Dear Ravens,

Once again I ask you to exercise you fundamental rights as members of my fan club by being the first to subject my works to your withering gaze of criticism and rebuke. I present to you a story about Procer Celestia Invictus, and if my feelings are right stories about Tia are something that we shouldn't take for granted much longer.

Some of you might recall this as one of my Fever Dreams. Well, I think it is time to admit that the compendium was a mistake. Flash fiction isn't my forte, and the works are all being evaluated to see which I can expand into one-shots or longer works, and I've discussed this with some of the site staff, so they are legal as long as I expand them significantly.

I hope that you enjoy. Please leave me any comments or criticisms!

3199587
...damn you

3199624
I am aptly damned, sir.

Gulp
I can feel the fees already and I haven't even clicked the link.

Is... that foal an alicorn? I think I can see a small piece of a wing.

-Lumino

3199719
Yes he is...

3199587

Good god... This will be something indeed...

Will look upon ending my shift at work.

~Skeeter The Lurker

Thanks for the PM about this, TD. With the changes to the notification system I would have never otherwise noticed this until it was posted.

Firstly, all the way through, I felt like I was missing some sort of reference with the witches. Of course, immediately after I finished reading Google told me about My Little Pony: The Movie, which I think I can almost remember from when I was five years old and me and my sisters would watch the old cartoons and then play with their ponies and my Transformers.

As for the story itself, to my great surprise, it left me unmoved. Maybe it's that I read it right after getting home from work in a semi-grumpy mood, maybe it's that I've never understood the unspecific desire for "a child", but for the first time ever, I came out of a story by The Descendant and felt like nothing special had happened. Most of all, I feel a bit confused - the storytelling is as technically competent as one expects from our favourite raven, and a lot of work has gone into making us feel what Celestia feels. So why don't I? This calls for some determined navel-gazing.

3199587 well that was...

pretty damn amazing as always.

3199587

Well, I think it is time to admit that the compendium was a mistake.

Science has taught me that an experiment cannot be a mistake, and cannot be useless, as long as it provides usable results! For Example:

Flash fiction isn't my forte, and the works are all being evaluated to see which I can expand into one-shots or longer works

At the very least, you've found that you don't care much for writing tiny little stories. Tada! Would you have known that for sure unless you tried? I think the results are pretty conclusive. Successful writing exercise.

Of course, now you've broken my mind when I contemplate what The Singular Constant would read like as an extended story. Perhaps a series of slice of life scenes, while each has an alternate "fantasy" scenario? Perhaps just exactly an extension of the story, as just a series of metaphor-laden vignettes? Or perhaps a single scene repeating across each chapter save for one word changed, which flips over the entire meaning of the chapter?

Or maybe you were just talking about the other stories. Aheh.

Regardless, time to read me a story.

3200418
I look forward to hearing your thoughts, Skeet.

3200656
That was my understanding, too. I've missed some great stuff from some of my favorite authors here since it went down.

3200717
I appreciate you honesty, Crei, even if I'm disappoint that "the streak" has ended. Is there anything that you suggest that I do that would help move the story towards making it more stirring?

3201833
True enough. Scientifically speaking, we've reached our conclusion... I don't have want or desire to continue writing the Fever Dreams.

I don't know for certain if every one of them will become a full-length story. If I tried, I'm sure that The Singular Constant would be the most difficult to adapt. "Random" seems to be a "tag of death," too.

3201922

I don't know for certain if every one of them will become a full-length story. If I tried, I'm sure that The Singular Constant would be the most difficult to adapt. "Random" seems to be a "tag of death," too.

As Discord will tell you, you can only be random for so long before it just becomes predictable. "Surprising" is far easier (and nicer) to work with.

3201901 Unfortunately and unhelpfully, even after sleeping on it, I still have no idea why. I have nothing against momlestia in general, and your sadfics usually hit the mark (I still remember sitting down after finishing The Youth in the Garden, just staring into space, mentally reeling from what I just read - and I have no emotional connection to the American civil war in particular).

One thought is that this is rather short by your standards, and thus the build-up may suffer. However, that matters much more in comedy than in drama, and especially with your usual dry British humour - it takes 30k words to make me laugh out loud at the mention of the phrase '“Eep!” said the Mill Creek Bridge', but, as the sadly few works of Adjutant Stormy teach us, 1k words is enough to get emotionally invested in a battle.