//------------------------------// // Chapter 6 // Story: Archangel Michael visits Equestria // by Kama and Hallie //------------------------------// In the throne room of Canterlot, five mares, a dragon, and an angel gathered around the Princess of Equestria. They all looked through Princess Twilight's scrolls and duties for the day and discussed with her what could or should be done, well, actually only one of them was helping, the others were still too busy staring at the one helping to be capable of doing anything more. The one doing the helping wasn't of too much help either as Twilight had hoped, Meekha El did do a good job at assisting Twilight and giving ideas and suggestions on every issue she was given, but it was clear that he didn't really know what he was doing all that much. "It says here that we need to finance some of the schools, renovate the banks, and respond to some complaints citizens are having about the newly established laws in their areas, and that's just some of the few things to do today. You've got any ideas?" Twilight asked the angel while she thought about how to handle the issues. "Well, you could try...sending money? Fix it? Change the rules? Ugh, what am I doing?! I don't know how to do this at all!" Meekha El finally snapped and turned away from Twilight. "You're more clueless on this than I am, aren't you." Twilight said, unable to really feel angry at the multi-winged creature's outburst. "I kind of am. I'm a warrior and a caretaker, politics aren't exactly my strength." Meekha El admitted, feeling a little disappointed in himself. "A warrior? So you're like a soldier or something?" Rainbow Dash asked, it was the first time somepony spoke besides Twilight and the winged entity of light. "Yes, a commander, to be precise. I lead the Heavenly Armies and guard the creations of the Lord." Meekha El answered bluntly, not in too much of a mood to answer so many questions. "Woah, cool! Have you been in a lotta cool battles?" Rainbow Dash asked, actually interested to learn what this alien creature did. "Uh...I lead my forces in the War of Heaven when we fought the Great Red Dragon." Meekha El answered. "'The great red dragon', you guys fight dragons?" Rainbow Dash got more curious. "Y'know, dragons aren't actually that bad once you get to know 'em,..." Spike tried to explain which was followed by a nod from Fluttershy before Meekha El spoke up again. "No, it's not an actual dragon. It's Satan in the form of...Urgh! Can you all stop asking me unimportant questions that don't even relate to the issue at hand?!" Meekha El scolded rather fiercely, but it didn't get the response he hoped for. "Hands?" Rainbow asked with a confused look. Twilight gasped happily. "You've met humans too?!" She asked giddily, which only got Meekha El glaring at her frustratingly, which made Twilight wince when she realized what she was doing. "Sorry, I'll just take that as a yes." Twilight went silent for a few seconds before speaking again. "How come the 'Lord' would send you out of everyone else? You clearly aren't the best on dealing with...rulership duties." "I told you, Princess, I don't know. I'm simply doing as the Lord commanded me to do." Meekha El answered with a tired tone. "What exactly were his exact words?" Twilight asked again. Meekha El sighed before answering. "Well, He said: 'Mikha'El, I have a special task for you. You are to visit the planet known as Equus, where you shall go to the land of Equestria, there you shall visit the ruler of Equestria: Twilight Sparkle. She is currently in a lost and confused state in her rulership of her country, facing dilemmas and problems someone like her in that position would obviously go mad. I need you to go down there and guide her through her hardships until whenever the crisis is averted." the strange-looking angel repeated the words of his master in a really weird tone, he sounded almost like a voice recording, which made the ponies and the dragon an uncomfortable feeling. "Uh...okay, then. Maybe you don't actually need to help me with my princess duties, maybe you just need to help me with personal stuff and leave the princess-y stuff to me?" Twilight suggested awkwardly. "Well, your princess life seems directly tied to your personal life so I thought that helping you out with your political side might help." Meekha El said. He turned to the others in the room who are still staring at him. "Is my form disturbing your state of mind?" The mares and the dragon just stammered and talked over each other while looking at one another to figure out what to say, then Pinkie Pie stepped in front of them. "It's not your look that bothers me, it's the fact that you guys apparently don't celebrate parties. How can you ever get by without any parties once in a while, are you not allowed to have one?" Pinkie Pie asked sadly. "No, Pinkamena Pie. We angels do not have parties, we've had a few celebrations once every million eons, but we don't have parties." Meekha El answered, forcing himself to satisfy the pink pony's curiosity. "But why?" "Because our purpose is to carry out divine commands, not to have fun. I suggest you stop your questions there, you won't be able to understand." Meekha El said trying to not show frustration. "But we wanna know more about you, like what's it like where you came from? Do you have any friends? What's this 'creator of the universe' like?..." Twilight wanted to ask, even preparing a quill and scroll, but Meekha El shot her down. "Princess, I'm sent down here to guide you, not answer questions every five seconds. Also, don't you have some duties to fulfill?" Meekha El pointed to her enormous pile of scrolls that nopony noticed were there until the winged alien pointed it out. "Oh, right!" Twilight frantically got back to going through her checklist. "There is one thing I gotta ask, I swear it's not gonna be a waste of time." Rainbow Dash spoke up. "Alright, but only this one. Any other questions you should save for yourself until I'm not doing my duties." Meekha El said. "Who's this 'Satan' guy you were warning us about, you kinda left with no explanation." the cyan pegasus asked. "Oh, right, I probably should've explained that. He's a malevolent entity who's come to your world to tempt the inhabitants to commit sin and bring the Lord's creations down to his level." the angel explained. "And you said that he's a red dragon? What kinda dragon are we talkin' about here?" Spike asked. "I told you, he's not actually a dragon. Satan has the ability to take any form he pleases that will help him achieve his goal, and he can be anywhere at any time, so be careful." Meekha El continued. "'Take any form', you mean he can shapeshift like a changeling?" Twilight asked as well. "Uh...yes, like a changeling. He's very good at psychological manipulation, so even if he says things that sound kind and reasonable, he's only saying what you want to hear, and just his words are enough to make any creature do what he wants, so don't listen to him." Meekha El warned. 'But how will we be able to tell when he's around?" Applejack asked. "You'll know it somehow, that's something not even I can explain to you." Meekha El answered anticlimactically. "So, Princess...do you need me to help with anything else?" the giant alien turned to the purple alicorn. "Um...no, I don't think so. I think it's better if I handle something like this on my own." Twilight answered with an awkward smile. "Are you sure? You look like you could still use some help." Meekha El said doubtingly. "No, I'll be fine. You just go and leave the princess stuff to me." "Alright, if you insist. When you need me again, just pray." Meekha El said before disappearing. "Are you sure it's a good idea to send him away right now, Twilight?" Spike asked. "I don't know, Spike. He doesn't know how to do this kind of thing, so let's just do it ourselves. Besides, it'll be easier to focus now that he's not around." Twilight said. "We still don't a hundred percent know if we can actually trust that feller." Applejack chimed in. "And what about that 'Satan' guy he mentioned? Shouldn't we deal with him considering how dangerous Meekha El said he is?" Rainbow Dash asked. "We can't really deal with him considering we don't know anything about him besides what Meekha El told us, we don't even know what he looks like or where he is. Heck, he said that 'Satan' is a shapeshifter, so finding him with zero information other than who he is and what he can do, not to mention he's probably on the same level as Meekha El, it's pointless." Twilight explained. "Why doesn't Meekha El deal with this 'Satan' himself if he's so dangerous?" Rarity wondered. "Yeah, and does anypony find it odd how much he emphasizes about orders when doing something?" Dash asked as well. "I don't know, girls. Look, I wanna know about Meekha El as much as any of you, but he's clearly not interested in answering questions in the middle of his duty. So why don't I just deal with the duties for the day, then we can study him more when I'm done?" Twilight suggested. "Alright, then. Do you want us to help you with them, we'd be happy to keep you company." Rarity asked who was joined in by the other mares with big grins on their faces. "Thanks, girls. I'd love that, but I think it's better if I deal with the princess duties myself. I wouldn't wanna get you girls into any more trouble than necessary, and you obviously have other things to do, so why don't you just go home and I'll inform you if anything comes up." Twilight said. The other mares wanted to argue, but they knew Twilight was insistent about what she said, and they were actually busy before Twilight called them over. So the mares said their goodbyes and left for home leaving Twilight and Spike alone in the throne room, now they were ready to actually officially start the day. At first, the day was going normally, a little difficult but still normal. But as the day went on, more duties kept being added to Twilight's to-do list for the day, which was already crammed in the first place, now it was starting to interfere with each other. Then more news came in, and then ponies of all kind kept coming in insisting on seeing her, from aristocrats, bussinessponies, and even lowly citizens came in trying to discuss a problem she has to take care of, something to help them with, or somewhere she needs to be. Twilight was slowly losing the ability to think straight as her subjects kept pouring in as quickly as they left, they were ceasing her from doing the other duties she was supposed to do, she could barely hear what their problems were anymore. Now, an entire crowd was trying to force itself in and Twilight couldn't make out what they needed to see her for, all Twilight knew was that she couldn't take it anymore, and needed a moment to herself, so she ordered the guards to close off the doors and tell the subjects to see her later. Once the guards did that and she could hear ponies complaining from the other side of the door, Twilight took this moment to go somewhere she could be left alone, and she went to her balcony. When Twilight went out to her balcony, she was surprised to see that the sun was setting, meaning it would soon be time for her to raise the moon as well. Has it really been that long? She practically lost track of the time of the entire day, so much has happened to her in such a short amount of time. There were a lot of problems going on in Equestria that needed her fixing, and on top of that, a giant winged alien showed up out of nowhere and refused to say anything about himself. Twilight just hunched over the railing and looked down on the land in front of her that was bathed in orange light from the setting sun, and behind her, a dark blue sky and cold black clouds were creeping over, but Twilight was mostly focused on herself. She was just so confused as to how to take in everything that's happening, how will she get through them, and most importantly... "What am I gonna do?" Twilight sighed and planted her face between her forehooves that were grasping the balcony's railing. Then Twilight gasped in shock when she heard something respond. "Good question. I'd say enjoy the view for a little while." the voice answered. As Twilight turned, she saw a tall and well-built pegasus stallion sitting on the balcony's railing like a bird, but his pose was like that of a lion. The stallion was blackish-grey with yellow eyes, and a red mane, red tail, and even the feathers of his wings were red despite the limbs of the wings themselves being black. Speaking of his wings, they were pretty large, almost Celestia's size, complimenting the fact that this stallion was taller than most. "W-who are you? What are you doing here?" Twilight asked, nervously at first but became sterner during the second question. "Oh, I'm just passing by, honestly." the pegasus stallion answered plainly. "Look, if you want my autograph or report something to me, can you just wait and save it for later? 'Cause I'm not in the mood to see anypo..." Twilight told the stranger. "Oh, I'm not here to do any of that! As I said, I'm just passing by." the stallion reassured. When Twilight turned away and just rested her head on the balcony railing again to look at the horizon, the pegasus spoke again. "You know, I can't help but notice how down in the dumps you look. Princess duties getting the better of you?" "Yeah, kinda." Twilight answered, exhaustion present in her voice. "You know, I'm no expert on politics, but I think you're being a little too passive." the pegasus stallion said. "What are you saying?" Twilight's ears perked up as she turned to the stallion, finally giving her full attention to the stranger. "I'm saying you're going too easy on your subjects, by letting other ponies tell you what you have to do for them you're essentially letting your own country make you their bitch." the stallion explained plainly as well. "What?! But a princess's duty is to serve their country and do what's best for her subjects, what on earth makes you think you can just say that about me?!" Twilight scolded. "That is true, but...I've heard some wise words that I think you should hear as well; "If you let others walk on you, they're gonna walk on you for the rest of your life". You're one of the most powerful creatures in all of Equestria, at least fucking act like it. Show your subjects that you are their leader, not their servant." the stallion motivated a little harshly. "W-well...I guess..." Twilight stuttered, starting to think there was a point in what the stranger was saying. "Celestia made the same mistake before you, her powers did the thing to keep her subjects in line and let them know who they're dealing with, but she went too easy on her enemies. She just trapped them somewhere for a thousand years which not only did nothing but delay the inevitable of them escaping, but just made them more dangerous since they had a thousand years to hold a grudge and plot their revenge, so those could be considered idiotic decisions." "But they all served a good purpose at the end, we brought Luna back, Discord became reformed, the Crystal Empire returned, I became a better princess, and it brought me and my friends together." Twilight reasoned. "Yeah, but making sure all those bad things won't happen would've had to rely on the fact that there would be somepony like you and your friends to fix it, and Celestia trapped them a thousand years ago so she would've had to rely on chance that somepony would come in and fix them for her. She might've been safe since she got to dump all the responsibilities on you, but what if you don't find your own star pupil and or successor to make sure she'll fix all your past mistakes and take over for you? You'd kinda be regretting not being too good at finishing problems yourself." "Well, then what do you suggest?" Twilight asked. "You gotta show to both your subject and those who oppose you that you are not to be taken lightly and that you deserve every ounce of respect they're able to show." the pegasus stallion said. "But they already have plenty of respect for me, I saved them multiple times, made Equestria a better place, and brought us and the other kingdoms together!" Twilight said. "You can do as many good deeds as you want, Princess. But everyone will look for a reason to screw you over and turn you into their personal punching bag. Even when you started having the word Princess in your name they all think they can treat you badly and make you do whatever they want by taking advantage of your kindness for them. You need to show them who's really in charge around here! You saved their asses multiple times, and they should act more grateful for it and start giving more than just empty praises, you should try being more stern once in a while, then you can have a calmer life for you and your friends." the pegasus stallion lectured. "M-maybe..." Twilight mumbled and looked away from the pony talking to her. While she still didn't agree with what the stallion was telling her to do, in the very back of her mind she was actually considering what he was saying. It did feel nice that someone other than Spike was around to tell her some motivational words that she needed to hear, it was such a strangely nice gesture from a pony she's never even seen before. Then, something clicked in the alicorn's head. "Wait...are you..." Twilight asked nervously, but when she turned to face the strange pegasus stallion again, he was gone. The balcony was empty with just Twilight on it once again, and she was just left alone with her thoughts.