//------------------------------// // Chapter 27 // Story: Repercussions // by Hiver //------------------------------// Thirty four more letters from Thestrals had been waiting for me when I returned to Canterlot, all of them along the same lines. Keeps the illusion up at all times in public, most of them hiding it from their friends too. Afraid to be discovered. More than a hundred ponies had answered so far. I didn’t know how much further that number would grow, but I suspected it would. Maybe not by a lot, most ponies that would write to me would likely have done so by now. Was it one percent that wrote to me? Ten? Half? All? It didn’t matter, it was way too many in any case. But what could I possibly do about it? Celestia was right, just ordering ponies to accept thestrals wouldn’t work. A sound of frustration reached my ears and I looked over to Tempest where she was practicing, “Don’t worry,” I told her, “You’ll get it.” “Yes, sir,” she answered before she lit her horn again and continued slowly and carefully picking up grapes one after another, moving it from one bowl to another. One. Two. Squish! Tempest gritted her teeth but continued. She had power to spare, she might actually be stronger than Sunset thaum to thaum. But not having needed to use her magic normally since she was a little filly had played hell with her control. I watched for another couple of seconds before I returned to my notes. What do we do? What do we do? Did I even have the right to decide something? Just because I ended up with wings and then had them changed by Discord by all beings? Did that somehow give me the right to decide the fate of hundreds of ponies? Of course not. But things couldn’t just remain like they were either. What do we do? I needed better numbers, but so far it didn’t look like the ‘assimilation’ idea would work. Even if it was only ten percent like I guesstimated that mailed to me so far, that’s still a population of only a thousand ponies. Among how many millions? It wasn’t enough. Not by a longshot. That’s barely the population of a small vill-. I frowned at the notepad. Would that work? Start a village and invite every batpony in Equestria to move there? I wasn’t poor, but I couldn’t afford to build an entire village, it would need to be sponsored by crown money. Buildings built, infrastructure put into place. It likely wouldn’t help with pony reactions, but at least everypony would be able to live without hiding themselves. But would ponies even want to move there? Move away from where they grew up? Even if they did, was it even the right move? Setting up an area where specific people were allowed to live had some really bad connotations to history back on Earth. No. Have to be something else. I sighed and closed the notebook, dropping my quill back into my satchel after cleaning it and closing my ink. I’m not cut out for this kind of political social stuff. Give me a pen, some paper and somewhere to write and I’m happy. Preferably close to Luna and Sunset. I’m just not cut out for this. Even if the village idea worked, it wouldn’t last. Like Luna said, there was less and less even a thousand years ago, in five hundred years they might be completely gone. The curse was fading. Which objectively was a good thing, no more ponies that needed to hide, be forced to keep hidden. But it still felt wrong. It wasn’t a curse, not anymore, not since it was changed from blood to fruit. For thousands of years ponies had lived, born and died as themselves. Thestrals were a people. A tribe almost. A small one maybe, but one that was slowly fading away. The curse might be messing reproduction as many thestrals had pegasi foals or at least a majority of pegasi foals. Maybe if it is stabilized for real… Was that even possible? Everypony would have to be volunteers of course, but if that was possible, it opened up possibilities that didn’t exist before. I would need to run the possibility of that past Sparks or Midnight later and without giving away that Fluttershy was a batpony. Squish! Tempest sighed miserably and I looked over to her, “How about we stop here tonight?” I asked, “I’m getting hungry and then it’s about time for Luna to raise the moon.” She shook her head, “I would like to keep practicing for a bit longer if you don’t mind, sir?” “Go for it. I’m going to go raid the kitchens.”