Belshazzar: Afterthoughts (but an Announcement First) · 1:30pm May 3rd, 2020
Before I go on with my afterthoughts on Belshazzar, just a quick announcement: outlining for the As Flies, Are We sequel, Their Darker Purpose has already begun. Don't know exactly when I will be done with that, but it shouldn't take me more than a month and a half.
Now, with that settled, onto Belshazzar. Spoilers for those who haven't read it yet. (And, yes, to the one or two readers who might have seen it as Incomplete before I turned it to Complete three or so minutes later: that was a rookie mistake on my part.)
It all began in the Writeoff with the writing prompt "Ot." From what I could tell, that prompt was a legendary if not memetic prompt because it was borne out of a slip of the keyboard-typing finger. When I had to face the prompt myself, however, I went through a list of what Ot could mean: acronyms and abbreviations. That's when I stumbled upon one meaning that caught my eye: the Old Testament.
So I decided to try sounding Biblical.
It didn't go so well since the original version of the story was so dreamy in its narration, it became very hard to read. Too many metaphors and similes and other things like that. Not to mention that the original version had Twilight Sparkle in Luster Dawn's place which did not bide well because, as one commenter/reviewer said, Twilight Sparkle was the Princess of Friendship—she was bound to make at least one friend or two through the centuries.
However, I saw potential in the story. If I published it here, it would be my first Writeoff-entry-turned-Fimfiction-publishable-story. Re-telling the story with a tighter narration while keeping if not somewhat amplifying the Old Testament/Biblical elements of it would do it good.
The name Belshazzar comes from the king of Babylon bearing that same name. As accounted for in Daniel 5, King Belshazzar was visited by God via His hand writing something on the wall. Belshazzar called for Daniel the prophet to interpret the handwriting and, long story short, Belshazzar's kingdom would fall and Belshazzar himself was found to not exactly be a good person.
The Bible verse that makes up the title of the story's only chapter is Daniel 2:31 where Daniel is speaking to King Nebuchadnezzar (Belshazzar's predecessor) about the king's dream. The image in the verse refers to the composite statue which many, including myself, interpret to be various kingdoms (most if not all ancient, though some say that the last one or so is either in the present or still in the future)—all to be smashed by a rock which symbolizes God.
The Book of Daniel was written by Daniel, so we do not dive so much into how Belshazzar was thinking during the fall of his kingdom. We do get a glimpse into Nebuchadnezzar's thoughts, especially when he was turned insane/animalisic by God.
So I guess, whether I did it consciously or not, I am not surprised that I've decided to flesh out the point of view of the one falling down in the guise of Luster Dawn.
One thing I've noticed about Luster Dawn on this site is that she is destined to be a blank slate forever. She appears in the show's last episode and that's that. No future seasons in which she can get grounded to some kind of characterization either as a main/side character or even as the occasional background character (viz-a-viz Derpy).
From what I can mostly see (without reading more than one story with Luster Dawn in it), Luster Dawn is often cast straightforwardly: the student to Princess Twilight and quite similar to Twilight (if somewhat less mature). Thus, to imagine her far in the future as a princess (and not a particularly good one at that) strikes me as unique, and I like unique story ideas that haven't been on the site yet.
But I also see it as the distant bad ending to the epilogue. One reason it's Luster Dawn in the story now and not Twilight is because, as the same commenter pointed out to me, we don't get to see much of Luster Dawn—how she tackles friendship problems, how she treats her friends, and so on. So while it is plausible that she ends up well-rounded and with her own true circle of best friends, it's also plausible that she doesn't—at least, long after she becomes princess and ends up outliving that first batch of BFFs.
Writing the Elysian Fields and not-Tartarus Hades (Heaven and Hell), even for a quick moment, was somewhat nostalgic, much more so in revising it for Fimfiction since it's the most heavily expanded scene coming from the original Writeoff version. Really, this story is like wearing my heart on a sleeve since the Christian (mostly Old Testament though) influences seem to come through a lot here.
A bit of a shame that I didn't expand on Luster Dawn's friends from Luster's last scene in the show. No promises, but maybe some other day in some other story. After having this up as a Luster Dawn story, I should get something light-hearted about them.
That would be all for now. I hope you enjoyed the story. Until then, have a good day!
