• Published 23rd Mar 2014
  • 5,853 Views, 10 Comments

The Conversion Bureau: Our Finest Hour - King of Baden



Humanity, on its last legs, is offering surrender... or maybe no?

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The Only Chapter

A tall black man, his name Herman Karlson, was on the balcony, looking around him absent-minded.

He saw the huge slums of one of the last human cities on Earth, Axum, situated near the Barrier. He saw the lust forest on the right side of the city, the cultivated lands on the left side, and the wasteland covered by a purple wall in front of him.

He saw what little was left of humanity, since the arrival of the ponies ten years before. Ten years after the first peaceful contact in the waters of the Atlantic Ocean near the Azores, nine years since the first pony community had established itself in Lisboa, eight years since the "Reddi's Potion" was invented as fertilizer for desertified lands... and three years since the ponies, under the banner of Princess Luna, started to conquer humanity's lands.

However, it was no conventional war: the ponies had employed the impenetrable Barrier as defense line, and a modified version of Reddi's potion, called "Conversion Potion" for its ability to turn humans into brainwashed ponies, as main weapon. The countries quickly: some fell as soon as the Barrier arrived, others resisted longer, thanks to the fierce resistance put up by the human population and the already-existing communities of ponies defending their neighbors, but, ultimately, the nations fell.

Now, the only traces of humanity's existence were the abandoned ruins left from the Barrier, and two spots of land, the Free Republic of Milan and the Socialist Republic of Axum. Those two microstates still existing for the militant pony population strenuously defending the inhabitants of Milan and Axum from conversion with fake conversion reports and land concessions. But the helping ponies weren't going to keep their human friends alive forever, and something had to be done.

And so Herman, with Guglielmo D' Este, Milan's head-of-State, drew up a plan... a plan for kill the former Princess Luna and her lackey Twilight Sparkle.

Herman sightseeing was interrupted by an heavily accent voice.
"Obbo, obbo, Queen Luna is at the city's limits!"

Axum's head of state turned around, for see one of his clerks, Menelik Hailu, running towards him with a untied black tie, a unfastened once-white shirt now gray for the sweat, brown work trousers and, for some reasons, barefooted.

Herman, slightly inflating his chest, asked with a determined tone.
"Is everything ready for the plan?"

Panting, Menelik said.
"Yes, obbo Karlson, we have everything set: we have the soldiers in position, I've already instructed the doormen to lock up the door as soon as Luna and her guards come in, and the bomb experts have already rigged the palace, if anything else fails."

Herman put up a smirk.
"Aren't you forgetting something?"

"Gadduu obbo," said the clerk, while he ran back into the building, and quickly returned with an old red box in his hands.

Herman took with his ebanon hands the box, and slowly opened it, revealing a silver-plated revolver.

Then Herman took the gun, and looked at it, seeing engravings. Engravings of men standing atop a pile of dead bodies while holding a symboless tattered banner.

Herman put the revolver in the holster of his belt, and hid it under his red shirt.

Deciding it was the time, Herman silently thanked Menelik, and walked back in the building, moving towards the room where he had set up his ambush, all while the soldiers saluted him with a ready and yet tired voice.

All except one.

A "soldier" of eighteen years of age, barely into adulthood and struggling to keep the rifle high, greeted Herman, and said with a tone of voice that expressed optimism.

"It's a great day for die, but an even better day for be alive and serve you, Sir!"

Herman shook his head, at the boy's phrase and enthusiasm.

"You are not serving me today, boy," said Herman, while walking past him with a smile on his face "today you are serving the whole human race."

The "soldier" was left briefly baffled, before returning to his previous position once again.

Axum's president finally reached the room's door, and opened it, revealing a long cedar table with poplar chairs around it. In the room, the four members of the People's Chamber were already sitting on both sides of the table, and Herman decided to sit at the head of the table.

While the five men were waiting for Queen Luna to arrive, a surreal silence reigned tyrannically. Everybody was tensed up in waiting, and nobody could say anything.

Then, after few minutes, the door at the opposite end of the room opened with a rumble, revealing three fully armoured guards, and the figure of Queen Luna in her regal battle armur, made up by an iron sharp horn cover, a black crown, a big bronze breastplate with a platinum crescent moon in the middle, and spiked kneecaps.

The iron of the horseshoes clanged on the stone floor, as the Queen walked towards the table. The members of the Chamber, some as part of their act and some sincerely, looked fearfully at the blue alicorn, while she sat down.

While the doormen locked the southern entrance doors, the armoured guards took position at the sides of the Queen.

Then the latter started speaking.

"Good morning, Karlson Herman. So, did you finally realized how inferior and pathetic your race is?"

Herman answered with a dry voice.

"No, I have not. If there is something I've learned since the start of this 'Holy War' of yours, is that nobody in your realm wanted it."

Luna leered.

"Nobody? I have entire crowds of ponies that have cheered, at the news that you and your pathetic ally are surrendering to us."

Herman remained collected and calm, trying to drag it.

"You have employed brainwashing, propaganda, and general lies, like our dictators did."

Queen Luna exclaimed.

"I am above your dictators!"

Herman increased his annoyance.

"No, you are not. In fact, you are worse to most of them, because you have killed your sister and your niece, and blamed their deaths on us, so to have Casus Belli against my race!"

The armoured guards gasped in horror at Herman's statement

"That's not true!" Shouted Luna "It was all your fault, all your fault!" Shouted Luna.

"No, it was not. Your sister Celestia was preaching peace and tolerance between your kin and mine, and your niece Cadance had decided to adopt the customs of the peruvians. We were both going towards prosperity, but you had to ruin it all. You had to try to kick us out from our homes, you have tried to exterminate us like parasites, you have turned a tool of healing into an instrument of death, you have killed the ones near you for accomplish your short-sighted goals."

Queen Luna screamed.

"Guards, throw the potion!"

Then an armoured guard fetched a potion with his magic, but another guardtried to yank it out the magical grip of the other one.

Herman took his chance, and standing, he said.

"They say that Ethiopia was humanity's crib..." The door in the northern part of the room were unlocked "But, for you, Queen Luna, it will be your tomb!"

The northen door opened with a loud bang, revealing a group of soldiers with their weapons pointed. The pony guards barely managed to understand what going on, before getting holed up by a volley of bullets.

The corpses fell on the floor and created big pools of blood around the bodies, blood that turned sickly green as soon it came in contact with the spilled potion.

Queen Luna, realizing she was under attack, charged her horn for attack, before getting it blasted off by a shotgun shot in a fountain of blood and bone pieces.

Luna let a bloodcurling scream out, before falling on the floor.

Seeing that the Queen was incapacitated, Herman walked towards her, his gun upholsterer and his body full of pride and proudness.

"Not so superior now, eh?"

Lun was the shell of what was few seconds before, with her horn broken and copiously spilling blood, her breastplate washed up with blood and tears, and her crown immersed in a pool of green liquid.

"I-I am..."

Herman smrked.
"Sorry? It's too late to be sorry," he removed the safety "it is time to leave this world forever, and begin judged by whom you have killed."

Then Herman pressed the trigger, hitting Luna in the middle of her eyes, spreading pink mist on Herman's shoes.

Done that, Axum's head of state spoke up with a solemn voice.

"At last, even if we were beaten, we have inflicted..."

From outside, a loud sound of cracking glass interrupted Herman. Everybody in the room, startled by the sound, ran towards the source of the sound. The doormen unlocked the doors, and pointed at the scene going on in front of them.

The Barrier appeared ot have huge cracks, cracks never seen beforehand. Everybody was surprised by this, and asked between each other what was going on.

Then the purple wall broke up in pieces with a very loud glass crack, followed by a defeaning hiss and a blue light that make Herman and the other members of the staff temporarily blind.

When their visions returned, the Barrier was gone.

"At last, the endgame. We are free to roam on Mother Earth once again." Sighed Herman, while kneeling, a little tear forming in the corner of his right eye. The People's Chamber members followed Herman's reaction.

Meanwhile, in the slums, the human population was overjoyed, and the pony population was relieved.

Future reports revealed that all the newfoals in the world spontaneously turned back to human after an agonizing process where the newfoal would feel something almost growing its stomach and eating him from the inside, until the human that the newfoal was once came out in its best physical situation. Also, the continent of Equestria had disappeared under mighty tidal waves hat washed out the Earth the existence of such place.

The few surviving ponies, forced to live under the rule of humans, peacefully died out a century after these events happened, and, with them, the proof that ponies and humans ever coexisted toghter.

Author's Note:

Hello everybody, this is my first story ever, and I am looking fowards to feedback!

Comments ( 10 )

I think, like most first time writers, you could definitely benefit from a beta reader/pre-reader to smooth this out. The tone is a little dry, and it reads as rushed. That said, all in all, it's a great opening foray into the world of fanfiction and writing! Totally worth the time it took to read. Plus, no one ever talks about the African nations in ConBur fic, even though logically they would be the last men standing as the barrier expands, so I'm really glad to have seen this in action!

Could definitely benefit from a good proofreading/edit run. What's more troubling to me is the choice of plot direction/content, which is not something the TCB group is interested in showcasing. Therefore, I'm removing it from our folders. Should you desire a more in-depth analysis, I can provide one through PM.

This felt like an extended summary of what typically happens in CB stories and your best work was towards the middle. If you want to see more than a few likes, then you will need an original idea. Conversion stories are overused as is and won't get that much attention. So as to prevent everyone overlooking yo shit, you have either start doing crossovers or non-generic cliche-free stories that are well thought out and have coverart that pertains to the content of the story (if you can find any) you can typically find that kind of stuff at sites like Deviantart.
Anyways, for a first story you did an okay job of saying what you wanted to say. Next time you just need a proofreader or someone who you trust to read it. If you can't find anyone then all you have to do is read it out loud to yourself. This may sound fucking retarded but it really works. And don't mumble it like your embarrassed, say it like someones gonna cut your dick off (or tits if you're a girl) like a piece of shit on a boot.
Towards the end it feels like you just ended it because you didn't feel like continuing. I realize that it sucks to write without motivation, the struggle is real, but if you want people to take notice then you're gonna have to put more effort into your writing.
Hope you end up with more than one story, so look at it this way: everyone started somewhere. I realize that sounds gay as fuck but it's as real as I'm gonna get. Have fun with life

Alright, at the risk of sounding like an echo chamber: You do need a proof reader. It's very rough.

And so Herman, with Guglielmo D' Este, Milan's head-of-State, drew up a plan... a plan for kill the former Princess Luna and her lackey Twilight Sparkle.

That was just one line that I caught, among the rest. You also made some funky formatting decisions:

Herman, slightly inflating his chest, asked with a determined tone.
"Is everything ready for the plan?"

Lines of dialogue should be on the same line, if that's not clear, not split between two lines.

You get brownie points for putting Equestria in the middle of Africa, but those brownie points can't buy off all the problems I found with this story, unfortunately.

In summary: A wobbly first step. I strongly recommend putting the pen down, picking up a book/another story on this site, and pay attention to how they do things; formatting, word use. Phallus of Malice's suggestions might be corny, but they're bang on, and he speaks wisdom.

And on a personal note: I recognize this is your first story, but I found the subject matter borderline abhorrent, and the fact that I don't care one iota for "evil ponies" in TCB contributed very negatively to my opinion of this fic. Researching the source material before you jump into a subfandom in future might be something to look into, I think.

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Oh, well, if I can find one, I will try.

Interesting concept with Luna as the leader of the whole operation, the false flag operation she masterminded and the somewhat depressing ending of Ponies going extinct and with them, all traces of Human-Pony cooperation. I see potential.

That said, the prose is extremely rough and stilted in some places. In addition, I found a few spelling errors. A passthrough with an editor would help immensely.

Furthermore, the quality seemed to degrade a bit at the end – like you were trying to rush it. I suggest not rushing the story and letting it come to an end naturally.

And one question, if there were enough Ponies to defend the two nation-states from attack by Equestrinian forces, why couldn't they reproduce naturally?

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And one question, if there were enough Ponies to defend the two nation-states from attack by Equestrinian forces, why couldn't they reproduce naturally?

Because it was legal warfare. Meaning that the ponies formely owned the land, but they asked for not expanding the Barrier there.

Good story and plot this story is very ironic with how it takes place in africa but however the story said to eliminate queen Luna and her lackey twilight twilight is nowhere to be seen

4123507 oh sure we understand. misanthropic scum

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I'm afraid that you missed the question. If there were enough ponies to defend two not so small nations from Equestria, then why did they die out? There should have been enough of them to keep the gene pool diverse enough for them to grow and expand and live side by side with humanity forever.

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