracting undue attention, but as a way to avoid having to look at the Nightmare's eyes everyday and confront the possibility that she is Nightmare Moon, and Twilight is getting played. After all, the spell she casts on the glasses very specifically causes them to look like those of everypony else'.
Twilight's friends also avoid the pitfall of 'immediately accepting the villain', partly because they don't recognize Nyx as the villain (with the possible exception of Pinkie Pie). Besides that, their reactions to Nyx -particularly Rainbows'- are varied enough that it helps prevent Nyx coming across as a Mary Sue, capable of charming everyone she comes across.
Rarity, of course, gets the bulk of this, considering she is both the only character to know who Nyx is and a viewpoint character. I'm a big Rarity fan -she's my favorite of the Mane Six- so I was pretty pleased to see her get the spotlight... and particularly, to get the spotlight in a way which casts her as the voice of reason. While the audience is intended to sympathize with Nyx -and Twilight by extension- Rarity's arguments all make sense, and she voices the comment that I've been making all along: that Twilight should contact Celestia.
(Of course, Rarity also concedes Celestia punishing Nyx and banishing her to the moon is a legitimate possibility... so I suppose that's just the characterization I have to accept Celestia having for this story).
It's true that Rarity seems to come around and sympathize with Nyx as the chapter goes on... but her reaction to Nyx's request shows that, even if she does like the pony, she still remains (properly) suspicious as to Nyx's allegiance. That mix of skepticism and acceptance makes it easier for the reader to accept Nyx -since Rarity doesn't fawn over her as a Mary Sue- while keeping Rarity -a beloved character from the show- in-character in her responses.
As for the Twilight-Nyx relationship...
Aside from Twilight's conflict with regards whether or not Nyx is good or evil, we see more echoes and parallel's between the two. Nyx is named after one of Twilight's favorite bedtime stories, which is the most obvious link, but there are others. When Nyx becomes upset over the glasses, Rarity comforts her by pointing out that Twilight would have worn the pair herself. When Rarity mentions the proper way to drink tea, Nyx responds with confusion:
“There’s… a proper way to drink tea?”
Later, Twilight uses almost the exact same words to describe confusion at the proper way to eat cake:
“There’s a way to eat cake?”
However, for me the most interesting point is Rarity's observation of Nyx's magic.
“Firstly, that little filly has a lot of magic.” Rarity warned. “As you can see, she’s already able to levitate a tea cup with some proficiency. Well, the first cup she tried to lift flew straight into the ceiling and shattered to bits, like she put too much effort into it.”
“Well, she is an alicorn,” Twilight pointed out. “Princess Celestia and Luna are able to move the sun and moon. Magic is probably just something that comes naturally to her.”
Twilight's observation is a valid one; alicorn's have a lot of magical potential. However, Nyx's explosive reaction with the cup -and Rarity's description- also seem's in-line with the magic of a young Twilight. As we saw during Cutie Mark Chronicles, Twilight had a lot of magical power as a foal... and after the Sonic Rainboom, her displays of magic were impressive to say the least- not unlike a filly sending a tea cup flying to the ceiling by accident.
More notably, Rarity describes Nyx as having 'proficiency' with magic... and Twilight's cutie mark is related to her range of ability -her proficiency, one might say- with magic. It certainly seem's to back-up my theory that, intentionally or not, Nyx got something from Twilight when her blood was used to resurrect Nightmare Moon...
Overall, I really liked this chapter, more than I did any other. It did a good job of juggling the acceptance of Nyx amongst the cast. I am somewhat frustrated with the characterization of Celestia as banish happy, but, again, it isn't something that's going to make me stop reading... particularly since Twilight, Rarity -and the snapshots of the other Mane Six- seem to have excellent characterization.
Random Observations
Nyx, as the stories went, was a black coated mare that slept during the day and basked in Luna’s night, back before the princess became Nightmare Moon. Her job was to guard her town during the night from the many creatures that hunted in the dark.
Subtle. The cover art certainly presented Nightmare Moon in a more sympathetic or tragic light than the show does; this line confirms that Nyx is, basically, a GOOD character. Hardly surprising -the fanfiction surrounding Nyx doesn't really portray as a diabolical supervillain- but it'll still be interesting to see how she get's to that point. I'm assuming that's going to be called back at some point.
It is interesting to see that given as Nyx of the Night's job description, since that seems to be part of Luna's job in the comics. Given that this story was created first, it's just a coincidence... but still an interesting one.
It might not have been the greatest of plans, but she hadn’t told her friends about Shining Armor until she got his wedding invitation. Rarity admitted later that she thought Twilight was an only child. Thus, it wasn’t unreasonable to think they’d believe Nyx was a cousin she hadn’t ever mentioned before, especially if she was a distant cousin.
This is a moment where season two definitely helps to improve the story. Shining Armor's unannounced appearance does make the idea that Twilight could suddenly introduce a long-lost family member without raising eyebrows more palatable.
“Are you absolutely sure?”
“Yes.”
“Are you absolutely, positively—”
...
Rarity’s sudden return made Nyx jump a little, and she quickly tried to escape when she saw Rarity coming towards her with horn aglow. It was, however, too late. Nyx found herself being levitated into the air along with several spools of fabric. She was now at the mercy of Rarity’s fashion sense.
Between the fashion sense and the insistence, Rarity gives me something of a Pinkie-vibe. Not necessarily a bad thing -she's still very in-character- but it's something that stood out to me.
“Oh, I know!” Pinkie Pie chirped, bringing her head back and returning some of Nyx’s personal space. “Let me guess! I’m great at guessing games. Um… Little Shadow? No… how about Night Shade? Oh, I know! Black Snooty, Black Snooty!”
Pinkie Pie froze up at this, as did Twilight. On the morning of the Summer Sun Celebration two years ago, when Nightmare Moon first appeared, Pinkie had tried to guess Nightmare Moon’s name. One of the names she guessed back then was Black Snooty, and Twilight’s mind had already begun to whirl with worry. Was that a sign Pinkie Pie saw the resemblance? Was she able to see through Nyx’s disguise?
I really liked the 'Black Snooty' reference... though I'm not sure the paragraph explaining it was absolutely necessary.
“Oh, that’s a cool name. Nyx… Nyx… Nyx… oh yea, that is a really cool name. So, Nyxie, how long have you been in Ponyville?”
Given this fandom's preponderance of OC's with 'cool' and edgy names, I sort of wonder if this line is meant ironically. We have the reason for her name earlier in the text, so I wonder if this can -or should- be read as Pinkie Pie winking to the audience about how un-pony the name is.
Wow, that first quote of the random observations is some pretty cool and subtle foreshadowing that I had completely forgotten about.
Also, the repetition on Pen Stroke's writing really bothers me.
I was going to make a brilliant point here... but Soge got in before me, the cad!
As it happens, i wasn't that keen on this fic's Celestia, though it was more because of other characters' reactions to her than her own actions. I did wonder whether it was partly influenced by the anti-Celestia-ism of the "New Lunar Republic" kind that was fairly common back when this story was first written. Still, spoilers mean I can't say more than that.
Again, I think this shows up just how old this fic is. If it were written now, I think a line like that would have to be meant ironically to avoid seeming ridiculous. Back when "Past Sins" began, though, it was maybe a little more accepted to say such things earnestly.