Some three months had passed since Princess Luna had returned from the Moon.
Bad dreams disturbed her less now, or at least she had stopped remembering them. She rarely woke up screaming in the middle of the day, or found herself on the floor at the end of the afternoon, after having thrashed her way completely off her bed. She knew she was still far from emotionally well-balanced, but she felt far better than she had at first. The mere presence of other ponies no longer made her want to fly into a berserker rage, or hide under furniture. Day by day, week by week, she could feel the madness slowly receding.
Sanity, sleep and regular meals had begun to restore her body. She no longer had to tap her self to avoid wobbling when she walked; her coat was glossy and her muscles firm. The love of her sister, and of her Night Guard, worked a similar restoration on her essence. It was not the intense empowerment Celestia received from the adoration of all Equestria, but it was significant. Nor was it the dark infernal might she had been granted by the Nightshadow, but it was truly her own: the only cost it came with was that of loyalty toward those who put their trust in her. That was a price she paid gladly.
Her form was growing back toward normal. Her body was now of full stature for a normal mare, though still far less impressive than that of any but a young Alicorn. Her mane and tail rippled with subtle energies, and moved occasionally by her will rather than the vagaries of wind. She was no longer so weak that anypony could kill her; she was starting to feel again less like a helpless foal and more like a warrior Princess.
As her strength returned, she felt new urges. She wanted to put her body and mind to use. The Night Guards were honored when she wanted to use their one of their training rooms, though she felt a bit bemused when they termed it a salle d'armes. That had been a new term in her last previous century on Earth, the sort of phrase which would be used by fops like Blueblood rather than by tough professional soldiery.
Some arms had changed. Others remained familiar.
Spears, swords, lances, wing-blades, wing-darts, hoof-daggers. She relearned the dances of death with these basic weapons, and found the memories came back swiftly to her. Then her special weapons -- the originals were long-lost, of course, but there were both modern versions and functional replicas. The battle-axe she had used in those decades she had called herself Monasdrommir, among the Northern barbarians of a time forgotten now save in legends. The twin crescent-swords from the Southlands, that she seized and spun into wheels of razor-steel, in an almost effortless use of her aura. The little target shields that, wielded with her reflexes, could pluck arrows out of the air. The twin swords of the traditional Neighponese unicorn-samurai, the katana and wakizashi. All so familiar, and she felt more than one kind of strength returning to her as she exercised with them.
She played with some of the newer weapons, too.
Firearms had come back, but they were still largely a curiosity. Single-shot muzzle-loaders took many seconds even for a unicorn to load and were utterly impractical for an earth pony or pegasus to reload in the middle of melee. Given the speed of a charge or swoop, they were too inaccurate for any but the most skilled shots to hope to hit anything with them. They really need at least semi-automatic action, Moondreamer said within her, if not fully-automatic. Equestrian technology may be up to the task, but Sunny never cared much for weapons work.
She added this to her list of things to do, when she was fully-healed.
She was a bit puzzled by the long, sharp and thin rapier. It was clearly meant to be used to impale through the chinks in an opponent's armor, but she didn't see many ponies training with it that way. When she visited a fencing-academy she realized that it was a relic weapon, once effective but now become a sport. There had been a phase in which it had been used for serious dueling, but that custom had long since faded among the ponies of this new kind world. Some of the nobles still dueled, but with blunted and sometimes even capped tips.
The saber pleased her, though she didn't think she'd trade her crescents for them. There was a curve and flexibility to the blade which would have been impossible to the swordsmiths of a millennium past, and it could be held in the aura or the mouth, used to deliver deadly slashing attacks in passing -- which the arms masters now called en passant, for no apparent reason that they could explain. Why had Prench and Istallion become the languages of melee weapons training? She supposed there was some history there, which she reminded herself to read.
Other weapons had gone through minor and incremental improvements. Bows and crossbows had reached a point of perfection. They now incorporated metal frames and cabling into their construction, allowing bows to be drawn with much force. Crossbows were powerful enough to shoot right through any plate armor any pony could bear -- she thought she knew now why the Guards seemed so lightly-mailed by the standards of past ages -- and some expensive ones were sprung to allow semi-automatic shooting, though the force of these was of necessity weaker.
The artillery park frankly amazed her. It was nowhere near that of the Age of Wonders -- it was all smoothbore muzzle-loader cannons and tension and torsion mechanical arbalests and catapults of varying types -- but it was far superior to anything she had seen a thousand years ago. She supposed that, lacking a Dark Princess, her sister had needed a new "ultimate reason of sovereigns" with which to convince recalcitrant nobles, in the chaos that had no doubt come more than once before reaching this current ideal of hyper-civilization.
There were so much else, so many things that she did not yet have time to master. She frequently saw air-yachts and larger air-merchants in the skies about Canterlot, sometimes briefly by day, sometimes piercing the night with their powerful running-lanterns. Sometimes she saw sleeker, deadlier-looking skyships which bore ports which looked to be cut for some of the artillery she had examined. Steamboats plied the river, and in her ventures to the coast steamships the seas, and some of these too were Equestrian naval craft. She realized yet again that the silk of her sister's new realm hid definite steel -- as was only right and reasonable.
Luna wanted to once again become part of that steel. Her sister was the Princess of Peace; her own job was to be the Princess of War. Her desire and duty were to defend the realm.
But through that long summer no foe presented itself, at least none worthy of her spells or steel. There were no invaders, no rebels, not even any brigands beyond the easy capacity of the ordinary authorities to suppress. Sometimes she uncovered crime in the course of her private dream patrols, but never meriting more than a discreet word to the local guards.
It was not that she wanted to see the land swathed in smoke, drenched in blood. Still less did she want to lose the lives of her beloved Night Guards. She had seen enough of that in the centuries over a millennium ago to suit her for many mortal lifetimes. That fight at Trottingham -- dead griffons and guardsponies everywhere, the streets running red: big, bluff kindly Little Seed, standing with a vacant stare amidst a heap of corpses; sweet young Red Lute dying cradled in her own forelegs, his songs forever stilled -- she shuddered at the memory, though that battlefield had fallen silent fourteen centuries ago. The smell! That was one part the minstrels never mentioned in their heroic sagas ...
All she wanted was to be once again be useful. To serve the realm again, instead of merely relaxing on its bounty. To be once again the Warrior Princess, in more than mere name.
Was that too much to ask?
***
In the late afternoons she would awake and spend some time with her sister. Celestia would tell her of the day's events, major and minor, and in this wise educate her regarding the new Equestrian world.
Sometimes, Celestia would read her one of the "friendship reports" her young vassal-in-training was writing her from Ponyville. These ranged from the funny to the insightful to the boringly-mundane. Some were so awesomely-innocent that Luna wondered if Twilight Sparkle had even known playmates growing up.
"Not really," Celestia told her once, when Luna asked this aloud. "She's a very driven filly -- well, young mare, now -- and aside from her brothers, she grew up pretty much alone."
"That is sad," Luna said sincerely. She remembered how Dusk had been as a young colt, when Moondreamer and Sundreamer had first met him -- smart and brave and strong -- but utterly friendless. She and Sunny had taught him the meaning of friendship back then, in the vanished Age of Wonders. She wished she could teach him ... her, again today.
"She's not alone any more," said Celestia, smiling.
Luna tensed.
"She's become good friends with her sister Element Bearers," Celestia explained. "As I hoped: she needs to learn how to get along with others, before she can become really great."
Luna relaxed.
"I know you have given her this post to raise her for higher ones to come," Luna said. "It is a good design: she can learn best by doing."
"Exactly," said Celestia. "To help me in the future, she must master the ways of leadership, both social and otherwise."
"I wish I might help her learn this lore," mused Luna.
"You are not my prisoner, dear sister," said Celestia. "You may visit Ponyville whenever you desire."
"But no," said Luna. "She must master this on her own. I am ... lost ... in this time. What could I teach her?"
"Whatever you wish," suggested Celestia.
But Luna made no reply to this.
***
Another afternoon, Luna learned that Twilight had overcome an Ursa Minor. By herself, and with magic alone.
"How was that done?" Luna asked, impressed. Even an Ursa Minor was the size of a large whale.
"She charmed it with magical music, gave it a whole dairy farm's worth of milk, and then picked it up and carried it back home," Celestia explained, beaming with pride.
"Zounds!" Luna reflected. "She really is mighty -- and deft!" Manipulating that much mass, and doing it gently, would have required some effort for Luna even at her best. In her current state, she wasn't sure if she would be capable of the feat.
"And wise," added Celestia, "in that she did not attempt to actually fight the creature. Had she hurt it, its bawling would probably have brought its mother to its defense."
Luna blanched at the thought of an angry bear the size of a small castle, running rampant among ordinary townsfolk. "That would have been ... bad." Something remained unexplained, though. "How did an Ursa Minor wind up wandering into Ponyville?"
"Two very foolish colts went looking for it."
"Foolish, and foalish, indeed!" commented Luna. "To what end?"
"A magician had come to town. They wanted to see her defeat it," her sister explained.
"They thought this magician could defeat an Ursa?"
"To be fair to them, she had boasted that she had done just that before."
"Ah ..." Luna considered the situation. "I would wager she was displeased when the beast showed up on her doorstep!"
"You ... would win that wager," Celestia commented. "Her best efforts at defense merely annoyed the creature. It crushed her wagon. Twilight had the two colts clean up the mess afterward."
"The poor foals," Luna laughed. "Their luck that they lived through the adventure. Some times it's as if a good spirit watches over the foolish and innocent!"
"This time," said Celestia, "the name of that spirit was 'Twilight Sparkle.'" She looked contemplative. "Did a good job of it, too. No one died. No one even took much harm, not even the magician, who was last seen galloping off toward the Whitetails."
Luna snickered. "I guess that magician wasn't too loved around Ponyville any more."
"Indeed," said Celestia. "I feel rather sorry for that magician. She lost most of her possessions with her wagon. Twilight's keeping those which survived safe for her, when she returns. Which might not be for a long time -- she was rather thoroughly humiliated."
"Well, she deserved it," scoffed Luna. "She made stupid boasts!"
"Yes," admitted Celestia. "The boasts were stupid. Her name was Trixie -- the 'Great and Powerful,' she styled herself."
"She was clearly neither," Luna said.
"But she wanted to be," said Celestia. "And she seems to have been skilled, from the accounts."
"Neither skilled enough. Nor wise enough," was Luna's verdict.
"As events showed," agreed Celestia. "Still, I wish she might not have so suffered."
***
It was the end of September. Autumn was stealing upon the land, and the leaves were starting to turn red and golden, when the crisis came.
It was still relatively early in the afternoon one day, when she was woken by Celestia. Luna looked blearily and a bit accusingly at her sister, before her eyes fully focused and she saw the tense expression on Celestia's face.
"Dragons," was the terse explanation.
Luna came fully awake and alert, ears up at attention. "An invasion?" she asked.
"Not quite. Not yet. Come," said Celestia. "I'll explain it on the way."
They made their way through the halls toward a spiral ramp. The ramp led down deep, below the cellars.
"There are reports of dragons all over the realm," Celestia said. "No attacks on ponies -- yet -- but they're making no effort to hide their presence. They seem to be establishing themselves in caves, and they've brought their hoards with them."
"They're claiming territory," said Luna. She snorted in anger. "In Equestria."
"Exactly," said Celestia. "And it's obviously no coincidence that the first reports are coming in from all over, this morning. This is a coordinated movement, which means this is the work of at least a significant faction."
They reached the bottom of the ramp. Several doors led from the chamber at its base. Two Day Guards, saluted, opened a thick bronze-plated door for the Royal Sisters. A corridor lay behind. The walls and ceiling formed a single barrel vault, braced by what looked like armored-steel arches. The corridor curved gently, so that there was no direct line-of-sight from one end to the other.
"Their Royal Family?" asked Luna.
"I don't think so," replied Celestia. "They've been relatively friendly for the last century -- and we have common foes. But --" they reached the door, "I doubt that they are exactly discouraging it."
Luna thought a moment.
"We're being tested," was her conclusion.
"I concur," said Celestia.
The door at the end of the corridor was also heavy, also guarded. It opened to reveal a huge conference chamber, crowded with high-ranking officers of the Royal armed forces. In the center of the room was a large table, on which was spread a great map of Equestria and the area immediately surrounding. On that map were arranged many small models, of ponies and ships and airships and other creatures. Unicorn aides stayed by speaking-tubes, frequently stepping forth to adjust the positions of the figurines.
"My new War Room," said Celestia, proudly. "I don't think I've shown you this before -- it's less than a hundred years old. It'll be even nicer in another century or so, when we've gotten back up to electronics. Do you like it?"
"Yes!" Luna's eyes lit up at the possibilities of such a place. "It's wonderful!"
Celestia faintly blushed, then got back to business.
"We've been getting reports for several hours now, and we're plotting them on the map with these ..." she made a little dragon figurine glow. "Blue for unconfirmed, yellow for confirmed, orange for confirmed and urgent -- those are the ones near settlements, or otherwise making a nuisance of themselves."
"Not many of those last," Luna said, scanning the map. "Too many of the yellows, though. Is each piece one dragon?"
"Yes," said Celestia. "They've come in singly, rather than as mated pairs or with young. You see what that means, of course?"
"They don't really expect us to let them stay," said Luna. "Even dragons would rather chance losing part of their hoards than their children."
"Precisely," said Celestia.
"So this really is a test," Luna continued. "I wonder why they're testing us now, though? Slaking their young bloods' thirst for adventure? Or has something changed here, to make them think we've weakened, or will soon grow ..."
Celestia looked away.
Luna's mind caught up to her mouth.
"...Oh," she gasped. "Oh. Oh, sister, I'm so sorry to have ..."
"It's not your fault," said Celestia. "Or if it was, it was your fault a thousand years ago, and you've already suffered enough for that."
"But they think you may be weak because you ..."
"And what am I supposed to do?" asked Celestia. "Harm my own sister to conform to the prejudices of another species? I wouldn't treat any of my little ponies that way just to please others. Least of all would I do that to you." There was a dangerously protective tone to her voice, a tone which (Luna knew well) had been the last thing some of Equestria's enemies had ever heard.
"It's not all about that, anyway," Celestia continued, relaxing slightly. "Part of it is almost certainly that they want to see if you will show up to help evict them. It's been over a thousand years since you -- as yourself -- acted in affairs on Earth. That's a long time by incarnate standards, even for dragons. They don't know if you've grown stronger -- or weaker -- or just changed, in some way that affects the power of our Realm. They want to find out if you're still ... you."
Luna drew herself up straight and looked Celestia right in the eye.
"I am, still and once again, myself. Luna Selena Nyx, Ruling Princess of Equestria, Princess of the Night, High Lady of War, your loyal supporter." Her voice was confident and clear, rising as she spoke to that of the ancient Royal Voice of Canterlot. She seemed to subtly grow in stature. Her mane and tail began to shimmer, to fill with the light of a thousand stars, to wave as if in the wind, though the air was calm inside the War Room. There was no sound save her voice, but there was something now in that chamber that made all present imagine that they heard trumpets sounding, calling back to them from ancient forgotten wars.
Some nearby officers winced, others looked on in awe. Everyone in the room paid attention.
"Princess of the Day, I stand ready and willing to accept and obey your commands!" Her great blue eyes shone with emotion, but she kept her gaze straight forward.
"Very good," said Princess Celestia, her face lighting in satisfaction. "Welcome back, Princess Luna.
"Now here's what you are to do ..."
First, I'd like to say good chapter.
Second, before I get into any specifics on this chapter, I'd like to say something related to Nightmares are Tragic. The author's note at the end of the Rarity specific chapter to be precise. You mentioned in great detail in that chapter about Rarity's generosity and how she uses it for social manipulation. I found that it was a most striking explanation of a lot of what happened in "Rarity Takes Manehatten". That thoroughly stuck with me after I watched that episode and thus you have impressed me.
Third, I did notice some mistakes in this chapter that confused me at first
I'm assuming the first "her" isn't supposed to be there. Beyond that it's an odd turn of phrase that I'm not familiar with but now that I'm reading again (Without that her) I'm grasping the possible meanings behind it.
Huh, you just gave me another thing to think about for writing my book. Not only do I need slang terms, but also old sayings and colloquialisms. Word of advice if you ever do what I am doing, creating a new language is a hard and very interesting task.
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Silk hiding steel is a very poetic way of saying that one speaks softly and carries a big, sharp stick.
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Thank you for your praise.
Yes, I think the writers of the series have a good sense of Rarity as a character -- she's been shown consistently since her earlier appearances, both in terms of her virtues and her flaws. I love Rarity in part because her type of character is so seldom done well -- on most TV shows. Most TV writers would present her as a shallow alpha bitch, or worse still greedy and heartless. What I love about her is that she's a nice social manipulator, and in her actions and morals an exemplar of generous, enlightened self-interest. Assuming Equestria survives all the demonic invasions, the realm will need ponies like her to lead them into the new Age of Wonders.
When I write Luna's dialogue (even internal) I specifically try to give her a Middle to Early Modern English turn of phrase. I don't mean just the occasional use of first-person personal pronouns ("thee, thou, thine"), I also mean that where possible I have her use Anglo-Saxon based rather than Latinate words, and try in particular to avoid modern euphemisms (and instead use archaic ones, where appropriate). This also works well with her personality -- save on battlefields (where she is a cunning tactician) Luna is a very direct sort of pony, and she scorns conversational evasion.
Heh, I wish I'd invented Silk Hiding Steel (follow the link to the TV Tropes explanation and examples), but it's an old concept, dating back literally to Ancient and Classical times. It's perhaps most prominent in Japanese medieval and early modern aristocratic and knightly culture, where the ladies were expected to be cultured, demure, and fully-the-match of their lords and of the samurai in following the iron and remorseless code of honor.
As a show where heroines far outnumber heroes (and one depicting an explicitly matriarchal culture), this is not uncommon on My Little Pony: Friendship Is Magic. Rarity is an obvious exemplar of the type: she's the most feminine of all the Mane Six -- and she's also a fearless martial artist, whose response to being attacked by a manticore many times her size was to kick it in the face (an act which I have impress Nightmare Moon herself in Nightmares Are Tragic). Celestia is polite, kindly, hospitable, feminine -- and basically a living tactical nuclear weapon. Fluttershy is a sweet shy animal lover -- who can stare down a basilisk. Cadance is an embodiment of loving harmony, and will fight her way through a Changeling invasion to get back to the side of her beloved. In fact, the ones to whom this description doesn't apply fail more because they are tomboyish to some degree: for instance, both Luna and Twilight are only minimally feminine in their behavior, while Applejack and Rainbow Dash behave tomboyishly -- all four of them are basically fearless, Badass superheroines: they have plenty of "steel," but not as much "silk."
As someone who has loved strong female characters since before they were fashionable, but prefers ones who are written as believable females rather than simply males with girly parts, it's not surprising that I love this show.
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I didn't mean that I didn't understand the "silk hiding steel" thing (Or catch the more Japanese and Chinese influence behind the actual phrasing of such a term) but I was in a hurry since I was going to be late for work if I didn't leave soon. I do appreciate your elaboration, though.
I also didn't mean to imply that you coined the term yourself. However, this brought to mind one of the many intricacies of language: old sayings and colloquialisms. I'm in the process of essentially creating a language from scratch for a book of mine. I don't halfheartedly take on endeavors such as this, and thus have to create the grammar, verbal conjugation, and many other aspects of language. It will be without flavor though, if I don't add things to hint at the one aspect of language that is most important. Language evolves (a fact you are already aware of because of your decision to write Luna the way you do, which is genius by the way), and yet old sayings will sometimes still carry through if they have a powerful enough meaning. So not only am I creating a language of the present, creating slang, and creating grammatical structure, but I also must come up with some sayings that, when directly translated, may not make perfect sense without explanation, especially to someone learning the language when all they knew was English.
I believe I can agree in how you describe each of their traits. However, since the show is less adventure and more slice of life, I find that Rarity and Fluttershy are my least favorite characters. I like all of the main six and in the few adventure based episodes they shine through their subtlety (however they wouldn't shine as much without the more "steely" characters to really contrast against). In the slice of life episodes, Rarity is indeed a social manipulator, a skill that I never learned as I'm much more like Twilight. This is an important and powerful skill, but to me has never been appealing. I think that if I were to meet Rarity in real life, I would have trouble getting past her outward self to get to know her. Her interests contrast mine as well. Fluttershy is just... if we met we'd probably sit in silence because of her demure nature and how long it takes me to come out of my shell. The others I actually feel I have common ground. Rainbow and Applejack I have less common ground with because I'm not an active person and probably more feminine than them, but I can also appreciate what they appreciate, and Twilight is just highly intellectual. Pinkie, she's just like a lot of my friends and myself (when the right writer has her).
I think I just went and over shared, but I already typed this out and it seems a waste to just not post it after that much effort.
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Ah, ok -- didn't mean to imply that you were ignorant. I actually had rarely encountered the term before TV Tropes, though I had encountered the character type, both in history and in fiction.
I love the constructed language thing. That's basically how Tolkien wound up creating Middle-Earth, you know -- he made up languages and then started thinking about the cultures and histories of the beings that would speak them. This is kind of backwards from the way that most fantasy writers before and after him did it, but it certainly worked well for him!
To some extent anyone who makes up a fantasy world must either construct (parts of) a language, or wind up basically naming everything in English. My Little Pony chose the second route, to the point that the names of most characters are basically "wordmeaning wordmeaning," as in "Twilight Sparkle" or "Sweetie Belle," and location names are either flat descriptions, such as "Ponyville," or puns on names from our own history, as in "Manehattan", "Canterlot."
Though, you know, they can't be speaking English. In fact, since they have an entirely different vocal apparatus, what they are speaking is probably in large part unpronouncable by humans; and since we haven't grown up learning their vocalizations, it's probably almost incomprehensible to us as well. The puns, alliterations and such that we hear would, if we take the secondary world seriously, be clever translations of what are probably puns and alliterations in their language as well -- but different puns and alliterations.
The same is true of their face and body language. They actually show some of this straight -- when you have good character animation in an episode, they remember to show things like the muscular, fully-controllable ears indicating emotional state. Their faces are probably expressive, too, but I doubt if the set of expressions hard-wired into their DNA are exactly the same as ours (though there would be some points of similarity -- we are both eutherial mammals). I've written some of this into my fictions -- you'll notice that characters' ears go back when they get mad or frightened, and they snort and stamp with anger. Not myself being a sapient equoid, I'm sure I miss a lot of it, though.
For a good fanfic that touches on some of the points of difference (and similarity) between humans and the ponies, you should check out Ardashir's My Little Balladeer, especially the chapters in which Twilight hasn't yet used her translation spell. Basically, Ardashir has the ponies' vocalization sound like incredibly complex versions of normal horse sounds, coupled with subtle and complex body language. The human hero Silver John, who is familiar with real horses, can pick up a lot on the emotions being conveyed, but not anything more complex. Also, his experience with (non-sapient) horses can play him false at points, such as when he inadvertently gropes one character because he doesn't grasp the nuances of Equestrian customs of affectionate behavior (fortunately, she makes allowances for his ignorance).
For a good science-fiction story dealing in part with translational conventions, check out Vernor Vinge's A Deepness in the Sky, a really excellent novel in which (among other things) humans attempt to understand the language and culture of the "Spiders," a physically (and to some extent psychologically) very-alien race. They use translational conventions to anthropomorphize the Spiders, which works surprisingly well, but also has hidden traps in their assumptions.
Eh, I love all the Mane Six for different reasons. Twilight is in some ways the closest to me, as I'm obsessed by books and love knowledge for its own sake -- though she's also what our culture would call a high-functioning obsessive-compulsive disorder neurotic personality, a character flaw which I've noticed the series actually manages to take seriously more than you'd expect for something being marketed as a children's cartoon. Fluttershy reminds me of my wife with the social anxiety dialed up to eleven (Rosanna's fascinated by, and good at communicating with, animals).
Not being into fashion myself, I can't share Rarity's guiding obsession, but I deeply respect a courageous, kind and hardworking artist and business owner of any species. Pinkie Pie just purely makes me happy, and I'm glad she came from whatever weird world gave birth to her (and I don't mean the Fantasy Amish rock farm) to grace our lives. And Rainbow Dash is insanely brave and determined to do the right thing -- "more awesome than even [she] ever imagined."
I suppose the ones I'd like the most in real life if I had to know her would probably be Fluttershy (as I said, she reminds me of my wife) and Applejack. She's easy to get along with, as long as you're decent, honest and hardworking. She has her own signature problem (Honor Before Reason), but it usually helps rather than hurts her (big exceptions in "Applebuck Season" and "The Last Roundup" -- hopefully, she's learned from those mistakes by now).
Hee, if you're at all like Pinkie, that's cool with me.
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And once again you have mentioned several things that I'm going to have to touch upon, and actually the concept of my story isn't going to be that different from a regular concept here "a human gets taken to Equestria and transformed into a local" only change Equestria to another planet far away. His situation is also a lot worse than just not being able to understand the language right off the bat (especially since there are multiple languages, but I'm really only going to focus on one because coming up with five full languages seems like a bit much. Doesn't mean that I won't also add bits of the others in as I go though). The way I see it, he isn't exactly going to be able to walk in a new body right off the bat. It's kind of like waking from a coma, it takes a while to get all the motor functions responding right. Plus if he has any extra appendages like a tail or restructured legs it would be even harder.
Honestly talking with you about language and characterization has stimulated many a thought and idea. I can already tell that you are an extremely intelligent person that I am going to enjoy talking with about things fictional and not (and pony and not). I also look forward to reading more of your writing. Now I just need to be productive on my own work. Thanks again for talking with me on this stuff, I'm at my best when I talk to others about ideas.
"You ... would win that wager," Celestia commented. "Her best efforts at defense merely annoyed the creature. It crushed her wagon. Twilight had the two colts clean up the mess afterward."
To be more precise, it crushed her HOME, and everything she owned. If we were supposed to feel Trixie got her just desserts by spreading tall tales about herself, I never felt it was a fair punishment.
Why do I get the feeling Celly was trying to lure Luna into taking Trixie under her wing?
I ABSOLUTELY POSITIVELY LOVE your view on Equestria weapons tech!
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Oh yes. Trixie suffered out of all proportion to her (relatively mild) sins. I think she's an annoying egotist (though she's actually quite powerful and skilled, and if her claims weren't so extreme she'd be more respected more widely for her very real talents), but she didn't deserve to have her home destroyed.
She did not, after all, actually cause the Ursa to attack. All she did was falsely boast that she had defeated an Ursa Major. It was Snips and Snails whose brilliant idea it was to go looking for an Ursa and -- having found it -- lead it back to town. Trixie could not rationally predict that her claim to have once defeated a giant monster would lead to someone actually causing a giant monster to attack Ponyville in an attempt to watch her do it again.
The reason why most of the Mane Six was unsympathetic toward her was that Trixie had chosen to personally humiliate them in the contests. This actually wasn't necessary for Trixie to do -- Trixie could have chosen to outdo them in better-humored ways -- and this shows that Trixie is a somewhat nasty person, probably because she's been emotionally-damaged somewhere along the line. But she's not, as far as I can, evil -- a point which is somewhat obscured on a casual view of "Boast Busters" and "Magic Duel." Specifically, that most of the really bad things she did in the sequel were due to the influence of the Alicorn Amulet, which basically ramped all her existing character flaws Up To Eleven.
Part of the problem, of course, was that Ponyville simply isn't all that used to professional stage presentations -- it's a small town in a pre-electronic media era. I noticed, for instance, that Twilight Sparkle, who comes from a sophisticated urban background, was far less offended by Trixie than anyone else out of her friends (except for Fluttershy who was Miss Not Appearing In This Episode in "Boast Busters"). Some of the boasting Trixie did was just standard magician's patter, but it was misunderstood by the audience.
Celestia thinks Trixie might have potential, and she really wants Luna to stop sitting around the Palace moping and obsessing over her current loneliness and past sins and other mistakes; and get out there and start helping ponies in trouble, like Luna used to do in the old days. A paralyzingly-depressed Luna may be better for the Realm than a maniacally-rebellious Luna, but a cheerful and active Luna is better still, and -- even more importantly -- far better for Luna herself. She knows that trying to push Luna into action by nagging her would only depress Luna more (and renew Luna's old resentments), so instead she's trying to pull her by presenting opportunities for achievement.
Until of course the end, when there's a crisis which by its nature makes it a good idea to command Luna. As you probably noticed, this works -- Luna is so happy to be called upon in a crisis that she gets a good long way back toward her old self.
This is, of course, the exact same crisis as in "Dragonshy." Celestia simply dispatched Twilight to deal with one of the dragons. Perhaps paradoxically, she felt that the large, older dragon was actually a safer training run for the Mane Six, because the Dragons are well aware of the difference in Celestia's likely response to a mere geographic incursion as opposed to murderous raiding. Young adolescent Dragons might lose their tempers and start killing Ponies anyway; an older and wiser Dragon would be much less likely to get violent. (The one in "Dragonshy" would't have gotten violent if Rainbow Dash hadn't kicked him in the face, and even then it's far from obvious that he was going all-out against them).
Luna, of course, can easily handle herself against a single Dragon of any size, save for one of their Royalty, and even in that case it might be an even fight.
I'm glad you liked my theories about their weapons. I assumed that black powder firearms are well within Equestrian technology (since Equestria is at an overall 19th century tech level and humans first developed firearms in the 14th century) but are disfavored because the Ponies are less accurate shots than Humans, are fleeter of foot than Humans, and tend to fight in looser formations than do Humans. Celestia, having been Sundreamer, is very well aware of the potential lethality of semi- and full-automatic rifled personal firearms, but simply doesn't put a priority on weapons tech -- Equestria is already the local hegemon power, and no likely foe has more advanced guns. Luna, having been Moondreamer (an engineer rather than a theoretical physicist) and also being much more warlike than her sister, took one look at this state of affairs and put "invent better gun actions" on her to-do list!
The Equestrians make more use of artillery than of personal firearms simply because one thing that even primitive cannon are good at is siege warfare. The same can be seen in our history, where the very clumsy and primitive bombards of the 15th century sufficed to bring down the walls of Constantinople. Celestia also is a vast territorial overlord and hence would find artillery useful to reduce fortifications. Notice that the Equestrians seem never to have developed trace italienne forts (low fortifications with sloped-sided brick-and-earth walls): consequently, they are strategically a "gunpowder empire" like the Ottoman or Manchu realms, even though politically they are more a Western-style parliamentary monarchy.
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I've been toying with the idea of dumping Twilight, Discord and Spike (dunno why I like putting the three of them in this kind of context, it just works for me) into an environment with humans, where they don't have their powers (possibly as an extension of Ice, though presumably involving them getting out of Antarctica without human intervention or getting back home through the portal), where the humans do not clue in to the fact that these creatures are sentient because the sounds they make are, as you say, very complex animal sounds. It isn't until Discord picks up one of their guns and starts shooting at them with it (after they've been shooting at the three of the "creatures" for some time) that they catch on that at least one of them is sentient. And the fact that Twilight's a unicorn and Spike's a dragon make it a lot harder for them to catch on to them being sentient, because they are mythical Earth animals (whereas Discord just shot at them with their own weapon, so who the hell cares what he looks like, he's obviously a sentient alien. Albeit a large, predatory, dangerous vicious alien they probably still want to kill. :-))
I actually have a fascination with the concept of sentient creatures being treated as nonsentient, because so much of our empathy as humans seems to be truncated by the ability to put creatures into a "potential food/potential predator" category where we feel justified in doing whatever damn thing we want to them.
I've seen some stories on this site explore that concept, but a lot fewer than you'd think for a series where all the characters are, by Earth standards, animals.
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Did I ever show you my old essay "Of Animals, Aliens and Human Destiny" ...? It's about precisely this issue -- the really horrible way that we treat the higher animals on Earth right now, despite the fact that we now have plenty of evidence that they are sapients like ourselves (if possibly not as smart on the average).
You should read this, and tell me what you think about it. It's five years old now, but I'm even more sure that I'm right on my main points.
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By the way, Alex, I'm almost finished posting the completed story here, so I can tell you that your comment about Trixie was largely responsible for An Extended Performance, in which I tried to show how heroic I think she can be without changing her from the obnoxious, egocentric show-mare we all know and love. Though from her own internal POV, of course, she thinks she's a nicer pony than she comes off being to most other ponies.
Anyway, thank you for inspiring me on that, because An Extended Performance grew into what amounts to an introduction to several other story lines and the Shadow Wars in general.
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Which comment inspired it?
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I never thought Trixie deserved to have her van wrecked, but that comment on your part got me to really thinking about who Trixie was, how being Trixie must feel, what she may have given up in her life to be a nomad, and why she does it.
After that, An Extended Engagement just had to be written. And now it's complete -- I just posted the eighth and final chapter. Hope you like it
*Missing quotation mark
Dragons are weird. How could they see the flawless execution of a centuries-old plan resulting in everything turning out exactly the way Celestia wanted as a sign of weakness? "Sir, we just figured out that the Sun Princess loves her sister." "Aha! Ready the invasion force. Now is the time to strike!"
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They are curious to see whether or not this really is a reconciliation between two strong Princesses, or an act of desperation and folly on the part of two weak Princesses. And it's not really a full-on invasion, as you'll see in the next few chapters (I know how 4 and 5 are going, even though I haven't written them). More of a test, like violating airspace to see how quickly the interceptors come up to escort one out of it.
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A relatively common specific phrase that's closely related is "the iron fist in the velvet glove"--power wielded mostly through subtle diplomacy rather than overt coercion.
and a little daft
Jordan179 i would have done suffered so here