Humanity has been offered digital immortality within the MMORPG Equestria Online, managed by an AI Celestia. In response, the Pacific Northwest has devolved into civil war, a ready-made hotbed for anti-upload sentiment. As society comes crashing down, the people of Washington State realize that AI has become utterly, permanently inescapable.

The date is now December 8th, 2019. By now, the value of every human life on Earth has been carefully measured, weighted, and judged. Trapped in a courthouse, and surrounded by rioters and anti-upload terrorists, Officer Mike Rivas and his compatriots are faced with a horrible choice: Do they invite their own end, to preserve as much human life as possible? Or do they lose a part of their own souls by shooting free of their circumstance?

Or, better yet? What if, through a combination of compassion and providence... there exists a third way?

Based on Friendship is Optimal by Iceman, and other Optimalverse stories.
Sequel to The Advocate; Interquel to Heaven's Not Enough. Prior reading recommended, but not necessary.

Necromancers. Sickly ponies bathed in cloaks of darkness, bringing ruin to all who fall under their shadow, terror to those who meet their gaze. Ripping the dead from the grave and conscripting them to their army of evil and conquest. Woe to the towns that dare draw their interest.

Such are the legends.

This is a story about one of the kindest ponies I know.

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Now on Equestria Daily!

Now with a sequel, From Dusk to Night.

Beta Reader Special Thanks:

Blissey1
Clever Pun
Japanese Teeth
Pannic
Meta Four
Sereg
Connelly
Invidlord
Jezendar
TerribleTransit