She had screamed, and so those below had heard.
Part of Twilight registered what had now started to ebb into a still-desperate background babble, just before she was pushed out of the room. The noise of their entrapment, added to that which still seemed to be echoing within her skull, had covered up most of the earliest parts -- but even then, it had been there. There had been a certain tension in the meeting, and hearing the scream coming from above had almost unleashed it. Under so many circumstances, it would have sent robed and hooded ponies instinctively scrambling for the only visible exit as fear of discovery drove them to get out, trampling anything and anypony in their way --
-- but the older stallion had apparently said something, words which bought just enough time for more words, and so he was still on the stage, currently holding the crowd back with speech alone. Telling them that this wasn't unexpected, they simply had a few more ponies in attendance than the rest had known about, there was no danger and those ponies would be with them shortly.
Only he didn't describe them as ponies. He'd said 'guests'.
So many of those below wanted to run. But words held them back long enough for fear to, if not vanish, drop to a level which was easier to fight. The gathering was shifting, kicking out questions, they needed to know they were safe --
-- but then Quiet, the last to leave the room, shut down the device. And so Twilight heard nothing more.
She was not the first in the line being forced through the passageway: there were robed ponies in front of her, making certain she didn't try to go anywhere. Not that she could: her horn was restrained, her wings had been wrapped within netting, and she seemed to have very little true control over her legs. She mostly moved when prodded, shuffled along towards whatever would happen next. Trying to think and finding that every idea of escape had been equally bound, negated before it ever had the chance to work.
The others were being pushed along. None among their captors seemed to care about whether Applejack's flanks scraped the rough walls, and the single grunt of pain which couldn't be held back was met by a harsh burst of laughter.
"Don't." Quiet's voice, somewhere well behind her.
"Scraping a clod off on stone. You can't tell me that's not funny --"
"-- a Bearer," Quiet softly said, "is on her way to speak with the doctor. Try to remember that."
Her ears had not been restrained, and so rotated back and down, pressing against her skull. Trying not to hear him, and so much else. But it didn't form anything close to a perfect seal, and so Fluttershy's muffled sobs continued to reach her. There was only a single source of true silence, and the traveling sonic vacuum simply indicated Pinkie's shuffling position in the passage.
They had all been gagged, with one unable to see. But nothing been done about their hearing, which allowed the frantic approach coming down the passage to reach them all.
"It got past her!" A gasp from a desperate mare voice. "We're trying to find it --"
"The staff will lock down the castle," Quiet stated. "All the windows, all the doors. There are security workings which can be activated, and he can't cast. We can at least keep him from getting out." A pause. "And let me tell them to do it. Any words they might have to repeat should be safe ones. Can somepony escort me back to the main hall?"
There was probably a nod, because then there was a flash. And then Quiet was gone.
Up the passage. Back into the main halls. Marched down the ramp or, in Rainbow's case, levitated. The pegasus had been completely immobilized: wings, legs, jaw -- and, after she'd tried for a few too many whips, tail. Her magic came from movement, and so all the impotent rage was left to harmlessly radiate from furiously-darting eyes. Rainbow was picking out target after target for her revenge and couldn't reach a single one of them. Multiple loops of field had been added to the bindings of nets and ropes, and so her flight was no longer her own.
Spike. Spike's still free...
One little dragon against an entire castle.
She wanted to have hope. She kept waiting for somepony to kick a scaly body in front of her before laughing and putting a hoof into the crests.
Through the main hall, and a moment of what would have often been normalcy turned into surrealism: there were servants cleaning up after the party, and one mare thoughtfully got in front of them long enough to make sure no crumbs would impede their hooves: it wouldn't do for the prisoners to get dirty.
Quiet rejoined them as they used one of the exit hallways: something other than that which had been utilized by those attending the conference. He took the lead as they stopped at a wall, and faint sparkles tapped at stone. The new passage opened, and they went down.
This one was even narrower, and the working lights did no more than show them how much trouble they were about to have.
They moved, and Applejack repeatedly bit into her gag. Pinkie remained silent. Small bursts of gag-muffled muttering occasionally came from Rarity. Fluttershy cried. Rainbow's anger continued to build into something which felt as if it should have been producing ozone on its own. And Twilight shuffled forward.
Then there was wood in front of them. The colorless field pushed again and the hidden entrance swung inwards, cloth rippling along its forward edge. The scent of old paper filled Twilight's nostrils, failed to bring comfort.
Robed ponies turned at the sound. Saw him, then some of their fellows -- and then Twilight. But there were no shouts. No fresh outburst of panic, although one damp coating was slightly mobile: the overweight flanks beneath were shaking with poorly-repressed fear. Only one pony spoke, and the calm words easily reached her.
"Our true guests on this evening," the older stallion evenly stated, "have already been introduced. They have also been welcomed. Nopony here will do anything to change that. Clear an aisle for them, please."
Slowly, they were brought forward through the new gap. A myriad of eye colors watched them pass. Warm orange ones simply took a count.
"The dragon?"
Quiet sighed. "Still in the castle, Doctor, because we're locked down now: there are just ponies trying to find out where." Ruefully, "I had some ancient restraints in the secondary armory. I always have ropes for the hoofball practices. But somehow, over the course of all the centuries this place has been standing, nopony ever thought to purchase something that was meant to automatically stop a sapient who breathes fire -- and no, nopony was hurt, at least not by that. He managed to claw through cloth: the snout scratches are being treated. But it looked like he aimed the flame to miss. Clearing space for the run."
The older stallion slowly shook his head. "And all anypony saw was the flame, and so they gave him that space. Very well. Thank you for your efforts, my most devoted: I know you did what you could. And as we know he cannot break the security spells, we will simply trust to the efforts of the searchers. One of you, go back out and make sure everypony knows not to hurt him: from my time in his presence, I doubt he will attempt to use his flame for more than fear. And as he is no true part of what must come next, there is no need for additional delay. Would those at the front please shuffle back somewhat?"
Eventually, they were essentially sitting with the audience -- in the front row: hindquarters were pushed down to put them in that posture and, in Rainbow's case, uninverted. And finally, he nodded.
His most devoted...
She was overflowing with reasons to hate herself (with the largest source of flooding sitting silent on her immediate right), and so temporarily relegated that one to the back of the floodwater current.
"As I explained to those on this level while you were on the way," the stallion (whom she no longer wished to give the honor of a name) told them all, "you are here as my invited guests, and will be treated accordingly. It was necessary for the six of you to hear my words, whether it was from concealment or in the open. You always would have been among us at the end, and -- I had hoped you would trot down at my most devoted's side, of your own accord."
Looking right at her now, and her head dipped, eyelids half-closing. The only means she had of escape, and it wasn't enough.
"I know the scream was yours, Princess," he told her. " And I am sorry, for the truth having upset you so. I have some idea of what your life has been, because change can feel as if it will break you, and I have been through my own shattering. You were the personal student of Princess Celestia. You studied at the hooves of what you must have believed to be a deity and now, with what you have heard... I can understand a scream, because I remember my own from the night I lost my spouse. I learned a working to keep that scream from my nightscape, and I would be honored to be your teacher." He took a slow breath. "I had hoped you would trot in at Quiet's side. But you may still trot out. You are restrained -- all of you -- only so that you will stay and listen. I asked everypony here to wait for you, and so they have. I told them that the Bearers may be the most important part of our Great Work. For I know what you told Quiet. It is why I wanted you to hear me."
His calm gaze moved to Pinkie, moved over the lank fall of mane, dropped down to darkened fur. Went to Fluttershy, and there he could look at nothing more than the cloth of the blindfold, doing so for five full heartbeats.
He sighed.
"This too," he softly said, almost as if speaking to himself alone, "will be fixed..." And back to normal volume. "You must hear all of it, Princess. You, your friends, and the two among you who are mine."
His. The word could not foul her tongue, and so its sewage backwashed into her stomach.
"We left off," he reminded them all, "with an extremely partial display of the lives I have saved. There is no need to go over them all, for it would take us all the way to Sun -- and perhaps quite some distance beyond. I remember every last one of them, Princess, and I am proud of what I have given to Equestria. Proud of what they have accomplished. For those who call them monsters, a word I know has taken up residence in at least one mind, look upon the six who have saved us. The living reasons why everypony here still draws breath in a Sun-lit world, or can take a step across the land without feeling its surface turn to water. You are looking at our heroes -- and destiny does not accept monsters as Bearers."
Ponies were staring at them, with expressions impossible to read through the hoods. But Pinkie merely looked at the floor, and oversaturated cotton allowed one of Fluttershy's tears to seep through.
He looked at that. And then he did not look away so much as through, before returning his attention to Twilight.
"Later," he said, "if all goes well, I will ask you of Snowflake, Fluttershy, for I remember both your words and letters." (He wasn't looking at the caretaker when he said those words, although it could be argued that there was very little point.) "How you trust him to look after the cottage while you are here, think of him as something very much like a brother. You should think of him that way, for the two of you are so very much alike. More intelligent than others give you credit for. Stronger than anypony believes --" which brought out a small, brief smile "-- although for him, that takes some saying, does it not? But the two of you also share that fear of being among others, and... essence. For I harvested from lost siblings, and so new siblings were born..."
Fluttershy sobbed. He smiled, and she could not see it.
"I have longed to tell you that," he softly admitted. "I often have, within my dreams. And Princess... Ratchette was so happy about the talks the two of you were starting to have, when I saw her last. She seldom finds anypony she feels comfortable speaking with. You have been a comfort to her. She would never tell you that, and so I wished to. I could speak of so many -- but there are ponies waiting. Some have been waiting for a very long time. And so we go on."
And with that, he once again began to pace across the stage, with the injured hind leg dragging.
"I brought those to Sun who otherwise never would have trotted and flown under its light," he continued. "But even when channeled during one of the two great moments of destiny, essence could not change a race. I continued to use it, for Equestria was better off in having a number of extra hoofsteps about. But I was starting to experience doubts. There was but one other possible moment before me, only so long it might be postponed, and I did not know if my attempt could work. There was no evidence. None of those I had helped displayed a single external change. So many of the young were having difficulties. And so I focused my search on yet another path, for Princess Cadance had not been born from the Elements. It meant there had to be another way. But everywhere I looked -- secrecy. She arose when Princess Celestia had something much closer to full control over information getting out of the palace, before portions of the press became so -- inquisitive." A sigh. "Or, in too many distressing cases, creative. But in reviewing the stories from that time, it seems that most ponies simply believed a long-long relative had been discovered in a place nopony had ever heard of. I went to that place, to find only ice -- and the Barrier around what was still Sombra's lands. Star Swirl wrote of what had happened to the siblings who traveled with him, and thus there was an account to uncover. But for Princess Cadance... silence and swirling cold."
He sighed, briefly glanced back at the shimmering main door.
"I began to despair," he softly said. "I can admit that now. And the question of resources had already begun to arise. I knew I would need more than one pearl, and I had more than one. Many more. But... I kept using them. Every foal saved was a pearl temporarily expended. Oh, they could be recharged with the energy of fresh chaos -- but there was but a single source. I spent so many Moon-hidden nights in the palace gardens, ready to teleport away at the first sound, pulling out the residual energies from the core of the statue. Long hours during which I sometimes began to think I --"
Stopped, with head dipping as his tail briefly dropped.
"Perhaps I did," he confessed. "Perhaps it was more than fear, lack of sleep, and imagination combining to make me believe that there was something still alive within the stone. After all, the proof for that became -- active. But it could not have been aware. No awareness, and no memory. Still... a weary mind sometimes believed there was at least a dream of... resistance. And I had to be careful in more than not being found within the gardens, because to take too much would leave nothing which could rebuild for the next harvesting."
It was Discord's mission: the detail she hadn't even told Quiet. And ever since the madness had begun, the question of why the draconequus would do that had echoed through everypony's mind. Fluttershy had only believed there was a true reason, to go with true caring. With Twilight, even after they'd met her, there had been rather more doubt -- and nothing had appeared to create a motivation.
But every other rule had broken, and so more fragments crashed through her mind.
He was harvesting Discord's essence. Something where a living subject has to be horribly weak, unable to fight back, something which would normally kill...
And Discord... remembered.
This isn't a mission. It's revenge --
-- no. He could have come here himself. Even with the Princesses trying to monitor everything he does, he could potentially have gotten away with a lot. Maybe even -- deaths. But he sent us, because he was...
...was what?
...afraid?
It could have been the fear of once again finding himself trapped within stone: it felt as if there was some sense to that. And yet the storm howling in her mind would not let the concept find a safe haven of belief.
He harvested from Discord. Over and over...
...what... what would that have done to the bindings? He had to reach inside and create channels for the power to escape. He could have been creating cracks...
"Essence," the false doctor went on, "was always easier. There are forever more graves." Sadly, "And forever one more foal I was unable to help, whose essence would be asked to save another. Essence and pearls, I could gather -- but the pearls came with a cost. It is not easy to find chaos terrain: it lies in those places where ponies fear to tread. I knew of a few roughly mapped areas -- but after that, I needed to hire scouts. Then the search expanded beyond Equestria, for the Discordian Era was his rule over the world entire, and so pearls existed within the other nations. And while I could cross a continent by using a sufficiency of safe points at the borders of my range -- to travel beyond, and hope to return to the cellars... no. Even personally searching within Equestria was becoming more difficult: my fame was spreading, and more ponies calling for my services meant more chances to save lives -- and less hours to gather the things which could do it. That meant paying ponies -- and eventually, others -- to go into chaos on my behalf while never understanding what I intended to do with the results. It is not something a sane sapient treats as a low-risk venture, and they charged accordingly. One might think it would be easier to simply purchase the ones which had already made their way to the public -- except, of course, for their being the single rarest gem to exist. I did what I could there as well -- but when it came to resources, I had inherited wealth: enough to comfortably live on the interest. Now I was spending the principal. And my income as a midwife... nowhere near enough to replace it."
During their time in the underground room, it would be the only time he fully looked over Twilight. To where the robed ponies listened.
"And thus," he quietly said, "all of you. I knew that there had to be others who wished to purge the taint of sin from their blood. Some were around me. Others had to be found, starting from the suggestions of those who were the first to help. I approached carefully, spoke of my pain -- and you gave to me. Replaced the bits I no longer possessed, with the understanding that I would devote them all to the Great Work. You gave me your hope -- and in every moon of my life, I channeled that hope through chaos pearls and essence, in the name of going forward."
He seemed to be looking at somepony specific now: his head had stopped moving, eyes focused --
-- but then he was pacing again.
"But I had no evidence," he admitted --
-- and stopped in front of Pinkie.
"-- until the day I met a miracle."
She didn't look up. She didn't seem to be looking at much of anything.
"One who hosted a party in the hopes that it would make her father love her," the older stallion stated -- and now there was a faint wash of rage coloring the words. "A party for a pony so angry and hateful and hidebound that he promptly concluded the supplies for that party had been purchased using money stolen from his coffers, with no thought as to how a filly who lived on a rock farm could possibly reach a store -- and he wouldn't exactly have been all that accepting of the truth, either. But he hated you in those mistaken beliefs, didn't he, Pinkie? There were so many days when he kicked you, and it led to the one where you finally kicked back, just before you ran away. Do you remember the wild zone? The party we had together after destiny let me find you, to celebrate going to Ponyville? I found myself with a party hat upon my head, one gifted to me by a pony with no saddlebags. A hat which hadn't existed until the moment you wove it from dream."
There were little gasps behind them now, murmurs racing through the crowd. Waves of disbelief, laced with the foam of something which might have been prayer.
But Twilight didn't know what they were praying for.
"For those whom I had saved were finding their marks," he told them, no longer looking at the baker. "Essence is part of what defines us, and as their manifestations took place, that new essence expressed itself in their magic. Outer transformation had not been achieved, but an inner alchemy was bringing forth new miracles every day. Essence defines -- and now it had redefined. My own were willing to talk about their discoveries, if often to nopony other than me." Another smile. "They were, after all, speaking to their first friend. I advised many to keep a few things hidden, recognized that others had yet to explore their full potential -- and if any thought to look for a true source, then none of it was ever placed at my hooves. I had learned that I could grant new magic -- and so hope was reborn, and the training continued."
He returned to the blackboard, and his field began to sort through papers again, delving somewhat lower into the stack.
"We have yet to speak of her training," he said, "other than the part which the snitcher played in it. And some degree of summary is necessary, because it took place across a lifetime. I wrote enough about it to create -- and bind -- my own books, and perhaps when we finish here, the Princess will be interested in reviewing my work."
Once again, she didn't have words. But this time, it was simply because she didn't know any curses which would have been foul enough.
"The snitcher..." A soft chuckle. "I may be one of the few to use it for its intended purpose. I needed to know just how close she was to her mark at any moment. There were some early years of relative peace: I was fairly certain I would be safe until we'd reached the world record for youngest manifest. But she had to be taught. And the first lesson -- was that I loved her. In spite of her being broken, in spite of everything, I would love her. And so she loved me too. She was remarkably bright, rather quick to master certain subjects..."
He sighed, as his eyes briefly closed. But then he was looking at them again, and papers moved. Course subjects. Titles consulted. Study schedules.
"It made me think of what she could have been," he told them. "What she could still be, if only the Great Work could be completed. So I trained her for what was, at the time, just about a singular occupation. I trained her to be a Princess. She studied government and diplomacy. Negotiations and arbitration. There was a..." (And to Twilight, the pause felt odd.) "...passing attempt towards mastering bureaucracy, but with only the two of us, there didn't seem to be much point in passing papers back and forth. And magic. She learned about workings she could not cast, techniques with no wings to drive them. Everything I could perceive as going into the life of a Princess, I taught her. When I could not learn a subject myself, I provided books. And when even books ran out... I had found those who were willing to help in the name of hope, and some of you came to me for a day. Went down into the stone and in doing so, learned that I had also taught her to be gracious, welcoming, and kind. So many in this room contributed to her education, and I thank you again for that. She needed to master so much, and... her mind had to be right. Not just for what she would learn, but for what she had to believe. And the difficulty in that..."
Sheets went down. Sheets came up.
"She needed to learn how to be a unicorn. She needed to dream of possessing the abilities of a pegasus." Wryly, "Fortunately, excepting certain rather limited circumstances, there isn't any real magical need to learn about being an earth pony --"
There was a squeal of stressed metal as multiple chains went tight, and Applejack stopped pushing at her bonds at the moment before the failed effort would have sent her crashing chin-first to the floor.
"-- and so I was able to excise a certain amount of material from the curriculum," he smoothly went on, having ignored all of it. "She has some concept of what earth ponies are, of course. But I needed her to think of her identity in a single way: as broken. To have that burning desire to become something other than what she was." Thoughtfully, "Actually... now that I think about it, she may have wound up associating a degree of broken status with earth ponies as a whole. But I taught her the most important aspect: that she was not the pony she should have been. That there were ponies all over Equestria who shared that status, and she was to blaze the trail which would save them. And she was..."
He took a deep breath.
"...well, nervous would be fair," he admitted. "It is, after all, rather a lot to ask of a single filly. But I told her how much I believed in her and in time, she began to believe in herself. She studied. She learned. And as a snitcher has no known maximum sending range, I could monitor her ongoing potential for manifest from afar."
Every sheet came down, leaving the blackboard bare. The papers restacked themselves.
"There were years of safety," he said. "And there were years of fear. There was so much to learn. To reach manifest too early, before her studies were complete... might have produced something less than a true result. We passed the youngest known age in safety. We had quite a bit of time after that. But then... there would be times when her deepest magic began to rise. And it always seemed to happen when I was outside her halls. Little advances, for the most part. Small surges moving up, during the years when I still felt her education was incomplete. And to prevent any of those surges from leading into a full-fledged manifest, I had to keep going back, calling for her, distracting her, finding new subjects to talk about and... well, those of you with children will be familiar with their universal magic of somehow making themselves hard to find within a limited space. There were days when I almost swore she had come to teleportation earlier than I had, and done so without a horn. And others when it felt as if her mark was getting too close to her fur, that if I didn't find some way to excuse myself and cross a dozen gallops in under a minute, everything would fall apart. And perhaps I was wrong: I can admit that now. There may have been times in her youth when she was on the verge of true insight, and it was my silly concerns about her needing a few more books which held everything off. In the end... well, we nearly set a new record: that for most postponed mark..."
And that made every wave crest, deluges of excitement crashing through the room.
"It happened?" somepony called out: the accent was a Canterlot one. "She manifested? Doctor, did you call us here tonight because -- because it worked? Because she's an --"
-- and he was smiling.
"-- yes, I thought you would all pick up on the wording. Settle down, everypony -- no, I mean it." With just a little more insistence, "Be calm. We will not continue until some degree of false peace is upon this room."
It took about two minutes, along with repeated tries: there always seemed to be somepony who felt their question could be answered immediately. And all Twilight could do was wait.
None of you have seen her... you don't know what broken really is...
What was the older stallion trying to do? To tell them about what had really happened...
She remembered her reaction upon seeing the mark, multiplied it by a full room, one whose occupants now seemed desperate to believe, and pictured a different kind of backlash.
We could still wind up with him being trampled.
The brief, vicious fantasy brought her no true comfort.
And finally, "Thank you. So. We are close now, I promise you. I simply wish to provide our guests with a little more concerning the methodology --" and then he looked directly at Twilight.
"-- although I believe that with what she's heard so far, our Incarnation of Magic has begun to work some of that out."
The weight of a phantom necklace pressed against her fur.
Essence. Essence and chaos and...
He looked at her widened eyes, and simply nodded.
"In the typical pony's life," he confirmed, "there are two great moments of destiny. The Princess and I briefly discussed them in the birthing room, for one is birth -- and the other is the manifestation of the mark. Consider what happens during the latter. Something within us shifts, and we find ourselves with new magic. It is the moment when a pony's body is clearly the most receptive to change, because that is the instant in which change is already occurring. I gave her the snitcher and over the years, I added to it. Chaos pearls, charged with carefully-selected essence."
But there were mountings for thirteen of them. How much essence was he --
The partial answer cut off the rest of the unspoken question. "I believed that I would need more than the single pearl I used for births. At a minimum, the process would have seemed to require two: one charged with unicorn essence, another with pegasus. But the Diarchy was part of a sextet. That increased the number. And I was not working with the Elements. Even Star Swirl still had questions about certain parts of that process, and to attempt duplication without them... It was a rather large change to be making, and so it seemed to require an equally large amount of power. Eventually, I felt I had enough to try. And given that there would only be one attempt possible..."
He smiled again.
"Her mark came," he said, looking at her alone. "And in the instant it began to appear, I attempted to channel all of the essence and energy into her form, in the only possible moment of her life when her body might accept new magic without displacing any of the old. Her body took it in. And..."
His fur seemed to shine. The radiance of a personal truth.
"...it was beautiful."
She looked directly at him, and another kind of transformation took place. It only occurred behind her eyes, it changed him, and it was permanent.
He blinked. Almost took a hoofstep back --
-- but that was when the room began to erupt again, and he cut them off with two words.
"We failed."
And with that, the herd began to revolt.
"You failed?" somepony screamed. "We gave you all that money, we did everything we could to back you, protect you and --"
"-- my family, my family is never going to be --"
"-- I knew it!" There was now something vaguely familiar about that voice, the perpetual anger within that singular west coast accent, the refusal to listen. "I knew you were a charlatan! Monsters and nothing more! Playing with chaos for decades -- what does that do to a pony's head? You're a fake, you got money out of everypony else and you called them here tonight to excuse the waste, but I'm not going to --"
"Stop talking." For the first time, it came across as a patient, oddly even order. "Now."
"-- forgive it, even on a first meeting! Somepony has to stop you, and --"
Which was where what little reason that Duke had ever possessed ran out, and the overweight body charged. Went right past Twilight, jumped onto the stage, the point of the hood showing where his horn had been angled to hurt --
-- stopped, as silver glow wrapped itself around his body. Silver without a single sparkle present.
"And what's this?" The sheer bemusement had momentarily frozen him. "Do I look like a pregnant mare to --"
-- and then there was only the scream.
It was a familiar scream, for Twilight had heard it shortly after coming to Trotter's Falls. It was the cry of a pony with no way to escape from their pain, somepony facing a lifetime of agony and wishing for that life to end. The desperate prayer for death that came from a body which had turned against itself, and it dropped the Duke's robed body to the stage floor, twisting and kicking, as the older stallion quietly looked at him with a patient, almost relaxed regard.
Looked and nothing more, with the double corona blazing, as Twilight watched in horror and the audience pulled back.
"Somewhat," the older stallion stated, timing the words through the bursts of torture. "You're heavy enough, although in your case, that may be because you're so full of yourself that it's starting to bulge out the sides."
"What..." The word was broken, and that too was familar. "Please... stop, please, what, stop..."
"What you are feeling," the older stallion calmly told him, "is my field. I just gave your heart a rather minor squeeze, which provided rather shocking proof that you had one. I currently don't care to make the same investigations for your brain. But if you wish to prove that possession yourself --" and his horn went dark "-- you will return to your place on the floor. And you will listen."
I... Celestia, Luna, I...
Differentiation had initially been wounded by a single stallion's horn, and the tear had spread.
It was a discovery. It was something which could have been the subject of a thousand journal articles. But in that moment, it was nothing more than nightmare, one which had sent Twilight into almost instinctive prayer --
-- one nopony would ever hear.
The Duke got up, eventually. Nearly fell again upon reaching the floor. Staggered through the crowd, and the hoofsteps didn't stop until he'd reached the absolute back of the room.
The false doctor sighed.
"Again," he told them, "I apologize. I should have foreseen an outburst, and arguably been less dramatic in my speech to begin with. But this is not the waiting area outside my birthing room, and so I will not permit anypony to attack me. Please allow me to continue, because there are more words to be said -- and then, there will be something which was worth coming to see."
Nopony spoke. They simply waited. And Twilight, her own magic restrained, had to wrench her eyes away from that mauve horn, because there was no point in watching for an event she couldn't do anything to stop.
"We failed," he repeated. "Or... perhaps I did. Or it could have been her, or both of us. In that way, this failure echoes the first. The death of her mother -- which was followed by my bringing her to Sun."
This scream was only internal.
Did she ever see Sun? Once in her whole life until you pushed chaos and death into her, because you'd told her that was right?
"I fail... and I succeed," he quietly finished. "The pattern of my life. I did not create an alicorn. Instead, I simply brought forth a miracle."
The shimmer coating the door vanished. A little prod of his field opened it, just enough for a glimpse of the wide stone corridor beyond.
"Come to me," he called out. "Give them something to believe."
There was a moment of silence, as everypony stretched out their senses. Strained to listen, see, feel...
Hoofsteps, coming down the passage. Heavy ones, created by a pony who was larger than the majority moving at a slow, even pace. A deep purple foreleg, one so dark as to almost shade into black, came up, planted itself on the back edge of the stage, pushed...
...and she was in attendance. The guest of honor at what had truly never been a party.
There was a new emotion in the room, thick enough to scent. A miasma of disappointment and regret filled the air as the earth pony slowly made her way towards the front of the stage, with the one who had summoned her quietly watching --
-- and then there was a snort.
It was a familiar sort of snort, and just about everypony else missed it. The sound wasn't one which indicated hatred or loathing. It was simply an exclamation which said that Rarity had just gotten her first good look at the horrible, clearly homemade disaster-in-approach which was that dress, and it was the only normal thing which happened during the entire meeting.
It was normal, and so a tiny part of the inner storm began to calm.
She's -- moving well. Better than I've ever seen her move. And there aren't any twitches. Like her pain is --
-- no. She stumbled a little there. But it didn't look like pain. More like there was a second when she wasn't sure about planting her forehoof, and --
-- her eyes...
Blue, in this form. But also slightly -- hazy.
Just a little unfocused, even when she's mostly looking at the back of the room and nothing else, and add that to the light sway of her head...
Drugged. That has to be it. He didn't find a cure for her pain: he's just given her something strong enough to drive it down for a while, and she trusted him enough to take it. And we're so close to the stage, but none of us can talk...
She stopped at that front edge, and finally risked looking down.
It wasn't a position where she could see Twilight, not first. Instead, her eyes found Fluttershy, and only wet cloth looked back.
Her head quickly went left. Right. Saw all of them, and her body began to pull back as her questioning, panicked gaze desperately, instinctively sought the older stallion, three body lengths away on her right --
"-- there were complications," he gently told her. "But they are here to listen. And if all goes well, you may find yourself speaking with them. Very soon."
She nodded. Took a breath and then forced herself to look forward again, with most of her focus directed at draperies.
His words had traveled farther than they normally would have: the relative lack of volume would have been stopped by even minimal buzz among the crowd. But nothing came from them, for everypony was waiting.
What is he trying? He could keep them here for enough time to see the change, but --
"For a few here," he said, "this is the second meeting. And this, but for a greater degree of mass, is how those ponies know her. But for nearly everypony else, this is their first encounter. And so it is my honor to make the formal introduction. Fillies, gentlecolts, Bearers..."
It happened all at once.
The dress bulged at the sides, revealing what Twilight had taken as ill-fitting folds to be deliberate rips. A rush of color moved across the fur, with a different hue racing along mane and tail. Legs slimmed, the rib cage shifted, eyes were suffused with shade and --
-- dark purple wings beat at the air, then folded into the rest position against the tan pegasus' sides.
"This," Gentle Arrival proudly stated, "is my daughter. And I believe the time is now right to take a few questions."
Well, the question now is how many new occupants of Tartarus there will be by next week.
Hmm. A reference to a possible etymology for "sincere," or is it referring to how more than one pony in this room is barely holding together right now?
And that really says it all. His daughter wasn't what he wanted, so she's broken. Wrong. A mistake, a sin, on the genetic level, and one that he has devoted his life to correcting.
Yes, that was established last chapter, but this sentence expresses Gentle's madness so succinctly that it needs to be called out. The madness he had to start with, anyway. I can't imagine working with the literal essence of chaos for decades has done his sanity any favors.
As for the moments of metamorphosis, I can't help but note that Twilight doesn't fit the mold. She didn't get her wings during birth or manifestation (which leads to certain questions regarding the royal sisters and how Harmony knew to make two crowns...) If it weren't for everyone in the setting insisting that nothing, information or person, comes back from the shadowlands, I'd think that the only other potential transition point would be death. Death and rebirth into a new body.
And what was Cadance's Callahan toast again?
I may be overthinking that. As for the chapter itself, it is truly disturbing to see just how mad Gentle truly has become, and how terrifying as a result. I eagerly look forward to him learning just how wrong he is about so very many things.
So much explanation! So Nice! And its spawned no new questions for now. I'm shocked!
And I guess the record is the one who had a snitcher bound to their flesh??
How very 500 Little Murders!
Hmm... Could she use those small movements to project?
And that hasn't changed, IIRC. So, if she ever thinks of herself as "whole" or something... What happens then?? Interesting things, I think?
---
I bet once Twilight thinks a bit more, she'll finally remember about Earth Pony magic, and use it!
But, she hasn't been chained up yet. The chains of sorrow and steel haven't happened yet. The only one chained, is Applejack? Or are all of them chained, with Applejack's being the only ones mentioned?
So, gonna delay escape predictions until further?
---
She might decide to stay as an Earth Pony, rejecting her father's experimentation?
And so the explanation is finished. And now... now things might soon get interesting.
For the Secret did what it was meant to do. It did many other things as well, of course, both for good and ill, but it did do what it was meant to do. There are two ponies among the Bearers who can speak to the earth. They, and all the conspirators, are underground, surrounded by earth and stone. And none of the conspirators have any idea that earth pony magic even exists. Soon, perhaps, one or the other of the two will decide that this is a great enough disaster that it justifies breaking, or at least bending, the Secret. They will fight through terror and bewilderment to find their voice and make it heard. And then... Gentle and his cult will have a very brief lesson in what earth ponies truly are.
Or perhaps it will be Fluttershy who acts. Fluttershy, who has killed more times than most soldiers ever manage. Fluttershy, who was granted the power to take away any one thing.
I think this is discord's attempt to teach them a simple message. The most evil thing is the one that looks the most good.
Sometimes the worst monsters wear pony skins. This is one of those times. I would prefer the company of a post reform Discord over “Doctor” Gentle. I suspect that even the Nightmare would be better to be around.
Wow, a new chapter already? Nice.
Less nice is this situation. Spike, you'd better come through. Granted, I bet those spells aren't gonna work very well if you can just melt your way through stone walls. Don't believe me? Spike can withstand lava, which is melted rock, yet had to dodge dragon breath, which implies that it is even hotter than lava . . .
Okay, I've seen a story where Scootaloo had hydrokinetic powers, and when I suggested she could attempt to lift someone by their blood, the author said that she'd be too scared to try. Gentle apparently is not. This is why most telekinetic super heroes have what Worm calls the Manton Effect, because it makes them scarily dangerous.
He still hasn't explained what his questions about if Twilight or she can "hear them" are about. Whatever it is, it's something he hasn't shared with his fellow conspirators. My guess is still the ponies of the Shadowlands, though a distant second guess is prayers.
8703095
They're all chained in some fashion, the chains are just heaviest on Applejack (& 2nd heaviest on Rainbow).
I for one still hope/believe that Fluttershy will use Discord's Aid to Remove something non-physical; most likely, either Triptych's transformation pain, or as of this chapter perhaps Gentle's madness/ignorance. Alternatively, perhaps she'd remove Gentle's magic, which would be quite fitting and utterly horrific.
Regardless, I'm on the edge of my seat, as I have no earthly idea of how the Bearers are getting out of this alive, nor of how Gentle, Quiet, & the Conspirators are going to pay for their collective crimes. Granted, Spike is free, & thus can find some parchment, quill, & ink to send a letter to somepony who could help, but Discord may prevent him from contacting the Royal Sisters/Cadance (& likely wouldn't show up himself). Trixie is too far out, no other non-Alicorn Pony is both strong enough and able to teleport to Trotter's Falls. I'm certain that Estee will surprise us with something excellent, but that doesn't give me any clue as to what the solution could be. Here's looking forward to the next chapter!
You could make a fair case that Dr. has been driven mad.
They don't know that Spike can send messages. It may come as bit of a shock to them to learn.
I think earth pony abilities are going to come as more of a shock.
It's sad. I'd respect the doctor a lot more if he'd quit talking about interbreeding as a sin. I still can't tell if he's playing to the crowd, which certainly seems full of unicorn supremacists. He's still a terrible pony though.
I'm honestly surprised that earth speaking is a real secret. I thought it would be one of those things that ponies don't talk about, but would be known to those that bother to actually go looking.
8703178
That's been explained to be intentional quite a while ago. You can reread the chapter Earth Tones for more details.
I think the way you handle racism is the most amazing part of Triptych.
It's amazing to me that he's so unaware of his hypocrisy in his blithe disregard of the dislocation he caused for so many others--breaking them in much the same way he'd considered his own daughter broken. Besides all the myriad forms of abuse, and generally scummy outlook.
8703130
Reminds me of Bloodbending from Legend of Korra.
8703287
The story's called "Scootaloo Will Fly" by MyHobby if you're curious.
New chapter! New chapter! New chapter! I'm so happy!
8703371
Give it time.
I mean, holy cow it's good, but this ain't gonna be happy for a while.
I'm glad she realizes this, to be honest. She's not nearly cynical enough to survive this setting, and she was warned, repeatedly, by other ponies her interest in Quiet wasn't a particularly good idea. Basically, a vindictive side of me is saying "Twilight had it coming".
Only other comment I have is mild resentment for ending on such a cliffhanger. Beyond that, a lovely chapter, although I am very much looking forward to Twilight giving a few...comments.
Funny how the quack doesn't realize that his daughter isn't broken because she wasn't a unicorn-- she's broken because he broke his daughter.
Fun thought time! I only realized this after recalling some genetics courses, but I'm bringing it here.
Your setting ostensibly follows many real world laws. I recall in Mark of Appeal, as an example, the revelation that the character with a cutie mark that makes people fall obsessively in lust with her produces pheromones, rather than a compulsory magical effect as was initially thought.
Genetics also seems to work more or less the same in this setting from what I can tell-that is, there is an exchange of genes between mother and father, and so on. So, here's the fun thought:
The good doctor was utterly fucked from the beginning.
Let me explain why (or one reason at least). He seems to earnestly believe that the tribes should be separate, to prevent these "horrible" births in a line. No earth pony should ever have an unicorn, no unicorn an earth pony, and etc. He stresses purity and so on within the species, and if you breed true, you never have to worry about having horrible little disabled babies (who, if he'd let her actually fucking grow, would likely be one hell of an awesome earth pony that I firmly believe would be body slamming Ursa Majors and winning).
He seems to think that the more pure your line you can trace the better, and while it's bad that the Discordian era made all ancestry trees turn into pear trees, at least you can trace your lineage back.
Problem: ponies can reproduce with one another and routinely produce fertile offspring.
The good doctor might have a point if it was situation similar to a mule-a horse and a donkey produce infertile offspring. But it's not. Ponies can go breed with each other, and biology doesn't give a single damn if the stallion has a horn or the mare has a wing. It just cares that the bits are compatible and more importantly, the egg and sperm are compatible.
This means that within Pony DNA, in every single tribe, lies the gene sequences for all three tribes. These sequences are in all likelihood suppressed except for one tribe, and the parents seem to have some influence in a the tribe of the offspring, but not always (alicorns through an extreme influx of magical power activate all the gene sequences, meaning they are all tribes at once, although this likely requires much more power than the average pony could safely sustain-hence, why natural alicorns aren't really a thing.)
Anyway, my point is, the good doctor and his wife could have had perfectly pure genealogy trees going back thousands of years, and an earth pony or a pegusus could have popped out if the pseudo recessive genes popped up in the offspring.
Anyway, my point is this: Congrats ponies, you can never be racially pure!
Secret is probably in a horrific state of the gene sequences being continually activated and disabled (barring the "base" pony form-heart, lungs, etc are probably identical sequences in most ponies) and, facilitated by massive levels of magic, so she keeps shifting. I imagine the chaos magic she has is the reason why she's not an alicorn.
It's chaotic. It is not in alignment or harmony with itself, and therefore it can never work together. If you got a sample of Alicorn essence, I'm sure you'd find components of all three tribe's essence working in harmony.
Anyway, I'm typing this because I am amused that the doctor's plans could never have worked. Probably. I might be completely wrong here.
Jesus, man. I couldn't think how to phrase my comment for last chapter before you posted this one. I'm shocked you got this out so fast after the marathon run the day before. I hope your keyboard/fingers aren't smoking.
TL;DR - just hit page end, I go on forever, I guess I'm trying to write my dissertation in this comments section. This is what happens when I am allowed access to a keyboard. Sorry.
Whew! This certainly was the first chapter where I physically recoiled from my screen in horror. In-verse consistency is so tight that to see Dr. Gentle "Mengele" Delivery just reach in and give ol Blueblood (95% sure) a heart handshake was really horrifying. I really thought he'd flat out killed him before the sap got back up. Not only did he just get his organs fluffed, he had to cope with a fundamental law of his universe being upended. Makes you almost feel sorry for the rich bigot.
This villain, this doctor guy, is really just sickening to read. He really and truly believes he's in the right, that he's doing a good and honorable thing, and any pain or suffering that happens along the way is irrelevant to the ultimate destination.
He honestly believes an entire race is just broken?
He deliberately raised his own daughter to only put trust in herself when it comes to the complete certainty that she's inherently broken through no fault of her own, but even if it's not her fault she's still broken!
All the kids whose lives he saved...Pinkie and Fluttershy have to live on carrying the knowledge that he didn't save any of them for good reasons, knowingly experimented on them, and would have completely altered them more if he'd gotten his way. How is Fluttershy gonna ever be able to look Snowflake in the eye again? Someone who it turns out, she literally shares dead sibling dust with? How's she supposed to feel, when now she knows the brotherhood felt with him was put upon her just like her affinity for the earth was.
I love what you're building to with the Bearers. Twilight is already regretting her 'entity' thought spiral from the last chapter, good, even if I think in the very instant the thoughts were had, she was just viscerally reacting. She knows it was wrong. Couldn't help the gut reaction anyway. Pinkie is a walking void, Fluttershy held together with spit and baling wire. Great 'work' there, Gentle. Rarity and Rainbow both are out for blood, and they're going to combine next chapter into a transformer named Retribution. Applejack is gonna cave the stage area in and kill the whole cabal. Can't spill the secret if they're all dead. [touches temple]
Well... This can only end well.
The "good" doctors attitude shows not just how much damage a person convinced of their own righteousness can do, even if it's only on a relatively small scale, but also the long term damage the earth pony's secret has done.
All of this has me very confused about how pony magic works. Is it in the blood, or in the soul? If it's in the blood, then Gentle has been able to change it partially but not entirely, but why? If it's in the soul... what?
I am severely confused.
8704110
I disagree. He would have done this if his daughter was a pegasus, or if he knew about the secret.
His thing isn't that he believes earth ponies are inferior. He believes that any pony born to a different tribe is caused by sin, and are broken.
If anything, its showing the advantage of the secret. If AJ said to hell with it there's NOTHING anyone can do to stop her from killing their captors.
8704153
Huh thinking about your probably right about that first part, but there's two problems with that bit about Aj one there's several earth pony's in the audience so they can and probably have shut her down before she can do a thing, and two if she does decide that she has to kill pony's she's going to have to kill all of them to make sure that they don't blab that she revealed the secret to her friends.
But I still maintain that the secret is causing more harm than good especially when it comes to people's attitudes towards them and the resentment said attitude breeds among the earth pony's.
8704181
Oh most certainly, but Earth ponies are still acting like it's about a 1000 years before when the tribes fought one another and did all sorts of nasty things.
Why is this so important? Why, food of course.
To put it bluntly, earth ponies and the cornocopia effect are the only things feeding Equestria. Say they do get revealed as having all these powers. What the heck can the pegusi and unicorn supremist do against them?
They could kill them, certainly-or try to, anyway-but they'd also be killing themselves. To put it bluntly, the cornucopia effect has completely and utterly neutered most pony agriculture in this setting. I've talked with the author a bit on this, and from what I gather agricultural techniques beyond occasionally rotating fields do not exist. Heck, most of them barely know what nutrients are. The cornucopia effect provides all of Equestria's food.
You take that away from the other two tribes, and Equestria starves, fast. They have no idea how to maximize yields without earth ponies. While unicorn/pegusus farmers in this setting are probably rare, I can bet you the only way they stay in business is by growing cash crops no one else bothers/are just so finicky even earth ponies need help making them grow (maybe magical ferns or something that require 6 drops of moonlight every half moon to grow healthily or something like that).
Basically, earth ponies form the backbone of Equestrian society. You remove them, the entire population starves in short order. And this is where it becomes important to realize Earth Pony tradition is holding them collectively back. They act as ifthey are still small tribes that could potentially be wiped out by pegusi and unicorns who could manage on their own. They're not. If anything, earth ponies are the sole tribe which could effectively colonize a whole new land and be self sufficient in short order.
So, this is a case of tradition failing to adapt to massive changes in condition, and is holding everypony back.
I mean, even if in the next chapter earth pony true powers go live, what is going to happen? The supremacist might try to wipe them out or enslave them, but...how are you going to manage that? They're a sizeable enough population that it'd be difficult to outright enslave entirely, and they're strong enough to resist. To try and act against them would be a catastrophic civil war Equestria would take decades to recover from. Plus, even idiotic lawmakers would, eventually, realize "They make the food".
(granted, there are real world idiots who caused famines due to utterly idiotic policies, and ponies likely aren't an exception. These guys are also often assassinated and replaced.)
I think I'm having too much fun talking about this setting.
8704181
Actually, there are no earth ponies in the conspiracy, unless you count her. They noted under the hoods that they all either had tents from the horn or bulges from wings, but always one of those.
8703162
The only question about Spike flame-mailing the Princesses for backup is if whatever factor Discord believed their involvement would result in catastrophic failure is still in play or if current events have rendered it moot.
apparently EVERY one of these ponies who have "contributed to the Great Work" have suffered the embarrassment (to them) of having a non-unicorn sibling or child...
but i can't help but think of the episode "baby cakes", where two Earth ponies produce a baby Pegasus AND a baby Unicorn...which happened near the beginning of Season 2! THAT certainly proves their belief that ONLY a pure Unicorn could give birth to a Unicorn is complete...Horseapples.
it's just more unicorn-supremacist Bigotry, like that unicorn in Estee's "Sonic Rainbigot".
oh, and if they HAD brought the Elements along, Gentle would certainly try to steal them, or maybe even try to force the Bearers to use them to further his "great work".
8704548
No. There's an assortment of motivations there. For starters, some want to cleanse their own bloodlines. Others are afraid for their potential children: think about the story told for giving birth upon a cloud. More than a few just want the power for themselves, because if an alicorn can be created, then why can't they be changed into one? And with Coordinator in play, a significant number are being blackmailed.
That's not all of the reasons why ponies are present. But it does say there's more than one.
8704374
Yeah, but I'd bet the rent money that if Spike can get paper + ink, he's panicked enough to try & be damned to what Discord wants
8704548
I don’t think that they were arguing that only a pure unicorn line can give birth to unicorns, but rather that a union of pure unicorn lines will only result in further unicorns... that there is no chance of giving birth to a foal of a different tribe unless someone in your family tree was knocked up by a member of that tribe. The Cakes foals support this, as Carrot gives an explanation where the unicorn and Pegasus genes came from in their family histories.
Well I wasn't expecting another chapter so soon.
The whole essence thing is the big mystery to me right now. It lies somewhere between the magic and the soul...the morality there gets odd, even if you take out the experimentation goo that's clogging it up.
It's like...forced organ donation. Lives are being saved - Fluttershy and Pinkie Pie would have died without the infusion if Gentle is to be believed - but the bodies/souls/magic of the deceased are being used without consent - whether of the dead themselves or a next of kin. It's already considered morally wrong to force someone to donate blood or organs (whether they're dead or alive) but when dealing with something so nebulous as essence, which could be more personal than the soul itself, or less than a shed hair...but there's so much we don't know about it. Does it linger forever, or does it decay with the body? If it decays, does it leave residue, or does it vanish entirely? If it leaves residue, can it be constructed from the remnants, if unique, or base components, if not? If it vanishes entirely, from and to where does it come and go? If it never leaves, is the entire earth saturated with the essence of thousands of years of ponies? Only so much has been told and there is only so much to guess from that. I'll have to read through again and see I'd there's something I've forgotten that's been lain down about essence here about where it lies on the impermanent-fleshy-vessel to inviolate-immortal-soul scale.
Well. It seems like essence should at -least- be on par with grave robbing, if not worse. And even though he -is- saving the lives odnliteral infants, experimenting on unborn children with what is effectively necromancy in order to alter their race is heinous. If his only motive were to save children, I'd consider him misguided but altruistic; its better to have a child with...magical dysphoria(?) than a dead child. But no, he's doing it all because his daughter wasn't born into the body he wanted her to be born in - everything and everyone else is either a stepping stone or an obstacle to his misguided goal.
8704374
Discord did say no calling back to Canterlot- I had forgotten about that a chapter or two ago. But surely Spike could call his big brother and ask him to bring any help from the Crystal Empire that he can muster. And if BBBFF decides that he's got to let Canterlot know to keep an eye out even if they don't directly intervene...well, that could be useful too.
8704651
oh, i hadn't thought about Coordinator blackmailing ponies into helping! though i did expect some wanting to make themselves Alicorns, JUST for the power.
I think I maaaybe figured it out.
The Dr was closer than he knew; the problem was that he assumed that an alicorn is a mix of a pegasus and a unicorn.
It never occurs to him that an alicorn is some combination of all three tribes (plus maybe a dose of harmony/chaos and so on).
His premise was off base. If he had gone forward thinking that all three tribes were needed, he might have succeeded.
The saddest thing is, he could have gone about this in a completely different angle and got widespread support. The idea of 'saving foals who would otherwise die' is a powerful motivation, and even harvesting essence of the dead can be put in a positive light.
Example - your grandmother passes away. Her dying wish is that her essence be saved so that if one of her descendants, long from now, might have a second chance.
That second chance is your own child, who isn't going to make it without help. Great-grandma literally bails them out in their darkest hour, and since their family and that essence went willingly - I think the results will be different. Look at Fluttershy and Snowball, who simply have the essences of siblings.
It's gross. It's tragic. It's terrifying. It's completely unethical. Or is it? Given even a ghost's chance of being given something concrete beyond life and death, many of us would jump at it. Go to the Sister's with the first of his discoveries - that of chaos stones being able to store and retrieve the souls of the dead for the purpose of saving the living. Accidentally use the wrong tribe on a dying infant. See their new futures unfold. Be asked to look further into it and see what else would happen.
It has such potential to be used correctly to save lives and grant peace to those at death's door. The promise that death is not really the end, and someday, you'd live on.
The tragedy is that because the Dr saw earth ponies as unicorns or pegasi that were broken instead of just different types of ponies it never occurred to him to approach from a position of true benevolence. He's been corrupted by his bias, and that's warped his work into something dark.
At the end of all this, I think Celestia would be forced to censure these discoveries, for now. But Twilight will always have this knowledge and wonder, what of the mortality of her friends some day?
Will she, in her position of slowly becoming equal in all tribes, come to reconsider this position?
8705487
His daughter was already an earthpony. He didn't include earthpony essence because she's already has her own.
The thing about Doctor Gentle is how close he is to being truly a good pony. There are plenty of bad ponies in this story and in Estee's fics generally; just look at Coordinator, or any number of selfish, thoughtless, uncaring, nasty, arrogant jerks that show up in various places.
Gentle is different. He's got the makings of a hero, a benefactor of ponykind, and an exemplar of Harmony. He could have been all that, if he had accepted his daughter as she is, truly loved her as not just a reminder of his dead wife but as a new pony of her own, and supported her as she sought her own path and destiny. Or he could have been an ordinary bad pony, by letting the little Earth pony filly die, or "sending her on". But no, instead he turned into a monster, the kind of which somepony like Coordinator could never have aspired to be, through a warped desire to do good, starting from toxic premises and leading to a lifetime of awful deeds.
OK, after reading last chapter (at long last! so wonderful--the reveal has arrived!) and this chapter? Mind=blown
8704140
I think that's a part of the mystery.
The thing that stands out most to me is how much ponies seem to revere it. I've always thought of it as an ability, nothing special, but in Triptych... I'm not sure what the right word is... It's like its divine, almost. Each race thinks their magic is best, and everypony tends to take it really personally. I wonder what would happen if magic stopped for some reason (other than the parts of their civilization that need it to be not dead.)
8708626
It's really not that surprising. From Estee's own writings on the state of the world of Equus, ponies basically live on a Death World. Whether or not it was Discord who made it so is irrelevant; ponies live in a world where, beyond the tiny circles of their "safe zones", hungry monsters and killer vegetation and untamed weather are the norm, where food is sparse and where ponies are quite low on the food chain. But, in their safe zones, ponies are basically gods. They manually alter the climate, they shape the weather on a daily basis, they coax the soil into producing an endless bounty of freely available food. They live lives that are vastly superior and comfortable, and if they ever need a reminder, they can go beyond the settled zones and see how long they survive.
And what made this change in circumstances possible? What took a small, vulnerable, squishy race with limited capacity for manual dexterity or to manipulate the world around them and raised them up to be one of the world's greatest powers, that freed them from the tyranny of nature and continues to make their lives one of comfort and ease by the standards of their ancestors?
Magic. Ponies owe everything they have to magic - by Estee's own blogs, ponies in the Continuum have barely figured out the principles of crop rotation, which means that if earth ponies suddenly vanished, Equestria itself would fall apart due to being unable to feed its resultant population. Magic has given them the world. It may have its limits... but, still, magic lets them achieve great things, impossible things. Magic makes them powerful, when otherwise they would be weak - in a world where ponykind had less magic, it would be the races with hands that would rule, the griffons and the minotaurs and even the diamond dogs, if they smarter. Magic is the only reason that ponies have risen to the heights they have, when they were once amongst the lowest of races.
No wonder that they worship it.
In fact, one could argue that ponykind has become too enamored for its own good. Even beyond the obvious example of the Great Work and the tribalism, look at how obsessive ponies are about micromanaging the world around themselves - in comparison, the minotaurs mostly work with what nature gives them and overcome its challenges, much like we do in the real world, and it makes them a lot less... brittle.
Estee has stated in one of her many blogs, I don't recall which one, that Luna doesn't like most ponies in general - individuals can fascinate her, but en masse, her opinion of them is low. Now, Estee has never said why Luna feels this way, but my personal opinion has always been that Luna views the modern generation of ponies as... well, spoiled. Coming from an age before Equestria, a time when ponies were more rugged and independent, I figured that Luna must see the ponies of modern Equestria as being, by comparison, weak, cowardly, self-serving and frivolous, spoiled rotten by a thousand years of Celestia's coddling.
I didn't expect yet another chapter so quickly. I'm so happy the cliffhanger got resolved so fast! Only... to be met with yet another cliffhanger!! YAY! (I'm not mad, just kind of laughing at myself for assuming there wouldn't be a worse one waiting.)
It's pretty eerie how Quiet can march the captured elements through his castle and the entirety of his staff doesn't care. As if this is some sort of common occurrence. But then I suppose when the foundations of the town are built on sending on foals, it must be hard for them to give a shit about some prisoners. Man, even Starlight's village wasn't this creepy!
His most devoted. That was such a powerful moment packed into so few words. Twilight recognises the full implications with just that one sentence - that all the horrible things she just heard Gentle confess to, and the things he's going to confess? Quiet was there for all of it and supported it as Gentle's closest confidant. And all of her denials and insistence that Quiet couldn't be involved were her being blinded by her own feelings. It's really painful and I feel sorry for her, but I'm happy she recognises it now. Just like I'm glad that she calls herself out on what she thought about Pinkie last chapter. Shame on you, Twilight.
Gentle is SO deluded. He thinks Twilight's scream was because of her shattered belief in Celestia's divinity, instead of the horror about what he did to his daughter and her friends? When Twilight herself has already ascended and knows there's nothing divine there? She even told him and Quiet how much it bothers her that ponies see her as a goddes when she clearly isn't one! How blinded by his own ego is this stallion?! (Plus wanting her to review his work. I think she does have an interest in obtaining his notes, if only for the purpose of setting that whole horror show on fire)
I'm really curious what Pinkie is currently thinking. Obviously she's just as hurt as Fluttershy is, but her silence makes me question what her thought process is. How does she think of herself now? The two of them have been given the tools to make sense of their oddities, but in such a cruel way. I really want to know how they're parsing that. Also, I wonder if infusing essence into a newborn and the resulting displacement... is that like a resurrection? Is the resulting pony exactly like the pony who died, or something new? Do they have the cutie marks of the ones who died, or new ones? When Gentle says he used essence of siblings on Snowflake and Fluttershy and so they're like siblings, is he being literal? Does he even know?? How far does this necromancy go?
It's pretty ironic that based on what Twilight is thinking, Gentle's actions might have led to Discord's freedom. Villains do create their own downfalls, huh.
I'm genuinely laughing at Gentle's offence over how Pinkie's father treated her. As if he has any right to condemn that. I suppose there's another saying that's true at work here; you are what you hate. Gentle's abuse of his own daughter might not have been quite as physical (although that sure changed after her transformation) but it was abuse all the same.
Is Applejack beginning to notice that Twilight was right? I mean, Gentle would have been a racist either way, even if he knew what Earth Ponies could truly do, but there's no denying that at least part of his dismissive attitude does stem directly from not knowing the full extent of their magic. You make yourself look weak, people will dismiss you as weak. C'est la vie.
I didn't expect for the differentiation exception to come up so quickly either!! I knew the fact that it wasn't just working on foals would become relevant, but holy cow, seeing it in action is truly terrifying. Reaching inside a body and rearranging their biology at will - what a horrible ability to have for a villain. Honestly Estee, you've done such a great job with the villains in this piece, with Gentle above all. He's despicable, powerful, deluded, arguably insane even if his circumstances are understandable, entertaining to read about while making the reader truly fear for the heroes. I think this is hands down one of the most effective and best villains I've ever read about in a fanfic. Maybe one of the best I've ever read about period. I love to hate him.
So he really did force her to speed it up, as that one chapter implied. Didn't she say doing that might be dangerous to her/kill her? I'd have to go back and check. Even with the painkillers, that can't be good for her body. Not that Gentle seems to care... another sign of his insanity: he talked at length about how he did all of this to fix her, but now he doesn't seem to be bothered by the idea of hurting her more than necessary, as long as he has something to present. And given that he has already spoken about arranging for her successor to Quiet, one really has to wonder how much he still cares about her at all. (Who would that successor even be? Where would he get that poor foal who he plans to repeat these atrocities on? Would he be willing to father another? Would Quiet have a kid for him, as his most devoted? Or would he simply steal one of his attended births, telling the mother that unfortunately it was too late, withholding the corpse from her? Or would it be one of the foals that Trotter's Falls would otherwise send on? The implications are horrifying in either case.)
How will things proceed now, how will they get out? One possibility is Spike: they don't know everything he can do. It's been established in the verse that ponies know very little about dragons, generally, and Quiet and Gentle definitely don't know about his flame mail. So he might try to contact someone for help. Cadance and Shining Armour, or Trixie, would be obvious candidates with Canterlot out. Maybe he'd contact Discord directly? How much do Quiet and Gentle know about everything else he could do? Spike's good at digging and has fire breath; could he dig/melt his way out of the castle and escape?
Another possibility is Applejack and Twilight using their earth pony magic, although that might be countered by her. She already seemed disturbed seeing the bearers captured like this, but I'm having my doubts if she's able to break through the brainwashing Gentle put her through. Rebelling against her own father when he convinced her so thoroughly that she loves him and that he only does what he does to fix her and the other "broken" ponies... Hmm.
Im a bit late to the party it seems.
I find it funny, very little of what Gentle has actually done is actually all that bad. In total I would say the only bad things he has done was using the snitcher on her, and fucking with the dukes heart.
Otherwise, while he displaced them from what they would otherwise be, he has done nothing but save lives by adding strange essence to them. Literally the only thing in my mind that makes him a bad person is the motivation that he has for all of his actions.
If only he wasn't fucking racist.
It just occured to me that we now know what the flashback of discord when he was still in the statue was about, it was gentle harvesting from him.
Doctor Gentle is just digging himself deeper. With a saintly Doctor in charge, and with his most loyal follower suffering from some unknown sickness, I think most people expected they wanted alicorn ascension to use it as a panacea.
So, having the motivation for starting all of it be wanting to fix their useless earth pony offspring was quite the surprise. Not to mention the whole thing about groping internal organs.
Applejack has pretty much become the face of the Secret. So consequently, I’m having a hard time sympathizing with Applejack’s outrage in this chapter because of my bad case of schadenfreude, and the words “Bitch please, you can’t throw stones” keep coming up undermining her moral high ground.
Like when she got pissed that they didn’t think an alicorn in training had anything to learn from earth ponies.
I was like: your ‘friend’ was an alicorn, you knew better, and you didn’t think to teach her anything either. Not until it was too little, too late. – Not until after Applejack had attacked her friends, her fellow bearers of the elements, her comrades in saving the world, for the Secret. and not before she had been shamed into it by Rainbow Dash’s example.
Considering how prejudiced earth ponies are in the Triptych Continuum, I wouldn’t put killing-off their handicapped children past them either, especially since they are already killing their own to maintain the edge the Secret gives them. They just know that earth ponies are only pretending to be handicapped.
You wanted everyone to underestimate you, so you would have an edge on them. To make everyone think you had no special power or heritage of your own.
Congratulation! They do.
Thanks to the Secret, every other tribe see their earth pony children as basically cripples who have lost their magic alongside their horn/wings at birth. – a stat increase and the fertilizer effect cannot compensate for what they lost. they will never be able to live on clouds alongside their parents or be able to get jobs requiring ‘actual’ magic.
When a unicorn has a Pegasus kid or vice versa there is the mitigating factor that their kid still has actual magic, if not the same as their parents.
I really hope there comes a post Triptych story where Applejack goes through some serious introspection on the Secret, hopefully while addressing her prejudices.
I mean, Applejack is the only one of the main-six whose requirement for her lover is that they have to be from the same tribe, with the ability to provide strong children of her tribe.
Which, combined with her other biases makes her uncomfortably similar to the unicorn nobles she hates.
8709725
>>Is Applejack beginning to notice that Twilight wasright? I mean, Gentle would have been a racist either way, even if he knew what Earth Ponies could truly do, but there's no denying that at least part of his dismissive attitude does stem directly from not knowing the full extent of their magic. You make yourself look weak, people will dismiss you as weak. C'est la vie.
Would Gentle Arrival have been a racist without the Secret, though? Remember, when he talks about his horror at his daughter being born an Earth Pony, the only thing he brings up is her (perceived) lack of magic, and how she will not be able to engage in... well, anything that a unicorn will be able to do.
Gentle Arrival is under the perception that being an Earth Pony is to have no "real" magical powers, to be completely cut off from all of the special racial rituals and intimacies that unicorn and pegasi share. This is because the earth ponies have "The Secret", the deliberate hiding of Truespeech's full potential. He has no way of knowing that an earth pony can physical shape the world around her, nor does he know of the shiva ritual. This is because the Secret hides such things from him.
If he had not been ignorant of what earth ponies can really do, if he had every reason to know that earth pony magic is just as strong and varied as unicorn or pegasus magic... would he have cared so much about his daughter being born an earth pony?
8710407
You know, early on, I had hypothesized that the Great Work might actually have been at its heart an anti-racist plot; after all, if everypony is an Alicorn (immortal or not - and Cadance believes she herself is mortal), then everypony has the same basic range of magical abilities, so there's no reason to view any one type of magic of superior. Well, that theory didn't pan out, but still, the Great Work was fertilized by the Secret.
Also, nice observation on Applejack really being similar to the same bigoted unicorn nobles she rails against. Hmm... I wonder if that's the Not So Different trope or the You Are What You Hate trope...
8710573
I think he would have been just as racist, yes. If you read the last and this chapter again, notice what exactly he describes as sin - it's not just earth ponies being born to unicorn or pegasi parents. It's any couple bearing a child of a race other than their own. He considers it a sin when two earth ponies have a unicorn foal too. Or two pegasi having a unicorn, or two unicorns having a pegasus. Yes, he views earth ponies as magicless and therefore useless, but that's not the core of his racism. He's against cross-racial breeding period. So if he knew about the secret, he'd know earth ponies are not useless, but he'd still consider two unicorns having an earth pony child a sin because some bullshit about them not being able to live up to their heritage.
Ironically, that means that he and Applejack/Igneous/Earth Ponies in general should get along rather well. They have the same goals after all! Racially pure children for everypony!! That totally justifies lynchings and/or murdering foals, imprisoning your daughter in a cellar to brainwash her and suppress her magic while denying her her own agency and destiny, and unethical experimentation on newborns!
Honestly at this point it feels as if the only 'unproblematic' character is Spike
8709883
...you don't think it's bad that he imprisoned his own daughter in a cellar, never let her see the outside, gaslighted her into thinking she was 'broken' and responsible for her mother's death, deprived her of almost all social contact especially of those her own age, took away her agency, denied her her own hobbies and interests, interfered with her finding her own mark and thus also her own mark magic and destiny, and enacted an experiment on her that trapped her in a state of constant body horror and unspeakable pain?