The Egg Thief

by OleGrayMane

Epilogue — The Hour Before Dawn

 
The little dragon rubbed her eyes. She wasn't certain why she was awake. The light in the cavern was dim, and she could not see far, but in the distance, she thought she heard weeping. She tugged on her mother's wing.

“Mama? Mama?” Mother's eyes fluttered open and she looked down at the child.

“Darling, why are you not asleep?” her mother whispered. “Are you hungry?”

The little dragon wasn't hungry. She nodded anyway, for it would be wrong to pass up an opportunity for a delicious gem. Mother selected a deep blue sapphire and handed it to her, and she gnawed away at the rich treat. But an empty stomach wasn't why she awoke. There was something else. The cavern did not feel right. Her eyes adjusted and she peered about.

“Where is Papa?” She spun her head around. “Where are all the daddy dragons?”

“They are standing guard outside. Papa has gone to search for a new home.”

“We have to move again?”

“Yes.” Mother's head rose and her voice turned to a hiss. “Another egg has gone missing.”

The little dragon chewed at the gem as she looked at Mother. Of her first year there were no memories, for she was small and had no words. But she remembered last year. She remembered the pain in Mother's eyes and the chaos of the move. She hated moving. She hated it almost as much as she hated being the only little dragon.

“Will I have someone play with this year, Mama?” Her mother remained silent, staring off into the cavern's depths. “Mama?”

“Not this year, child. The white witch has taken the last egg.”

The little dragon did not understand many things. That was the problem with being small. Life was so confusing with its hiding and moving, and she did not like it. But she understood that the white witch took eggs, and she knew that without eggs she would have no playmates. She hated the cruel witch for taking the eggs. But no one ever told her what became of the eggs or why the witch took them. She stopped eating for a moment and she wondered.

“Will the white witch take me away too?”

Mother looked down and held her tight under her wing.

“Never. Papa and I would not let that happen.”

The little dragon finished her treat and licked her claws clean. A full stomach made her drowsy, and her eyelids drooped. Her mind filled with images of other little dragons, ones that she could chase and who would chase her. She and her friends would learn to fly and shoot flames. They would go on great adventures and find many beautiful and tasty gems.

She yawned. “Will there ever be someone to play with, Mama?”

“One day soon, my child. We shall take back what is ours, and you will have so many playmates you will never remember all their names. Together, you will play games and grow strong and fierce.” Mother watched her drift off. “Dragons will fill the skies once more and we will be feared.”

“But sleep now, for the dawn comes soon.”

Comments

[Tetrominon]

So I was right from the start: there wasn't any actual need for them to be ponies at all.

Oh well. Still a damn good yarn, even with the joke being overexplained at the end.

[Lurks-no-More]

4470112
Well, while it's strictly speaking true that the characters didn't need to be ponies as such... for the story you'd need something like Equestria, or at least this version of it, anyway.

[son_of_heaven176]

Wait, what? That's the end? What happened to Dusty? Was he correct, or was he being paranoid? Did he ever tell his story?

[Ultra-the-HedgeToaster]

7560916 Same here.

---

Wait, what? That's the end?

Huh? What??

This... doesn't make any sense.

At first, Dusty suspects one thing, then it turns out he's wrong. So, when he gets new evidence after a week of psychologically draining work and two sleepless nights that clearly have left him in a rattled state, he immediately jumps to the worst possible conclusion that runs completely contrary to our own understanding of canon-Celestia.

So obviously, he's wrong again, right? I mean, obviously he must be wrong.

The entire time, I was waiting for the other horseshoe to drop.

For some random detail to suddenly make him stop and rethink his conspiracy. Heck, even as late as in the train-car with the mare and her foal I thought the mother/daughter interaction may suddenly have sparked a previously unconsidered thought.

Or for Birdsong to go ahead and read the letter anyway, then catch up to him and provide some alternative perspective on the subject, other than his sleep-deprived panicking mind.

Sure, it'd have been kinda awkward to turn around and go back to his appartment and explain himself to his friends, maybe indeed quit that job and rethink his life, but I fully expected him to come to his senses and then actually figure out the real truth.

This would have been a really good story, the mystery had me completely hooked until the very end - except that there is no ending. Or, if there is, it makes no sense to me. Princess Celestia is evil? Huh? What? Why?

...What???

Even Dusty couldn't really come up with a plausible theory for why Princess Celestia was taking the eggs.

And this was even featured in a FiMfiction review? What?

Did I miss something?

Seriously, was there some extra chapter I missed? A sequel? A prequel? Am I misinterpreting something?

In the early chapters, my initial hypothesis was, that the eggs had some sort of self-replicating spell going on. Princess Celestia was planning to repopulate the species once a sufficient quantity had been reached..

Then we find out she's bringing them there, so they must've come from somewhere. Theory #2: Uh... maybe she's working with the dragons somehow? Maybe most dragons can't hatch their eggs themselves anymore and that's where the "hatch egg in magic entrance exam" came from? Clearly Spike is in that storage room somewhere, that much is obvious.

Okay, the only halfway "plausible" theory I have is that Princess Celestia is driving a hostile dragon-population to extinction, so she can re-start their species with pony-friendly dragons. But that still implies "Princess Celestia is evil", and you can't just drop that on the reader like that. At the very least, there would've needed to be a scene where Celestia explains her reasons.

It's like, as if you read a story that seems perfectly normal, and in the last chapter it's revealed Fluttershy is actually a murderer, the end. You'd also go "wait, hold on, what?", "That can't be right", and "wait, how does it go on? There's no way it can end like that! Why would she do that? Fluttershy wouldn't do that, this makes no sense! ...Was it in self-defense? Maybe it was 'just' a magical construct and not a real pony? Was Fluttershy under the influence of dark magic? Was it even Fluttershy who committed the murder, or a changeling disguised as her? Was the pony she killed a changeling trying to kill her? Poor Fluttershy must've felt horrible afterwards, how did she cope? Does she even remember doing it, or is there some sort of memory-erasure spell involved?" ...And so on and so forth.

In other words, it leaves more questions than it answers.

Heck, I'm sure you can make the "Princess Celestia is evil"-ending work, but then you need to expand upon it. Make Princess Celestia question her own actions. Make it a moral gray area rather than black and white. Make this somehow related to Luna's banishment, clouding Celestia's emotions and judgement. Hay, we only know that the story takes place before Luna's return, but not how long before it. It could be 10 years before, or 500! ...Are the dragons somehow related to bat-ponies?? Is she doing this for Luna for some reason?

All in all, you've got a really good story there... except for the ending. You still get an upvote from me.

[RTStephens]

7560916
7561153
Very good questions, guys, ones in which I'm sure Dusty is wishing he knew the answers to.

Remember this, though. We see all the events through Dusty. He most definitely doesn't have all the information he needs to understand what is going on. But, he feels he needs to take action in some way and chooses this method. Is it the right method? Well, to him, it is.

Now, this does leave the story in a rather open-ended manner. But, I approve of this and it was one of the many reasons why I decided to feature it. Not all stories have to be tied up in a perfect bow. Life often doesn't grant us that luxury.

My challenge to you is to decide if you agree with Dusty's decision. If you don't, that's fine! It opens discussion, something that a story like this warrants.

Perhaps down the line, the author will feel inclined to expand on the story in a sequel. If not, it's left up to your interpretation.

Once again, nice story!

[Thought Prism]

This was great, and I understand perfectly what you're implying with this epilogue. Maybe we'll see a sequel?

[Ultra-the-HedgeToaster]

7603712 ...Please explain it, because I didn't get it.

[Peachy Keen]

A great read! This was, in Rainbow's words, 'unputdownable'!

I can only imagine the fallout that occurred after Dusty spread the word like wildfire, if he was able to, that is. I have to wonder if Celestia wouldn't have already had a story up her sleeve to cover up her acts should they ever comes to light. Which also begs the question, why wouldn't Celestia have stored the eggs somewhere where no one could get in? Did she think it better to 'hide in plain sight'? Maybe she couldn't have a doorless room due to ponies getting suspicious? And maybe she couldn't have magical wards to protect the room due to unicorns being able to sense magical fields.
I'm not sure, but the open ending works. Sometimes it's best to leave readers with more questions than answers. I think making this story longer and providing explanations wouldn't really make this story better in my opinion. This mystery was solved, the reason behind it still unknown. I think that's delightfully ominous. Not all stories need to have everything explained to be great just as they are. Nicely done!

[howard035]

Count me as one of the readers who is a little confused by the ending. I would love to hear more about this story, but what perplexes me in particular is: What about Spike? I was kind of assuming the egg that Stone took would be Spike. But the egg Stone takes is headed out of the country, and the rest of the eggs are locked up in the basement of the castle. Either Stone fails and the eggs remained locked up until all the dragons go extinct (after the show), or Stone succeeds and Celestia is forced to return the eggs to the dragons. The set up of this story makes it almost impossible for any egg to be openly used as an entrance exam test at the Celestia's School.

Maybe this is nitpicking, but I thought this story would be giving an interesting take on a possible origin for Spike's egg, when in fact it feels like it precludes Spike's origin.